9 Deadliest Start-up Sins

**Great article we found on Inc.com.**

These common assumptions can be toxic to the success of any new venture.

Editor’s note: This is an excerpt from the recently published book, The Startup Owner’s Manual, written by entrepreneurs-turned-educators Steve Blank and Bob Dorf. Come back each week for more how-tos from this 608-page guide.

Whether your venture is a new pizza parlor or the hottest new software product, beware: These nine flawed assumptions are toxic.

1. Assuming you know what the customer wants

First and deadliest of all is a founder’s unwavering belief that he or she understands who the customers will be, what they need, and how to sell it to them. Any dispassionate observer would recognize that on Day One, a start-up has no customers, and unless the founder is a true domain expert, he or she can only guess about the customer, problem, and business model. On Day One, a start-up is a faith-based initiative built on guesses. 

To succeed, founders need to turn these guesses into facts as soon as possible by getting out of the building, asking customers if the hypotheses are correct, and quickly changing those that are wrong.

2. The “I know what features to build” flaw

The second flawed assumption is implicitly driven by the first. Founders, presuming they know their customers, assume they know all the features customers need.

These founders specify, design, and build a fully featured product using classic product development methods without ever leaving their building. Yet without direct and continuous customer contact, it’s unknown whether the features will hold any appeal to customers.

3. Focusing on the launch date

Traditionally, engineering, sales, and marketing have all focused on the immovable launch date. Marketing tries to pick an “event” (trade show, conference, blog, etc.) where they can “launch” the product. Executives look at that date and the calendar, working backward to ignite fireworks on the day the product is launched. Neither management nor investors tolerate “wrong turns” that result in delays.

**To read the rest of the article from the original source, click here.**

Is education still worth the debt?

**Great article from the Finance section of Yahoo.com.**

As the years tick by, college is becoming increasingly unaffordable. Financial aid information site Finaid.org reports that the average college tuition is rising at nearly three times the rate of inflation. However, the percentage of college costs thatfederal Pell grants cover is diminishing. Lauren Asher, president of Institute for College Access & Success, an Oakland, Calif.-based advocacy group dedicated to increasing college access, says the financial burden of higher education is enough to turn off some students from it entirely. With student loan default rates up and employment opportunities down, is educational debt still worth it?

“There is no question that, on average, a college degree is still a very good investment,” says Asher. “The unemployment rate for young adults who have just a high school diploma is more than twice the unemployment rate for those with a (bachelor’s degree).”

Research shows that in addition to having more job options, bachelor’s degree holders also have significantly higher salaries. A study by Georgetown University’s Center on Education and the Workforce shows that the average worker with a four-year degree earns 84 percent more over his or her lifetime than someone with a high school diploma. That’s a payoff of approximately $1 million.

Asher adds that oftentimes it’s fiscally better to borrow and beeline your way to graduation than it is to minimize debt by juggling full-time work and studies.

“If you wait a while after high school before you go to college, if you drop out of school once you’ve enrolled to work for a while then go back, if you go to school part-time, if you go to a two-year school and you’re qualified for a four-year school and if you work long hours, you’re less likely to get a degree or a certificate. So in some cases, modest federal loan borrowing can really support (degree) completion,” she explains.

**To read the rest of the article from the original source, click here.**

How to Turn Your Worst Employee Into a Top Asset

**Great article we found on Inc.com.**

You can’t save your weakest staffers. But you can use them as an way to upgrade your whole team’s performance.

You’ve heard the adage, “Hire the right people, and everything else is easy.” That may be true, but it’s also unrealistic—especially in start-ups and rapidly growing, innovative businesses. Mistakes are made in hiring; high-potential peope fizzle out, burn out, or check out. Every owner eventually leads a workforce with mixed talent and ability.

And inevitably, one member of the workorce comes in dead last.

In that situation, the temptation is to fix the weak link. Under pressure from other team members who resent the poor performer, you start to squander time and energy in righteous indignation, remediation, and repair. It’s a dispositional world view—if only you could fix this one person, the organization would be better. I once took charge of an organization where a direct report actually told me, “Here we spend 90% of our time on the worst 10% of our performers.” If the worst are taking energy away from the best at your company, there is no way you are performing to capacity, and your leadership will be distracted and ineffectual.

How great leaders handle the problem

So what should you do? Great leaders reframe this issue, and start working on behalf of the team instead of fixing the “eaches”—a more situational world view.

Many years ago I saw this play out on a planning staff run by then-Lieutenant Colonel David Petraeus. It became clear that a few of us were substantially weaker than others. Petraeus had the power to fire and hire, but turnover creates its own set of challenges. Rather than spending his time trying to fix individuals, the future four-star drilled into team development using the weak performance as team indicators, rather than individual failings.

We became better—not in spite of the weakest performers, but because of them. Their performance focused us on organizational vulnerabilities and areas where we could make changes to strengthen our processes. Our team took responsibility for each other’s products, worked together, and all boats rose. We sometimes worked around those who needed help, touching up their work, making sure that the team didn’t fail. We were respectful of people trying their very best but falling a little short, and everyone learned to critique unemotionally. I loved working on that staff, and in just a few months with no personnel changes, we became very, very good.

Why the weak performer is a gift

The primary insight is that poor performance points to conditions in the organization that allow it to occur. What a gift that can be! In the long run, it’s usually more important for you to address those conditions than it is to fret over a single weak employee. Is there a flaw in the hiring process that, if fixed, could improve hiring across the organization? How can on-boarding be improved so that everyone’s potential is maximized? Are the right assessments and metrics in place to help predict problems before they take the organization down? Are other leaders in the right place at the right time? Is there sufficient coaching? Is there sufficient guidance provided so that people make the right decisions? The list goes on.

**To read the rest of the article from the original source, click here.**

The Ten Worst Things to Put on Your Resume

**Great article we found on FINS.com.**

According to a 2010 Accountemps survey, 28% of executives say the resume is where most job seekers make mistakes in the application process. But what exactly constitutes a mistake?

We talked with career coaches and resume writers to find ten gaffes that will guarantee that your resume never makes it past round one.

Related: Explaining Job Gaps in Your Resume | How to Gather References and Make Them Work For You

1. Unnecessary Details About Your Life 

There are a few personal details you should include on a resume: full name and contact information, including email, phone number and address. But beyond that, personal details should be kept to a minimum. If the prospective employer wants to know more than the minimum, they will ask you or figure it out for themselves.

“Your age, race, political affiliation, anything about your family members, and home ownership status should all be left off your resume,” says Ann Baehr, a certified professional resume writer and president of New York-based Best Resumes. “What’s confusing is that [a lot of personal information is] included on international CVs. In the U.S., including [personal data] is a no-no because it leaves the job-seeker open to discrimination.”

The exception to the rule: If you’re looking to work for an organization closely tied to a cause, you may consider including your race, political party, or religious beliefs.

“Personal data may suggest a bias, unless what you want to do next is directly tied to one of those categories, because it shows aligned interest,” says Roy Cohen, a New York City career coach and author of The Wall Street Professional’s Survival Guide. So, unless you’re looking to work for a religious, political, or social organization, you’re better off keeping personal philosophies to yourself.

2. Your Work Responsibilities as a Lifeguard When You Were 16…

“Don’t include information that will not advance you in your work goals,” says Rena Nisonoff, president of The Last Word, a resume-writing and job-coaching company in Boston. “Anything extraneous should be left off your resume.” That includes hobbies and irrelevant jobs you held many years ago.

Unless you’re an undergraduate student or a freshly minted professional, limit your work history to professional experience you’ve had in the past 10 to 15 years (or greater, if it was a C-level position).

3. A Headshot

In some industries, being asked for and including a headshot is commonplace, but unless you’re a model, actor, or Miss America, the general rule of thumb is that photos should be left out.

“To many [hiring managers], including a headshot feels hokey,” says Cohen. It can give off the wrong impression, and isn’t a job-seeking tactic that’s customarily received well.

Furthermore, it’s illegal for employers to discriminate against job candidates based on appearance, so attaching a headshot can put employers in an awkward position, says Nisonoff. Unless it’s specifically requested, and it’s relevant to the job at hand, keep your appearance out of it.

**To read the rest of the article from the original source, click here.**

What Glass Ceiling? Killer Career Advice From Women Who Lead By Example

**Great article we found on FastCompany.com.**

It’s been more than 100 years since 15,000 women marched through the streets of New York City demanding shorter hours, better pay, and voting rights, but how much progress have women really made in the workforce?

First, the tough news: Although women make up 49% of the total workforce, they represent 59% of low-wage workers. That number is down from 63% a decade ago, but research from the Institute for Women’s Policy Research (IWPR) shows that it will take until 2056 for women and men’s earnings to reach pay parity–if the wage gap continues to close at the same pace it has for the last 50 years.

Another sobering statistic is from a study by Grant Thornton International on the status of women in leadership roles at top private companies worldwide. In 2011, only 20% of those at the helm were women–down from 24% the year before. The world’s largest economies–the G7 nations, which include the United States–lag further, with an average of 16% women leaders. In the U.S., only 3.6 percent of of Fortune 500 CEOs are women. And the recession may have brought the glass ceiling down a bit further as companies attempting to reverse the “mancession” hired more men.

Instead of bemoaning the numbers, though, Kathy Cloninger, former CEO of Girl Scouts of the U.S., is calling on all women to raise awareness and push back. As such, Girl Scouts is spearheading a nonprofit-sector celebration of 2012 as the Year of the Girl. “But what we really need is a Decade of the Girl, because we need to take a giant step, and we need more than a year to do it,” declared Cloninger in her book Tough Cookies: Leadership Lessons from 100 Years of the Girl Scouts.

**To read the rest of the article from the original source, click here.**

6 Ways to Make People Believe in You

**Great article we found on Inc.com.**

You’re a start-up and you haven’t done anything yet, so why should anyone believe in you? Classic research suggests how to convince them.

Why should anyone believe in you or your company?  Even if you have a great idea and a fantastic team, why should anyone trust that you’ll build those resources into something great?  In short, how can you convince customers, investors and employees to take a chance on you?

A classic bit of psychological research suggests the answer—or, rather the six answers. The book is Influence: the Psychology of Persuasion, in which renowned psychologist Robert Cialdini identified six key principles of building personal credibility.  They provide a roadmap for entrepreneurs seeking to convince stakeholders they’re the real deal.

Reciprocity

People are more likely to do something if they feel like they’re returning favors or repaying debts.  So, as an entrepreneur, offer small giveaways to potential investors or other stakeholders. Email them an article they’ll find interesting, introduce them to a potential customer or make legitimate suggestions that might help their business.  Over time, many will likely factor reciprocity into the decision to become a customer.

 Consistency

People respect others who honor their commitments.  So, meet your milestones.  Arrive on time. Do what you say you will do, and gently remind people that you always come through.  Deliver on small promises, and you’ll be in a better position when you start asking customers for larger commitments.

Social Proof

Humans look to others for information about the desirability or usefulness of a product. (So please, click the Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter buttons to the right of this column if you think it’s helpful!)  When we wrote our new book, Breakthrough Entrepreneurship, we asked for feedback from a number of respected entrepreneurs, executives and academics.  We then asked them to write brief “blurbs” to endorse the book.  Of course, we now hope potential readers might judge the book as more credible because of these endorsements.

**To read the rest of this article from the original source, click here.**

How AutoCAD Retooled Its Marketing With Facebook

**Great article we found on SocialMediaExaminer this week!**

Chris Hession has been a product and marketing manager for nearly 15 years. But recently, his job completely changed.

“Just in the last year and a half, social media has become not just a component of our product marketing plan, but really the core component,” said Hession, currently senior manager of Autodesk’s AutoCAD product marketing.

“Pretty much for everything we do, we’re looking at, ‘How can we make this work for social?’”

Millions of people worldwide use AutoCAD software to design everything from sunglasses to skyscrapers. If there’s any question that a B2B software company can market effectively with Facebook, look no further than the AutoCAD team.

The firm Nikken Sekkei used AutoCAD to design the Tokyo Sky Tree.

The AutoCAD Facebook page has become a new media channel of sorts, with largely live and on-demand video keeping fans very actively engaged.

Every day the AutoCAD group connects directly with its audience on Facebook, bringing them high-value educational video, tech tips, fun quizzes and reality TV–style segments. At the start of 2011, the company had 120,000 fans. Now it has reached 652,000.

**To read the rest of this article from the original source, click here.**

Managing Multiple Bosses

**Great article from The Harvard Business Review Blog.**

In the movie Office Space — a comedy about work life in a typical 1990s software company — the protagonist, Peter Gibbons, has eight different bosses. All of them, seemingly unaware of each other, pass by his desk and tell him what to do. While the film is most certainly a satire, for some, it is not far from the truth. More and more people report to more than one boss and learning to handle multiple managers is an essential skill in today’s complex organizations.

What the Experts Say
According to Robert Sutton, a professor of management science and engineering at Stanford University and the author of Good Boss, Bad Boss, it is extremely common these days to have more than one boss. “As you to go to a matrixed structure, you can easily have between one and seven immediate supervisors,” he says. Adam Grant, an associate professor at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School and co-author of “The Hidden Advantages of Quiet Bosses,” concurs. “As companies continue to flatten, organize work around specific projects, and use temporary teams to complete projects, many employees find themselves reporting to multiple bosses,” he says. While this is more likely to happen in bigger and more complex organizations, it is just as common in start-ups and family-owned businesses. “In family-owned businesses authority structures are often blurry, and roles frequently overlap. As a result, employees can find themselves reporting to multiple members of the same family,” says Grant. Having many bosses is complicated and as Grant, who has worked for more than one boss at two different points in his career, says, “If you’re not careful, you can end up letting all of them down.” The first step is to know what you are up against. Then you can take several steps to mitigate the risks and make your job, and theirs, easier.

Recognize the challenges
Grant and Sutton agree that there are numerous challenges to working for more than one person. However, there are three main issues that you need to look out for:

1. Overload. With more than one person assigning you work, one of the greatest risks is simply having too much to do. “If you report to multiple bosses who supervise your efforts on different tasks and projects, it’s all too easy for each boss to treat you as if you have no other responsibilities,” says Grant.
2. Conflicting messages. “The more bosses you have the more conflicting messages you get,” says Sutton. He points out that sometimes this happens out of ignorance — your bosses aren’t aware of what the others are saying — or because people are pushing their own agendas. “Different bosses often have different expectations, and what impresses one may disappoint another,” says Grant. “When I led an advertising agency, I had an idea for expanding the agency’s imprint to new media. I brought it to both of my bosses. One loved it. The other hated it,” shares Grant.
3. Loyalty. “Some bosses want to know that they’re your first priority. If you have more than one boss who feels this way, it’s easy to get caught in the middle,” says Grant. Reporting to more than one person often requires you negotiate between competing demands for your loyalty.

You won’t necessarily face all three of these challenges, but knowing the most common ones can help you identify what you’re going through.

Know who your ultimate boss is
While you may have multiple managers you take direction from, most people have one person who is ultimately responsible for their career. When you enter a situation where you work for more than one person, be sure to ask a lot of questions about the reporting structure. Find out who completes your reviews, and who contributes to them. Ask who makes decisions about your compensation, promotions, etc. Sutton says that understanding who holds the most power will aid you in making decisions about how to act. While this may seem mercenary, it’s important to know from the outset who can help and hurt your career.

**To read the rest of the article from the original source, click here.**

Why You Need To Compartmentalize Your Life When Building A Business

Starting a business can be one of the most challenging things that you can take on in your life. While the rewards of owning your own business cannot be matched in the corporate world, the hours worked and rollercoaster ride of highs and lows can often be extreme.

One way to deal with the workload and manage stress is to compartmentalize your life.

When you start a business, you will likely wear many different hats, and in many cases wear all of the hats. You might be in charge of marketing, sales, legal, HR, operations, finance, accounting, IT etc. And you might add on top of all that a personal life of some degree.

When you add up all of the responsibilities from these different areas, you end up with a very heavy workload. Not only can all of this work create a lot of stress, but there can also be stress from the uncertainty that simply comes with owning and building a business.

By compartmentalizing your life, you can try to break down the week into different compartments and then assign your different areas of responsibilities to the different compartments. The key to this working is that you shut down your attention to a particular area to a certain degreewhen it is not time to work in that area and when it is time to focus on that area, you shut down thoughts and attention to all other areas.

Below are some examples of common compartments that can be built. By segmenting the week, we can not only improve focus and effectiveness, we can also stand to greatly decrease stress.

Accounting / Finance

Unfortunately, there are accounting needs that come with starting and owning a business. Whether it is paying bills, paying employees, balancing the books, or dealing with vendors, there is simply accounting and bookkeeping tasks that need to be done each week and month. If we don’t stay on top of these items, not only can it have a negative impact on our business, it can also stand to create a decent amount of stress.

One way to deal with this is to pick a segment of hours during the week where everything else is shut down and attention is solely placed in the area of accounting, bills, payroll, etc.

Sales

In order to truly be successful, sales is something that you will need to do a little of everyday when building a business. But to pick a day (or days) of the week where we focus solely on sales, we can position ourselves for more success in this individual area.

This can be a good tactic when picking up the phone and making some sort of sales calls is a component of our sales strategy. This is something that we can often procrastinate on. But if we block out a compartment for making calls and shut down everything else during that time, we will likely increase the amount of sales activity we are getting in each week.

Marketing

Two powerful marketing tactics for starting a business can be search engine optimization and social media. And effectively executing with either of these tactics can also be extremely time consuming. Setting time aside side specifically for blogging, improving the website, and interacting on social media can help to make sure enough time gets spent in this area.

**To read the rest of the article from the original source, click here.**

What to Do When the Mailman Slows Your Business Down

**Great article from Entrepreneur.com.**

If you thought snail mail was slow before, you haven’t seen anything yet. The revenue-strapped U.S. Postal Service announced yet another way to cut costs: shave the delivery time on first class mail.

Currently, first class mail gets delivered in one to three days within the continental U.S. Yesterday’s announcement that the agency is going forward with its plans to begin eliminating nearly half of its 487 mail processing centers in March would extend delivery times to roughly two to three days, as mail would spend more time traveling between post offices.

To be sure, the move was expected. In September, the USPS announced that it would study the effects of closing more than 250 mail processing centers. While many business owners have given up regular mail delivery in lieu of digital correspondence or online bill paying.

But a number of Americans are still licking envelopes. Patrick Donahoe, the postmaster general, told the New York Times that about 40 percent of people still pay their bills through the mail.

For those business owners who continue to rely on the Postal Service for everything from paying invoices to dispatching holiday cards, slower deliver times could make you more vulnerable to late-payment penalties or even lost sales. Instead, here are three tips for revising your mailing strategies:

1. Don’t wait until the last minute. As credit card companies increasingly look for more ways to fill the gap in their revenues brought on by the passage of last year’s credit card law, late payment fees have already begun to tick up. Some banks now charge $25 to $35 if you’re late paying a bill. To save yourself from being nickel and dimed, sign up for automatic bill pay through your bank, or, when you see that you’re cutting it close, make an online payment right away.
2. Target your efforts. If you have a mailing list, consider cutting it down to save on postage. For instance, sending a mailing to everyone who lives in your shop’s zip code is less effective — and more expensive — than sending an invite to shop or discount offer to your actual customers. You’ll want to cater to your best customers, not everyone in the neighborhood. Also, if you receive returned mail, be sure to cross that person off your list.

**To read the rest of the article from the original source, click here.**