Tim Gasper

In entrepreneurship-land, I’ve always though of myself as the “business guy” in a business versus technical polarization. I come from a marketing / economics / management background, and it just made sense. I’ve spent a long time skirting the edges of the technical world, and it’s time I dove in.

The last couple weeks, I’ve begun immersing myself in programming documentation and challenges with the hopes of (in order of awesomeness):

1. Gaining some perspective on the life of programmers.
2. Enhancing my product management impact by being able to be more involved in technical decision-making.
3. Building something cool.
4. Building something cool that makes a lot of money.
5. Building something cool that changes the world.

I’m focusing on a few things at first, but tackling them simultaneously so I don’t get bored. And so when I get stuck (which has happened many many times already), I can stay fresh. Technologies I’m tackling:

• Languages: Ruby and Java
• Frameworks: Rails and Hadoop 
• Slices of Stack: Databases and Web Servers
• Tools: Terminal, Git, Emacs, and TextMate
• Cloud Services: Heroku and Amazon Web Services

Progress so far:

• Created a Hadoop cluster from scratch
• Created a Hadoop cluster using Cloudera Manager
• Created a Hadoop cluster using Ironfan (authored by Infochimps)
• Created a Rails app on Heroku (gotta figure out what site to set up now…)
• Lots of messing around with Terminal, Git, and various configuration files thinking I know what I’m doing only to figure out after 4 hours later of troubleshooting that I’ve got much, much further to go.

I’ll blog about my journey as it progresses, and share my creations as they become available. If you have recommendations or hints for a new programmer, give me a shout with your ideas!

Everyone is always looking for shortcuts, whether it’s personal life, business, whatever. It’s not always the easy path that is the best path. That’s common sense. But applying that logic to life decisions doesn’t happen as often as it should.

Startup life is somewhere this happens like crazy. Some common complaints:

Features

• Misconception One: we have to create these small features that customers have been requesting. Realization: we dont’ have time to build more significant, large feature sets.
• Misconception Two: let’s build only the most important large feature sets. Realization: our customers are pissed off.
• Stop trying to take a shortcut. You have to take bold leaps forward, but you also need to sweat the small stuff. This might involve staying late some nights or coming in on the weekend, but hey - that’s what you signed up for.

Customers

• Misconception One: I don’t like cold contacting people. I’ll just cultivate the accounts I already have. Realization: Whenever I lose a customer, it’s like someone stole a limb.
• Misconception Two: I’m gonna create and follow up on leads like crazy. New business, new business, new business! Realization: I’m plowing down all the trees, but no one is building a house.
• Stop trying to take a shortcut. You have to put the time into lead generation and new opportunities, but by keeping customers happy you will maintain strong, loyal business. There is no sales silver bullet.

Documentation

• Misconception One: I take meticulous notes about everything that goes on in my [insert your function… development / marketing / sales / ops / customer service] process. Realization: I spend more time documenting than doing.
• Misconception Two: I just cc some people via email and everyone else should just keep up with me. Realization: The team lacks good communication and shared learning.
• Stop trying to take a shortcut. You can’t let distractions keep you from your *actual* job. But without strong communication and documentation channels, your crew members are all rowing the ship in different directions. You get to a point eventually where you feel productive… but you’re doing the wrong stuff. Or something your coworker already did. Or something opposite of what you coworker is doing.

Bottom line? As long as it’s smart work, put in the work. See: Lead Bullets.

Transitioning to Lean at Infochimps by Tim Gasper

Since Posterous is mostly a ghost town, I’m going to switch my blog platform to Tumblr.

That also means I’ll be posting a few old posts onto Tumblr that I liked on my old blog that I don’t want to lose, so apologies if you’ve seen this content before already.

Entrepreneurship is an Art not a Job http://v.zite.com/eg6yCH via @Ziteapp