sacha chua living an awesome life

“So, what are you going to do?” That’s always what people ask after I tell them that I’m leaving IBM in order to experiment with entrepreneurship.

“I don’t know yet,” I say. I explain that I haven’t yet experimented with anything that could be seen as competing with IBM, following our Business Conduct Guidelines – and that covers so much ground. I’m leaving without a solid business plan or a proven opportunity, just itch and curiosity and the sneaky suspicion that there’s probably at least one business that I can build considering how others have succeeded.

The first thing I’m going to do after I leave is to create a structure for experimenting. Despite the associated costs and paperwork, incorporation makes sense to me. Limiting the downside – building that part of the safety net – makes it easier to experiment.

How can I go about testing possible business ideas? There are some conventional things I’d like to try.

Writing: I love reading and writing. If I can combine that with drawing and design, maybe I can create engaging e-books that will help people save time and be inspired. People have earned money from information products, so this has worked for other people before. Some have even succeeded without sleazy marketing tactics and without preying on people’s greed, which is encouraging! =)

I can test this by researching topics I’m interested in, writing blog posts and chapters, and eventually building up to e-books for things that people might buy. I’ll be writing notes anyway, so I may as well invest time into making them more usable for others.

Coaching: I’ve gotten so much value from writing, presenting, and experimenting with life. People find these things intimidating. Maybe I can help build scaffolds so that people can gradually try things out, succeed, and then gain enough confidence to do things on their own. (And I can write about what we learn along the way!)

Self-tracking: I like the results I’ve been getting from tracking my life, and I’m curious about building and tailoring tools for other people’s lives. Can I turn that into a recurring source of income? We’ll see.

Sales and customer relationship management for development: Quite a few developers have told me that they don’t particularly enjoy this part of freelancing, and it’s one of the parts I’m actually the most curious about. Maybe I can get started by helping my friends take better care of their clients and leads, and then see if the arrangement works out well.

Community analysis tools: Considering the success of the Lotus Connections toolkit within IBM, it might be interesting to make it more available to other companies. Right now, some of the functionality is available externally in a plugin for Lotus Notes, but things are still difficult to adopt. If I write a new implementation from scratch and I build the tool based only on externally-accessible information, that might be okay. It’s been quite a useful service within IBM, and it would be great to share it with more companies.

Testing ideas: How meta is that? If I’m going to be testing lots of business ideas and possibly working with other people to help them test their business ideas, then it would be great to gradually build processes and infrastructure for doing so.

Freelance consulting and development: I want to focus on the other initiatives first before I get into freelancing. I’m reasonably confident that I can figure out freelancing (especially with a little help from my friends). The kinds of work I’m considering (consulting, web development, technical writing, data migration) are similar to my work at IBM, so there’s less uncertainty to resolve. Custom work often means fewer opportunities to build compounding value, and I’d like to see if I can build a business that can scale up beyond my time.

I’m looking for things in the sweet spot: the intersection between what people need, what I’m good at, and what I love to do. If you’ve been reading my blog for a while, you’ve probably picked up a good sense of what I’m interested in and how I might help you (and lots of people like you!). Is this list missing something that would help you even rock more?

One of the key points of “Effortless entrepreneur” is that you need to create systems and delegate work so that you can free up time to improve your business.

p38. Work on the business from the outside, not in it. A great
entrepreneur builds systems to run the business as if it were a
machine, and stands over it instead of being part of its inner
workings. A business owner should sell that machine to clients and
perfect its functionality, but not sit in the gear room. How many
times have you seen a local store owner answering phones, doing
paperwork, and assisting customers all at once? This business owner
works IN the business, not ON it, and hasn’t identified the different
positions within his business, such as receptionist, salesperson, and
cashier. Instead, he does all those jobs himself.

Creating manuals and training maps for each position from the get-go
forces you to evaluate what needs to be done and helps identify tasks
you might not think of right away. That can mean fewer unpleasant
surprises down the road. At first, you’ll likely have to work IN your
business and do most, if not all, of the work for each position.
That’s common when you start out. But create a system that allows you
to just work ON it as soon as possible. Once that system is operative,
a business gains its true value.

Work on your business, not just in it. It makes sense, although lots of small-business owners find it hard to make that jump.

How can people practice this now? After all, even if you work for a company, you work for yourself, too.

It’s kinda like what Trent (The Simple Dollar) writes about in “Who is your real boss? Some perspectives on career success”:

My belief is this: the people that succeed are the people who invest that energy and time and patience and thought a little differently.
What do I mean?

• Option A: Let’s say you go to work each day and leave it all on the
  table. When you leave work, you’re so drained you can barely make it
  home. You sit on the couch, vegetate for a while, eat dinner,
  vegetate a bit more, then hit the sack. Or perhaps you’re a parent
  and you leave work with just enough energy to get through your
  parental requirements in the evening.

• Option B: On the other hand, let’s say you go to work and
  intentionally keep half of your energy for yourself. You give the
  company 50% of the gas in your tank. After you leave, you spend that
  50% improving yourself. You go to night classes. You go to the gym.
  You go to the library. You go to meetings of professional growth
  groups, like Toastmasters.

Well, maybe not 50%. If you can do your work with 80% effort, and then invest the rest into building skills and processes, then it’s like a savvy entrepreneur investing time into building systems, not just fighting fires. Sometimes it’s more like a full-energy work and 20% extra, but I enjoy the work and the learning along the way.

At work, I’m learning about the way we work on projects: the processes, the templates, the questions and conversations. I like making systems, processes, and tools, so I’m learning how to improve things.

I’m working on applying this idea of “working on the business, not just in it” in personal life as well. Hence the household optimizations: batch cooking and a chest freezer, tweaked routines, relationship-building. Capacity-building for future adventures.

I’m looking forward to do even better. At work, I want to to learn more about Drupal 7, consulting, and the processes we have. I’m also looking forward to writing up more notes and coaching others. In the rest of life, I’d like to experiment with delegating again, invest time into becoming a better writer, and continue building wonderful relationships.

How about you? How can you not only work in your business, but on it?

Effortless entrepreneur: Work smart, play hard, make millions
2010 Nick Friedman and Omar Soliman
Three Rivers Press
ISBN 978-0-307-58799-2

Book: Effortless entrepreneur 2011-01-10 Mon 19:27

SCHEDULED: 2010-09-17 Fri 08:00

One of my role models is leaving IBM to explore the world of entrepreneurship. Jamie Alexander has a lot of development experience. He built a number of sites, including PassItAlong, an internal social learning system we use at IBM. He’d be the first to admit he needs help with the business side, though, and he’s looking forward to learning more about marketing and adoption. He’s applying to the Digital Media Zone incubator at Ryerson University, and will check out the local technology events.

What advice could help a new tech/web entrepreneur get started? Here are a few tips I picked up by osmosis from the Toronto technology scene. What do I know about it? I haven’t started a company yet. But this is what I’ve heard from lots of conversations and books, and it might be useful. I’m hoping people will pitch in with other ideas.

Learn from companies that have done it. There are a number of interesting local companies that you can learn from, like Idee, Freshbooks and LearnHub. How did they do it? How did they identify and go after their market? How did they bootstrap? Did they need investment, or did they self-fund their growth? What challenges did they encounter and how did they deal with them? There are lots of events that feature companies in different stages of evolution. Go to them and ask questions. Read blogs and news articles online, too. But don’t get too focused on how people have done things before – the world is always changing, and there’s no sure-fire recipe for success.

Connect with mentors and the community. There are a number of tech events for startups. Go. Meet people. Learn from others. Connect with potential mentors, investors, and partners. There are plenty of online networks, too. Don’t get stuck in the new media echo chamber – you’ll still need to actually make a product or service, and you still need to go out there and build or discover your audience – but connect with people who can share what they’ve learned. I just did a quick search for Toronto startup events and found http://toronto.startupweekend.org (Sept 24-26, 2010 at Ryerson). There’s always something going on.

Make it easy to keep in touch. “Do I have to use Twitter?” Jamie asked. If you’re starting a Toronto web startup, yes. It makes it easier for people to talk about you and your sites. Create a Twitter account and a blog, and use that to make it easy for people to find out more about you, interact with you, and refer to you. Reach out and connect with people. Share what you’re learning. Make it part of the way you work. You need that network. Why limit it to just the people you can regularly e-mail or have coffee with?

Collaborate. You don’t have to do everything yourself. Find people with complementary skills and who believe in your vision.

This is easier said than done. Where can you find business people if you’re a tech person? Startup events are one way to do it – you’ll find people of varying experience. Look for people who have succeeded before. Ask your mentors for referrals. Look for people who have failed before but know what they’re going to do differently next time. If you’re partnering with someone who’s also new to this, factor that into your planning, then hustle as much as you can. Don’t let an artificial tech/business division isolate you. You need to know your customers. You need to know the business side as well as the tech side.

Here’s a tip from entrepreneurs who have learned the hard way: get things in writing. You might be great friends now, but get your partnership on paper, and make sure you can live with the exit clauses. Sure, you probably won’t waste your time suing people, but it’s good to be clear about expectations and contingency plans.

Ship. Make something. Sell it to somebody. Seth Godin has lots of great insights on the value of shipping on his blog and in his recent book, “Linchpin.” Make something happen.

What else can help a new Toronto tech entrepreneur?

See also:

• My notes from Sarah Prevette’s talk on Sprouter
• DemoCamp
• Canada Business

I love reading. Love love love love.

Here are a few more books:

Fight For Your Money: How to Stop Getting Ripped Off and Save a Fortune David Bach, 2009 Decent reference, useful form letters. Nothing too surprising in terms of advice. I like this more than his other books, which tend to hammer in the Latte Factor a bit much. Good to give to people who are just starting out in Canada.

The Illusions of Entrepreneurship: The Costly Myths That Entrepreneurs, Investors, and Policy Makers Live By Scott A. Shane, 2008 Surprising data-driven insights into entrepreneurship. Depressing in some places (such as when he’s looking at the statistics for women and entrepreneurship), and encouraging in others (such as when it comes to capitalizing new businesses). Something to read in a library.

How are these Friday book reviews working out for you? How can I make them better?

Funny aside: When Jay Goldman handed Gary Vaynerchuk a bottle of water, Gary offered it for sale. Little things like that reinforce story.

Key take-aways: Passion and patience are everything. Hustle. Out-care others. Offer good stuff. Pay attention to everything. How do you scale? By trying.

Notes from the demos and the pub, before I broke my fountain pen:

Explanations for scribbles upon request, or when I can make time for it! =)

We headed out for taco salads and soup at the Easy Restaurant on King Street after our last class of improv comedy. My three classmates and the teacher were all deeply into the Toronto improv and sketch comedy scene. I was the lone non-comedian, and I got a fascinating glimpse into that world.

They talked about the awkwardness of telling non-comedians about your interests. When the conversation turns to what people do, they feel that people who are outside the comedy scene just don’t get it, saying: “Oh, you’re a comedian? Tell me a joke.” One of my classmates said that this was probably why practically all her friends are also in the comedy scene. I wonder if they also have problems with the echo chamber effect that we see online, when people end up talking only to people like them.

They talked about the challenges facing the Toronto comedy scene. There are lots of stand-up rooms in Toronto where people can practise their material, but attendance is hit-or-miss. If you liked a specific comedian, it was hard to find out when and where they’d perform next. Shows were better publicized, but individuals were hard to track. I asked them if it was a matter of marketing. To me, it seemed obvious: if you were starting out as a stand-up comedian or an improv comedy performer, why not make it easier for people to find out when you’d be performing next, and share your adventures along the way?

They reacted strongly against the idea of self-promotion. To them, the idea of an amateur having business cards, a website, or a Facebook fanpage smacked of pretentiousness. It was okay if you’d done a number of well-received shows, or had some kind of national profile. If you were just starting out, you needed to know your place.

I found that really interesting because we run into the same social norms against self-promotion in different business cultures, and it can get in the way of connecting.

I think people do want to keep an eye out for teams and people they like. Facebook’s use of “Fan” might turn people off, so they’d need a more neutral space that can keep track of teams, individuals, shows, and locations. It would be a natural fit for Facebook integration, calendar exports, RSS feeds, and mailing lists. You could probably build the whole thing using out-of-the-box Drupal and the Content Creation Kit. Data entry would have to be done manually for a while (listings from Now Toronto and from the major venues?), but it might eventually grow into something that people can update on their own.

I don’t see people paying to use a service like this, but it might be supported by advertising (and perhaps a share of ticket sales, if you have an e-commerce system tied into venues’ ticketing).

In terms of marketing, you’d probably approach venues that don’t have event lists, as well as teams and individuals. Teams and individuals would be your primary channel for marketing. You could also offer a badge for venues, teams, and individuals in order to advertise upcoming shows, and pre-designed flyers (like what Meetup now does), and provide webpages for people who don’t have their personal sites set up yet. Posters near established comedy venues would be good, too, and hand-outs given to people in line. Business cards might be interesting too.

A business idea for someone who’s really interested in the comedy scene, perhaps! =)

Last night’s Toronto Girl Geek Dinner with Sarah Prevette, the founder ofSprouter, was a great braindump of entrepreneurship and networking tips.

Sarah told us stories about her failures and what she’d learned along the way, particularly the importance of talking to potential users and reaching out to the community. Her tips for engaging with the community were:

• Amazingness. Provide value. Don’t focus exclusively on What’s In It For Me. Be worth talking about. The best way to achieve success is to enable someone else’s.
• Accessibility. Respond in a timely manner. Don’t ignore reactions, whether positive or negative. The worst thing you can do when people criticize you is to ignore it. Be open. Share the facts.
• Authenticity. Provide as much information as you can. Be real, be transparent, be honest, and be yourself. Be patient when answering questions. Privacy really is dead, so get used to it.

Here are other tips she shared:

• Release early, release often. Don’t worry about making things perfect. Worry about making people care. Just push things out. If they hate it, they’ll tell you why they hate it. If they love it, great. It’s indifference that sucks.
• Be entrenched in the community. Talk to people. Listen. Do your homework. Do the legwork.
• Twitter is a great backchannel that can add a lot of value to conferences and conversations. If you’re not on Twitter yet, you should at least read it when you go to a conference, and follow what interesting people are saying. Otherwise, you’ll miss out on half the conversation.
• Twitter helps connect with the community. Twitter accounts for far more of their site visits than either Google or direct traffic.
• Make sure you activate your network. Collecting business cards is not networking. Adding people to LinkedIn is not networking. Act onyour network. Find ways to reconnect and be relevant. Meaningfully reach out. She mentioned a new habit she’s working on: revitalizing her network by stacking up business cards in front of her, randomly picking five people, and consciously looking for ways to reach out and help that person succeed.
• Entrepreneurship is stressful but fun. The last year has been the most stressful and the most fun for her.

Here are some notes from the Q&A:

• What’s your business model? Ad-supported freemium.
• Aside from the aforementioned stack of business cards, how do you keep track of your contacts? New startups like CloudContacts, NetworkHippo are interesting. (Sacha’s note: Gist is another social aggregator, too. It’s pretty darn awesome.)
• How do you scale accessibility? Hopes that as usage scales, revenue scales, too.
• Who built your site? Internally developed. One rockstar doing Ruby, a total team size of three. Shout-out to Jet Cooper team for the design.
• What tips would you give new entrepreneurs?
  1. Do it. If you have a fabulous idea, do it. Talking about it at dinner parties is not doing it. Researching is not doing it. Do it.
  2. Solicit feedback. Get feedback not only from people who’ll be nice to you, but people who’ll tell it like it is. Talk to your potential users. Push beyond the fluffy responses. Ask for specifics.
  3. Find a way to grow organically, or find the money to do it. Don’t worry too much about equity. Don’t be afraid of investors. Don’t do things in isolation.
• What key trends are you seeing? Mobile applications, geolocation, better filters. Also general trends like green.
• What was your biggest obstacle? Not engaging the network enough. Either that, or ego. No, network. You have no idea who’s going to be the key person in your network, so just connect with people.
• How do you know where to go for funding? Again, network. Ask startups who’ve been funded by investors; they’ll have insights. Techvibes.com lists startups.
• How does the amount of sleep you get compare to when you were a teenager? Used to be a big sleeper as a teenager. Now is usually thrown off by jet lag, etc.

Toronto Girl Geek Dinners is giving away one free pass for people who would like to attend the Mesh Marketing event. Tweet @s_moore with the answer to the question of why it would be awesome for a girl geek to go to the event, and the most creative answer will get a free pass. More details about that and upcoming events at .