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Grass, Leaves or Snow – Nobody rides free.

I’m going to get into a little bit of uneducated philosophy here…..it translates to tech startup advice later in the post……hang on.

Humans have a very bad ‘decision compass’ on what is important.

In the spring I spend money and time (M&T) fertilizing my grass, then I spend M&T all summer cutting it, then M&T raking leaves, then M&T shoveling snow. Why? Makes no sense.

I see gas powered machines that “BLOW” leaves.
Seriously, cave men would look down on us.

Are you already rationalizing ‘why’ you do these things?

Green grass for the neighbors? cut grass for uh…the neighbors? maybe to avoid the redneck label. Dandelions are flowers I say.

Raking leaves for the purpose of? I find it amazing that we rake leaves or blow them to the neighbors yard, then we buy ‘fall fertilizer’. You know what that is? It is FREAKING leaves! with artificial coloring to make them granules white. Granules..really? that is just marketing. When have you ever used this word, ‘Granules’ unless you were talking about wasting time, I mean fertilizing.

Snow is the solid form of water. It melts. I see people with multi-thousand dollar machines plowing sidewalks. Why? laws. What?…who made these laws, a special interest group for the national association of snow walkers? Who in the hell walks on the sidewalk in the winter?. You’d only do this if it warmed up and if it warmed up, the sun would melt the sidewalks.

 

Startup Lesson
Evaluate what you should do from the giant list of what you could do.
Then be absolutely sure what you are doing is not rationalizied by someone. Most of the time, the absolute should do is only 2 or 3 items, max.

Be perfect at what you should do..then be average at everything else.

If you get it right, a few things happen to your startup.
1. You get momentum for less money….VC guys call that ROI.
2. Great people will network for you…often known as – jumpin’ on the bandwagon.
3. You have no problem raising money
4. You get good terms.

I think the team at Tapinko is a refreshing example of this.

I’m going to winterize my mowers (I have two), put away the fall fertizlier and get out the snow shovel. It all blows if you ask me.