Recently I ate Lunch with Nick Spiller, the President and Co-Founder of uThinkTank, the official community for student startups at The University of Texas. Nick is Co-Chair of the UT Entrepreneurship Week, and is also working with the Longhorn Startup Camp. We met when I spoke last year at RISE [...] Read more »
Risk means losing your balance
“To dare is to lose one’s footing momentarily. To not dare is to lose one’s self.” Soren Kierkegaard, the Danish Existential Philosopher and Theologian said that. I love Keirkegaard’s work because he explores our emotion and choice when we as people face big life decisions. “Facing a big life decision” [...] Read more »
Don’t Make New Years Resolutions
New years resolutions simply don’t work. Don’t waste your time making them. Spend your time worrying about something else instead. Think about it. When was the last time you were confident about making a resolution at new years and then sticking to it? When folks talk about their new [...] Read more »
The 87 things you learn after 9 months at your first startup
You have to show up every day. The endless days where nothing works have their own arithmetic that adds up to breakthroughs of genius. The sun will come. Everybody works for free at first. Free doesn’t really mean “free” though. Free means that you’re an investor. If you’re the entrepreneur, [...] Read more »
Entrepreneurial Marketing and Blogging Angst (A Response)
This is a post from the Tech Ranch Austin blog, and a response to Tech Ranch Partner Cristi Jakubic’s blogging post about why not to blog. When Cristi Jakubic writes something, everyone around the Ranch pays attention. This goes double for me. Few others have the experience she does in [...] Read more »
Business Plan vs. Business Strategy
Conquer your enemies. Use your own agility to make your opponent move even slower. The faster you can make decisions and take action, the more deadly you will be when facing your opponent. There is a business book making the rounds at the Tech Ranch that, similar to the last paragraph, [...] Read more »
TED Talks Austin: Dan Pink on Motivation
TED was here over the weekend. And he brought with him some really interesting news on what motivates us in the workplace. Author Dan Pink, who has said many things that I like, including the statement that Right-Brainers will take over the world (GO TEAM), gave an inciting talk about [...] Read more »
Almost as Scary as No Bacon:
Here is a question that I’m posing to the greater entrepreneurial community, inspired by my new favorite blogger, Ramit Sethi of IWillTechYouToBeRich.com. What is the scariest risk to your business idea? I think there are two basic answers to this question. And I am convinced that I know how far [...] Read more »
Two Jobs in a Down Economy
One of the more challenging things about graduating college in 2009 was finding a job in a down economy. Our economy’s outlook was so severe that even George Martin, St. Edward’s University President, spent most of his graduation address on some hard facts about the reality we faced once we [...] Read more »
BarnBuilders at Tech Ranch Austin
The way that I am currently working to architect connections in Austin right now is through a program at the Tech Ranch called BarnBuildr. We are targeting the substantial amount of folks that are highly trained in the various Technology companies, like Dell and IBM, that helped make Austin a [...] Read more »