The Startup Journey

Extracts from the brilliant article by Dr. Ajay Shah : Let us start with short-sightedness. The best firms in India are able to borrow five--year money at around 13%. At 13%, a rupee five years from now is worth 54 paisa today. A rupee ten years out is worth 29 paisa today, and a rupee twenty years out is worth 9 paisa today. In contrast, a rupee next year is worth 88 paisa today. With this kind of discounting, it is not surprising that projects that yield returns next year (i.e. 88 paisa today for each rupee of profit) are very attractive when compared with projects that yield returns 10 years from now (i.e. 29 paisa today for each rupee of profit). This difference -- between 88 and 29 paisa -- is striking. In a world with high interest rates, being short-sighted is rational. ...What about risk, and the willingness to undertake risky projects? Modern finance teaches us that when firms are able to issue equity into liquid and efficient capital markets, the risk premium that they ...

From Charles Assisi's column in Mint : ...why is it a stewardess on Jet Airways greets each passenger who gets on board with a smile? For that matter, why is it if a guest asks for directions at any Ritz-Carlton property, they aren’t directed, but led to where they want to go? Everybody, from the bellboy to the hotel manager, follows the rule.  The stewardess at Jet Airways told Kamath’s colleague their research on passenger behaviour indicated that when greeted with a smile, people lower their guard. For instance, if a flight is delayed or the meal they expect is not on board, as a thumb rule, most people take it in their stride. In the absence of a smile, even minor deficiencies are viewed as offensive, people get boorish, and their behaviour permeates to others on the flight, making it a harrowing experience for the crew. At Ritz-Carlton, the key Kamath observed is empowerment. A bellboy is empowered to take time off from whatever it is he has been assigned to do if a guest...

If you are an entrepreneur who would not have the patience for snooty waiters and difficult to translate/interpret menu cards, you might have some interesting takeaways from this article by Paddy Padmanabhan in Swarajya based on an analysis of the ratings of Bangalore restaurants. Extracts: Peter Thiel, billionaire founder of PayPal and the first ever outside investor in Facebook, talks about this in his new book Zero to One, and offers some interesting theories. He talks specifically about the spectacular boom-bust of the alternative energy industry in the US, especially solar, which was decimated in the 2009-2010 period by cheap Chinese products that were subsidized heavily by the Chinese government. He proposes that the solar industry’s woes were brought on by CEOs who were sales guys in suits who had no idea about the technology and even less about the hard questions that needed answering for the business to be viable over the long term. He clinches his point with an interest...

If increasing pay doesn't work to motivate and retain your best people, what will? Try paying them less advises Atul Jain, CEO of US-based analytics firm Teoco. Extracts from the Business Line article by Teoco country head Srinivas Bhogle: The gratitude that you think you’ve earned after giving a hike or a bonus fizzles out very quickly. Within a matter of weeks the employee begins to take his ‘new’ compensation or incentive for granted. ...instead of slightly over-compensating our employees, we slightly under-compensate them. If this sounds crazy, hear how Teoco’s CEO Atul Jain explains why it might work. He says, “Assume that I’m the CEO, and let’s see it from my perspective. I see the under-compensated employee as offering me more value. I’m therefore always a little more cognisant of his concerns and requirements; and my sense of fair play forces me to offer him the more challenging or lucrative projects. So he usually ends up getting much better projects and learning th...

NEN's Srikrishna has provides a simple rule to nip flame wars conducted over email in the bud (emphasis mine) : Most back-and-forth email stinkers or flame wars are preventable and many times seem downright silly or petty. Yet they seem to pop up all over the place with near-despairing regularity. Flame wars, particularly between colleagues, is a huge emotional sink, sapping productivity and motivation. This is even truer when the parties involved are in the same office. It is to overcome these that we’ve formulated a simple rule – yep 1 single rule to prevent email flame wars. The No 3rd email rule Simply put this rule states, if one person has sent an email (#1) and a second person has responded (#2) and it’s clear that they are not agreeing, or not happy – there should be no 3rd email sent. Instead the two parties should talk in person (sometimes this only requires swivelling in one’s chair) or pick up the phone, if not in the same office. Think about it – most email flam...

From the wow post by Srikrishna of NEN ... Quadrant 4 – Don’t have the right attitude but are effective This is the hardest group to deal with. The obnoxious sales person my friend had to deal with, the supercilious technologist or rude finance guy we met all fall into this quadrant. Two things make it difficult to effect change with these folks - - they are deemed successful and have been rewarded in the past, despite their interpersonal shortcomings. - they are often positions deemed critical, that make change not just unpalatable but downright scary. “What’ll happen to my sales, if this guy leaves?” or “Will I find another trusthworthy finance guy?” ...Organizations suffer the most, because most of us don’t know how best to handle Quadrant 4 folks. The first step is to recognize not only the existence of these four quadrants but that people can move within the quadrants.  ...I’ve found talking about the four quadrants and even mutually agreeing with your ...

Extract from a Mixergy Masterclass titled "How to use cold emails to make sales – with Bryan Kreuzberger" (emphasis mine): ..how do you find the decision maker and get them to hear you out? Use the Waterfall Technique  Go directly to the top. When Bryan wanted to pitch Best Buy, he wrote separate emails to the director of marketing, the VP of marketing, the CMO, and the CEO. “I know the CEO of Best Buy isn’t the right person for me to talk to,” says Bryan. “But I can put together an email that is crafted from [their] perspective. They’ll just delegate it. And now [the person the CEO delegates to] has to take my meeting.” Bryan says this technique uses the company’s hierarchy to your advantage. The request is coming down from the CEO to the manager, much like water flows down a waterfall. And if the CEO asks an employee to do something, they have to do it. In the case of Best Buy, the VP of marketing emailed Bryan back, asking him to present to six executives, who...

From a Mixergy Masterclass with Mike Michalowicz on how to specialize, fire bad customers and systematize your B2B business. “If you have more than four or five competitors, [your offering is] way too broad,” says Mike. “You can be a heart surgeon or you can be a general practitioner. ...Let your customers decide on your specialty . “I believe people speak the truth through their wallets,” says Mike. “What I care about is the ones who spend and buy from you repeatedly, the ones that generate the most revenue and pay the quickest and show you through their actions that they truly value you.” Once you’ve identified those customers, get inside their heads. “You need to understand their market as best as you can, perhaps even better than they understand their own industry, and then cater to it.”   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 ...

Extracts from a blog post by AnnMaria of The Julia Group (emphasis mine). 1. Show up when you are supposed to show up. ...The point is that if I say I will be in Fort Totten, North Dakota at 10 a.m. on April 10th, if you come into the office at that time, you should find me there. Reliable competence is worth more than unreliable brilliance. I can make promises to a customer based on reliable competence and know that those promises will be kept. ... 4. Don’t just do the bare minimum! Most jobs offer a great opportunity for people to LEARN and unlike college, they actually pay you to do it. What a deal! At The Julia Group, you can learn how to do everything from complex statistical calculations to use the video editing software. Specifics may vary from one job to the next, but the more you learn, the more valuable you are to us and the better it is for your future. Don’t just do only what you are specifically asked and then sit on your hands. Suggest something! Ask questions!...

Came across this old post by US-based venture capitalist Mark Suster on the topic via a recent guest post by Amit Sharma in NextBigWhat. Uses comparative examples to help understand Gross Margin / Net Revenues, Price/Revenue Growth, Cash Flow vs P&L Profitability, etc. 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.

Mukund Mohan of Microsoft Ventures has a wow blog post on why illustrated with a couple of examples of startups from the firm's accelerator: For every two of these entrepreneurs, there are 100′s I know whose story did not end up with funding. It ended with a company that closed, or a marriage that fell apart and a kid that had to go to a tier 2 college, because they had spent a lot of their life’s savings in their startup. To them as well, I say “you tried, and did not succeed, but you did not fail”. Those who “failed” are the ones who did not try at all. The ones who failed are the ones in a safe job, 9-5 assignments who keep telling me “they want to start a company some day”. I think we should have entrepreneurs that succeeded and those that did not succeed. I liken it to giving the gold for the successful ones and silver to the unsuccessful ones. The ones watching on the sidelines and commenting are the ones that “failed”. Arun Natarajan is the Founder & CEO of Ve...

Entrepreneurs like Sanjiv Bikhchandani of Naukri, Murugavel Janakiraman of Matrimony, the Bansals of Flipkart;  VSS Mani  of Justdial, etc. deserve massive admiration. What they have achieved is more like conquering Everest. Good to know that once they have climbed the peak, thee environment also helps protect "their" turf. From a blog post by Dev Khare of Lightspeed Ventures (emphasis mine): Many of India's successful startups have navigated a maze of challenges, creating leading brands and sustaining for long periods of time.   Correspondingly, it is much harder in India, relative to the US/Europe, for competition to unseat leading brands . ... Startups need large markets (Rs 2500cr+ or $500 million+) to get large and succeed.  This is hard to find in India, perhaps due to early consumer demand, unorganized markets, regional differences or foreign substitutes.  For example, digital advertising is a roughly $400 million annual business here, ...

Was wowed by this powerful quote I'd heard yesterday: " You are the average of the five people that you spend the most time with. " (It's attributed to Jim Rohn .) It seemed to be much more powerful than the famous Silicon Valley mantra of " A Players hire A Players; B Players hire C Players ." Since for most working professionals (and especially so for entrepreneurs) almost all the 5 people (that we spend the most time with) are likely to be co-workers, why would we ever hire a "B Player" again? 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 Exhausti...

Was wowed by Deshpande's simple yet powerful speech and interaction at the TiE Chennai organized event on February 5 . Amazing how someone who's been living in Boston for 30 years is so much in touch with the grassroots issues in even small town India - and more importantly able to come up with practical solutions to them. My top takeaways from the many that he provided: India's Creme-De-la-creme is Taking Charge 2% of Indians are Globally Competitive. And the cream of this segment is now applying its intellectual and financial resources to tackle some of key problems of the bottom of the pyramid. The advantage that we enjoy, as compared to say China, is that citizens here enjoy the freedom to take action (and, as required, also partner with the state) to deliver these basic services. The Govt should have an M&A arm to acquire NGOs! Just like how big corporations (especially in developed countries) keep a keen watch on the innovation experiments being made by...

From Mukund Mohan's post There are 3 primary parameters I have seen used when people hire folks to determine their salary. 1. Experience – usually measured in # of years working on relevant and related technologies. A rule of thumb I have seen is 1.2 to 1.5 times the number of years of experience + starting salary of a fresh graduate at 2L ($3K) per year to 6L ($10K) per year. For example, if you are looking to hire a developer with 5 years of experience, then you will pay 5 years times 1.2 plus 2L per year if you are a startup that’s not funded. 2. Type of technology – The more arcane the technology the more you can expect to pay for it. For example, you can expect to pay much less for a person who knows PHP and more for someone who knows Android app dev or Ruby on Rails. Some common technologies and your base times multiple is below. I am assuming php developer is the base at Rs. 1. All others are multiple of what you’d pay the php developer. I dont mean this to think of php...