A whole new world

"Wow, I didn't even know this world existed." A phrase that captures the feeling of astonishment and awe I get when discovering a whole new set of ideas / ways of thinking / networks of people etc. It's in those moments that my world-view grows very quickly, practically jumps - in business terminology it's the difference between organic growth and acquisition.

I love that feeling and it has hit me time and time again, each time with a different scope and magnitude. I can vividly remember when first discovering the world of tech entrepreneurship in NYC - I attended my first NY Techmeetup after a friend suggested it might be interesting. To my amazement I found over 400 people milling around: entrepreneurs, investors, programming wiz-kids and curious consumers. There were presentations and discussions about new ventures and radical ideas - some of them things I had been discussing among friends but never in such volume. All I could think was "wow, I didn't even know this world existed." It was as if I pulled up some ordinary rock to discover not just an ant or two, but an entire colony.

Seeking out and being open to these kinds of discoveries allows them to happen more frequently (and often when least expecting it). In search of a place to print new business cards, I discovered this post at Creativebits which rounds up some of the most creative designs. My world of business cards and general creative design ideas suddenly made a new acquisition.

Improving public transportation's reliabilty

I ride a WMATA bus every morning to commute to work - and every morning I get to work at a different time. There are posted bus signs at each bus stop but they can hardly keep their schedule because of the unpredictability of traffic (there are no dedicated bus lanes in DC) as well as the unpredictability of the bus driver.

This means that whenever I'm out in a different part of the city, I won't wait to catch a bus. The unpredictability just isn't worth it especially considering there's a chance the bus might not come at all. Although the bus maps at each bus stop tell me where the bus is going, I have no idea if the bus is actually going to come or how long it will take as the posted schedule is meaningless. So I'll pay a premium to just hop in a cab.

I suspect I'm not the only one who has this problem. And each time this happens WMATA loses revenue. Because the incremental cost of an additional person on that bus is essentially $0, that's lost profits.

Interestingly there are people who have the information I need to let me know a bus is coming - it's the people riding that bus and the bus driver himself. If I could just call/text/e-mail/(or look them up on Google latitudes) , they could easily let me know how far away they are, run that through an algorithm, and bam I know in how much time that bus is coming.

Such a system could easily be automated to avoid annoying my friends.
First there are (at least) two ways to gather the data:

1. Simply install a GPS in each bus with wireless to communicate the bus's position to a central server (essentially the I-phone w/ Google Latitudes)
2. Plug in a bare bones cell phone into the machine which announces the stop name (these busses have a machine that announces stop names, which is activated by the bus driver by pressing a button). The cell phone would simply text the main database with a code for each stop.
   

With the information gathered, the main database can then run the positions along with current traffic reports and it's own algorithms (which can be based on the data collected). Potential customers, like us, can then simply text/ call/e-mail etc into an automated service with our stop number or cross street and receive the estimated wait time. You could even provide an estimated time of arrival.

The data collection itself would also provide WMATA with important metrics which they could use it to track bottle-necks in real time as well as the driver's ability to keep to the schedule.

This kind of small investment = better data = better service = more $

Learning fom private equity

Building on yesterday's post, I've picked out some of the key lessons learned while working for a small Private Equity shop over the past year. Like with the previous post, I'm focusing more on the context of work as opposed to the content; as Seth Godin points out in one of his post (I can't find it yet, but it's in there), content can always be Googled, learning "the how" is the key. I'll flesh out many of these items in later posts so for now I'll keep this in a list format:

General

• Project confidence
• Manage expectations. Always.
• Measure twice, cut once
• Seek to understand reality as it is, not what you want it to be
• Always learn from others and then immediately teach what you've learned (this helps others as well as helps yourself - when you teach is when you begin to really understand)

Presentations

• Get to the point immediately, then provide the details
• Always have an agenda/ specific goal for any meeting, call, etc
• Prepare and speak to the world view of the recipient (boss, client, etc.)

Analysis

• Find the key levers of a business. "In this business you win by...[enter short phrase]"
• Systematically layout the assumptions of any problem then work to find the answers to those assumptions
• Someone in the world knows the information - you just need to find them
• After completing your analysis, take a step back and find the questions you would ask someone if they asked you to review the analysis. Then answer them

Organization

• Leave the desk and desktop clear every night with only tomorrow's to-do list
• Complete a self-assessment every month: listing out what I've learned, and what I need to learn next
• When in need of a productivity boost - work in tabata sprints (30 min increments of extreme focus with 5 minute breaks)
• Stay on top of the calendar

Lessons from our start-up venture

After running our start-up for about a year, the two other founders and I sat down and listed everything we learned. As we drilled down the list we uncovered some real gems that have continued to serve me well. I think about them often and I believe that the action of sitting down and writing them out has kept them in the forefront of my memory.

Some of my favorites from the original list include:

• “Fail Faster and More Often” – Tristan Louis.
• Have fun. Play Foosball. Build Camaraderie.
• Net-weave, don’t network. When you meet someone new, always think: “how can I help this person.”
• Don’t be arrogant – do the due diligence on the industry and the space.
• Trust your team to make decisions. Delegate.
• Set regular meetings for various levels of conversation. Vision, Strategy, Operations, etc.
• Keep operational meetings short and with a strict agenda. Use a timer.
• Keep vision meetings relaxed and open ended.
• Eat breakfast as a team: and keep a schedule.
• Sell water in the desert.

Interactive world

Using the internet and wireless technology to connect with (i.e. collect data and/or remotely control) everyday objects is nothing new. But increasingly, the technology formerly used in major supply chains is reaching small businesses and consumers. The convergence of several factors have made this primordial soup not just ready, but already brewing up life.

The right conditions:

• An increasing foundation of flexible applications (Google maps, etc)
• Cheap contract manufacturing
• Deep market penetration of various key electronic components (cameras, GPS, motion sensors, batteries, wireless communication, lcd screens)
  

And the first signs of life:

• A keyword linked to a website to track lost/traveling items (i.e. sendmehome)
• A motion recorder device to measure physical activity/sleep quality (i.e. FitBit)
• Personal RFID or 2-D barcodes (i.e. TouchTag)
  

Just think what you could do if you could collect information out of everyday objects and then tell them to do something given that data. This already has and potentially could touch a variety of markets w/ various applications:

• Fitness (nutrition and exercise tracking)
  
• Household utility usage (and controls)
  
• Payment systems (consumer-consumer)
  
• Medication disbursement
• others..

Hat tip to TechCrunch for the heads up on sendmehome and thanks to fatknowledge and Andrew Jackson for pointing out fitbit.