2002 - Inside The Minds-The Entrepreneurial Problem Solver

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I N S I D E T H E M I N D S
Inside The Minds:

The Entrepreneurial
Problem Solver
Entrepreneurial Strategies for Identifying
Opportunities in the Marketplace – For Corporate
Executives, Managers, Salespeople & Entrepreneurs
Published by Aspatore Books, Inc.
For corrections, company/title updates, comments or any other inquiries please email
info@aspatore.com.
First Printing, 2002

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Copyright  2002 by Aspatore Books, Inc. All rights reserved. Printed in the United
States of America. No part of this publication may be reproduced or distributed in any
form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, except as permitted
under Sections 107 or 108 of the United States Copyright Act, without prior written
permission of the publisher.
ISBN 1-58762-229-7
Library of Congress Card Number: 2002091106
Cover design by Kara Yates & Ian Mazie
Edited by Jo Alice Hughes, Proofread by Ginger Conlon
Material in this book is for educational purposes only. This book is sold with the
understanding that neither any of the authors or the publisher is engaged in rendering
legal, accounting, investment, or any other professional service.
This book is printed on acid free paper.
A special thanks to all the individuals that made this book possible.
Special thanks to: Kirsten Catanzano, Melissa Conradi, Molly Logan, Justin Hallberg
The views expressed by the individuals in this book do not necessarily reflect the views
shared by the companies they are employed by (or the companies mentioned in this
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The views expressed by the endorsements on the cover of this book for the Inside the
Minds series do not necessarily reflect the views shared by the companies they are
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Inside the Minds:
The Entrepreneurial
Problem Solver
Entrepreneurial Strategies for Identifying Opportunities in
the Marketplace – For Corporate Executives, Managers,
Salespeople, and Entrepreneurs
CONTENTS
Gary L. Moulton 11
LIFE LESSONS: BUILD YOUR TEAM
OF ENTREPRENEURS
Douglas P. Bruns 29
DID I SAY ENTREPRENEURIALISM?
I MEANT CREATIVITY!
Rodney Kuhn 45
THE CONTAGIOUS ENTREPRENEUR
Peter J. Valcarce 55
IT TAKES TWO: HUMAN AND FINANCIAL
ENTREPRENEURIAL RESOURCES
Dave Hegan 67
STEEL DETERMINATION: HANGING TIGHT
IN A ROLLER-COASTER ECONOMY
Aaron Kennedy 77
ENTREPRENEURIAL SPIRIT AND PASSION
FOR PASTA: A WINNING COMBO
Greg Wittstock 89
ESSENTIAL NUTRIENTS FOR GROWING A
WATER GARDENING ENTERPRISE
Kurt Thomet 105

TOOLS, TRICKS, AND TACTICS THAT
WORK
David Law 121

SHOOTING FOR THE MOON
Patrick Smith 133

SUCCESS MAKES YOU JUST LIKE
EVERYONE ELSE
Daniel A. Turner 147

LEADING A VIRTUAL ORGANIZATION
FOR PLEASURE AND PROFIT
Russ W. Intravartolo 167

BACK TO BASICS: SUCCESS THROUGH
ETHICAL AND SOUND FUNDAMENTALS
Mark Esiri 179
SEIZING THE GOLDEN MARKET
OPPORTUNITY
James D. Murphy 191

LEARNING TO FLY IN BUSINESS COMBAT
Acknowledgements & Dedications 239

The Entrepreneurial Problem Solver
LIFE LESSONS: BUILD YOUR

TEAM OF ENTREPRENEURS
GARY L. MOULTON
Glyphics Communications
Chief Executive Officer
11
Inside The Minds
The LIFE Method: An Overview
The LIFE Method will help your organization build and sustain a
team of “thinkers,” who, in turn, will bring to your business the
very thing for which the method is named – life. Too many
companies, through poor leadership, build an environment that
can literally drain the life out of their employees. By focusing on
four areas, a leader can ensure he or she is creating and
supporting a working environment that breathes life into its
employees. The four stages of the LIFE Method are:
Leadership
Information
Follow-up
Execution
Just as a plant needs a specific environment to develop and grow

– the right type of soil, light, water, temperature, etc. – so does
the entrepreneurial company. The LIFE Method will help create
the specific environment for entrepreneurial thinking within a
business.
Leadership
Leadership is like the soil. If it is full of nutrients (motivation,

creativity, integrity, etc.), it will support the continued growth
and development necessary for business to blossom. If it is full
of poisons (control, finger-pointing, dictatorship, etc.), nothing
can or will grow. It all starts at the bottom.
I know what you’re thinking. Don’t I mean the top?
No.
Why?
12
True leaders are great supporters. They are motivators. An

entrepreneurial environment requires great leadership. When you
think of leadership, throw out the old mindset of a hierarchical
pyramid with the executive at the top. Invert that pyramid.
Did you know the majority of Abraham Lincoln’s letters were

signed “Your Obedient Servant”? He didn’t sign them “Your
Commander-In-Chief,” nor did he sign as “Your President.” This
speaks volumes about the leadership style of one of the world’s
greatest leaders.
The number one killer of the LIFE Method is ego. I call ego the
morning glory of leadership. Once it has been introduced into
your entrepreneurial environment, it can quickly spread, feeding
off the nutrients needed for more productive aspects of business
to flourish, until it has suffocated everything in its path. There is
nothing wrong with taking pride in a job well done; in fact, you
should promote team pride because it leads to confidence. You
want confident employees. But if pride and confidence turn into
ego, if one becomes focused more on the “me” than the team,
that pride turns into arrogance. Contrary to popular belief, there
is no such thing as an arrogant leader. There are only arrogant
dictators.
I often hear people refer to “entrepreneurial management,” but I

believe that to be a contradiction of terms. Entrepreneurs think
outside the box, while managers work within it. Entrepreneurs
focus on breaking barriers and developing new methods, while
managers protect barriers like guard dogs to ensure that only
“approved” methods are applied.
I prefer the term “entrepreneurial leadership.” This promotes an

environment built upon creativity and thinking – the two prettiest
perennials that can grow in your entrepreneurial garden. An
entrepreneurial leader will continue to push for better processes
and methods and encourage thinking outside that box.
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Inside The Minds
Information
You have probably heard the phrase, “Knowledge is power.”

This is especially true with an entrepreneurial team. They have
to know the whys, whats, wheres, and whens of each project.
Unless you want a garden full of mushrooms, don’t fill it full of
manure and keep it in the dark, because nothing else will grow.
Information is like water and, if your want life to continue, you

must keep it flowing. Without it – just as a plant will wilt and
ultimately die – so will your entrepreneurial team. You must
keep them informed by giving clear objectives from the start and
continuing that flow of information as each project develops.
Follow-up
Follow-up is like the gardener, and the gardener’s tools are the
measurables established for each project. When I was a kid, I
had to weed our family garden.
I hated it.
At the same time, I knew if the weeds went unchecked for any
given period of time they would take over, and there would be
no harvest.
Execution
This is where you reap what you sow. If you have been focused
on life in your garden, then you can ensure a great harvest – if
not, well, you reap what you sow.
14
Leadership: Step Up, Then Step Aside
Entrepreneurial leadership – not management, but leadership – is

the most important part of the LIFE Method. “Attitude reflects
leadership,” to quote a line from the movie Remember the Titans.
There are a many traits I respect about leaders. Foremost, I
respect leaders with a passion about what they do. When you are
around these kinds of people, their passion is contagious; it helps
you lift yourself to the next level. If you’ve been around people
like this, you know what I mean, because you’ve benefited from
it, as well.
Another trait of a great leader is integrity. One person who

exemplified both passion and integrity was Abraham Lincoln.
Numerous books have been published about his leadership
abilities, and I highly recommend reading them all. He really
cared about people and led by example through making
suggestions and telling stories. At the same time, he knew when
to draw the line. If people wouldn’t step up, he had no problem
taking the reins to get things done. Knowing exactly when that
needs to be done can be challenging, but it’s one of the great
things about being an entrepreneurial leader.
I learned an important lesson about integrity and its worth

through a stranger when I was about 19. I was in California
serving in the military and had lost my wallet at the beach.
About three days later, I got a phone call from a man who spoke
only broken English. He told me his home address so I could
come and pick up my wallet. He lived in a very rough, nearly
impoverished area. Kids were everywhere, running in the streets,
and I couldn’t imagine how the families were able to support
them. I went up to the door, and the man returned my wallet. I
looked inside to find that everything was there – cash and credit
cards – all there. I had about $80 in cash in my wallet, which
could have made a difference in his life, but he didn’t take it. I
tried to give him some money to thank him for returning my
15
Inside The Minds
wallet – he was speaking his broken English, and I was speaking

what little Spanish I knew – but he wouldn’t accept it.
The entire experience had a profound impact on my life. I had

always been taught about honesty and integrity, but this was the
first time I truly understood their meanings. How valuable is
your integrity? Would you sell it for $80? $100? $100,000? How
about $1 million? I think about that experience whenever my
own integrity is on the line and try to ensure that my
entrepreneurial leadership reflects lessons I’ve learned like this
one.
Leadership can be taught. It’s not something you have or don’t

have. To learn to be a strong leader requires self-evaluation. You
need to be able to look at yourself and what you’re doing. You
need to be able to see where you have faults and take the
necessary actions to improve. Strong leaders are not arrogant or
egotistical, but they are willing to take charge and make things
happen when the time is right. The whole purpose of life is to
make yourself better today than you were yesterday. You need to
maintain a constant progression. That does not mean, however,
that you do everything yourself.
Entrepreneurial leadership means allowing people to do their

jobs, not managing with an iron fist. The entrepreneurial leader
outlines the objective, then steps aside and lets the employee get
it done. This includes allowing employees to make mistakes.
That’s not always easy, but it’s critical to the long-term success
of your organization. There are plenty of times I’ve bitten my lip
about a minor issue, but I let it follow its current course because
the experience would help the employee learn how to understand
the issue from all angles. As a result, if the same problem comes
up again in the future, it will be handled even more efficiently.
This practice also allows the entrepreneurial leader to learn each

employee’s talents and offers the opportunity to recognize your
16
people for their successes. Recognition is critical to continued

achievement. The challenge in motivating people is figuring out
what they need to get their motors running. Some people need to
be whipped to get the most out of them; that may destroy others.
That’s the most important part of employee motivation, and
motivation is key to getting your employees to think like
entrepreneurs.
Getting your employees to think like entrepreneurs is a good

thing. The entrepreneurial leader does not have the monopoly on
entrepreneurial thinking; however, the entrepreneur is critical to
getting employees to think like entrepreneurs. In this case it does
start at the top. As I stated earlier, entrepreneurial leaders offer
leadership, not management. You set objectives, then back away.
It’s important to think through the entire process, and that needs
to be conveyed to your employees. They need to look at a
problem from A to Z, which means weighing the various and
extended repercussions of their actions. Often, employees are not
allowed the freedom to think, so all they do is follow directives.
In that scenario they’re robots, not people, let alone
entrepreneurial thinkers.
At the same time, finding and hiring entrepreneurial people can

be a challenge. One element I’ve found is key to the search is a
positive attitude. I have never met an entrepreneurial thinker who
does not have a positive outlook on life. Plain and simple, it’s
not hard to convince yourself you’ll fail. When I’m hiring, I
want people who look for ways to succeed, not people who see
only how things can fail. Just pay attention and you’ll see what
kind of people they are. What I notice most about people are
their personalities and personal drive. I actually pay more
attention to these things than their individual talents because you
can teach skills. It’s not so easy to teach someone to have drive
and maintain a good personal attitude. Once they’re hired, you
have to create an environment in which they can thrive without
squashing the entrepreneurial spirit out of them.
17
Inside The Minds
That’s not to say that entrepreneurial thinking is something you

have or you don’t have. Just as with leadership and specific
skills, entrepreneurial thinking can be taught. If I have
employees whom I want to take the next step toward
entrepreneurial thinking, I may give them assignments here and
there to see how they carry them out. If they pick up the ball and
run with it, then they fit the entrepreneurial mold. If they’re
unwilling to step out of their comfort zones, then they will
probably never learn entrepreneurial thinking. Entrepreneurial
thinking is teachable, but not all people are entrepreneurial, and
the entrepreneur needs to accept that. Just pay attention and see
how each employee responds. Hire and cultivate the right types
of people, and they can help you and each other grow and
progress.
This may sound like common sense, but I’ve seen plenty of
executives surround themselves with people who just praise
everything they do. When this happens, it’s no longer about
success; the focus of the entrepreneur has shifted to stroking his
own ego. You don’t want a “yes man” – particularly when
you’re in a creative mode. You want people to question
everything when it’s time to be creative. You want them to look
at a problem from all angles. That’s why I may not even attend
meetings where employees are evaluating a specific problem
because I want their true thoughts, not the ones they think I want
to hear. But when a decision is made, I expect the same
employees to stand behind it and move forward.
This is an important distinction to make. When it’s time to move

forward, your organization must make progress. There is a huge
value in giving clear direction, and then letting your employee
teams make decisions and take action. At smaller companies
decisions tend to roll up to the entrepreneur. The larger the
company gets, however, the less feasible this becomes. The
entrepreneur needs to hire good people, but also ensure that good
procedures are in place, with plenty of checks and balances.
18
With appropriate checks and balances, an employee can make a

mistake, learn from it, and improve for the future without costing
the company too much time, money, or other resources. With
good procedures in place, the entrepreneur can feel confident the
company is heading in the right direction as it grows, which will
make it easier to step back and let your people do their jobs.
This, in turn, helps your employees take on a sense of ownership
in a project and loyalty to the organization.
In most cases I think being an entrepreneurial thinker shows

more of a sense of loyalty and ownership in a business. This can
be a very positive thing, unless people begin to feel things would
not happen without them. That’s ego, poking up its ugly head
again.
Nothing happens because of a single person. Every business is

made up of a team of people, and a true entrepreneur knows
when to step aside. An entrepreneur is like a perfect Marine. He
storms the beach and moves on. If he stayed, he would just be in
the way. Some entrepreneurs are great at storming the beach, but
can’t step aside and let their people do what they were hired to
do. That damages any sense of ownership the employee may
have developed. Entrepreneurs are great for creating, but true
entrepreneurs see the project through creation, then hand it off
when the time is right.
It’s not always easy. In fact, the worst part about being an
entrepreneurial leader is that people are always looking to you
for leadership – and everyone’s human. On some days you may
not feel like being in leadership mode. But you have to be.
To get around this type of block I try to find a situation in which

I have to take charge and take on a job, and then force myself to
get past it. In other words, I force myself to get into leadership
mode. This is particularly important when things are not going
well. It’s easy to be a leader when things are good. When things
19
Inside The Minds
are not going well, it’s hard to be the one in charge, but that’s
when it’s the most critical to do your job and do it well.
Information: Positive Input
The “I” in the LIFE Method can stand for two things:
information — both the gathering and the dissemination – and
innovation, which can be reached through information. This is
not to say, however, that innovation only results from deluging
your employees with information; in fact, doing so can have the
opposite effect. You want people to be able to see things
through, but too much information shared too soon can fuel a
feeling that things never get done. I stated earlier that
information is the water feeding your garden. Remember that too
much water can drown the very things you’re trying to grow.
For example, there may be 500 implementations planned over

the next five years. But after two years, only two of the hundreds
implemented may have had an impact that employees could
perceive, because they don’t understand the big picture. As a
result they arrive at the conclusion that the executives don’t
know what they’re doing. Although your intentions were good in
presenting the big picture at the start of a long campaign, it
ended up having a detrimental effect on the company. In cases
like this the entire company may not need the whole story at the
onset, but would be better served by receiving it piece by piece
over time. You water a plant every few days. Giving it a year’s
worth of water all at once just creates a flash flood.
At the same time, if things are not going as planned and you
receive negative feedback, you need to acknowledge the intent
behind it. The employee went to the trouble of voicing his or her
opinion, which shows the person cares at some level. So
acknowledging the employee’s input will go a lot further than
20
saying, “It will happen this way or not at all.” This approach
lends itself to an environment free for the sharing of ideas.
Your job as the entrepreneur is to create the environment in

which people can ask for input and share their thoughts without
fear of reproach or ridicule. If people ask for input, provide it,
but be careful not to get into a situation where someone will
never make a decision without your input. I avoid this by asking
questions to guide the employee toward a solution. I know it can
be difficult, but calling an idea foolish or useless kills a person’s
incentive to try. Asking questions and guiding them toward a
more effective solution teaches them to go through the same
process on the next go-round without coming to me. Next time
they may bounce ideas off other managers or their coworkers,
rather than the entrepreneur, getting everyone more involved.
More direct involvement then results in more personal vested
interest. More vested interest in a company and its projects is a
goal in itself. You want your employees to care. You want them
to take initiative. How to foster these types of behavior should be
part of a company’s strategic plan.
True entrepreneurs look forward to strategic planning. It can be

difficult, and it requires discipline, but there are ways to develop
the needed discipline. One way to look forward to strategic
planning is to anticipate the chance to fix things that may not
have been executed well in the past. The start of every strategic
planning session should begin with looking at where you were
and where your planning may have been off the mark. Then go
into an information-gathering mode, and don’t underestimate
how much time this might take. Never assume anything. You
may learn that the realities of providing a product or service are
very different in the trenches than at the conceptual level. You
need that information so you don’t move forward with a half-
baked plan.
21
Inside The Minds
Gathering and understanding information is critical to being an

entrepreneur. If there were two golden rules for maintaining
entrepreneurial thinking, I’d have to say they’re as follows:
1. Don’t be afraid to ask questions. Many great things come

from people questioning the way things are done. Why?
How? Can’t it be done better? It’s not being difficult or
abrasive; it’s looking for ways to improve.
2. Be aware of the situation around you. Look for or create a

niche. I’ve had the opportunity in a short time to surround
myself with some talented entrepreneurs. If there is one
thing they all agree on, it is find a niche and fill it. Just pay
attention and keep looking for opportunities.
Once the information is gathered, go into a creative mode. This

is where it gets to be fun – you have the opportunity to turn a
past shortfall into a success story.
When entering the creative environment, I implement cross-

functional teams, where the people hit a project from all angles.
In the development stage even negative people can help point out
weaknesses in a project that others may overlook. When I assign
teams, I make sure they understand the end goal. I appoint a
chairperson for the team and ensure the chairperson has an
assistant or backup. I also require that every meeting have an
agenda. The chairperson and his or her backup are critical
because, even in a team environment, someone needs to be held
responsible. I personally believe people will grow and innovate
naturally if you give them the room to do so. If they need help,
you give them help, but you don’t do the work for them. The
team, however, does not need to hold the reins the whole rest of
the way. When the project moves out of the creative mode, the
cross-functional team may do more harm than good. Once the
creative stage is complete, the teams need to be more focused on
succeeding stages, such as development, financing, and sales.
22
You’re simply not going to hit the mark 100 percent of the time,
but with proper planning up front, your misses will be closer to
the mark.
Information feeds not only your employees, but also the

entrepreneur. This is another trick a few of my mentors taught
me early on – read, read, read. A ton of reading helps me stay
on top of my knowledge base, which helps me keep my edge.
And most of my reading is not business-related materials. I like
historical books about presidents, generals, and leaders;
inspirational and self-help books; and of course, newspapers and
trade magazines. When choosing my reading material, I use a
little trick a close friend taught me. If the book doesn’t require
you to have a pen in hand (for underlining the important stuff),
then the book probably isn’t worth reading.
I cannot emphasize enough the importance of positive input in

your daily life. There are so many bad things going on in the
world that I honestly can’t see how people get through the day
without seeking out some positive message. If you can make
something this important to maintaining your sanity part of your
personal work ethic, you’re already a step ahead of the game.
Why?
Because being positive is crucial to selling your vision. Being

positive results from confidence. The best way to start building
that confidence is to ensure you understand the vision
completely. If you don’t understand it, then you can’t sell it.
People need to buy into your vision. Your personality can play a
big part in this. Two of the most useful classes I took in college
were public speaking and acting. They taught me how to deliver
a message in ways people would understand and feel on a
personal level. For example, using a little humor to warm up the
audience is something businesspeople often overlook. Humor
has its place in business, just as it does in life. You have to be
23
Inside The Minds
real. You have to be. If you’re not passionate, then you need to
go into a different business, where you can be passionate,
because people will see through you if you fake it. People are
smart. They’ll know if you’re not sold on it – which will make it
next to impossible for you to sell it.
Follow-up: Measure and Reward
I stated earlier that follow-up is where you weed your garden. It

can be tedious and may not be the most fun part of the LIFE
Method, but it’s absolutely critical.
Ensure the strategy is shared and communicated accurately. Also

ensure the phases of implementation can be measured. Business
writer Barcy C. Fox wrote, “What gets measured gets done.
What gets rewarded gets done repeatedly.”
Establishing measurables for each project is critical to success.

Unfortunately, I had to learn this the hard way. I know that on
the surface you may think every organization understands this
simple technique, but the reality is just the opposite. Consultants
around the world get paid a lot of money to teach companies this
simple strategy – measure your successes and failures, and align
them with your corporate strategy. You also need to create a
reward system for individual and team performance. This does
not necessarily have to be a financial reward. It can be simple
recognition for a job well done. Numerous studies show people
crave public recognition. It also never hurts to tie performance
bonuses or other incentive programs to executing well.
Of course, having measurables in place to quantify success will

help you see improvement and focus on execution. You need
objectives at all levels – individual, team, and corporate. You
should first establish corporate objectives and expectations that
fall within your corporate strategy. Then set objectives at the
24
individual and team levels to outline how you will reach your
strategic goals. You also reevaluate your goals periodically to
ensure they remain in line so you don’t get off-track.
So it follows that the measures attached to performance are truly

quantifiable. There’s nothing wrong with challenging people; in
fact, I think people enjoy it, as long as the challenges are fair,
and the goals are understood. Assigning goals to employees that
they can’t achieve will only act to demoralize them, and nothing
positive can come from it.
Execution: Go for Continued Improvement
You reap what you sow. Just as a farmer receives satisfaction

during a bountiful harvest, so should you when a plan is
executed to perfection. Remember that great entrepreneurs
measure success by continued improvement, not by financial
accomplishments. To progress means to learn from each
experience, whether it was a success or a failure. I think it was
Louis L’Amour who failed to get a book published 16 times
before his 17th attempt was finally accepted. What lessons do
you think he learned at each failure? Yet, because of his tenacity,
he continued writing and making submissions to publishers –
and look what he accomplished. Another lesson from this is that
some failures are simply caused by bad timing. What do you
think happened to those 16 unpublished manuscripts, once Louis
L’Amour became a published author?
Always realize that execution is a dynamic – not static – process.

You may find that you move back and forth between follow-up
and execution as you implement a project, learn that something
needs to change, go back, make adjustments, and relaunch. It can
happen 20 times. Or it may be a perfect plan, executed
flawlessly, resulting in the birth of a new leader in your
organization. These are the moments that make it all worth it.
25
Inside The Minds
The greatest reward a leader receives is to watch the progression

of individuals as they blossom into great leaders themselves.
How you can help is by being clear in what you expect from
your employees, then backing off and letting them do their jobs.
If you have set clear objectives and offer them the support of a
true leader, then they will find a way to accomplish them.
Entrepreneurial Legacy
I do not recall where I heard it, but isn’t it interesting that a six-
foot-tall man can have all the agility in the world, while an eight-
foot-tall man can barely move? It is the same in business: Large
companies tend to be lethargic. They get caught in the corporate
web, where employees are simply faceless numbers. This is sad.
Tapping into employee wisdom is tapping into one of the
greatest assets a company has; yet so few take advantage of it.
Because of the rapid changes in technology, companies that

think entrepreneurially will thrive, regardless of size. The big
thing today won’t be the big thing tomorrow. Entrepreneurial
companies will make adjustments to shifts in the market and
make necessary changes to accommodate new technologies and
needs. Doing so will ensure that the company will survive and
thrive.
The best entrepreneurs are those who can see a project from the
50,000-foot level. There are a lot of ideas in the world, but they
get nowhere unless they are put on paper. Translating the idea to
paper forces the entrepreneur to think it through in detail; then he
or she has to communicate it well to the employees. I have met a
lot of people with amazing ideas, but, sadly, they end up
justifying why it’s not the right time to move forward with them.
Justification is the great killer of entrepreneurialism. If you can
26
think of one reason something should not be done, look again

and think of five more reasons it should be done.
Gary L. Moulton is cofounder of Glyphics Communications, Inc.,

where he currently serves as its chief executive officer. In this
role he is responsible for developing and implementing
corporate vision and strategy. He also plays a critical role in
establishing new products and maintaining client relations. With
his extensive experience in operations and customer service, he
brings a unique perspective to the company’s overall direction
and vision for the future.
27
DID I SAY
ENTREPRENEURIALISM?
I MEANT CREATIVITY!
DOUGLAS P. BRUNS
Atlantic Corporate Interiors
29
Inside The Minds
Creativity Rules
I do not practice “entrepreneurialism,” whatever that may be. I

understand that in a book about the mind of the entrepreneur, this
is heresy. But the word is heavy with meanings about which I
frankly am not sure. Like many overused words and phrases, it
has lost something in the generalities of common usage.
It is my nature to reduce things to a simple level. The word

entrepreneur is derived from the French word meaning to
undertake and is closely related to the word enterprise. All
undertakings are acts of creativity. A journey, a career, a
marriage – they are undertakings creative in nature; that is, at the
outset you cannot be sure of the end result. And getting from
outset to completion will test your resilience and your discipline,
but most of all your creativity. The undertaking will be rife with
challenges, over which only creativity masters.
That is my long-winded way of saying that creativity rules in the

business arena. This was first impressed on me when I was
toying with the idea of starting a business. Over beers with a
successful business owner, I was inspired with the simple advice:
“Make something out of nothing.” If ever there was an idea to
captivate an imagination! It was the best advice I ever received.
Thinking creatively is the standard at our company. All
challenges are subject to passing the creative test. I have yet to
find a challenge (read: problem) that cannot be solved by a
creative approach.
You Can Be Creative – So What?
For purposes of this monolog, if we agree the word entrepreneur

(with its derivatives) is synonymous with creativity, we can
perhaps approach our business questions from a different (dare I
say, creative?) angle. For instance, how do you make a business
30
creative (entrepreneurial)? Or how do you find people who are

creative? Or my personal favorite: How do you think creatively?
Once I was bitten by the challenge of making something of

nothing, I had to wrestle with the realities of the task at hand.
Sure, you can fancy being a creative thinker, but how does that
translate into paying the rent? History is filled with stories of
starving artists. Being a creative businessperson is hardly
different. Statistically, start-ups fail at an alarming rate.
Eventually all businesses have to sell something – a product, a
service, an idea, or even a vision. Identifying an opportunity is a
fancy way of saying you need to sell something and are
wondering how to market it. And the sooner you figure this out,
the sooner your business will start to generate its own red blood
cells – that is, cash flow. (Cash flow, which results from selling
or billing for something, is the blood of all business.)
The biggest trap in the early stages of start-up is to forget the

inspiration of creativity and fall into the trap of thinking like
everyone else. We started our business in one of the most
saturated markets in the country, home to two of our industries’
giants. Competing on their terms was not an option. Now, after
almost a decade of successfully practicing business, we
understand we are – and will remain – most successful when
competing on our own terms. Going to market in a mainstream
way was not a creative option for us. The moral of the story?
Staying the unique course, being creative, and competing in a
fashion of our own design consistently wins the day for us. The
creative challenge is: How can we be different in a better way? If
you base your answer solely on a product platform, you will
eventually be disappointed. Products are static. They remain
unique for only a finite period. Creative organizations are
dynamic, ever challenging the pull toward the static.
31
Inside The Minds
Embrace the Challenge of Change
Change forces creative choices. It creates opportunities. It seems

that organizations, like people, either like change or are afraid of
it. Fear of change is related to control: If things change, will I
lose control and lose business? If there is a competitive change, a
customer change, or a marketplace change, will my company
lose business, market share, or money? We teach the opposite.
We practice the theory that change creates opportunities, that
control is ephemeral in a dynamic market. The only constant is
the ever-moving target of opportunity.
Let’s say, for example, that a company with which you have no
relationship acquires your largest customer. The immediate
concern is that you have lost a customer, that you have lost
control – a natural reaction. The discipline to look at the situation
creatively requires effort but is worth it. The situation is rife with
opportunity, obviously oriented toward expanding market share
to a new customer, rather than losing share. So pull your team
together, share knowledge and information, develop a strategy to
approach the new customer, publish some marketing information
specific to the acquired customer, touting your company’s past
performance or products. In other words, accept the challenge of
change.
It is good to remember as an organization that control is elusive.
You will never get everything buttoned down, never have your
arms around it all, or get everything set. It is like squeezing a
balloon: Squeeze it here and it will bulge there. The sooner you
understand this, the sooner you can peer into the future of change
before you and search for the opportunity you know is out there.
The Creative Leader
In the spirit of being contrary, we don’t think much about

management or management style. We focus on leadership. We
32
practice under the impression that everyone has an element of

the leader in them. Some people are comfortable with their
personal sense of leadership, others less so. It is the
responsibility of those in charge to discern individuals with a
sense of leadership about them and nurture that sense. The
stronger the leader, the more risk the individual is capable of
assuming, and the more responsibility that individual must
marshal to creatively (and successfully) manage the risk.
People talk about entrepreneurs as risk-takers. On the contrary –

good entrepreneurs are masterful at identifying risk and
developing a plan to manage – and offset – risk. They must be
creative to think in this fashion, and they must convince others
(leadership in action) of the correctness of their perception and
plan. The more frequently they practice this discipline, the better
they become at it.
There is much banter about “empowerment” in the workplace.

This is especially true in what are deemed entrepreneurial
environments. It is our opinion that individual leadership equals
empowerment. That is, the more leadership an individual
exhibits, the more responsibility they will assume. Responsibility
is what makes an individual feel empowered. People like
creativity. Creative people are often leaders for that reason.
When such an individual emerges in your organization, exploit
them! Or, to be more PC, encourage them.
Good leaders are made. Great leaders are born. If you find a
great one, more power to you. In the meantime, make leaders by
challenging the creative instinct in your workforce. We have all
heard stories of the line worker who engineers a better way to
install a widget, takes the idea to management, and subsequently
reduces the manufacturing time and cost. The line worker is
profiled in the company quarterly and gets a raise or some other
reward. The worker’s creative insight into the manufacturing
process is an act of leadership. He was thinking about a process
33
Inside The Minds
and improving it. He was challenging the status quo. And he was
doing so because he worked in an environment that encouraged
and rewarded such energies.
Good leaders get better and better. Creativity, like ambition,

feeds on itself. The more you experience it, the better you
become at it, and the more frequently you want to exercise it. It
is cliché to say good leaders inspire, but as with all clichés, there
is an element of truth to it. Leadership by definition does not
work in a vacuum. It requires interaction. Leadership is a wave
that shapes the beach it breaks against. It is extremely satisfying
to see the results of good leadership. Confidence in the good
leader is always present. A good creative leader will understand
perceptions that are not apparent to others; they will see and
think in a way that distinguishes them from others. This comes
with experience and confidence. A leader will assume the risk
for decision making. Once risk is identified and managed, it is
minimized, and the leader will stride forward with confidence.
Risk aversion will hinder the creative leader.
Leadership is a responsibility not to be taken lightly. The

understanding of risk to the project must be identified and a plan
for management designed. It requires discipline and warrants
seriousness. The idea that the creative leader (i.e., entrepreneur)
flies in the face of risk and, “damn the torpedoes,” moves
forward is outdated. Believing too much in one’s individual
effort creates an ego that negates the value of good leadership.
Good leaders know they are good because of the people who
follow them. Without a team, there is no leader.
The plan to address and manage the leader’s understanding of

risk is the leader’s first team project. Guiding the team to victory
over risk to the successful completion of the project is the
ultimate goal. Creative leaders will always be on the lookout for
changing conditions and will respond quickly. That is why many
smaller companies are the envy of large organizations: They can
34
respond quickly and are guided by creative leaders who have the
capacity to address risk and change efficiently.
A good leader is a team builder. Teams are built on shared goals

and aspirations. It is the job of the leader to creatively show the
team how the goals will be accomplished and how the team will
personally contribute to the process. If your business were a
sports team, who would write the playbook? The creative leader
would. Who calls the plays? It depends. Some plays get called in
from the sidelines, but the best calls are made on the field, where
the view of the goal line is most direct. In this manner good
managers and good employees are developed, as they are the
ones not only running the plays, but calling them, too. If the
leader/coach calls in all plays from the sidelines, the team will
always depend on the leader/coach. But the true team works
together most effectively – and creatively – addressing the
challenge on the field. This is how vision is shared and
leadership is passed among the team. Moving forward the most
diverse team of decision-makers will be the most successful.
Prepare for the Climb
As I noted earlier, the general perception of entrepreneurial

endeavors is one of risk taking and independent thinking. I have
a friend who is a high-altitude mountain-climbing guide. He has
by all accounts an occupation with a very high degree of risk.
There is no question that this is the case compared to, say, being
a receptionist. Mountaineering is inherently more risky than
answering a phone. But the mountain climber has not set about
his task recklessly. He simply must have a more risk-inclusive
plan than the receptionist. The good climber, like the good
business leader, will be prepared with a plan to address what
could possibly go wrong. The good climber will not set out for a
summit push until conditions are on his side in favor of victory.
He is not reckless, despite the general perception to the contrary.
35
Inside The Minds
The good creative leader, the superior entrepreneur, will be

likewise prepared for unknown challenges. He does not set out
recklessly on his endeavor.
All industries and even most businesses are different and unique,
each with its own time line and business cycle. We joke that our
crystal ball gets cloudy beyond six months, which, for our
planning purposes, defines long-term thinking. Our cycle is
defined by our sales cycle. Other businesses are subject to their
own terms. The cycle does not matter. What matters is that an
organization, lead creatively, will attempt to manage identified
risk within its working time frame. The climber takes enough
food and supplies for the allotted time to summit. Should
conditions within the time frame change because of weather or
injury, for instance, the climber will have a contingency plan:
bail, set about a different route, or bivouac until the storm clears.
The creative organization is no different. It will have set out on
its defined route anticipating potential problems and challenges.
For instance: Is cash flow sufficient? When will this competitive
window close? How long will it take to make the widget or write
the code? Asking the questions is important. Having a plan to
answer them is absolutely necessary for survival. The better the
leader, the more insight he or she will have when considering the
risks that might arise as the business moves forward.
Lastly, there is, of course, no way to fully anticipate all potential

risks. Many are outside your control. In mountain climbing this
is called objective danger. Objective dangers are the things that
can potentially go wrong over which the climber has no control –
a loose rock, an avalanche, a deadly storm. As in climbing,
objective dangers in business present unique challenges to the
creative leader and to the organization. Objective dangers might
include a lawsuit, a distribution shift, or a technology
breakthrough. Properly viewed, some objective dangers, like
change itself, present opportunities for creative thinking and
action, but some, frankly, will force you off the mountain to base
36
camp. Some will force you to hunker down and weather the
storm. This is not a failure of leadership or a breakdown of the
organization. It is a fact of life. Survival is paramount, and such
conditions will bring out the best in the leader and the
organization.
We ask what our goals are. The balance of risk against reward
applies here, too. The most difficult summits, the most technical
climbs, are the most rewarding. They also carry the most risk. Is
your organization fit for the goal you, the leader, have defined?
Has your team trained sufficiently? Are they technically capable
of the goal you have chosen? If the answer to any of these
questions is no, then you have either not chosen a realistic goal,
or your team is lacking. Face it, any leader worth his or her salt
will aspire to lofty goals. There is nothing wrong in this, with the
understanding that the goal and the time frame are in balance,
and that the risk and the risk-management plan are in sync.
When the balance is off, the results will be off, too.
I have heard of failed start-ups that were “undercapitalized.”

There is no such thing as being undercapitalized. The reality is
they overspent. Or, as grandma was fond of saying, “Their eyes
were bigger than their stomachs.” We are speaking in financial
terms, but being “undercapitalized” is a not only a problem of
dollars. The goal must fit the resources and the vision. The
fitness level must equal the challenge for success to happen.
Vision and resources are types of capital, too. The creative leader
will know what is within reach of his team and stretch them to
that goal. If the goal is out of sight, the leader has failed. If the
energies necessary to accomplish the goal (not enough capital or
manpower or time or talent – the list goes on) are insufficient,
then the goal is unrealistic. Knowing the capacity for challenge
is the leader’s responsibility, as is being a good route finder or
map reader. Being creative and of sufficient vision to determine
the route within the team’s capacity is the mark of the good
leader.
37
Inside The Minds
Nurture the Creative
I mentioned finding individuals with a sense of leadership and

nurturing them. I could as easily talk about getting people to
think creatively, or “entrepreneurially.” Leadership and the
ability to be creative are not universal qualities. Some people are
not meant to be leaders. Some people, even if they could think
creatively, would rather have someone else do the thinking for
them. There are places for such people, but they are not usually
found in a highly creative or strongly entrepreneurial
environment. They tend to migrate to the largest of organizations
or government agencies. Creative people seek out opportunities
to be creative. If a leader develops an organization sensitive to
such people and their needs, feeding them opportunities to
express their leadership and their creativity, they will flourish,
and so will the organization.
My friend, the mountain climbing guide, recently turned back

from a summit attempt with a client. “He didn’t want to
succeed,” he said of his client. “Physically, he was capable, but
mentally, he did not want it enough.” He went on to say that in
climbing, every quality – good and bad – is on the surface,
exposed. In business, things are more subtle, but the perceptive
leader will still discern the good and bad. And the excellent
leader will filter the bad out of the organization and replace it
with good. That is the first step to nurturing the creative: Know
who wants the summit. Second, make the aspiring creative
leader work hard; that is, give the individual tasks in excess of
those given to his or her peers. Don’t be afraid to test their
mettle, challenge them, and force them to exceed in ways they
had not previously thought possible. Force them to condition
themselves for their summit bid. Third, reward them. Pay them
well, and give them authority. Be slow to give them advice when
they seek it. What do they think? Tell them to act on their
intuition. Be candid with them. Share information. Include them
in discussions. Ask their advice. Every turn in their direction
38
builds their confidence, underscores their authority, and teaches

them to stretch themselves. Soon the summit will be within their
reach. When that happens, stand back: You have a creative
leader on your hands.
These are simple ideas, really. The focus is no more complicated

than bringing out the best in people.
Hire for the Best Fit
Hire everyone who walks through your door who brings you
value. Practice this even if you don’t have a position for them at
the time. A good hire, someone who is creative and ambitious,
will find a place in any organization that values creativity. We
had an early hire, a person of value, and we couldn’t figure out
exactly how to pay him. We both knew it was a good fit, but the
mechanics were uncertain. He came in on Monday, holding his
Rolodex, and said he was ready to work, trusting we would work
out the details. Five years later, he remains a valued employee,
making, incidentally, more money than he ever made before.
I share this story because it speaks to a number of qualities we

value, qualities that have served us well. First, all parties – the
new hire and the company – must be confident of the fit.
Hemingway described a writer’s most essential gift as a “built-
in, shock-proof shit detector.” Hiring is very much the same. A
lot of people interview well but disappoint later. Whoever is
hiring must know the real thing when it walks through the door.
In the example I shared above, the hire was first and foremost
based on shared values, not economics. So hire first because you
are convinced of the person’s intrinsic worth to your
organization. This is a difficult thing to determine through the
interview process; consequently, whoever is doing your hiring
needs a pretty good you-know-what detector.
39
Inside The Minds
Second, the hire noted above was a creative risk-taker. This

spoke volumes to us about his ability to function and perform
without having to have the job laid bare for him. The best hires
are the ones who understand the position will be different
tomorrow than it is today. Most important, they accept the
challenge of changing it directly. Base the hire on the
individual’s commitment to change the nature of the position, the
department, and ultimately the organization.
Last, build teams. Our early hire saw a position where both of us
were putting skin on the table. It was less a company hiring an
employee than it was two people rolling up their sleeves and
getting a job done. We don’t have people working for us; we
have people working with us – an important distinction.
Loyalty Through Ownership
One can be loyal to a company, a person, a country, or even an

idea. A process will garner loyalty, too, as will a method.
Loyalty is created when a person believes in someone or
something. The process of creative hiring rewards the
organization with loyal employees. They believe in the
organization because they deem their individual contribution
valuable to the organization as a whole. We all like to be loyal to
a thing we have helped create. It is in our nature to believe in our
portion of that which we have helped create. The organization
that is filled with individuals who have been challenged to
contribute in creative ways is an organization filled with people
who believe in the organization and share in its goals. Like all
things of value, work is required to ensure the success of this
endeavor. Upper management, owners, and every leader in the
organization must on a regular basis demonstrate their interest in,
and commitment to, the contribution of others in the
organization. Some organizations pay lip service to this idea.
40
Such practices are quickly sniffed out, though, and cynicism

gains a foothold.
Take notice when creative practices are employed by those less

likely to contribute. It will send the message that everyone is part
of the process. We have a practice of putting our service
managers in front of potential customers. In our business, the
service managers are where the rubber meets the road. They
make it happen, often taking months of effort in design and sales
and putting it into action on the customer’s site. Who can best
talk about creative solutions to potential customers? There is a
place for the executive sales pitch, but is there a person in your
organization whom your competition will overlook in their effort
to impress with their suits? Don’t underestimate your resources,
resources which for entrepreneurial organizations are often less
developed than larger and less dynamic organizations. We have
been told on many occasions that meeting our in-field guys
finalized a deal for us, usually at the expense of our
competition’s failure to do so. Obviously, securing the business
is important. Of equal or even more value is the enthusiasm
everyone in the process experiences.
Here are some “golden rules” that briefly summarize the art of
being an entrepreneur:
❏ Be creative.
❏ Imagine “What if?”
❏ Challenge the status quo.
❏ Train for the summit every day.
❏ Quest for leadership where it is not apparent.
❏ Where leadership is apparent, strive to make it better.
❏ Do not give up until it is physically impossible to satisfy a
business need.
❏ Fill the organization with complementary talent.
❏ Be lean and never spend more than you have.
❏ Honesty will earn trust.
41
Inside The Minds
❏ Expect more.
❏ Have fun.
The Entrepreneurial Difference
Creative people are different from most people. Most people are
not creative, so to be creative is to be different. As I’ve argued,
entrepreneurs are creative people in a business environment. I
think you can learn to become creative, just as you can learn to
paint or garden or cook, all having elements of satisfaction for
the creative individual.
Business is a disciplined approach to puzzle solving. The

creative practitioner of puzzle solving will learn to see the
picture from the fragments on the table before him or her. Just as
there are people more or less talented at painting, there are
entrepreneurs who are more or less creative puzzle-solvers.
Therein lies the distinction, measured in degrees of marketplace
success. Often the individual who starts the business, the original
creative founding member(s), is not the leader who grows the
company beyond the mature stages of start-up. Management is
hired, not only because the organization requires additional
leadership, but also because the talent that started the
organization is the not the talent necessary to move it forward.
Let’s say a business problem presents itself – a competitive

threat, a takeover, a distribution challenge, or a logistical
problem – the nature of the problem does not matter. What does
matter is the approach to the problem taken by the individuals
charged with solving it. The world rewards the creative thinker
in the business environment. Better mousetraps are built by
challenging conventional design. If the same or a similar
problem presents itself to several organizations, or, say, to an
industry, the most creative approach to solving the problem will
rule the day. Of course, government and legal intrusion will
42
usually trump, but even there lies opportunity for creativity.

Whether the original creative leader or subsequent leadership
takes on the challenge does not matter. Creative puzzle solving is
the solution.
History is filled with creative leaders. It is an old saw that there

are three types of people: people who make things happen,
people to whom things happen, and people who wonder what
happened. Creative leaders make things happen. Individuals and
organizations that have developed the discipline to lead in
creative ways will always fill history. Success will follow them.
Large-scale or mom and pop, these businesses will, through their
acts of creativity, define their times.
Doug and Carole Bruns started Atlantic Corporate Interiors,

Inc., in their home in 1993. Now, covering the mid-Atlantic
region with offices outside Washington, D.C., and Herndon,
Virginia, ACI provides design and specification, sales, and
installation of modular workstations and office furniture.
Mr. Bruns is chief executive officer of ACI, and Mrs. Bruns is

president. ACI has appeared three times on Inc. magazine’s list
of 500 fastest-growing private companies in America. In 2000
ACI appeared on the FastTrack 2000 list as the 41st fastest-
growing company, private and public, in the D.C. metropolitan
area.
43
THE CONTAGIOUS
ENTREPRENEUR
RODNEY KUHN
Envision Telephony
Founder and Chief Executive Officer
45
Inside The Minds
The Entrepreneurial Culture
A trusted friend and former executive in a very successful

company once told me you can’t really learn about
entrepreneurship from a book, from a class, or from watching
others. You just have to experience it for yourself. He was right.
Books and courses exist to help guide entrepreneurs to build
products, services, business models, etc., but nothing can teach
you how to develop the instinct of an entrepreneur, how to
handle the inevitable failures that will come along, how to use
your gut to make choices, and how to take risks to become
successful. You learn all that from living entrepreneurship daily.
Many people think of entrepreneurs as risk-takers – people who

don’t fear anything in business. But most successful
entrepreneurs are risk-averse and don’t take unnecessary risks.
Unnecessary risks lead to unnecessary consequences. What
entrepreneurs do possess is the unique ability to not be afraid of
failure. Failure is, in fact, a necessary step on the road to success,
and without it, an entrepreneur will never know if he or she is as
successful as it’s possible to be.
Entrepreneurs do take calculated risks. Successful entrepreneurs

are able to set goals and hit them, usually with less information
than they’d like to have. A decision must be made with the
information available, but it must always take into account the
business goals you have identified. The decisions you make
should be based on the options that will help you achieve those
goals, as well as the impact the decision will have on the
company. I tend to look first at areas of impact. Then I ask
myself whether I’m betting too much on this decision, based on
where the risk is located and what it will affect. We all make
decisions based on less information than we’d like, but the key is
to focus on your goals and then determine which path will help
you achieve them successfully.
46
You become a successful entrepreneur first and foremost by

focusing on the customer. I believe if you focus on the customer,
believe passionately in solving real customer problems, and
execute well-designed plans, then you have the road map for a
successful growth strategy. The customer must always remain
the focus, and helping solve their problems must drive your
business across all departments. Solving problems in an
entrepreneurial manner requires the ability to think flexibly and
adopt the perspective of the customer. You can choose from only
a limited number of options, and you must explore them,
evaluating the risks in the face of the rewards and making your
decision. An entrepreneur must be able to trust his or her
intuition when making decisions. The entrepreneur must
remember that intuition is the competitive edge that assists with
decisions. Sure, you might make a mistake or two along the way,
but people who live through failure come out of it stronger and
better able to identify risk and reward when making future
decisions.
Being an entrepreneur also means encouraging an

entrepreneurial culture within your company. The longevity of a
company lies in building the right culture. You must create a
culture that allows other people to help identify opportunities.
Risk must not be feared. It must be a culture focused on
delivering value to customers, and your employees must know
that every idea needs to support this priority. Companies with an
entrepreneurial spirit are more nimble, more customer-driven,
more innovative, and better positioned to add value for the
customer. They are more likely to diversify, grow, and continue
to add more customers. From this, the company will provide
better returns to employees and shareholders and be more
successful. Create value for your customers first; value for your
shareholders will automatically follow. This will provide a deep
foundation for the long-term survival of the company.
47
Inside The Minds
Details, Details
To be an entrepreneur, you must want to be a leader. An

entrepreneur always wants to erase a need, improve a life, or fix
a problem. This takes massive amounts of drive and passion that
cannot be taught. You must have a high tolerance for failure and
never become a critic of yourself. These qualities must fall into
line when the right opportunity presents itself.
As an entrepreneur, you must have the knowledge necessary to

deliver the product or service and the business skills to
understand what it takes to build a business model. It is
important to build a solid business model, one that takes into
consideration financing, planning, hiring, and managing, and to
be able to execute against that model. Build a model that starts
small and can grow large. For example, profits are often left as
an afterthought in many entrepreneur business models, but it is
absolutely critical that you have a well-defined plan to achieve a
profitable business, or you will fail.
After you’ve established a business model, it is essential to

execute the business plan as efficiently as possible. Execution
must be stressed from the top of the corporation down. Keep
your eyes on the details. This requires the ability to rally
individuals to execute according to the model. I am a firm
believer that the devil is in the details and that good businesses
are run by managing details. Managing details while still
focusing on the customer is the key to running a good business.
The first thing I do to ensure efficient execution is to establish a

clear and direct process. The goals must be articulated simply,
and there must be a clear way to measure progress. An integral
part of any execution is the management team. I believe that
behind every great entrepreneur is a strong management team.
There are too many details for an entrepreneur to do it all alone.
48
A successful entrepreneur knows his or her strengths and

weaknesses and hires top-notch people to help execute the plan.
The Entrepreneurial Team
An efficient management team must be made up of people who

understand and know their particular parts of the businesses very
well. If the entrepreneur does not have marketing professionals
who really understand marketing, sales professionals who can
sell, or product development people who know what it takes to
deliver a quality product, then the vision will never be realized.
It is necessary to build the skills of the team and empower them
to do their jobs to the best of their ability, according to the goals
of the company.
To be an entrepreneur, you must always be planning for the

future, and that means keeping communication open and
continually reiterating the business goals. While engulfed in day-
to-day business, entrepreneurs sometimes do not take the time to
put a plan in place to ensure the business remains on track. As a
result, a company may lose its direction. You must execute
today, but you must also plan for tomorrow. In planning for the
future, it is important to ensure growth by doing several things.
First, I believe it is crucial to have regular off-site meetings with
the management team, where you can escape, take a step back,
and assess where you are and where you need to be. You need to
ask: “Where are we going? Are we on the right track? Should we
be here now? What alternatives do we have?” If you are lucky
enough to build a company so that it has a long future ahead of
it, then getting away from the daily details to plan for growth
will become that much more important. Break down your
objectives into financial, market share, and customer satisfaction.
Put plans in place to grow; then communicate the plans to the
entire company and execute.
49
Inside The Minds
Next, for each department, you have to set clear objectives that
support the overall corporate goals. And it is important to
consistently measure progress. For example, I have set a goal to
have 100 percent customer “reference-ability.” To achieve this,
we communicate a clear customer lifecycle that defines the steps
every department and employee will take when working with a
customer. We have also developed a program to measure the
level of customer satisfaction. Having well-defined objectives
and continually reviewing progress are vital to achieving results.
Communicating objectives to the company is also critical. The

corporate vision must be clear, concise, and easy to understand,
or your employees, customers, and investors will not grasp the
direction of the company. Goals must be clear and objectives
measurable. This is essential, no matter the size of the company.
When you are a small company, you are primarily striving to
create the niche that will gain your initial customers, or what I
call “launch” customers. As the company grows and more people
become involved, the entrepreneur loses the direct contact that
brought early success. This is a hard transition for the
entrepreneur because he no longer has daily contact with people
who are now integral to the execution of the initial plan. Now it
is vitally important to expose every part of the company to every
aspect of the business. This is why there must be regular
company meetings that inform employees about the financial
progress of the company and outline short-term goals, as well as
the long-term plan that keeps the company on target for optimum
opportunities. This will ensure people are not isolated. When
employees are isolated, they will start to play politics and focus
internally on their own career paths, rather than externally on the
customer, which is where the focus of an entrepreneurial
company should be. Good entrepreneurs are excellent at
articulating corporate objectives and understanding how the
company as a team is performing to reach these objectives. They
must then make sure the employees keep an external focus on
the customer and work as a team to succeed.
50
Building Entrepreneurial Spirit
Acting entrepreneurial is essential in pursuing opportunity and

building a flexible company that can achieve both initial goals
and those developed along the way to sustain the future growth
of the company. The opportunities you pursue should be only
those that make good business sense. Is there a customer? Can I
reach them with my current infrastructure, or do I need
additional capital? Can a profitable business model be built to
address the opportunity? It is important always to put yourself in
the customer’s shoes when determining whether to pursue
opportunities. For example, if there is something that needs to be
bridged, simplified, delivered, or provided I constantly ask
myself if it makes sense from the customer’s point of view. I
always ask the question: “Would I buy it if I were the
customer?” If the answer is yes, I will pursue the opportunity
with due diligence. Then if the initial hunch continues to make
sense, and it fits into the overall business goals, I will pursue it.
Acting entrepreneurial means managing both people and the

business entrepreneurially. For me, this means touching every
aspect of the business. It means keeping in touch with customers
and traveling with the sales force to understand how we are
positioned competitively and what our customers are facing
when trying to reach their customers. It also means being
involved in the financial details and getting the product
developers to understand the big picture of where the product is
going and how important their contribution is. You have a
management team in place, and you must trust them implicitly,
but always reserve the right to go further to understand how
things are working and to help identify how they can work
better. A successful entrepreneur is interested in all parts of the
business and is involved in building the entrepreneurial spirit
throughout the business.
51
Inside The Minds
Building the entrepreneurial spirit has to be contagious. This is

why it is important to ensure that the vision and spirit are
reinforced in every employee in the company. Innovation is
critical not only to the growth of a company, but also to the
effectiveness of employees. Employees who have the
entrepreneurial spirit take more initiative and tend to have more
efficient approaches to doing their jobs. This is difficult to
inspire; it requires keeping the right perspective. Again, if
employees become isolated, their goals will turn in on
themselves; whereas, if they stay focused on the big picture and
common goals, they will be more productive and more willing to
innovate and succeed. Employees cannot adopt an island
mentality. They must all be out touching the customers in some
way. For instance, the marketing team must not get away from
the customer and start viewing the market as an entity instead of
as people. Building entrepreneurial spirit throughout the
company makes for innovative employees who promote growth
by bringing new products and new ideas to the people who buy
them – the customers.
A leader can do many things to set the tone for the company.
You can, for example, bring product developers to visit a
customer so they know that what they are developing is for an
individual, a person who uses the product daily and whose use of
the product is critical to their success. The customer puts his or
her livelihood on the line to do business with us, and everyone
involved in the process must understand this. I believe the whole
organization must be focused on the customer to keep it
entrepreneurial.
The entrepreneurial spirit must also be reinforced by the

willingness to take risks. Employees must be encouraged to
innovate and change. I try to make sure our employees know
their ideas will be challenged along the way, but any good idea
that will make things better for our customers will be pursued.
52
This is why it is critical to hire employees who are innovative

and willing to take calculated risks to drive forward. These are
“A” players, and they are vital to an entrepreneurial company.
They must be drivers, be self-motivated, and have a strong work
ethic in combination with a high degree of integrity.
An entrepreneur can build a great company with great products

and people. Once this is established, the entrepreneur should
build for the future. As the company grows, too many new
opportunities will arise for one person to make decisions alone,
and it will be up to the individual employees and their own
entrepreneurial spirits as to whether or not they pursue certain
courses of action. It is sometimes hard to find those willing to
take risk, but it’s important to surround yourself with those with
an entrepreneurial spirit who will keep the company fresh and
exciting. The great minds within the company will sustain its
entrepreneurial pulse and allow the company to maximize its
ability to provide the best possible products and services for the
customer. These types of employees make the difference
between a good company and a great company. Hire the smartest
people you can find.
Overall, fostering support for a vision is most difficult at the

start, but success breeds dedication and commitment among the
employees. Everyone likes playing on a winning team.
Entrepreneurs should know that what they do is contagious.
Getting people to believe in the vision of an entrepreneur takes

two things. First, it takes a high degree of credibility built by
example. And second, it takes a huge amount of humility,
combined with passion, to transcend failure and the fear of
failure. Remember, nothing can teach you about
entrepreneurship except experiencing it for yourself.
53
Inside The Minds
Envision Telephony has been built from the ground up through

the vision and leadership of its founder and CEO, Rodney Kuhn,
a pioneer in the field of computer telephony integration (CTI)
and call-center technology. Throughout his career Mr. Kuhn has
identified industry trends to create first-to-market solutions in
support of Envision’s mission: To provide software applications,
knowledge, and expertise to help Envision’s customers maximize
every contact with their customers.
Mr. Kuhn introduced Envision Telephony to the market through

the launch of its initial product, SoundByte Enterprise, in 1996
to improve the performance of customer-facing agents.
In seven years, and several industry awards later, including

Product of the Year and Users’ Choice Award distinctions, Mr.
Kuhn’s vision continues to help some of the world’s most
customer-focused organizations retain loyal customers and
achieve optimum performance in their customer contact centers.
Before founding Envision Telephony, Mr. Kuhn helped develop

computer telephony standards while developing CTI-enabled
voice-messaging products for Active Voice, a leading
manufacturer of voice processing systems.
54
IT TAKES TWO:
HUMAN AND FINANCIAL
ENTREPRENEURIAL
RESOURCES
PETER J. VALCARCE
Arena Communications
President
55
Inside The Minds
A Tale of Two Resources
In any organization there are only two types of resources –

human and financial. Managing them appropriately, especially at
a company’s inception, is a difficult, but entirely necessary, task
for a company to be successful.
If a company is funded correctly it can hire the right mix of

people. But many times a company does not have sufficient
funding and must rely on finding people who will become part of
the enterprise on an ownership or commission basis. Let’s
examine some of the issues surrounding the two basic types of
resources and ways to make them both more cost effective and
efficient.
Entrepreneurial Thinking - Finding and Keeping the Right

Employees
I never liked working for someone else. I need to make

decisions. My first job out of college was working for a very
conservative U.S. Senator who was surrounded by several
power-hungry people who jealously hoarded all the power and
decision making in the politician’s office. I remember being
reprimanded by my superiors on several occasions for being, as
they described it, “overly aggressive.” I always felt they were
threatened by what they saw as an ambitious, young political
nerd with a college degree.
The result of this lack of power-sharing was a stagnant,

unproductive office, where staff was intimidated into being quiet
for fear of being reprimanded. Junior staffers were not allowed
to have contact with the Senator without one of the senior staff
present. It is a great irony in the political and business world that
one who hoards power ultimately loses that power because they
lose the loyalty of subordinates. The great leaders of today and
56
yesterday seem to be those who know how to delegate and allow

others a role in decision making.
Take a look at past presidents of the United States. Americans

routinely list John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan among the
great leaders of the 20th century. It is no coincidence that both of
these men believed in the power of delegation. They routinely
delegated tasks to staff members who participated fully in the
decision-making process. They trusted people, and in return, the
people who worked for them trusted the leaders and served them
diligently.
When I started my business I vowed I would follow the

leadership models of Reagan, Kennedy, and so many others. The
axiom goes, give a man enough rope to lead but not enough to
hang himself. At Arena Communications we have tried to create
an environment in which employees are given a task, with just
enough information to get started on it but not so much that
creativity is stifled.
The next lesson is to create a culture that is employee-friendly,

fun, and non-threatening. If it’s a slow day at our company, we
let our workers take the afternoon off. Liberal leave is given to
employees in the slow months that follow an election. I always
try to remember how much I disliked the structure and stifling
environment of my first job and treat my employees the way I
wish I had been treated during that first employment experience.
We give our employees a task and say, “Here is the bottom line;
see what you can come up with to get there.” While succeeding
at a task empowers employees with the knowledge they can do a
good job, failure can also be a valuable experience. Employees
need to understand most failures can be fixed, albeit with a price
that is either emotional or financial in nature. But we make sure
that with each failure an employee is given the incentive to learn
from the failure and strive for a greater level of success.
57
Inside The Minds
We also try to get our employees to think entrepreneurially by

offering incentives. Election-year bonuses have become an
integral part of our employees’ overall take-home pay. We want
them to feel they are an integral part of what is going on daily.
This is easier in a small company, because everyone can have at
least some idea of everyone else’s role in the functioning of the
company. In a large company there are so many facets to what
goes on that flexibility is lost. We, however, can be nimble and
flexible.
The niche of our business is so specific that it is critical once we

find the right mix of employee skills, we make sure those
employees stay. We must retain the services of those who are
willing to eat, sleep, and breathe politics.
In our friendly environment we hope we have stimulated our

employees in such a way that they know there is no limit to what
they can do and what they can make. They have a personal stake
in the growth of the company. We let our people know that if
they work hard, and the business prospers, they will gain the
financial success they desire. This creates a sense of ownership
in our employees. We recently had our first employee dismissal
in the company because the worker did not fit the entrepreneurial
mode of the rest of our employees. We want employees who
understand there will be benefits for them if they participate in
the process of our business enthusiastically and passionately.
Financial incentives are the best and most tangible way to inspire
a personal link between an employee and the company. This, in
addition to an office atmosphere that fosters creativity and
freedom, creates an enthusiastic entrepreneurial spirit that
continues to bring success to our company.
When hiring new workers we look for those who will enjoy
politics – which is our niche. No matter what you do, you need
to surround yourselves with employees who believe in what you
do and who are motivated by the importance of your product or
58
service. This is especially true in the political consulting world,

since so many people enjoy political participation as an
avocation, as well as a vocation.
Additionally, politics is unique because it has such a high level

of gamesmanship. Like a sporting event, there is a final score
that allows you to know whether you have failed or succeeded at
the task at hand. How many companies sign on clients – in our
case, campaigns – with the knowledge that, within one year or
so, they will be out of business? Politics is retail, but the store is
open only one day – Election Day. Everything we do is based on
preparing for that one big day. While other advertising agencies
sell themselves to businesses that will be around for decades, or
possibly even centuries, we seek out clients who may be with us
for a number of months before disappearing into the world of the
defeated candidate. This uniqueness attracts a unique type of
employee – an employee who is a risk-taker, a gambler. Our
employees, for the most part, are political junkies who sleep, eat,
and live the world of politics. Employees must enjoy their
specific tasks and enjoy the surrounding issues.
As a leader, it is important to develop trusting relationships

between yourself and your employees. The trust must extend into
a willingness to help one another in any possible way. We try to
operate our company as a family, where everyone understands
everyone else’s strengths, while also acknowledging weaknesses
in a non-judgmental way that we hope helps each employee
overcome his weaknesses. We value and admire hard work,
determination, and an eternally positive personality. If those
attributes are present, I believe anything else becomes possible.
Such a personality will never lose its edge. Rather, it will rise to
the occasion if a problem presents itself and help solve the
problem in a positive and efficient way.
I often reflect on my first employment experience, where power

sharing was not the modus operandi of the management. That
59
Inside The Minds
first experience allows me to be a better employer. In the

business of creating businesses, it is always important to
remember that failures and bad times are important ingredients
in learning how to succeed.
Entrepreneurial Maneuverings - Finding and Creating

Opportunities for Success
Simultaneously to creating a positive and productive

environment for employees, a company must obviously
concentrate on making money. This sounds blatantly simple, but
it is amazing how much activity is pursued that is not dedicated
to the basic goal of making money.
Before Arena Communications, I participated unsuccessfully in a

public relations venture with a man who saw the creation of a
business more as a source of personal pride than as a
moneymaker. This man was vice president of a large steel mill,
where his position gave him prestige and was a source of great
personal pride. Not wanting to lose any of his community
standing, he made sure his lifestyle was maintained in the
creation of his business. The result was a company where,
instead of paying the employees, all income was used for his
personal assistant, a country club membership, designer office
furniture, and a Lexus payment. These things are all fine, but a
company should consider them all luxuries to be pursued as the
reward of success. I see many small businesses that put personal
triumph over financial success. Personal triumph must follow
financial success. To reverse the order of these two things is to
put any new venture in harm’s way.
It sounds simple, but making money is matter of looking at

everything from an opportunity standpoint. Every activity of a
business must be analyzed in the context of whether it makes
money for the company. Before you spend money on
60
advertising, make sure the advertising actually reaches the

intended audience. Join a trade association only if it adds to the
value of the company by providing training unavailable from
other sources or it if gives you a network of potential clients.
Create a plush conference room only if it gives you credibility
with potential clients. Everything you do must be done with an
eye toward eventual return.
If something will not add to the bottom line, don’t do it until it

becomes a need. If something adds to the bottom line, it is a high
priority. Early in my career I used to do pro bono work for
political campaigns to network. That was important to show
people our organization had the ability to get the job done. Pro
bono political work is no longer a necessity; in fact, it is a
liability because it distracts from paying clients and cheapens our
service. Now we spend all our time on directly finding and
keeping a strong client base. It is a matter of identifying correctly
what is needed to increase the bottom line of the company at any
given time. Once customers are gained, it is necessary to please
them first and foremost. This is the most important thing you can
do to ensure business success. A happy client will recommend
you to others, while a disgruntled client will do all he or she can
do to keep business from coming your way.
When you have a new marketing idea, experiment with it. Don’t
buy 12 months of advertising until you’ve tried one or two
months. Carefully measure the result of every expense and every
activity of your company to ensure it benefits the top line.
From an administrative point of view, keep an eye on the bottom

line to make sure you receive the most value out of your phone
service, your shipping, and so on. Dollars wasted on the wrong
vendor quickly add up and can mean the success or failure of a
new business.
61
Inside The Minds
To efficiently use marketing dollars, it is important to simplify

your marketing message. In other words, what does your
company do that will help your customers? In our business the
bottom line is winning. If we can show political candidates we
can help them win, we have won the marketing battle. I recently
attended an awards luncheon during which I asked the person
next to me what her company does. She replied the company was
into “top-down integration of automated point-of-purchase
hardware.” When people outside of our industry ask me what we
do, I usually tell them we produce high-quality junk mail that
helps political candidates win elections. For those inside the
industry, I explain that we produce direct mail that has
successfully elected dozens of people to public office. Clarity is
the key to a successful marketing campaign.
Once you have refined your marketing message, the next step is
to determine the best form of marketing that reaches the best mix
of people who will buy your product. Nothing can sink a
business more quickly than a poorly placed marketing tool. Such
a tool that comes to mind is the bus bench ad that reads, “Don’t
Know How to Read?” followed by a number the person can call
to learn to read. In this instance I think radio would have been a
better medium. Before any advertising is placed or a marketing
effort is launched, you must ask yourself the following question:
“Am I reaching my potential audience?”
In our business we have learned long ago that direct marketing –

one-on-one marketing – is the only medium we should use. With
such a limited office, few sources of mass marketing are
available to us.
Another important function of financial success comes from

surviving. You must organize your personal life to be able to
withstand the downside of risk – failure. This doesn’t mean you
should enter a new venture haphazardly. You must take a risk
only after thinking through it and analyzing the good and the bad
62
surrounding it and determining that if the worst happens, you are

financially and mentally ready to bounce back.
No market is stable, and the political advertising market is no

exception. You need to understand your market and prepare for
the down times. For us, that means making sure we have enough
money in the months following an election to be able to pay for
our employees and other related administrative expenses.
Another simple yet vital part of the marketing side of a business

is making sure the product or service you offer is unique and
fresh and that it fills an important niche. So often, companies
forget that the first key to survivability is to ensure you have a
good product. A good product will get you through the door of
potential customers and will ensure you are able to stay with
them over the long term.
Another aspect of creating a good product is to install quality

controls early. Employees must be taught that no matter how
good the creation of a product is, it is important to check and
double check to make sure every product that goes out the door
is of high quality.
Once you have developed a product that is needed and wanted

by somebody, you must also be prepared for changes in the
market. That means video stores should be prepared for the
onslaught of cable TV and satellite “movies on demand.” Phone
companies will have to learn to compete with Internet companies
that offer Web-based long distance. We in the political world
will have to learn to live with the new campaign finance reform
bill that just passed Congress. We have looked at ways the bill
will affect our business and what we will need to do to survive
under a new law that adds more regulation to our industry.
After the events of September 11 and the ensuing anthrax scare,

we had to make adjustments to the way we address our mail. We
63
Inside The Minds
could no longer use a return address from Washington, D.C.

Doing so could have created more panic in an already panic-
stricken public. But instead of seeing the anthrax as a downfall to
the business of producing political mail, we saw it as an
opportunity for members of Congress to reassure their
constituents of the safety and stability of the American
government. We stay abreast of the news to know what is
happening and what can happen, so we are poised to lunge at
opportunity when it presents itself.
We look at past election cycles to help determine our future

strategy. We use history as a predictor of what will happen next
year. If we create great mail, then we will be used again.
Capacity is what we apply to growth. We ask, “What can we
handle?” We then assess what it will take to reach our maximum
without surpassing it. We monitor execution by constantly
assessing our long-term goals in the face of our short-term goals.
If we are not going to meet budget we push to get more work.
The most important part of selling ourselves to potential clients

is creating political mail that is effective: We make sure our
candidates win elections, helped in no small part by our
mailings. We make sure our product is of high quality and is
priced right and that it reaches people in an effective and
efficient manner. If we do this, regardless of the surrounding
circumstances, we will succeed. The client needs to be able to
work with our product. It must be responsive and alert to the
amazing time constraints that exist in the world of politics. This
is true of any business. Create a good product and market it
correctly, and the world – or at least your part of it – will come
knocking at your door.
64
Words of Advice – Putting It All Together
The right mix of people is the best key to success in starting a

business. Find good people, be loyal to them, and treat them
right financially. If they understand the big picture and how it
can ultimately benefit them, they will do all they can to help the
company become successful.
If you have the right mix of employees, you will also find your
company will be better suited to ensure that money is spent
frugally and that the right financial decisions are made early. A
company can quickly lose its edge if it does not know how to use
its financial resources appropriately.
Make sure you stay on top of your industry by understanding the

events that affect your market significantly. I keep my edge by
reading prolifically. I read numerous political publications. I read
several magazines and newspapers daily and weekly. I also read
state-by-state accounts of what is going on with political
candidates. In addition, I try to keep my network fresh, so when
something of interest happens politically, I hear about it through
a phone call or an email.
As an entrepreneur, you must be ready to do as much as possible

for your company to survive in tough times. But keep your ego
in check. Survival is not about ego; it is about making money. It
does not matter who gets the credit. If you are a company, you
will share the credit.
It is important to stay within your bounds. Financial expenditures

must only add to the bottom line – make sure the money you
spend contributes somehow to making money. A nice office will
come later, on the heels of success; it is not necessary to have a
nice office when you are just starting out.
65
Inside The Minds
In addition to having the right mix of employees and focusing on

your goal of making money, you must put your life on hold to
dedicate yourself to your business. Time management is
essential for your personal well-being, however, so you must
recognize what time you have for yourself and take it. But be
willing to make the necessary sacrifices to make the idea work,
so the future is more secure and prosperous.
Peter Valcarce is the president and cofounder of Arena

Communications, a national advertising firm that specializes in
creating direct mail for Republican political candidates and
members of Congress. In its six-year existence, the Salt Lake
City–-based firm has produced mail for the Bush-Cheney
presidential campaign, the Green Bay Packers’ Save Lambeau
Field effort, and more than 50 members of Congress. In 2001
Arena was named to the Inc. 500 list of fastest-growing
companies in the U.S.
66
STEEL DETERMINATION:
HANGING ON TIGHT IN A
ROLLER-COASTER ECONOMY
DAVE HEGAN
MAJAC Steel
67
Inside The Minds
From Golf to Steel
My parents were divorced when I was young, and I’ve been

working ever since – at golf courses, restaurants, anywhere I
could possibly make money. In 1986 I quit my job as a tax
accountant to become a golf pro. I spent three years as a golf pro,
lost all my savings, and went into debt. When I could no longer
get cash advances to pay my credit card bills, I had to get another
job. I couldn’t find work as an accountant because I had been
away from it for three years, so I ended up with jobs in sales. I
ultimately found a position selling burglar alarms, and I was
terrible at it. One day, when I was playing golf, I realized that if I
trained as hard at sales as I had at golf, I could be successful.
That day I went to the library and started reading books on how
to sell. Within four months, I went from the worst to the best
salesman in the burglar alarm company.
I soon learned the next important lesson in sales: You have to

deliver what you sell. I ended up leaving the burglar alarm
company because their lead times were too long, and I went back
to the company where I had been a tax accountant, this time as
an inside steel sales representative. After two years I became an
outside sales representative.
Selling steel is very different from selling alarms. You have to

forecast demand, buy months in advance, and persuade people to
spend millions of dollars. Once again, I went from the worst
sales representative to one of the best. During the next five years
I spent a lot of time with the owners of the companies I sold to.
One owner in particular complained that his biggest problem was
getting the steel he bought cut into squares to be used in the
production process. I told him I’d see if I could help find a
solution, but when I looked for people who did this kind of work,
I couldn’t find anyone.
68
In 1994 I found myself sitting in a bar with Darryl Washington,

wondering how much it would cost to get a steel shearing
operation started. I mapped out a preliminary business plan on
some napkins and figured it would take about $19,000 to
$20,000 a month to buy the equipment, pay for workers, and
jumpstart the overall operation. I took the plan to Carl Horst and
asked if he knew anyone who would make the investment. He
called back a few days later and said he wanted to do it himself,
and he began conducting due diligence into the specifics.
I did not officially work at MAJAC in the beginning, but I was

there to witness how exciting and scary it is to start a business.
When the shear finally arrived, three weeks behind schedule, the
company was already committed to getting orders out the next
week. The installers showed up on Christmas Day and worked
throughout the afternoon. When they finally turned on the
machine, we heard a terrible noise, and I knew something was
wrong. It turned out they had wired the machine incorrectly and
had blown up the motor. Somehow they got the machine fixed,
and the orders went out. The first full month was a lot of hard
work, and every penny was counted. At the end of the month,
there was a profit of approximately $1,200 after payroll.
Let the Good Times Roll
When I started working at MAJAC in September 1996 the

company had brought in about $300,000 in sales for the first nine
months. By the end of the first year we were up to $980,000 in
sales. Late in the first year we were able to obtain a $100,000
line of credit from the bank, and the business took off.
I take a three-pronged approach to “selling” our business to

customers. First, I sell service. Second, I sell convenience: I buy
steel, shear it, and sell it. This saves customers the burden of
buying and maintaining the machines, hiring the workers,
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Inside The Minds
dealing with the scrap, mistakes, accidents, and other issues

involved in shearing. Many large service centers outsource their
work to us for these reasons. Third, I sell expertise: I buy steel,
have someone else process it for me, which is similar to our
service of shearing for others, then ship it. I buy more steel than
my customers do and maintain a low overhead, so I can keep
prices competitive. It is essential that the people who buy from
me make money; my biggest competition is from customers who
choose to do the job themselves.
In 1997 we completed $2.2 million in business, cutting steel for

other people, as well as selling steel ourselves. The company
kept growing, and we could afford to hire new employees. These
new hires included an accountant and a plant manager. During
1998 sales went to $3.6 million. I bought out Carl’s share of the
company, and he left the business.
In late 1998 an old customer provided us with some work

supplying steel for large truck parts. Sales for 1999 exploded to
more than $6 million. In 2000 sales were at $9 million, and our
staff grew to 49 employees. August 2000 marked the first time
our sales exceeded $1,000,000 for a month. At one time,
operations had expanded to two buildings, plus a third storage
building, and an office at another location. It was too much to
handle.
Rolling Downhill
Around the time of the 2000 presidential elections, everyone in

the manufacturing business knew the economy was going south.
Businesses started losing money left and right at the end of 2000.
Over a five-month period, I watched all the hard work of five
years slide though my fingers.
70
Managing through the radical shift from growth to decline was

tougher than anything else I’ve worked through in my adult life.
The anxiety was horrible, and one night I had a panic attack so
terrible I was afraid I’d have to call 911. What bothered me the
most was laying people off. I had to lay off more than 20 people
to take the company back to profitability. Fortunately, this
strategy worked, and surviving those dark days actually helped
us develop a more solid business.
By the end of the summer of 2001 the company was back on

track, even though the economy hadn’t revived. On September
10 I was at a golf outing, and I distinctly remember feeling
grateful that I was in a good place both personally and
professionally. The next morning the terrorist attacks plunged us
into another difficult period. By November, any customers that
had been marginally shaky started going bankrupt. Bankruptcies
exploded. All the money we had made back, we lost again. As a
result of September 11 we lost money for the year. Yet, we are
more grateful for what we do have. We have survived those
bankruptcies and are doing all right again today. I like our
position within the steel industry, because we can control our
risks. We are able to focus on our goals, even though the steel
industry is in a constant state of turmoil.
I’ve always been a risk-taker, and when it came to business, risk

taking was an extension of what I’d done all my life. When I
started out as a pro golfer, I was constantly assessing risk and
reward, whether it was going for it on a par five over water, or
hitting over the corner of a dogleg. I like to say that if you let me
spend an hour with a person at a blackjack table, I’ll be able to
tell you whether he or she would make a good entrepreneur. At a
blackjack table, you find out the extent of a person’s aversion to
risk, along with their ability to avoid emotion and stick to a plan.
I’m pretty non-averse to risk, which is important in this business.
I’ve gone out and bought millions of dollars’ worth of steel at
one time with the hope of selling it for more than I paid for it.
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Inside The Minds
Another risk in my business is extending credit to people. Part of

me knows if risks go wrong, I still have to keep the business in
operation. What helped us through 2001 was maintaining the
processing, or service, end of our business. These operations
have become a bigger part of the business as a result of the
constantly fluctuating economy, and they help us control when to
take risks.
Lessons Learned
I have learned that to survive through tough economic times, you

have to stay lean at the administrative level. I’ve also learned
you have to be able to change your inventory strategy. For
example, if I get stuck with different types of inventory, I may
lose money just to get rid of steel. If I stay in a similar product
mix, I can find multiple uses and customers for the steel and turn
over the material more easily and with better profitability. This is
what you have to do in our industry. You also have to accept the
fact of change. You have to bite the bullet and react right away,
instead of hoping things will go back to the way they were.
I have learned a lot about managing people over the past six
years. When I started, I made some terrible mistakes. I wanted to
be everyone’s friend. I knew where everyone lived and what
their wives’ and kids’ names were. I took it personally when
people were upset about something and told them to come to me
with their problems. Finally, I read a book called The E-
MythRevisited, which greatly influenced my management style.
In the book, the author, Michael E. Gerber, argues that the boss
has to build a system and work people around the system, instead
of vice versa. As the boss, you can’t get too involved in the lives
of the people you work with, because you have to remain the
boss. Today I still care about my employees, but I do not
maintain personal relationships with them outside of work. This
is for their benefit, as well as mine. They come to work to make
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money. My job is to help them develop the right goals and to

work them through the system toward the achievement of those
goals.
I have a solid program for hiring a good team. Number one, I

look for someone who has commitments, such as a mortgage or a
spouse and children. This partially ensures that he or she will be
responsible. I also look for someone from a blue-collar
background – someone whose mother and father both had jobs.
This is the type of person who is not afraid to work. They might
not be the prettiest people with the highest degrees, but they will
give you their best effort.
I used to be a micromanager, but I have learned a lot about

sharing power. Most businesses start with a person who has
technological knowledge. In my case the knowledge concerned
how to sell steel. This doesn’t mean that I am a business genius.
The reason we lost money in 2001 is that I was a bad manager at
the beginning of the year. You have to reach the point where you
realize you made the decision to put your middle managers in
place, so you need to tell them what to do and let them do it. I’m
wise enough to know they are smarter than I am in much of what
they do, so I try to stay out of their way. You have to give your
employees a chance if you want to see them deliver results. Just
make sure they are focused on the proper outcome.
To make sure that everyone stays on track, I’ve built a chain of

command and an incentive system. I measure the profit on every
job and reward my managers with a percentage when we make
money. They are aware of the finances and are motivated to
make the right decisions by the prospect of making more money.
I also try to hold a management meeting every week, during
which we review financial statements, walk through the projects,
and assess problems. Most of the time the challenge is how to
get all the work cut, because we have oversold the capacity of
the plant. It is essential to keep track of the flow of information.
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Inside The Minds
Stick to Your Plans
Based on my own experiences, I would give the following

advice to people who are just starting a business: Write your own
personal financial plan, and use your business to fulfill that plan.
The opportunities you see when running a business will make
your eyes widen in wonder. Emotion can get the best of your
intelligence, and it is easy for greed to overcome logic, but don’t
let anything change your plan. If your goal is to save a certain
amount of money per month, make sure the decisions you make
still allow you to save that money. Whether your objectives
involve free time, financial independence, a creative outlet, or
not having to work for someone else, use your business as a tool
to achieve them. If you remember your own goals first, you will
save yourself a lot of personal and financial unhappiness in the
long run.
The same philosophy applies to your business plan. Build a

system and work the system toward your goals. Every time I’ve
strayed from the original plan I wrote on those napkins in 1994,
I’ve had nothing but problems. If you stick to your plan and use
your business to achieve your personal goals, you should
succeed. This kind of discipline will also make you a better
leader. At this point in my life I believe leadership is really about
helping others maintain focus.
Build a plan, set a goal, develop a system to get you to that goal,
and work the system. That is the golden rule. If the dot-com
companies that went bankrupt had done just that, they might
have survived. They were selling several focal points, and they
didn’t have an overarching plan. The idea that you can build
market penetration without profit wasn’t going to work. You
have to make money.
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Dave Hegan, chief executive officer of MAJAC Steel, was born in

northern Indiana and schooled in Chicago. While attending
Indiana University and majoring in accounting, he played some
college golf. After college he worked for five years as an
accountant, but quit in 1986 to become a golf pro, playing in
tournaments and teaching. Three years later he was broke.
At that time Mr. Hegan made the decision that if he could

become as good at sales as he was at golf, he could make a good
living. He returned to his former accounting firm as an inside
sales rep, becoming an outside sales rep two years later. After
four years he came up with the idea for MAJAC Steel and
persuaded a friend to pursue it, joining MAJAC himself a year
later. He bought his friend’s interest in the company in 1998.
75
ENTREPRENEURIAL SPIRIT
AND PASSION FOR PASTA –
A WINNING COMBO
AARON KENNEDY
Noodles & Company
Co-Chief Executive Officer
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Inside The Minds
Starting From Scratch
My experience as an entrepreneur began in Greenwich Village,

New York, in August 1993, when I was hit with the global
noodle shop concept. The entire concept just fell into my lap. It
began flowing out of my brain onto a napkin as I was commuting
to Boulder, Colorado, to see my wife. Almost immediately, I
began typing up the concept and creating the business plan.
Now, Noodles & Company is a restaurant chain featuring freshly
sautéed noodle dishes that bring together culinary influences
from around the world. We offer a big bowl of noodles for
around five bucks, from Japanese Pan Noodles to Mushroom
Stroganoff to Pesto Cavatappi to Wisconsin Mac & Cheese. We
have a very warm and comfortable dining environment, with
natural wood tabletops and a décor of warm colors, such as sage
green, okra, and spice red. It is a wonderful place to have a meal,
and we make it convenient to carry out, as well.
To get the word out about Noodles & Company, we used a very
grassroots marketing approach. I chose a time of day when I
knew business would be slow, and I’d grab three employees and
a box of menus and head out into the neighborhood to distribute
the menus to potential consumers. Literally, we just wanted to
get to the people on the street to introduce ourselves, give out a
free noodle bowl, shake hands, and reach out to every single
household. Another way we marketed ourselves was to begin at
the top floor of an office building, introducing ourselves to each
receptionist and offering an incentive to come in and try our
product – usually a free noodle bowl – and then leaving several
menus behind. This proved the most effective way to drive our
business in the early days.
Noodles & Company took some creative financing to get off the
ground, as well. We actually used both the capital we raised and
the ability to pay for some services with stock. We made our
cash go further by paying our executive chef, graphic designer,
78
architect, operations consultant, and accountant with stock in the

first year. The lawyer required cash. Had all of these consultants
required cash, we probably would not have survived. I
personally had to take out a second mortgage, and I charged
about $50,000 in credit to pay the bills. Fortunately, we made it
over that bump.
The ingenuity required to conserve capital was taxing in the first

two years. We got to know the tolerances of our creditors very
well during this time, and we figured out when payments
absolutely had to be made. Conserving capital was time-
consuming and frustrating, considering it’s an activity that
doesn’t strengthen the business or the team, but just helps to
keep it alive.
From my experiences I have learned it is critical to have a well-

articulated business plan and financial model to demonstrate the
business can make money. I also learned how important it is to
have a lot of great relationships – people you can send your
business plan to, knowing they think highly of you and will read
your business plan, thinking, “This sounds interesting.” It was
certainly a flyer for anyone who invested, as there was no other
global noodle shop concept anywhere to prove it might work.
They basically had to believe in me and believe I could make
this wild idea happen. Having a lot of those strong relationships
allowed me get the funding to start the business.
We have completed four rounds of financing since then. These

were a little different, because we had some operating results.
We’ve been able to sell more stock at higher prices in each
successive offering. At this point we’ve sold shares for 100 times
the price our original shareholders paid. The beautiful thing is
that all of our shareholders have had the opportunity to sell
shares and take gains, even though this is still a privately held
company. We achieved this liquidity buy turning excess demand
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Inside The Minds
for our stock back to our existing shareholders. This has

produced a large, but very satisfied, shareholder group.
Success as an Entrepreneur
The common question that rings through the minds of aspiring

entrepreneurs is, “Will I be successful if I start my own
company?” If you knew the answer to that simple question, you
would know whether to get started or get it out of your mind.
To be successful as an entrepreneur, it is helpful to be very good

at a lot of things. It is essential to have excellent intuition about
virtually every discipline that affects your business. This means
you have good instincts in accounting, operations, marketing,
engineering, architectural design, law, finance, and human
resources. It is helpful to have the ability to be creative and
decisive in all of those areas. I think this is a foundation a person
needs to have. If you don’t, you must quickly surround yourself
with people who have these skills. In addition, an entrepreneur
will greatly benefit from having the following innate traits. In
nearly 10 years of cutting my own path, I have found these to be
the most essential elements of my success:
Innate Traits or Talents
❏ Insatiable passion for your concept

❏ Self-drive and self-motivation to get started
❏ Courage to make the leap from your safe haven
❏ Ingenuity to overcome the barriers before tripping over them
❏ Determination and tenacity to claw up the growth curve
❏ Physical and emotional endurance
❏ Patience to allow the concept to breathe and come to life
❏ A vision for how it will all come together
❏ Finesse to infuse others with the vision
❏ Ability to set aside your ego and pick up a broom
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In addition to these internal traits, several learned skills and

external components are important elements of successful
entrepreneurship. You must have strong relationships and
contacts with people in financing and consulting services, along
with designers, engineers, and anyone else who might help you
get your business off the ground. You should also capture as
much broad experience as you can possibly obtain from someone
else’s business – working at other companies and immersing
yourself in every project you can get your hands on. Attack
every challenge available to learning and preparing yourself for
the future.
External or Learned Components
❏ A distinctly appealing business concept or system

❏ Compelling business economics (risk/return ratio)
❏ Connections for money, people, and services
❏ Organization and time management skills
❏ Leadership and management skills
❏ Good experience and instincts in multiple disciplines
Many people started businesses in the e-commerce world who

were not qualified entrepreneurs and who had neither the internal
nor the external attributes required. Many were not capable of
running a business, but they were able to launch a company
because they had the technical expertise that allowed them to get
financed as a start-up. I think one of the most prevalent reasons
for business failure is that people with specific expertise in
developing the product try to start or run a company (chefs try to
run restaurants, software developers launch tech companies,
etc.). You cannot expect to be successful at starting and running
a business if you are good at only one thing.
Despite the e-commerce boom-splat, it appears to me that strong

interest remains in starting new enterprises. However, much
more caution is being exerted now by the founders and the
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Inside The Minds
financiers. Those who have a broad skill set and experience to

run a business are still getting funded. There is actually far more
money available and wanting to be placed today than there are
sound business ventures available to fund.
Getting Started
When I had accumulated a broad base of experience from

working first as a marketing research manager in new-product
development at Oscar Mayer (Lunchables) and then as a brand
manager at Pepsico (Pepsi), I was awarded a great concept in the
form of an epiphany. The concept for Noodles & Company, a
global noodle shop with modest pricing and a warm, comfortable
dining room environment, hit me with such clarity that it never
occurred to me that I should even consider not proceeding. It was
obviously what I was supposed to do. When I was risking my
own financial future and reputation, I did not really consider or
weigh those risks. I was utterly committed. I knew this was my
path, and I simply had to figure out how to drive down it. It was
not logical. If I had relied on logic, I would not have started a
restaurant business or continued to fund losses beyond my
means. I took far more risk than was appropriate – way more
than a rational person would have driven through. I would not
advise anyone to take an irrational risk. If, however, you have a
very clear vision about the company you are creating, and you
have deep confidence that it will work, then my advice would be
to not let anything stop you.
I am a noodle zealot. I live and project my vision every moment

of every day. It is in every word I say, every email I send, and
every glance I throw. I live our culture and our values, and I
convey my own commitment and confidence in our mission.
Anyone who has this clarity of vision should find a way to bring
it to life. I did some crazy things to make my vision happen, and
today I am very thankful I did.
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Making the Transition
From the moment the lightning bolt hit me on Hudson Street in

Manhattan, I was so utterly captivated by the Noodles &
Company concept that I could think of nothing else. I was
miserable, going to work every morning, knowing I was wasting
time on something other than my new business concept. My lack
of enthusiasm for my job became evident to others, and that
made it difficult for me to be effective. Within a couple of
months I realized I simply must pursue this dream. In fairly
decisive fashion, I arranged to spend a couple of extra days in
Boulder on one of my weekend trips. I coordinated an interview
with the owners of a graphic design firm in Denver, where a
friend of the family worked. I conveyed my interest in becoming
the firm’s marketing director and developing my business plan
on the side. They agreed, and in the next six weeks, I obtained
the blessing from my wife to initiate the plan, found a house, quit
my job in New York, and started my life as an entrepreneur in
Colorado.
From a financial perspective, newly minted entrepreneurs will

find it helpful to have another stream of income, perhaps from a
spouse or a parent, while you are getting your company off the
ground. You really cannot expect to take home pay from the
company for at least a year or two. Once you’ve proved the
business can generate returns, investors and manpower will
become more available, and you’ll be able to begin making an
income. Unfortunately, most new entrepreneurs underestimate
their capital needs and overestimate the early potential of our
businesses. This was true for me, as well. So I drew upon four
financial resources. I went back to the “friends and family”
investor group and requested 25 percent in incremental funding,
took out a second mortgage on our new home, applied for every
credit card I could get my hands on, and pushed all of our
vendors to the limit of their terms. By tapping every one of these
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Inside The Minds
completely, we just made it through the tight spot and emerged

on the other side to become a very successful company.
Motivating Employees
The success of our company thus far has been generated by

hiring competent and committed people and successfully
integrating them into our culture and vision. We believe
employees gain a sense of ownership when they feel they are
actually doing meaningful work and that they are working for
people who appreciate their contribution. When a person comes
to work feeling inspired because they are doing something that
contributes to the creation of a great company, and they feel the
appreciation for that, that feeling weighs in heavier than any
number of stock options could. That is how people become
emotionally invested in the company. Stock options invest you
financially, but they do not get your heart and your enthusiasm
into your work every day.
When Noodles & Company began, we did not have middle

managers. Now that we do, we have to address the question of
how to make certain we keep these people passionate. We try to
maintain a strong level of communication with each of them, so
they do not feel they are getting lost in a growing organization,
and so they know their contribution is valued at all levels of the
company. It really goes back to employees having meaningful
work and realizing their contribution is critical to the success of
the company. As we grow larger, it becomes more difficult for
me personally to connect with each person. So it is imperative
that others in the organization become capable of conveying this
message and meaning to each person.
We have begun to develop some human systems that will help

keep our team well-informed and aligned. Objectives are set for
each person at the beginning of every year with specific bonus
84
dollars attached to each objective. Quarterly, we go back and

analyze how we, as a company and individually, are performing.
Throughout the year we continue to touch base, and at the end of
the year we go through a performance planning worksheet for
each person and discuss how the person contributed to the
company this year and how he or she can contribute next year.
For each person we will conduct five to seven interviews with
peers, subordinates, and senior-level people to gather input.
When the manager sits down to share this feedback, the
employee also presents written thoughts on his or her own
performance. They clarify the feedback and begin the process of
setting objectives for the upcoming year. In addition to setting
objectives for the employee, the staff member gets an
opportunity to explain what they need from the company to be
more successful in the coming year. It’s a very useful dialogue.
Innovation in a Corporate Environment
We have a mantra at Noodles & Company: “Either you are

moving forward, or you are moving back. There is no status
quo.” If we remain static, other companies will pass us by. We
engrave it into our culture that we are constantly innovating to
find better solutions to our customers’ problems, to our business
challenges, to our financing. We constantly push for a better
way. When we select people to join our company, we look for
that forward lean, that high-performance mentality that will push
for better solutions. Then we make them passionate about our
mission and purpose. We ask them to be self-directed. I don’t
provide much day-to-day direction on things outside of the
brand, culture, and culinary arenas. If they aren’t able to thrive
on their own, we’ll help them move on to a new environment
that is better suited to their style.
The entrepreneurial spirit is not limited to people who start their

own businesses or work in a start-up. Some large companies
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Inside The Minds
encourage their employees to think entrepreneurially. In a

corporation, innovation by itself might bring some success, but if
you are an innovative person who wants to create a new way of
thinking within a large corporation, you must bring a disciplined,
structured approach to it. You must integrate and gain
acceptance broadly across the organization. That requires
patience, political savvy, and a sound methodology. I believe
discipline and innovation can coexist. In fact, in any organization
that wishes to grow and thrive over the long term, it is essential.
As companies grow larger, innovative, entrepreneurial
approaches must be supported by disciplined systems. If they are
not, both the innovator and the broader organization will become
frustrated and lose productivity. Most large companies do not
like wild ideas coming from a pioneer spirit. Recognizing this
and tailoring your approach will yield better results.
Once a company reaches a size where the founder can’t reach out
and inspire every manager, you’ve essentially become a “big”
company. At that point you must put the systems in place to
replicate the results that were generated by a finesse-driven
approach inherent in most small, entrepreneurial organizations.
Adjusting my approach to suit the larger company I now run is
my primary challenge. As my father once told me, “If you decide
to eat an elephant, don’t gag when you get back near the tail.”
The timeless adage, “Be careful what you wish for, because you
just might get it,” would also apply to those aspiring
entrepreneurs.
Aaron Kennedy is founder, chairman, and co-chief executive

officer of Noodles & Company, a global noodle restaurant with
locations throughout Colorado, Wisconsin, Illinois, and
Minnesota. A passionate brand builder, product developer, and
global marketer by trade, Mr. Kennedy developed Noodles &
Company based on more than 10 years of professional
86
experience and a burning desire to enter the world of the

entrepreneur.
Mr. Kennedy has worked with some of the world’s largest and
most recognized brands. As brand manager for Pepsi Cola, he
directed national advertising and promotional campaigns for
more than four years. He also worked for Oscar Mayer Foods,
where he conducted consumer research to develop the
Lunchables brand, one of the most successful products in the
Oscar Mayer portfolio. In addition, Mr. Kennedy’s history
includes several years at top design firms, where he directed
marketing and design efforts for international companies,
including Coca-Cola, Sears, Burger King, Swiss Army Products,
Warner Lambert, and The Limited family of stores.
In 1993 Mr. Kennedy came up with the global noodle shop

concept after eating at a neighborhood Asian noodle restaurant
in New York’s Greenwich Village. In 1995, at the age of 32, he
founded The Noodle Shop Co., parent company of Noodles &
Company. Since then the company has opened a total of 39
locations throughout the United States. Noodles & Company’s
rapid growth and success recently warranted its inclusion in the
Inc. 500 list at number 45.
Mr. Kennedy was recently named Entrepreneur of the Year by

Ernst & Young and a “Top 40 Under 40” by The Denver
Business Journal. In addition, Noodles & Company has been
named a “Hot Concept!” in 2001 by Nation’s Restaurant News,
an “Emerging Growth Chain” by Restaurants & Institutions
magazine, a “Concept of Tomorrow” by Restaurant Hospitality
magazine, one of the “Top 10 Companies To Watch in 2000” by
Boulder Daily Camera, and an “Esprit Entrepreneur Hot
Company to Watch” by Boulder County Business Journal in
both 2000 and 2001. The Denver Post also named the company
one of the “21 Companies to Watch” in 2001 and 2002, and
Rocky Mountain News selected the company as one of “18
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Inside The Minds
Colorado Companies to Watch” in 2001 and 2002. Other

awards include Boulder County’s 2001 IQ Award for innovation
in business.
Propelled by the company mission statement, “To always

nourish and inspire the individuals within the communities in
which we serve,” Mr. Kennedy is committed to improving each
community through good works and charitable contributions.
Because of the company’s leadership role in the non-profit
community, it was just selected a multiunit “Neighbor of The
Year” by the National Restaurant Association.
Mr. Kennedy serves as a guest professor at the University of

Colorado, the College of William & Mary, and the University of
Wisconsin. He also guest lectures at the Boulder-based Cooking
School of the Rockies executive culinary program. He is an
advisor to the Boulder Family Learning Center, is an active
member of the Colorado chapter of Young Presidents
Organization, and is listed in the National Register’s 2000-2001
edition of “Who’s Who in Executives and Professionals.” He
earned his bachelor’s degree in journalism and English at
Augustana College in his home state of Illinois and his MBA in
marketing management from the University of Wisconsin in
Madison.
88
ESSENTIAL NUTRIENTS FOR

GROWING A WATER
GARDENING ENTERPRISE
GREG WITTSTOCK
Aquascape Designs
President and Chief Executive Officer
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Inside The Minds
A Home for Sampson
I started my business without start-up bank loans, capital

investment, and all the things that most people normally think
they need to go into business for themselves. To be honest, I
didn’t start by thinking “business” at all. I started out as a
hobbyist, and I built my first pond in my parents’ backyard when
I was 12 years old. My motivation for building it was to give my
pet turtle, Sampson, a place to call home.
I got caught up in the pond and all its critters. They included not
only my pet turtle, but also the fish I added, the frogs and toads
that came on their own, and the wildlife that showed up to bathe
and drink from this little pond I’d built with my own two hands.
It was really cool, and my interest continued through high
school.
I saw an opportunity when the postman, the UPS delivery guy,

and neighbors all reacted with a resounding “WOW” when they
saw my pond. The UPS guy even asked if I could build him a
pond like mine in his backyard. I said sure. Then I thought,
“There’s a business opportunity here.”
By then I was attending Ohio State University. But after my

sophomore year, when I returned home for the summer, I needed
a job. I’d researched the possibility of building ponds the
summer before, and I knew that local landscapers were installing
traditional (concrete) ponds in the Chicago area.
I also knew how much more beautiful my rubber-lined, natural

looking ponds were than their concrete counterparts, for which
installers were charging approximately $5,000.00. I knew my
cost of goods, and that the profit potential was high. So I figured,
why work for somebody else when I can work for myself? I
calculated that if I built only three ponds the entire summer, I’d
make more money than I made the previous summer, working
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for an hourly wage and answering to somebody else. That first

summer, financed by sweat equity, along with the help of some
part-time guys from my high school football team, I built five
ponds, and I thought I was rich!
Great Timing, Little Competition, Much Luck
One thing that helped was that this company took root in the
early 1990s, during a rise in the popularity of non-traditional
landscapes. The tried-and-true green grass, a few perimeter
bushes planted around the house’s foundation – that was all
being replaced by perennial plants, wildlife gardens, and yes,
even water gardens. Our timing couldn’t have been much better.
The other factor was that there was no formally organized water
gardening industry when we started. There were hobbyists like
me, but there was nobody out there really promoting professional
pond installations. So we got in on the ground floor of the
industry, and we had an unprecedented opportunity to help shape
and define a market niche now recognized as professional water
gardening. This also meant that we had minimal competition,
which allowed our start-up company to maintain its prices and its
profit margin.
In the summer of 1992, my second full season, we’d built a total

of 17 ponds, and I was in water garden heaven! Late in that
season we had another stroke of luck when the Chicago Tribune
picked up on a little press release I’d sent out the previous
summer.
The writer who called was intrigued. She wrote a cover story on
my unique little pond business, and we suddenly had so many
calls that I was working 18 hours a day just to keep up. (By the
way, that article still hangs front and center on my office wall.)
We had a wonderful problem that, till that point, I’d never
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dreamed of having. I also hired my first full-time employee that

year.
In 1995 I launched the mail order side of the business and found
that it worked well locally, where installers had actually seen my
crew build a pond. With hands-on experience, the connections
were made. But without that component, the connection failed. It
was then that I began the training and education side of the
business, where we traveled the country, directly showing
installers how to build beautiful, naturally balanced, low-
maintenance ponds.
In 1997 we had another stoke of luck when I met a direct-

marketing guru by the name of Peter Henry. He suggested we
reduce our catalog from 36 to 16 pages and increase our
circulation from 65,000 to 800,000. I trusted his judgment. We
rented lots of names, mailed lots of catalogs, and entered our
current level of catalog distribution. It was at that point that our
business took off like a house afire, and to be perfectly honest,
we’ve never looked back. We’re now one of Inc. magazine’s top
500 fastest-growing privately-held companies in the country.
You Do What It Takes
Since I started as a one-man band, I should say a few things

about my personality and my outlook on life. I believe
confidence plays a large role in any entrepreneur’s success. If
you know the odds of a business succeeding in this country, and
you lack confidence in yourself, you’ll never step out onto that
limb and take the risk. But if you opt for the salary, the financial
shelter, and the so-called predictability of working for somebody
else, it may be less risky, but lots harder to get ahead. And I like
being ahead!
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I would find it impossible to work for somebody else. I

combined my inherent optimism, my confidence, and self-
esteem, with the knowledge of my own personal limitations (I
can’t work for somebody else), and decided to take a swing at
starting my own business – on a shoestring.
I once read that Herb Elliott, the great Australian track and field
star and world-record holder in the mile said, “In order to go for
a world record in the mile, you have to be arrogant enough to
think you can do it, and yet humble enough to subject yourself to
the discipline required to achieve it.” I think the start-up
mentality in business has to be very similar. You must be
confident (arrogant) enough to think you can beat the odds, yet
willing to pay the price. Starting a business on a shoestring is
truly a humbling experience that requires you to be able to choke
down a little crow, and risk everything in the process.
In real estate they say the three most important factors are
location, location, and location. But when it comes to building a
business, I say the three most important factors are motivation,
motivation, and motivation. Some people claim it’s all a matter
of hard work, and I did my share of this. Others claim it’s all a
matter of smart work, and I’ve always tried to do this. But I say,
if you’re a beast and a glutton for punishment, then hard work
alone may do the trick. And if you’re a genius, smart work may
suffice.
I’m smart enough to know I’m neither. I need to work hard and
work smart to win. In my case, doing the all things it takes to
win in business and in life boils down to motivation – what
makes me tick. That goes not only for me, but for every member
of Team Aquascape, as well. My primary job in this company is
to lead the way, to motivate, to light the fire in our team, and see
to it that it stays lit.
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Inside The Minds
My favorite motivational speaker in the world is a gentleman by

the name of Francis X. Maguire. Frank is fond of saying,
“Leading is not getting somebody to do what you want ’em to
do. It’s getting somebody to want to do what you want ’em to
do.” The difference between these two levels of motivation
(extrinsic vs. intrinsic motivation) in a company is the difference
between night and day, the difference between a company that’s
going places in a hurry and a company that is treading water, just
struggling to maintain its market share. (Worst of all, their
employees are bored stiff, going through the motions, and living
for the weekend. I confess I’ve never spent a boring day at
Aquascape Designs, and that’s the way I want to keep it!)
Filling Your Ranks With Entrepreneurs
In my view, there’s really no such thing as an entrepreneurial

person. There’s only an entrepreneurial environment, or system,
that encourages and inspires each individual team member to
meet the challenges, to respond creatively, to confidently step up
to the plate and take advantage of their skills and talents to
benefit the company, the team, and themselves. I guess that
makes me a strong believer in people because, given the right
environment – the right system within which to maximize their
talents – I’ve met very few people who fail. But you have to find
the personalities who can handle your unique culture. The
difference between a conventional gossip-laden, idea-
suppressing, glass-ceilinged, back-stabbing corporate culture and
a true, keep-it-simple, get-the-job-done entrepreneurial culture is
huge.
My job is to make sure the people who work for us are working
in an environment that encourages them to think for themselves,
to act creatively, and to take full responsibility and ownership for
a job well done. And when that job is well done, I make every
effort to make sure the rest of Team Aquascape knows about it.
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Frank Maguire calls this part of the formula “validation.” He

also says it’s the job of a leader to deflect the spotlight away
from himself and put it on others. That’s all part of validation,
and it’s virtually impossible to overemphasize this critical
concept. On the other hand, when the job is not well done, I’m
not shy about recognizing that either.
There is more than just the environment and the system, though.
For instance, an individual can find himself or herself in an
entrepreneurial environment and still fail to respond creatively,
fail to meet the challenge. And if that happens, the responsibility
falls on the shoulders of that individual.
The individual’s response to the opportunities in the environment

dictates success and failure. We do occasionally run into people
who, for lack of confidence or some other reason, just fail to live
up to their full potential. So we look for individuals who are
optimistic and who have strong self-esteem and enough
confidence in themselves to step up to the plate and take a swing.
It takes a little confidence to get the bat up off your shoulder and
to swing at the pitch. But if you refuse to swing, there’s very
little anybody else can do for you.
Sometimes those qualities take a little time to develop.

Sometimes we end up pumping up someone’s confidence level
so they can fulfill the potential we see hiding inside them. But if
we see potential, we’re not afraid to prime the pump and help
our people grow and believe in themselves. In Maguire-talk,
that’s “validation.”
By the same token, I love the old Field of Dreams thinking that
says, “If you build it, they will come.” We work hard at building
an entrepreneurial environment that will motivate, motivate, and
motivate our team members. And our success at building that
sort of environment, more than anything else, explains the
success of Aquascape Designs over the past decade.
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Inside The Minds
Now Aquascape Designs is lean and mean. We have a little more

than 80 employees – fine for a relatively small, but explosive
company. But what happens if Aquascape grows to 800 or 1,000
employees? Will we evolve into a bureaucracy?
For my money, the basic principals are exactly the same. But the
bigger the organization gets, the more the responsibilities have to
be spread out, and the more the decision-making process has to
be pushed down through the ranks. Everybody has to “buy in”
and take ownership of the company, its mission, and their own
job for us to be running on all cylinders.
That “buy in” is either systematically built in, or it’s

systematically excluded. In the global economy of the 21st
century, I wouldn’t want to be part of a company that fails to pull
every member of its team onboard and make every employee a
critical member of the team, all pulling in the same direction,
together. Without it, your ship is destined to sink in the waters of
worldwide competition.
All this is not to say I endorse a workaholic mentality. It’s not all
about working, producing, making money, increasing company
stock. It’s in the culture. We have no benchwarmers, no
spectators in this company. And we don’t want any. Spectators
are dead weight and counterproductive. By the same token, you
have to know your end goal. In the NFL it’s winning the Super
Bowl. In Major League Baseball it’s winning the World Series.
In track and field it’s Olympic Gold. For Aquascape Designs,
our big-picture goal is to participate in the market in such a way
that all members of Team Aquascape – not just upper
management – are compensated in such a way that they can live
balanced and meaningful lives with their families and friends.
And with that as a core goal, we’ll reach our company goal of
“changing the way the world builds ponds.”
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Money Can’t Buy You Love
I feel sorry for those people who think “more money” is the real
end goal, that “more money” can buy them “more happiness.”
What is money, anyway, other than a means to an end, and a
measurement of freedom? I expect to work for a living. But work
is only part of a balanced recipe in life. Work and the income it
produces should give you enough leisure time to spend on all
those other things that make life meaningful, fulfilling, and
worth living.
Using myself as an example, if I can’t do my job in a 50-hour

work week, I won’t do it. Tomorrow is guaranteed to no one.
Figure out what you value most in your life, and don’t let work –
or anything else – keep you from it. For some people it’s reading
and growing intellectually. For others it’s participating in
church-related activities. For those with families, there can be no
higher priority. When work detracts from – instead of contributes
to – a person’s ability to participate in those kinds of liberating
activities, then something’s wrong with the job, and something’s
out of balance in the life of the employee.
We aim to avoid that occupational trap at Aquascape Designs. If

I’m not happy, or if my family is unhappy, as a result of the
things I do for a living, what’s the purpose of work? I’d sum this
up by saying happiness is priceless; for everything else, there’s
MasterCard.
Along the same lines, although we challenge our people to

challenge themselves and to grow, we also need team members
to recognize if they’re operating on overload. We discourage
workaholics, and we encourage everyone to lead a balanced life,
including work, play, leisure, rest, good food, good times, good
families. Burning employees out is not only dumb, but it’s also
costly and does nobody any good in the long run.
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Inside The Minds
Overload and burnout are symptoms of lives that are out of

balance. In the water gardening market we preach the virtues of
naturally balanced ecosystems. In the workplace we preach the
virtues of naturally balanced lives. As management at
Aquascape, we do lots of things to counter the problem of
overload and burnout.
For starters I’m really big on physical fitness myself, so we have

a first-class in-house workout facility and a personal trainer
whom we encourage all our employees to take advantage of on a
regular basis. I try to set the right example myself. We have
fitness contests and fitness seminars, complete with healthy
meals.
I’m completely and totally convinced that a physically fit Greg

Wittstock is a more productive Greg Wittstock. The same goes
for all our team members. So a significant percentage of our
employees actively participate in our fitness program. That helps
them keep work in its proper perspective and counteracts
burnout, big-time!
We’re also a young company with an average employee age in

the early 30s, so we have lots of employees who have, or are
about to have, young kids in the nest. We go out of our way to
make sure we’re a family-friendly company. I know an
employee with family problems is an employee who will be
unable to live up to his or her fullest potential. So we have
parties; we encourage spouses and kids to come to the office and
visit; we have a get-away weekend every summer where
everyone – all family members are welcomed – gets together,
lets their hair down, and just plays. All these things are essential
to inspiring the spirit that’s so central to our company.
I genuinely care about all our employees, and it’s vital that I not
only tell them, but I show them, in tangible ways, that we really
do care. I figure if I go out of my way to treat my team members
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right, they’ll go out of their way to treat our customers right. And
as long as our customers are being treated right, their inclination
to pitch a new tent with my competition is minimal. So we just
continue to deal all our cards right off the top the deck – nothing
under the table, for employees or customers.
Customer Care Is Critical
Our competition credits our success to “good marketing,” by

which they really mean good advertising. But my definition of
marketing is broader than our competition’s. When it comes to
the customer, we’re in business for one reason, and one reason
only, and that is to make sure our customer succeeds and
prospers in the water gardening business. We attack that end
goal in a number of ways.
For example, we work very hard at giving our customers the

most bang for their buck in the pond products we sell. We sell
only items we’ve tested thoroughly, we use ourselves, and we
actually believe in. That means there are plenty of items in the
water gardening market you can’t buy from us. We also go to
great lengths to educate our customers about water gardens, so
they understand why some things are worth their time and effort,
and others waste it.
We turn orders around faster than anyone else in the industry.

And with our new dealer program, we’ll have local access all
around the country, so an installer can drive up and get what they
need any time. Service in any industry is critical, so we support
our installers with an incredibly knowledgeable tech staff who
are on call, toll-free, 10 hours a day, five days a week for an
installer to call whenever he has a problem.
Another way we support our customers is through our

nationwide educational tours. For starters, each year we travel to
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Inside The Minds
more than 60 cites and put on “Build a Pond Day” seminars,

where we teach up to 50 installers about our systematic pond
building methods. It’s a real hands-on experience, and customers
walk away from it feeling they have the confidence to do the job
correctly in their own local markets. There’s no substitute for
actually being there and doing the job with your own two hands.
We also host our biannual “Growing Your Water Garden

Business” seminar tour in cities around the country. This
program is more theoretical, more business oriented. You can
have the best product on the market, but if you fail to get enough
customers, or fail to correctly interpret the numbers your
company generates, you won’t be in business for long.
It’s our job to make sure our customers succeed. We take this job
seriously, and our customers all know it. I’m proud of saying
that we not only talk the talk, but we also walk the talk, and that
wins customers every day of the year. If all these things are
involved in “good marketing,” our competition is right about us.
Strength in Communication
I was a communications major at Ohio State, and although I’ve

always felt I learned more outside of class than in class, my
appreciation of the importance of communications is my
strongest suit. That appreciation probably comes from both the
major I chose to pursue in college, and that my mother was an
English teacher. She was a big influence on my thinking in this
regard.
In any case, since day one, I’ve been a stickler for good
communications, and at Aquascape we go to great lengths to
communicate clearly and regularly on two levels. First, we
communicate internally with our teammates. And second, we
communicate externally with our customers, whether they’re
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contractors who use our kits to install ponds, or consumers who

are the end-users of our products.
Our customer relations department produces a quarterly

newsletter for all our dealers. Our publishing department
produces two quarterly magazines, one aimed at the trade and
one aimed at the consumer. I personally write articles in various
trade magazines on a regular basis.
Our marketing department produces all sorts of marketing

materials designed to help our installers communicate with
customers and attract more customers. The tech department
produces video tapes and helps produce books and various other
communication materials. We even have a weekly internal,
employee-produced newsletter called The Froggie Chronicles,
which keeps everyone involved, up-to-date, and informed about
all kinds of things going on in the company.
Take a look at any failing company, and I’ll show you a

company that does not communicate effectively with its various
markets. As along as I am at the helm of Aquascape Designs, we
will be strong proponents of clear and regular communication.
More than any one thing, that’s what I bring to the table.
Moving Aquascape Into the Future
We are revamping our business model based on a book we’ve

discovered recently. It’s called The Great Game of Business, and
its author is Jack Stack.
Stack is a proponent of a strategy he calls Open Book

Management, in which all employees are given access to, and are
taught to understand, all the books – the antidote to future
Enrons. Furthermore, employees are strongly encouraged to
study their jobs closely and to make suggestions they think will
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Inside The Minds
streamline the process and make the company more efficient,

more competitive, and more profitable. When they do so, the
employee shares financially in the savings that are generated
from their suggestion. The whole thing ends up in an ESOPS
(employee stock ownership plan), effectively throwing everyone
in the company on the same side of the bunker, working together
for the common good of the whole team. Talk about
systematically building a fire-in-the-belly level of motivation!
This strategy is being implemented by a few businesses around

the country, so we’re by no means leading the pack on this thing.
It’s very hands-on and practical, as opposed to theoretical pie-in-
the-sky. It’s been tried and tested in numerous business settings.
But as far as I know, we’re the only company in the water
gardening industry that is planning to implement Jack Stack’s
open-book management strategy. Done correctly, this will put
turbo jets on our operation, and I can hardly wait to see how it
works out for us.
Some people say to me, “Greg, you already have a company

that’s eating your competition for lunch. Why fix something that
isn’t broken?” But my feeling is different. I am personally
always looking for ways to improve myself physically, mentally,
and spiritually. I see no difference when it comes to my business.
If we sit back and rest on yesterday’s headlines, it won’t be long

before we’re no longer leading the pack. And I don’t care for the
view in second place, so I constantly look for ways we can
improve, streamline, become a more efficient and effective team.
The Great Game of Business offers concepts I know we can all
take to the bank. So why not implement and improve? That’s my
question. Isn’t this all just common sense?
I’ve said “team” about a thousand times; obviously, teamwork is

important to me. I was a member of the 1986 Illinois state high
school football championship team my junior year at Wheaton
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North High School. To this day, I can’t remember an experience

that was more exhilarating.
Our coach (Jim Rexilius, still the greatest single influence in my

life) preached teamwork, teamwork, teamwork, and motivated,
motivated, motivated his team members. In a sense, I suppose
I’m still just chasing down another championship ring. I love
sports and thrive on competition and good times, and Aquascape
Designs is a reflection of that orientation. And I won’t rest until I
see my dream of “changing the way the world builds ponds”
become a reality!
Greg Wittstock is the president and chief executive officer of

Aquascape Designs, Inc., of Batavia, Illinois, a company ranked
in Inc. magazine’s top 500 fastest-growing privately-held
companies in the U.S. for the past three years. In 1991 Mr.
Wittstock began his business with four assets – a shovel, a
wheelbarrow, a strong back, and the foresight (some would say
audacity) to think he could build a profitable business around
backyard ponds and water gardens. With his fierce
entrepreneurial spirit, Mr. Wittstock turned these four decidedly
unbankable assets into a $30,000,000 runaway train that
currently controls a full 70 percent of an exploding market.
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TOOLS, TRICKS, AND TACTICS

THAT WORK
KURT THOMET
Quest Solutions
President
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Inside The Minds
Identifying Marketplace Opportunities
In high tech, the game is in spotting the trends that will be long-
lasting and sustainable. As the products and services that are
most profitable become adopted, they create momentum. It
makes the most sense to look first at install base, profit margins,
and gaps. Once known, they are further evaluated by
determining whether a second and third market opportunity is
available with minor modifications or as a fallback market.
It is kind of like being a futurist and a historian, with a sales and

marketing bent. A current day example is pen-based computing.
It was mired down in 10 years of small niche marketing to early
adopters of “gee whiz” technology. When the idea of wrapping a
day planner, address book, and to-do list into one device collided
with an affordable portable, the technology took off. Now the
makers of these devices are using a second and third market
opportunity to capitalize on the wave of widespread adoption of
cell phones and PDAs to design the next device that will take
advantage of a large install base and a possible convergence of
these two markets into a new one.
Other opportunity areas are easy to spot by looking at other

industries and adopting some of their marketing, products, or
tactics, then recombining those ideas around your products and
services in easier to use or lower cost ways. An example of this
is Intel selling a more expensive product (chips) by changing the
sale to a total cost of ownership presentation. New cars are being
sold at a much more brisk pace when leasing is used as the tool
to create affordability. You cannot leave an appliance store or
office products store without being offered an extended service
agreement at the time of your major purchase. Taking these three
ideas together to the mobile computing industry has yielded
great results and has created a successful competitive
differentiator. The game was changed to keep the competition
guessing and out of the game.
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My entrepreneurial management style could be described as a

trusting, hands-off, tough, nearsighted, mistake-making
submariner named Johnny Appleseed. I plant seeds everywhere,
creating many small experiments in many different markets, not
putting all of the effort on only one initiative. Once a tree begins
to bear fruit, we pour more resources at the new “money tree.”
We hire the right people and empower them with the ability to
self-manage and perform to their potential using good people
skills and the cumulative wisdom of their team. We push so hard
that we make mistakes, but the mistakes we make build us and
build our relationships with our customers. When we review
successes we have had with our customers, they are most often
filled with mistakes. When we look at those customer
relationships, we know our painful mistake recoveries are what
strengthened our hold on that customer.
With employees there is no handholding, only a requirement to

perform. Great professional sales reps are attracted by tight
control of pay plans that lean toward commission-only plans
without guarantees and without caps. Management prioritization
of problems and opportunities is most often based on
nearsighted, short-term benefits. Long-term planning is a year
out, not five years. We change who we are very quickly, based
on what the market tells us. Key managers make phone calls
once in the morning and once in the afternoon, recapping
successes and failures, and then changing the company based on
that input. We call it torpedo tactics – continuously keeping the
torpedo on course by making many small adjustments along the
way.
Employees as Entrepreneurs
On the sales side, getting the salespeople to think a bit differently

is what makes deals happen. Working on a deal together, looking
at various ways of combining different elements is what actually
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Inside The Minds
closes business. Using strong business logic, return on

investment analysis, and creative “what if” analysis, our sales
team learns to create deals in a style that is our norm.
On the operations side we encourage the entrepreneurial style

through positive strokes, regular recognition, and storytelling.
We conduct company-wide training that focuses on our core
values and a review of the mistakes we have made, along with
the unique entrepreneurial style that was used to cure the
problems we faced in the past.
How does this change at a big versus a small company? As long

as the teams are kept small enough, the divisions have their own
goals, and people are empowered, quick change can occur. This
is the unique characteristic of entrepreneurs that excites me.
There is no boredom because we are always changing, always
improving. Looking at the best large companies will show you
they operate as mini-companies within companies. Many times
they are actually part of a rollup that allowed autonomy after
acquisition. Failures occur when too much change is required by
the acquiring company dictating widespread cultural changes.
People are the most important assets of an entrepreneurial
company, not policies and procedures. Balance is required to
avoid the chaos created by too many entrepreneurs in one
company. When creative people are forced to live with rules and
too much structure, their business soul is destroyed, and they
whither. This is one of the reasons a company cannot be entirely
full of entrepreneurs. Entrepreneurs must lead, working with a
team that can support the vision, to implement the plans and to
develop the policies and procedures required to survive in some
sort of predictable business model.
Finding people who are entrepreneurial is a search for open-

minded, flexible employees who are intelligent, responsible, and
moral. It is a company norm that can be taught to good people, a
way we do business. We do not want all employees to be
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entrepreneurial because we would train them and then lose them

to their own ventures. How entrepreneurial do you want them? It
is a trait you like to see come out in employees sometimes, but
not all the time. I would say management can have it, but that it
creates too much chaos among the ranks. If someone exhibits
these characteristics, they demand to be considered for
management through their innovative ideas.
What do entrepreneurs do that is special? How is the way they

think special? High growth and rapid change are the most special
traits found in entrepreneurs. The other biggest gift found in this
group is the ability to overcome the odds. They are the eternal
optimists who look at mistakes and setbacks as successes in
disguise. When the company is bigger, better funded, and better
staffed, the entrepreneur magically finds a way to win. Jumping
over industry norms, around tougher competition, and under
barriers set up by unfriendly foes, the ever agile entrepreneur
always seems to find a way to be involved in taking business
away from the expected sure winner, through his or her ability to
take a blank slate and create a living and vibrant business that
changes lives and markets.
To allow a team of individuals to form out of very separate lives

is both special and difficult. It is all about creating the culture,
the business plan, the norms, and the repeatable successes.
Maintaining a changing vision that evolves over the life of the
business is the burden that comes with the job. It is one of the
most challenging and exciting parts of being an entrepreneur.
Sharing that vision is what excites and motivates the people who
join this cause.
Special differences are built into the belief system. A bit of rebel,
out-of-the-norm thinking is common, as is believing in the vision
of the business without interference from what others say and
what has been done before. This trait is a gift and a curse. If the
leader cannot get enough customers to help support the vision,
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the business fails. What must occur in the process is a feedback

loop from customers that is constant and everlasting.
The other problem is dealing with change. As the business grows

from one stage to the next, the skill sets required change. It is my
belief that the very best entrepreneurs gain the wisdom to bring
in different professionals along the way to fill new slots as the
business matures. Staying true to the passions of building,
creating, and growing means putting others in place to farm what
has been created to date. The notion of hunters and gatherers
seems to fit the evolution of an entrepreneurial organization. The
organization needs both types of employees – those who seek out
opportunity and start relationships and those who maintain those
relationships. These are two different types of employees, with
very different skill sets.
Being an entrepreneurial thinker gives an individual a sense of

loyalty to and ownership of the business. It is part of the
democratic company – a shared sense of ownership that comes
from the ability to make a difference.
Momentum Marketing, Planning, and Execution
Change is what we look for. It is the indicator of momentum

marketing and creates all of the large sales and opportunity for
the company. In the product adoption lifecycle, the bell curve is
split into early adopters, early majority, widespread adoption,
and, going down the other side of the curve, the late majority and
the laggards. Spotting the services and products that are about to
enter the majority is how we make our money. We also look at
the most popular products and draft behind them, creating
support products and services for the very largest trends.
The planning in our entrepreneurial organization is part of the

founder’s continuous, everyday activities. After the revenue and
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sales model are self-sustaining, after the methods and techniques

for creating profitable income are completed and passed on, a
larger percentage of time is spent creating strategic alliances that
do not cost the company as much money as if we hired or
created the expertise for which we look to alliances. It is part of
the Johnny Appleseed job of trying a bunch of different ideas to
find one that works. We can share in the risk with another
company, another alliance, and then either learn the skills we did
not have or develop the partnership more fully.
We make sure our company executes through information

systems that are stable and metrics that are known, measured,
and adhered to. Focusing our sales team on weekly goals, as
opposed to monthly or yearly, works better for us. Focusing on
the most realistic sales opportunities is the most difficult task the
sales representative has to do. As a sales mentor, it is our job to
continuously help them to stay on task and to effectively
prioritize opportunity. The model of a balanced investment
portfolio with high growth, large cap, and secure, reliable payoff
is the same one we follow for opportunity management.
Empowering other executives or middle managers is the only

way to get enough done in a high-growth business. Allowing
managers and their employees to make mistakes and
empowering them to take corrective actions pushes them harder
and teaches them self-reliance. Power for employees to effect
change has no limits and is encouraged. We prevent the abuse of
power by splitting final large decision making to a team of two
or more.
Vision of Success: A Balanced Life
My vision of success is a balanced life, full of family and friends

who enjoy very frequent gatherings away from work. Playing,
laughing, sharing, and caring are the cornerstones of this
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lifestyle. Realistic pleasure comes from a happy heart that is

honest and full. Our work, our employees, our families, and our
fun should all be blended in a healthy and exciting life.
Dealing with the stress that comes with rapid growth and change
is the biggest single problem I have encountered. Because of the
speed, the volume, and the frequency of change, it is difficult to
kick back and relax. Squeezing in a midday workout helps
relieve some of the stress. Taking long weekends and quarterly
family vacations helps lower the average work hours per week
below a scary number. Keeping weekends and school nights free
of work is the best way to schedule and force down time.
Because there is so much to do, I find myself using time after my
family is in bed and before they are up in the morning to get
more done. Weekends are usually spent with only family and
friends, seldom with work.
Charging Up and Taking Risks
Selling yourself, your product, your vision to prospective clients,

your own team, and others is an ongoing process. Belief in your
own abilities has to come first. Confidence, competence, and
wisdom must be full-blast and contagious. Our people are
charged up daily with interaction from our most gifted people
manager. Our prospective clients come to our Web site for a
consistent story delivery. Our vendors get to know us through
working together, through a concerted effort to educate, and
through feedback from our customers.
Jumping off the cliff is always hard. Each of our life-changing

events is looked at that way. You get to the edge, where the
decision to do something has to take place. You have arrived at
the cliff for a reason. Camping at the edge is dangerous because
the reason you are going off the cliff is to get to something
unknown at the bottom. Knowing as much as you can about the
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unknown is the best way to make the decision to jump, so

research, understanding, and due diligence are well worth the
time before even getting to the cliff.
Knowing the person at the bottom of that cliff increases the odds
for success tremendously. All of the cliff diving we have done
has brought good results. Even the dives that were wrong taught
us something of value. We did not do enough research, did not
know that person well enough, or learned what will not work.
We then knew how to change it to something different that did
work.
We like to make quick decisions; we like to get on to the next
level. Evaluating the size of the risk in that decision is what
makes the decision a good one. Hedging the risk is the best way
to allow you to make more decisions faster. Trying it just a little
is like bungee jumping. You get to go off the edge of the cliff
and look at the bottom a little, but you don’t incur all of the pain
if the decision is wrong. Most of our wrong decisions led us to
the right decision. When we hedged, we were able to adjust
faster. Selecting a new accounting package is an example of a
wrong decision that was painful and hard. We did not hedge it
enough; it is a product that is hard to try before buying; however,
we did not talk to enough companies that were very similar to us
to determine the fit.
Cliff Diving and Guerrilla Marketing
The best piece of entrepreneurial advice that I have received is

that the business is a game. The game is about plateaus and
continual cliff diving. It is like being at the top of a series of
pools with increasingly higher waterfalls or cliffs to dive off to
get to the next one. The scale gets bigger, and you have more
people cliff diving with you along the way. You have to be sure
you know your risks before jumping, looking at your downside
and your upside. Being careful about where you are going allows
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you to safely complete the next stage of growth and change.

Taking on more than your cumulative experience can handle
causes crashes that can be fatal or felt for a very long time.
The best advice I can give others about being an entrepreneurial

problem solver is a collection of ideas based around “guerrilla
marketing”: low-budget, against the norm, non-defensible,
change-the-game strategies. Don’t allow others to know where
you are coming from. Repackage and recombine, taking some
ideas that work and putting them together in new, creative ways
that win. Discover the best proven ideas in other industries and
use them in your industry before anyone else allows you to
quickly differentiate, to be remembered easily. Make swift
changes that are the norm, moving the market instead of making
the market (too expensive). Perseverance against the odds,
creativity, original thought, and use of recombination are the
traits that I respect most about leaders. A good mind, combined
with the wisdom to learn, teach, and push, makes a leader who is
most often found in the companies and organizations that are the
most respected in their field.
Leadership and Passion
To build a leader, you start out with three common cores:

experience, a positive attitude, and most of all, passion. Passion
is so often missing in our much too busy lives. We get spread too
thin and do not have enough energy left over to start the
“passion-mobile.” A very high level of energy is required to
keep the passion at its best and burning brightly.
I like to lead through storytelling, through value examples. I

learned that I like to follow a passion of another if that person
can communicate the vision brought out through belief in shared
values. If a story is very like me or very unlike me, I relate to it
and learn to adopt the story line into my beliefs and goals. When
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a vision of future change is believed in enough and can be

visualized through storytelling or goal setting, the good leader
ensures that enough subconscious minds are working on making
the vision a reality.
We shape our children with storytelling, religious reading, and

fairytales that teach values and actions we would like to see them
emulate. We teach our coworkers the same way. Reinforcement
of the actions and values through reviewing “stories” of combat,
competition, or of what went wrong is the way we have most
successfully led our employees. Once a leader has experience,
attitude, and passion, they graduate to the top of their fields
through their effectiveness, ability to spot trends, communicate
them, and then monetize them.
The worst part of being a leader is being involved in the failure

to exceed customer expectations. The very worst part is living
through the disappointment of losing a sale because of
something we did wrong. Being so passionate about work that
patience is short results in actions that may be taken too quickly.
Not achieving a goal quickly enough to satisfy a customer or our
employees is the one that hurts the most and lasts the longest. To
overcome the failure, the disappointment, and the setbacks that
are part of leadership, family, friends, and physical activity all
seem to work well when enjoyed in volume and without the
memory or discussion of work.
Being noticed happens when the passion for a full life is so

strong that it vibrates. It is exactly like being a good parent.
When you listen well, act with your heart, and spend the right
amount of dedicated time, your child (like your business) grows.
You are loved or appreciated more; you get more business or
more attention; and the circle of passion just keeps rolling along.
Good things happen; good luck occurs; and repeat business just
keeps piling up. Your child grows up to be better than you were;
your business becomes bigger and better than you ever imagined
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it could be. Being a truly grounded and well-balanced person in

life allows you to perform better at work. Performing better gets
you noticed; getting noticed gets you promotions and
opportunities; and it just keeps getting better all the time. When
you are imbalanced, the whole person is missing something and
almost always compensates with overindulgence that leads to a
spiraling downfall.
Staying on Top
To stay on top of knowledge and maintain a lead, I read. Reading

periodicals and business books that are outside your field seems
to help keep the mind active and creates an opportunity to apply
successful ideas from other industries in new combinations.
Grabbing an article and doing the “grip and rip” allows you to
share the information with a coworker, a customer, or a vendor.
Sending that information or a Web link keeps you in front of that
person and helps show you care about them and their
professional progress. Grooming vendors to keep you in their
thoughts and in their plans by sending them ideas you found
reading allows them to find reasons to work with you more
often.
Taking advantage of education from vendors and from

competitors puts you in a position of strength, where knowledge
truly is power. Watching and analyzing what competition is
doing and strategizing how we can copy it, change it, or improve
it gives us an edge over those who do not invest in learning,
changing, and adapting. Encouraging employees to take the
opportunity to use equipment or services you sell creates honest,
believable relationships with customers and employees that
make it even more difficult for competition to penetrate your
stronghold.
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Goals and planning are the roadmaps for success. Without them
there is no way you can arrive at your intended destination. An
important lesson we have learned in the process of planning is
that prioritization is the very most important part of it. Writing
down goals without the steps and tactics to reach them is like
viewing the name of a city you want to drive to without a map to
assist you in the journey.
Our sales reps all want to make a lot of money, but often were
bogged down by not prioritizing all of the many choices of
prospects and customers. After reviewing projections, we
discovered that our job as management was one of prioritization
and measurement. If we did not have small pilot projects or tests
going on with our customers, the big number we expected them
to do with us would never happen. After realizing this, we
formalized pilot projects and tests as part of the selling culture.
This was like many great discoveries – simple revelation with
extraordinary results.
An Entrepreneur’s Golden Rules
❏ Business is a game. You need to practice, fail, and laugh.

❏ Coopetition (cooperating with your competition) works. Use
it.
❏ Enemies usually cause you the worst harm. Don’t make
them.
❏ Be easy to do business with. The alternative takes too long
and is not as much fun.
❏ Recognize the lifetime value of a customer. Making less on
the first sale is OK.
❏ Problems are the manifestation of an improvement to be
made.
❏ Perpetually asking why allows you to truly understand and
gets to the answer.
❏ Prune bad customers and bad employees.
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Inside The Minds
❏ Do not waste time.

❏ It is better to do it wrong than not at all. You learn from
wrong; you rarely learn from not doing anything.
❏ Appreciate your customers, your employees, and your
opportunity. Fight for them all.
Future Advantage to Entrepreneurs
The advantage individuals “thinking entrepreneurially” in a

company have over the next five to 10 years is job security.
Change is occurring at a more rapid pace than in any other time
in history. When left without government interference or
company politics, our markets are pretty pure. They establish the
prices; they weed out the weak; and they allow the best to rise.
Greed has created some forces in the market that are vibrating
hard enough to shake up our abnormal norms. Layoffs,
downsizing, and rightsizing are forcing some of the non-leaders
either to find different passions or companies, or to leave and
learn entrepreneurialism on their own. Within companies, those
traits generally get you promoted, not fired. The more agile, easy
to change, adaptive companies that survive into the future will be
those that have cultivated and created in-house teams of
entrepreneurs.
Those employees who create growth and change through

entrepreneurial actions are the movers and shakers who get
noticed. They take calculated risks, winning more often than not,
and losing gracefully. A person who has these traits will be
tapped to become a leader or manager within a company because
of the results they achieve, the respect they earn, and the passion
they exhibit.
Companies will have an advantage in “thinking

entrepreneurially,” regardless of size, over the next five to 10
years. With customers realizing they have power and choice and
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that they are enabled more fully with the Internet, personal
relationship selling and customer relationship management will
become much more important. Those companies that use the
tools of the entrepreneur will be able to capitalize on winning the
battle for the customer. Quick and highly adaptive changes,
differentiation, and personal touch-the-customer actions will be
the winning formulas the best companies employ.
Industry-leading organizations maintain their leadership

positions through success with their customer base that is
sustainable and long-lasting. Staying close to the customer,
having them become true partners in your business, and growing
it together is the way of the entrepreneurial company. Creating
partnerships is the strategy that a smaller company often uses to
grow faster or fill voids in skill sets. Viewing all relationships
with customers, employees, vendors, and competitors as
partnering possibilities is a way of life that creates relationships
that are hard to defeat.
Kurt Thomet is president of Quest Solutions. He entered the

business on the edge of the technology explosion, when the
PC was first taking off in the 1980s, driving to become the
largest Commodore education dealer west of the
Mississippi. Mr. Thomet was one of the first of the Zebra
bar code print integrators and was also a channel manager
for PI Systems, a pen-based computer company, in the
early 1990s. He served as regional sales representative for
Telxon Corporation, selling wireless mobile computing,
beginning in the days of narrow band.
Mr. Thomet attended Arizona State University, majoring in

marketing, but dropped out to jump on the PC explosion
one term short of graduation, and later becoming a student
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of Geoffrey A. Moore (Crossing the Chasm, The Gorilla

Game).
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SHOOTING FOR THE MOON
DAVID LAW
Speck Product Design
Co-Founder
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Take the Pull Over the Push
Most start-up companies are founded by people who have had an

opportunity to identify problems in the marketplace.
Entrepreneurs can transform these problems into business
opportunities. For example, we’ve done a lot in the notebook
arena, in which heat dissipation is a major issue. If you have ever
tried to use a laptop on your lap for any length of time, you have
experienced the uncomfortable heat given off. A laptop will
never be as fast as a desktop, currently because the main CPU
gives off too much heat. If you could develop a way to
circumvent or solve this problem, you would have a viable
product.
Finding these nuggets of information is vital to potential product

development. In this sense, it has been helpful for us to consult
in the industry – not to see what people are developing, but to
ascertain the major problems that exist. We definitely spend our
time looking for major industry challenges rather than, for
example, attempting to figure out whether blue Palm Pilot cases
will sell better than yellow. That’s more of a guessing game;
whereas, with the thermal problem with laptops, for example,
you know there is a need for a solution.
It is hugely advantageous to discover the key issues in the area

you are trying to enter. Developing a new product should be
based around a market pull. Developing a product that does not
address a need is pushing something onto the market. It will be
much harder to achieve success by pushing a product on the
market than by addressing a market pull. Good entrepreneurs
should be lured by the potential to solve a problem rather than
simply to take advantage of a huge market.
We do not define market pull as asking consumers for their

opinions. Incremental changes and improvements to existing
products can benefit greatly from user studies and market
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research. But a breakthrough product will never be developed by

asking consumers what they want and then developing a product
based around that feedback. A great example is the development
of the first graphical user interface for computers. At the time, if
you had asked consumers how their experience of DOS or
similar systems could be improved, you would have received a
lot of feedback that would have suggested tiny incremental
changes, e.g. font size, color, different scrolling methods, etc.
The leap to using a mouse and clicking on a graphical
representation of your desktop came from rethinking the entire
situation and from addressing the underlying problem of
accessing and interacting with information stored on the
computer.
Taking risks is everything in business. If you don’t take risks,

then the company is dead – or, to put it less dramatically, no risk
means no future. You have to take risks to benefit from all of
your hard work; however, there is no way to be certain of the
outcome. You have to take a stab at the option with the most
potential. Obviously, it is better to have as much information as
you can possibly get, but it is still impossible to predict how
things will turn out. Basically, you take the same steps you
would take if you were trying to predict the future: Look to the
past; avoid repeating your mistakes; lick your finger; hold it up
in the wind; and take a big leap.
I think in this environment, people understand that with risk

taking comes the possibility of both reward and loss. It is natural
for people to concentrate on the positive side of the equation and
not regard the negative outcome as a distinct possibility. But it is
healthiest to regard both potential outcomes as equally likely to
occur.
The most practical way to approach risk taking is to ensure that

the risk isn’t so great that it will threaten the survival of the
company. As long as the risks won’t put you under, then you can
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take them all the time. You can have setbacks and not make as
much profit as you might have wanted, but as long as the
company will survive, you’ll be okay. Just don’t bet the farm.
Getting Real
I think it’s important to shoot for the moon in terms of business

goals, but it’s equally important to keep your feet on the ground.
Make sure your business plan is conservative and sustainable.
Some people imagine the only way to be successful is going for
the gold. The wild success stories you read are only a very small
percentage of the successful businesses that exist, and they are
on the extreme end of the success scale.
I find it important to enjoy yourself along the way. I try to aim

high while maintaining a realistic perspective, so I can survive
and enjoy myself day to day. Any business requires
perseverance, and I most frequently find myself telling
newcomers to stick with it. That’s why it’s important to enjoy
what you are doing. If you are just working toward the goal, do
something else. As long as you enjoy what you do, getting to the
goal is simply frosting on the cake.
People who have an idea they want to patent and take to market
often approach us. My advice to them is to get a provisional
patent application and then share their idea with as many people
as possible. They should also consider whether the idea they
have is something they want to spend the next five years of their
life working on.
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Sticking With It
The golden rules of entrepreneurialism are as follows: Be

optimistic. Never give up. Believe in yourself. Get lots of
feedback. Surround yourself with great people.
If I have learned anything, it is that success doesn’t arrive

overnight. Essentially, you have to be in it for the long term, and
you can’t expect to cash out a year from now. A few years ago it
was tough to be in a hardware-based area when everyone in the
software and Internet business was apparently being wildly
successful. It was difficult to not look over the fence and believe
the grass wasn’t greener on the other side. Many people were
overwhelmed by the excesses of overnight money and success,
without having experienced the reality of entrepreneurialism: the
day-to-day grind and the sense of striking out on a long path.
Many were hooked by the pot-of-gold-at-the-end-of-the-rainbow
idea. So it has been interesting and in some ways gratifying that
people have come back around to hardware and to hard work.
Entrepreneurialism is about perseverance and keeping at what
you are doing.
The importance of sticking with it is an essential part of what I

communicate to my employees. To motivate employees during
slow economic times, you sincerely have to believe in what you
are doing, and you have to strike a balance between exciting
people and instilling in them a sense of realistic timelines and
success rates. As a leader, I attempt to articulate the freshness of
my vision, as well as help my employees understand that success
won’t happen overnight.
Employees should know as much as possible about what’s going

on in the business. If they are aware of how difficult the process
actually is, they won’t be surprised and disappointed when things
don’t move as rapidly as you (or they) would like. We were
shooting for the moon when we first started, back when the dot-
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coms were roaring. There was an impression that everything was

going to be great, and we definitely lost a few employees early
on, when our goals didn’t materialize as promised. Now, we
recognize the value of making employees part of our own
learning curve.
We continually ask our employees to identify how we can do

this or that better, how a product can make us money, where the
opportunities exist, and so on. You can never do this enough.
People want to learn, and part of that learning involves
evaluating concepts and identifying good business opportunities.
Asking employees to think in an entrepreneurial way helps them
stay motivated and innovative. Motivating employees through
compensation plans is also important. They will be more
committed if their own financial future is closely tied to that of
the company.
As much as you foster entrepreneurialism, however, you can’t

create an entrepreneur. You can encourage entrepreneurial
thinking, but I believe that true entrepreneurs are born, not made.
Entrepreneurial thinking helps employees identify with the
company to a larger degree. They are more motivated to make
the company successful, which is a great boon for the business.
An entrepreneur will be harder to keep without providing
opportunity for growth and ways to share in the success of the
business.
You have to remember that an organization can only sustain a

limited number of entrepreneurs. Along with the plotters and
dreamers, you have to include employees who simply want to
make good money and work hard. We generally can identify
good employees through the interview process. In our company
prospective employees meet with at least six or seven people
before being hired. Given that we are a small business, they will
have met a significant percentage of the company before coming
onboard. Another human resource strategy is to hire people as
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contractors. This gives us an opportunity to work with someone

before extending an offer. We attempt to use our hiring strategies
to protect the prospective employee, as well as the company.
Because of the long hours we spend together, employees really
have to enjoy what they are doing and thrive in the environment.
In a small company such as ours, the importance of a match in
personality is more important than it is in a larger company.
Another reason you really have to like the people you work with
is that it is so difficult to balance work and home life in this
business. The worst mistake you can make is to fail to fully
commit to your personal life at the appropriate time. It is not
good to be with your family but still be semiconcentrating on
work. When you are in your personal life, commit to it wholly.
The same is true at the office. If you don’t, no one gets your full
attention, and everyone is disappointed, whether it’s your
business partner or your domestic partner. I attempt to draw a
line: When I’m away from work, I’m away. If you can’t find an
appropriate balance, it’s hard to keep going. If anything defines
the entrepreneur, it’s the ability to continue in the face of a lack
of success over an indefinite period of time. Having a personal
life helps keep things in perspective.
A Delicate Balance
I hope the people I hire have as much drive and enthusiasm as I

have, so I try not to spend a lot of time managing them. The flip
side to a hands-off approach is that I don’t have a lot of control. I
rely heavily on my employees to get their work done. My
personal style is that people can approach me anytime. We work
in a large, shared space that lends itself to this approach. As a
manager, there’s a balance between having time to work on your
own projects and making sure other people’s work meets your
standards. This has forced me to become less hands-off over
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time. I’ve realized I have to guide people more than I might like
to, because I’ll always have a vision they don’t necessarily share.
While I would love to be more involved in the day-to-day project

management, there simply isn’t enough time. We are a small
company, and there is always too much to do. Realistically, my
management style is determined by the limitations of having
only 24 hours in day. The amount of effort I’m able to put into
shepherding my employees is ultimately driven by external
factors, and I would similarly qualify my personal time-
management style as “interruption-driven.”
I have found the best way to ensure the company executes and
follows through is to hire someone whose sole responsibility is
profit and loss. This person looks at what the company or project
expects to achieve and comes up with a plan to get there. The
company provides a sense of the big picture in terms of what has
been done before and what resources are available, and this
person determines what the company has to do to be successful.
We have benefited from this strategy, not only going forward,
but also in providing closure on the past. In an entrepreneurial
environment, it is easy to become overly attached to certain
projects. For example, it can be really difficult to let go of a
patent, even if it is not a good return on investment. The ongoing
patent fees can become a major financial drain when
international filing and maintenance fees start to occur. In these
situations, it’s helpful to have an independent third party step in
and evaluate the project with a measure of detachment –
someone who can ask questions that would never occur to
someone closer to the project.
At some point you have to cut your old projects so as not to

burden the business. This is a really hard lesson to learn. There is
a lot of emotional attachment to projects that people have
worked hard on, and I think it is nearly impossible for someone
close to the project to be impartial about it. This is a direct result
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of the entrepreneurial spirit. People naturally get emotionally

attached to the projects they work on.
Ultimately, the way we measure our employees’ success is

somewhat subjective. We get direct feedback from clients we
work for on the consulting side, and we definitely measure
against tangible goals and performance measures. In the
entrepreneurial environment of a small company, however, part
of an employee’s success is determined by his or her
contributions to the overall atmosphere. We look at how
supportive they are, how they help people survive through both
the good times and bad times. Peer performance review is
important. We assess how they contribute to their projects,
whether they make their deadlines, whether they come up with
good ideas. In many ways it boils down to how much they care
about the company. Did they take on new responsibilities, or did
they sit back and do only what they had to do? Did they perform
well, or did they go to the next level and not only perform well
but also come up with new ideas? If you are looking for
motivation and self-direction from your employees, then
assessing those qualities is a good measure of overall
performance.
I try to lead by example, through working hard and sharing my

excitement. If you are in a long-term relationship with your
employees, which is the goal, leadership ultimately boils down
to your employees’ belief in who you are and what you hope to
do. Good leadership is all about how honest you are and how
well you communicate. If you don’t believe in yourself, you’ll
have a hard time persuading other people to believe in you and
the future of the company.
Sharing your vision is also critical in winning new clients. The

best way for us to sell ourselves is to get in front of customers.
You can have reams of sales literature and a fantastic Web site,
but they will never replace sitting in a room with people.
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Potential customers can really understand who you are when

they are sitting across from you and hearing you answer their
questions and concerns. The Internet and video conferencing will
never replace face-to-face conversation. There are many ways to
demonstrate our work, whether through printed materials, the
Web site, or phone conversations, but face-to-face contact is the
real deal-clincher. Business is about relationships with other
people. I think that is one of the things people forget to
concentrate on. When you are trying to make a deal with
someone, the financials will have to make sense; however, given
the same financial results from two competing businesses, the
deal that will ultimately move forward is the one in which the
two parties have the greatest level of comfort on intangible
aspects such as confidence and respect.
Instruments of Change
There’s a lot of change in any business, but we are in a

somewhat unique position to thrive, in that our whole business is
about change. On the consulting side, every couple of months we
are working in a different industry, trying to think up the next
great innovation. On the development side, we ask people to
continuously think about solutions to problems in our current
area of focus. For example, if we are looking at handheld
solutions, we try to figure out how we can make them better by
figuring out the major problems and overcoming them. We have
to be open to change – and even ahead of change – because we
are the instruments of change. A normal business often has to
worry about stagnation and lack of innovation. We have the
opposite problem: staying focused on one thing long enough to
make sure we follow through on it.
I struggle every day with how to get resources for the projects
we want to do. We are self-funded and have never taken on any
outside investment. We’ve gone back and forth on the topic. We
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are not an easy entity to fund because we are a blend of a service

company and a product company. It is difficult to articulate how
the capital would be allocated. Financially larger businesses
definitely have an advantage. If you are entrepreneurial in a large
corporation, and your idea and vision are strong enough, chances
are you’ll be able to get funding for it more easily than you
would if you had to convince an external capital source. Our
major stumbling block is finding someone to give us money so
we can make money. I imagine this is less frustrating in a large
company. The advantage of limited resources is that you work
out ways to do things that produce great results for less outlay. I
am continually amazed by how much internal budget a larger
corporation can spend for development without realizing
anything tangible.
As a result of our limited resources, we’ve learned how to use

capital in an efficient way. We try to maintain a good
relationship with our bank, so they can be as flexible as possible.
We also work hard to foster good relationships with our
manufacturers. Manufacturers can be a source of funding by
working with you on the terms of payment and amortizing the
up-front costs into the part cost of the product.
When people think of capital, they typically think of funding

resources. However, not being billed for three months can make
a huge difference. We try to explore options whereby our bills
for advertising, tooling, part prices, and so on, are delayed,
reducing a significant amount of up-front capital expenditure.
Entities you don’t necessarily consider to be sources of capital
can work with you to help finance a project.
Change is the natural state for companies. If there is one

universal law that can apply to any business, it is that four
months from now everything will be different. It is important to
remember this and take time to step back every couple of months
and ask yourself important questions about what you are doing
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and why you are doing it. It is very easy to get caught up in the
day-to-day execution of an initial plan and not realize the
external drivers for the project have changed. This will
necessitate shifts in direction on the projects and of the company
as a whole.
Being an entrepreneur is like a high wire act: Keep focused on

the long-term goals, and let yourself be flexible enough to retain
balance, regardless of the external forces you experience. And
hope for the same feeling of exhilaration and joy.
David Law is one of the three founders of Speck Product Design,

where he has been involved as a designer and manager on
several projects ranging from notebook computers for Apple
computer to toys for OddzOn Products.
Born and raised in Scotland, Mr. Law pursued a degree in naval

architecture and ocean engineering at the University of London.
He turned to Glasgow University to complete an honors degree
in product design engineering.
In early 1993 Mr. Law moved to the U.S. and joined IDEO
Product Development. He played a lead role on projects ranging
from portable computers to furniture and office equipment. He
has several utility patents, including one of the first major
commercial uses of Memory Metal (shape-memory alloy).
Mr. Law teaches Experiences in Visual Thinking, a required

creativity course for engineering students at Stanford, and
regularly helps run volunteer projects to introduce
schoolchildren to engineering and product design.
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SUCCESS MAKES YOU JUST

LIKE EVERYONE ELSE
PATRICK SMITH
Natural Data
Founder and President
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Inside The Minds
Making the Leap
You are truly an entrepreneur for only a short time. It’s when
you jump over that edge – the cliff – where you go from working
as an employee, to one day saying, “No more! I’m going to go
do something on my own!” Entrepreneurs are the people who for
15 to 20 seconds decide they have an idea and they’re going to
run with it. It is only during that brief moment of inspiration and
initiation that you are truly an entrepreneur. After that, as time
passes, you are back to being a normal person again.
It may be a combination of two things that brings someone to

jump over the cliff. Many times, right before they get to that
point, they’ve seen some type of inefficiency or situation with
their current company, something they felt they could improve
upon. There has to be that one situation that makes you think,
“Hey, I can do this better.” The realization and challenge,
combined with drive, urge you to take the risk and go it alone.
Drive is definitely a major factor. Some people may have ideas
of ways to do things better, but lack the gumption to follow
through with their vision. One without the other won’t work.
They go hand in hand.
To a certain extent – let’s not kid ourselves – there’s also a

certain amount of selfishness that causes you to become an
entrepreneur. Your ego creates a desire for a better life – a desire
to create your own time plan, be your own boss, and reap your
own profits. There is definitely a passion in there to further your
own personal situation. That, along with the thought and
determination that you can do it better – those are the things that
get it done.
To be successful as an entrepreneur, you have to have great

people skills because you deal with so many people on a daily
basis. Intelligence, whether you call it upper-level brainpower or
just street smarts, is quite important. Either will suffice, but you
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must posses at least one of the two. Honesty is also essential, for
people to look at you as someone they would want to associate
with. People can sense dishonesty quickly. If you’re trying to
attract the appropriate people, you must to be honest; otherwise,
if you’re a dishonest person, you will attract the same – and that
normally does not work out too well. Also, people want to join
with someone who keeps others’ interests in mind and not just
their own. I think if you can convey to people that a certain
decision is going to benefit everyone involved, that’s really what
people are looking for. Energy also helps quite a bit – people
with energetic qualities, or who are just very enthusiastic day to
day, are positive people to be around. We recruit great people
with high energy. Not only do these qualities serve as drive to
help them accomplish the task at hand, but they also rub off on
others, raising company morale and productivity as a whole.
Management Day by Day
My management style has evolved quite a bit. I was 25 when I

started the firm, and in six years I have definitely grown up a lot.
In the beginning you want to build a friendship with your
employees and clients first and foremost. While it is a natural
inclination, it can sometimes be very difficult emotionally, and at
other times devastating. Then you begin to build a kind of
separation, or barrier. You still work on building relationships –
don’t get me wrong – but with a different goal in mind. Business
and friendship are two separate entities that should remain
distinct and not overly entwined.
As we (the company and I) have matured, we’ve reduced some

of the knee-jerk reactions and become more thoughtful, more
patient. In the few short years we have been operating, we have
had the misfortune and benefit of experiencing such catastrophes
as September 11 and the recession that followed. They forced us
to quickly reflect on and refocus our company goals and
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strategies. We made it through the turmoil, and those of us who

did not jump ship are much stronger now and share an even more
powerful commitment to the success of our company.
Our management team is literally made up of superstars, and you

tend to want to treat everyone that way. But not everyone has the
heart or understanding to do what it takes to succeed. You must
fully apply yourself and be willing to put in long hours to reap
the greatest rewards. Some people need more time to grow
before they realize and achieve their full potential.
To find the people for our team, we call in PLUs – “people like
us” – little by little, one by one. I believe if you’re in charge of
assembling an awesome team, most of the time you have to do it
one by one. Each successive member has to buy in to the others;
they have to mesh. Each individual fills a specific role and
influences the rest of the team in a unique way. I think that’s
why building a team through networking is so helpful. It’s “Who
do you know?” and “Who do you know?” and “Can you bring
someone you know will be a perfect match, as well?” Word of
mouth and referrals mean a lot.
We challenge our employees to think in a more entrepreneurial

way through our leadership style and compensation structure.
Our compensation structure is based on growth, whether it’s the
whole company through profit sharing, or divisional bonuses
based on how large, for example, our engineering services group
grows – compensation is big! Stock options also help foster that
ownership feeling. We also try to keep our employees updated
about major opportunities and obstacles the company faces. We
want them to understand why we make the decisions we make.
Being informed helps everyone see the bigger picture and feel
more involved in the status of the company. By informing and
involving our employees, we are teaching them to think in a
more entrepreneurial fashion, which should lead to greater
ambition and stronger dedication to the company.
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Sometimes, however, it’s dangerous to drive people to believe

they are entrepreneurial. This word should not be used lightly. I
think if you have people totally buy in to the vision, they stop
acting like employees, and that can be scary. They can become
too self-righteous and unruly without realizing the major
consequences true entrepreneurs face. When you’re not only an
entrepreneur, but also an owner of a company, you have the
fiscal responsibility and other burdens that come along with it.
But when you simply try to think and act like an owner, and
share in the freedom, but you don’t have the headaches that
comes with it, you tend to be more reckless. That can be
dangerous. But we do preach vision and ownership; we teach
determination and accountability. It’s an education thing.
With regard to finance, we have an open book. If you continue to

drive home two things – responsibility and accountability for
profit – and educate people about cash flows, then employees do
become more entrepreneurial. I believe having employees think
entrepreneurially goes both ways. In general, it works if you can
convey to people how important it is to think like someone who
has the financial responsibilities, and tie that to financial rewards
that simulate being an entrepreneur or an owner.
On top of that, you have operational excellence to strive toward.

This ensures that even though people are thinking out of the box,
they stay within the set value guidelines, such as not going
outside the accounting rules and so forth. Creating and
maintaining some sort of structure and accountability that works
for your company and fits within the specified parameters is very
hard for many companies to accomplish. There must be a good
balance.
My role, or the role of the leader of any organization, in creating

that balance is education and definition. You have to try to
educate people about the financial side, as well as the visionary
side. Then be sure to create the checks and balances – sometimes
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Inside The Minds
people call it “trust but verify.” Putting the correct processes in

place and then putting the managers in place to lead and ensure
accuracy is my job. It’s all-encompassing, with education being
the major part of it. Putting in additional time to lay out
operational manuals, to lay out periodic performance reviews so
people know where they stand, to set the accountability lines – I
guess that’s where a manager’s role can help – balancing the
visionary’s role. I won’t say building the vision is the easy part,
but once you get it going, it’s a little easier than putting in the
checks and balances.
To create an empowerment situation, not only do you need to

reward successes, but you also need to let mistakes happen so
people actually feel responsible for and learn from their actions.
Some managers or businesspeople keep things too structured and
keep a reporting system or hierarchy that doesn’t allow for
mistakes. I think that destroys empowerment. When our people
make a mistake I think they realize it, and we don’t hold their
hand. We say, “Hey, this was your deal and this is what happens;
these are the consequences. You were empowered to make a
mistake, and you did.” It also encourages the employee to say,
“Hey, they let me make that mistake, and I learned from it; that’s
pretty wild.” So let mistakes happen, but remember the
compensation, which plays a big part.
Our promotion system also plays a big part. People can tell who
will rise through the ranks at our firm just by the actions (which
are empowered) they take. It’s almost like a challenge. People
look at those who take the biggest steps with the most risk and
say, “Wow, look what he’s doing. That’s crazy!” But when they
win, the rewards are huge. It’s a competition situation to go out
and do the next cool thing.
The original vision set this up from day one. It’s a large vision, a
risky one, and a highly rewarding vision if it works, but it’s also
diversified. At the beginning we outlined certain potential
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diversifications and told people, “If you’re the one who runs
with this partial thing, you’ll win. You can control 20, 30, 40
million dollars of revenue on your own. Your potential with this
company is limited only by your efforts and achievements. If
you take risks and they work, you will swiftly rise to the top.”
Taking risks and selecting the right risks to take are integral to
creating a company that can withstand fluctuation. I severely
criticize people who criticize others for taking big risks because
usually the critics don’t take risks at all. Risk management is
extremely important – I’ve just begun to realize how important.
You have to ride the right wave and be prepared for that wave to
crash. I think, as far as entrepreneurs go, they need to hand off
that risk management to somebody else. From what I know of
entrepreneurs, risk management is not their favorite thing to do,
so I think it is wise to put someone else in place to handle it. It
helps give them an outside perspective – for example, “Pat, if
you do this, here are your risks. Let’s weigh them. You might
want to wait until this point to do that.” Or, “We need this kind
of finance situation to do that.”
Seizing Opportunity
To help identify opportunities in the marketplace, we read

everything we can get our hands on, even though it’s filtered.
We read entrepreneurial-type magazines such as Inc. and Fast
Company, and the Wall Street Journal – everything. We get
involved with community situations through the Chamber of
Commerce, whether that’s attending their tax and fiscal policy
committees or just networking events in general. We target
specific business leaders and ask for their insight and advice. We
also survey our employees and clients, to incorporate their
feedback, about every six months.
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Inside The Minds
To decide whether we should jump on an opportunity, we match

it up with our current core competencies and our vision. Then we
do a quick financial analysis to decide whether to take the next
step. If you are a young company, you won’t do a lot of that
because you’re really focused on making your current business
work. When you do take a look at diversifying a bit, it is
important to weigh all the pros and cons and make sure you do
not stray too far from your original vision.
I consider us a youthful company; we’re still just six years old,

and the majority of our management team is fairly young, as
well. In six years there hasn’t been a lot of opportunity to create
a mess. The energy is still extremely high. A younger
organization also still has the key people driving the entire
business, which is an added advantage. The people from the
beginning have their hearts in the business and feel a stronger tie
to the company.
We act on the opportunities in the marketplace. Since we haven’t

been able to create much of a mess at this point, we’re very, very
clean – so I guess I’m willing to take a high amount of risk to
advance the company fast. Some organizations will look at 3, 4,
5 percent growth. Through our vision, we’re looking at 20, 30,
40 percent growth. We still work long hours and are very
aggressive in our pursuit of success. Our goal is to be the best in
business and admired as experts and innovators in our industry.
Thriving on Change
To position our company to thrive on change in the marketplace,

we think speed; we have to be speedy. That helps with our
clients; it helps with our decision making; and it keeps our
company flat. It also forces our managers to delegate tasks and
authority. If you create that speed, then you can change relatively
fast. Again, though, there’s that other consideration – the
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educational things you do – quarterly, daily, whenever – to keep

an eye on things and to keep people fresh. We educate people,
and we reward them when they build a growth situation. We’ve
drilled into everyone’s heads that if they’re the one to locate this
new opportunity or change in this way, they will get recognized.
Opportunities and obstacles will always cross our paths; it is how
we respond to them that truly measures our skill. The more we
experience, the better and quicker we should become. So
keeping things speedy will create empowerment, delegation, and
decision making. We keep it fast.
If you want to keep up that pace, you have to take a look at

change. That forces you to plan often and to do strategic decision
making instead of strategic planning. If you just take out
“planning” and substitute “decision making,” you create a very
different idea about how people plan and strategize. We’re here
to make decisions, not to sit around and plan. Decisions need to
be made to execute and fulfill your plans. And if our goal is to
keep things speedy, we’ll need to do our planning much more
frequently than just once a year. We’re not going to run a 10-
hour strategic planning session once a year; we must have
planning sessions periodically throughout the year to capture and
respond to change. At times when the industry or economy is
more chaotic and volatile, we must plan more frequently and
more carefully.
The biggest issue, once the strategy is set, is making sure the
company executes efficiently. We hire either a senior executive
or a consulting organization to help us run our planning sessions,
or as I prefer to call them, our decision-making sessions. It
makes a greater impact when someone from outside the
company is involved, instead of me just telling the same people
over and over again to make sure they perform. When we bring
in an outside person our group respects, and we create our
decision-making process with our goals and plans for a certain
time throughout the year, that person also handles the
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Inside The Minds
accountability for it. I definitely feel having an outside person

create the accountability helps a lot. He’ll actually come into the
group, as an outsider, and say, “You didn’t get your part done,”
and that creates a greater sense of urgency and responsibility.
Since we’re still a very youthful company, normally we go after

people who have a lot of experience. When we go outside, we go
to people who have learned valuable lessons and want to share
their insights and solutions with others. They can bring
introductions; they can bring certain processes that have worked
for other organizations in the past; they can do a lot. But the
biggest thing is they bring is newness, freshness. They catch our
interest with stories of their experiences and open our eyes to the
possibilities we face. They almost act as mentors from whom we
can seek advice and inspiration.
The newness creates fun and energy and interest; it also brings a
refocus. Often when you bring in someone from the outside, you
may feel they didn’t cover anything you didn’t already know.
But they did: They revived your attitude. They reminded you of
things you were taught, but didn’t learn how to apply until they
gave you examples from their experience.
Lonely at the Top
When you’re an entrepreneur, you often feel very, very lonely.

It’s paradoxical that you become an entrepreneur to do it alone,
but when you get there, it is scary to look around and realize that
you are indeed alone. You are the greatest motivator and final
determining factor of the success of the company you created.
Sometimes you get the feeling you’re the only person on earth,
and everything is on your shoulders. But when you hear from
another entrepreneur talking about situations they’ve been
through, you realize the sun doesn’t revolve around you. It’s
happened to other people, too. It gives you a sense of comfort, or
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the reassurance that you’re not so alone. And that’s a big relief. I
think that’s why a lot of young CEOs and entrepreneurs join the
Young Presidents Organization or the Young Entrepreneurs
Organization. Not only does joining create a network of support,
but even more than that, it allows them to say, “Well, I’m not all
alone. I’m not the only one this has happened to. Maybe I can
learn from them how to deal with this better.”
The best piece of entrepreneurial advice I ever received was “Do

not take a partner.” Unfortunately, I did not listen. It was the best
advice I ever received and the hardest for me to follow.
Entrepreneurs, although they may not always be right, do need to
be able to make decisions. And having a partner, especially one
who is not entrepreneurial, creates stagnation and conflict. On
top of that, entrepreneurs tend to be very powerful people who
do not like to be handcuffed; an entrepreneur who is handcuffed
can be explosive and uneasy. Speaking personally, I gave
essentially 50 percent of my company to my best friend, so I
would have someone to share in its success. The thinking behind
it was, “I’ve been doing this for a year and a half now. I’m going
to be wealthy. I might as well do it with my best friend and share
my good fortune.” Big mistake!
I’m not a negative person, but it’s good to know the worst.
Entrepreneurs need to be hard-nosed, stick-to-it people. Quitting
is not an option. One of the hardest things is conveying your plan
over and over and over, while creating and maintaining a
passion, and just not giving up on it, no matter how difficult the
times get. Another difficulty of being an entrepreneur or leader is
that you always have to be thinking about how and what to
communicate. Staying positive is very difficult at times. Always,
always being an example for the people you lead can be
exhausting, and always being in the spotlight can keep you pretty
uptight. The biggest and nastiest problem is doing things on a
micro-level that you don’t want to do, but for the sake of the
organization you have to. Doing those very difficult things, such
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Inside The Minds
as firing someone for the good of the organization, can be

emotionally very difficult.
Once you reach the realization that you must do things like that,
you begin to learn how to communicate in thorny situations. You
find ways to explain that a certain action is probably better for
everyone involved in the long run. You begin to learn that if you
look at something in the right way, it may not be as bad as you
think. And you begin to realize you are doing something for
everyone’s good, and you latch onto that and learn to be
unemotional about it. It also helps you make better decisions
from the beginning because you don’t ever want to have to go
back and correct something, especially if it will be painful. Time
and experience should make you a better leader.
The Golden Rules
❏ Take that step.

❏ Be honest.
❏ Be humble. (You’ll probably have humility forced on you;
it’s something that just happens to you.)
❏ Treat others as you would like to be treated by them.
❏ Be very smart. And never stop learning.
❏ Go after those things you are passionate about.
❏ Bring people along with you – but chose your team wisely.
Patrick Smith is the founder and president of Natural Data, Inc.,

a multimillion-dollar national staffing firm headquartered in
Phoenix, Arizona. Natural Data’s rapid success has recently
been recognized and ranked by such accredited publications as
Inc. magazine in its Inc. 500 list, Purple Squirrel magazine in its
PS100 list, and The Phoenix Business Journal in its FASTECH
50 list, to name a few. Founded by Mr. Smith only six years ago,
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Natural Data is now considered one of the largest and fastest-

growing privately-held staffing firms in the nation.
Mr. Smith is very active in his community, the business arena,

and positive international causes, especially those concerning
children, providing personal and corporate financial support
and personal time. His employees are constantly made aware of
opportunities to get involved in volunteer activities, and
employee fundraising is often matched by corporate
contributions.
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LEADING A VIRTUAL
ORGANIZATION FOR
PLEASURE AND PROFIT
DANIEL A. TURNER
Turner Consulting Group
President and Founder
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Inside The Minds
Entrepreneurialism and Vision Imposition
I believe there are two kinds of entrepreneurs. First, there are

“serial entrepreneurs” – the ones you’ve always heard about,
who start companies, reach a certain point, get bored (or
depressed or tired or greedy or anxious), and start another
company. They often sell the company or change it into
something else. Second, there are people like me. We’re
“lifestyle entrepreneurs” – people who truly enjoy the lifestyle.
We are building a company for the long term, and we don’t
intend to sell out or change the business radically.
A serial entrepreneur often comes up with her own way of doing

things, but generally leaves the administrative work to someone
who enjoys it. A lifestyle entrepreneur also has his own way of
doing things, but can tolerate more of the day-to-day drudgery
associated with owning a company. I really enjoy all the
administrative activities. I do my own bookkeeping, and I also
like the legal aspects of running a small business. All of the
policies I’ve created make sense to me; part of my job is to
explain them to my employees and get them to buy in to that
vision. The biggest part of my vision is of a company that can
thrive even as its employees, scattered around the country, are
making their families stronger and more resilient. We don’t
allow people to work more than 40 hours per week, and we pay
overtime for hours completed over that. We have only rare in-
person meetings, though we are always meeting via conference
call. Our employees are scattered all over the U.S., from Florida
to Maine to Oregon. This is my vision.
Vision is an important concept in any size company. If you have

a codified list of core values, those values can be transmitted to
your staff. If the values are clearly articulated, your staff will
more closely reflect those ideals. We’ve tried several different
core values, and they have evolved. Our basic core value is that
everyone is working here because it’s fun. If it’s not fun, there’s
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no point. I know, and my staff knows, having fun isn’t always

possible, but we try to average everything out so we’re generally
having more fun than not.
Part of having fun is building a team that believes they can make
a difference in the management and running of the company.
Team building and other things described by buzzwords are
important. For example, recently one of my managers said they
thought .NET would overtake J2EE because Microsoft has a
much better marketing engine. In one of our daily meetings we
had a big argument about whether that was accurate, but the
upshot was that the person who made the observation is putting
together a team to evaluate Microsoft’s offering – setting up
training for some of the technical folks – to see if we want to get
into .NET. People put together their own teams and budgets and
figure out the ROI and how we can pay for it. In my experience,
the easiest way to make people more entrepreneurial is to be as
lazy as possible and make them do all the work! Anyone in the
company can come up with an idea and run with it.
Recently I discovered that laziness is recognized as an important

quality even outside my company. Larry Wall, the inventor of
Perl (a computer language), says a truly great computer
programmer is lazy, impatient, and full of hubris. This is
absolutely true. Laziness, properly applied, makes one work
really hard up front so future work is avoided. A good
programmer hates getting calls about broken programs – they are
only interested in their current project, and having to go back and
fix stuff from two projects ago annoys them to no end.
Impatience has the same outcome. A good programmer wants to
get on to the next project, and so does not want to deal with old
work. Hubris is important when you’re out to change the world –
if you don’t think you can do it, you won’t do it.
Once I’ve trained my employees on my worldview, I try to give

them as much leeway and information as possible. I am in a
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Inside The Minds
group of young entrepreneurs who meet regularly and who aren’t

allowed to solicit each other (the Young Entrepreneurs’
Organization). It’s a great organization because we can talk
honestly to each other. The group does a class with MIT and Inc.
magazine, where participants go up to Boston for one week a
year and leave with the equivalent of an entrepreneurial MBA.
We learn how to get our workers to think a certain way, how to
evaluate our opportunities, and how to make small companies
into bigger ones. It works very well; what I have learned has
been valuable and has allowed me to come back and teach my
employees how to think in new ways.
For instance, I learned that companies that have more meetings

to make sure everyone is on the same page do better. Companies
that have weekly meetings do better than those that have
monthly meetings. Companies that have daily meetings do better
than those that have weekly meetings. There’s a limit, of course
– if you meet too often you don’t have time to actually do any
work – but we have daily and weekly meetings by conference
call, since everyone is all over the country. We have calls every
morning for about thirty minutes, with all the managers in the
company. We have a strict order and a standard agenda.
Information about what is going on is presented quickly, and any
problems are identified, so they can be solved. When I’m not
there, the calls are held the same way. There is a codified
process, and all of the managers know how to run the meeting
with or without me. This proved so valuable that the project
managers started having daily and weekly meetings with their
project teams. Programmers now have weekly meetings to
discuss problems they’ve come across and solutions they’ve
found. This knowledge transfer is fantastic.
The biggest barrier to knowledge transfer is oppressive

management. My middle managers generally tell me what to do
and what I am spending too much time on. I listen to them – they
know what’s really going on. I don’t tend to just make
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pronouncements; instead we generally argue things through until

everyone agrees on a solution. That’s empowering, because it
means people are taking their own hands in running the
company. When I do make a decision without allowing
argument, it’s because I want to get past a problem and don’t
feel it’s worthy of discussion, or because it’s part of the vision
that I’m trying to impose.
During our weekly meeting we review what each person tracks –

each person has his or her own metric. Some people track the
number of employees who were productive in the past week;
some people track how many opportunities we have, how many
are in the pipeline, and what the costs are. My metric is how
much money we have, how much we owe the bank, and how
much our customers owe us. These metrics give my employees a
sense of ownership, even though I own 100 percent of the
company. When my employees know the numbers and our
business situation, they can start thinking in ways that will
improve those numbers.
The great thing about this kind of management is that it makes it

easy to grow as a company. Because of the telecommuting basis
of the company, we have never lacked for people, even in the
hardest of times – for instance, in 2000, when it was impossible
to find technical people. We were still getting 10 résumés or
more a day – and good ones, at that. Today we’re getting more
than 15 per day, and we often hit 30 or 40 per day. We put those
people in a database and contact them individually when they
look promising.
The nice thing about working from home is that you have to
have a certain amount of entrepreneurialism built in. If you can’t
force yourself to get out of bed and do the work every day, then
you won’t succeed as a homeworker. So the people we hire are
innately entrepreneurial. It’s a bit odd to work with people you
never see. I have employees I still haven’t met (unusual in a
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small company) and probably will never meet. I know them very
well and have talked to them on the phone a lot but have never
seen them. There is no need, as long as they understand what
they need to be doing and are doing it. Our relationship is as
good as any other employer/employee relationship.
The difference between this and other employer/employee

relationships is that I can’t judge the success of the company or
of a particular project by walking around, seeing who is working
late and who isn’t. Instead we manage by results. We tell the
project manager (PM) there is a project to be done. The PM is
given a technical leader out of the programming group, and the
PM sits down with the tech lead and figures out how to break the
project into tasks. The tech lead generates an estimate of the
amount of time each task will take to complete. The tech lead
then takes the tasks to the programmers who will be assigned to
the project and asks them how long they think their task will
take. The programmers set their own time frame to do their
tasks, provided they’re not wildly out of line with the tech lead’s
estimate. We have a fairly sophisticated task tracking system,
where each hour’s work is recorded carefully on a time sheet,
based on the project the employee is working on and a
description of what she did. The tech lead can evaluate all this to
make sure people are on task. The PM does the same thing for
the task leader, and I examine the work of the PM, so there are
checks and balances. Everybody has incentives to make sure his
or her estimates are correct.
We don’t stifle innovation by doing this, because innovation

doesn’t mean not having a schedule or not knowing what you are
going to do that day. It means having enough time to do what
you need to do and coming with better ways to do things. To
help people come up with better ways of doing things, we
promote continued learning. That leads to “eureka moments,”
which are important. When someone has one, we press him or
her to investigate the idea as thoroughly as possible within the
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confines of what needs to be done for our client. Sometimes we

will set up R&D projects, so the idea can be investigated without
having to rely on client funding.
For example, a long time ago someone said it would be nice to

have an online time sheet. So we put some money into it, and six
years later we have a full Web-based intranet with a calendar,
timesheet, survey module, expense reporting module, purchasing
module, bug/requirement tracker, archives of our mailing lists,
and a document repository. The original idea included less than 5
percent of the current functionality, but in 1995, when the person
came up with the idea, no one was using this kind of technology.
Ours is better than anyone else’s because it builds in everything
our company needs. (If you’d like it, we’re happy to give it away
– we’re a services company, not a product company.)
Holidays are another example of how we give people the time

and flexibility they need to be innovative. For us, there is no
point in shutting down the office on a holiday because people
don’t work on site. People will work on that holiday if they want
to. For example, if someone wants to work on Labor Day, he
can. He can take Labor Day on any day within the month in
which it appears. That person could use the holiday on
September 23 instead, to spend the day at his kid’s school.
People use the time when they need it and don’t take time when
they don’t need it. It just makes more sense for a company that
doesn’t have a physical presence – or even if they do – because it
makes people happier. That kind of leeway gives people the idea
that they can do a lot more with us than they can do with other
companies.
I’m a big advocate of telecommuting because it’s what my

company is based on. What we found by doing studies and
examining the research is that the average person working at a
desk job at an office gets about three hours of productivity out of
the day – three out of eight hours. Let’s say you’re a regular
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office worker. You arrive in the morning, and after sitting in

traffic you are exhausted, so you go out and get coffee and talk
to other people. By then, it’s 10:30 or 11:00. You get about an
hour of work done. Then it’s time to talk about lunch for a while.
Then you go out to lunch. When you come back, it’s about 1:00.
You are full and kind of droopy from the carbohydrates, so you
play Solitaire for a while. Then it’s about 2:00, and you start
getting phone calls because other people have digested their
lunch. You work for a while; then people stop and visit, and lo
and behold it’s 5:00 – three hours of good work in that eight-
hour day. You have to stay late to finish your work, and your
work product is bad because you’re feeling guilty that you’re
staying at work late again instead of going home to your family.
This is no way to live!
We find that our employees, working from home, find

themselves much more exhausted after a day of work. It’s much
more tiring to work from home because you actually get about
six or seven hours of productivity out of an eight-hour day.
When you do the laundry or run an errand with your child or call
a friend, you don’t charge that time because you have a certain
amount of things to get done in the time you have, and you don’t
have time for loafing. You are not working from nine to five;
you are working when you are working. We track time in 15-
minute intervals, so we know exactly what people are doing. If
someone says she is working eight hours straight every day, we
get suspicious because it’s not possible for someone to sit and do
something for eight hours without breaks. Our eight-hour days
tend to last 10 hours. However, without the commuting, people
still have more time to spend with their families and more
freedom.
It’s true that there are some downsides to telecommuting. It is

very difficult to have any kind of celebration. We were in the
Inc. 500 this past October and were very proud of it and decided
to have a party. It’s not so easy. I bought a webcam for everyone
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who didn’t have one. For those in the Washington area, I had
them come to the office where our office manager and I work
(and where we have a nice conference room for meetings like
this), and ordered pizza and beer. For the remote workers, I told
them they could order pizza with one topping of their choice, and
the company would pay for it. We all got together using a
service called iVisit that allowed us to see everybody at the same
time from the office. We had two cameras at the party at the
office; everyone else was at home. We got to have a party at the
same time, but we didn’t party in the same place. Since we were
on a conference call together, we could hear and see each other.
The advantage of this was that nobody got drunk and smashed
their car on the way home. The disadvantage, of course, was that
nobody got to hook up after the party.
There’s another downside to telecommuting: Not everyone can

handle it. The reality is that there are some people who simply
need more human contact than we can provide on a day-to-day
basis. There’s nothing we can do about that, except to offer
opportunities within the company where people can work on-site
at a client’s office. We’ve done that in a number of cases, and
that works very well for people who simply cannot stand to work
without daily face-to-face interaction with their coworkers.
Telecommuting will both stifle us and help us as our company

grows. The advantages are that we can get people whenever we
need them. If we need someone who does VMS and CORBA,
then we can look through our pile of resumes (6,000 in the past
year) and pull up whomever we need on the spot. The problem is
that a lot of clients aren’t comfortable with that. They don’t
understand that in reality most people never see each other
anyway, and when they do it is often to the detriment of the
project. We have lost projects because of that. So what we have
started doing for our larger projects is to put one person on-site,
so that the client can at least see him or her and see that there is
someone around they can talk to face-to-face, if necessary.
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Inside The Minds
Everyone else on the project works at home, and we rotate those

people around if possible. This works very well with our larger
clients, who manage by walking around and don’t trust people
who say they’re working and produce well, but aren’t there.
Staying in Touch
We are better at keeping in touch with our employees than any

employer we’ve encountered. We use every form of
communication available. I received 364 emails yesterday. I sent
out 142. That’s a big day, but my average is 177 in and 100 out.
We don’t just use email. We use a conferencing system for
which all we pay is a flat fee and long-distance charges. We have
about 12,000 minutes of conference calls a month, which runs us
about $1,200. Each employee also has his or her own 800
number, so they can call each other from wherever they are.
They all have one of the Instant Messenger clients – preferably
Trillian, because it incorporates all the different instant
messenger systems – up at all times. The Internet is so important
to us – as it is to every company now.
Using all of these things I can get information out to my

employees as well as or better than anybody else. On September
11 we had a floating conference call starting at 10:00 a.m. and
continuing until 6:00 p.m., just so the employees could talk to
one another. We also had a chat room open, and we kept the
cameras on. We were able to get feelings of comfort, even
though things were so bizarre on that day. Everyone saw the
plane go into the Pentagon, and they knew how close that is to
our office, and they were all worried for us and for their
livelihoods. But we didn’t have to send anyone home, and we
got work done that day anyway.
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Dealing With Change and Risk
Ideally, I talk to prospective clients to sell my vision. The reality,

however, is that this is a commodity business. The only vision
we need to sell them is that we are capable and able to do the
job. To do that, all we can do is show them what we’ve done for
our former clients. We have lost contracts to kids in high school.
We had one opportunity for which we bid $70,000 (it wasn’t a
huge contract). A company that later folded then bid $35,000.
The client felt they had to go with them because they were half
our price. A year later the client called us and said the other
company got halfway through and stopped. They spent $10,000
getting us to consult with them to finish the work. The other
people had run way over budget and had no interest in putting
more money in. So eventually we were hired to fix the situation
for another $40,000. The whole thing ended up costing the client
more and taking far longer than it should have. We use that
example when we pitch our new clients – we tell them even
though our prices may look higher, we are actually trying to tell
the truth and not lowball. We have a reputation for giving actual
estimates and not lowballing, and that helps. Even with that, kids
and out-of-work Silicon Valley types, who need the money to
eat, regularly undercut our prices. That’s part of life in a
commodity business.
When I started my company I firmly believed it was wrong to

charge too much money for my employees’ work. I told my
parents I would never charge more than $10 per hour more than
what I paid somebody. I figured that when the work is for the
government, it’s taxpayer money, and it doesn’t seem right to
make more than that. My parents laughed at me. The reality is
that it costs me more than just the hourly rate of the person.
There is overhead time, training, training time, marketing,
computers, connectivity, benefits, and a thousand other costs. All
of those things aren’t free, so we have to charge for them. The
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best advice I ever got was to charge more than what it cost me to
do the work.
Getting work from the federal government is very interesting.

The government requires you to report exactly what your costs
are, to the penny. You have to know your overhead costs per
individual and per hour of work. I need to know exactly what it
costs me to employ any particular person, including myself.
Once I have that, I can then add profit. The government is happy
to allow me to make a profit, though the profit is allowed to be
only in the 3 percent to 6 percent range. That’s not a lot – on
commercial work we can make 25 percent to 50 percent profit, if
I can sell it to our clients. That’s the downside of working for the
government: You can’t make a lot of profit. However, they will
pay all of your expenses, so growing is pretty simple. It’s
basically all about information. Once you know what your
business is, it’s easy to make money off it. In my business we
don’t really have any supplies or inventory or capital
expenditures like big computer systems or HVAC units. The
only thing we have is people. That knowledge allows us to move
along very easily. We can grow instantly to a thousand people or
shrink down to two people, according to market conditions.
The reality, though, is that the marketplace actually doesn’t

change that fast. What happens is that people don’t pay attention
for a while, and then the marketplace changes from under them,
and they get surprised and frightened. There has never been a
killer application that came up in two weeks and changed the
world. It just doesn’t happen. If you think of email, for example,
it took 30 years to get it to work very well. I was using email in
1986, when I was 13. That’s a long time. I’ve been using it
forever. It’s a killer app, but not a surprise. Fax machines took
40 years to become ubiquitous. Automobiles took at least 25
years. In contrast, the World Wide Web took four years to
become usable by business. But it shouldn’t have come as a
surprise to anyone when it did become popular. There was plenty
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of time to grow accustomed to it – in 1991, when the WWW

protocol was invented, it was hard to even register for a domain
name.
That said, the browser did become part of daily life faster than
any invention before it. I started my company based on the
concept that the world was changing every three months,
because every three months a different browser came out that
worked very differently. We started with Mozilla 0.9 and NCSA
Mosaic. When Netscape 1.0 came out, that was another change,
and so on with 1.1, 1.2, etc. The attitude of having the platform
we were working on change every three months came to be the
way we thought. However, that slowed down and proved to be a
short-term phenomenon. If someone wasn’t paying attention for
a full year, they’d be fine; they would just have to work a bit to
update to the newest platform when it came time to update their
system. The technological risks of migrating to the Net or to
some Internet application are gone. Those who got in early are
enormously wealthy or gone forever.
It’s hard to know when to take risks. A lot of people call me a

risk-taker. There are risks that seem like obvious ones. We have
had bids out where we came up with a bid of $350,000, but we
realized the client would never go for a project that cost that
much money and tried to see where we could cut back. After
doing that, we got down to no profit and just barely squeaking
by, at cost, for $270,000. But the client didn’t use us. Some other
company came in at $350,000 and the client used them. Why did
the client use them? They felt like they had more leeway in the
bid – the other company could expand the work to use up all the
money because it would already have been allocated. We have
had other projects where we thought the client was trying to
lowball us. We bid $250,000 and the clients would try to get us
down to $200,000. When we didn’t go there, we lost anyway, to
a company that bid $400,000. None of it makes sense.
Sometimes we win, and sometimes we lose.
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In that sense, every day we have to gamble. I have gambled with

the whole company. Four years ago I fired our biggest client. I
realized that the company wasn’t doing the quality of work I
wanted us to be doing. So I fired the employees and then fired
the client. It was important to do, and the client understood. We
had changed, and the client knew they weren’t working well
with us anymore. Since we let them directly hire the people they
liked and took away the people they didn’t, it was an amicable
breakup. And it was absolutely vital for my company’s health.
I’m convinced that if I hadn’t taken that gamble, we would have
failed entirely in the subsequent six months.
Balancing Personal Life With Work
For a long time I didn’t have a personal life. When I was 24 I

was living with my parents, since I started my company at my
parents’ place and didn’t have any money. I put all my money
into the company. I would go to singles events and meet
somebody and tell them what I did. They would get interested
when I told them about myself, and more interested when I told
them about my company. Then they would ask me where I lived,
and I would tell them. That would be it. Who wants to date
someone who lives with his parents and claims to be an
entrepreneur? Once I moved out, it was a lot easier.
Still, the reality is that I have to spend a lot of time at work. Of

course, after running a company for a long time, you get really
good at what you are doing. You can get by with doing less than
the standard entrepreneur workload of 70 or 80 hours a week
because you are doing it well. I can now do my job in less than
50 hours a week, which gives me time to do other things. That
said, having a business and a personal life is a terrible idea! You
really can’t put the required amount of time into either, and
that’s not acceptable.
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Now that I’ve found someone and am getting married soon, I can
state with conviction that it is very good to get married because it
increases your productivity and drive to succeed. Suddenly I
have a reason to do well. When I was single, I was doing well for
fun. When I get married, I will suddenly have people depending
on me, besides my clients and employees (whom I care about in
a different way).
In terms of a personal life for employees, telecommuting is a

major plus. We had 13 babies last year, in a company of 28
employees. That’s a lot of babies. It’s partly due to a nice
parental leave policy. However, the reality is that when you work
at home, you have more time for other things. Also, a lot of my
staff is female – about 70 percent – and women are more likely
to take leave than men (since women can create babies without
men, but men are kind of stuck).
Leadership – and Coping With It
Becoming a leader is more than just running a company. A

leader is formed by crisis. To create leadership, you have to be
intimate with crisis. The best entrepreneurs create crisis because
leadership is the only way for a company to succeed, grow, and
move forward. Leadership shows only when crisis is involved.
The flip side of any crisis is the opportunity that created or that is
created by that crisis. Opportunities are themselves potential
crises. A good entrepreneur will find opportunities and create
crises to exhibit their leadership and move their company
forward. Without crisis and leadership, you are left with
managers, who only run things and who benefit from
maintaining the status quo. A company run by managers cannot
grow.
Good examples of leaders are people I’ve worked with who have
excellent rapport with everyone they meet. They know
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everyone’s name, and they can judge people and draw people
out. I’d love to be able to do that. When I was in college, one of
my bosses, now a friend of mine, worked at the National
Institutes of Health. He had toys all over his office. When you
walked into his office, he would throw a toy at you or shoot you
with a Nerf gun. This is what computer guys do. They work
hard, so they enjoy themselves a lot. Now my office is filled with
toys. I have a six-foot tall Dilbert standup doll. We use humor in
our job ads, and the people who respond to the ads respond
enthusiastically to the humor.
I am on the board of my Young Entrepreneurs’ Organization

(YEO) chapter. The only criterion for participation in YEO is
that you have to be under 40 and have a business grossing a
million dollars or more. The average age is 33; the average
number of employees is 60; and the average gross is around 9
million. In addition to monthly learning events, the organization
puts on events called “universities,” where you go off for four
days and are taught how to make your business better. Hundreds
of people attend each one. You learn how to deal with unusual
situations. More important, you get to meet interesting people. I
learn more from the people I talk to than from the conferences
themselves. You take a group of entrepreneurs and put them in a
strange place, such as Cuba or Hong Kong, and you learn an
enormous number of things. You are exposed to ideas you would
never have come up with on your own – different ways of hiring
people, dealing with problems, sales techniques. The take-home
is endless, and it’s a great opportunity. There is a strict non-
solicitation policy: If you solicit, you are kicked out. As a result,
there is no worry about being hit up for work. This isn’t a
networking organization; it’s an organization that lets
entrepreneurs develop a peer group. My YEO friends are always
calling me when their businesses are going well, or badly, and
they want to brag or complain. A company owner needs that
kind of release – nobody else in the owner’s life wants to hear
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about it, because they can’t relate to the problems or

opportunities they have.
Another opportunity YEO provides me is the opportunity to be a

member of a small group – a “forum,” where eight to 12 people
get together and talk in a completely confidential environment
about problems they have had and solutions they have come up
with. Participants are forbidden to discuss afterward what is
talked about there. It works really well. The stories I have heard
in my forum have been enormously interesting and helpful to my
business. The people in my forum are wonderful – we have an
interior designer, the owner of a chain of bakeries, a man who
owns three businesses, a woman who is building a spa and a
research and development company, a systems integrator, a
promotional materials integrator, and the owner of a large
government contracting computer agency. It has given me an
opportunity to learn things and talk to people I didn’t know.
Suggestions for Large Companies
One of the main problems I find in big companies is that “the

book” binds them. That has a certain amount of value in some
situations, but not always. You need a book to rein in
salespeople who will say whatever they want to make the sale.
For managers, you need a book that will give them the basic
tools they need to do their jobs. Beyond those basic rules,
employees and managers should be able to make modifications.
We don’t live and die by our lawyers. I tell our lawyers what I
want. They may tell me what I want to do is risky and not the
best thing to do. They outline the potential risks, and based on
that I decide what I want to do. A lot of companies do whatever
their lawyers say, which is not the best way to do things.
Lawyers, accountants, and so on, are programmed to avoid risk,
and avoiding risk isn’t necessarily the right way to do things.
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Several things can help. One is a certain amount of open-book

management. Tell all of your employees what exactly is going
on financially with the company. That’s scary to do, but the
reality is that it makes people think of how they can help the
company do better. The other thing they can do is to be open to
alternative ways of working. People who telecommute are
already thinking differently. They will be more productive, more
creative, and more valuable to the company in the long run
because they can work from home. Last, you can teach all your
employees to use all their resources. By this I mean that when an
employee has a problem, teach them the first answer isn’t to ask
you for help. It’s to ask their neighbors, ask their friends, check
the dictionary or online, and if they still can’t find an answer, ask
you for help. If everyone in every company were self-sufficient,
it wouldn’t work – it’s the asking that’s more important than the
self-sufficiency. Asking generates knowledge transfer, and we
all know how important that is.
And most of all: Have fun!
Daniel A. Turner, president of Turner Consulting Group, Inc.,

started the company in 1994 after a 14-year career as a
programmer for various clients and his own pleasure. He
brought his background in government computing services and
state networking agencies to the creation of a virtual
organization. Using technology he pioneered for clients, he
manages two dozen employees in seven states on his own secure
intranet.
TCG has developed secure custom Web sites for several

divisions of the National Institutes of Health and for private
industry. Those clients, for whom confidentiality is an important
concern, include an international telecommunications company,
the world’s biggest computer manufacturer, and one of the
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country’s best-known financial and consulting firms, as well as

associations, educational institutions, and small businesses.
Mr. Turner is president and a founder of the World Wide Web

Data Base Developers Group; a member of the Washington
Breakfast Club, a group of technology business leaders; a
member of the Information Industry Association; and of the
Netscape Developers Group.
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BACK TO BASICS:
SUCCESS THROUGH ETHICAL
AND SOUND FUNDAMENTALS
RUSS W. INTRAVARTOLO
StarNet
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Long-Term Value
Throughout my prior career at Motorola, Inc., I was lucky

enough to be assigned to “culture changing” roles in several
business units. My tasks included implementing radically
different technologies into the business processes, which at times
was difficult to undertake. New business processes can be
implemented in many ways into an existing culture. We chose to
“pull the rug out from under” the existing culture, which was
sometimes a painful process to spearhead. I had to learn to guide
the people in the process with an understanding of the way
things were traditionally done, and how to apply that thinking
and the changes necessary to do the same tasks in new and
different ways. This experience and “thinking out of the box”
landed me in a special entrepreneurial think-tank organization in
the company called New Enterprises.
As a member of the New Enterprises group at Motorola, I was as

close as you can come to being an entrepreneur without having
to take all the risk. It was great to have someone else’s money
behind our team of entrepreneurs. As one of the founders of
Motorola Lighting, I held virtually every job you can imagine
within the new business. When I left Motorola to begin StarNet,
three of the Motorola Lighting founders agreed to be my
advisors. They don’t have a large financial investment in
StarNet, but they’ve played a key role in guiding the company.
Perhaps my advisors’ most pivotal role was to keep me from

jumping into the dot-com frenzy. It’s interesting to see their
perspective on basic business processes and the keys to success.
They are true business fundamentalists, and they have been
unaffected by the market’s ebb and flow, always advising me
from a strategic perspective. They predicted the bubble in the
market would deflate, and they warned me that if the company
couldn’t stand its own two feet financially, then it would go
under, just as the others did. So we kept our nose to the
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grindstone and built a company that was a self-supporting, long-

term value proposition. Our belief has always been that if the
company could not offer its equity to the public, with real value,
then why would anyone want to invest in it or buy stock?
As we look forward to an IPO in our near future, I am grateful

for my advisors’ charge to “build a company with value.” Selling
real value to the public is a far cry from staging an IPO from an
untried and unproved business plan. We will go forward with our
IPO plans with the assurance that we are selling equity in a
company that has a proven track record, profitability, and real
value. Many people fell for the dot-com ideas before they had
been proved. There’s no replacement for proving your ideas
through hard work. Furthermore, if you build the company using
your own money, you’ll have an easier time persuading others to
invest theirs.
The time to look for outside investment is when all of the

principals have tapped their own resources. I couldn’t have
gotten an outside dime if I hadn’t used all my own resources
first, and I think this makes sense. How can you expect someone
else to put their money into your business if you aren’t willing to
risk your own funds? I talk to people who are trying to get
money to fund their ideas, and my first question is whether they
own a house and, if so, if they have mortgaged it a few times for
their idea. If you aren’t willing to put your own money into your
idea, then it must mean you don’t really believe in it.
Honesty and Integrity
To ensure the company’s longevity, we are always planning two

or three years ahead. It’s a given that the technology we sell
today will not sustain us forever. We recognize, however, that
our current business enables our future product development. As
plans for our future products and services are solidified, we
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Inside The Minds
compare them to our current business, and we try very hard not
to place a higher premium on either technology. We recognize
they are in different phases of the life cycle.
It’s easy for the people in the company to look at the new
technology we are working on and wish they were all involved
in that process instead of the technologies we mastered years
ago. If the people in the business all wanted to work on the new
technologies, the old ones would falter and not produce the
necessary revenues to fund the ongoing development of the new
ones. It’s important for us to make sure all employees know how
their efforts help the whole organization move forward, either
working on new technology or supporting older technology –
they all have an integral place in the process.
Being highly attuned to technology is important, but it won’t

help you identify customers. If you can match your technology
expertise with customer needs – or, ideally, anticipate their needs
– you can create opportunities.
The equilibrium we have been able to achieve through matching

our natural strengths with our customers’ needs is a very
important attribute to our ongoing success. Strengths in a
business are not as technically based as many people may
believe. Our strategic strength lies in our people and the culture
we portray to our clients. Our clients see that people can relate to
StarNet; they relate to us as ordinary folks, working hard and
trying to do the right thing. Customers relate to us not because
we are a polished-glass-and-brass telecom supplier, but because
we are good folks who work hard and do a great job. We sell the
“what you see is what you get” philosophy. If you walked into
our facility, you wouldn’t necessarily be impressed, but you
would be convinced that we will do what we say we will do.
Customers see our honesty and integrity.
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Honesty and integrity are critical to every aspect of the company,

and they are the primary characteristics I look for in new
employees. In the first four years of our company’s existence, we
had only one employee with a bachelor’s degree; we were
primarily composed of high school graduates. I hired people who
had military backgrounds and who, above all, were loyal and
trustworthy. Someone with the right attitude can learn anything,
and technology can definitely be taught. You can’t teach honesty
and integrity. My general manager had been a manager in a bar;
my human resources manager was the sound guy in a bar; and
my network deployment manager was a supervisor at
Blockbuster Video. They would go to bat for me and risk
anything for the company’s success. These people may not have
impressive résumés, but their work for the past few years has
been something this industry has never seen before. It makes me
wonder if the aspects of a typical résumé we traditionally look
for should be changed. Hard work, desire, and dedication are
difficult to ascertain from a résumé.
There was a period when it was hard to hire people with

experience because they all demanded a high salary and equity.
Interestingly, there was a time when a 21-year-old technology
person expected a salary over six figures just because they knew
about networking. Technologies come and go; they change; it’s a
continuum. Knowing a specific technology is valuable for only a
short time, and then it fades. We tried to tell the young members
of our team to become experts in dealing with change, fast
decision making, and deploying technology for the sake of the
business, not for technology’s sake. These skills make an
employee valuable.
Now the applicant pool has changed, and people with experience
and realistic salary expectations are begging to be part of the
company. Two years ago I never got a résumé in the mail. Now I
get two or three a day from good candidates.
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Loyalty and honesty will take you a long way. As one of my

advisors reminded me, your gravestone won’t say, “He was a
great CEO.” You want to be remembered for being an honest
person, a good parent, a loyal worker.
Managing the Culture
No one here doubts we will succeed and that everyone will share
in the company’s successes, as well as its failures. I sell my
vision for the company with conviction, and I think the
employees like to see the executive isn’t out golfing every day,
but working alongside everyone else. If we have a direct mailing
to get out, we all sit around together and stuff envelopes.
People want respect; they want to feel they are part of a winning
team; and they want be able to relate to their leadership. You can
give employees good salaries and equity, but that doesn’t keep
them around for the long haul. People want to feel respected, no
matter what their job is, and they want to feel proud of the
company. I continually ask myself what motivates me and what
makes me tick. I think a lot of CEOs and other business leaders
forget the people they lead are the same as they are. We all have
similar needs and wants from our careers and lives. The people
in this business view their jobs as only a part of their lives. Their
jobs are now a separate aspect of their lives, but an integral part
of it. We need to feel satisfied financially, no doubt, but it isn’t
just money that motivates us for the long term. Success, respect,
loyalty, genuine concern for their well-being – all these things
play a role in satisfying an employee, and it’s all part of my job.
As a manager I’ve become a lot less dictatorial over the years.

Continual interaction helps me to keep a finger on the pulse
without constantly telling my employees what to do. When
people ask me what my job is, I tell them it’s managing the
culture. I’ll sit in the visitor’s chair in someone’s office and ask
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them what they’re up to. In a mix of personal and business talk, I

might interject a few of my ideas in a casual manner. I try to do a
lot of pulse-taking without making it look official. This approach
is far less stressful and more effective. I like to think there is a
healthy level of mutual personal respect among people in the
company.
We also have short weekly sessions with department leaders,

during which we discuss what’s behind some of the decisions
that are made. I’ll guide the process so the departments see they
are part of a whole, interdependent organization, and that their
decisions affect others. My job is to keep everyone moving in
one direction.
I try to empower others by forcing them to make decisions. I’m

opinionated and tend to take over meetings, so I purposely sit
back and allow my employees to argue their positions. I
encourage healthy confrontation, and people who may not have
fought for their ideas a year ago are becoming more confident.
They may not think so, but their willingness to argue their
position with conviction tells me they are more confident in
themselves. I encourage my employees to make decisions and
then live by them, even if I think they may be making a mistake.
In preparation for the IPO, my “tactical” focus has shifted from

technological to financial strategy. But, without fail, I will
always be responsible for leading the culture. It’s my most
important strategic responsibility. I spend a lot of time talking to
other companies’ CEOs, and I do more now to understand the
market from Wall Street’s perspective. I have learned more
about the financial aspects of the technology world and have
allowed other people to take over the technological strategic
view. I’m spreading around a job that used to be all mine.
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Inside The Minds
Motion for Motion’s Sake
I was fortunate to be at Motorola during a time when the

company leaders were like patriarchs. It was like having your
grandfather as your boss. The person to whom the New
Enterprises group reported gave us a lot of his time. He is the
former CEO of Motorola, and one of the most influential men in
American business through the 1980s and early 1990s. His motto
was “Motion for motion’s sake.” He told us to keep moving
forward because even making mistakes was better than standing
still. He said, “Even if you are faced with a fork in the road, and
absolutely no idea which direction to take, take one, any one. As
you are walking down this unknown path, something may catch
your pant leg and give you a clue. It may even tell you that you
chose the wrong path, but either way, you are now smarter than
when you were faced with the fork. Your motion provided you
with the means to learn something new.”
This philosophy is far more fun than overly analyzing a decision.

Sure, we make a lot more mistakes than most organizations, but
we learn faster, and eventually we get where we want to go.
Michael Jordan said he wasn’t necessarily a better shooter than
anyone else, but he was just not afraid to keep taking the shot,
even if he missed. His confidence was not hindered by missing;
rather, he kept shooting. He scored more points because he
wasn’t afraid to take the shot.
In terms of keeping my company fresh and innovative, I, too,

believe in motion for motion’s sake. Trial and error is infinitely
better than stagnation. You can keep things moving with good
people because they will learn quickly. It’s better to quickly
learn the wrong way to do something than to waste time sitting
around and analyzing.
Creating motion simply for motion’s sake is healthy in some

situations. As the company gets bigger, it is becoming harder for
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people to accept change, and I’m worried that we will become

set in our ways. One way we keep fresh is to shuffle
responsibilities for employees who have been doing the same
thing for a long time. We are also planning to move our offices
shortly. I try to keep pulling the rug out from under everyone to
keep them moving. Sometimes, forced motion is better than no
motion.
While change is good, I also believe in Alvin Toffler’s

philosophy that a business should be a healthy mix of the radical
businessperson and the incrementalist. Businesses need people
who will rattle the cages and create turmoil, as well as people
who want to continue to do things the same way. There is a need
for consistency and predictability in business processes, so
incrementalists do have a place.
New processes are defined by radical thinkers and maintained by

incrementalists. Radical thinkers become bored with the
seemingly mundane task of operating a process in a consistent
manner. An incrementalist is less apt to create change or new
processes, so matching the right task and responsibility with the
right type of individual is critical.
Managing people seems easy when you give them

responsibilities that match their skill sets. They are happier when
they have the confidence they can do their job well, and there is
a perfect fit between their accountabilities and their skills. Many
leaders promote their employees into positions that don’t match
their skill sets, and then blame the employee for their failure to
succeed. What a shame – to change the rules on someone who
was a success, and then blame them for their failure. It’s my job
to see that people’s jobs are matched with their skills. If a person
has a weakness, then we stay clear of it. We exploit their
strengths instead.
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Inside The Minds
Conviction and Determination
It takes conviction and determination to be a leader. Basically, it

boils down to whether you can take a hit and get back up. We’ve
had some serious hits here at StarNet. In 1997 a wholesale
customer who accounted for more than 60 percent of our revenue
quit with one day’s notice. All of a sudden, over half our revenue
walked out the door. With integrity and ethics as core strengths,
you don’t take it out on your people; you try to get yourself out
of the situation. I had to give back equipment, get out of leases,
and scale down operations to make ends meet. We learned a lot
about our people and our business partners. Some of the
suppliers we approached with our dilemma were unresponsive to
our situation. Others were willing to step up to the plate and help
us work through the problem, with the long-term relationship in
mind. Many of those suppliers are still with us today. Similarly,
in 2000 one customer who owed us $2 million went bankrupt.
This killed us from a cash-flow perspective. We run our business
through our own cash flow, without outside money. We’ve never
sold equity to gain venture money.
The leader has to be willing and able to take a step backward to

keep the business healthy and moving forward. True conviction
and determination surface when people are ready to do what it
takes in the bad times. It’s easy to say you are dedicated to the
business when times are good, but what will happen when there
is a serious problem? Those are the times when the people in the
business show their true colors.
One survival strategy we have always employed is to oversell

our capacity before it’s even built. In other words, I know that if
we can push our network to a certain percentage of utilization,
we can make a profit within a month. But we need to have the
equipment asset to generate revenue. If we sell the capacity first
and get vendors to give us longer payment terms, we’ll have
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enough time to get the equipment installed, generate revenue,

bill revenue, and pay them back.
For example, having sold a certain capacity, I’ll buy $100,000

worth of modems from our modem supplier with $5,000 in the
bank. With a 90-day term of payment, we’ll have just enough
time to get the modems into use, collect the money for usage,
and turn around and pay the supplier.
The trick is to sell first; if you don’t sell anything, then you don’t
need to buy anything. This approach assumes a high level of
trust among the departments in the company. Many times the
sales team would tell the network deployment team, “You better
deliver this capacity, because we’re selling it as though it exists.”
The network deployment people tell the procurement people,
“You better get this equipment in here because we’re making
travel and installation arrangements assuming you’ll deliver.”
Everyone trusts the other processes will deliver, and they assume
they will succeed. This “work in parallel” saves so much time in
the delivery cycle from the customer sale to actual delivery of
service. If all the processes waited for the previous process to
complete its assignment to begin theirs, then the delivery cycle
would be as long as everyone’s tasks added together. Our
approach delivers the service in the length of time it takes to
accomplish only the longest single process in the delivery cycle.
As companies grow larger, small working groups are critical. It

is essential to keep the delivery process small, so working groups
can maintain a sense of ownership and can make decisions
quickly. Keep the power of guiding a business within a small
team.
As technologies and marketplaces continue to evolve more

rapidly, the traditional corporate methodologies can’t sustain
themselves. Smaller, specialized companies will use available
technology to deliver big services with big revenue. Our
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company is a good example: We are competing successfully

against WorldCom and Qwest. While the same premonition of
demise may have existed 15 years ago, the waning of big
companies may be more imminent today than ever, and in 10
years it will be even more so. As technology evolves, small
companies like StarNet will have a greater chance of succeeding
against bigger competitors. While technologies make us look
big, our small size gives us the advantage of rapid mobility and
adaptation.
Russ W. Intravartolo is chief executive officer of StarNet, Inc. He

attended Washburn University of Topeka, Kansas, the Illinois
Institute of Technology, and DePaul University before going to
work as a mechanical engineer at Motorola. When CAD
technology came out in the mid-1980s, he taught himself the
system with a sample system from General Electric. Within a few
months he was using CAD during his daily engineering job and
eventually ended up managing the CAD department at
Motorola’s Automotive Division.
After working throughout the world for Motorola, Mr.

Intravartolo was chosen to be part of a group called “New
Enterprises,” an entrepreneurial think tank tasked with creating
new business processes and researching new market potential.
In 1990 the New Enterprises group started a highly successful
business called Motorola Lighting. In mid-1994 Mr. Intravartolo
created a mock business plan in a course called “Challenging
Perceived Monopolies.” This assignment taught him how to
found a business from the idea stage, and he went on to create a
plan for what would become StarNet. He resigned from
Motorola in 1994.
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SEIZING THE GOLDEN

MARKET OPPORTUNITY
MARK ESIRI
Fulcrum Analytics
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Inside The Minds
Identifying and Seizing Opportunity in the Marketplace
If you don’t look for something, you won’t find the one thing
you’ll be good at. One of the things my chairman and mentor
said to me when I was first thinking about Fulcrum was, “Until
you’ve really identified, crystal clear, what the business idea is
and how it makes money, do nothing.” You must understand
your value proposition, your target market, the skills required by
your team, your evolution, and the steps required to move your
company to achieve your dream, or you won’t be good at
running the business. Otherwise there won’t be a sustainable
business.
That was the best advice I ever received. I was working –

basically interning – for a venture capitalist, who said, “You sit
here; you’ll see lots of different businesses, and one day, what
will happen is that you’ll see this thing that will come past your
nose, and the key is whether or not you recognize it as the thing
you want to be doing.” And with Fulcrum, that’s basically what
happened.
I was looking at businesses all around the marketing space, just

doing strategic analyses and helping them do their business, and
I saw this idea. It was just the idea of direct interactions – one-to-
one with consumers – and data mined to drive it. There was no
epiphany, just a clear idea of how you could actually turn that
into a practical business need and make marketing budgets run
much more efficiently. That’s when we started working on a
business plan, but it took about two years before I saw the result
of that idea.
I think you just have to immerse yourself in the market, and

almost through synthesis you will identify a clear, well-defined
gap in the marketplace from the customer’s perspective. Then
you have to work out whether you can fill that gap through
technology or service or whatever your solution might be. I think
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many times people identify a gap, but find it impossible to

identify the solution.
Most of us are consumers of something, so whether you

recognize it or not, you are buried in a big consumer
marketplace. An example – in my case, at least – would be when
I’m at home, and I get direct mail that spells my name wrong. Or
you discover a very poor marketing method when you read the
letter or look at the letter and you think, “That has nothing to do
with me. Why are they wasting their money?” These are actually
all business opportunities. The same goes for things like fashion.
You see someone wearing something and you think, “That is
something I want to be wearing.” Maybe the person made it
herself, or only very few people have it, and you work out that it
is something that could be rolled out as a retail concept. I think
we’re all immersed in markets, wherever we are, around the
world, all the time. The difference is whether you recognize the
things that persistently pop up, and you know someone should
do something about the problem.
Another way people recognize opportunity is within their jobs.

They’ll be working on whatever it is they do, very often at big
companies, and they’ll think, “There’s a better way to do this.
Why doesn’t management understand or recognize that?” But
management is so busy keeping the billion-dollar traditional
business going that they’ll never put their best resources on the
emerging business idea, and consequently, that creates the
opportunity for someone else to do it.
Take Microsoft: If IBM hadn’t focused on its core business

(mainframes), then there would be no Microsoft, because IBM
would have written the PC code. But they said, “We don’t
actually have the resources to risk our core business by focusing
our best people on this new area, so we’re not going to do it;
we’ll outsource it.” And, of course, Bill Gates and his crew are
what they are because of that. The rest is history.
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I think opportunities pop up all the time – literally daily.

Whether you recognize it is one thing, and the second thing is
whether you care about it passionately enough to think about the
solution. The third thing is whether you have the capability to
deliver against that problem.
Management and Entrepreneurial Style
My management style is collaborative, in that I’d rather a team

make decisions. Many hands make light work. You just have to
balance that with not having too many cooks in the kitchen. So
divide your management teams’ roles, and trust them to do the
best they can, to run with their area of responsibility, and to have
good judgment as to when or when not to bring in other people
to help them do that job.
I favor delegation of most decisions at the functional level of a

business. On the entrepreneurial side, that kind of attitude
basically forces others to think about ownership of the business,
and about making decisions as owners, rather than as employees.
Inevitably, if you make a decision as an owner, it is always
different from the decision you would make as an employee.
During the growth period of a business – the really accelerated

growth at the beginning – you need employees thinking
entrepreneurially because they need to be as passionate as you
are about the success of the company. They need to be happy to
work weekends and happy to come up with solutions on their
own and to innovate, because you’ll never manage to do all the
things that need to get done, particularly as you go through the
phase of getting your first big client or launching your first
product. You need everyone pulling in the same direction and
not worrying about their jobs and their domains or building their
own kingdoms.
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The original employees at the company are also the primary

builders of the brand. I think when you reach about 150 people
and a good amount of revenue (say, $15 million to $20 million),
you’re approaching a size where what you ask of your
management team is much more to manage than to come up with
ideas and solutions. You’re saying, “We have the business down
to the model that we now need to scale. That means focusing on
our core business and less on ideas around the edge. We have to
expand the model we’ve already created.” That’s a different
case, in which it is normal to bring in more experienced
managers from a similar field.
This is the time when the entrepreneur needs to decide whether

he’s the best person to manage the operations. In my case we are
looking for a very heavy-hitting chief executive for Fulcrum,
because I think my shares will be more valuable if I bring in
someone else to do the job I’ve been doing to this point. And I
don’t want that person to be an entrepreneur. I want that person
to be a professional manager with skills I lack; he or she needs to
be able to play the chief executive role, but the chief executive is
not necessarily an entrepreneur.
Experience, Priorities, and Risk taking
Experience is your business accelerator. Experience is knowing

which client to bet your company on, because you’ve been
through it before. Experience is knowing that if certain things
happen – if you oversell, for example – you will end up with
cash-flow problems. Until you have been through a situation
where you’ve overtraded, you will never understand the link
between increasing sales and decreasing cash balances. Cash
flow and making payroll are the most important bits of
experience you could possibly have. Experience lets you hire
people who are better than those you would hire if you just
followed a formula. The more experienced hirer will often spot
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Inside The Minds
the person who is very good at interviewing, but who is not

actually someone who can deliver. Experience also lets you win
arguments with your management team!
Experience is many little things you pick up through stubbing

your toe along the way. At each stage of the development of a
business, a different thing becomes the priority. When you start
out, it’s probably getting the product right; then it’s positioning
the product in the market; then it’s actually selling your product;
and then it’s hiring people. Can you actually hire a salesman
right at the beginning who’s really good? That can be the
difference between three years of negative cash flow and
immediately going profitable.
Before Fulcrum I was involved in a business with a friend,

currently the chief financial officer at Fulcrum; we had a
cleaning company. It was maid services, plumbing, and that kind
of thing, and we learned some very simple lessons. We learned
we wanted to work with technology, and we wanted to work
with very bright, goal-oriented people who had real career
ambition. We did not want to work in a business that involved
trying to drive lots of vans and trucks around a town.
Those are some very practical things we learned first of all, and
then we recognized probably the best learning experience there
was: what you can do with good managers. If you have good
managers, you can make a lot more money than if you have bad
managers. Very simple. That was one obvious thing. Second was
making payroll. That’s the most important thing you can do
when you’re a growing company. Make sure you pay people. It
sounds stupid, but when a company goes into cash crisis, it can
be all over. I’ve never seen a company that missed payroll
survive, because you lose all credibility. Yet every small
business stays right at the edge. Always. You scramble around
on Friday trying to get in the last check so that you know you
can pay everybody.
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You learn those important lessons. You then identify what to do

next time around. We wanted to tackle a harder problem that
involved technology – that would give us investment advantages
and offer us higher margins – and we also wanted to make sure
we have a cash cushion, which means getting outside capital,
unless you’re willing to risk it all yourself. Those were the
differences between the first business we ran and the second.
We’ve raised $30 million in Fulcrum.
I think understanding risk is incredibly important. If you

understand risk – and you ask any people taking risks, and
they’ll agree – you’re not actually taking risks. I don’t remember
who it is attributed to, but an entrepreneur once said, “The
definition of an entrepreneur is basically that we go to work and
have three ways of operating: One, you go to work; you get in in
the morning; you start work; you work all day; and then you go
home. Two, you go to work; you put your feet up; and you
daydream all day about what you could be doing. Or three, if
you’re an entrepreneur, you go to work; you daydream for an
hour; and then you do what you daydreamed about for the rest of
the day.” He said that third category is far less competitive and
therefore far less risky than either of the other two.
I know if I want to be the best financial services marketer in the

world, I could work at First USA or Citibank or wherever there
are 2,000 other people I’d have to compete with if I want to get
to the top. That’s pretty tricky unless I’m a brilliant politician
and fairly brutal, with lots of traits and skills I don’t have.
Whereas if I define a slightly more narrow goal – and go off and
do it, even though it doesn’t seem to be as big, but no one else is
trying to do it – I could be the person who succeeds at being
number one in a group of one, but I may actually make money.
So I think being able to evaluate risk and manage it is very

important. I think that is where experience comes in, and that is
ultimately where you can help small businesses develop – in
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Inside The Minds
managing risk. Experience is hindsight; and hindsight reduces

risk.
Vital Tools
I’m a big believer in getting all the training you can, so when I
was in the United Kingdom starting the first business, I went to
every government small-business course available. I also did my
MBA at night school. Doing it part-time meant I got a chance to
experiment during the day and then went to business school at
night and learned something else. That was hugely helpful.
Constant learning, getting the practical skills, and having great
mentors are all vital tools.
I have had a fantastic mentor for the past nine years; he was a
senior executive at Marsh McLennan, the world’s biggest
insurance company; he’s now head of the venture capital firm
Wand Partners. Having access to experience like that, and a
sounding board and advice, is something everyone should have.
Whether he or she is a board member or someone you have
breakfast with once a year, a mentor is a vital tool. The other
organization that I’ve been getting involved with recently is
YPO, Young Presidents Organization. Through this organization
I receive the chance to meet a lot of other people running
businesses more successful than mine. Meeting other people who
run businesses and finding ways to network with them are
extremely valuable.
To be a good mentor, you have to give back to the art. A lot of

patience and enthusiasm are required, and you have to suffer
fools. You have people asking terribly basic questions – I ask
Bruce, my mentor, questions he probably addressed 30 years
ago, and he has the answer in his pocket, so that must be quite
boring to him. But he has a desire to help people, and he’s
enormously helpful to me. That’s a prerequisite: Mentors have to
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want to mentor, and they have to get a lot of satisfaction through

your success, normally without getting anything in return for it.
Think of your best teacher while you were at school or in
college. It’s that kind of person who just has a gift for mentoring.
Measurements of Success
I attribute the success of Fulcrum to the great respect everybody

in the company has for individual cultural differences and to the
full access to all our finances. It is true openness – to the extent
that the managers very much control the majority of outcomes,
including closing down their own business units. I have had
people at the company who have literally come to me and said,
“My department – given the plan for the business – has
succeeded in doing what it needed to do, and we now need to
close it.” That could mean their jobs. Or they say, “I need to hire
someone who is better than I am at this job because we have
reached the stage where I don’t have the bandwidth or the
technological capacity to handle it. I would like a mentor to be
hired above me.”
So, there are three things: One is a culture free of prejudice; the
second is open books – and I’m saying what it is, but also what
the objectives of the businesses are and being able to link the
two. The third is people having ownership in the company, so
everyone in the company owns shares of stock options. This
really helps them think like owners, so we keep pulling in the
same direction even to the extent that some people put
themselves out of their jobs. But they still own shares of the
company, so they still want the company to do well. The culture
is really where people feel ownership, not just equity. Are people
really able to contribute? To change the company? Tangible
evidence of individuals’ impact on progress, and encouraging the
mistakes and successes that result are critical.
187
Inside The Minds
Fulcrum started as a company that used to do focus groups for

AOL in 1994, back when AOL had 100,000 members. We were
the only ones doing this interactive research over the Internet,
which meant the group of seven of us were the world’s experts
on focus-group research online. Since then, the stake we’ve had
in the ground is to pick the niche and be the best in the world at
it, both from a personal perspective and a company perspective.
From a personal perspective, it might take all our lives to get to
be the best at whatever field we choose. From the company
perspective, it is in many ways easier to measure because you’re
very exposed to the marketplace, day in and day out, and a
company either picks you to run its database, or it picks someone
else. So where we focus – as experts at analytical custom
database management – we are arguably the best in the world.
Even though we’re a small company, ours is a new area, and

there are certain companies that will be the first to adopt this
kind of technology. We want them as our clients because that
will show us we have succeeded. They are typically companies
that are six-figure consumer businesses with big customer
databases. They have very competitive marketplaces and a lot of
customer information. We’ve set out to win business in the retail
arena and also in telecommunications and utilities in the United
Kingdom. We have a lot of the top clients now – Ford, Tommy
Hilfiger, Lowe’s, and Circuit City.
Many of the top businesses in their fields, when it comes to

analyzing and managing their customer databases, come to us.
We don’t do a lot of marketing, so we’re close to achieving what
we want to achieve in terms of position, and from there we want
to roll it out and create a lot of value and very big companies.
Metrics for our performance, in terms of revenue and competitor
position, are easily measured.
So that’s the goal, and assuming we price right, we’ll make a lot
of money, too. The money will come with it if we get the model
188
right, but the first thing is to be the leader in the field, to create
immense value for your customers, and as a result create value
for the shareholders of the companies.
I personally think I want to be very good at helping small

businesses develop – helping them achieve those kinds of goals –
and being one of the best people in the world at doing that. At
the same time I want to help them have a balanced lifestyle,
which is difficult to do when you end up doing lots of
entrepreneurial types of things, because the business is always
24/7. I’m not quite sure what the metrics for success will be, but
I think, to use the cliché, it’s more about the journey than the
destination. I hope along the road there are a few events that
make you stop and smell the roses (a very important thing for
small businesses and their employees to do!).
The Golden Rules of an Entrepreneur
❏ Have a very clear focus on the value proposition, what the

market needs, and how you’re going to satisfy it.
❏ Have a great deal of self-confidence. This is necessary to
overcome the frightening knowledge that you’re probably
trying to do something no one has done before, and you need
to keep trying to do it and be creative.
❏ Demonstrate real discipline about building a good team and
delegating.
❏ Find mentors.
❏ Remember you can’t be successful without understanding
cash flow and making payroll every week.
❏ Recognize when you’re lucky.
Mark Esiri has served as chief executive officer and president of

Fulcrum Analytics since 1996. He also serves as an operating
principal at Wand Partners, which holds a controlling interest in
189
Inside The Minds
several of the nation’s leading marketing and research

companies. Previously, Mr. Esiri was a vice president of Wand
Partners, where he focused on investments in marketing and
information services businesses, playing an active role in the
management of Yankelovich Partners, a market research
business, and KnowledgeBase Marketing, Inc., a database
marketing business.
Before joining Wand Partners, Mr. Esiri was director of

CASEwise Systems Limited, a United Kingdom business process
reengineering software firm, and cofounder of a lucrative
London-based high-end household services business.
Mr. Esiri has a law degree from University College London and
an MBA from the University of Greenwich, also in London.
190
LEARNING TO FLY
IN BUSINESS COMBAT
JAMES D. MURPHY
Afterburner Seminars
President and Chief Executive Officer
191
Inside The Minds
Turning and Burning
Afterburner Seminars (ABS) teaches flawless execution and

methodology in rapidly changing, challenging, and sometimes
hostile environments. The seminars are presented by a group of
60 men and women fighter pilots, using the tools we were taught
as frontline fighter pilots in the Air Force, Navy, and Marines.
The same tools and techniques used to fly high-performance jets
in combat are the tools and techniques Afterburner Seminars
teaches Fortune 500 companies and entrepreneurs. These tools
and techniques help companies survive in today’s rapidly
changing, challenging, and even hostile business environments.
The idea for Afterburner Seminars began when I was in F-15

fighter pilot training. I realized the Air Force had taken me from
a farm in central Kentucky and trained me to fly one of the most
sophisticated jets in the world. I loved my career, and my
teammates were extremely sharp and empowered. I recognized
that if the CEO of a company could do what the U.S.
government had done – by teaching intense levels of leadership,
camaraderie, focus, attention to detail, planning, and execution
skills in a short time frame – he or she could create a great
business environment.
After graduating from college I sold Toshiba copiers door-to-

door for my father’s business. This taught me about cold calling,
rejection, and communicating effectively. I learned the sales
process, especially how to close a sale, and the idiosyncrasies of
building situational awareness. Situational awareness (SA)
means understanding exactly where you are, based on where
you’ve been and where you want to be in the rapidly changing
environment – a term the Air Force would later instill in me and
all of its other fighter pilots.
As a salesperson, you use SA to pull in all the clues and cues you
need to close the deal. When you use SA, you realize how much
192
preparation and visualization goes into a sales call – you

visualize the pitch before you pitch it, and you understand how
to close the sale. SA allows you to anticipate the pitfalls before
they happen. I think anyone who wants to build wealth and
success as the leader of a corporation or as an entrepreneur
should be very effective in selling or marketing, and use SA to
create maximum effect with limited time.
Later, I decided to test my theory. I secured a job as vice

president of sales and training for Smiland Paint Company in
California. I helped Smiland launch a new line of paint the
company was selling exclusively through The Home Depot.
When I started, Smiland was bringing in $5 million in revenue.
When I left two-and-a-half years later, the brand of paint I had
started selling was making the company $52 million. This
experience gave me confidence that the tools and techniques I
wanted to teach to the business world would work in any
situation, with any product, and in any environment.
I launched Afterburner Seminars in 1996. We have grown at a

thousand-percent rate since inception, and we made the Inc. 500
list of fastest-growing companies in America last fall. We work
with more than 80 Fortune 500 clients, teaching them flawless
execution and methodologies through our half-day seminars and
one-hour keynotes. We also coach executives on these
methodologies through our corporate wingman program for mid-
level and top-level executives.
At Afterburner Seminars, we draw on our experience as fighter

pilots to help create team spirit within organizations. As an
individual fighter pilot in a single-seat jet, you either fly a good
mission or you don’t come back from your mission. You have to
look out for yourself, but you also have to fly perfect formation
with your wingmen and work effectively as a team. Many of
today’s business people see themselves as fighter pilots because
they are out turning and burning, but they have to realize they
193
Inside The Minds
have wingmen – teammates – to support, and they have to

understand how their actions and decisions on the front lines
affect the entire organization. Thinking about the surrounding
environment will help them win.
Flawless Execution
We run Afterburner Seminars the way we hope our clients run

their businesses. We have a plan; we brief the plan; we execute
the plan; then we debrief the plan. We teach our clients this
flawless execution model to win: plan, brief, execute, debrief.
Briefing the plan (daily or weekly, depending on the cycle of the

mission) is crucial. For example, if the mission is a seminar, we
send the plan ahead of time to our facilitators at the seminar and
fly in a day ahead to brief every detail of the plan, so everyone
understands it.
Most businesses operate from a general vision, but a business

will never execute flawlessly on general vision and direction.
With our six steps to combat-mission planning, we take the
company’s general vision and run it through six steps, resulting
in an exact roadmap for the company’s mission. This roadmap is
what we brief before we execute our mission. Our briefings are
not meetings; they are briefings. There is a big difference, and
we teach companies that difference so the briefs are effective.
Briefs are short and concise. They are the tools for understanding
how to execute the business mission this week, this month, this
quarter.
We then execute the plan, based on the brief. After the seminar,
we debrief in a nameless, rankless environment, admitting
mistakes and pointing out others’ mistakes made during the
execution phase. We do this because as fighter pilots we learned
if we repeat mistakes, we do not return from our missions.
194
Our debriefing follows the STEALTH format. This opens

communication in a corporation and creates an environment
where people can admit their errors in front of their peers,
superiors, and subordinates. They can then walk away with
lessons learned, both positive and negative, and expose those
lessons learned to the entire organization, through a device such
as a company intranet.
To accomplish the STEALTH format:
❏ S: Set a time, place, and end time for the debrief.
❏ T: Set a nameless and rankless Tone. The debrief begins with

the person at the top of the organization admitting his or her
mistakes to the group first.
❏ E: Compare the Execution against the objectives. Do people

understand the mission objective, now that the mission is
over? If they still have questions, it means the mission
objective was not clear, and a company cannot hold people
accountable unless they understood the objective.
❏ A: Analyze the execution. Look at the outcomes: Missing our

monthly target, the cause, and the root cause of that mistake
(or high point). For example, the cause is that we lost two
key legacy clients. The root cause was not focusing on new
business, and we did not communicate with existing clients.
❏ L: Lessons learned should focus on the biggest root causes:

What did the company do to fix the communication
problem?
❏ T: Transfer lessons learned through a methodology that will

ensure the whole team sees them. This will accelerate the
experience for the entire organization.
195
Inside The Minds
❏ H: Always end on a High note or happy note. Some debriefs

get bloody, but it’s important to say, “We’ve learned a lot
today. We’re going to turn this around, and by turning it
around, we’ll gain 25 percent more market share. Great job.
Let’s do it.”
Task Saturation
A company can have the best plan in the world and can brief the
plan, but if task saturation is not identified and eliminated, it is
impossible to execute well during the execution phase. Task
saturation (TS) is having too much to do and not enough time or
resources to accomplish the goal. At Afterburner Seminars, we
know business executives everywhere are suffering from task
saturation. We know it kills pilots and businesses every month
because as TS increases, business decreases. As TS increases,
the number of mistakes increases.
Humans deal with task saturation in any of three ways: They

quit. They compartmentalize. Or they channelize. Quitters
simply shut down. Compartmentalizers organize everything into
a neat linear format so they can complete each item one by one
by one. Channelizers focus on the most important item and shut
everything else out. All three of these processes are dangerous
ways to deal with task saturation. At Afterburner Seminars we
provide the tools and techniques to effectively eliminate task
saturation.
Some of the tools we use to eliminate TS in the cockpit are

checklists, cross checks (how we monitor the 350 gauges in the
F-15), and mutual support and teamwork. We teach these three
tools to businesses, teams, and executives. Then we teach the
STEALTH format on how to have a nameless, rankless debrief
and share lessons learned from that debrief with the entire
business group. This accelerates the whole team’s experience.
196
Six-Step Model
To run a company through our six-step model, I begin by

looking at the company to see if it is operating under specific
guidelines that everybody understands. If these are absent, we
work on those approaches to build a good foundation of
procedures, policies, and standards. Then we look at how the
upper-level management articulates the weekly, monthly, and
yearly plans: Are they laser-guided mission objectives, or are
they very broad? If they’re too broad, we then begin the six-step
process.
1. Determine a mission objective, “not mission a statement,”

that must be clear, measurable, and achievable (i.e.,
believable), and that supports the overall vision of the
organization. A poor mission objective, for example, would
be to increase sales or be the dominant player in the IT
industry in the Southeast. A good mission objective in this
case would be to increase sales 15 percent by December 31,
2002. The mission objective is clear, and it must be
measurable, so the company can see how well it has
executed the mission based on the plan. But it must also be
achievable (believable). This is where most CEOs and
businesses fall down. For fighter pilots, when you are
sending men and women into missions where they may lose
their lives, you’d better make sure your idea is achievable
(believable). In a business, make sure that quota is realistic.
Finally, ask yourself if the mission objective supports the
overall vision of the organization.
2. Define the threat, based on today’s mission objective. Many

companies focus on the external threat of competition, but
they shouldn’t neglect the internal threat of complacency,
indifference, or apathy. Other internal threats are task
saturation and poor communication. When the economy
grew robustly a short time ago, there were an unprecedented
197
Inside The Minds
number of mergers and acquisitions. Two of the main killers

of these companies were poor communication and poor
infrastructure, which made it impossible to bring two or
three teams together to understand today’s mission objective.
3. Identify your support assets. Find out who or what is on your

team to help you win today. It sounds straightforward, but
most companies do not do this in the planning stage. They
wait until they are executing, and then they scramble to find
out what vendor, what customer, what person or department,
can help them out of the situation. Afterburner Seminars
trains companies to find out and identify those support assets
ahead of time, in the planning process.
4. Compare strengths against the internal and external threats

and weaknesses. After steps 1 through 4, the company
should have a rough plan for execution.
5. Prioritize or set timing. We always set our timing as if the

mission will go perfectly down to the last second. How many
times have I seen a mission go perfectly down to the last
second? Zero. But we do it because it gives everyone a
timeline for where every player will be at the exact time and
exact altitude. If the mission does not go as planned, we can
flex much more easily, based on our expectations of where
everyone is supposed to be. The timing is also based on the
threat’s weaknesses, your strengths, and the environment.
For fighter pilots, the environment is the true environment.
In the business world the environment might be
sociopolitical – for example, rolling out a new product in
Europe is very different from rolling one out in Southern
California.
6. Plan for contingencies: Ask, what if? What happens if

production is not ready for the product launch, and we’re
198
already out there selling this new product? What if the

economy in the U.S. continues to go downhill? Will we be
able to launch this new product on time? The saying in the
fighter pilot world is, “Flexibility is the key to air power.” At
Afterburner Seminars we believe preparation is the key to
flexibility.
Measuring Success
Our success is measured on how well we hit our budget and our
marketing and sales plans. We track these plans on a quantitative
basis and identify whether we are repeating past mistakes that
have been identified and debriefed. If so, we look at our
communication process. Since our company is truly a virtual
business – only four people work in the Atlanta office, but we
have more than 60 people in our organization – it is imperative
that we communicate. We debrief our clients to see whether we
are executing our primary objectives or are getting task saturated
and pulled off our primary objective of providing world-class
management training and seminars.
We hire fighter pilots from the Navy, Air Force, and Marines
because they have been trained in the skills we teach and set a
high standard of excellence. For our internal training, we have a
standards guide that lays down every standard in the company –
from how to dress on the airplane before a seminar to how to
conduct a pre-seminar briefing and debriefing, to what to wear
on your flight suit when speaking at the seminar. For our
operational people, the guide outlines how to go through the
daily operations, so every person in the company can keep our
product consistent across the board. This ensures that the
customers see the same brand, the same front, and the same
intellectual property, and receive the same learning. It makes our
business very turnkey.
199
Inside The Minds
We also have a phone bridge the entire team uses for daily,
weekly, monthly, and quarterly meetings. It allows us to get our
entire company on one phone line and have a virtual meeting
with virtual briefs and debriefs. Every Monday at 1 p.m., our
operations team, our Hunter team, and our California and Kansas
City teams get on the phone and do a 55-minute brief and
debrief. During that time we brief the week’s mission objective
and debrief last week’s mission objective. Afterward, we post
the lessons learned on our company’s intranet, so the entire
company can access it and read it throughout the week.
Another tool is bringing people to Atlanta for a “Reblue.” An

example is bringing in our 18 corporate coaches for retraining, to
ensure our standards and high level of coaching are being
executed. In short, our communication is a combination of
bringing people to Atlanta, phone bridging, and using the
standards guide and the company intranet.
Air combat – because of its speed, team approach, individual

approach, and hostile environment – requires a very sharp edge,
and we think the business world greatly needs this same edge.
We understand that as technology evolves, our tactics need to
evolve. We articulate the latest tools and techniques so that the
business world can benefit from and use that information.
James D. Murphy (“Murph”), president and chief executive

officer of Afterburner Seminars, has logged more than 1,200
hours as an instructor pilot in the F-15. He has accumulated
more than 3,200 hours of flight time in other high-performance
jet aircraft. He was selected a combat flight lead and has flown
missions in Panama, Singapore, Turkey, and Israel. He was
selected the 116th Fighter Wing’s Chief of Training; his job was
to keep 42 combat-trained fighter pilots ready to deploy
worldwide within 72 hours.
200
Mr. Murphy has added to his combat training over a decade of

top-level business management positions in prominent
companies in the imaging and manufacturing areas. He started
Afterburner Seminars in 1996 to bring his business and fighter
pilot skills together, training more than 40 Fortune 500
companies through his daylong seminars and keynote addresses.
His business has enjoyed triple-digit growth since its inception.
Afterburner Seminars and its 40-person staff will train more
than 30,000 business fighter pilots this year alone.
Mr. Murphy’s book, Business Is Combat: A Fighter Pilot’s

Guide to Winning in Modern Business Warfare, is in its second
printing. Mr. Murphy resides in Atlanta, flies internationally for
a major commercial airline, and is a member of the Young
Entrepreneurs Organization and the Air Force Reserves.
201
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Inside the Minds: The New Health Care Industry-Industry Leaders Share Their Knowledge
on the Future of the Technology Charged Health Care Industry
Inside the Minds: Leading IP Lawyers-Leading IP Lawyers Share Their Knowledge on the
Art & Science of Intellectual Property
Inside the Minds: Leading Labor Lawyers-Leading Labor Lawyers Share Their Knowledge
on the Art & Science of Labor Law
Inside the Minds: Leading Litigators-Leading Litigators Share Their Knowledge on the Art
& Science of Litigation
Inside the Minds: The Art of Public Relations-PR Visionaries Reveal the Secrets to Getting
Noticed, Making a Name for Your Company, and Building a Brand Through Public Relations
Inside the Minds: Venture Capitalists-Inside the High Stakes and Fast Moving World of
Venture Capital
Term Sheets & Valuations-An Inside Look at the Intricacies of Term Sheets & Valuations
Bigwig Briefs: Hunting Venture Capital-An Inside Look at the Basics of Venture Capital
Inside the Minds: Leading Wall St. Investors-Financial Gurus Reveal the Secrets to Picking
a Winning Portfolio
Inside the Minds: Leading Marketers-Industry Leaders Share Their Knowledge on Building
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Inside the Minds: Chief Technology Officers-Industry Experts Reveal the Secrets to
Developing, Implementing, and Capitalizing on the Best Technologies in the World
Inside the Minds: Entrepreneurial Momentum-Jump Starting a New Business Venture and
Gaining Traction for Businesses of All Sizes to Take the Step to the Next Level
Inside the Minds: The Entrepreneurial Problem Solver-Getting Yourself & Others to Think
More Like an Entrepreneur
Inside the Minds: The Telecommunications Industry-The Future of Telecommunications –
Opportunities, Risks & Areas to Watch
Inside the Minds: Leading CEOs-The Secrets to Management, Leadership & Profiting in Any
Economy
Inside the Minds: Building a $1,000,000 Nest Egg-Financial Gurus Reveal the Secrets for
Anyone to Build a $1,000,000 Nest Egg on Their Own Terms
Inside the Minds: Leading CTOs-Industry Leaders Share Their Knowledge on Harnessing
and Developing the Best Technologies
Bigwig Briefs: Guerrilla Marketing-The Best of Guerrilla Marketing
Oh Behave! Reinforcing Successful Behaviors at Work With Consequences
Business Library Code 041002

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Chapter #/Title Author Units
ENTREPRENEURSHIP/ VENTURE CAPITAL
267. *The Journey to Entrepreneurship Dave Cone (Camstar, CEO) 1
268. *Founding a Business on Principles Steve Demos (White Wave, Founder & President) 1
269. *Entrepreneur 101-From Validation to Viability Mike Turner (Waveset Technologies, CEO) 1
270. Entrepreneurship Through Choppy Waters Frederick Beer (Auragen Communications, CEO) 1
271. The World of Entrepreneurial Momentum Hatch Graham (Bandwidth9, CEO) 1
271. The Extreme Entrepreneur Todd Parent (Extreme Pizza, CEO) 1
272. *An Entrepreneur’s Blueprint for Success Farsheed Ferdowsi (Paymaxx, CEO) 1
273. From Mom & Pop to National Player Jack Lavin (Arrow Financial Services, CEO) 1
274. Better to Be a PT Boat Than a Battleship Lucinda Duncalfe Holt (Destiny, CEO) 1
275. *Lessons Learned for Entrepreneurs Art Feierman (Presenting Solutions, CEO) 1
141. *Term Sheet Basics Alex Wilmerding (Boston Capital Ventures) 1
142. *How to Examine a Term Sheet Alex Wilmerding (Boston Capital Ventures) 1
143. *A Section-by-Section View of a Term Sheet Alex Wilmerding (Boston Capital Ventures) 4
144. *Valuations and the Term Sheet Alex Wilmerding (Boston Capital Ventures) 1
289. *A Summary of Term Sheets Alex Wilmerding (Boston Capital Ventures) 1
145. Marketing Your Business to Investors Harrison Smith (Krooth & Altman, Partner) 1
146. Essential Elements in Executive Summaries Harrison Smith (Krooth & Altman, Partner) 1
123. *Developing the Right Team Strategy Sam Colella (Versant Ventures, Managing Director) 1
124. *Successful Deal Doing Patrick Ennis (ARCH Venture Partners, Partner) 1
125. *Deal Making: The Interpersonal Aspects John M. Abraham (Battery Ventures, Venture Partner) 1
* Denotes Best Selling Chapter
126. *The Art of Negotiations Robert Chefitz (APAX Partners, General Partner) 1
128. *What VCs Look For Heidi Roizen (SOFTBANK Venture Capital) 1
129. International Opportunities Jan Henric Buettner (Bertelsmann Ventures) 1
134. Early Stage Investing Virginia Bonker (Blue Rock Capital) 1
136. *VC Investments in Technology Stephan Andriole (Safeguard Scientifics, Inc.) 1
137. Evaluating Business Models Marc Benson (Mid-Atlantic Venture Funds) 1
138. Early Stage Valuations and Keys to Success Roger Novak, Jack Biddle (Novak Biddle Venture Partners) 1
276. Life Lessons-Build Your Team of Entrepreneurs Gary L. Moulton (Glyphics Communications, CEO) 1
277. Did I say Entrepreneurialism? I meant creativity! Douglas P. Bruns (Atlantic Corporate Interiors, CEO) 1
278. The Contagious Entrepreneur Rodney Kuhn (Envision Telephony, CEO) 1
279. It Takes Two: Human and Financial Resources Peter J. Valcarce (Arena Communications, President) 1
280. Hanging Tight in a Roller-Coaster Economy Dave Hegan (MAJAC Steel, CEO) 1
281. Entrepreneurial Spirit and Passion Aaron Kennedy (Noodles & Company, Co-CEO) 1
282. Essential Nutrients for Growing Greg Wittstock (Aquascape Designs, CEO) 1
283. Tools, Tricks and Tactics That Work Kurt Thomet (Quest Solutions, President) 1
284. Shooting for the Moon David Law (Speck Product Design, Co-Founder) 1
290. Success Makes You Just Like Everyone Else Patrick Smith (Natural Data, President) 1
285. Leading a Virtual Business for Pleasure/Profit Daniel A. Turner (Turner Consulting Group, President) 1
286. Success Via Ethical and Sound Fundamentals Russ W. Intravartolo (StarNet, CEO) 1
287. Seizing the Golden Market Opportunity Mark Esiri (Fulcrum Analytics, CEO) 1
288. Learning to Fly in Business Combat James D. Murphy (Afterburner Seminars, CEO) 1
MARKETING/ADVERTISING/PR
1. *Connecting With Consumer Needs Stephen Jones (Coca-Cola, Chief Marketing Officer) 1
2. Staying Customer Focused T. Michael Glenn (FedEx, EVP Market Development) 1
3. Building an Internet Mega-Brand Karen Edwards (Yahoo!, VP, Brand Marketing) 1
4. Giving the Consumer a Seat at the Table Michael Linton (Best Buy, SVP Marketing) 1
5. Building a Powerful Marketing Engine Jody Bilney (Verizon, SVP Brand Management) 1
6. *Brands and Marketing: Evolving Together John Hayes (American Express, EVP Brand Management) 1
7. Marlboro Friday: Branding a Product Richard Rivers (Unilever, SVP) 1
8. Marketing Success: Providing Choice Richard Costello (GE, Corporate Marketing Manager) 1
9. Turning a Brand Into a National Pastime Tim Brosnan (Major League Baseball, EVP Business) 1
10. Advertisers’ Conundrum-Change or Be Changed M T Rainey (Young & Rubicam, Co-CEO) 1
11. *Rallying the Troops in Advertising Eric Rosenkranz (Grey, CEO Asia Pacific) 1
12. Achieving Success as an Advertising Team David Bell (Interpublic Group, Vice Chairman) 1
13. *Advertising: Invitation Only, No Regrets Bob Brennan (Leo Burnett Worldwide, President) 1
14. *The Secret to Global Lovemark Brands Tim Love (Saatchi & Saatchi, Managing Partner) 1
15. Soak it All In-The Secrets to Advertising Success Paul Simons (Ogilvy Mather UK, CEO) 1
16. Likeable Advertising: Creative That Works Alan Kalter (Doner, CEO) 1
17. Advertising Success: Tuning Into the Consumer Alan Schultz (Valassis, CEO) 1
18. The Client Perspective in Advertising Brendan Ryan (FCB Worldwide, CEO) 1
19. *Advertising Results in the Age of the Internet David Kenny (Digitas, CEO) 1
20. *Communications for Tomorrow's Leaders Christopher Komisarjevsky (Burson-Marsteller,CEO) 2
21. The Creation of Trust Rich Jernstedt (Golin/Harris International, CEO) 1
22. *Prosumer: A New Breed of Proactive Consumer Don Middleberg (Middleberg Euro RSCG, CEO) 1
23. *The Power of PR in a Complex World Richard Edelman (Edelman PR, CEO) 1
24. Success in Public Relations Lou Rena Hammond (Lou Hammond & Assoc., President) 1
25. The Art and Science of Public Relations Anthony Russo, Ph.D. (Noonan Russo Communications, CEO) 1
26. Critical Elements of Success in PR Thomas Amberg (Cushman Amberg Communications, CEO) 1
27. Small Business PR Bang! Robyn M. Sachs (RMR & Associates, CEO) 1
28. PR: A Key Driver of Brand Marketing Patrice Tanaka (Patrice Tanaka & Company, Inc., CEO) 1
29. PR: Essential Function in a Democratic Society David Finn (Ruder Finn Group, Chairman) 1
30. *21st Century Public Relations Larry Weber (Weber Shandwick Worldwide, Founder) 1
31. *Public Relations as an Art and a Craft Ron Watt (Watt/Fleishman-Hillard Inc., CEO) 1
32. Connecting the Client With Their Public David Copithorne (Porter Novelli International, CEO) 1
33. PR: Becoming the Preferred Strategic Tool Aedhmar Hynes (Text 100, CEO) 1
34. Public Relations Today and Tomorrow Herbert L. Corbin (KCSA PR, Managing Partner) 1
35. Delivering a High Quality, Measurable Service David Paine (PainePR, President) 1
36. *The Impact of High-Technology PR Steve Schwartz (Schwartz Comm., President) 1
37. The Emotional Quotient of the Target Audience Lee Duffey (Duffey Communications, President) 1
38. The Service Element in Successful PR Andrea Carney (Brodeur Worldwide, CEO) 1
39. Helping Clients Achieve Their True PE Ratio Scott Chaikin (Dix & Eaton, Chairman and CEO) 1
40. The Art of Public Relations Dan Klores (Dan Klores Communications, President) 1
41. Passion and Precision in Communication Raymond L. Kotcher (Ketchum, CEO) 1
42. Professionalism and Success in Public Relations Victor Kamber (The Kamber Group, CEO) 1
45. Narrowcasting Through Email Marketing Joe Payne (Microstrategy, Chief Marketing Officer) 1
51. *What is Guerrilla Marketing? Jay Levinson (Best-Selling Author) 1
52. *What Makes a Guerrilla? Jay Levinson (Best-Selling Author) 1
53. *Guerrilla Marketing: Attacking the Market Jay Levinson (Best-Selling Author) 1
86. *Everyone is a Marketer Jay Levinson (Best-Selling Author) 1
87. *Media Choices for the Guerrilla Marketer Jay Levinson (Best-Selling Author) 1
88. *Technology and the Guerrilla Marketer Jay Levinson (Best-Selling Author) 1
107. *Guerrilla Marketing on a Budget Jay Levinson (Best-Selling Author) 1
MANAGEMENT/ CONSULTING
276. *Maintaining Values in a Culture of Change Richard Priory (Duke Energy, CEO) 1
69. *Fundamentals Never Go Out of Style Fred Poses (American Standard, CEO) 1
70. High-Tech Company, High-Touch Values John W. Loose (Corning, CEO) 1
71. Balancing Priorities for the Bottom Line Bruce Nelson (Office Depot, Chairman) 1
72. *Keeping the Right People With Your Company Thomas C. Sullivan (RPM, CEO) 1
73. *Gaining Entrepreneurial Momentum Myron P. Shevell (New England Motor Freight, CEO) 1
74. Creating a Culture That Ensures Success Justin Jaschke (Verio, CEO) 1
54. *The Drive for Business Results Frank Roney (IBM, General Manager) 1
55. *Understanding the Client Randolph C. Blazer (KPMG Consulting, Inc., CEO) 1
56. *The Interface of Technology and Business Pamela McNamara (Arthur D. Little, Inc., CEO) 1
57. *Elements of the Strategy Consulting Business Dr. Chuck Lucier (Booz-Allan & Hamilton, SVP) 1
58. *Consulting: Figuring Out How to Do it Right Dietmarr Osterman (A.T. Kearney, CEO) 1
195. Client Value in Consulting Luther J. Nussbaum (First Consulting Group, CEO) 1
196. The Rules Have Changed in Consulting John C. McAuliffe (General Physics Corporation, President) 1
197. Tailoring Solutions to Meet Client Needs Thomas J. Silveri (Drake Beam Morin, CEO) 1
198. *The Future of Marketing Consulting Davis Frigstad (Frost & Sullivan, Chairman) 1
59. *Setting and Achieving Goals (For Women) Jennifer Openshaw (Women's Financial Network) 1
60. The Path to Success (For Women) Tiffany Bass Bukow (MsMoney, Founder and CEO) 2
61. Becoming a Leader (For Women) Patricia Dunn (Barclays Global Investors, CEO) 1
62. Career Transitions (For Women) Vivian Banta (Prudential Financial, CEO) 1
63. Making the Most of Your Time (For Women) Kerri Lee Sinclair (AgentArts, Managing Director) 1
64. Follow Your Dreams (For Women) Kim Fischer (AudioBasket, Co-Founder and CEO) 1
65. Keep Learning (For Women) Krishna Subramanian (Kovair, CEO) 1
66. Keep Perspective (For Women) Mona Lisa Wallace (RealEco.com, CEO) 1
67. Experiment With Different Things (For Women) Emily Hofstetter (SiliconSalley.com, CEO) 1
68. Do What You Enjoy (For Women) Lisa Henderson (LevelEdge, Founder and CEO) 1
LAW
75. *Navigating Labor Law Charles Birenbaum (Thelan Reid & Priest, Labor Chair) 1
76. The Makings of a Great Labor Lawyer Gary Klotz (Butzel Long, Labor Chair) 1
77. The Complexity of Labor Law Michael Reynvaan (Perkins Coie, Labor Chair) 1
78. *Labor Lawyer Code: Integrity and Honesty Max Brittain, Jr. (Schiff Hardin & Waite, Labor Chair) 1
89. The Litigator: Advocate and Counselor Rob Johnson (Sonnenschein Nath, Litigation Chair) 1
Chapter # Title Author Units
90. *The Key to Success in Litigation: Empathy John Strauch (Jones, Day, Reavis & Pogue, Litigation Chair) 1
91. *Major Corporate and Commercial Litigation Jeffrey Barist (Milbank, Tweed, Hadley, Litigation Chair) 1
92. Keys to Success as a Litigator Martin Flumenbaum (Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Litigation Chair) 1
93. *Deciding When to Go to Trial Martin Lueck (Robins, Kaplan, Miller, Litigation Chair) 1
94. Credibility and Persuasiveness in Litigation Michael Feldberg (Schulte Roth & Zabel, Litigation Chair) 1
95. *Litigation Challenges in the 21st Century Thomas Kilbane (Squire, Sanders, Dempsey, Litigation Chair) 1
96. *Keeping it Simple Evan R. Chesler (Cravath, Swaine & Moore, Litigation Chair) 1
97. Assessing Risk Through Preparation & Honesty Harvey Kurzweil (Dewey Ballantine, Litigation Chair) 1
98. The Essence of Success: Solving the Problem James W. Quinn (Weil, Gotshal & Manges, Litigation Chair) 1
99. The Performance Aspect of Litigation Charles E. Koob (Simpson Thacher Bartlett, Litigation Chair) 1
100. *The Future of IP: Intellectual Asset Mngmnt. Richard S. Florsheim (Foley & Lardner, IP Chair) 1
101. The Balancing of Art & Science in IP Law Victor M. Wigman (Blank Rome, IP Chair) 1
102. *Policing a Trademark Paula J. Krasny (Baker & McKenzie, IP Chair) 1
103. Credibility & Candor: Must Have Skills Brandon Baum (Cooley Godward, IP Litigation Chair) 1
104. The Art & Science of Patent Law Stuart Lubitz (Hogan & Hartson, Partner) 1
105. Successful IP Litigation Cecilia Gonzalez (Howrey Simon Arnold & White, IP Chair) 1
106. Achieving Recognized Value in Ideas Dean Russell (Kilpatrick Stockton, IP Chair) 1
108. Keeping Current W/ Rapidly Changing Times Bruce Keller (Debevoise & Plimpton, IP Litigation Chair) 1
109. *Maximizing the Value of an IP Portfolio Roger Maxwell (Jenkins & Gilchrist, IP Chair) 2
110. *The Power of Experience in Deal Making Joseph Hoffman (Arter & Hadden, Corporate/Securities Chair) 1
111. *The Deal: The Beginning Rather than the End Mark Macenka (Testa, Hurwitz & Thibeault, Business Chair) 1
112. Communicating With Clients Gerard S. DiFiore (Reed Smith, Corporate/Securities Chair) 1
113. Making a Deal Work Kenneth S. Bezozo, (Haynes and Boone, Business Chair) 1
114. Challenges for Internet & Tech. Companies Carl Cohen (Buchanan Ingersoll, Technology Chair) 1
115. The Copyright Revolution Mark Fischer (Palmer & Dodge, Internet/E-Commerce Chair) 1
116. Privacy Rights and Ownership of Content Brian Vandenberg (uBid.com, General Counsel) 1
117. Business Intelligence From Day One Mark I. Gruhin (Schmeltzer, Aptaker and Shepard, , Partner) 1
118. Legal Rules for Internet Companies Arnold Levine (Proskauer Rose LLP, Chair, iPractice Group) 1
119. Protecting Your Assets Gordon Caplan (Mintz Levin PC) 1
120. The Golden Rules of Raising Capital James Hutchinson (Hogan & Hartson LLP) 1
121. Identifying the Right Legal Challenges John Igeo (Encore Development, General Counsel) 1
122. The Importance of Patents Richard Turner (Sughrue, Mion,, Senior Counsel) 1
79. *Common Values in Employment Law Columbus Gangemi, Jr. (Winston & Strawn, Labor Chair) 1
80. Building Long Term Relationships with Clients Fred Alvarez (Wilson Sonsini, Labor Chair) 1
81. *Becoming Part of the Client's Success Brian Gold (Sidley Austin Brown & Wood, Labor Chair) 1
82. *Understanding Multiple Audiences Raymond Wheeler (Morrison & Foerster, Labor Chair) 1
83. Employment Lawyer: Advisor and Advocate Judith Langevin (Gray, Plant, Mooty & Bennett, Labor Chair) 1
84. *Bringing Added Value to the Deal Practice Mary Ann Jorgenson (Squires Sanders Dempsey,Labor Chair) 1
85. Traditional Legal Matters on the Internet Harrison Smith (Krooth & Altman LLP, Partner) 1
TECHNOLOGY/INTERNET
276. Success Begins & Ends With Customers Richard Notebart (Tellabs, CEO) 1
277. *Success is Persistence, Passion & Perspiration David Struwas (DSL.net, CEO) 1
279. *Successful Telecom, Here and Overseas K. Paul Singh (Primus Telecommunications Group, CEO) 1
280. Managing in Telecommunications Alex Mashinsky (QOptics and Arbinet-theexchange, Founder) 1
281. Staying on Course: Telco Navigation John Schofield (Advanced Fibre Communications, CEO) 1
282. Surviving to Success Danny Stroud (AppliedTheory, CEO) 1
283. High-Speed Management David Trachtenberg (StarBand Communications, CEO) 1
284. Leadership in Telecommunications Gordon Blankstein (Global Light Telecommunications, CEO) 1
285. Winning on the Basics: Right People, Values Jeff Allen (IntelliSpace, CEO) 1
286. Watching Information Flow Art Zeile (Inflow, CEO) 1
167. *Closing the Technology Gap Dr. Carl S. Ledbetter (Novell, CTO) 1
168. *Creating and Enriching Business Value Richard Schroth (Perot Systems, CTO) 1
169. *Innovation Drives Business Success Kirill Tatarinov (BMC Software, Senior Vice President, CTO) 1
170. *Managing the Technology Knowledge Dr. Scott Dietzen (BEA E-Commerce Server Division, CTO) 1
171. The CTO as an Agent of Change Doug Cavit (McAfee.com, CTO) 1
172. The Class Struggle and The CTO Dan Woods (Capital Thinking, CTO) 1
173. A CTO's Perspective on the Role of a CTO Mike Toma (eLabor, CTO) 1
174. Technology Solutions to Business Needs Michael S. Dunn (Encoda Systems, CTO, EVP) 1
175. Bridging Business and Technology Mike Ragunas (StaplesDirect.com, CTO) 1
176. *The Art of Being a CTO - Fostering Change Rick Bergquist (PeopleSoft, CTO) 1
178. Developing Best of Breed Technologies Dr. David Whelan (Boeing, Space and Communications, CTO) 1
179. *Technology as a Strategic Weapon Kevin Vasconi (Covisint, CTO) 1
180. Role of the CTO in a Venture-Backed Startup Dan Burgin (Finali, CTO) 1
181. *Leading Technology During Turbulent Times Frank Campagnoni (GE Global eXchange Services, CTO) 1
182. Staying on Top of Changing Technologies Andrew Wolfe (SONICblue (formerly S3), CTO) 1
183. Building What the Market Needs Neil Webber (Vignette, Former CTO, Co-Founder) 1
184. *Let the Business Dictate the Technology Dwight Gibbs (The Motley Fool, Chief Techie Geek) 1
185. Technology Solutions: From the Ground Up Peter Stern (Datek, CTO) 1
186. The Securities Behind Technology Warwick Ford (VeriSign, CTO) 1
187. Building Leading Technology Ron Moritz (Symantec, CTO) 1
190. Designing the Right Technology Solution Michael Wolfe (Kana Communications, VP, Engineering) 1
191. The Role of a CTO Daniel Jaye (Engage, CTO and Co-Founder) 1
147. *Wireless Technology: Make It Simple John Zeglis (AT&T Wireless, CEO) 1
148. *Bringing Value to the Consumer Patrick McVeigh (OmniSky, Chairman and CEO) 1
149. Wireless Challenges Sanjoy Malik (Air2Web, Founder, President and CEO) 1
150. The High Costs of Wireless Paul Sethy (AirPrime, Founder & Chairman) 1
151. Developing Areas of Wireless Reza Ahy (Aperto Networks, President & CEO) 1
152. *The Real Potential for Wireless Martin Cooper (Arraycomm, Chairman & CEO) 1
153. Bringing Wireless into the Mainstream Robert Gemmell (Digital Wireless, CEO) 1
154. VoiceXML Alex Laats (Informio, CEO and Co-Founder) 1
155. Reaching the Epitome of Productivity Rod Hoo (LGC Wireless, President and CEO) 1
156. Identifying Revenue Opportunities Scott Bradner (Harvard Univ., Senior Technical Consultant) 1
157. The Wireless Satellite Space Tom Moore (WildBlue, President and CEO) 1
158. *Memory Solutions for Semiconductor Industry Steven R. Appleton (Micron Technology, Inc., CEO) 1
159. *Programmable Logic: The Digital Revolution Wim Roelandts (Xilinx, Inc., CEO) 1
160. The Streaming Media Future Jack Guedj, Ph.D. (Tvia, Inc., President) 1
161. Building a Winning Semiconductor Company Igor Khandros, Ph.D. (FormFactor, Inc., President and CEO) 1
162. The Next Generation Silicon Lifestyle Rajeev Madhavan (Magma, Chairman, CEO and President) 1
163. Semiconductors: The Promise of the Future Steve Hanson (ON Semiconductor, President and CEO) 1
164. Dynamics of the Semiconductor Data Center Eyal Waldman (Mellanox Technologies, LTD, CEO) 1
165. The Market-Driven Semiconductor Industry Bob Lynch (Nitronex, President and CEO) 1
166. Semiconductors: Meeting Performance Demand Satish Gupta (Cradle Technologies, President and CEO) 1
193. Internet Ad Campaigns, Not Just Cool Ads Brooke Correll (Wineshopper.com, VP Marketing) 1
194. Internet Advertising: Moving the Profit Needle John Herr (Buy.com, Sr. VP Marketing & Advertising) 1
208. *Being a Sustainable Internet Business Jonathan Nelson (Organic, Inc., CEO and Co-Founder) 1
210. Risk & Uncertainty: Internet Co. Challenges Joseph Howell (Emusic.com, Chief Financial Officer) 1
211. Focus on Profits in the Internet Economy Lynn Atchison (Hoovers.com, Chief Financial Officer) 1
212. Cash Flow for Internet Companies Tim Bixby (LivePerson, Chief Financial Officer) 1
213. Financial Accountability for Internet Companies Greg Adams (Edgar Online, Chief Financial Officer) 1
216. Scalability and Profits for Internet Companies Alan Breitman (Register.com, Chief Financial Officer) 1
217. *Building Real Value for Internet Companies Joan Platt (CBS MarketWatch, Chief Financial Officer) 1
219. *Organizing the Internet Financial House Mary Dridi (webMethods, Chief Financial Officer) 1
220. *Internet BizDev: Leveraging Your Value John Somorjai (Keen.com, VP, Business Development) 1
223. Finding the Right Partners for an Internet Co. Scott Wolf (NetCreations, SVP, Business Development) 1
224. *Changing Internet Market Conditions Daniel Conde (Imandi.com, Director, Business Development) 2
225. *Maximizing Time and Efficiencies Bernie Dietz (WebCT, VP, Business Development) 1
226. Internet BizDev: Pushing the Right Buttons Mark Bryant (LifeMinders.com, VP, Business Development) 1
FINANCIAL
244. *Merging Information Tech. & Accounting Paul McDonald (Robert Half Int’l, Executive Director) 1
245. *The Accountant's Perspective Gerald Burns (Moss Adams, Partner) 2
247. *Audits & Analyzing Business Processes Lawrence Rieger (Andersen, Global Managing Partner) 1
248. Accounting & the Entrepreneurial Market Domenick Esposito (BDO Seidman, Vice Chairman) 1
250. E-Business Transformation Fred Round (Ernst & Young, Director of eBusiness Tax) 1
251. Accounting: The UK/US Perspective Colin Cook (KPMG, Head of Transaction Services - London) 1
252. The Changing Role of the Accountant Jim McKerlie (Ran One, CEO) 1
253. The Future of Accounting Harry Steinmetz (M.R. Weiser & Company, Partner) 1
INVESTING
197. Who Wants to Become a Millionaire? Laura Lee Wagner (American Express, Senior Advisor) 1
198. *The Gold is in Your Goals Harry R. Tyler (Tyler Wealth Counselors, Inc., CEO) 1
199. *Timeless Tips for Building Your Nest Egg Christopher P. Parr (Financial Advantage, Inc.) 1
200. It’s What You Keep, Not Make, That Counts Jerry Wade (Wade Financial Group, President) 1
201. Accumulating Your Million-Dollar Nest Egg Marc Singer (Singer Xenos Wealth Management) 1
228. Time-Honored Investment Principles Marilyn Bergen (CMC Advisors, LLC, Co-President) 1
229. *The Art & Science of Investing Clark Blackman, II (Post Oak Capital Advisors, Managing Dir.)1
240. Altering Investment Strategy for Retirement Gary Mandell (The Mandell Group, President) 1
241. *Fair Value & Unfair Odds in Investing Scott Opsal (Invista Capital Mngmt, Chief Investment Officer) 1
242. Earnings Count & Risk Hurts Victoria Collins (Keller Group Investment Mngmnt, Principal) 1
243. *Navigating Turbulent Markets Howard Weiss (Bank of America, Senior Vice President) 1
249. Building an All-Weather Personalized Portfolio Sanford Axelroth & Robert Studin (First Financial Group) 1
254. Managing Your Wealth in Any Market Gilda Borenstein (Merill Lynch, Wealth Mngmt. Advisor) 1
255. Winning Strategies for International Investing Josephine Jiménez (Montgomery Asset Mngmnt, Principal) 1
256. The Psychology of a Successful Investor Robert G. Morris (Lord Abbett, Dir. of Equity Investments) 1
257. *Investing for a Sustainable Future Robert Allan Rikoon (Rikoon-Carret Investments, CEO) 1
OTHER
258. *E-Health: The Adjustment of Internet Tech. Robert A. Frist, Jr. (HealthStream, CEO and Chairman) 1
259. Health Care: The Paper Trail Jonathan S. Bush (athenahealth, CEO and Chairman) 1
260. Consumer Backlash in the Health Care Industry Peter W. Nauert (Ceres Group, CEO and Chairman) 1
261. Forging a Path in the New Health Care Industry Dr. Norm Payson (Oxford Health, CEO & Chairman) 1
262. The Future of Clinical Trials Dr. Paul Bleicher (Phase Forward, Chairman) 1
263. Health Care: Linking Everyone Together John Holton (scheduling.com, CEO) 1
264. The Future of the Health Care Industry Robert S. Cramer, Jr. (Adam.com, CEO and Chairman) 1
265. Being a Change Agent in Health Care Kerry Hicks (HealthGrades, CEO & Chairman) 1
266. Personalized Solutions in Health Care Dr. Mark Leavitt (Medscape, Chairman) 1
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Great for Yourself or Your Entire Team
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Visit www.Aspatore.com For a Complete List of Titles & Availability
MANAGEMENT/CONSULTING
Inside the Minds: Leading Consultants-Industry CEOs Share Their
Knowledge on the Art of Consulting (ISBN: 1587620596)
Inside the Minds: Leading CEOs-CEO Visionaries Reveal the Secrets
to Leadership & Profiting in Any Economy (ISBN: 1587620553)
Inside the Minds: Leading Women-What It Takes to Succeed & Have It
All in the 21st Century (ISBN: 1587620197)
Bigwig Briefs: Management & Leadership-The Secrets on How to Get
There, Stay There, and Empower Others (ISBN: 1587620146)
Bigwig Briefs: Human Resources & Building a Winning Team-Hiring,
Retaining Employees & Building Winning Teams (ISBN: 1587620154)
Bigwig Briefs: Become a CEO-The Golden Rules to Rising the Ranks
of Leadership (ISBN: 1587620693)
VENTURE CAPITAL/ENTREPRENEURSHIP
Bigwig Briefs: Term Sheets & Valuations-A Detailed Look at the
Intricacies of Term Sheets & Valuations (ISBN: 1587620685)
Inside the Minds: Venture Capitalists-Inside the High Stakes and Fast
Moving World of Venture Capital (ISBN: 1587620014)
Inside the Minds: Leading Deal Makers-Negotiations, Leveraging
Your Position and the Art of Deal Making (ISBN: 1587620588)
Bigwig Briefs: Startups Keys to Success-Golden Rules for Launching a
Successful New Venture of Any Size (ISBN: 1587620170)
Bigwig Briefs: Hunting Venture Capital-Understanding the VC Process
and Capturing an Investment (ISBN: 1587621150)
Bigwig Briefs: The Art of Deal Making-The Secrets to the Deal Making
Process (ISBN: 1587621002)
TECHNOLOGY/INTERNET
Inside the Minds: The Wireless Industry-Leading CEOs Share Their
Knowledge on The Future of the Wireless Revolution (ISBN:
1587620202)
Inside the Minds: Leading CTOs-Leading CTOs Reveal the Secrets to
the Art, Science & Future of Technology (ISBN: 1587620561)
For More Info, Visit Us At www.Aspatore.com Or

Inside the Minds: The Semiconductor Industry-Leading CEOs Share
Their Knowledge on the Future of Semiconductors (ISBN:
1587620227)
Inside the Minds: Chief Technology Officers-Developing,
Implementing and Capitalizing on the Best Technologies in the World
(ISBN: 1587620081)
Bigwig Briefs: Become a CTO-Leading CTOs Reveal How to Get
There, Stay There, and Empower Others That Work With You (ISBN:
1587620715)
Bigwig Briefs: Small Business Internet Advisor-Big Business Secrets
for Small Business Success on the Internet (ISBN: 1587620189)
Inside the Minds: Internet Marketing-Advertising, Marketing and
Building a Successful Brand on the Internet (ISBN: 1587620022)
Inside the Minds: Internet Bigwigs-Leading Internet CEOs and
Research Analysts Forecast the Future of the Internet Economy (ISBN:
1587620103)
Inside the Minds: Internet CFOs-Information Every Individual Should
Know About the Financial Side of Internet Companies (ISBN: 158762)
Inside the Minds: Internet BizDev-The Golden Rules to Inking Deals in
the Internet Industry (ISBN: 1587620057)
Bigwig Briefs: The Golden Rules of the Internet Economy-The Future
of the Internet Economy (Even After the Shakedown) (ISBN:
1587620138)
Inside the Minds: Internet Lawyers-Important Answers to Issues For
Every Entrepreneur, Lawyer & Anyone With a Web Site (ISBN:
1587620065)
LAW
Inside the Minds: Leading Labor Lawyers-Labor Chairs Reveal the
Secrets to the Art & Science of Labor Law (ISBN: 1587621614)
Inside the Minds: Leading Litigators-Litigation Chairs Revel the
Secrets to the Art & Science of Litigation (ISBN: 1587621592)
Inside the Minds: Leading IP Lawyers-IP Chairs Reveal the Secrets to
the Art & Science of IP Law (ISBN: 1587621606)
Inside the Minds: Leading Deal Makers-Negotiations, Leveraging Your
Position and the Art of Deal Making (ISBN: 1587620588)
Inside the Minds: Internet Lawyers-Important Answers to Issues For
Every Entrepreneur, Lawyer & Anyone With a Web Site (ISBN:
1587620065)

Bigwig Briefs: The Art of Deal Making-The Secrets to the Deal Making
Process (ISBN: 1587621002)
Bigwig Briefs: Career Options for Law School Students-Leading
Partners Reveal the Secrets to Choosing the Best Career Path (ISBN:
1587621010)
MARKETING/ADVERTISING/PR
Inside the Minds: Leading Marketers-Leading Chief Marketing
Officers Reveal the Secrets to Building a Billion Dollar Brand (ISBN:
1587620537)
Inside the Minds: Leading Advertisers-Advertising CEOs Reveal the
Tricks of the Advertising Profession (ISBN: 1587620545)
Inside the Minds: The Art of PR-Leading PR CEOs Reveal the Secrets
to the Public Relations Profession (ISBN: 1587620634)
Inside the Minds: PR Visionaries-The Golden Rules of PR and
Becoming a Senior Level Advisor With Your Clients (ISBN:
1587621517)
Inside the Minds: Internet Marketing-Advertising, Marketing and
Building a Successful Brand on the Internet (ISBN: 1587620022)
Bigwig Briefs: Online Advertising-Successful and Profitable Online
Advertising Programs (ISBN: 1587620162)
Bigwig Briefs: Guerrilla Marketing -The Best of Guerrilla Marketing-
Big Marketing Ideas For a Small Budget (ISBN: 1587620677)
Bigwig Briefs: Become a VP of Marketing-How to Get There, Stay
There, and Empower Others That Work With You (ISBN:
1587620707)
FINANCIAL
Inside the Minds: Leading Accountants-The Golden Rules of
Accounting & the Future of the Accounting Industry and Profession
(ISBN: 1587620529)
Inside the Minds: Internet CFOs-Information Every Individual Should
Know About the Financial Side of Internet Companies (ISBN:
1587620057)
Inside the Minds: The Financial Services Industry-The Future of the
Financial Services Industry & Professions (ISBN: 1587620626)
Inside the Minds: Leading Investment Bankers-Leading I-Bankers
Reveal the Secrets to the Art & Science of Investment Banking (ISBN:
1587620618)

Bigwig Briefs: Become a CFO-Leading CFOs Reveal How to Get
There, Stay There, and Empower Others That Work With You (ISBN:
1587620731)
Bigwig Briefs: Become a VP of Biz Dev-How to Get There, Stay There,
and Empower Others That Work With You (ISBN: 1587620723)
Bigwig Briefs: Career Options for MBAs-I-Bankers, Consultants &
CEOs Reveal the Secrets to Choosing the Best Career Path (ISBN:
1587621029)
INVESTING
Inside the Minds: Building a $1,000,000 Nest Egg -Simple, Proven
Ways for Anyone to Build a $1M Nest Egg On Your Own Terms
(ISBN: 1587622157)
Inside the Minds: Leading Wall St. Investors -The Best Investors of
Wall Street Reveal the Secrets to Profiting in Any Economy (ISBN:
1587621142)
OTHER
Inside the Minds: The New Health Care Industry-The Future of the
Technology Charged Health Care Industry (ISBN: 1587620219)
Inside the Minds: The Real Estate Industry-The Future of Real Estate
and Where the Opportunities Will Lie (ISBN: 1587620642)
Inside the Minds: The Telecommunications Industry-
Telecommunications Today, Tomorrow and in 2030 (ISBN:
1587620669)
Inside the Minds: The Automotive Industry-Leading CEOs Share Their
Knowledge on the Future of the Automotive Industry (ISBN:
1587620650)
ORDER THESE OTHER GREAT BOOKS TODAY!

Great for Yourself or Your Entire Team
Visit www.Aspatore.com
For a Complete List of
Titles & Availability

Inside The Minds:
THE ENTREPRENEURIAL PROBLEM SOLVER
Acknowledgements and Dedications
Gary L. Moulton
My business partners, Bill Kilpack, my wife and children
Rodney Kuhn
The entire Envision team
Peter J. Valcarce
James Ohman
Dave Hegan
Carl Horst and family – Marcia, Allison, John, and Chris. Eric Wessel, Ken
Gospodarek, Humberto Terrazus, Jason Burkhart, Susan Courtney, Vickie
Keelen, John Hendrickson, Danny Redding, “Chief,” Roy, Barb, Donna, Kathy
Zemaitis, Debbie, Alex (the Macedonian Mafia chief), Danny Gutierrez, B.B.,
Milos, Sandy, Darryl Cook, Junior, the “human rain delay,” Dave Luna, Javier,
Jose, Vladimer, Stoyanjco, Joe Redding, the guys from “American Blanking,”
the East Chicago Firemen who work for us part-time, Nancy Hendrickson,
Jason Rosanski, Lisa Lute, Michelle Knezevich, Mary Morrison. The
customers, suppliers, truckers, and bankers who believed in Majac Steel. Jack
Riordan, Bill Gottlick, Steve Parker, Matt Keller, Jim Wirth, Steve Carwile,
Chuck D’Alessio, Steve Ferry, Bob Mack, John Harris, Larry Mullen, Steve
Heneveld, my father, my friends at Feralloy, my wife Joanne
Patrick Smith
My wife Diana, Connor and Kylee
Russ W. Intravartolo
Bob Galvin, Rembert Stokes, Phil Gunderson, Ken Kindness, all the StarNet
team members

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CORPORATE PUBLISHING GROUP (CPG)

Inside The Minds:

First Printing, 2002

Library of Congress Card Number: 2002091106

Cover design by Kara Yates & Ian Mazie

Edited by Jo Alice Hughes, Proofread by Ginger Conlon

This book is printed on acid free paper.

Kurt Thomet 105

David Law 121

Patrick Smith 133

Daniel A. Turner 147

Russ W. Intravartolo 167

James D. Murphy 191

Acknowledgements & Dedications 239

LIFE LESSONS: BUILD YOUR

The LIFE Method: An Overview

Just as a plant needs a specific environment to develop and grow

Leadership is like the soil. If it is full of nutrients (motivation,

I know what you’re thinking. Don’t I mean the top?

True leaders are great supporters. They are motivators. An

Did you know the majority of Abraham Lincoln’s letters were

I often hear people refer to “entrepreneurial management,” but I

I prefer the term “entrepreneurial leadership.” This promotes an

You have probably heard the phrase, “Knowledge is power.”

Information is like water and, if your want life to continue, you

Leadership: Step Up, Then Step Aside

Entrepreneurial leadership – not management, but leadership – is

Another trait of a great leader is integrity. One person who

I learned an important lesson about integrity and its worth

wallet – he was speaking his broken English, and I was speaking

The entire experience had a profound impact on my life. I had

Leadership can be taught. It’s not something you have or don’t

Entrepreneurial leadership means allowing people to do their

This practice also allows the entrepreneurial leader to learn each

people for their successes. Recognition is critical to continued

Getting your employees to think like entrepreneurs is a good

At the same time, finding and hiring entrepreneurial people can

That’s not to say that entrepreneurial thinking is something you

This is an important distinction to make. When it’s time to move

With appropriate checks and balances, an employee can make a

In most cases I think being an entrepreneurial thinker shows

Nothing happens because of a single person. Every business is

To get around this type of block I try to find a situation in which

Information: Positive Input

For example, there may be 500 implementations planned over

Your job as the entrepreneur is to create the environment in

True entrepreneurs look forward to strategic planning. It can be

Gathering and understanding information is critical to being an

1. Don’t be afraid to ask questions. Many great things come

2. Be aware of the situation around you. Look for or create a

Once the information is gathered, go into a creative mode. This

When entering the creative environment, I implement cross-

Information feeds not only your employees, but also the

I cannot emphasize enough the importance of positive input in

Because being positive is crucial to selling your vision. Being

Follow-up: Measure and Reward

I stated earlier that follow-up is where you weed your garden. It

Ensure the strategy is shared and communicated accurately. Also

Establishing measurables for each project is critical to success.

Of course, having measurables in place to quantify success will

So it follows that the measures attached to performance are truly