Pure Play

Other peoples Business Plans are easier!

In the two weeks before San Fran I did some consulting work with a Scandanavian early stage business. They had two small to medium funding rounds under their belt and had written their draft of the plan which is being used for the next round.

I helped them do a couple of things:

• Refine the pitch
• Develop the flow
• Clarify the focus

I enjoyed it and they found it really helpful. It was so much easier to do this with them than for the dbTwang plan we prepared last year - working like this you can take a very detached view of the proposition. In fairness to them they were receptive to the feedback and suggestions and in the process agreed a number of changes to sections which they had already debated internally.

Watch and see the results now - meetings with potential investors start this week :-).

keith

Congrats to all shortlisted blogs

Congrats to Michele, Maryrose, Sabrina, Matt and Ruth on getting through to the Best Business Blog Shortlist.

"Keith does not blog to win awards, he does it for the love of his business" said a spokesperson for the once longlisted blogger.

Best Blog of a Business - Sponsored by RedCardinal.ie

• blog.blacknight.com
• brightspark-consulting.com/blog
• sabrinadent.com
• curiouswines.ie
• nicedaydesigns-ruth.blogspot.com

Looking forward to seeing you all on Saturday evening in Cork - the rest of the shortlists are here.

keith

bizcamp Dublin - speaker selection No. 1

I am going to do a series of posts which each highlight 5 speakers at bizcamp Dublin and their chosen topics. The 1st 5 are a great cross section - finance, marketing and startup experience with innovation and management skills thrown in. Full line up here.

• Aileen Hannan “Practical Finances for Entrepreneurs”….sales projections, switching from paye to self employed, profit and tax, understanding p&l and balance sheet, doing figures for the bank, that sort of thing.

• Anton Mannering “Networking, how it helps to get your business going“….. Networking and getting your business going when you don’t have much resources.

• Eve Bulman "Our Communication Styles" This short session will provide an overview of the 4 Communication Styles, their Strengths & Weaknesses, how they serve us as Entrepreneurs and facilitated discussion on the topic.

• Chris Byrne “Startup advice from a serial entrepreneur” ….Starting your own business, email marketing, online research.

• Johnny Beirne "The story of how one business innovates" Johnny Beirne talks about how his business constantly innovates their service to develop new markets and also shares the story of the Leitrim Business Network

Thanks to everyone who has offered to speak to date - 22 in total so far.

keith

Whale watching was brilliant

We had a brilliant time yesterday. After the disappointment in summer 2006 of watching dolphins for 3 hours we saw loads of fin whales (the world's second largest mammal after the blue whale) and a couple of humpbacks (pretty much the only one which does the tail in the air dive - the tail lob). 

We went out with Nic Slocum of WhaleWatchWestCork - he is courteous, knowledgeable and respectful of the animals we went out to see. I cannot recommend his trips enough.

It was a mild and calm morning - so despite the heavy frost when we got up the journey was quieter than our last outing.

This is what we were looking out for - the blows which a whale does when it surfaces to breath and which are followed by the sight of the majority of the whales length coming to the surface. There are three in this photo and the ususual thing about this group is that there are 2 fin whales and a humpback - something which Nic Slocum (the skipper) said he has never seen as it is rare for different species to "hang out" together!

The tail of a humpback - we saw this a couple of times with two different animals and it was wonderful to see - reminiscent of the poster shots of whales which are so popular. It signifies a terminal drive by the whale - one which brings them down deep for 5 to 10 minutes and so they can end up anywhere when they blow again.

The best bit of the trip was this - when a female fin which is 50 ft approx (smaller than the max) blew and surfaced about 30 to 40 feet away from the boat. It caught all of us by surprise.

Here is a slideshow sequence showing a humpback blowing and then going into a terminal dive with a tail lob at the end.

keith

BizCamp

Conor O'Neill has posted the learning from CorkCamp2 over on their blog - link here. In it he suggests there maybe interest in a Bizcamp.

My interpretation is a Camp which does not exclude technology sessions/streams but which is pitched more at business discussions and experience sharing. So it would appeal both to the early stage technology community which turn up to standard Camps but also to entrepreneurs and startups from other sectors.

Happy to work on it in KK/South East - welcome comments or feedback. Alternatively would also pitch in with a team taking it on elsewhere.

keith

enterprise-ireland.com

One of the most interesting projects I have worked on as a consultant is as a member of the Path Pacific team which is currently developing a new web strategy for Enterprise Ireland.

 

Apart from Michael Clyne in Path Pacific who has enormous experience in the eGovernment sector (most recently with reach.ie) I am also working with Gerry McGovern, Brian Lamb and the crew at CustomerCareWords.

Meeting some great people in EI and looking forward to seeing how the outcome turns out - we all have preconceived ideas going in but the outcome and recommendations will be based on the the results of the methodical and comprehensive work that is being done :-)

keith

Photo from Tinakilly House in Wicklow

Stayed here on Thursday evening and really enjoyed it

Keith

EI, a photo of the new building

The stairway in the EI only half of the building. Only place we could get coffee :)

Quick prediction

Reading an article on ebooks and very confidently thinking that I will never consume books on that medium. Followed immediately by the memory of having been wrong many times in the past about technology trends.

There is a pleasure in reading real books that screen reading does not add to for me. And there is no missing functionality that I am aware of.

Wait and see ;-)

Keith

Humour does not get much more geeky

Thanks to Paul in Ormonde Design for passing on this - font comedy!

keith