Very rarely, movies capture the legends in the making and that too right in the middle of the phenomenon. The Social Network is such a movie. This is a great insider (rather 'insiders' or 'outsiders') view of Facebook's initial days. This is a must for all entrepreneurs. (No wonder, TiE, Bangalore was giving away complimentary tickets!)
As the movie is based on dispositions against Mark Zuckerberg; we get exposed to harsh truths/facts about facebook. The dialogues are sharp, witty and show Mark Zuckerberg as nonchalant, in-your-face protagonist tackling all kinds of attacks singlehandedly.
The movie, since covers all the complicated twists and turns related to Facebook; poses interesting intellectual challenge to the viewer. The movie builds on the ongoing phenomenon,- Facebook, hence gets initial big draw. The movie empathizes with the entrepreneur is everybody. The movie is directed by David Fincher, the veteran of the movies: Fight Club, Zodiac, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Se7en and The Game, amongst others..... (I will be writing further!!... after watching again tomorrow, thanks to TiE, Bangalore!)
18th Nov., 2010
Nearly, half of yesterday's audience was budding entrepreneurs from Bangalore. There are many lessons to be learnt from Mark Zuckerberg's facebook venture.
Execution is Much Bigger than the Idea!: There were ideas like social networks existing already (MySpace and Friendster, additionally the social networks of respective institutes). Divya Narendra andWinklevoss brothers had come up with the 'idea of the exclusivity' for ivy league institutes.
But Zuckerberg's facebook went much beyond that to provide real life club feel for the venture. (In a way, there is a huge opportunity for all of us to re-create the Real World on the net!) Zuckerberg, with his relentless efforts, high intellect clubbed with programming prowess went on creating more capabilities to ensure that the site, 'the facebook' came very close to the vision. No wonder, within a few weeks the facebook became talk of the town! And caught attention of Napster's Sean Parker!
So it is not just the idea or knowledge (though they are the seeds and provide direction); what matters is the fulfillment through flawless execution relentlessly pursued against time! Actually, execution is the function of the leader and his team's capability, professed vision, profile of the market and pace of growth. I am working on 'Elements of Spectacularly Successful Start-ups', it will shortly appear in the same blog! You may refer to my blog on Idea, Execution and Realities
Passionately Pursue Your Dream: Once the idea got Zuckerberg, he was possessed by the idea. Nothing else mattered to him.He kept on pursuing it in a highly focused manner. The passion creates a clear vision of your dream.
In fact, Warren Bennis, the global leadership guru exhorts leaders to be dreamers while awake, and they are the ones, who dare to change the world and can change it! So Zuckerberg, could clearly visualize what needs to be done and how fast!
Leverage Everything Around You: Zuckerberg leveraged the access to the data, resources available to him to build the website. He sensed that Saverin could fund the idea and additionally the right sounding board as Saverin's thoughts genrally reinforced his thinking. Saverin also provided the right ideas, while programming. Zuckerberg fully leveraged everything around him.
At the same time, Winklevoss brothers and Divya Narendra might not have provided the same kind of reinforcements except for lots of money, if needed.
As the project progressed, Zuckerberg could resonate more with Sean Parker of Napster than Saverin. By the time Zuckerberg met Parker, he had already moved to the next level. And at that level/stage, he needed Parker as the sounding board.
Though Zuckerberg is portrayed as reckless dreamer moving ahead at the cost of friendships or earlier mentors, in reality it may be slightly different. Anyway, the takeaway here is,- at different stages you may have to change the content and structure of your leadership group. But, that needs to be managed in such a way that all the stakeholders understand the implications. It is easier said than done, especially when the pace of changes is so fast and all the stakeholders are so young.
Build A Great Team: Zuckerberg could intuitively understand that the talent he needs has to be more like him in programming prowess, hence he came out with the recruiting method of conducting the programming contest, spiked with gulp of beer at every few minutes. He could see the complementary skills of his friends and he would assign them the tasks which they could deliver.
The team leader also needs to understand the possible repercussions due to the team members' individual quirks. The leader needs to manage the repercussions at the earliest. This needs to be achieved with tact, patience and as far as possible, there is a need to involve the stakeholders. This might have gone little wrong here due to the time pressure and the overwhelming realities around.
Fast Scale-up: There is no substitute for fast scale up. The sooner the idea is scaled up, the better it is. Progressively, the Strategic Inflection Points (SIPs) are occurring at faster pace. If the idea is not executed well and not scaled up in time, another wave and/or competition may wash away all the efforts. In fact, this is what might have happened to the other players in social network market!
Relentless Focused Perseverance to Race Ahead: Though Zuckerberg is perceived and portrayed as nerd (which is/may be true, depends on how and from where one looks). Zuckerberg has been persevering relentlessly. At least, till date he has not given any leeway for any of his competition. Life becomes endless mission to achieve the goal. The 'life-work balance' may seem to be at odds. But for a passionate leader, the passionate journey becomes life of fun all the way!
Keen Sense of the Realities Around and Matching Execution: Zuckerberg could identify quickly, the Facebook's growing popularity, and could sense the potential of Facebook. In fact, the same was sensed by Napster's Sean Parker. I believe that such sensibilities are developed over a period of time by being in the thick of the action and also the great prowess in extrapolating the present happenings.
Zuckerberg and Parker started executing appropriately until the millionth unique user. (And, that continues beyond 500 millionth user too!) As I update in August 2013, Facebook has 1.1 Billion users!
So, the great journey of entrepreneurship may define and develop completely new possibilities. Today, I came across Richard Feynman's quote about the age of discoveries, as follows;
"We are lucky to live in an age in which we are still making discoveries. "
— Richard P. Feynman
Let's make more discoveries as entrepreneurs!
