The Startup Journey

I was recently a guest at the Insead "India Business Dialogue" event at Bangalore. The event aimed to provide Insead grads - who are naturally mostly employed at large corporations - on starting up, attracting venture capital and, if the entrepreneurial plunge is too much of a risky leap, getting hired by a startup. If the grads thought getting hired by a startup sounded safer, they had anothing think coming. The last session (on joining a startup) had one representative each from a VC firm, a HR Services firm and a veteran entrepreneur. And here's a sample of what they had to say about startup hiring techniques: The Entrepreneur: One of my friends makes sure to pour coffee on the candidate and takes a call based on how the candidate reacts. The HR Person: We offer to send a cab for picking up the candidate. And we generally don't bother to. We - and out clients - like to see whether the candidate turns up late and cribs about the taxi or figures out an alter...

Richard Branson column in Mint Once your company is well established, keeping your employees engaged in their work can be tough, especially those who took the job because they were intrigued by the excitement and the challenges presented by the launch stage. Most of your best people will always be interested in developing their skills further, but they may find fewer new projects available, along with fewer paths to advancement. Working with employees to find solutions will be the job of every manager on your team. ... One day you might be a member of a team that is working on the launch of a new mobile phone network in Latin America or the Middle East, and the next week you could find yourself helping to develop one of our Branson centers for young entrepreneurs. I like to encourage all our employees to apply for jobs at other Virgin companies that they find interesting. ...Another way we keep our employees engaged is by inviting them to take part in company events...

Second time I'm coming across this "being watched issue" this week. From Srikrishna's post (emphasis mine): What most of us don’t realize is that we are actively, even if blindly building culture in our companies every waking moment. The trouble is when we do this without being mindful or engaged, we usually end up building a culture that we are surprised about as it invariably bites us in the rear. Starting from the moment you step into the office, people see if you greet the security guard, whether you get your own cup of tea or put it away when done. Whether you text in meetings or worse yet when you answer the phone during a 1:1 meeting. Even if you answered yes, yes, yes and no & no, they see what you do or say when a senior team member flames another, or a team member screams at a vendor. When you are quiet about a white lie to a customer or don’t question why a payment is being withheld, you are communicating loudly and shaping culture – though ...

Came across this presentation via pluggdin by one of the company's founders, Srikrishna. Sri Krishna   Arun Natarajan is the Founder & CEO of Venture Intelligence, the leading provider of data and analysis on private company transactions, valuations and financials in India. Click Here to learn about Venture Intelligence products that help entrepreneurs Reach Out to Investors, Research Competition, Learn from Experienced Entrepreneurs and Interact with Peers. Includes the Free Deal Digest Weekly Newsletter: India's First & Most Exhaustive Transactions Newsletter.

Krishnan Ganesh, Angel Investor & Founder of Tutorvista in Business Today : As CEO of Bharti British Telecom, I used to work directly with Sunil Mittal. During meetings on strategy and plans, we used to have stimulating debates and heated arguments. At the end of it, Sunil Mittal used to take a firm commitment - either the senior managers were going to do it, or they had the choice to refuse. Accepting to try an idea was not an option. Agreeing to "try to do it" is a sure-shot recipe for a half-hearted attempt that will result in failure. This has helped me as I started four companies and built strong teams to get people committed to a cause or task wholeheartedly rather than start with doubts and dissonance. Arun Natarajan is the Founder & CEO of Venture Intelligence, the leading provider of data and analysis on private company transactions, valuations and financials in India. Click Here to learn about Venture Intelligence products that help entrepreneurs...

Anil Gupta, Joint MD of Havells India, in Business Today You need to attach yourself to certain things to go deeper, develop a passion and get work done. But you need to get detached after achieving certain milestones. If you remain attached to a certain thing, you cannot professionalise and grow it. Detachment makes it easier to professionalise and monitor the work from a distance. ...My father repeated this advice when Havells went through a tough time during the global economic crisis in 2008 and 2009. When we acquired Sylvania (in November 2007) we were very detached from the business for the first one-and-a-half years and we let the existing management team to run the company. But when Sylvania fell deeper into the red, the management team of Havells got fully involved. For one year there was close coordination between Sylvania and Havells. Sylvania became profitable (in 2011/12) and now we again run it from a distance. The advice has helped me balance my work and person...

Impresario Entertainment & Hospitality MD Riyaaz Amlani on the "best advice he ever received" in a Business Today article : The trouble: ...The same people who bring you from Chapter 1 to Chapter 2 in one's story sometimes don't elevate their own game for what is required to get you through to the next chapter. They get comfortable, become fat cats quickly, and don't seem to want to change. It seems that they needed me to ratify everything. I needed to be everywhere and personally supervise everything. I worked 18 hours a day. And couldn't do enough. It was frustrating and heartbreaking. I loved my people but I just couldn't get them to take full ownership. The solution provider: Tariq Ansari of Mid-Day, The solution: "Go on a two-month holiday." As soon as I began to protest, he explained: "It's a concept called 'benevolent negligence'." Leave. Go away. Take your hands off, and your people will be forced to s...

The founder's bother has written an 90 page e-book on the starting-up of FusionCharts - a $7-M revenue product company created by a teenager - Pallav Nadhani - out of Kolkata.  Read Pluggdin's post on the highlights from the book here . Arun Natarajan is the Founder & CEO of Venture Intelligence, the leading provider of data and analysis on private company transactions, valuations and financials in India. Click Here to learn about Venture Intelligence products that help entrepreneurs Reach Out to Investors, Research Competition, Learn from Experienced Entrepreneurs and Interact with Peers. Includes the Free Deal Digest Weekly Newsletter: India's First & Most Exhaustive Transactions Newsletter.