StartupBozeman

Last Friday I had coffee with my (new) friend Jeff.  We didn’t have a schedule, agenda or purpose to meet.  We used to work at the same company & I’d only met Jeff a couple of times but based on those interactions I wanted to get to know him better.

We had a vibrant yet relaxing conversation, at one point he commented that I should write more often on this blog.  I thought about that over the weekend in the context of my own discipline for doing things, the commitment I made to help the Bozeman startup scene flourish the ratio of time that I read vs. write & the value others may derive from  updates I may publish.

Inspired by Jeff’s comment this morning I grabbed my copy of The Power of Less by Leo Babauta (@zen_habits) and started rereading it.  While I thought I had simplified my life and made it more productive / effective, my conclusion was that I still have a long way to go.

By now, you are probably asking yourself what this rambling has to do with startups or Bozeman, no?  By simplifying my life (read quitting a job where I was not happy and thus not very productive)  I’ve managed in the last five weeks to:

1) Make the decision to invest in a company in Bozeman (because I loved the idea and the people felt a need to put my money where my mouth was when it came to helping startups).  It’s been a fascinating exercise thus far in learning about the paperwork involved, the decisions that need to be made and their potential future impacts, the different expectations between what young entrepreneurs think about the 2.0 world of business and what the more experienced angels expectations are, etc.

2) Devote more time to my role in Montana Programmers, including presenting at one of the meetups, making a trip to Helena to help that group get off to a good start and helping drive the organization and logistics of BigSkyDevCon, which is coming together nicely.

3) Get the first four StartupBozeman lunch sessions scheduled at Blue Ocean Innovation Center (see details on this site’s calendar page):

May 16th: Protecting Intellectual Property with Doug Warner http://www.linkedin.com/in/dougkwarner

June 20th: Digital Marketing with Jake Cook http://www.linkedin.com/in/jakecook

July 18th: Starting Up with Rob Irizarry http://www.linkedin.com/in/robirizarry

August 15th: Negotiation with Alan Rassaby http://www.linkedin.com/pub/alan-rassaby/6/368/3bb

4) Assist several startups with fleshing out their business models, finding programming talent, figuring out technical issues and other “opportunities” that they encountered.

5) Attend the Rocky Mountain Venture Capital Association’s “VC’s Unplugged” event at the Baxter Hotel.  It was great to see (and meet some of) the panel, get their perspective on investing in this area and hear some success stories from their portfolio companies.  My personal feeling is that the majority of investment opportunities (with a few notable exceptions) in the valley at this moment are more suited to angel level funding, it is encouraging to see this type of event happening here.

5) Spend time reading and thinking about how I can best help the Bozeman startup community grow.  The strongest theme that emerged from that exercise and the feedback I’ve been receiving from local entrepreneurs is the need for an organized, visible angel funding network in Bozeman.  I’m not far enough along in my thinking yet to propose how we might fix this, stay tuned.

Rob

Hard to believe it has been six weeks since I last posted, it has been a busy time personally & professionally.  After much consideration I decided to exit my career in the corporate world and get back to the excitement and energy of the startup world.

Thanks to all of you who have happened across the site and contacted me with questions and/or encouragement!  The energy and diversity of the Bozeman Startup community is amazing.  A couple of significant things have happened over this period:

1) I was contacted by Jake Cook, who works in and teaches about the Digital Marketing space, he invited me to a “startup” lunch at our local library.  Our expectations for turnout were low, it turned out to be a great event, with local serial entrepreneur Lance Tinseth providing a history of his multiple ventures (starting @ age 14) and some sage advice:

2) I met with Brit Fontenot, Bozeman’s Director of Economic Development and Warren Vaughan, Gallatin County planner to discuss ways they could help facilitate the growth of the local entrepreneurial community.  We had a great discussion & set up follow-on meetings to drive progress on growing the community.

3) Jake and I met & collected a core group of individuals we know to help organize a series of presentations / discussions on topics of interest to the local startup community.

I’ll be juggling my corporate exit responsibilities & the startup world for the rest of this month, after that I’ll be posting on a more regular schedule…

In my last post I indicated that I would write the next in 72 hours.  That was three weeks ago, much has transpired since then so here goes the story…

When we moved to Bozeman 12 years ago I had accepted a job with RightNow Technologies and joined as the 20th employee.  At the time, we and Zoot Enterprises were the two major tech companies in the valley.

Back then I saw the potential for Bozeman to become a hotbed of startups, as usual I was a little ahead of the curve.  I’ve been watching and waiting, biding my time to see the valley come into its’ own, I believe that time has come.

The story of Startup Bozeman’s birth is here, reading that will frame up the rest of this post.

As with most of the rest of my life, the simple act of moving in the direction I wished to go unleashed a flurry of activity.  In the three weeks since I emailed Brad (who was incredibly, amazingly responsive, supportive and gracious despite the fact that I was doing the email equivalent of a cold call) I:

Spent a fascinating hour with Teresa McKnight, the recently hired director of Montana State University’s newly renamed innovation campus.  She’s a breath of fresh air in that arena, filled with equal measures of vision and determination, stay tuned for great things there!

Visited with entrepreneurs from the companies at the front edge of the second wave of startups in Bozeman – the “Silicon Prarie” (as the national press has coined it): Foundant, Schedulicity, Webfilings and Wisetail.  Each of these companies has staked a place in their respective markets, are on healthy growth trajectories and are filled with intelligent, energetic teams that are driving them forward every day.

Saw Montana Programmers, which two friends of mine (who were kind enough to let this wannabe coder join in) started in 2008 with four members sail past the 300 member mark!  This week alone we had two great events in Bozeman, an incredibly well done Agile presentation by one of the most passionate scrum masters I’ve had the privilege to meet, Boulder’s own Erin Beierwaltes of Skipstone consulting and a drink-up (thanks for that idea Github!) at Webfilings.

Spent some time experimenting with co-working at Blue Ocean Innovation Center, founded by yet another serial entrepreneur who has made Bozeman home, Becky Smith.

Watched my friends Chris and Carie launch their own startup, jobfeedy, and see it get traction in the first 48 hours of operation!

Hung out with a number of other people I met through the events above who are either on or considering the entrepreneurial journey.  Had some great conversations, learned a lot and was able to give back in several cases, which is my real mission in all this!

Saw the publication of another article on Bozeman’s startup community.

Watched Startup Bozeman get it’s first public callout at the second Pecha Kucha night (thanks Greg!!!)

So, thanks to a great group of friends and encouragement from Brad Feld, Startup Bozeman is off and running.

If you’re of a mind to start something, figure out what you need and start asking!!!

When you start up, there’s going to be a LOT of stuff you won’t know.  Trust me on this, I’ve been down the startup road a few times over the course of the last 15 years and I’m STILL learning

Everyone (including me) thinks they are smart & many are, but there are gaps in everyone’s knowledge.

Often, best source of the help you need will be someone you don’t know.  Frequently, that person will also be someone who you might think unapproachable.  Some people have no qualms about approaching people for help.  I (and potentially you), struggle with this, particularly when I can’t see a way that I can create value in return.

KILL that thought.

To get to success, you’re going to have to go outside your comfort zone early and often.

There are two back stories to this post, I’ll reveal them both in the next 72 hours or so, in the meantime think about the help (whatever form it would come in) that you think you most need to get (either to start, or to get past the next hurdle), and who you might ask for it.  I’ll provide some thoughts on how to cross that barrier shortly.

Inspired by my experiences in business & teaching, this is a gathering place for anyone in Bozeman with a desire to start or grow a business to gather, share & learn…

Rob