Building software is expensive. It doesn’t matter if you build it yourself or you hire someone to build it for you, software will cost you both time and money regardless of the approach you take.
As stewards of our companies, then, it’s our responsibility to ensure that, at the very least, we make a plan for monetizing our products and services.
Mindset during a crisis isn’t about cultivating a sense of peace as we normally understand it. It’s about cultivating a deep sense of focus and purpose and we do that by coming to terms with the reality of our situation and cultivating resiliency to weather the storm.
Building software is expensive. It doesn’t matter if you build it yourself or you hire someone to build it for you, software will cost you both time and money regardless of the approach you take.
As stewards of our companies, then, it’s our responsibility to ensure that, at the very least, we make a plan for monetizing our products and services.
In our previous post, we talked a lot about the example of someone in a car, in a new city, blindfolded.
Starting a new business, for many people, isn’t unlike our poor driver. Sure, you’ve got an idea for a product or service, but, unless you’ve done this before, you’re blind and operating in an unfamiliar environment.
The problem we need to solve right away, then, is how to remove our blindfold. Forget familiarizing yourself with the “city.” Right now we just need to see clearly.
Starting a business is scary, expensive, and difficult. There are so many unknowns. You’re really not unlike a blindfolded driver attempting to navigate a busy city. The task can feel just as impossible.
But don’t despair. The secret to getting started is lowering the pressure you place on yourself and your idea. We want to reduce the “activation energy” so you can take smaller steps that are easier to manage.
Welcome back to The Dispatch!
Today I’m talking with Max Polec. Max is the interim COO at Fledging, a Birmingham-based startup building really cool hardware that helps make life easier for creatives that rely on technology to get their jobs done. Max also runs Abstract Collective, a design, marketing, and strategy firm that helps your brand stand out.
Sometimes things just go wrong.
Sometimes you forget details, even important ones. Sometimes you sleep through your alarm. Sometimes you say the wrong thing to the wrong person.
And sometimes the people and things in your life will just let you down.
All of these things are universal truths that take on a different meaning in the context of running a business.
Today's guest is Lydia Dick. Lydia is the Director of the Commercialization Accelerator at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Lydia spends her days working with university students to help clarify, refine, and, ultimately, commercially their business ideas.
Starting a business is hard and no one I know has had more experience with that process than Lydia. She's worked with and coached hundreds of students on how to take their ideas from start to launch and I'm super proud to have her on the show today.
Today, I’m talking with a good friend of mine and an incredibly talented and kind human being, Dave Masom.
Dave has extensive experience studying and implementing Lean Startup and Agile methodologies to bring new software products to market, so I asked him to come on and give us the lowdown on what these methodologies are and how we can take advantage of them to help bring our own products, services, or even entirely new companies to market.
This is a chewy episode, so buckle up, grab a pen and some paper for notes, and enjoy!
