Business & The Complex System

A few weeks back I read a great post from Hiten Shah on mentoring. In it he calls out that 99% of mentors are doing it wrong. At first it got me thinking about how I go about mentoring. At Amplify I’m in a position to do this on a regular basis for the first [...]

#4 of the 10 part series on Docstoc and it’s about running lean. When it comes to getting far on a little, most of it is common sense. But when you’re in the thick of things, you need to be deliberate about it. Remember, it’s not just you building things, it’s your team. The key [...]

Yesterday my wife and I took our twins (who will be 3 next month) to Disneyland for the first time. It was wonderful and fascinating to watch them experience all that is Disney for the very first time. I could probably write a short essay on that alone, but for this post I want to [...]

I’ve heard about a thousand variations of this statement which is used to explain the business model for way to many companies. Personally, I don’t believe in it. The idea is that if you build a localized mobile application or some verticalized (new word I’m using by the way) content play, you’ll be able to [...]

It’s been way too long since I was in the thick of things at a very early stage startup. I’d forgotten how many things there are to do, fundamental things and strategic things. It’s like there are a million little Lego pieces strewn about the ground and it’s my job to pick them up, one [...]

#3 of the 10 part series on Docstoc and it’s about motivating some of the most important people in your company, engineers. It starts with the environment; they’ve got to love it there. Then pile on challenging and though provoking projects and your own the right track. Here are 4 things I like to do. [...]

This is the first video from my 10 part series on Docstoc. I like the style of the videos they produce, they’re short and to the point with good nuggets; not just mine, all of them, and there are hundreds from other smarter guys than me. That said, the stuff in my videos is pretty [...]

What’s more important, great engineering or insane product management? Well, seeing as I’m not an engineer for shit (although I think I might have been in a past life), I’ll say the passionate product guy. I don’t think this has been the common thinking for some time, at least as long as I can remember. [...]

In my experience, and particularly these days, when it comes to building a technology or product company, things tend to go in phases. The first phase is the product building phase. This is where you actually build something that works, hopefully. This phase also includes some really good thinking about what problem your solving, how [...]

In my experience it’s the exact opposite. Sure, there are those that have a passion for money, but for most people, like me, passion is about things we just love to do; and we don’t always see dollar signs when we think of doing it. But there is a lot of evidence to support that [...]