Domo! Alvin Lai desu!

In the class of Technology Entrepreneurship I’m enjoying at Stanford University, I have the privilege of exploring creativity and brainstorming from Tina Seelig, the Executive Director of the Stanford Technology Ventures Program. Here’s an brief list of what I’ve garnered from the session:

• No bad ideas
• Build on ideas
• No hiearchy, but take turns
• No conformity, conventions and limits
• No best idea, don’t limit potential
• Wild ideas
• The facilitator and the honored participants
• Additional Tips
• Ending thoughts

Check out my take on creativity and brainstorming!

Domo! Alvin Lai desu!

I can’t believe I’ve had the chance to step afoot in to my favourite web based IM company Meebo in Castro, Mountain View!

Imagine! Having AIM, Yahoo!, MSN, Google Talk, ICQ, Jabber all in one instant messenger program! How convenient is that!?

And we’ve got to chat with the Meebo CEO Seth Sternberg! Woo!

And here’s what I gathered:

Meet get to know people who have complementary skills to yours! In school, we tended mix around with peers who are very much like us, and as we think the similar thoughts, I reckon there probably was little out of the box thinking.. Get to know people who have skills that complement yours and that can probably improve on your weakness!

Seth isn’t really a techie person, but he got to know his techie friends’ friends and together he started a company with them! Awesome isn’t it?

Autonomy from Venture Capitalist is great to have, imagine the flexibility to make strategic decisions that could make or break the business!

Launch first, do what you yourself want first, without thinking what others say, get some traffic then get advice and comments! Otherwise you might just never get started!

Be clear of what you want and be prepared before opportunities come your way!

You NEED VCs because you need them to hire people!

Revenge is the wrong answer. STOP. Cut losses early. Ask! Why do you feel that way?

Respect people and have intellectual conversations.

Approach job interviews like a conversation, it’s just conversation about business!

He joined IBM and learnt a whole lot about business – his advice to us is to join a startup or a business before starting our own, because there are so many aspects of a business to learn about, a little contrary to what Farzad saying that the best way to learn is to do your own startup. As they say, there are many ways to get to the final destination!

Startups!

• Be really flexible, let chaos and ambiguity be the norm!
• Be a self starter, just do stuff that helps!
• The less time you need to be managed, the more you’re actually helping and doing things!

Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook is smart and he surrounds himself with smart people.

Got more to add? Fire away with comments!

Wow! I just gottasaythatagain. WOW!

After blogging about Farzad’s session in a whole new style, I’ve received tonnes of feedback – mostly great and encouraging ones:

Great! Fresh outlook! Cute! (for the Domo-kun banner, woo!) Well done! Looking good! Direct to the point! Great style! Good humor!

Even from friends who are not from the NUSEA/NOC network! Thanks Alastair and Ah Buang!

And of course from our most lovely dear program manager Jupe!

THANKS!

It feels AWESOME to receive fan-mail! I can attest to the ego trip!

But of course there were a few thoughtful people who gave useful and interesting pointers to improve upon:

Too much self advertisement

Several links to alvinlai.com – my personal blog. An introductory post for readers to check me out, a couple of posts to illustrate my writing styles. Too much? You tell me

I think this blog is an excellent avenue for NUSEA members to be heard, why not let our readers get a good glimpse (or ogle) at who we really are, how much fun we are having while reaping a full, wholesome, and rich experience in leapfrogging hurdles and relishing the Silicon Valley entrepreneurship process?

Really? Why not?

That is why I encourage the concept of guest blogging! Everyone should take this opportunity to let our readers know you better! Where better place can you portray yourself personally along with a YOUNG VIBRANT PROFESSIONAL STUDENT ENTREPRENEURIAL organization in the world’s most renowned tech hub of innovate SILICON VALLEY CALIFORNIA!? I’m so psyched up as I’m typing this! XD

So what are you waiting for! Guest blog!

My dear friend Derek Du Wenyu has made a great headstart over everybody by submitting his thoughts on Farzad’s mentorship session! I’ve updated the post! Check it out on Mentorship Session with Farzad Naimi!

Come on guys! Don’t lose out!

An informal blogging style

An informal blogging style might not represent NUSEA in a manner that everybody would like – some prefer a more professional corporate style.

After someone told me that it would look weird to have Domo-kun splashing across the front page on the NUSEA blog, I chickened out and removed the banner. But after some good consideration, I got it back up.

WHY?

Because I believe that it doesn’t do harm. I feel that a blog is supposed to be personal, fun and interesting to read. Pictures that catches your eye definitely do well to attract readers.

What’s more the Domo-kun image serves as a striking bold introduction to a new start and a new blogger contributer – me!

That is exactly what guest blogging is about!

Who’s our target audience?

Fellow bloggers? Professionals? Entrepreneurs? NOC alumni? NUS? Singapore? California? So many! As we fondly recall our favorite person saying we are AMBASSADORS! You must always bear some AIR (Attitude Integrity Responsibility) in your head! We will never never forget that!

Is the blog nicely geared toward our target audiences? Remember that means YOU TOO!

Thoughts to keep in mind

There were also some good pointers that were floating around too, I might as well just post them here as a good reference point to fall back on should we return to them in the future:

Great motivations for blogging (I didn’t edit to preserve the full meaning the author/commenter had intended):
1. archive of lessons learnt in each session
2. new mentees will not feel unprepared when joining
3. avoid asking the same questions each time over and over again (it should be continous and progressive. not walking on the same spot each time)
4. act as resources (sounds like a rails plugin!) that we can always have a common place to share our lessons learnt.
5. this is community driven. it is collaborative efforts and we could see different perspective on that.

Interesting, personal guest blogging style or formal corporate risking readership?

Monitored content – permission from mentors to avoid potential liability issues.

Recommendations

There were a couple of recommendations on how to move this forward too:

Podcasts

So that peeps who missed the mentorship sessions don’t miss out when they read the exciting notes!

Link Exchange!

Like link up with local NOC bloggers (e27, TheDigitalMovement), of course! Always welcome!

Separate/another blog for mentorship

Someone suggested having a separate blog for mentorship, apart from the main NUSEA blog bringing total to 2 NUSEA blogs. (I’m not so sure about this, tell me!)

Did I miss out on anymore points?

Tell the world who you are and what say you!

For obvious reasons I have not identified who commented on what, but if you’d like, I think it would be excellent if you can let others know what you think for more vibrant discussions! Those with great positive constructive feedback need not shy away, in fact you should let the world know how awesome of a person you are! I can edit this post to identify you if you wish!

REMEMBER! It’s all about you!
This blog is for you! YOU YOU and only YOU! This is an excellent avenue to share your thoughts, your passions, your dreams (SO cliche, but I like XD).

The world’s your oyster.

Fire away comments!

PS: You might wonder why I chose that bowl of something for a blog post image and what’s that. Easy. I love nice food, and images of nice food attraction attract (thanks Vincent for point pointing (walao double smack in the forehead – can u guess how psyched up I was typing that?) that out!) attention and curiosity. Now can you guess what’s that?

5 Hours since Rainmakers Live! “The New Argonauts” ended. 0300. My last day as President of NUSEA. And I can’t seem to contain my post event excitement.

Meeting Professor AnnaLee Saxenian and hearing her speak was a dream come true. No one really knew the extent in which she impacted my life.

1 year ago
It all happened one year ago, after I applied to the NOC program, I took on the assignment to write a paper about Silicon Valley, what are the lessons that organizations and the government can learn about this region. That was when I first came across the terms “Regional Advantage”. I read about the rise of Silicon Valley and the stagnating of Route 128 back in the 1990s and I was fascinated by the story. Route 128 was in many ways, parallel to Singapore. AnnaLee’s story of stressing the cultural element in an innovative region opened my eyes to why Singapore might not be taking off as an entrepreneurial region.

I arrived, and I thought
It was then, my goal to come to Silicon Valley, and be consciously thinking about what makes Silicon Valley attract the top talent from around the world? How did they create a culture of cooperation and continuous learning? Can Singapore learn anything at all from the Silicon Valley story?

I started observing. I observed how mentors share their experiences with us. I observed how people behave in networking sessions. I observed how Starbucks is a place of ideas. I observed how there is such a strong sense of cooperation between companies and individuals. I observed how every profession in Silicon Valley can contribute to the success of the region. A lot of things I see happening around me reinforce all the descriptions and insights AnnaLee had about Silicon Valley.

The Secrets of Silicon Valley
The more I thought about AnnaLee’s words, the more hypothesis I formulated. I tested out these hypothesis, and when they are proven true, I called them “The Secrets of Silicon Valley.” And NUSEA really took off as an entrepreneurial organization because we discovered so many secrets of Silicon Valley. Does anyone question how Silicon Valley evolved?

The appreciation of the history of Silicon Valley made us acutely aware of the nature of Silicon Valley, and it was the basis of our strategic planning in NUSEA 6 months ago. There was a strong emphasis in connecting people, forging new areas of partnership and cooperation, being sincere, passionate and righteous in all that we do. All these outlooks and discoveries paved the way for NUSEA’s rise in Silicon Valley. The more we observed, the wiser we became, the more we leveraged on the collective wisdom.

Can Singapore become an entrepreneurial hub?
AnnaLee made an important point in the event just now. She mentioned numerous policy makers calling her to ask “How do we build the next Silicon Valley?” And the answer is, “You can’t”. It was perhaps 9 months ago in which I began to feel that Singapore may never take off as an entrepreneurial region. There is a strong cultural element of pride, lack of trust, fear of failure and competitiveness that restricts innovation and creativity. I was losing hope.

Yes Yes she can!
The New Argonauts offered a perspective that revived the dream of Singapore being able to take off. It proposes that Argonauts go back to a country, influence policy makers, mentor companies, start companies, invest in companies and most importantly build a bridge between Silicon Valley and their home countries. In a great way these Argonauts pave the road for technology entrepreneurship and innovation.

Look at the ingredients that Singapore possesses in becoming an entrepreneurial region. We have the knowledge. We have government support. We have funds. There may be a cultural conflict. But perhaps, just perhaps, one day, in a few decades’ time, some Argonauts may return when the opportunities are in place, for a knowledge transfer from Silicon Valley to Singapore and for Singapore to begin their path towards technology entrepreneurship.

NOC Students as Mini Argonauts
To my NOC friends: Why did you come here? You have stepped out of your comfort zone to be in a country where they consider you an alien. Although you will only spend 1 year here, remember all that you have learnt here. You’re educated. You’re inspired. You’re taught. If you take all that you have and start to light the flames of entrepreneurship in others, you are, in my opinion, a mini Argonaut. The question now is, where is our Golden Fleece?

To Professor Saxenian, thank you once again for making this event happen. I can never forget the day you agreed to speak at our event, and the words are still ringing in my head.

“Is this the same event that Soh Chin San and Mei Lin Fung have asked about? If so they get a prize for persistence . If we can work out a mutually convenient date I will accept this invitation.” - AnnaLee on August 23rd 2006.