Think before you speak

Yesterday, I met Pankaj Sharma of LeadInvent, start-up in drug discovery space. We were both participating in Start-up Fair along with some other start-ups, in NIST, Delhi. Occassionally, we talked on our experiences there in NSIT event and also discussed about LeadInvent and CellStrat, our companies, how we started, possible solutions for possible problems we face in talent management, etc.

One thing, many of us there observed was that he (Pankaj) was a very patient listener to all students. We asked him the reason later for the same, as time is generally a constraint in these kinds of events, especially when you are hiring from among so many students. He told us the following:

“People younger to you are the only ones you can create your impression on in your first meeting.”

Generally speaking older people will not give you a patient hearing how so ever good your idea may be. Thus, he says. his interactions with older people get over in less then 5-6 minutes. This is becuase in in initial days of startin up his venture, he met around 10 experts from his field and all were very very rude to him and never were ready to listen to him, were never ready to give him any work even for free as they all had ego. Only one professor of his gave him a patient listening and when he was about to go back to his job after getting discouraged, that the professor offered to help him by giving work to him even for which he said, he will not be paying  Pankaj. But that was the time when Pankaj started his venture and never looked back again. Now, after about 2 years, he is a successful entrepreneur and for which he gives credits to that professor, who listened to his ideas without any ego and advised him in the right direction. From then on, he listens and talks to all younger people very patiently.

It’s a great lesson one can learn. I hope, I am able to follow it and make it a habbit. I also read another post about this which you can read here.

How to Accelerate your venture

1) Go out of discussions and planning:Some people says that plans are inispensable but I also feel that planning if prolonged can eat up all of ur time. I believe in executing as and when ideas come and the person leartns with experience which can then be put in writing on the plan. Some ventures never come to exist as their planning nvever comes to an end.

2) Set dead lines else u will never be able to Start and finish: as I said in above point, start now or at nest set a dead line to finish the task at hand and then move on to next task.

3) Cost mgmt – dedicate a person to finances: All ventures require. That atleast one person of the team should be made accountable for the finances of the company else budgets will be finished in no time with lot of problems in accounting all the time.

4) Communicate – Communicate and communicate – document everything:communicate more often with ur team. Document everything so that it can be referred to again later for effective smooth discussions and good conslusions.

5) Set tasks list: Accomplish and move on. But, don’t make too big a list which is unachievable on a daily basis.

6) Get first 100 customers fast as they will be the ones telling u how, what and when to do for making ur services and offerings super effective.

7) Monetise fast or else u will b left out in no time.

8) Quality should be maintained and increased always. Even when dream comes true, maintain quality else u will go down fast.

9) Biggest mitakes:
A) After project features hv been finalised, sign off and accept no more for that project.

10) Groom ppl who are scalable and who are good at doing certain tasks.

11) Hire the best ppl who gel with the team. Law of crappy people: at some point of time, the best guy will become as good as the worst guy. Hire and fire the right people at the right time else if a guy is not doing the right work, u will do a favor by firing him as he may be able to do good at some other place.

12) Be optimistic, learn and move on, just don’t cling to urpast mistakes or misfortunes and keep grudging on ur mistakes.

13) Build ur own team as if u outsource u loose time (good outsourcing company is hard to find) and thus money both.

14) Take care of your employees, give them the best to work as leaders are servants as more people u Sat, Apr 18, 2009, more of them u r serving so trayte ur ppl best.

15) Give opportunity to people to try working with u, if he fits u and u fit his mind, it will work.

16) Entrepreneurs are Opportunity Hounds and with never say die attitude. They are always on the look-out for new opportunities.