“I’m Golden, baby!!”

Ahh… to be “golden” – what a great feeling!  For those of you don’t understand the context, being “golden” is when you can do no wrong.  Be it in your career or in your personal life – you basically have reached living bliss!  Everything you touch – turns to gold!  People love you!  They want to be around you!  It just doesn’t get any better!

All of us, at some point, have enjoyed being golden at some point.  Note the past tense?   That’s right – being golden isn’t, for many of us, a constant.  It’s a state that we enter and exit at different points in time.  Remember when Michael Phelps set all those world records for swimming?  No – what you remember is his being in the news for possession of marijuana!  Sorry Michael – not golden!  Or how about Tiger Woods and the fact the he’s probably the greatest golfer ever?  You get the point.

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My Thoughts on Taking “Vacations”

You put in the long hours at the office and after a period of time, you have earned enough hours to go on vacation!

In fact, given today’s naturally stressful work environment, vacations are important to help get recharged so you can continue to push forward and climb the corporate ladder.

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We Bid Farewell to an Icon

To you, Mr, Jobs – we salute you.  You have been an inspiration to us all.

“Your time is limited so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma—which is living with the result of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. Stay hungry, stay foolish.”

Sustainable Competitive Advantange

Recently, I was attending a session at UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business, where I am a class mentor, and we were talking about new venture opportunities. Specially, after you have gone through the screening process of identifying your next venture, you have to identify your sustainable competitive advantage and how that will map to your grand strategy.

Unfortunately, what I find is that many (inexperienced) entrepreneurs’ don’t place enough emphasis on this – partially because they believe, given what they are doing, it may not be that important and, in many cases, don’t really comprehend what a competitive advantage really is and what it can do for a company.

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The “3B” Rule

The next time you are pitching your idea to someone, remember the 3 B’s…

Be Brief!

Be Brilliant!

Be Gone!



To your continued success…

Why Do Good People Fire Good Companies?

This is a question that I have given thought to repeatedly over the years. You have good, hard working people who join a good company and, over time, the relationship between the two changes. That doesn’t necessarily imply things are bad, but just different. The result, unfortunately in many cases, is that the real loss is felt by the company losing the talent and not by the individual losing the company because that prominent individual is very capable to securing a new position elsewhere.

This is clearly evident by the lack of good talent available in the market today and why, in many cases, there are bidding wars on the limited talent pool. If you are in Silicon Valley – I’d like to see you find a great software programmer – go on… find one that is just sitting idle waiting for your call!

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The Value of Facetime!

FacetimeCommunication, in itself, is a form of expression… communication between two people – well, that is an art!  I think people tend to underestimate how important effective communication is, regardless of the topic, in ensuring understanding between all those involved.

At times, speaking to people can be challenging for a myriad of reasons. Layer on a topic sensitive in nature or frame the conversation around a tense situation, and suddenly your intent of that straightforward talk doesn’t play out as you originally thought.

So, what’s the best way to have this “type” conversation?

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Know Thy Customer!

Of the many, many, many questions entrepreneurs must ask themselves, one of the most critical is “Who is my customer?”  Without understanding who your customer is, you cannot begin to perform other important tasks such as market research, building a value chain, conducting user experience studies, buyer behavior analysis, cost of acquisition information, etc.  Heck – if you haven’t determined who your customer really is – why are you even getting into business?

So…who is your customer?

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The Formula for Power

power = f(dependance)

Power is a function of dependence.

The more someone depends on you, the more power you have over them.

With great power comes great responsibility.

The Law of “The Process”

I was introduced to the “Law of the Process” by John Maxwell – respected management and leadership guru through his book (which I highly recommend for anyone interested in this subject matter), the 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership.  Of the many valuable lessons contained within the book, one of the most important in my opinion is, in fact, the Law of the Process.

With reference to the book, it places the law strictly in the context of leadership.  However, to extrapolate the meaning behind the law – you’ll understand that it’s widely applicable to many facets of life.

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