Finding Momentum

This semes­ter I’m tak­ing IEOR 190A — Engi­neer­ing Entre­pre­neur­ship. We are made up of a bunch of busi­ness types and engi­neer­ing types and business-engineering types who come together to fig­ure out how to start a busi­ness in the tech sphere.

Here’s how I’d explain this class: come up with a busi­ness plan for a com­pany in semes­ter, then exe­cute it. At the end of the semes­ter, you should have the tools to actu­ally do it. Yow!

The thought of (or idea of) entre­pre­neur­ship is really allur­ing. I think it’s the idea of cre­at­ing some­thing where there was noth­ing, start­ing and sus­tain­ing a great idea or prod­uct that could change the world (or some­thing slightly less schnazzy, sure) seems so rewarding.

Of course, in class we only hear from the smil­ing guest lec­tur­ers who nav­i­gated shaky start-ups through uncer­tain waters and nailed cru­cial busi­ness deci­sions to accel­er­ate earn­ings by 1000% mar­gins. We always hear about the myth­i­cal ser­ial entre­pre­neur, the quin­tes­sen­tial Amer­i­can man or woman who by a mix of cun­ning insight, dogged per­se­ver­ance and arbi­trary mar­ket whims (e.g. sheer luck), see their dreams become reality.

We don’t always hear from the entre­pre­neur whose fam­ily life is strained because he always trav­els or stays late in the office. We don’t always hear from the men and women who burn through money on dud after dud.

I worked with my friend Dave at FAQLY, his social net­work­ing startup two years ago my sopho­more year. Dave was way pas­sion­ate about the net­work and its poten­tial. I knew it took a toll on him. Most of his wak­ing hours were spent dream­ing (I like to think) of ideas. He didn’t sleep much. He had to play many roles, from vision­ary to man­ager to chauf­feur (haha, hi Dave!).

Any­ways, my point was that even though there was a high poten­tial for fail­ure and a ridicu­lously demand­ing work­load, Dave per­se­vered through it all. Two years later, Dave’s work­ing on another project now (have you heard of gOS?). And I talk to him occa­sion­ally and he tells me that he’s still not sleep­ing much. I know he’s just as passionate.

I’m start­ing to sus­pect that the draw to start a com­pany is less about the idea than it is about the feel­ing of cre­at­ing. It’s elu­sive and fleet­ing but when you catch it, you’re ener­gized to try some more.

Hsiu-Fan and I are still a bit hes­i­tant to call Wejoinin any­thing more than a pet project. Could it be any­thing more? Who knows. We’re tread­ing care­fully on that idea as we care­fully cal­i­brate our expec­ta­tions. It’s been kind of cool as I start apply­ing what I learn from IEOR 190A to Wejoinin.

One thing’s for sure, though. I’m in it for love of the game. I’m there because I feel alive when I cre­ate. Whether that means I’m behind the ter­mi­nal or on the field or what­ever remains to be seen.