Just seen this is post 100 for Reconverse! Yey us.
Recently I’ve toyed with the idea of running a “bigger” event in 2013. Our monthly events are great and we’ll continue to lead the way for in boutique networking events in this market, but having lately gone to a few conference style events, my imagination has run away with me. I had this audacious idea to run a huge conference style event, over several days, with world class guest speakers and lots of interactive components and funky social media stuff going on. The HT would trend worldwide, the opening would be like the VMAs and my closing speech would conclude in a blustering “standing O”, as Scorsese, who’s obviously filming the whole event, would pan to one particular lady, with a tear in their eye. OK, maybe that’s over cooking it, but we wanted to do something big.
Then I did the numbers. Hmmmm, maybe not.
It was ego driving that idea because commercially is made no sense at all but I still wanted to do it, and egos kills small businesses. It’s that little part of everyone that wants to be the biggest at anything their passionate about and if you run a small business, there’s usually no one there to stop you from making really stupid decisions. Me attempting to put on that size of an event would have been a really stupid decision and luckily for me, my wife talked me off the ledge. But I see these decisions being made all the time by small businesses, and they’re all made through ego. Just because they’ve given themselves the title of MD, they think “I’m an MD now, no need for me to do anything other than….errrr….MD!” and they go out and hire a sales person, and a finance person etc before they’ve put penny 1 in the bank. Get your hands dirty FFS!
When people talk about VC funding, it makes my skin crawl. Not because I think there’s anything wrong from getting investment, far from it, but it’s the way people band it about, like they’re going to buy eggs from the local Tesco. People talk to me all the time about starting a business themselves and I encourage that, but I hate it when someone with nothing more than a napkin for a business plan, starts to talk about lining up VCs. Maybe I’m from a different era, but for me, you go an get investment once you’ve proven, even on a very small scale, that your idea works and the investment is for scaling. Who would invest in a product to see if it works? Oh yeah, most VCs in the market today. Slap the word social on the side of any old piece of crap and out come the cheque books. ”Thanks Uncle Pete, we’ll be back again for round two, once we’ve blown this lot on bean bags and micro scooters for this massive office we rattle around in.”
Maybe I’m just jealous? Right, I’m off to by a micro scooter to drive around my living room.
I have to disagree there Jamie. If you look around and try to find a common denominator for entrepreneurs, those that have made it truly BIG and who either run or have been running large global corporations. They all have one thing in common being that they in one way or another (can be extrovert, can be introvert) have this one idea, this vision, this goal and this relentless belief in what they wish to achieve, the product they want to produce, the place they want to reach to is sky high, out of the ordinary, unthinkable and a mountain to climb. Then they start, and they put every living minute and anything else they have into it, they are driven by this relentless pursuit and belief and aim for realising their dream. It is what makes big businesses, – it is what makes mad men/fanatics, that wish to impose their view on the world. Many fail and a few succeed, if the product/service is viable, the timing right the market there then with the right people at the helm it should have a a chance of success, – if all the odds are against it, – then it will not fly.
So big dreams are in my view OK, – big dreams/belief and relentless pursuit has made much of the world wha it is today and what it will be tomorrow. It is what we need to survive and to have a place going forward, – it is what we lack and why we are where we are generally speaking.
So do not let your big dreams die, nourish them, let them quietly evolve, – have 10 people let you know if they see it as viable and possible and listen to their advice, and when you have a solid idea, plan and knowledge that timing, market and everything else is right then go to the VC’s and ask for their backing.
We need dreamers, we need to encourage thinking big and to go off on a tangent, – otherwise no Apple, Microsoft, Tata, Facebook, Children in Need or Comic Relief, – all did they come from near nothing, yet driven by a dream/aspirations, all have they in their own right grown to become something substantial.
I think you and the comment left bring good points to light about small business with big dreams. without dreams we would never get to the moon or drive in comfort. My opinion is that most people who start a business don’t really set the goal right.
When I started my business, the goal was to be rich. A porche to drive to my lambourghini. A jet to take me away to my island where the butler was waiting for my dinner order. This was unrealistic but it didn’t stop me dreaming and gearing my company to those goals. I was rich before I could afford to buy the ticket for the bus in my mind.
My goals now are take care of my family and make sure they never want. And with that I found sucess.
No matter the idea, product or service. Remeber why you started your company and be true to that goal. that is where the wealth is.
IMHO
Some nice sound bytes in there but I think you may have both missed my point. When ego starts to drive a business, it fails. That was point one. Point two around VCs had nothing to do with not shooting big or trying to change the world, it was a lot more of a grounded point than that. I, personally, have a lot of conversations with people about them starting companies and the mentality of getting investment before they’ve even got a product is embarrassing. All of the companies the mentioned above, outside of maybe the charities, were ideas that people started, worked on themselves and grew to a level where they could no longer sustain the growth without money on the table. That’s how you do it.
If the post came off like I was critizing people for having big dreams, it was not meant to, it was merely a an observation of my experiences in today’s market.
So if that was your intention Jamie, I fully agree, however apart from the odd VC backed crazy idea (and I wonder if not the FB story may be a ‘wake up call’ that despite world dominance, if you cannot monetise your product/solution it has little value/sustainability) not much passes these days that does not have either a larger than life uniqueness and subsequent chance to make money, or having shown its viability prior to getting funding. In regard to egos I agree, and that is where the true skill comes in as to how to stay true and on a straight and narrow path rather than fall into the traps that kill most businesses and endavours. It is about staying honest, have a level of self critisism and to have and allow people around you to give their opnion and/or having advisors that know what they are talking about and having a voice in your business.