Entrepreneur Geek

Where will you succeed today?

My school’s motto was “Better Everyday“. I kept screaming “Better Everyday, Better Everyday” during Friday morning school assemblies for over six years, but did not really understand what it meant.

I have been overwhelmed with work (happens every 3 months, it’s been a pattern, but more about it some other day). And while I was reflecting on this pile of work, I realized I did get at least one solid item off my list almost every day. But I was stressed as that list kept getting longer.

What if I focused on my successes, rather than failures? What if I could succeed in just one thing everyday?

I reviewed the work I did get done last week and felt very happy. That’s when I twitted:

Nothing motivates more than success. Where will you succeed today?

I wrote it, was proud and went to sleep. But when I booted up my MacBook this morning, I noticed it again.

And I stopped. Thought about where do I want to succeed today. Made a mental note of it. And began working.

This is how my day went:

• By 10.30, I had one client happy. Work was moving slowly on that project, but today we nailed it.
• Around 11.30, I had another client happy. Solved an annoying bug within minutes and the client said “Wahoo! That’s brilliant!”
• One major customer called before noon, complaining about a mail server issue. I talked to my team and gave an update in an hour. By the end of our day, we had a good enough solution in place.
• Shown stick to a project team in our standup meeting at noon. They completed pending work before signing out.
• Worked on cleaning up some malformed XML files in afternoon. This project was facing lot of technical challenges. But I had a working prototype ready at 6.45pm when I left work.
• And I even fixed an annoying bug in PlannerX just before I started this post.

Amazing how much happened by focusing on where I want to succeed today.

And I could say:

Satisfying day. Progress on projects. Made 5 customers happy!

Incremental improvements carried out daily can make transform your life in three months. Focusing on small successes can bring you big victories. I understand that’s what our school wanted us to learn from “Better Everyday”.

Did you get better today?

What are you going to succeed at tomorrow?

Remember Passwords, Not Usernames

“Remember Me” options typically remember both username and passwords. Some sites remember your username and ask you to enter the password every time you login.

I saw that Plesk control panel remembers your password and asks you to enter the username.

That’s a really smart trick. It’s much easier for me to remember my username than my password. Someone who gets access to the computer will have to know my username to get in. It’s a good enough protection I think!

Anyone else on this? What do you think? Should we remember passwords or usernames?

Are you feeling the heat of times? There aren’t sufficient interesting & rewarding web projects out there. Everyone either wants to copy some social network / iPhone app or just wants to get it done at weekly grocery cost.

It’s not easy to find projects, so you may tend to pick up anything that comes your way. But beware!

Greg Hoy (on A List Apart) talks about five warning signs you should watch for. He recommends avoiding such customers. They will create problems later. And with my 11 years in web design / development business, I couldn’t agree more. I’ll even share couple of my own warning signs! Plus I have a list of positive signs from customers at the end.

Let’s start with Greg’s list of 5 red flags to Getting To No:

1. The never-ending contract revisionist: clients who can’t settle on the terms, keep asking for material / mocks upfront before taking decision
2. The giant project team: more than 3 people on client’s team is harmful. My experience says more than 2 is deadly as well.
3. Mr. or Mrs. Vague: All of us have them. Ask them plenty of questions.
4. The prospect with ants in their pants: clients who want it done yesterday. Sure shot problem creator. Charge rush rates.
5. The vanishing boss: Now he’s here, now he’s not. He’ll be present in the first “vision” meeting, and vanish until you deliver on the second milestone. And then claim “you’ve got it all wrong”. Solution: keep him in loop – email, phone, text – whatever works.

And here are my additions to the list:

1. Wannabe web millionaire with no commitment: someone who wants to make tons of money with this project, but has no time, money and background. He probably got an idea and his friends told him it’ll tick. But a good idea doesn’t make a business success. A project needs higher commitment from the client to succeed – higher than your own commitment.
2. Mountain of molehill’er: They give you one line requirement, like, “I want a Facebook clone”. Another version is “I want Facebook + Google Analytics + the next big Web 4.0 startup”. All your alarms should ring when you hear something like that. The spec will grow faster than mushrooms.
3. The Window Shopper: They ask for price / time estimates first. Have a long list of suppliers they are evaluating, but don’t have clear parameters for evaluation. May not have the time to answer your questions or may answer generically. Such guys will either go with the vendor who bid at 60% of the highest bidder or scrap the project.

Here are 3 signs of good prospects – do whatever it takes to win them

1. The Lake Water Guy: Such prospects give you clear specifications, are calm and understanding. You can sense their calmness even when you speak to them. They have clear vision of what they want – may not know the technical details – and passionate about it.
2. Suggestions Welcomed type: a prospect who’s willing to listen to your ideas is grounded and open. They will respect your skills and the discussions will make the project better.
3. Been There, Done That, But Not Boasting It: These are people who’ve seen the ups and downs, have failed a few times and have seen successes too. They understand there will be challenges and are ready to give you the time and space to handle them.

What kind of customers have you seen? What’s your list of positive / warning signs?

(Image courtesy dev null)

Take a Pit Stop, You Need It

I am bogged down. Got hundreds of things to do. I feel caught up in responsibilities and my own expectations. I need a break. Need a pit stop!

My mind is full of pending items, guilt and worries. I keep moving from one task to another. Fixing one problem and then to another. My mind wandering around something else in between. I don’t like doing a lot of things on my list and resist them.

So here’s what I am going to do this weekend.

Go for a walk

I meet two friends every Sunday morning. We talk about life and how to go beyond our stops. This time, we will go for a walk together instead of meeting at his office. Serves two purposes for me

Do 10 Surya Namaskar & Meditate

Been a long time I did them. Doing 10 Surya Namaskars always gave me a fresh start for the day. I am going to do that this weekend. And I want to just sit quietly and observe my thoughts. Not resist them, not negate them, not worry. Just accept whatever comes to my mind! And I will finish it by pondering over what I am grateful for in my life.

Create my Project Satisfaction – Weekly Review Matrix

Ok, I coined that term! Essentially, I want to make a list of life areas (business, personal, family, society, friends, money etc) and current projects in each area. This will be the first column. Columns on right will be weeks. Every week, I will give a satisfaction rating on each project – satisfied, neutral, not satisfied. This will give me an overview of where I am!

Review my Passion List

I have a list of what I am passionate about, what I want to contribute to the world. This is another weekend to get back in touch with my passions!

Watch a movie with family

Will grab the TV remote this Saturday night and watch a movie with family. Anything works as long as we enjoy it together.

Choose 5 things from my todo list, and complete them

I will also pick 5 things from my list of pending items (related to work / business) and complete them over the weekend. Nothing satisfies me more than completing things!

Read a book

Will pick up a book I am reading and complete a chapter!

Revelation begins by getting present…

While I made this list of what I am going to do this weekend, I realized I added another list of items to my already long pending todo-list! I can see it’s my pattern to start a lot of things, go from one to another. Complete many items in between and keep feeling sad about stuff I don’t complete.

I will tell you what happens after the weekend

And by the way, how many items do you want to pick up for your weekend?

Photo courtesy: sidehike

Big Lie Repeated Audaciously becomes Truth

Hitler, for good or bad, changed the world history. Some of the things going around me, just reminded me of Dr.
Joseph Goebbels – Adolf Hitler’s public relations / marketing / propaganda man.

What’s most remembered of Goebbels is his explanation of Britain’s Big Lie theory (which was adopted by Hitler / Goebbels very well). Quoting:

That is of course rather painful for those involved. The essential English leadership secret does not depend on particular intelligence. Rather, it depends on a remarkably stupid thick-headedness. The English follow the principle that when one lies, one should lie big, and stick to it. They keep up their lies, even at the risk of looking ridiculous.

So a big lie + repetition + audacity will soon become truth! People won’t care to find the truth, they will just listen to the big lie, and blinded by it, soon they will start believing that’s the real truth.

If you look at it, what were the primary rules of Hitler?

• Never allow the public to cool off
• Never admit a fault or wrong
• Never concede that there may be some good in your enemy
• Never leave room for alternatives
• Never accept blame
• Concentrate on one enemy at a time and blame him for everything that goes wrong
• People will believe a big lie sooner than a little one; and if you repeat it frequently enough people will sooner or later believe it.

The mentality of people is such that they will believe a big lie sooner than they would believe the truth. Malintentioned people use this to their advantage. They skew the facts and present only portions of it to public, omitting the original context and adding their own “big lie” context to it.

Some people realize this is so ridiculous, since they know the original facts. But the number of such people is generally less. And the propaganda man walks away to his advantage fooling everyone. By the time people realize the truth, it’s too late for them.

Have you ever experienced this happening? With you?

How would you fight it?

• Would you start countering every big lie?
• Would you keep quiet and wait?
• Would you expose the big lie?

(Image courtesy: notionscapital)