The Word of mAn[S]o0r

And the slogan of the campaign isn’t off the mark at all.

I had the pleasure of attending the startup insiders session, arranged jointly by Green and White and PASHA, and event which i was waiting for at least two weeks. Why? Because its exciting! The idea that the people present, presidents and CEO’s of major organizations were at one time where we are today, and that we too might join their ranks one day. And better yet, we have their brains to pick now!

The event expected 15 to 20 people. After the phenomenal success of the Karachi event, the expectations were raised to around 70 or so, At 6:20, we had a full room, with people standing in the aisle, and the number of participants being 100+. Not a bad turnout for the sleepy city of Islamabad.

The event was scheduled as a series of questions and answers from a panel of six successful entrepreneurs, and we got right down to them. From how to set a vision, how to know if your vision is even correct, how select a team, who to have in a team, and ups and downs of a writing a business plan, the event covered a large majority of concerns budding entrepreneurs have.

The most important lessons i learned in this session were the following

1. Have a right mix of skills within the founders team.
2. Its just as important to have the right sense of who to hire, than the sense of building the product to keep the startup going.
3. Build the product first, get it working, get customers and then get funding.
4. Business plan is a good thing when you have long term ideas. However, its never written in stone and acts more as a guide throughout your startup process than a series of commandments. It will mostly be rewritten at various points and becomes a living document of sorts.
5. Passion is the most important ingredient a startup founder needs to have.
6. Rally your team against something more substantial than money. Otherwise, braving the inevitable storms become harder.

And the funniest (and most hard hitting) lessons

1. Startup founders hardly get any sleep.
2. For a balanced work and family life, include your spouse in your startup!

There were quite a bit more insights shared in the forum, these were just the ones which stuck to me.

The audience were also really a good mix, from students, to budding entrepreneurs, to those who had already taken the plunge and were now heading companies of their own. Again, who knew that within the sleepy city of Islamabad, such activities were taking place.

Trackback URI | Comments RSS