question: how are you learning to code and building a prototype when you have 25 meetings + 10 meetups to go to + 100 (wildly) repetitive blog posts to read every week? The blatant exaggeration hurts your argument. By trying to make it sound so easy and straightforward you actually make it sound much harder and intimidating than it is. Get one meeting with an influencer in your market. Go from there.
No better way to learn than to do so great advice and post about strategies to do just this. Although I do wonder if this all can be realistically achieved in 6 weeks.
The only thing I'd disagree with esp given the finite time available is that you should focus on meeting (or getting meetings) with potential customers and partners exclusively.
Sure Meetups are great but the signal:noise ratio for content is generally low. Lots of startup platitudes like "build something people want" with little useful, credible, actionable insight. And then the ratio of quality people to wantrapreneurs and service providers often leaves much to be desired and makes the networking goal difficult.
With regards to reading blogs, there is lots of great insight out there (many that you highlighted) but you can chew up your day reading through lots of entreporn as well which talks about the vagueries of the VC industry and other non-useful content which while interesting (and sometimes dramatic) doesn't really help you build or validate an idea/real biz.
Really. Really? Running a business has nothing to do with...um...running a business? No, no it's not radically different. Only in the minds of those who have no idea what's involved with business, MBA programs, or what the definition of entrepreneur is outside of these articles begging you to buy books, and web services, and promising that if you sit in your mommy's basement long enough putting up $10 web sites you will be a billionaire. Only with people who can't take ideas and education and use them as the springboard for something great, but instead can only get by regurgitating the thoughts of those who have actually been there and taken the time to know WHY things are the way they are and WHY those things have to change and WHAT has to change because of it.
First, there are many many things wrong with Mr. Blank's deck at slideshare. Not the least of which is that only start ups are scalable and agile. That b-plans are static. Maybe in the "old days" when he was cutting his teeth. When education was unobtainable. When companies ran by the rules of companies like GM and Chrysler. I assure you, whatever you know of a company externally, or from some grunt, is not what is going on internally in the C-Suite.
Second, there is such a diluted idea of what entrepreneurship is. As I said, it's not sitting in mommy's basement knocking out crappy, templated websites hoping one hits. To be an entrepreneur you have to have skin in the game. Entrepreneurship's definition includes the word "risk". Registering an $8 domain and putting up an app using the free service level Google App Engine doesn't carry any inherent risk. Putting your house up to grab a loan, hiring staff and remembering that if you fail, these people have no jobs. People with families to feed. Having nothing much to fall back on. This involves RISK. It might be stupid to do, but it can force you to make more calculated decisions.
And finally remember that people like Mr. Blank and the older VC/Startup/Entrepreneur set usually cut their teeth at larger companies, or in the presence of those with degrees in business, accounting, finance. This is mostly where they learned the trade second hand. As many old timers did. This is where they learned how to balance books, the basics of marketing, the rules of finance, that they used to forge paths in their futures.
And as some background to me, I started a company with a friend 17 years ago, grew that company into a multi-million dollar firm with several divisions. I ran one division of the company with around 25 ftes. I ran that place for 12 years before finally going for my MBA, and then moving on to work at a large healthcare organization.
His point, with which I still agree, is that running a business is different than starting a business.
More specifically, running a business with a known, stable business model is a very different activity than starting from scratch and discovering a new business. MBAs prepare you for the former, but generally not the latter.
A point that your history seems to match: you started and ran a business just fine without an MBA. And now that you have one, you've turned from entrepreneurship to working at large company.
There are MBA programs that are specifically tailored for entrepreneurship, such as the Babson College program (disclaimer: I am an alum).
For instance, there are specific tools and frameworks that, when used properly, help you identify the opportunities worth pursuing.
Further, you can be an entrepreneur in both cases: when starting your own business, or working for a large company. It's true the other way too: you can start/have your own business and that wouldn't make you an entrepreneur.
I really enjoyed seeing this today. It's very good timing for me. I just wish I knew how to translate the software specific parts of it into more general advice or where to go for similar information on other products/business models. I did go ahead and start a posterous group and invited a friend who was enthusing about starting a business with me earlier today. And also started a wordpress site. I have no idea where I am going to go with this but my health has been the big thing holding me back and I worked 17 hours of overtime this past week (a lot more overtime than I have ever worked before) without having to go home sick some time during the week due to pushing myself. This has been a watershed week for me and I want to go ahead and start getting on with life. I'm not ready to run flat out, so to speak, but I think I can stop sitting on the sidelines of life and wishing I had one (a life, that is).
