Coffee, Sun & Technology

There am I again on one of favorite topic - differences between Americans and the French, or Europeans in general. This week I had lunch with a successful European entrepreneur, CEO of a €10M/year Internet business. In discussing a few more personal updates, one theme that struck me was this permanent concern, almost obsession, for what could happen if […]. Would we still exist? Would I be able to find another job? Would I be able to survive?

Having been in this country for almost 10 years now, I’m starting to wonder. Do we Americans have too much faith in our economy, ignoring the troubling signs others are more sensitive to? Probably. But at least we’re little happier.

posted from iPhoneSlide.com

I don’t expect anyone to be particularly happy about JP Morgan buying off Bear Stearns for $2 a share - with the Fed supporting the transaction with a $30B loan to JP. But what worries me more than anything is this sort of downward spiral the economy is in right now. Subprime crisis, recession looming on the horizon, and a terribly weak dollar.

This type of economic environment directly affects entrepreneurs, because (a) access to capital (VCs or banks) is harder, and (b) customers generally tighten up their budgets and postpone their technology investments till things get better.

I’ve lived through the 2000-2002 technology recession and learned a few lessons. First, cash is king. Startups with soft business models (like advertising) will feel the pinch, and this is the time to nail that business model before it’s too late. Second, it’s not just about surviving the recession. It’s about leaving the recession with a strong position as a company to start growing fast again. Keep investing in your technology. Keep listening to your customers. Keep believing in what you do.

And last, no matter what, good times will come back. And so will future recessions. That’s just part of the game.

posted from iPhoneSlide.com

Ahhhh… The joys of starting a new venture with little or no capital. I’m in Seattle for a couple of days working with a beta client for Liveclicker. Got here using United miles, booked a car for $25/day, and got a great hotel room for under $60 on www.hotels.com. I’m hoping I can keep it all under $200. Below my orange Ferrari - reminds me of European cars!

posted from iPhoneSlide.com

Here are a few things I’ve learned working on the product management side for software startups for the last few years… Might be useful if you’re running short release cycles (1-2 weeks) with a handful of engineers working with you.

1) Spec early, spec often. Put down on paper your thoughts as soon as you have a clear idea for how a feature or bug fix should be handled. This will help your engineering counterpart know where the product is going, and minimize the surprises. Also do not hesitate to create updated feature descriptions even if the feature is still being developed, instead of waiting for the final release. The cost of correcting a feature once it’s out is generally high.

2) Minimize disruptions. Product managers are often pressured to interrupt engineering for important bug fixes. 99% of the time it’s a for an impatient key customer or a trial client. When this happens, it’s best to schedule the fix for the next release and focus your cycles on making sure you understand what the problem is, and have a plan ready to deliver to engineering when they are done with their upcoming release. This will maximize the team’s productivity and reduce the number of half-baked features or fixes.

3) Don’t brainstorm with engineering. Brainstorm with clients. Your most productive discussions will always involve a client. Clients pay invoices, engineers don’t. I remember countless meetings where we would discuss for hours about a product issue between the four walls of our conference room, when a simple phone call to a client with a pointed questions could have ended hours of speculation.

4) Put your engineers in a position to be creative. Keep the team up to date on customers and try to articulate clearly to your team what their problems are. Engineers are brilliantly creative at solving problems when given a little bit of context.

5) Learn about your competition by talking to your customers. No amount of online market research will beat the quality of the competitive analysis you’ll get from your existing clients. Your competitors are constantly pitching your customers, with phone calls, emails and elevator pitches. Ask your clients - “who should I worry about, and why”. They’ll tell you.

These days I’m running into more and more eMarketing folks with engineering backgrounds. I think this happens for a couple of reasons. First, e-business is about efficiency. Online you can track the effectiveness of your campaigns, promotions, changes in site design. Something you can’t do easily in the offline world. So it’s not too surprising to find people who can crunch numbers taking key roles in companies - even in the Marketing departments. Second, we live in a Google world. Google has become such a powerful force in e-marketing that it was able to push its spread its analytical/math based culture on to their partners and customers. It’s all about results as they say.

Coming from an analytical background, I certainly am happy to see this happening. As long as analytical folks realize they still need to work hand-in-hand with their more creative counterparts, this is a promising evolution.

Here’s a bonus… eBags.com first sketch, dated 1998, from Jon Nordmark and Peter Cobb.