​De-rusting - 3rd month

​This too shall pass...
Been a labor of love getting this book out, "Your Authored State". As it turned out, coming up with the idea, concept, and putting the quotes together weren't the difficult part. It was everything else after; finding the right material for the cover, getting rhe material imported to Vietnam, dealing with printer who was quite obstinate in how the layout should be done, and finding an outfit to put the entire book together.
This exercise of getting the book out serves as needed reminders of what to expect as I build out my startup. It's not important that I spent more than a year crafting the idea and concept, it's not important that I've identified the audience/users, and it's not important that I have a working prototype to demonstrate the use case.
What's really important now is the forward journeys of getting the product to market, that it's beyond just usable, it has to serve a need, the panadol, rather than satisfy a craving. And then to think about how it should grow along with the users.
Not gonna lie, I did think about stopping this book project. After all, it's really not that critical, and maybe I should focus more on the startup. I'm glad I didn't and persevered on to get the book out. In dealing with some unforeseen requests to change, I was able to make some changes that I believe will make it a lot more useful. So here's to making lemonade from getting lemons.
As I collected the final sample, the first page I flipped to, randomly, was this shown here. Serendipity? Perhaps. Had to smile, coz this quote lend a totally new meaning for me, and going back to basic, this book is what it's all about; authoring your life's journey.
Thank you to those friends that have pre-ordered, who showed tremendous patience and understanding for the unwanted delay, and the continued support.
I'm stoked to finally see the print sample and it's all systems go.

De-rusting - week 7/8

Had a great week in hcmc, as I continued meeting smarter people than I am. I am lucky to have such great souls I can reach out to and unselfishly share their knowledge and domain expertise with me.
Answering the questions
I love how they'd ask me probing questions that made me think hard on the answers. While I'm glad I was able to provide some reasonable answers, I'm even more glad that I couldn't on some of the questions. This made me not just think about them but also required me to look into these unanswered questions. Importantly, let them know later to these answers.
In general, as you tell others your idea, you’ll get some silly questions.
!https://images.unsplash.com/photo-1484452330304-377cdeb05340?ixlib=rb-4.0.3&q=85&fm=jpg&crop=entropy&cs=srgb
It’s important to maintain your composure and try to answer as objectively as possible and avoid becoming defensive. These people could potentially be your customers and you can never predict how they perceive what you’re trying to do. The more NOs you can unravel, the better it is for you.
Mental wellness
This may be somewhat long, so please bear with me.
Building your own shit isn’t a walk in the park. I’ve met founders who burnt out, lost interest in what they were doing, and even giving up. Certainly, we’ve also come across even more articles about founders falling deep into the abyss of mental illness.
Let’s be clear about this. Founding a company is done on our own free will. It isn’t forced upon us. Let’s accept the fact that founders are a privilege lot, to be able to choose your own destiny. And other people give you money, too, to realize your destiny. At that point, mentally we are well, until we are not. Like in general health, we are healthy and then somehow we let things slip, and before we know it, we become ill.
How not to let ourselves slip?

1. Pace yourself
   Rome wasn't built in a day. Neither will your success. So chill the eff out. Learn to build momentum and keep to a steady cadence of growth. I know, everything needs to be done by yesterday. So how do you prioritize your work? Strive for good enough, and not perfection. Move on to the next priority, good enough, move, repeat. I'm not advocating sloppiness. I'm saying, perfection takes time, not in one sitting. Focus on the quality and not quantity.
2. Time blocking
   How do you pace? Some would call it ‘time blocking’. In anything you're doing, allocate a time slot, as if you're in a meeting. Finish that task or work within that time frame. If you can't finish, reschedule. If it's not life or death, it can always be rescheduled. When you have a limited time slot, you tend to be more focused in the task you doing, as compared to when you have an open-ended slot.
3. Space
   ​Many of us do one form of exercise or another. Could be running or going to the gym. Block out a time slot as well, and treat it like it's an appointment that you need to go; an appointment with yourself, or me-time. Give yourself that space. Use it however you like; answering non-work emails, text your friends, or just sit there doing nothing. When you consciously do nothing, it's still doing something. Too zen for you? 🤣
   Or read a chapter of a book while sipping tea. The point is, by giving yourself space, you allow your mental muscle to relax and de-flex instead of constantly tightening.

The above are just some of the things I do, hopefully to avoid the dreaded mental breakdown, or to the breaking point. As I’ve said above, we founders choose our paths. We should be happy doing what we set out to do. However, we get to the breaking point because of expectations, expectations from outside sources, like VCs. Startups raise on hope, the potential of reaching that potential as prescribed when we raise. And we raised, so we need to deliver, and then we fall short. And we get into the cycle of downward spiral.
From the point of near-nirvana to the pit, countless things happen and most of that can be prevented. For virgin founders, this may sound ludicrous. But for founders who have failed, this hits quite close to home.
For me at the moment, I’ll just pay attention to all the stories I’ve heard, learn well the lessons of failure of others, try to emulate the habits of successful ones, and focus on building a sound business on solid foundation. I may not build a unicorn, and that’s ok, coz I‘m too old to believe in fairy tale, anyways.

​De-rusting - week 5

We're officially into the 2nd half of 2024. The first 6 months did zip pass although I can still vividly remember the first 6 months of this year, suffice to say, I won't forget, ever.
One of the reasons I believe this to be is that I started writing a lot more than usual, with veiled references to all that happened.
Since I posted most of my writings on social media, I'm also getting many comments and feedback, some public and some direct messages. I'd be remiss if I didn't at least think about them.
🧢 One of the comments to a post about ideating on my startup, a friend mentioned that I should wear the 'hat' of a mentor as if I was listening to someone else. I have to admit, it's both a brilliant suggestion and yet an extremely difficult thing to do. Nonetheless, I tried and it did help a lot as it took my mind off of my startup being about the product (common problem), but rather, about how my purported users were going to perceive it. Sometimes, it does help getting perspectives from non-tech people.
👨🏻‍💻 Another comment was about posting less and working more. It did give me pause and a little bit of reflection. In the end, I decided that I'd continue writing and posting, when necessary, not because the advice was wrong but it's because those moments of reflection made me find the actual meaning of why I'm doing this. Ultimately, those that care about you will offer unbridled opinions and the least you can do is to give it a good think. So why have I decided to continue writing and posting?
1️⃣ Mostly, it's committing to those thoughts and putting it out there, with upsides of getting great feedback, and maybe a couple of chuckles, and also to share my learnings with fellow entrepreneurs.
2️⃣ At a more personal level, it's to leave my words and thoughts for my kid to read, that perhaps she'll gain some insights into her old man's mind. I wished my dad had written more but it wasn't what his generation was used to.
3️⃣ I like that social media pops up reminders of posts and allowing me to see what I posted age well, or not.
🦦For everyone else, do know that your comments and feedback are well appreciated. When you have people around you that can make you laugh, you're blessed. I know I am.
Doing a startup is a lot like being a sculptor. You first lob off big chunks to get the intended size and shape, akin to your forming the fundamental hypothesis of your idea. Then you begin the work of chipping away at the intended design of your sculpture. This is where you put together the pieces as you execute on the idea, bringing to fruition. At this stage, nothing is scalable.
Finally, the design that you have in mind reveals itself. This is when your idea is validated, with real users finding your solution extremely helpful, enough to pay for it. But it's still a rather rough and unpolished design, both the sculpture and your product.
As the sculptor starts using other tools to refine the sculpture, it's not dissimilar to you starting to hire more smart people. So now you have people who want to buy your sculpture, much like more users coming on board.
What next? Well, it's not exactly one-off, so you start looking to manufacture your sculpture, similar to how you now begin to automate and improve your product's unit economics.
You start pushing to better branded stores and malls (either you go see them or they come to you) coz why not? After all, you do have a great design to start off with. As you would be scaling to more users who now are willing to pay, some you get through marketing, but mostly, you want to acquire them organically.
Once you're here, the rest hopefully becomes history.
No wonder people say startup founders are creative people. But they don't even know half of it; like how difficult it is to sculpt.

You know the saying, 'even a broken down clock tells the time correctly, twice a day'? It's the same with the England team at the Euro 2024. They weren't all bad, at least now I know if I have trouble falling asleep, I'll rewatch the game.
What other good that come out of watching England play?

• I have no issue scrolling social media. These days, lots of ads popped up, and many of these on teaching others how to use Chat-GPT, or any of the AI tools available. No doubt, it's the hottest thing to happen in the tech world. I'm just wondering, when the main products are available less than 3 years, yet we have self-professed gurus selling courses that promise 10x productivity, on using a product that's still iterating on its own. With all the money going into AI, it's likely the fastest to get commoditized. Granted, probably most of these are affiliate selling but how will these courses age? Not very well, perhaps. This is why watching the England games is good; it allows your mind to wander, with a lot more creativity than the game itself.
• Invariably, my mind turned to my startup. Every time I mentioned that I'm doing a startup, I'm asked if I'm the CEO. I cringed. Which is strange for me, coz, what am I executing chiefly? Am I even managing anything? Over the last dozen years, I've come across countless new startups, most with less than 3 team members, and they'd all be titled as CxO. Maybe I'm being too pedantic, but I feel that you shouldn't be saddled with a title that's a CxO, if you have less than 20 members in your team. I believe calling yourself a founder suffices. You are expected to found, not manage. There's no one there for you to manage other than continually iterating and founding, and discovery. In my conversations with many young founders with CEO title, they possess this complex that it's a step-down if they were to move to another position. Psychologically, it limits your potential. Everyone in the founding team should experiment and experience various roles. Be flexible, be self-challenging, be a janitor as well. This is why watching the England game is good; I'm allowed to freely wander my mind, without missing out on any action, unless a goal is scored, which is far and few in between, over 90 minutes.
• Back to Euro 2024. So far, the Spaniards are playing the best football. Free flowing, skillful, and highly entertaining. It's reminiscent of days of old, where you see passion on the field, and not Oscar-worthy performance when you get brought down. Alright, maybe not Oscar-worthy since Neymar is not playing but you get the drift. I know the simpler days of football will not return. It's money game these days. Seeing the fans on the stand, I wonder if the players share the same fervor, whether it's a win or loss. Maybe they do, I don't know, but I doubt it. This is why watching England play is good; I can be philosophical, in line with aging, where I lament on the loss of the good old days of football.

Ps: it's Sunday, just taking the mickey out of how bad the Euro 2024 has been, as well as sharing some quirky random thoughts.

Have a great week ahead…🤣 🤣 🤣

De-rusting - Week 4
​The momentum for my startup is gaining speed. Have since spoken to numerous people that have gone round the blocks a few times. You know who you are, and greatly appreciate your insights.

Invariably, the subject often discussed is about building a highly effective team. Getting your A-team is paramount, as proclaimed by many successful founders. But how do they get their A-team? It's fine and we'll if your financial war chest is brimming but what if it's as dry as the Gobi? What about those young first-time founders who lack the financial and network firepowers?

I believe the A-team construct starts with you, the founder; how you plan to constructively build your team. Founders need to recognize that the initial A-team is only temporary, since as your company grows, you'll need to revisit the team composition.

What's important is that the initial members need to understand that their positions/responsibilities are not etched in stone; they have to evolve, and sometimes making room for new inclusion of team members, and a willingness to move to other positions.

Ultimately, at any given stage of your growth, your team is comprised of A-level personnel, and what make them "A-lister talents" is the ability and willingness to evolve.

This is important from a company culture standpoint. Fundamentally, people follow you because they know there's a future for them at your organization.

As a culture, it start with the founder. I am also replaceable at some point. Better include a succession plan too.

What else did I miss?
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#hiring #talents #evolve #culture #lead