I would like to start by commending the city for working hard to provide Opinion Ottawa as a forum on economic development. This is a good initiative and anyone in Ottawa that has any comments, concerns or suggestions on economic development should take the opportunity to offer their thoughts.
.
If Ottawa is to remain a going concern in the creative economy we as a city need assess our economic development efforts based on the OAR equation. OAR stands for Open Accountable Results. It is extremely important that all of the economic development OARs are rowing in the same direction.

First and foremost the city needs to adopt an OPEN as in open source economic development model (the term open source economic development was coined by TheCodeFactory). The model should be open and accommodating to organizations capable of efficiently delivering on the city’s economic development agenda. Based on my personal experiences the current economic development system is sole sourced and closed.

ACCOUNTABLITY is another important aspect. Economic Development organizations that receive the majority of their funding through public sources should be obligated and held accountable to the public. Public accountability would include full disclosure of;

- financial statements,
- procurement policy/procedure and
- salaries greater than $100k.

This is the same standard as the rest of the city of Ottawa. I have searched for but never been able to find any of this information with respect to OCRI.

Economic development for the city of Ottawa should be RESULTS oriented. I have often questioned the value of large expensive events like the Ottawa Venture Technology Summit, The Eastern Ontario Economic Development forum (with Donald Trump speaking) and other large and expensive initiatives like 82000reasons.

Some open and transparent discussion around a cost benefit analysis of these types of expenditures versus alernatives is in my opinion a worthy discussion. We need to focus on continuous improvement in our economic development.

“However beautiful the strategy … you should occasionally look at the results.” – Winston Churchill

Ian Graham

Filed under: Featured, Open Source, Ottawa by Ian
1 Comment »

If you are thinking … hard work how the heck is that a good thing. My guess is you would probably fail the marshmallow test too … in which case move along there is nothing to see here. If you like hard work please continue reading.

Those who get it will understand the value of hard work. This is especially true in a web x.0 world. One of my favourite entrepreneurial quotes is from local Ottawa Entrepreneur Aydin Mirzaee of Chide.it and it goes something like this “if it was too easy then anyone could do it.” There is a lot of wisdom in that statement and it highlights the key value underpinning hard work. Lots of people have ideas far fewer the passion and persistence to make them happen.

Both idea and easy are aptly four letter words. The difference between an idea and a successful business is a whole lot of well … you guessed it … hard work or execution. The only way to turn an idea into reality is to make it happen.

Hard work is the new competitive advantage. However much hard work you have had to put into something to make it work anyone with the same idea afterwards is going to have to follow in your footsteps. The harder you work and the more distance you put between yourself and the competition the greater the barrier to entry you have created.

There are two other awesome by products of hard work; serendipity and small victories. If you persist keep at it and continue to make progress I can pretty much guarantee that plenty of both will come your way. I love that Canadian Olympic commercial where the athletes say we create our own destiny and destiny didn’t get up for that 6am practice I did. The entrepreneur and hard work is the same thing. You create your own success and inevitably victories small and large.

Personally I find tremendous comfort in the phrase “if it were too easy anyone could do it.” Bring on the hard work baby.

Next post in the series – Small Victories.

Ian Graham

Filed under: Camp Culture, Entrepreneurship, Featured by Ian
No Comments »

My favorite nuggets;

Well worth the 2 minutes and 52 seconds it takes to watch.

Ian Graham

Filed under: Entrepreneurship, Innovation, Start-up by Ian
No Comments »

FINALLY! We get to the gratification part of delayed gratification. You can think of the tone and intent of the previous posts as your entrepreneurial marshmallow test. Congratulations for making it this far in the series … let THE GOOD begin …

… but before we do that you are probably wondering … WTF is the marshmallow test. There is a great book by Daniel Goleman called “Emotional Intelligence” and in that book there is something called the “Marshmallow Test”. This is a test that scientist used to predict the future success of young children and it works something like this;
.

.
Result: Children that wait 5 minutes without eating the marshmallow understand delayed gratification. Children that understand delayed gratification are far more likely to be successful later in life.
.
There is a whole bunch of really good stuff about being an entrepreneur and I think you can sum it all up with this statement:
.

“The harder I work … the luckier I get” – Henry Ford

.
I firmly believe that entrepreneurs create their own serendipity and that the harder you work the more small victories you create. Hence the next two posts are; Hardwork and Small Victories.
.
Next Post – The Good – Hard work.
.
Ian Graham

Filed under: Entrepreneurship, Featured by Ian
1 Comment »

If the demons from without and within are what can cause self doubt and uncertainty in entrepreneurs then persistence is that strength of character that propels them forward. Persistence is that dogged determination that keeps entrepreneurs moving forward. Persistence is that strength of character that all good to great entrepreneurs possess.
.
There is a fork in the road that every entrepreneur will reach at least once (if not many times) in their journey toward building a successful business. At that fork in the road there is a sign on one road that says “I quit” and it is the easy path because the journey ends here. The other road is a much more difficult path and much more work because it means the journey will continue. This road is marked with a sign that says “F#@& THAT”.
.
Ever entrepreneur that I have had the chance to speak with has experienced a “F#@& That” moment on one or several occasions. These moments tend to occur in the deepest depths of despair and it is that persistence gene and desire to see something through to completion that trigger it. Persistence is an essential characteristic of successful entrepreneurs.
.
Next Post – The Good
.
Ian Graham

Filed under: Entrepreneurship, Featured by Ian
2 Comments »

The demons from without are those external forces that can complicate the process of getting started. The people that tend not to understand are those that are risk averse and enjoy working in the comfort and relative security of a steady pay cheque and stable work place. Typical comments are;
.
- Why are you doing this?
- Why don’t you get a real job?
And stuff like that.
.
The truth of the matter is that the only support that really matters is that of your family (spouse and kids), advisors/mentors and close personal network. Support on the home front is absolutely essential before beginning any entrepreneurial endeavour. Anything beyond that is just noise and doesn’t really matter.
.
“Don’t think you’re on the right road just because it’s a well-beaten path.” ~Author Unknown
.
Entrepreneurs are usually travelling down the less trodden path and those on the well beaten path may not understand. IMHO dealing with the demons from without is far easier than dealing with the demons from within.
.
Next Post – the Bad – Persistence
.
Ian Graham

Filed under: Entrepreneurship, Featured by Ian
1 Comment »

Apparently there is a real disconnect brewing between the Conference Board of Canada and Legatum Prosperity Index. One ranks Canada 4th in Entrepreneurship and Innovation out of 106 countries while the other ranks Canada 14th out of the 17 OECD countries. Interestingly enough the same 17 OECD countries are in both rankings. 4th versus 14th thats quite a difference.
.
Here is what the two have to say:
.
Canada provides a highly conducive environment for business, although technology exports are low
.
Canada has an excellent technological infrastructure for business: internet bandwidth and the number of secure servers are very high, and personal computer ownership is the highest in the world at approximately 94 personal computers per 100 people. Just two formal procedures are required to start a business, thereby encouraging entrepreneurship, and 194,000 new Canadian enterprises were started in 2007, the sixth highest in the world. Canada achieves a high score for the value added in its service industry, and it ranks in the top 10 countries for royalty receipts, suggesting that Canadian companies are able to commercialise their intellectual property. Canada’s score is lowered by its very low levels of high-tech and ICT exports, which rank the country around 30th in both variables. Spending on R&D is 1.9% of GDP, which places Canada just outside the top 10 nations on this variable.
.
How does Canada perform on innovation overall?
.
Despite a decade or so of innovation agendas and prosperity reports, Canada remains near the bottom of its peer group on innovation, ranking 14th among the 17 peer countries.
.
This does not mean that Canadian inventions are themselves inferior. In fact, Canada produces some great inventions and inventors.
.
Canada’s low relative ranking means that, as a proportion of its overall economic activity, Canada does not rely on innovation as much as some of its peers. Overall, countries that are more innovative are passing Canada on measures such as income per capita, productivity, and the quality of social programs.
.
Pretty significant disconnect between the Conference Board of Canada and Legatum Prosperity Index. Personally I would put my money on the Legatum Index.
.
Ian Graham

Filed under: Featured, Innovation by Ian
No Comments »

The best metaphor I can think of for the titanic struggle that goes on within the mind of all entrepreneurs is a Cherokee legend known as the “Two Wolves”.
.
Within every person there live two wolves; a light wolf representing faith and a dark wolf representing fear. These two wolves are constantly battling within everyone and particularly in entrepreneurs during the first two years of their business. The wolves are constantly fighting each other for dominance.
.
A young child that was listening intently to the elder the story asked; “Which one wins?”
.
The elder stoically replied; “It depends on the one that you feed.”
.
The same is true for the entrepreneur.
.
“Think you can or think you can’t either way you will be right.” Henry Ford.
.
Next Post – The Bad – Demons from without
.
Ian Graham

Filed under: Entrepreneurship, Featured by Ian
No Comments »

.
Passion is a double edged sword and needs to be tempered with reason. Reason is usually complimented and aggregated from without and within. I call this “The Bad” not because it is a horrible thing but because it perhaps the most difficult of balancing acts that any entrepreneur must perform.
.
The ability to deal with that conflicted set of signals that tend to indicate either; the irrational and emotional “I love this idea and I am going to make it work” versus the cold logic of Jim Collins “face the brutal facts”. That conflicted set of signals that form the bad or as I like to call it the demons from within and without.
.
In summary the bad is made up of the inner demon of self doubt and reason battling against that entrepreneurial spirit of forward at all costs. The second demon is the demon from without usually made up of people asking things like;
.
- Why are you doing this?
- Shouldn’t you get a REAL job?
.
These demons from without and within make up “The Bad” of entrepreneurship and the cure for which will be revealed in the third post from now.
.
Ian Graham

Filed under: Entrepreneurship, Featured by Ian
1 Comment »