If we look at tech news over the last 48 hours we see that AOL bought TechCrunch, RiM released their tablet solution PlayBook, Google bought a million bucks worth of shares in a monorail company, Twitter gave us more details on promoted tweets, and Facebook is apparently finalizing a partnership with Skype.The high-tech world is getting as much attention in the news cycle as Obama and the economy. I do some work with a start-up and it can be tempting to build something that perhaps one day can be swallowed up by a bigger fish but so can cashing your pay stub at the lottery kiosk.
If you are daydreaming about the sports car and lakefront property you will buy, you may be distracted from building what someone may want to purchase one day – a profitable company.
Twenty years ago, most of these companies didn't exist and now they're buying each other. We often forget that even Google and Microsoft were once start-ups hoping to make it big one day.
Tech is sexy now. Although it is much tougher to get funding these days, calling your company a start up is way cooler than simply calling it a new company. Start-up sounds feisty and scrappy. It’s cool to be a geek.
Here are some questions you may want to ask yourself. These are valid in start-up mode or at any point in your company's maturity.
• Do you have a documented Plan?
• How often do you review your Plan?
• If you are a start-up, how long will you call yourself a start-up?
• Is your goal to build a company or be acquired?
• Do you know what holes exist?
• Have you identified the strengths of everyone in your organization?
What would you add to the list?
knealemann
