Looks like we’re headed to Internet Summit 2009. Here’s the story:
A few weeks back, I started listening to This Week in Startups in my free time at work and while I’m driving from DC to Raleigh and back. It’s a great podcast and the guests are usually serial entrepreneurs that have a passion for starting up companies. Also, the host is on his third company (I think), and is usually very straightforward with people that call in or email questions. One guy recently called in to ask about conferences and their crazy cost that is usually too much for students or anyone on a shoestring budget. This particularly caught my attention because Steve and I wanted to attend IS 2009 but really couldn’t afford the $245/person registration cost. The advice to the caller was simple – volunteers are always in high demand at these events and coordinators often may exchange registration for you volunteering to help with various things leading up to and during the actual event.
I shot off an email, got a response back in a few hours. Done and done. Moral of the story? Just ask for a break and offer a little in return, you might be surprised with what you find. Thanks to Jason at Southern Capitol for hooking us up with the right guy.
As I sit in Dunkin Donuts reading CEO blogs and “the long tail theory” I’m trying to figure out how I can refocus my time thinking about a startup venture. Until now, It’s been nothing but going through raw options of “what service can I offer” – this has not been fruitful for the past four weeks. I’m starting to believe that this path may not lead me to the pot of gold, and that a major shift in thought process may be necessary to bring this “think tank time” to fruition. To illustrate where I feel I need to be heading, let me tell of a story that offers great analogy to life and learning.
One day, while rock climbing, the person in charge of making sure I didn’t splat against the ground was talking me through a particularly tough face of the wall. He had been up it many times and was overall a more experienced climber than myself. I was new and was particularly stuck at a certain junction – trying incessantly to make the “jump” and grab a prayer of a ledge to keep up the wall. Just in passing, he mentioned to me the following – “hey dude, head sideways, can’t always think about heading straight up the whole time”. I followed suit, and completed the climb relatively easy after a tiny sideways scoot.
All poetic sap aside, the concept of positioning frequently comes up in my infant entrepreneurial efforts, and it seems that repositioning my thought process is going to be necessary to ideate in the proper direction. Time to start thinking sideways. Better yet, time to figure out how to think sideways in the first place. I’m taking anyone’s two cents for thoughts in this area, and your whole bank account is certainly welcome.