Steve Jobs - VP, New Product Development

Thirty+ year old business card of Steve Jobs, as Apple Vice President of New Product Development.

via obamapacman.com

Nice. I wasn't even born, yet.

# Posted via email from opportunity__cost

How bad MBAs for your startup?

Despite of the common belief that MBAs are typically bad for the startup, I want to disagree with this statement.  And to support my point, lets dig into the grounds of the issue.  

Entrepreneurs (typically, without MBA, so let me call them non-MBAs :) are coming to form the company, ready to fight for the vision, to lead the passion.  At some point there is a need for somebody educate to come onboard.  And when MBAs are coming in, entrepreneurs are often making a huge mistake: blinded by the name of b-school and degree, they forget to test candidate to share the same vision and passion.  

More than that, some entrepreneurs I know, don't think they need a passionate MBA.  Instead, they want a super smart and knowledgable person, to use the best of his knowledge to apply to their problem.  They don't even understand why passion is needed for these brutal business men, who are born (or made) leaders.  

But the startup is built by those who came to lead, not leaders.  MBAs may apply the best of their knowledge, but this wouldn't help to win the market, if they are non guided by passion and belief.  Yes, they'd definitely get some portion of it, but never the hearts of mass market, what you are really for.  

Disagree?  Try Start with Why http://www.amazon.com/dp/1591842808/?tag=iwhite-20 by Simon Sinek first.  And than lets talk.

# Posted via email from opportunity__cost

Don't let you site slow down

via natishalom.typepad.com

Nice post on relation between the slowness of your site and page rank (and many business metrics, actually).

# Posted via web from opportunity__cost

HBR March 2010

Started my day with reading thru the March HBR. (Do you start your day like this?)

1. Nice research on page 30 concluding that getting cash makes you feel less pain or being socially excluded. (Yes, that's who we are.)  There is definitely a possible application of cash to many places to improve them, and it's interesting to see how it was put together.
2. One more nice article on page 38 on bankers' practices and the incentives, that, unfortunately, are not long term oriented.
3. On page 66 you can find great review of ways to get from the recession and typical strategies used.  This doesn't apply directly to the small businesses though, but more in general way, mostly because of operating costs and actual budgets range.

And, generally speaking, I liked this month's issue.  Good mix of articles worth reading.

# Posted via email from opportunity__cost

Эфир с Женей Чичваркиным

Каждую неделю, по пятницам, Русская Служба Новостей приглашает в эфир Евгения Чичваркина.  Это конечно не "серия откровенний от бизнесмена в ссылке", но послушать не помешает. 

# Posted via email from opportunity__cost

Business and passions

During many years I developed many passions. And I also tried many (and, sometimes, very different) ideas. Some of them [ideas] worked well and some of them don't.

Passions allowed me to acquire some skills. Trying out ideas gave me priceless experience.

Roughly, the business is about skills and experience.

I'm a tech person. I started into tech by reading books at the age of 10 or so. We couldn't afford a personal computer, but I compensated it with the theory. The tech became my life now (in very wide meaning). The forms of it can change, but never the meaning.

I like numbers. I'm not good with them, but I like them. The numbers are all around and the more comfortable you're with them, the most advantages you'll get in life.

I like interaction with user (through UX and UI). I find it very challenging to approach different problems and come up with solutions that people love. (Sometimes, it really works out.)

I like both business markets and consumers. And I believe that good consumer-based market always has an application for business. So I prefer consumers.

Whatever I'm busy with, I am always aware about generalism. Generalism is dangerous. It can even be suicidal, especially when you don't know what risks are you taking when approaching general markets.

And to crown it all, let me tell you this. Experience matters. Passions matter. Intellect matters. But this is not enough. We've got to be honest with ourselves about one true desire for entrepreneurship. It could be either making a fortune, going out public or building serial companies. And this is what will be driving us through the life.

As for me, my true desire is to be the part of the big thing and my real passion is building things.

Blomus

I haven't blogged anything for a while: it wasn't right time or right mood for that. A lot of things happening, however, not sure this is a good place to talk about them. The most of them are pretty personal.

Well, speaking about other things, I received my Blomus business card case today. I found it originally at Amazon, but end up ordering at other place. I wasn't very sure did I make the right choice, as it didn't look attractive enough on the Web. But I liked it European roots though.

It arrived today. It was a long story as well - the Fedex driver turned around while me watching at him, got back to his car and marked that he couldn't deliver the package. I called the Fedex, received the standard "Sorry", but was advised to wait for it until tomorrow. When I insisted that I want more then "Sorry", I've got connected with the local Fedex guy who finally instructed the driver to come back. No appologizes from the side of driver, except, "Didn't I call you and you never picked up the phone? Oh, maybe I called the other guy."

Anyway, now it's here. I paid for it barely $20 with shipping and handling costs included. I didn't expected too much, but the fancy design. But I was wrong. First of all, it was nice boxed.


When I opened it, it was looking great, well done and actually much thinner that it feels to be on the photo.



The Blomus logo has got a perfect placement as well. Very small, but very nice.


It opens and closes perfectly. And it fits about 12 pretty thick business cards.


Well, it might take more, but I'd better not do it. You can also check out my photoset at Flickr. This Blomus business card case worked out to be the best one I saw anywhere so far. It feels so solid and so nice that you want to have it with you all the time. ;)

My curiosity is killing me as I really want to see (and try) how the other one from Blomus looks like. You can find it at Amazon as well. I had many doubts about which one to choose. I don't have any concerns now, but I still pretty interested about the other one. ;)

So that's for now, still waiting a few more surprises to arrive, so I'll keep you updated.

Успехи

Позавчера Atomkeep заключил первую (дебютную ;) партнерскую сделку с небольшой нишевой компанией занимающейся подбором персонала. Как показала практика, о нас говорят больше чем пишут.

Обо всем об этом будет официальная новость в блоге Atomkeep и, со временем, на самом сайте. Ждите новостей. :)

P.S. Новый релиз на носу. Вы просили - мы сделали.

Business the AOL way

I've recently finished reading (err, listening) the books Business the AOL way by David Stauffer.

Only a few words about it: too old, too bothering, more a time waste than something valuable, unless you'd like to know more about AOL history. And even for history reasons, you should better dig the Internet - much more information in a better and more objective form.

I didn't like at all. Sorry about wasted time.