Startup Insiders 6 @ LUMS Lahore

Frankly, I did not have high hopes for Startup Insiders #6 @ LUMS, after the disappointing experience at previous Startup Insiders #3 (as it was restricted to very basic things). But the gathering was exactly what it should have been. An informal, bi-directional, moderated and mature discussion.

Since I did not note down anything, I have to rely on my memory. So I will definitely miss things and might misquote. Also I will only be covering the best (IMO) points by each panelist. (See the video for details)

Jehan Ara and Jawad Farid introduced the panel and the format.

Panel

• Jehan Ara
  
• Jawad Farid
  
• Dr. Umar Saif
  
• Faisal Qureshi
  
• Zia Imran
  
• Fahad Bangish
  
• Zafar Khan
  
• Nadeem Malik

Format

Each panelist was given 2 minutes to answer the question (or face the consequences :)). The audience could interrupt the speaker at any time and direct the question to anyone/all panelists.

The Yellow Cards

But the best feature was, 'The Yellow Cards'. Some people (including yours truely :)), were given yellow cards. If someone felt that the discussion was going off topic, he/she would raise the card and stop the conversation.

This minute change turned out to be the best thing. As with the previous event, a lot of people tried to jump in with whining and complaints. Though most of them were answered comprehensively by the panelist but we also made good use of the yellow cards. This moderation mechanism was one of those things that kept this discussion on track.

Discussion

It started off slowly, Jawad showed a series of advertisements including the ads for Apple's 1984 Mac, Mastang, Lexus and FedEx. He explained the concept behind each individual ad and how it targetted a specific audience. The core thing out of that 30 minutes was,

You must be able to specify the attributes of your product in 30 seconds. Identify the qualities of your product and relate them to the customer needs such that it makes the customer ask for your card

After that it was primarily Q&A with the panelists with following highlights,

Jawad Farid

An entrepreneur does not complain but solves problems. This is critical as your customer does not care if its raining, your building is on fire or there are strikes. Buy generators to cover electricity shortage, dig holes and put tube wells to get water. Solve the problems you face, do not complain.

Know your customer, know his pain. Identify the points that are most painful and then convince him that your solution solves these pains better than any other exisitng solution. You can make the best product in latest technology but if you can not convince your customer to use it, its not worth anything to him.

These points convey the essence of entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurship is not about making money, its not about having a huge company. It is about solving problems, creating value and converting that value into money. Jawad was spot on with the details on how he got his first customer and how his company ended up having the business they are doing right now.

Jehan Ara

Jehan Ara was the anchor for most of the time and she sure did not make anyone sleepy. She added to almost every question but particularly to the questions pertaining to the 'impossibilities' of starting the business.

There are lot of problems with working in Pakistan.

• resource dependency
• lack of infrastructure
• bad image of Pakistan

However, we must face these problems and try to solve them. Complaining will not help. Our universities need to produce good people, our people need to imporve our image by working hard and being honet. The image is not just built by government, but by the people. Companies in India face lack of infrastructure, poverty and bomb blasts at a much higher scale than Pakistan but still they manage to overcome these problems.

Frankly, I think the questions like 'It is not possible to work in Pakistan' should not be answered anymore. Entrepreneurship starts with annoying passion and belief in your idea. If you do not have faith in yourself, do all of us a favor and dont become an entrepreneur.

Dr. Umar Saif

Dr. Umar (looking fine and dandy as usual) spent a lot of time listening. But he added some valuable thoughts when it mattered.

One thing common in all these people is commitment and hard work. These people worked really hard at whatever they did, whether it were studies or business. Withouth hard work, you are bound to fail even in a job, let alone your own company.

Faisal Qureshi

Faisal Qureshi undoubtedly dominated the whole session with his all round personality. He was surrounded by no less than 15 people during the refreshment and at the ending. I am sure he could have easily won the NA elections today :).

I dont care WHY I dont use your product. The bottom line is that i DONT. I should be using it but I dont. Now figure out how can you make me use it. You only get 30 seconds before I leave your product and the image I have will stay with me.

Find your 'Mamoon Akbar'

You have to find a link to your first customer. A customer probably gets 100 phone calls today for business and listens to 1% with some seriousness. But if his 'Mamoon Akbar' calls him and tells him about you, he will listen to you. Find that 'Mamoon Akbar'. This will open the door for you. After that its your job to 'con' him into buying from you (he later explained it as con from CONvince not from CONvict).

Before the customer buys your product, he decides if he wants to have a relation with you. Every thing matters in this regard. Dress up nicely, talk nicely and be honest. You have to look like in control. Do not let anyone else dress up and look better than you and take the center stage. If you cant do that, hire someone who can.

I guess I wont be showing up in the next gathering in slippers :P

MBA degree neither makes you a better human being nor a better business man, it only opens up doors for you that might not be opened otherwise.

*cough* *cough*

You are responsible for the two square feet you occupy. You destroy it when you trash the city, when you make a personal attack, when you lie or cheat. At the end of the day, be responsible.

You should aim to absorb and keep growing yourself, help others because that help will definitely come back to you.

Faisal's thoughts about innovation, impact, responsibility and success were just extraordinary.


Some other good questions were,

Q: Three things you now have and wish you had when you started?

A:

Faisal Qureshi: People management

Nadeem Malik: If I had what I have now, I would not have been what I am now

Fahad: More money

After that, the discussion went off topic :(

Q: How to balance your team?

A: Find people who can complement your skills. If you cant implement a tech idea, find someone who can. If you cant sell, find someone who can sell.

Q: How to target a wide range of customers? (the long tail)

A: You should divide your customers in categories. Then build your strategy around each category. Each category has different buying power, needs and problems. Identify them and sell to them according to their needs.

Some lame questions/comments were,

-Give us some practical advice (meaning shortcut to success)

-We should not follow the examples of Yahoo! and Google (I ll be blogging about this later)

-How can we work in these awful conditions? (some more whining)

-You have to be experienced to start a company

Conclusion

I feel that 50% of the audience was the wrong type of audience. This event is for entrepreneurs, since not everyone can be an entrepreneur, not everyone should be in it. Currently, it is mainly advertised to the university students who treat it as a workshop for career making and even worse, a shortcut to making money.

The session started with me at a very low energy level, expecting not much. But as the session picked up the pace, it became more and more engaging. The penalists did not talk about WHAT they have accomplished, rather HOW they accomplished it. There were times when the discussion went off topic but was never derailed (we had lots of yellow cards to make sure). At the end of the session, I had a high energy level and motivation (despite getting only one sprite). I am sure the discussions with Jawad and Faisal Qureshi will provide me food for thought for a long time.

2's Complement of 3

Are we going in the right direction? This is the question you need to ask at every step of your startup. There is no definitive answer to it. But you are certainly on right track if you are able to interest great people in you, your idea and best of all, have them join you.

When we started in summer 07, we wanted to do great things. We knew we could only do great things by having great people. Steve Jobs says that you should hire people better than you. I say hire people who can kick your ass. 

But it is not easy to convince great people and it should not be. Great people are like magnifying glass. They will highlight the flaws in your thinking, your ideas and your execution. This is exactly what makes them great. The ability to look in corneres that others neglect.

In 7 months a lot has happened, but 7 Feb 08 marks the first (visible :)) success of 2's Complement as Yaser Amer Awan has joined us as the third Founder (not a hire). For those who dont know him, he is, a sportsman, a hardcore gamer, a passionate hacker and has a great business mind. Above all, he has vision and the drive to reach that vision.

All I can say is, 2's Complement has been upgraded from 15 to 30

Lessons About Startups Part II

Startups magnify minute details and force you to think and work like you never have. There are many things you will need to learn and learn quickly.

Define Your Ethics

Define your absolute do's and dont's. Some examples are,

· Keep your word, even if it means losing something

· Respect other people

· Self-respect

· Accept your mistakes

· Be forgiving

And the list can go on. Important thing is that you MUST have some values. These values are the foundations of every decision. Do not let your values be defined by the world. Never compromise on your values. The stones with no weight are swept away with the waves and turned to dust.

Learn to say NO

During your journey, you will get a lot of opportunities. You will find people who will offer you money, support and contacts. What you must realize is that you do not and should not accept every offer. This means that you have to accept some and reject others. Remember that you have as much right to say 'YES' as 'NO'. But how do you know you are making the right choice? This you do by going back to your values. Evaluate the person making the offer on your values. Look at the person not just the words. To define your answer, you must have already defined yourself.

Do not be Apologetic

There is nothing conventional about startups. Being unconventional leads to uncertainty and you tend to get apologetic. You can get over this feeling by building confidence. And confidence comes from believing that you are doing something great. Take pride in your company, your product and your working 80 hours per week. You should not be ashamed of your desire to change the world.

Be Yourself

It is generally believed that companies are run from huge, well decorated offices by grey-haired managers and MBAs. This thinking is so dominating that the startups also take to be true. So they feel inclined to pretend like big companies. They pretend to sound and look conventional. Because if they do not, they look out of place and exceptions just look silly in the first glance. Do not be afraid of looking silly. Part of entrepreneurship is learning from your mistakes.

Do not pretend someone you are not. People laugh at monkeys who pretend even though they pretend very well.

Do Not be a Whiner

I hate whiners. Not just me, but every sensible person hates people who whine and cry. Your server crashed; fix it, you are out of money; find some way to earn more, aliens kidnapped your pet cat; get a new one. But do not cry and blame the world. If you are not used to accepting and cleaning up your own mess, stay in your cubicle.

Make your own decision

Making a decision is difficult. Decisions are just another name for well thought out guesses. These are based on your past experience, your judgment of future, your fear of failure and your intelligence. No one else can see these things as good as you. Do not take the easy way out by following someone else's decision. No one is going to take the blame if the decision goes bad. It is better to fail on your own rather than succeed on someone else.

It seems impossible to remember and follow all these guidelines. Yes, it IS impossible. Nobody said startup was going to be a walk in the park. This is one reason why you should have multiple founders. Make sure that if you forget, someone from your team remembers.

Lisped

A programming language is much like the languages we speak. If a sound is missing from a language, the speakers cant produce that sound. More interesting is the fact that they do not understand the value of that sound. The lives of chinese people are not any worse because of the inability to say 'R'. Ditto for the programming languages.

1. Languages vary in power. This can be proved by nagation. Let us assume that "All languages are equal in power". If all languages were equal, there would be no need for new languages because a new language means the inability of existing languages.
2. New languages are created by programmers, not by standards. (JAVA whiners should read http://www.paulgraham.com/javacover.html). Languages are much like food. You can fool customer by wrapping bad crappy food in pretty packaging once, not twice.
3. A language should get out of your way. A hacker's time is very valuable and the language should respect that.
4. There is always a simple way to do everything. An elegant language should take the user to the most natural solution. Even if it means twisting the standards.

We have  a cyclic problem here. To understand the power of a language you have to learn it. And to learn it you must be convinced about the weakness of your current language. But how can you identify the weakness when you dont know it is a weakness? Kind of recursive, isnt it? The best way is to just take the word of a better haker. So if a person X who is a great hacker, says that a language Y is great, trust his word and study Y.
It was when I started reading Paul Graham that i heard about Lisp. I coould see people appreciating it, praising it, see it in action but not understand it. It seemed like just a big pile of CARs and CDRs. It took me three months of reading to witness the first glimpse of its power. And it was worth waiting. It was when I solved a problem in it that i saw its real strength.

Problem: You have to write a function that takes two lists, fun_list (a list of functions) and arg_list (list of arguments). Your function should apply each function in fun_list on every argument in arg_list and return a list containing the list of result of each function.

The C way
What we write and call C++, isnt remotely close to C++. So i wont be calling this C++ code.

• First question: How to represent a list of functions? I ll just use vectors. DAMN, now i have to read about the syntax of vector. And how do I represent functions? That too with unknown signature? DAMN again! no problem, I ll just restrict the signature to some predefined value and mention it in my documentation. Or i can define it a template, but how do you do that? DAMN again. The arg_list also has to be defined as a template list.(Refer to 5)
• Lets try Google for syntax issues (Refer to 3). Notice that we have already spend a good 10 minutes and we are yet to write a single LOC.
• Okay, now that we have gathered all the stuff, lets get on with writing code. Lets start by a simple code and expand it to full form. Lets assume the each function operates on integers and return an integer as well.

#include <vector>
using namespace std;
vector<vector<int>> apply_funcs_to_args(vector<int (*)(int)> fun_list,vector<int> arg_list)
{
vector res;
return res;
}
And i am stuck as i need to confirm the syntax of function pointers. What to do? Back to Google and MSDN.SHEESH, hope somebody is keeping time, this is hard work dude.
Now i need a function that will apply a function to the arg_list and return the result. Here it is,
vector<int> apply_func_to_args(int (*f)(int) f,vector<int> arg_list)
{
int i = 0;
vector<int> res;
for( i = 0 ; i < arg_list.size() ; i++ )
{
res.push_back(f(arg_list[i]));
}
return res;
}
I have to make sure that this function is defined before apply_funcs_to_args or it will not recognize it. Now my final code becomes,
#include <vector>
using namespace std;
vector<int> apply_func_to_args(int (*f)(int) f,vector<int> arg_list)
{
int i = 0;
vector res;
for( i = 0 ; i < arg_list.size() ; i++ )
{
res.push_back(f(arg_list[i]));
}
return res;
}
vector<vector<int>> apply_funcs_to_args(vector<ret_type (*)(arg_type)&gt fun_list,vector<int> arg_list)
{
int i = 0;
vector<vector<arg_type>> res;
for( i = 0 ; i < fun_list.size() ; i++ )
{
res.push_back(apply_func_to_args(fun_list[i],arg_list));
}
return res; 

}
But to make it work with any data type, i have to change it to template.
#include <vector>
using namespace std;
template<class ret_type,class arg_type>
vector<ret_type> apply_func_to_args(ret_type (*f)(arg_type),vector<arg_type> arg_list)
{
int i = 0;
vector<ret_type> res;
for( i = 0 ; i < arg_list.size() ; i++)
{
res.push_back(f(arg_list[i]));
}
return res;
}
template<class ret_type,class arg_type>
vector<vector<ret_type>> apply_funcs_to_args(vector<ret_type (*)(arg_type)> fun_list,vector<arg_type> arg_list)
{
int i = 0;
vector<vector<arg_type>> res;
for( i = 0 ; i < fun_list.size() ; i++ )
{
res.push_back(apply_func_to_args(fun_list[i],arg_list));
}
return res;
}
This code assumes that the return type of every function is same. So how do we handle different return types? We can make a generic class Result and force each function to return a pointer to class inherited from that class? Notice how a language restriction has forced us to propagate a change in some other code.
Okay, I am done. Where is my Electra? What! i am not? I have to test it too,well too bad, i am exhausted, maybe tomorrow. Infact i dont want to look at the code again because its too ugly.

Let me try Lisp. I can directly jump to writing whatever i am thinking. 

(define apply_funcs_to_nums(lambda(fun_list arg_list) (map (lambda (f) (map f arg_list)) f_list) ))

And we are done. Dont believe it? I myself was shocked to see that the code worked on the first run. And it took me not more than 5 minutes to write it and test it (infact I really didnt have to test it). And I spent the next two days in high fiving everyone just because I was so happy :D. This code is bug free, evident, non-restrictive and makes no assumptions. Its short and its beautiful.

Imagine a person who can pull this kind of stunt in every LOC. Do you think such skill can be beaten by scale? Would you be willing to take him on as your competitor?  I know I wouldnt.

The life in the dead stuff

Yesterday i was going through some old things and i found lots of stuff. Stuff like,

• Old books
• School notebooks
• College notes
• University quizes, assignments, exams etc

There were pages with phone numbers, web sites and email addresses (of course by me:)). I could not remember when and why i wrote them down. Yet i felt the urge to keep them. But then i asked myself; Why do i need to keep these pages? They looked important, but i never needed them in the past, surely i do not need them now and chances are i will not need them. If i wanted to keep them, i had to sort, filter, analyze and arrange them. So i just threw them in trash (after destroying them of course).

We encounter such things every day. But the behavior is not just limited to stuff. At any time, we seem to carry around loads of useless things, ideas and values. Stuff that i like to call Dead Stuff. Little do we realize the cost associated with them. To us, their unknown value is so huge that we ignore the costs. Note the word 'Unknown' here. I ll get back to it later.

We can assume that this is default. But actually it is not. Observer a kid playing (get married and have kids if you dont already). If you can look into his treasure chest (kids have them), you will find lot of stuff. Stuff like,

used batteries, thumb pins, common pins, shiny coins, fancy cards, key chains, candy warper

Useless isnt it? Actually its not. Ask a kid why he keeps that stuff? He will have an answer for EVERYTHING. You will not find anything USELESS in that chest. At least not for the kid! Strange; isnt it? The kids only collect things that they find useful. Its simple; keep what is useful and get rid of others. Kids go on to become adults, so the adults should exhibit this attitude. But the adults seem to carry so much dead stuff. Somewhere during the transition this behavior gets lost.

Teenage fits perfectly in this situation. Kids have to go through teenage to become adults. So teenage might just be the culprit here. But what happens in teenage? Lets have a look.

A teenager is just old enough to become a part of adults. But to be an adult, he must BEHAVE (not think) like an adult. This he cannot do, because his whole life he has been a kid. As a kid he knows how to assign values to things. No one ever told him that his values are incorrect because he was surrounded by kids.

But now suddenly he has to deal with adults. Adults, who try to impose an adult like thinking on him. The first thing they tell him is "Your judgment of values was wrong. These things that you value are actually trash. We will tell you what is useful and what is not. Since you are too young to understand, take our word for it and behave like an adult". If you do not feel the strength of this statement, read it again. Now we refer to the term 'Unknown'. Things that he sees in the adult world are unfamiliar with unknown value. He feels the urge to reject them but is forced to accept. So he begins to believe that if something is unknown, it MUST have a value. Mathematically speaking,

Unknown = Valuable (Equation I)

Being a kid, the teenager can not understand something without a value. So he asks for it, but is told that he is too young to comprehend and should trust the knowledge of adults. He has to obey or be considered abnormal. Result, he begins to rely on adults to tell him things. Again, mathematically,

age difference = authority (Equation II)

Combine I & II and you get a crippled mind. To make someone understand the value of an unknown, you must have an age difference. Conversely, an age difference can convince someone of a value for unknown. Think about it this way, the inventions and discoveries are done by young energetic people. But people do not accept them because they are only influenced by age, not idea. Without age difference to impose value, they fear the unknown, not value it.

People do not like young managers, young CEOs and young founders. They like to think that they are wrong...because they are young. People do not like to think about the value of unknown. Because they fear that the unknown will turn out to be nothing. They prefer to keep unknown stuff with imaginary value than to get rid of dead stuff.

Lessons about startups, Part I

A startup is a different experience altogether from a stable/big company. Its like a benchmarking software. It puts extreme load on your each and every brain cell and stretches your limits. It brings out best and worst in you. Its brutal as it showcases your weaknesses and its rewarding as it highlights your strengths.

A few lessons learned so far,

1. Its frustrating
   Its like walking on a rope 100 feet above the ground. A slight error of judgment or wind can cause you to wobble. You oscillate between extreme low and extreme high. When everything goes well, the other end seem to so close. When you wobble, one step seems an eternity.
   
2. Where can i get some slippers?
   Ever thought about those small, petty things you use in the office. Things like writing pads, pens, slippers, pencils, cups etc etc. Well, prepare yourself for a trip to the local general store. Small things seem too big when you need to address them yourselves. They will bother you, they will take your time.
   
3. Blame yourself
   "OKAY...so there is a bug in the code, who wrote this piece of $#!T?".
   Careful when you say this. Chances are that you wrote that code yourself. Happy blaming yourself :). There is no one to blame...i repeat THERE IS NO ONE TO BLAME...Because there actually is no one else (except your pet cat maybe). Dont be a whiner, identify the error, accept the consequences, correct it and move on.
   
4. If you delay it, it will not be done
   "I ll take issue 'XYZ' later". In a big company this mean "I ll let someone else take care of this". In a startup it means, "It wont happen". Things that are deferred, are not done. In fact, they will never be done.
   
5. Anything and everything will go wrong
   Imagine all the things that can go wrong. Then prepare yourself for everything to go wrong. Hardware items will be short, light will trip, your servers will crash, your data will be lost, riots will start, it will rain and you will catch fever
   
6. I ll be done in 2 days...
   "Oh yes, this seems like an easy task. We can just slap this in 2 days".
   In each task there are many unknowns. Each unknown requires its on prerequisites, time and effort. Unknowns like new paradigm, learning curve, lack of documentation, network setup etc. In a startup, the unknowns increase exponentially. so a simple rule while establishing time lines is, multiply your first time line with 4 and set it as time line (at leat in the beginning)
   
7. Whats cooking...errr its the server
   This part is so important that it deserves a separate section. Memorize this "My servers will be on fire" (inspired by Paul Graham). There is nothing more frustrating than your server crashing at the last minute of release and it WILL. (we actually went through that :D)
   

Where did my time go?
In a big company you do not need to address any/most of the mentioned issues. So you can sit down and code 8 hrs/day. In a startup, you need to address every issue. Things drain your time and increase the frustration. But remember, these things are not redundant or useless. Each and every thing goes into the contribution to your success.

My first day as Entrepreneur

It was a strange feeling on the morning of 9 July 2007. I didnt know when to get up, when to leave and when to return. WHY? well...after 2 years and 2 days of working as an employee, i was now an Entrepreneur. It was strange feeling that cannot be named, just experienced. Why did i chose this path is a different story altogether. I will come back to that soon. So, I am now an entrepreneur and have lots of things on my mind. Things like,
Meeting the client, Looking for office space, Hiring brilliant and talented people bla bla bla

Not really...actually my first task was to go to Hafeez Center and buy myself a PC for work :). As i was on my way, i realized that i had not activated my credit card and even didnt have it with me. So i stopped at the ATM machine and waloa...it was out of service :). I went to another and same result. Finally i called the bank support and was told that it will take one hour for the service to restore. So i had one hour to wander around in deserted Hafeez Center. (didnt i mention i was early and Hafeez Center was closed?). Anyways, i decide to call up a few friends just to bug them on their jobs and ask for some advice for the PC. So far i found out two things,
1> when something can go wrong, it will go wrong
2> Hafeez Center is really boring when it is closed

I was quite confident that i could just skim through the buying process and get a PC before lunch, but it took a lot of blood, sweat, marching up and down to get my stuff together. When i finally got my PC together, it was 3:30PM and i had a sweaty shirt and aching legs.

But finally, i did it. I got my PC and then i had to carry it all the way to Sharjeel's car, load it in, get my bike and race to the office. The rest of the day i spent getting my shirt dry in the Air Conditioned room and setting up the developing environment.
So, was my day different from usual days? Yes...A LOT...was it enjoyable...A LOT...was it memorable...A LOT...was it fruitful...well, only time will tell...