• Search

• Recently Written

  • Economy or Agony?
  • Darnit! Basecamp did it again!
  • Document Templates for Entrepreneurs
  • Evans Codeworks is Hiring!
  • The easy way to learn .NET
  • Cornell entrepreneurship on MySpace
  • Speed up Rails apps with RPM
  • Inbound marketing
  • Excellent screencasts available on .NET MVC
  • Entrepreneurship videos from Stanford

• Categories

  • .NET
  • Cornell
  • Entrepreneurship
  • Evans Codeworks
  • Fitness
  • Fun
  • Online marketing
  • Productivity
  • Programming
  • Puzzles
  • Ruby on Rails
  • Software Performance Tuning
  • Uncategorized
  • Web Development

• Archives

  • September 2008
  • August 2008
  • July 2008
  • June 2008
  • May 2008
  • December 2007
  • November 2007
  • October 2007
  • September 2007
  • August 2007

He who will not economize will have to agonize.

Confucius

I’ve always struggled with this. It’s all too easy to justify an expense with an idealistic mindset which imagines possibilities beyond every immediate opportunity. Starting a business though is a very, very good learning experience. There just isn’t enough money to spend on anything and everything that seems as though it might help get you to the next level.

I’ve found two devices which help keep me on the thrifty side of things.

#1. Stay Focused

Pick a few goals and spend what you need to make measurable progress toward achieving those goals. It might be purchasing a book, it might be taking a course, it might be a bottle of wine to help you unwind and relax. But every time you take out your wallet ask yourself whether you really need to make that purchase right then and there. If you can put it off, do so. You’ll either come back and spend the money later, or realize that you didn’t really need it.

#2. Look at the price tag and imagine that you just found that much money on the ground.

Which makes you feel better? The thought of finding the money on the ground or the thought of having whatever it is you’re about to spend money on? If the thought of having the money makes you feel better then put your wallet away. By making that simple choice you essentially did just find that money. Enjoy it.

I found a great collection of document templates for entrepreneurs and small business owners. These templates are a great starting point for anyone interested in developing and growing their business by writing a business plan, creating financial forecasts etc.

Cornell entrepreneurs are everywhere!

Here’s a link to the Cornell Entrepreneurship group on MySpace.

A wealth of information from successful entrepreneurs is available on the Stanford website. Highly recommended viewing.

Here’s a great post to read for anyone who’s interested in technology entrepreneurship.

It’s titled “Postmortem”. And it’s all about the the lessons learned from the experience of trying to get GameClay off the ground.

It’s probably counter-intuitive to many people, but failure is one of the things I really like to see on the resume of an entrepreneur. Nothing educates like failure.

Anyone who’s got the drive and tenacity to stick with a startup long enough to call it a failure doesn’t like to fail. They’re driven to succeed.

Failing is one thing. Failing, dusting yourself off, getting back out there an doing it again is something that only entrepreneurs who have what it takes to succeed will do. Someone who’s failed over and over again and continued to get back out there with a new idea is someone with a lot to teach about what not to do.

So, despite the end of GameClay, the experience of starting it clearly taught a lot to it’s founders. And that article is a great digest of some of the main lessons they learned.

Just a good reminder. Every good idea needs a champion.

Here are 100 reasons why.