Sharing The Dream

I was on a website recently to submit my company as a possible entrant for a business contest. This should be easy enough but I found he following questions disturbing:

Describe the value proposition, including differentiation versus the rest of the market.
How big is the market? How do you calculate TAM? What is the business model? Be as specific as possible. I prefer bottom-up TAM versus top-down TAM for my analysis and dislike broad swathes.
What are the top target segments? Be precise and granular.

Huh?

It seems that we have forgotten a few things. Most people who start businesses do a reasonable job analyzing the potential market. They are trying to fill a need as they perceive it. They most likely did not start by reading through and understanding this kind of stuff. If you ask the average business owner these questions, their reaction will most likely be the same one I had. Huh?

I know that this stuff probably is important, it is a good idea to have a handle on your potential. But remember, the most important points are passion, drive, desire to accomplish your goals. These with a little luck and some skills will take a business wherever you want it to go. No matter what the numbers say.

The title of this post says it all. While many would argue with such a sentiment, for me at least it is true. I have returned to my old hometown only to find that it isn’t the town that I left. Instead there is a dullness to the colors, they are muted and grey. The mountains are lovely as always but the city itself is not what I remember. Perhaps it has always been this way and new experiences have opened my eyes to more that what I knew as a boy.

I returned to the neighborhood where I grew up. Many of the buildings are still there. Many of the fields I played in now sport shopping centers instead. My old junior high school is still here with a new sign out front. There are new roads too making it harder to navigate.

Change is the way of the world. While reflection is a good thing, we must remember the past so we can define the future. Keep a good heading, stay on course and look back from time to time so you can keep your bearings.

Time for a little more reflection on life, the universe and everything.

The last time was on an airplane (commercial that is), you could barely use any kind of electronic device. Today, through the magic of technology, you can access the Internet at pretty good speeds. The cost still seems bit high at 10 bucks for two hours of Internet, but the idea is at least a fun one. Maybe on the flight back I will spring for it. Right now, it is too much for my meager travel budget.

It has been over two years since I last boarded a commercial airplane for a flight. Most of my recent travel has been by car rather than plane. I’m not certain why that is but I guess I just like the open road. I like the open skies too but getting on a plane has become so much trouble it almost isn’t worth it. Perhaps the flight will be more like what remember and I will enjoy it. I will certainly enjoy the landing.

Today is a much better day today. It is sunny and 74 outside with some light clouds and a cool breeze. It sure beats yesterday as we had heavy rain, hail, fierce winds and worst of all - no Internet. Verizon was down and so was my 3G on the iPad. The Edge network kept flaking out and GSRM was dreadful.

Yup, I’m a geek.

I have always been a fan of Star Trek. I don’t keep that a secret at all. I have attended conventions, met with many of the stars of the various shows and even have a uniform (or three). Now the iPad has a program called LCARS Reader and it is exactly what I have dreamed of. A functional program that actually looks Trek. It has feeds for news, twitter and RSS. You can lookup Craigslist items and share photos too. It is a nice diversion and looks really futuristic on the desktop.

Besides, it keeps all of my coworkers guessing.

I suffered my first iPad letdown this weekend when the device lost connection to the 3G network. After giving up and resigning myself to taking it to the Apple store nearby, it came back to life. Mind you this was two days after the thing had stopped working. I took it to the Apple store anyway. The genius was friendly but had no clue as to what had caused the issue.

Bummer.

I have a week long trip planned for later this month and I really don’t need this thing having a hussy fit when I need it most. I guess if you want cutting edge, you have to expect to bleed a little. I’d better stock some band-aids.

Today was a day of busy work. It didn’t seem like I accomplished all that much. There were a series of meetings, some discussions on what the next steps for our servers should be and few other technical issues that needed solving. Overall though, it was a quiet day. Couple that with a lack of sleep from last night and you start to feel drained and not all together with it. It sucks.

I’m planning an evening walk with a friend. I am trying to walk at least two miles a day each weekday morning but today was a bust. So we’ll try an evening walk instead when the weather cools down. Maybe we can bounce some ideas off of each other. That always seems to help put things back into perspective.

Some days the amount of work to be done is just overwhelming. No matter where I look there is more to do than there is resources for. Part of the work that a project manager should be doing is maximizing the amount of productivity that a group can achieve while keeping everyone sane and on track. this is a delicate balancing act that when it goes out of whack (and it will go out of whack) it is almost impossible to get it back on track.

Right now I am facing some major challenges to keep things running smoothly on the project I am working on even as the scope continues to grow. Perhaps this will settle in but for some reason, I don’t see it happening.

Sigh.

It has been just over twenty-four hours with the iPad and the device continues to grow on me. I have discovered a nasty issue with typing but that appears to be a problem with my typing and not the device. When I type, I tap a few too many characters with my thumb and this causes missed keystrokes since the iPad is a capacitive touch device. No signal - no touch happening.

This is a matter of my retraining my brain to type in the correct manner. If I had bothered to take typing in school, I just might not have this issue.

As for battery, the device holds up well. I finally have it in the charger taking it down to 19% over the day. Not bad considering I have not ever plugged it in before. The device just works for me. I’d like to see several improvements but for a first take, the gadget is great.