Sifry’s Alerts

I’ve just gotten back from a week on the east coast – first I was at the NCTP
Industry & Academia portfolio meeting, went up to NYC to see some family,
and then went back to Baltimore, good old charm city, to give a speech on entrepreneurship to a class at Johns Hopkins, my alma mater.
I did a presentation called Rules for Entrepreneurs.
It is a collection of stories and hard-earned experiences I’ve learned in
my experiences as a consultant and as founder and executive of Securemote,
Linuxcare, and Sputnik. In a tribute to Guy Kawasaki,
one of the entrepreneurs and evangelists I’ve had tremendous respect for
(from way back in the Macintosh days), I made a Top 15 list: Rules for Entrepreneurs
15. Never fear mistakes.
14. There are no dumb questions.
13. Serendipity is your friend.
12. Know yourself.
11. Know your customer. Listen.
10. Know your competition.
9. Vision is easy. Execution is hard.
8. Focus, focus, focus!
7. Get a great team.
6. Don’t forget your friends.
5. Understand your business model.
4. Never ask someone to do something you wouldn’t do yourself.
3. Do Good.
2. Do it because you love it.
1. Dream. You can change the world.
And 5 practical tips:
1. Incorporate in Delaware.
2. Everybody vests.
3. Do your own due diligence.
4. Beware of nepotism.
5. Get an employment contract!
Maybe I’ll write up a short description on each point sometime, if anyone is interested…

Related posts:

1. Working offsite
2. So you wanna be a high-tech entrepreneur?
3. Time for a physical – and a social software lazyweb request
4. Madrid Talks / Geek Dinner / Photowalk: Save the dates!
5. Looking for bloggers who went looking for audiences

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