How Did We Get Here?
Jul 27 2009
Do you ever wonder how people get to where they are? What are the daily things that happen or don’t happen that contribute to where you are right now? It’s often hard to piece everything together, but I found myself wondering that recently when thinking about friends, myself, and other entrepreneurs.
An older gentleman came in to pitch his company to the Austin Technology Incubator recently. He had an interesting concept having to do with wireless technology but it was as if he was living in a different time dimension. He actually presented using transparencies on an overhead projector that we happened to have because we are part of the University, but I daresay that projector has sat mostly unused for over a decade. He had over 40 transparencies and we asked him to skip most of them. When I asked him why he chose to use transparencies instead of a PowerPoint presentation, I don’t think he really understood what I was asking him. He equated transparencies to being more technical.
His point of view of his situation and why he wasn’t able to raise money for his venture for the past 9 or so years was so far off from our points of view, that it seemed too far a gap to bridge. He would have to have a spontaneous shift in being and thinking that would probably take someone a lot of time to help him achieve. A true paradigm shift (business buzzword of the 90’s) would have to occur.
It made me think about how we all view our worlds a certain way and how some people have such far gaps to bridge to see another person’s or group’s reality. It made me wonder about myself and how my perception might be skewed in certain situations in my life/business and conversely how I could be trying to relate to someone or a group, but they can’t relate because they are living in a transparency world and I’m living in a PowerPoint world.
I’m guessing that this happens in a less obvious way in many start-up companies but many of us entrepreneurs are just too blind to see it or really can’t see it because we don’t know how and don’t have the right glasses to help us see the light.
Maybe I’m just being too philosophical and thinking too much, which is quite possible.
Author: Aruni | Filed under: entrepreneurship | 5 Comments »
We’re probably all victim of our minds looking for ways to make snap judgments based on things we see/hear from other people. It’s a natural (and I’d argue evolutionary) response to being overloaded with far more information in the workplace than our ancestors.
But you do have three major red flags here: transparencies, 9 years w/ no funding, apparent major business issues that would prevent it from being funded.
That said, someone taken to his/her breaking point may also be the person who you can coach and help in a big way.
Chris
.-= Chris Treadaway´s last blog ..Living Cheap =-.
@Chris – Yes, big red flags indeed. I wish him well and that he finds people who can help him.
Sometimes I’m so overloaded with information I start to forget names! Sleep and downtime is a much needed commodity.
I’ve had the opportunity to sit it on a few “pitches” at the ATI, and the energy and ideas from people are just incredible. To many people what happens inside the walls is kind of a mystery, and blog posts like this help break down the barriers, and also help people to prepare their pitches.
Maybe being “philosophical and thinking too much” is just your own paradigm…which is not a bad paradigm to have by the way!
.-= Erin Defosse´s last blog ..Nelly Furtado – another English/Spanish crossover musical artist =-.
@Bryan – Thanks for the feedback. We hope to do more ‘breaking down barriers’ on the ATI new blog that will be announced soon.
@Erin – I guess it could be my own paradigm and I’ll have to figure out if I want to shift it.