So you’re an engineer and you’ve decided to try your hand at entrepreneurship.  Chances are you have a sweet idea you think you can sell for a bundle.  Maybe it’s not the money but the glory and you want to see your name stamped on the best thing since sliced bread.  Or perhaps you’re just tired of working for that incompetent boss or irresponsible board members.

In my case, I had a mix of all those factors working to push me out of corporate life and onto the entrepreneurship track.  Even before I had my first full-time job I started keeping a project notebook of all my great concepts.  I have CAD drawings and hand sketches dating back to the mid 90′s when I was around 10 years old.  I knew I was not bound for a long-haul career with a big technology company or defense contractor as some of my friends and colleagues were pursuing.

Testing the waters

My first serious stab at an entrepreneurial venture happened in 2000 when I launched a college textbook resale site.  The core concept was simple: allow college students to resell their textbooks directly to each other and cut out the bookstore middleman.  I put in the hours to develop an entire classified ad system from the ground-up in ASP classic, lined up a graphic artist to assist with themes and logos and recruited friends to help me plaster Ohio State campus with printed advertising.  After investing hundreds of hours of combined time and a decent chunk of change in hosting, advertising and other expenses, the site was a complete and utter failure.

After a few years licking my wounds, I started my second entrepreneurial venture in early 2005.  This company focused on performing home automation and home theater installation and integration projects in the central Ohio region.  We researched new technology and located a thriving young company that was offering one of the first practical solutions for performing home automation installs in existing homes, something that was difficult prior to that time.  Twelve months and several thousand dollars later between travel, trade group membership, advertising and demo equipment, we ended up performing all of one installation in a now-defunct restaurant in Ohio State’s South Campus Gateway.

The problem with running a business like an engineer

So what went wrong with these ventures?  Despite a life-long passion for entrepreneurship, I had zero in the way of practical business experience or education at the time.  I had never held a sales or marketing position.  I’m not even a particularly outgoing person.  All of my prior jobs involved sitting at a desk 8-10 hours per day writing software and only speaking with a client in the context of providing technical support.  My education was in electrical and computer engineering.

First taking a look at the college textbook resale site, I transformed what should have been a very simple, very clean concept into an entire portal site.  We first branched into message boards.  Then we started publishing a bi-weekly comic (and not a good one at that.)  We eventually went so far as to create a movie review section.  That’s right: a movie review section on a textbook resale site.  All of a sudden, the time I should have been devoting to marketing our core concept and making the site as easy to use and powerful as it could be was devoted to creating weekly filler material for the site.  Furthermore, creating an entire portal site really blurred our core concept and made the site difficult to market.

Looking back on the home automation company, I can identify several clear problems with the concept and approach but a few stand out above the rest.  Once again I allowed the concept to blossom into an all-in-one solution rather than focusing on single product or service.  Customers were frequently confused as to whether we were selling home theaters or installing intelligent lighting systems.  I also failed to sell customers on the value of the equipment versus the technical merits of the systems.  Lastly, the equipment was expensive not only as an end user but even as a distributor.  We were required to buy demo systems and attend training sessions before even being able to market our services.

Learn from my mistakes

These days I know better but I hope I can save my fellow engineers-turned-entrepreneurs lots of money, time and frustration by offering the following tips:

1. Determine your core concept and stick to it. Until you’ve started and driven a few ventures into the ground it’s hard to appreciate the value of focus.  Engineers have a tendency to allow their relatively simple ideas to blossom from the clean and simple into an all-in-one, everything you can imagine solution.  Maybe the idea is too complex out of the gate, in which case you need to strip it down.  Either way, keep it simple.
2. Identify barriers and threats. Find out early if your concept involves a huge up-front investment, special licensing or anything that will destroy your momentum before you even manage to get off the ground.  Does your idea involve an inventory or manufacturing overhead?  You better find out before investing significant time and money.  This isn’t to say you should bail at the first sign of trouble but you should always be aware.
3. Sell based on value or return and not merits. A new wireless light switch, solid state media server or mobile gaming device may be everything you’ve ever dreamed of as an engineer but you better be able to justify why a consumer needs these things.  Will it reduce the electric bill?  Will it last three times longer?  Is it significantly more convenient to use than other solutions at no additional cost?  Why should the consumer care?

Network and socialize

I didn’t find this out until the early days of KappaStone, but a necessary part of becoming a successful entrepreneur is constant networking and socializing.  Right or not, engineers have a reputation for being socially awkward and shy.  If this applies to you, start learning to break those habits right away.  Here are some good places to get started:

• College or University Entrepreneurship Clubs. Most business colleges have established entrepreneurship clubs.  These are a great place to interact with not only business students but also fellow engineers with an entrepreneurial bent.  Perhaps more importantly you can have an opportunity to be mentored by seasoned entrepreneurs.
• Local Chamber of Commerce Events. Chamber of commerce events are wonderful networking opportunities and will allow you an opportunity to refine your elevator pitch.  Get comfortable striking up conversations with total strangers and talking about your concept.
• Business Plan Competitions. Every entrepreneur should go through a business plan competition at least once.  It is a great way to face any fears of public speaking, learn how to convey your concept in a concise manner and develop contacts with the very same people who may eventually invest in your concept.
• Social networking-organized events. A relatively recent phenomenon is the organization of regular business and entrepreneurship-focused meetings over platforms such as Meetup and Facebook.  These can be hit-and-miss but you should never pass on an opportunity to make a new contact.

Get out there and do it!

Analytical minds tend to over-think things and either never take action, or by the time they do take action they have become overwhelmed with self doubt.  This shows and is generally a deal-breaker.  Follow the tips above, polish up your social skills and get out there.  There’s no better time to start being an entrepreneur than today.

Tags: engineers, entrepreneur

This entry was posted on Monday, March 1st, 2010 at 11:41 am and is filed under Founder thoughts. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.