
Startup Founders Should Flip Burgers - jasonlbaptiste
http://www.bothsidesofthetable.com/2009/10/15/startup-founders-should-flip-burgers/?awesm=grp.vc_BM&utm_campaign=GRP&utm_medium=grp.vc-twitter&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_content=tweetmeme
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dstik
If flipping burgers isn't for you, I received a great piece of advice once,
take some time and work for a used car dealership for a few months. Point
being everyone should learn how to sell, how to be a salesman, you can be the
most technical person in the room but without the ability to "sell" people on
your product or articulate what makes it worth while, you are missing a key
element. And face it, if you can be successful selling used cars (or cars in
general, in this economy) you'll have a very practical skillset.

~~~
tomjen2
I would rather risk being bad at selling and get to keep my soul.

~~~
petewarden
Up-voted from oblivion not because I agree, but because it's a common attitude
that I held for a long time, but which now drives me nuts.

Maybe my soul leaked away while I wasn't looking, but I've had to spend a lot
of time selling in the last year, and the typical hacker contempt for
'marketroids' is way off the mark. It's a deep, deep art that deserves
respect.

Can you cut corners, be a douche-bag and rip people off? Sure, but it doesn't
work as well as you think, and show me a programmer who hasn't shipped
something that has made at least one person's life a misery. All the used-car
salesmen in the world have nothing on the Windows OS developers if you want to
compare suffering inflicted on the world. I still can't look someone in the
eye if I know they spent good money on the F1 '98 game I worked on:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Formula_1_98>

~~~
HistoryInAction
Earning and keeping trust is a very major part of sales--at least repeated
sales--that I've learned about over the past year or two. Rip someone off and
not only are they never coming back, but they're telling a bunch of people
(~5) that you are untrustworthy. Big net loss in my book.

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HistoryInAction
I recommend doing political phone banking. You're selling not only a person--
the candidate--but also what he or she represents. If you can sell an idea,
pretty much a vessel where people put their hopes, dreams and fears, then you
can sell a product that actually exists and will actually fulfill some need.

I typically had to about the end of my first line to judge how the call was
going to go. If I was interrupted during that first line, the trick would be
to get out of the call without having earned a vote for the opponent.
Sometimes, I'd just bounce up against personal armor and the call would be a
waste. Sometimes, you'd find a 'fellow traveler,' and the call would be easy
and enjoyable, with the only limit of not talking for too long and destroying
your efficiency. On the other hand, calls like that do wonders for your
morale.

The rare times were when someone was willing to be engaged, but only from one
specific approach. Those rare calls, maybe 5% or less, would give you about 30
seconds to guess on the approach. In some cases, it's being ultra-respectful,
on the other agreeing to listen for five minutes before getting a commitment.

All in all, political phone banking was one of the more thoughtful job duties
I've had, at least in retrospect. Like the other jobs mentioned, it's
incredibly wearing with the daily grind of making quota.

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jasonlbaptiste
I think the key take away of the article is this: Even if you're the "business
guy", you should have some technical understanding of what's going on. It's a
benefit for actually making strategic internal decisions or simple investor
pitches. Sit in on tech discussions, learn the basics, or hell even take some
simple CompSci courses at your local community college (basic theory). I know
you're strapped for time, but it will be well worth it.

~~~
shykes
Another takeaway, maybe more relevant to the HN audience: if you're a
technical founder, you need to get your hands dirty on financial modeling,
customer development, and all the other non-tech stuff that "will ultimately
owned by functional experts".

~~~
nkassis
I credit my mom for making me take all business classes as electives. I wanted
to do something like physics but she made a good point that if I wanted to run
a business one day, I probably should know what Accounts Receivable means.

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btilly
This reminds me of a piece of advice from Brian Fox
(<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_Fox>) which is that anyone who wants
freedom should get enough jobs as waiters to be confident that you can do it
at need.

The reason is very simple. If you are in a strange place in desperate
circumstances, an experienced waiter finds it fairly easy to get a job. And
very importantly, you get to eat on your first day in the job. This makes it a
very valuable fallback to have.

If you're a waiter in a decent restaurant, the food will also be pretty good.
Furthermore once your circumstances improve, it is a job that you can leave
easily.

(Note that Brian Fox's circumstances have definitely improved. He had a
successful startup back in the mid-90s.)

~~~
incandenza
It's interesting that this also seems to have factored into Richard Stallman's
philosophy. Since he considered working on closed software unethical, and
noted that he could always survive as a waiter, he felt he couldn't justify
working on closed software based on the excuse that it was necessary for
financial reasons.

~~~
btilly
This is unlikely to be coincidence. Among other things, Brian Fox was the
first person ever hired by the FSF.

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edw519
I know OP used "flipping burgers" as a metaphor, but for my brother and me,
it's very real.

We both worked at McDonald's in high school when it was difficult to get a job
there and they ran a very tight ship. It was the hardest job either of us
every had. We had to do everything: cook, clean, take care of every customer,
make sure everything was in place and everything was properly scheduled. We
had to smile the whole time, and when everything was done, we had to come back
and do it all over again the next day.

We may have complained how hard it was back then, but now we both realize how
valuable those work habits would be in every single job either of us has had
since. The lessons easily apply to any start-up.

Now if I could only get a hot Big Mac without making it myself.

~~~
gcheong
Reminds me of a quote I read from Charlie Munger:

“I get flack for saying [when I visit a college and give a speech], “This is a
nice college, but the really great educator is McDonald’s.” They hate me for
saying this and think I’m a slimy creature. But McDonald’s hires people with
bad work habits, trains them, and teaches them to come to work on time and
have good work habits. I think a lot of what goes on there is better than at
Harvard.”

~~~
RK
I was at a McDonald's a while ago and they had a job ad that said something
like 20% of the entire US workforce had been employed at McDonald's at one
time. I found the number very hard to believe, but interesting if true.

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motoko
I worked at McDonald's. It helped make me the man I am.

Mark, have you also considered advice to burn estates? It is analogous from
the under up as your flipping burgers is from the over down.

~~~
lamby
> I worked at McDonald's. It helped make me the man I am

A lot of people say this. How can you be sure you are not just kidding
yourself into thinking the time you spent doing something actually quite
unproductive was useful?

~~~
motoko
If you were a man of titles and wealth from a family of the same, and you
overheard a lean stranger say to a man of some skilled employ to you: "The
best servants burned down estate once..." how would that make you feel?

...Especially, if you knew that was true?

Keep feeling; invert class.

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Mz
My ex worked at McDonald's and then later was career military. He once
indicated they were much the same: In both cases, you have a uniform, photos
of the chain of command are on the wall, and they work you like a dog. (Or
something along those lines.)

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TalentOnCampus
You gotta cook the beef & acquire the client so If ur in the restaurant biz
it’s time flipping burgers and if ur in the product startup space it’s time on
the phone [works way better than email] Everybody talks about innovative
products. Innovative sales & marketing is ignored We have made inroads into
accounts like Dell, Yahoo, Walmart & Google and it all started with tracking
big guns at these organizations attending conferences, getting their phone
numbers from conference organizers, calling up & requesting a meeting at venue
– also to mention an innovative pitch. Definitely could not have been done by
a sales ace to start with but definitely something we can teach a sales guy to
replicate Bottom line – if the founding team does it themselves its easy to
build a scalable process

