Fizz Day 2 “Entrepreneurship Fundamental Skills”

Iain Verigin

September 2012

Dating Skills For Engineers

• Last year Dr. Waltham suggested I change the title of my talk

•

Entrepreneurship Fundamental Skills

Listen

Help

Communicate

Don’t Be an Asshole

Notice that

these are all

People Skills

Why Are People Skills So Important?

! New Ventures fail from lack of

customers !• Not lack of product

• Translates to– People make the product– People buy the products– People make the decisions– People sign cheques– People

• More info: http://steveblank.com/

Because Work is Emotional

The Startup Curve << http://www.avc.com/a_vc/2012/03/the-startup-curve.html

Johnny Bunko’s 6+ Lessons

1 There is no plan [The economy changes too fast for your career to have a

plan.]

2 Think strengths, not weaknesses [Find your advantages]

3 It’s not about you [Serving others serves you best]

4 Persistence trumps talent [Keep showing up]

5 Make excellent mistakes [Take risks, but fail forward]

6 Leave an imprint [Do something that matters]

7 Stay hungryhttp://www.kk.org/cooltools/archives/002898.phphttp://www.johnnybunko.com/

Entrepreneurship Fundamental Skills

Listen

Help

Communicate

Don’t Be an Asshole

Getting Ideas to Stick

• Let’s Listen to the Introduction

• 5:50min

http://www.madetostick.com/Communicating

Curse Of Knowledge

• “The Curse of Knowledge: when we are given knowledge,

it is impossible to imagine what it's like to LACK that knowledge.” Chip Heath, Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die

Communicating

Key Points• Simple is about Prioritizing.

• Unexpected is about violating schema/ “norms”

• Concrete is about using sensory language

• Credible is about human scale statistics or vivid details

• Emotional - People care about people (not numbers)

• Stories - drive action thru simulation

• SUCCES– Simple – Unexpected – Concrete – Credible – Emotional – Stories

Communicating

“Listening”Notes From Marshall Goldsmith Chapter 9 - Listening

Listening

Listening

• Think Before You Speak• Listen With Respect• Ask Yourself - “Is it Worth It?”• Make The Other Person Feel Important

– The Big Skill - – Do they feel like they’re the only one that matters?

Listening

Tactics• Listen• Don’t Interrupt• Don’t finish the other persons

sentences• Don’t say, “I knew that.”• Don’t even agree with the other

person ( even if he praises you, just say, "Thank you" )

• Don't use the words "no", "but", or "however”

• Don't be distracted.• Don't let your eyes wander, or

attention wander, elsewhere while the other person is talking

• Maintain your end of the dialogue by asking intelligent questions that– (a) show you're paying attention– (b) move the conversation forward– (c) require the other person to talk

( while you listen )

• Eliminate any striving to impress the other person with how smart, or funny, you are. Your only aim is to let the other person feel he, or she, is accomplishing that.

Listening

Paradox:

The more you subsume your desire to shine, the

more you will shine in the other person's eyes

Listening

Helping

Helping

This is Important because

• You’re serving (helping) your market.

• Boss / Employee relationship– You’re serving ( helping ) your boss.– You’re asking your subordinates for help.

Helping & Receiving Help is everywhere

Background

1. All societies are “stratified”(Status matters )

2. All behavior is reciprocal

Helping

One Up & One Down

One “Up-ness” of being asked to help

One “Down-ness” of asking for help

At beginning – helping relationship is “unbalanced”

Helping

Three Roles

1. Expert ( self diagnose and find expert )

2. Doctor ( diagnose & prescribe )

3. Process Consultant (engage in humble inquiry )

Helping

Seven Principles ofEffective Helping

1. Giver & Receiver are both ready

2. Relationship is equitable

3. Helper is in Proper Role

4. Communication is not a choice

• Starts w/ Humble Inquiry

• Receiver owns the problem

• Helper never has all the answers

Helping

This is why …

• You love being asked to help – you don’t ask for help

• Jumping into most powerful role “the doctor” often (always) fails– Why listening is so important (again)

Helping

CustomerCentric Behaviour

Traditional CustomerCentric

Make Presentations Converse “Situationally”

Offer Opinions Ask Relevant Questions

Focus On Relationships Focus On Solution

Gravitate Towards Users Target Business People

Rely on Product Relate Product Usage

Compete to Stay Busy Compete to Win

Close on Sellers Time Frame Close of Buyers Time Frame

Attempt to Sell By • Convincing/Persuading• Handling Objection• Overcoming Resistance

Empower Buyers to• Achieve Goals• Solve Problems• Satisfy Needs

Note How Traditional Techniques are “Not Helping”

The “No Asshole Rule”

• The Quiz– http://electricpulp.com/guykawasaki/arse/

Behaviour

20 Bad Habits

• Here is a list of 20 Bad Habits• It is very useful to be able to describe them• Unfortunately it is very difficult to assess

yourself.

Behaviour

Bad Habit 1-4

• 1. Winning too much: The need to win at all costs and in all situations.

• 2. Adding too much value: The overwhelming desire to add our 2 cents to every discussion.

• 3. Passing judgment: The need to rate others and impose our standards on them.

• 4. Making destructive comments: The needless sarcasm and cutting remarks that we think make us witty.

Behaviour

Bad Habits 5 - 8

• 5. Starting with NO, BUT, HOWEVER: The overuse of these negative qualifiers which secretly say to everyone that I’m right and you’re wrong.

• 6. Telling the world how smart we are: The need to show people we’re smarter than they think we are.

• 7. Speaking when angry: Using emotional volatility as a management tool.

• 8. Negativity, or “Let me explain why that won’t work”: The need to share our negative thoughts even when we weren’t asked.

Behaviour

Bad Habits 9-20• 9. Withholding information: The refusal to share information in order to maintain an advantage over

others.• 10. Failing to give proper recognition: The inability to give praise and reward.• 11. Claiming credit that that we don’t deserve: The most annoying way to overestimate our contribution

to any success.• 12. Making excuses: The need to reposition our annoying behavior as a permanent fixture so people

excuse us for it.• 13. Clinging to the past: The need to deflect blame away from ourselves and onto events and people

from our past; a subset of blaming everyone else.• 14. Playing favorites: Failing to see that we are treating someone unfairly.• 15. Refusing to express regret: The inability to take responsibility for our actions, admit we’re wrong, or

recognize how our actions affect others.• 16. Not listening: The most passive-aggressive form of disrespect for colleagues.• 17. Failing to express gratitude: The most basic form of bad manners.• 18. Punishing the messenger: The misguided need to attack the innocent who are usually only trying to

help us.• 19. Passing the buck: The need to blame everyone but ourselves.• 20. An excessive need to be “me”: Exalting our faults as virtues simply because they’re who we are.

Behaviour

Entrepreneurship Fundamental Skills

Listen

Help

Communicate

Don’t Be an Asshole

Extras

Book Links can be found here

http://hnorth.wordpress.com/entrepreneurship-readings/

The End

Rules to Live By• The company is a no-asshole zone. It requires employees to agree to sign this document• Rules of Engagement

• 1. I will be passionate—about SuccessFactors’ mission, about my work. I will love what we do for companies and employees everywhere.

• 2. I will demonstrate respect for the individual; I will be nice and listen to others, and respect myself. I will act with integrity and professionalism.

• 3. I will do what it takes to get the job done, no matter what it takes, but within legal and ethical boundaries.• 4. I know that this is a company, not a charity. I will not waste money—I will question every cost.• 5. I will present an exhaustive list of solutions to problems—and suggest actionable recommendations.• 6. I will help my colleagues and recognize the team when we win. I will never leave them behind when we lose.• 7. I will constantly improve Kaizen! I will approach every day as an opportunity to do a better job, admitting to and learning from

my mistakes.• 8. I will selflessly pursue customer success.• 9. I will support the culture of meritocracy and pay for performance.• 10. I will focus on results and winning—scoring points, not just gaining yardage.• 11. I will be transparent. I will communicate clearly and be brutally honest, even when it’s difficult, because I trust my

colleagues.• 12. I will always be in sales and drive customer satisfaction.• 13. I will have fun at work and approach my work with enthusiasm.• 14. I will be a good person to work with—I will not be an asshole.

• I agree to live these values. If my colleagues fail to live up to any of these rules, I will speak up and will help them correct; in turn, I will be open to constructive criticism from my colleagues should I fail to live by these values. I understand that my performance will be judged in part by how well I demonstrate these values in my daily work.

• http://blog.guykawasaki.com/2007/02/arse_the_asshho.html

Behaviour

Mindset? What Do You Believe?

1. Your intelligence is something very basic about you that you can’t change very much.

2. You can learn new things, but you can’t really change how intelligent you are.

3. No matter how much intelligence you have, you can always change it quite a bit.

4. You can always substantially change how intelligent you are.

Attitude

- Brains grow like a Muscle

- practice makes it stronger!

- By extension “Groups can grow their intelligence”

Attitude

Let’s Listen To Vinod Khosla

• Persistence• Getting into Stanford MBA School

– He didn’t get in the first time.• Closing Sun’s first Deal

– Did he really sleep in the lobby?

• ~ 7:15• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vinod_Khosla• http://iinnovate.blogspot.com/2007/10/vinod-khosla-co-founder-of-sun.html

Attitude

Where R U Gonna Work?

• Skill set & Intent are radically different

• Think about your past Co-op term experiences

• Think about where you may want to be or what you need to experience.

37

Six Types of Startups

http://steveblank.com/2011/09/01/why-governments-don

%E2%80%99t-get-startups/

38

“Six Different Startup Types”

• Lifestyle• Small Business• Scalable• Buyable• Large Company• Social

39

LifeStyle

• Surf Shop• Dive Shop• Technology Shop

• A lifestyle entrepreneur is living the life they love, works for no one but themselves, while pursuing their personal passion.

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Small Business

• 5.7 M in US• 99.7% of all companies• 50% of all non-governmental workers• Most barely profitable

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Scalable

• Google, Skype, Facebook, Twitter• Founders believe “Gonna Change the

World” . • Their job is to search for a repeatable

and scalable business model.• “4 Steps to Epiphany

is about this” 

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Buyable

• Goal … develop business for acquisition by larger companies

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Large Company

• Build or Acquire?• Big Companies

+ win with incremental innovation- at a disadvantage in new markets

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Social

• Their goal is to make the world a better place

• Non-profit, for-profit, or hybrid.

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6 Startups

• Lifestyle {Work to Live Their Passion}• Small Business {Work to Feed Family}• Scalable {Born to be Big}• Buyable {Born to Flip}• Large Company {Innovate or Evaporate}

• Social – {Driven to Make a Difference}