As many of you know I am in the process of writing a book- a field manual of how social networks can be used to facilitate getting real work done, with my personal focus being about how to support fields of entrepreneurs build their businesses together. Well… the great thing from having y’all help [...]

In memory of September 11, I thought I would share some quotes about making peace.  These were assembled together in a book called The Right Moment p. 146.  It just did not seem like I could let this day pass without doing some small token gesture.  If you have other quotes to share about peace, [...]

Over the last few weeks of silence here at my blog I have been working on a book about how to apply social networks for organizing entrepreneurs- called Peer Production.  The world continues to see the flattening of most organizations- where knowledge and decision making happen at the edges of the organization.  This especially happens [...]

Lest there be any question about the potential power of the Internet, the One Laptop Per Child Project , and the work that we are doing coordinating entrepreneurs through Enterprise Teaming, see this video. At 14 years old, Malawian inventor WIlliam Kamkwamba built an electrical generator out of some wood, plastic pipe, wire, and [...]

My friend and colleague Leonardo Maldonado recently pointed out a great problem in the way that most of the social networking websites look at connections among people online. I believe that Leonardo sees this as a viewpoint from the USA, and after my travels, I can understand why. Leonardo says: No somos [...]

Out of the research that I have previously done on different economic development models, one of my favorite comes from the Sirolli Institute. In fact, as I have talked with some of you about- the notion of building an Aikido style network of entrepreneurs supporting entrepreneurs, part of my grounding in these ideas came [...]

Frank Fullard’s recent comment on this blog brought me some interest to check out who is checking out my blog (ain’t the blogging world grand ). In reading about his recent post about Women’s Vision For Their Future and his notes about Enterprise Ireland, I was reminded of some of the research [...]

Several people have asked about the article that BusinessWeek wrote about Bootstrap Austin- so I figured that instead of continuing to email it out to everyone, I would post it here.  The article starts with an example about how I leverage Bootstrap Austin, and expands into several other bootstrappers, with a feature on Bijoy.  Enjoy [...]

One of the things that we do a lot inside of Bootstrap Austin is sharing information between the members of the network- getting feedback perhaps before software or ideas or business process has been well developed… This is a powerful aspect of the network- given that all of us are “experts” in our own [...]

Recently, I came across a tool for every entrepreneur’s toolbox…  the  One Page Proposal.  The whole idea here is that most proposals can be delivered in one page, following the format that Mark Fox details at the link above.   This methodology of writing a one page proposal can be very powerful especially when communicating to [...]

I have noticed that as I have started taking this whole idea of blogging more seriously, that I have tended to hold off till I have a thought fully thought out before posting… as if I was going to have a full PhD level defense behind what I am thinking/ writing / saying.  Well enough [...]

One of the common themes has been coming up in a bunch of the work that I have been doing (in personal development work, in reading, as well as answering some of the questions on the business side of entreprenuership… e.g. what is your personal brand / competitive advantage). The theme is [...]

Over the last few days, I was at the SxSW Interactive Conference and had time to stop by the SxSW Trade Show. At the trade show, one booth stood out out of all of the ones that I went to… and after thinking about it over the last day, I realized why this one booth [...]

At SxSW (South by Southwest Conference) Tom Brown, Bijoy, David Bluestein, and I (with other bootstrappers) announced the launch of the BootKarma system. BootKarma is a complementary currency system meant to allow bootstrapping entrepreneurs leverage their time, especially in the early stages of their venture where cash is short. Essentially this is [...]

At SxSW (South By South West Conference) this year Bijoy and I gave a talk on Bootstrapping Your Startup. The talk was well received, and we got lots of interest in taking the Bootstrap Network to other parts of the US and the world. We have refined our model to a level that we [...]

This blog is about “going exponential” with a community of fellow entrepreneurs. It is through building strong communities (or some would say ecologies) that a group of entrepreneurs can create the greatest shared outcomes with each other and for themselves. (In this case, I am using “entrepreneur” to refer to both traditional entrepreneurs [...]

This weekend I tested and received my blackbelt (“shodan”- “begining dan”) in Aikido.  I started Aikido back in August of 1997.  Almost ten years of practice three to five times a week have resulted in this accomplishment.   Aikido informs much of my life.  I greatly appreciate what I have learned along the way;  In a [...]

Recently I was asked about my background, and what I had worked on- what the common theme had been across the many companies that I had been involved with.  My answer, that I ended up presenting in a power point slide as part of a longer response to the questions that had been asked was [...]

A recent article that I was reading from Verne Harnish had me thinking as well of a conversation that I recently had with Ed Perry… about finding one’s calling, not just one’s mission.  First the quote from Verne:
The power of purpose — George Lucas, Film Director and Producer — “You have to find [...]

This quote from Edison just came to me… and is a good reminder for all of us as entrepreneurs to keep the faith:
“Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.” ~ Thomas A. Edison
Keep the faith.  Get the right people involved.  Ask the [...]

I recently received a link to the following article on “What makes entrepreneurs entrepreneurial?”.  This is a great paper- with at the author Saras D. Sarasvathy’s analysis of two types of reasoning- causual reasoning and effectual reasoning.  Causual reasoning is what I would call more traditional “MBA” reasoning… that is, a given, specific goal is [...]

Over the holidays I found out that my friend B.J. “Billy” Stanberry has been busy with his solar power startup, called HelioVolt.  Billy has come up with a new way to both increase the output of solar cells, as well as a method for making it very easy to apply / install / almost “paint” [...]

At the beginning of most books, there are acknowlegements and dedications.  As I start this blog to share my insight into building communities of entrepreneurs, I would like to start with a dedication… to my grandmother who passed just a few months ago. She has been many times the inspiration that has supported me along [...]