In partnership with Via Rail, we’re hosting a pre Startup Train meetup May 29th. It’s a wine and cheese in the Panorama Lounge in Union Station. If you’re already bought your ticket for the train then this is a chance to meet some of your fellow passengers. If you haven’t bought your ticket yet, go do that, and join us to learn more about the train.
There’s no cost for this event, please register to allow us to track numbers, thanks.
EDIT: It’s a bit of a challenge in this large venue to hunt me down so let’s add twitter to the mix. Post a tweet with both #startuptrain and #meshcon to be entered into our starving startup ticket draw.
I’m excited to be attending Mesh Conference the next two days. I’m also hoping to make it out to Startup Drinks tomorrow evening. If you’re a developer keen to get involved in startups, please come speak to me about our upcoming Startupify.Me program! We’re also looking for project partners so chase me down if you’d to work with our cohort.
As well, I’m hoping to spread the good word about our upcoming Startup Train. We’re packing several Via cars with Toronto area founders and funders this July and travelling to Montreal for The International Startup Festival.
To spice that up a bit, I’m going to give away one of our starving startup tickets for our train trip to a startup I meet while in Toronto. That gets you first class travel on our train and full access to the conference. Thanks to Phil and the conference for partnering with us on this.
Here’s the “rules”….
Any startup that hands me their card while I’m in Toronto will be entered into the draw for this. That’s it, simple and app-free. If you’re shy, just hand me your card and run away.
So you need to find me at some point, you need to hand me some sort of paper with your email address on it. That’s it. We’ll announce the winner early next week. See you tomorrow!
I’m heading into Toronto Monday May 13th to speak at an evening event about books and startups. My plan is to head in for the day and meetup with anyone curious about our upcoming round of Startupify.Me.
If you’re an experienced software developer hungry to get into startups and small business, I’d like to buy you a coffee at The Dark Horse Monday afternoon. I can explain in more detail what we have planned and answer any questions you may have.
If you’re a company interested in injecting some startup talent into your company or a startup hunting for technical cofounders, I’d also like to chat. You may be want to join us as a project partner.
Please email me directly so we can coordinate timing or register here.
Very few people, projects, companies etc associate, or identify, themselves as entrepreneurs, myself included. In doing the rounds promoting our upcoming Startupify.Me program, I hear it everywhere….
“Well I’m a developer and startups seem exciting but I’m not an entrepreneur and I’m not sure I want to do my own startup”
“We’d like to have a project from our company in Startupify but we’re not a startup”
None of that matters. As Brad Feld clearly illustrates in his book Startup Communities, we’re all entrepreneurs now, or at least we all need to start acting like one.
For software developers considering Startupify, you do not have be committed to launching your own startup. It’d be great if you did and we’ll support you in that but our program will prepare you to be a player “in dynamic industries that require entrepreneurial skills”. Find me an industry that doesn’t require entrepreneurial skills today and I’d say let’s wait and check back tomorrow. You simply need to understand the massive value that increasing your entrepreneurial aptitude offers you.
For companies considering putting a project into this round of Startupify, you do not have to be a startup. Our program will inject some startup talent and culture into your organization along with offering you the chance to evaluate and potentially hire some of our cohort. Even books are trying to imagine themselves as startups. As I say to all companies we speak with, technology will eventually disrupt every industry, your business may as well do some of the disrupting!
The other night my son was about to do something he knew was wrong. He looked around, noticed I was the only person around so he asked me “Should I do this? No one will see if I do it now.”
First I told him it was his choice. Then I did my best to convey that how you act when no one’s watching is important. It’s character. Do you really want to only be who you are when someone’s watching? Do or don’t but it shouldn’t be based on the audience (nose picking, bathroom breaks excluded of course).
That night I was lucky enough to catch my buddy AJ’s band The Odd Years playing downtown. Watching them play, it struck me how some bands are able to make massive leaps forward in the time since I last saw them play live. When you see a band and wonder “what the hell have they been up to?”, because of how much better they are, you’re watching a band that’s working their asses off.
Great musicians surprise and inspire you every time you see them perform. It means they’re busy when you’re not watching. Athletes are the same. If you only work hard and get better when the coach and fans are watching then you will eventually get beat.
“Write a song. All your old ones don’t mean a thing if you don’t sing any new ones”, Hayden
Corporate life is all about what’s observable. There’s little point in doing anything unless it’s observed, documented and lands in a performance review somewhere. The only currency in the workplace is observed acts.
For small business owners and entrepreneurs, it’s almost the exact opposite. If you’ve never truly created something from nothing then this is part of the reason you think starting a business is easy. I’ve seen what that guy does, I can do that.
The bits you observe are the easy bits. All the real work, all the fighting, clawing and making it happen goes on in the dark when on one’s watching. No one’s there at 3 am when I’m pacing the room for the second hour in a row. That’s why it’s such an overwhelming feeling for an entrepreneur when a business starts to click and move forward. Yes it looks like an overnight success but there’s likely decades of work put in which no one witnessed.
The parts you see really are the simple ones. This is especially important for anyone considering moving from a corporate environment to their own thing. Everything will be flipped upside down. If you’re not prepared to work your ass off when no one’s watching then you’d best just work on that promotion.
