Review of Guy Kawasaki's The Art of the Start - Page 2

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• 1 - Aaman

  Dec 14, 2004 at 9:48 pm

  What's with this Kawasaki obsession on bc? There are many more geniuses out there?
  
  "Ship, Then Test" is a stupid way to run a business - it is possibly the reason for every bug out there - I speak from experience. Bad code is never respected . Anyone who recommends this should be tossed into QA Hell and then given a stint in Marketing.
  
  Bottom-up forecasting is a great idea, though. Any forecasting is good, in fact, for a business, as long as it's somewhere on track.
  
  Thanks for the review:)

• 2 - Anita Campbell

  Dec 14, 2004 at 10:08 pm

  Hi Aman, first of all, Blogcritics is a review site. I managed to secure a review copy and so I reviewed it. That was the point of getting a review copy. In fact, reviewing artistic works is more or less the point of this site.
  
  Second, if you want to get a business started, you'd better get something into customer's hands and start bringing some money in the door. If you wait until it is perfect it probably won't get off the ground. I don't know that he meant "ship then test" literally. He was overstating the case in order to make a point -- a good point.
  
  Besides, there are all manner of other businesses out there to start up that have nothing whatsoever to do with software to which the same advice applies.
  
  I think his advice is pragmatic for business people. And I think it is good advice.
  
  It's really a good book all around.
  
  Best,
  Anita Campbell
  

• 3 - Aaman

  Dec 14, 2004 at 10:15 pm

  Point taken, thank you indeed for the review. I am sure there are many companies who need advice of this nature, in fact perhaps most companies could do with some advice.

• 4 - Steve

  Dec 15, 2004 at 8:37 am

  Speaking as one who has just closed a business after two years of unsuccessfully trying to start a consulting business, that the book would have been valuable to me 2 years ago. However, I am not sure I would have paid attention, I thought I knew best how to make it work. Only now am I more open to learning how to maybe do a start-up better.

• 5 - Eric Olsen

  Dec 15, 2004 at 9:59 am

  thanks Anita, great job - Aaman, we are involved with a project to disseminate the Kawasaki book throughout the blogosphere, there will be a master post up shortly collecting all that has been done on it thus far

• 6 - Anita Campbell

  Dec 15, 2004 at 10:27 am

  Hey, Aaman, I can think of a few companies, too!
  
  And Steve, everything I've learned in business I owe to my mistakes. I just hope I live long enough to be able to capitalize on all of them.
  
  Now for a little fun. I ran this review through the Snoop Dog Shizzolator, and here is a snippet in Snoop's voice:
  
  

  Build a Bottom-up Forecast, know what I'm sayin'? This is some of da best advice yo' ass could give an entrepreneur in a startup, but that shiznit is advice few muthas want hear." Entrepreneurs has so many things think 'bout that that shiznit's tempting do a broad swag fo' sales numbers." But unless yo' ass take da time think through where yo' sales will come from on a weekly, even daily basis, yo' numbers won't be realistic -- I guarantee that shiznit." Kawasaki suggests a formula fo' how build a bottom-up forecast, by calculating how many sales a sales rep can actually close in a given day, week, month, year, know what I'm sayin'? It's a handy formula -- 'n bomb diggity advice n' shit.
  
  
  

• 7 - Aaman

  Dec 15, 2004 at 11:19 am

  Very funny, Anita - bomb diggity advice - that's a great catchphrase!
  
  Perhaps I should post my own experiences with building and defining companies - no names, but they incl a CRM product, a certain search engine, a SAN startup. The CRM prod co almost flamed out. This might be useful for others

• 8 - Anita Campbell

  Dec 15, 2004 at 12:14 pm

  Sure, Aaman, tell us about them! Send me an email when you have something up, so I don't miss it. Email link is over at my Small Business Trends blog.

• 9 - Paul

  Jun 24, 2006 at 4:15 am

  Understaff and outsource...as long as you don't throw the baby out with the bath water. It is sad how often struggling statups and small companies shut down or outsource R&D and innovation...there goes the baby