An article in Saturday’s Toronto Star caught my eye. It talks about the rising numbers of self-employed Canadians in the last 12 months. 

Whether by necessity or desire, self-employment is becoming more popular.  This is good news; Canada needs more entrepreneurs. And if you read Avvey’s post titled “Buck the Trend”, many agree recession or no, it’s a good time to start a business.  Maybe it’s because we’re hungry. Or we’re developing our talent to recognize and capitalize on opportunity. Or because Canada has made it easy to start a business. (We tie for first with Australia and New Zealand according to the World Economic Forum’s Global Competitiveness Report 2008-2009). All of these are reasons why Communitech is obsessed with entrepreneurship — we host a huge celebration of entrepreneurship every fall with Entrepreneur Week.

Whatever the case, the statistics and the how-to-succeed tips in the article give a much-deserved nod to the entrepreneurs who play and will play such a key role in our economy. These firms may start small, but over 1.3 million of the start-ups cited in the article employ other people. Jobs are good. Economic momentum is good. So instead of looking at your neighbour, friend or daughter with horror when she tells you she’s going to start a business during a recession… read the article, pass it on, then applaud. 

- Iain

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Not to be confused with the ‘old’ murphy’s law that posited “what can go wrong, will go wrong”, Jacqui Murphy has been spending a lot of time of late talking how to make things go right for entrepreneurs. Her belief is that the focus of building companies should be on getting customers and revenue first — and not the ‘old normal’ that you must raise money first. She believes that not only is it the new order — it’s also the best way to establish a power position when you do go to raise money with VCs. I agree and invite you to check it out and let us know your thoughts about the ‘new murphy’s law’. http://blog.techcapital.com/
- Iain

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Our community is a success in part because we spend time thinking about what’s next: What’s the next opportunity? What’s the next innovation? What’s the next sector where tech can have an impact? 

We’re full of questions about the future possibilities and opportunities. Combined with our capacity to DO something about the opportunities we find and our resilience… . Well, you can start to see why we’re one of the most “talked about” tech Regions in North America.

We’re producing a publication called TechNEXT. In it, we explore new areas of technological capability and strength. We examine the commercial, scientific and mental momentum of the Region and discuss the aspects of our ecosystem that cultivate start-ups and business success.  I hope you’ll take a look at it. More importantly I hope it get you thinking about what’s NEXT.

TechNEXT is available for distribution on May 31^st. You’ll find copies of the publication at Communitech, CTT, the Canada 3.0 Forum on June 8-9, 2009 and in local waiting rooms. We’re also distributing to specific postal code areas through The Record. 

Post-script: When you see TechNEXT, would you take a very brief survey to let us know what you think of the content? We’re interested in your opinion. Thanks in advance!

Click Here to take the TechNEXT survey

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Jacqui Murphy at Tech Capital Partners Inc. wrote a compelling blog entry last week on the potential for increasing our innovation-to-market capacity by doing a little homework, using social network technology and being generous with your connections. I’ll pasting Jacqui’s blog entry (with permission, of course). 

Calling All Connectors
April 14th, 2009 Jacqui:
 Lots of discussion/blogging/articles over the past few weeks about entrepreneurs and innovation in Canada. Here’s where we weighed in:  Tim Jackson: Entrepreneurship and the upside to a downturn 

The consensus appears to be that yes, we do have great entrepreneurs and great innovation in this country. I for one believe this is true and have worked with a good number of entrepreneurs who have built (with their teams of course) very successful companies. 

Lately, I’ve been spending a ton of time thinking about what we as a venture capital community and the broader technology industry can do to support these entrepreneurs. When I look around at the venture capital ecosystem in Canada (and elsewhere) most VCs are either out of cash or have very little cash left to invest (there are obviously exceptions and some VCs have raised funds in the last couple of years). I’m not sure that the majority of entrepreneurs have heard this message. When I look at the amount of time and effort that Canadian entrepreneurs invest in pitching their companies to VCs (here and elsewhere), it makes me want to scream. If we could harness this time and effort and direct it towards selling products and services to real customers, imagine how much revenue all of these companies could generate. 

Looking at the funding process today, entrepreneurs pitch their companies to VCs who pitch to LPs. Wouldn’t it be great if entrepreneurs never had to pitch VCs? What if we turned the process on its head and built such great companies that entrepreneurs could choose whether or not to fund their companies with venture capital? And what if VCs had to demonstrate value beyond money for entrepreneurs to want them to invest in their companies…? And wouldn’t it be great if VCs never had to pitch LPs to raise new funds because of off the chart returns?  

So how can we help entrepreneurs beyond providing capital?
* By helping them generate revenue more quickly*

Here’s what I’m proposing: 

1. Entrepreneurs/companies:   

• • Map out your industry ecosystem: a) Types of companies you sell to (e.g. carriers) b) Types of companies you would partner with in order to sell (e.g. network equipment vendors)
  • Identify the specific companies that fall into this ecosystem: a) Potential customers b) Potential partners
  • Identify the specific person/people at each of these companies that you need to get in front of in order to sell your products (great tools for this includeLinkedIn and Jigsaw). Figure out where these people are located. Group by geography. Plan trips to visit these regions.
  • Search on LinkedIn to identify “connectors” who can introduce you to these potential customers/partners so that you can set up initial calls and then face-to-face meetings with them.
  • Commit to building out your LinkedIn rolodex and sharing the connections you make with other entrepreneurs.

Now, these first few steps can be difficult and will take a significant amount of time. If anyone can come up with a cost effective way to help entrepreneurs work through this process, please weigh in below in the comments…

Communitech is one organization that has been supportive in finding creative ways to help entrepreneurs work through this process. 

2. VCs and other supporters of entrepreneurs:

• • Spend some time building out our LinkedIn rolodexes (many of us know many more people than the ones we currently have listed in LinkedIn).
  • Highlight the market sectors where we have experience on our LinkedIn profiles.
  • Respond to entrepreneurs who reach out to us for introductions. Go for coffee to learn more about them and their businesses. Introduce them to potential customers/partners and others who can help them generate revenue more quickly.

I spoke with a group of entrepreneurs last week on this topic — “Leveraging Non-Existing Networks Into Guerrilla Revenue Generating Strategies”. Many were skeptical at the beginning of the discussion but by the end, there was a real energy in the room.

I understand why people might hesitate to open up their rolodexes and connect people. 

My response:

1. I am not proposing that we destroy our reputations by spamming our rolodexes with Canadian content  . I am proposing that we spend a bit of quality time, interacting with entrepreneurs in our sectors and connecting them with potential customers/partners when/where we feel comfortable doing so.

2. We would be connecting our contacts with entrepreneurs who have developed products and services that have real value propositions. Our contacts may well benefit from being introduced to these entrepreneurs.

3. What good are our relationships if we don’t leverage them? We become more powerful and influential by sharing and connecting.

“He who receives ideas from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine receives light without darkening me” – Thomas Jefferson (tip of the hat to Michael Masnick) 

Some ideas to get started:

1. I’ve been told that there are about 300,000 expat Canadians living in Silicon Valley (yes, 300,000). Have you reached out to a Canadian expat today?

2. There’s a small but mighty group called Canada Connects on LinkedIn. Same objective as this post. Please join to help get our Canadian entrepreneurs on steroids.

I’ll be the first to admit this plan is not perfect. Constructive criticism with suggestions for improvement are absolutely appreciated.

Interesting, no? If you’d like to respond to Jacqui’s post, click here. If you’re not on LinkedIn yet, I encourage you to try it. The philosophy of the site is (as Jacqui suggests) that relationships matter. They are one of your most valuable assets and, as with all assets, you can leverage them for career or personal success. 

For a few tips on how you might use LinkedIn effectively, check out Guy Kawasaki’s blog “How To Change The World” for Ten Ways to Use LinkedIn. 

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Jim Estill spoke at our Techworking Breakfast on Wednesday; it was likely his last speaking engagement prior to moving on to new challenges with an as-yet-unnamed $750M company in New York. Good for him. He’s a man who values the challenge of learning and momentum, and while we’ll miss his day-to-day physical presence in the Waterloo Region tech community, he’ll never be completely gone. Not really.  Jim’s legacy includes the inspirational nature of his entrepreneurial spirit (he started EMJ out of the trunk of his car), his success with SYNNEX Canada and the close to 100 venture capital investments totaling nearly $20M Jim has made in tech start-ups.  At the end of his talk, there was an impromptu standing ovation for Jim.  Although he’s not routinely the cover-story of tech leaders, people know how important he is to this region, the tech industry and Canada. So I’d like to share some of the good stuff from this morning’s talk. You can find some of it on Jim’s blog, but here it is in summary. Jim’s 10 Secrets of Success:

1. There is no secret.
2. You’re the product of what you habitually do, so chose good habits.
3. Fail often. Fail fast. Fail cheap.
4. Know yourself. 
5. Set a pace you can maintain.
6. Be frugal. Understand good value.
7. Welcome and embrace change. Change is opportunity!
8. Manage your downside. Anticipate risk.
9. Be a time management fanatic.
10. Embrace technology.

The Q&A after Jim’s talk generated some interesting questions from the audience – many of them about venture capital. (I’m particularly happy about this. It seems people in the Region are thinking about investing in the future – see Avvey’s post below.)  Some of the key points for me were Jim’s take on criteria for venture investments — he looks for scalable high tech or low-tech start-ups with good, frugal people who are open to change.  He also gave some good advice to start-ups looking for investors: Look for good people, who are mature and practiced investors. Make sure they have money for a round now and a round in the future – if you need it. And find out what they do with the rest of their money.Sound advice from a guy who knows a thing or two about success and how to create it.  Even though Jim is heading to NY, he’ll maintain ties in the Region. And you can follow him here:

• Blog: www.jimestill.com
• Twitter @jimestill 

 Before I push the publish button, here’s my favourite quote from Jim’s talk:“I love pulling off the things people say you can’t do.” Words to live by? Absolutely!

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