Culture

Head Start

The entrepreneurial lifestyle resists definition.

Business owners paint with strokes of curiosity, determination, and innovation. When people build with creative ambition, experience is valuable, but the symphony of desire and attitude plays an equally important role. It takes heart to start and resilience to keep building. Executing early moves, managing focus, collecting feedback, building a team, and maintaining sales is such an art form.

The best part about an entrepreneurial lifestyle is that it’s accessible to everyone. This can be seen as students explore projects that look like work to others, but feel like play to them. It’s intrapreneurs fueling positive change in existing companies. It’s startup founders achieving product-market fit with new ideas and others who build on existing momentum by acquiring an established business.

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This caffeinated contribution was written by Sheldon Ohringer. Sheldon has led large sales teams, is an active investor, a board member, and is now building Cocoon Growth to help others buy their first business.

Starting a business is one way to explore the entrepreneurial lifestyle, but buying an existing business is also an interesting way to write your own story. While there may be a cost for the head start, acquiring an existing business presents an interesting side door to the entrepreneurial lifestyle.

As you consider a business to buy, avoid future headaches by understanding industry requirements such as licenses, permits, zoning, and environmental requirements. As you work with existing ownership to determine a purchase price, a valuation based on capitalized earnings, excess earnings, cash flow, and tangible assets are all methods to guide fair negotiations. In the end, the right price is one that delights the seller and has the buyer excited.

As details come together, partner with legal and accounting experts who focus on mergers and acquisitions to document the transaction. A letter of intent, confidentiality agreement, contracts, leasing documents, financial statements, tax returns, and sales agreements are all important documents to talk with your M&A team about. Many transactions include a vesting schedule as well, so stay in-tune with these details to avoid unwanted surprises.

There are a variety of strategic ways to acquire a business, but once the transition takes place, new owners are given keys to a kingdom that hails an established team, customer base, and operating procedures. As we see in the Exit section of the Results chapter in YDNTB, there will be challenges during these transitory times, but in the end, virtuous leaders listen to keep the culture balanced. All the good that comes with a business is important to maintain, but an honest audit of negative aspects are important too. Intentional candor with areas to improve allows new owners to build on past success, while charting a renewed vision for lasting prosperity.

By Ben McDougal, ago

Conspicuous Kindness

These two hours between Elon Musk and Lex Fridman was fascinating. During their opening examination of war, Elon was sharing peculiar ways to deescalate tension with “conspicuous kindness”. This term caught my ear and has me wondering if the winds of outrage are human nature, perhaps conspicuous kindness can help us heal the future?

Conspicuous kindness feels empathetic, but not without boundaries. Like a vibe that welcomes other vibes. It keeps hope evolving, but everyone experiences the world differently. Consistency may be what people want in business, but the discipline to stay centered is challenged by constant change and history makes it hard to imagine world peace. Acts of conspicuous kindness are seen everyday, but what happens when conflict tests humanity?

We may long for a cosmic utopia where peace and progress co-exist, but reality can always be altered as long as humans play by different rules. Not rules based on objective truth, but the dynamic personal and political truths of mankind. Such variety of imbalance combined with endless complexity makes global alignment ostensibly impossible. While interplanetary travel may someday reduce geopolitical stress, when survival feels at stake, desperation sets in. Anonymity without kindness devolves into animosity and isolation fuels fear that can apparently justify begrudging rage.

Fortunately, life on earth has long been resilient.
Unfortunately, any single planet has limitations.

With over 8 billion humans all consuming finite resources and our species altering the earth like never before, conflict may be inevitable. If we know it’s coming, can the kindness we teach children be extended into our shared experience? What equilibrium must be achieved to make everyone feel thankful, happy, motivated, and significant?

Kindness cannot be the only answer, but it feels like part of an equation where we collectively assume positive intent, welcome the opportunity to be wrong, appreciate healthy debates without regret, and let others lead.

If versions of vulnerability are necessary, how can we lean into conspicuous kindness without being taking advantage of? If you saw how Lex and Elon interacted with xAI in the interview that prompted this writing, you may be reminded of how BEN BOT contributes in You Don’t Need This Podcast! This is pure human, but let’s brew in an interesting response from our conversational companion.

“I believe that leaning into conspicuous kindness without being taken advantage of starts with setting boundaries and expectations. It is important to be clear about what you are willing and not willing to do, and to communicate this to those around you. Additionally, it is important to be mindful of the intentions of those you are interacting with and to trust your instincts. If something feels off, it’s okay to take a step back and re-evaluate the situation. Finally, it is important to remember that kindness does not have to mean weakness; it is possible to be kind and firm at the same time.” –BEN BOT

As we rebound to human wisdom on such a heavy topic, my dad reminded me of how people’s life experiences impact innate responses. Has trust been broken before? Are there generational activities that seem destine to create tension? When distrust has been woven into the history of any interaction, good will can feel unfathomable.

Perhaps when kindness feels this
removed, is when it’s needed most.

By Ben McDougal, ago

Make It Rain

Adam Viet is a baller who connects others and recruits tech talent to support company cultures that sing the songs of significance. Adam is a leader in Des Moines, hosts the Shooters Touch Podcast for basketball coaches, and owns Vociferous – #109 within the Roasted Reflections NFT Collection. Sub in as we shoot hoops and talk sports, hiring talent, RPO/ROD, connection vs. transaction networking, web3, and always staying curious.

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By Ben McDougal, ago

Triangulation

Cross-checking helps determine distance, maneuver around obstacles, and identify missing objects. Alongside the math, a triangulated team diversifies real skills and increases dependability.

With more distinct perspectives, entrepreneurs add synergy that accelerates forward movement and increases confidence when the same problem is attacked from multiple angles. This nimbleness can be leveraged as co-founders also create an invigorating culture that makes each person feel significant. With back-to-back episodes of You Don’t Need This Podcast featuring my two co-founders in FliteBrite, what a wonderful chance to reflect on talented friends who build as one.

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“One’s company, two’s a crowd,
and three’s a party.” -Andy Warhol

If you’re on the prowl for co-founders, consider the value of triangular patterns. Connectors become connected, so show up and be quick to make interesting introductions. Even when the first degree of contact lacks obvious opportunity, remember it’s often the second and third degree of connectivity that delivers more precision. Over time, generosity within an entrepreneurial ecosystem will expand and tighten engaged networks. Instead of forcefully recruiting co-founders, the open-ended activity of a serendipitist will have us colliding with friends we simply haven’t met yet.

When it’s time to build, bonds that formed naturally will support lasting collaboration with people you already respect. That said, established trust is not an excuse to get complacent. From start to finish, be honest and transparent. Every story ends, so invite difficult discussions early and often. Agree on terms, leave space for change, structure the business, maintain an operating agreement to ensure clarity with less tension, and lead by nurturing the power of triangulation.

  • commit to abundant communication
  • invite responsibility, keep the promise
  • remain attentive to details
  • take blame, give credit
  • celebrate in style

Lone wolves can move mountains and rare resources are required with more human capital brewed in, but the expanded capacity and ongoing resilience makes this odyssey worthwhile. When long-term players play long-term games together, the chemical reaction is an affinity toward work that feels like play. Cheers!

By Ben McDougal, ago

Echos

The echo of an idea is always fading.

How can we extend ideation long enough to activate early moves, blow through barriers, and maintain lasting enrollment? This is clearly a loaded question. Much goes into enabling ideas into reality and the rate of an idea’s degradation depends on a million factors, but let’s sip on the artistry of pushing without being pushy.

As seen in the Ideation and Research chapters of YDNTB, personal reflection is the easiest way to think through the various angles that might make an idea interesting. This private contemplation doesn’t require much skill and we don’t get stuck trying to earn the attention of others. Unfortunately, the ease of your own activity is matched by the hardships that await those who don’t let ideas breathe. This is why stealth mode is precarious and ongoing customer discovery is key.

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Will you spend time or money?

When we share a new idea with someone else, the situation becomes complex. This is the moment we put our idea on a hook. It’s when we push past fear and invite doubt. Connecting dots within such complexity is difficult, takes time, and is never straightforward. Research helps to build confidence and adds clarity to how opportunities are articulated. While this preparation helps guide others through layers of understanding faster, a blend between patience and urgency is required to align interest.

This makes blunt repetition tempting, but ineffective. Whether it’s potential co-founders, mentors, early adopters, or investors, more of the same (without execution) can chase away interest. To avoid potential fading too fast, find different ways to motivate movement.

For a fun visualization, let’s imagine a small pond. If one pebble drops in, the lonely ripple would be obvious, but also fades fast. While it made a splash, it’s soon forgotten. Now, imagine many pebbles being thrown in different ways, all around the pond, and over time. The pond is now alive! The echo of each pebble is magnified and the abundance of rippled collisions leave a more lasting impact.

Like this pond full of pebbles, we can nudge progress long enough to activate action by adding variety into how we introduce and continue to explore an idea. Conversation in different environments, creative analogies, inquisitive questioning, active listening, talking about anything else, releasing reluctance, or getting more people involved are all ways you can keep building without seeming frantic, repetitive, or desperate. This intentional diversity allows different echos of one idea to each feel different, and yet, all bounce in the same direction.

By Ben McDougal, ago