Archive for May, 2005
By Rajesh Setty on Tue 31 May 2005, 9:45 PM - Leave Comment
Microsoft wants developers to contribute their enhancements to OneNote (a note taking software from Microsoft) and win prizes.
Microsoft says:
It’s your opportunity to influence the future of OneNote. It’s your
chance to wow a global audience. And it’s your shot at winning one of five
Toshiba Portégé M200 Tablet PCs.
Open Innovation is a model where everyone wins. Open source software
has been adopting this model (with no prizes attached, though) for
quite sometime. Corporations are now applying this model effectively to
reduce R&D costs and also win on the “time to market” front.
Posted under Innovation, Main Page.
By Rajesh Setty on Sun 29 May 2005, 9:09 AM - 2 Comments
This happened in 1997. Kavitha (my wife) and I had just landed in
Silicon Valley. Before this, we were living in Singapore and things
were very different there. We had to make a lot of changes in our lives
to adapt to the valley. First, we had to get our driving license and
buy a car so that we could move around. It took us about two weeks to
learn to drive here, get a drivers license and buy a car. We moved into
an apartment and thought that we should buy some stuff for the home.
Someone suggested us that we should go to Gilroy (where there are
outlet malls) and buy stuff there. To give you an idea, we were in
Sunnyvale and Gilroy is about 30 miles south of where we lived.
I asked my friend how would I know when I reached Gilroy. He asked me
to take 101 (a freeway) and after about 30 minutes, I should see a
chain of stores from the freeway – basically he told me that it would
be hard to miss.
That weekend, Kavitha and I decided to go to Gilroy. I just realized
that I had not asked my friend whether to take 101 North or 101 South.
We took 101 North. Long story short, we drove for more than an hour
(went past San Francisco) and both of us realized that we must have
missed it. I stopped at a gas station and asked the folks there about
Gilroy. The gentleman was very polite and said “You have to take 101
South and drive for about two hours and we should see Gilroy.” I was
shocked and said “I thought we were supposed to take 101 North” and he
laughed and said “That would be right – if you were coming from Los
Angeles. Unfortunately, now you have to take 101 South”
Even today, we both remember this and laugh at what happened.
It is interesting though, that it’s the same rules that apply in our
lives. Although you may know the destination, you wouldn’t know what
direction to move – unless you know where you are right NOW. Many of us
have trouble assessing where we are in our lives. Sometimes the current
situation is not that great and accepting this may cause some heart
burn. So one choice would be to make a wrong assessment about our
current situation (thinking we are better than what we actually are)
and that would lead to another wrong assessment of what we should to to
get to where we want to get.
With due respect for positive thinking and optimism, I must say that
making a correct assessment of our current situation is very very
important to move ahead!
Posted under Distinguish yourself, Main Page.
By Rajesh Setty on Fri 27 May 2005, 9:29 AM - Leave Comment
I saw this interesting story
about a bank in San Ramon coming up with an innovative mortgage banking
product offering. Mortgage banking is mostly commodity stuff and most
commodity offerings compete solely on price
CMG Financial Services, the company that came up with this innovative
product bucked the trend. The idea as I understand it is that with this
offering mortgage loan is tied to a checking account. When your payroll
check and any other checks are deposited to this account, they are
directly applied as credit towards the principal of the loan. As you
write checks, the loan amount increases and an interest is charged to
this loan amount. The final interest at the end of the month is added
to the principal owed. Interesting and different concept from the
traditional way mortage products operate.
They charge a steep premium for this (about a percentage point higher)
My point is not to make a case for this product but to point out that
whatever be the product, you defy commoditization and you get two
things:
a) you make news
b) you can charge a premium
Something to think about in our own professions. What could we do to de-commoditize ourselves?
Posted under Business Models, Innovation, Main Page.
By Rajesh Setty on Thu 26 May 2005, 10:27 AM - Leave Comment
They say that failure is the stepping stone for success. What happens
once you succeed? Success is not a destination and it should lay the
foundation for your next quest. Interestingly, success can be a problem
sometimes. A classic situation is when one thinks that he or she is now
successful and it’s time to take a break. Complacency seeps in and one
may relax a bit. The problem worsens if one starts getting used to the
complacency.
Maintaining the success status quo is hard and I believe one is either
moving up or sliding down. There is nothing that is constant about
success.
Talking about organizations, when you bring something unique to the
marketplace, it’s unique only for a short time. The marketplace expects
innovation and constant improvement. The rules won’t change for
individuals. We as individuals bring our skills and experiences to the
marketplace and while our offer may be compelling at a point in time,
the marketplace changes and our offers have to change with times. If we
rest on our laurels and are complacent, we will be left behind sooner
than later.
When you get violent, please remember to kill complacency in your life. It is one “crime” that will get you out of your own prison 
Posted under Distinguish yourself, Main Page.
By Rajesh Setty on Tue 24 May 2005, 9:32 PM - Leave Comment
Last month I wrote a short article titled The world is your R&D unit. Many of you wrote back about examples other than the ones I mentioned. Thank you.
Brad talks about Nike shoe design contest. Take a look how Nike is engaging with designers outside of Nike to come up with eye-catching designs.
Way to go. My friend Steve Shapiro has a term for this kind of innovation – Open Innovation. Sounds cool!
Posted under Innovation, Main Page.
By Rajesh Setty on Tue 24 May 2005, 6:05 AM - Leave Comment
Great post on Seth’s blog about a story in pictures – story of the effect of drugs and prostitution.
Here is the link to the story. As you can see, even if you don’t read the accompanying text, the story is clear and compelling.
Worth sharing this with friends and family members.
Posted under Main Page.
By Rajesh Setty on Mon 23 May 2005, 12:33 PM - Leave Comment
What a gem. That’s why listening and interpreting what you listen is such a hard thing..
“A
stupid man’s report of what a clever man says can never be accurate,
because he unconsciously translates what he hears into something he can
understand”
Posted under Great Quotes, Main Page.
By Rajesh Setty on Fri 20 May 2005, 8:59 AM - Leave Comment
When microsoft announced a subscription service to tackle spyware, I thought it was an interesting move. In fact, it reminded of a story my friend used to say. Here is the story:
Long ago, there was a salesman whose job was to sell maintenance contracts for fax machines. He would go around and pitch this idea to local businesses and as expected very few folks were interested in signing up for a maintenance contract for their fax machines. The simple reason was that fax machines had very few issues. They worked well!
The salesman was smart. After waiting for a couple of days, he would pick a few businesses (out of the ones that he visited recently) and fax them a black sheet of paper. Obviously, some of these business owners would get worried and would want to get their fax machines fixed. Since he had visited them recently, they would call him to discuss the maintenance contract. The salesman would make an offer they couldn’t refuse. He would say that if they signed on the same day, he would get the fax machine fixed under the new maintenance contract – free of charge.
I am NOT asking you to draw any parallels here. You make your own assessments.
Posted under Business Models, Main Page.
By Rajesh Setty on Thu 19 May 2005, 8:29 PM - Leave Comment
Picked this up from Tom Evslin’s blog. In the following quote, George
Bernard Shaw asks us to step out of our comfort zone and be
unreasonable if you want to get uncommon results.
“The reasonable man adapts himself to the
world; the unreasonable man persists in trying to adapt the world to
himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.”
Posted under Great Quotes, Main Page.
By Rajesh Setty on Thu 19 May 2005, 2:51 PM - Leave Comment
Here is a great post on this topic by Tom Evslin where he provides a 10 point list to do a self-assessment to determine your entrepreneur quotient (for lack of a better phrase)
11. Chris Yeh adds one more item to the list called Reality Distortion Field.
I have a few to add but here is one that I like most.
12. You won’t let uncertainty slow you down.
I wrote about this a few days ago in the Distinguish yourself series.
Have fun!
Posted under Main Page.
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