Category: career

career, economy, faith, fear, health, job, religion

My Year of Hopefulness – Cathedral of Saint John the Divine

Christa Avampato

Yesterday, I found myself leaving the emergency room of St. Luke’s Hospital. I had developed a “subconjunctival hemorrhage” and a slight amount of “petechiae”. This is a fancy way of saying a very small blood vessel popped in my left eye and I had a few tiny red freckles around both of my eyes. I was panicked that I was experiencing the beginning of a very serious medical condition. Turns out that all of my blood work and diagnostic tests came back completely normal. I’ll just look a little weird for a week or so.

I called my mom to update her and let her know that nothing was seriously wrong with me. I wandered down the street, into the children’s sculpture garden of the Cathedral of Saint John the Divine. As I was explaining to my mom that I was just fine, I found myself tearing up. Maybe they were tears of relief, or fear, or maybe it was frustration with the week I had just finished. Over the past few days I have discovered many more of my friends have lost their jobs. I’m beginning to wonder how I’ve been so fortunate to escape that situation in this economy. I work very hard, though not any harder than my friends who have been let go from their positions. I’m beginning to think that luck has a lot to do with it.

I sat in that sculpture garden for about 20 minutes and had a good cry. The sun had come out, the wind was blowing, and I felt lost. I’m worried about the uncertainty we’re all facing, despite the fact that I have managed uncertainty so many times before. I feel like the ground is shifting beneath our economy, and there is no sign of it settling down any time soon. I was angry for my friends who have been let go from their jobs – hard working, talented people who were seen as a line item on a company’s excel spreadsheet, an expense rather than a resource and an investment. I felt shaken.

I had never really looked at that giant sculpture next to Saint John the Divine. It’s a collaborative piece of work based on Noah’s Ark and the triumph of good over evil. The Cathedral has been closed for some time for renovations and recently re-opened. I was weary from my hospital visit though felt drawn into that incredible cathedral. I wandered in and it was nearly empty. The choir was practicing and I felt drawn to sit in the center of the space, letting that beautiful music wrap around me like a warm hug. Though I am not a religious person, I felt that God was very close to me at that moment, that he knew what I was going through, and wanted to help.

I let my eyes tear up again, I was cemented to that seat, transfixed by the music. After a little while I got up and walked around the edge of the cathedral, stopping to look at each of the small chapels. The light shone through them so brilliantly. I had never seen stained glass that colorful and perfect. By the time the choir stopped, I got to The Poet’s Corner, a small area that pays tributes to literary greats such as Mark Twain, Herman Melville, and Gertrude Stein. They each had their names and birth date engraved into a stone, along with a quote they famously wrote.

One quote particularly caught my attention. Theodore Roethke said, “I learn by going where I have to go.” I thought about this quote all the way home. It reminded me that I have places I need to be, where I’ve committed to be, and there are things for me to learn there and to take somewhere else. Today, I just need to do what I have to do. The acts of hope and faith are a daily process. Just keep showing up.

The image above can be found here.

career, entrepreneurship, fear, technology

My Year of Hopefulness – Fear #8 of entrepreneurship

Christa Avampato

One last fear to conclude this series: “People will laugh at my idea.”

Acceptance. Appreciation. Someone who “gets it.” We all crave this. Erma Bombeck famously said, “It takes a lot of courage to show your dreams to someone else.” And sharing our business ideas with others means sharing our dreams with them. It’s a scary proposition.

Consider this: About 10 years ago a couple of guys named Larry and Sergey wanted to start an Internet search company called “Google”. You think people didn’t laugh at that idea? The name, the proposition, the lack of business experience of the founders. While very smart guys, we had no reason to think that 10 years ago they would transform our lives to the extent that they have. Let’s consider each of the fears I’ve laid out over the last 8 days in turn as it relates to Google:

“I won’t make enough money.” Really? I’m sure Google started out small. Now, the founders are two of the wealthiest people on the planet.

“No one will want the product of service my company produces.” Today, Google is so widely used that it’s become a verb in the American lexicon.

“I’ll fail.” Perhaps, but look at the upside. The Google founders kicked around ideas, some successful, some not so successful, as they learned the tricks of the trade of entrepreneurship. You can, too.

“Someone will steal my idea.” Go right ahead. There are plenty of other search engines, email services, on-line cloud computing applications that existed before and were created after Google. No matter. Google is still at the top of their game, and improving all the time, even though other people stole their idea.

“I don’t have enough time.” Start small. Build up from zero. With each extra bit, you’ll leverage what you learn, and figure out how to work smarter. Googlers did, and still do.

“Everything that goes wrong will be my fault.” Google screws up all of the time. They invent some applications that don’t work so great. So they ditch them and try something else. Don’t let set-backs get you down. Use them to learn, grow, and move on.

“Starting my own business will be lonely.” The founders of Google can’t get people to leave them alone. I’m sure they’d do just about anything for a moment of peace and quiet. And I’m sure they won’t get one any time soon.

“People will laugh at my idea.” Can you imagine a funnier name for a company than “Google”? It reminds me of those weird little eye balls you find in craft stores. It wasn’t even a word 10 years ago. Now, you can’t go anywhere on the planet without people recognizing the name and fun, colorful logo. So let people laugh – just don’t let that laughter chase away your dream.

“Well,” you might say, “Google is an exception to the rule.” Maybe. But consider that Larry and Sergey weren’t in any better shape 10 or 15 years ago than you are today. They weren’t famous or fabulously wealthy. They were very smart, normal people in graduate school. They had an idea and they worked like heck to make it a reality. No magic. Just dedication to an idea and very hard work. They aren’t any different than you or I, except that they could put aside all of their fears and began. Let’s take their lead and do the same.

The image above can be found at: http://www.tmonews.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/12/laughter.gif

business, career, entrepreneurship, fear, lonely

My Year of Hopefulness – Fear #7 of Entrepreneurship

Christa Avampato

“Starting my own business will be lonely.”

Some times I wake up in a cold sweat: I’m dreaming about being at my desk, starting at my computer’s blank screen with nothing to say. And no matter how hard I think about it, I have no words. I can’t think of a single thing to write down. That cursor blinks and grows larger and larger at the top of an empty Word document. The fears of a writer!

Starting a business elicits the same kind of fear. When push comes to shove, it’s us and our business on one side and the rest of the world on the other. We have to keep ourselves motivated to get up everyday, sit down with ourselves, and get to work. No one is giving us a to-do list or setting goals for us – it’s all up to us.

We live in a privileged time – reaching out, making connections, and finding support are just a few clicks away no matter where we are. Hop on Twitter or Facebook. Join any one of the thousands of smaller social networking sites on Ning. Meet-ups are around every corner. And these are just the beginning!

Experts, supporters, partners and customers are within arms reach thanks to all of these new and free communication tools, and they want to help us. Make them a vital and vibrant part of our business, and that fear of loneliness will be a thing of the past.

business, career, entrepreneurship, fear, mistakes

My Year of Hopefulness – Fear #6 of Entrepreneurship

Christa Avampato

“Everything that goes wrong will be my fault.”

Looking failure in the face is tough. When we go it alone, or even when we join a small company, there isn’t anywhere to hide. We have responsibility, lots of it, and we will invariable make mistakes. And then we will have to own up to those mistake, many times on our own.

When we are #1 and only on the workforce, we then need to admit mistakes and failures to ourselves – the toughest audience out there. And it’s painful, and sometimes embarrassing. We find it much easier to forgive others than to forgive ourselves. And no one holds mistakes over our heads like we do. That little voice will pop up from the back of our minds continuously to remind us of our failings and flailings. And it takes a lot of determination and effort to turn down the volume of that voice.

What we need to be mindful of is that there is a tremendous upside to responsibility. We can make changes that we feel are right and necessary. We can focus on ideas and tasks that we deem important and worthwhile. Our mistakes are ours, and our victories and wins are as well. It’s taking the good with the bad, the yin with the yang. No matter whether we work for someone else or we work for ourselves – responsibility inevitably will find us. We can run but we can’t hide.

If I’m going to make mistakes and own the outcomes, I’d much prefer that they be my own so that I can learn as much as possible from them. Mistakes are an investment and a sunk cost of doing business. We all make mistakes; the trick is to not make the same one twice and the best way to assure that is to make sure that I’m the one who made it and owned up to it.

The image above can be found at: http://imagecache.allposters.com/images/pic/QUOMAG/MX01~Mistakes-Esther-Dyson-Posters.jpg

business, career, entrepreneurship, fear, time

My Year of Hopefulness – Fear #5 of Entrepreneurship

Christa Avampato

“I don’t have enough time.”

Running a business, particularly as a side venture in addition to a day job, is time-consuming no question. There will be trade-offs. I’ve found that a good deal of organization and keeping initial goals small helps to temper this fear of not having enough time. Starting a business can be an overwhelming project, though breaking it down into small bite-sized action items makes the idea less daunting.

Here are some ideas to make the time management portion of your new business more manageable:

1.) Develop an action plan, a task list, and a timeline to stay on track with small goals

2.) Celebrate achievements small and large, especially at the very early stage of starting a business – developing the first draft of your business plan, meeting a contact that has the potential to be a partner, deciding on the name of your company, etc., launching your website. Every accomplishments is worth at least a little celebration.

3.) Get some help – could be an intern, a family member, a friend, or a potential business partner to give a few hours of their time. Sharing the load can take some of the pressure off.

4.) Fun organization tools abound at places like Target, Container Store, and Staples. Use them to keep you motivated in your quest for organization.

5.) Set a realistic time frame. There’s a lot of pressure in the world to move as fast as possible all the time. Running a business is a long-term commitment and slow, managed growth wins the race.

6.) Remember that the time will pass any way, regardless of how you spend it so why not invest in an idea that you have and see if you can make a go of it? The worst that can happen is that you’ll still have your day job, you will learn a lot about yourself and what you want out of your life, and you can always switch gears and work on a different idea if the first one doesn’t work out.

When I was in college, I was feeling overwhelmed by some paper or exam. One of my roommates gave me a very small two inch picture frame. To this day, it still sits on my desk to remind me that all I have to do at this very moment is enough work to fill that two inch frame. And once I finish with that first small task, I can move on to another. That two inch frame doesn’t reduce the amount of work I have – it just gives me a perspective that’s a little bit easier to deal with.

business, career, entrepreneurship, failure

My Year of Hopefulness – Fear #3 of entrepreneurship

Christa Avampato

“I’ll fail.”

A hallmark fear for anyone starting anything new – whether it’s a business, a new job, getting a degree, starting a relationship, moving to a new city. Every time that we adopt a change in our lives, we open ourselves up to the risk of failure. The flip side of that possible failure is a tremendous upside for growth, learning, and improvement of our current situation.

Failure has a very negative connotation in our culture, and it’s often unwarranted. Failure means to discover what doesn’t work. Knowing what doesn’t work puts us one step closer to knowing what does work. And once we know what doesn’t work, we can correct it and move forward. Peter Skillman of Palm is famous for advocating for early failure. Try something. If it doesn’t work, switch gears, and take another run at it.

Whenever I am afraid of failing, I consider what I would have to do to completely protect myself from it. And the answer is often that I would end up not doing anything. That’s no way to live. Our time on this Earth is too brief, too precious, to stand still for every long. Life is about experience, and with every new experience comes the risk of failure.

Like death and taxes, failure is a part of life. It can be a wonderful teacher if we cast in that role in our lives. Whether it changes our lives for better or worse is largely up to us – it all depends on what we do with the lessons it teaches us. Do we use them as valuable information or do we take them on like a yolk, a source of discouragement and despair? How we look at and use failure says a lot about how we live our lives.

business, career, entertainment, technology

Examiner.com: An interview about entrepreneurship with David Priemer of Rypple

Christa Avampato

A few months ago I came across an article on Rypple, a company that builds on-line collaboration tools. I was very impressed with the simplicity and elegance of their mission and interface. They identified that there was a hole in the market for a tool that could help people identify where and how they can improve their job performance. For those who are pro-active, believe in the process of continuous improvement, and dread performance review time, this tool is a godsend! For the full interview, click here.

business, career, children, entrepreneurship, fear, rejection

My Year of Hopefulness – Fear #2 of entrepreneurship

Christa Avampato

“No one will want the product or service my business produces.”

This is the #2 fear of entrepreneurship for me, the second in a series that I’m doing after being inspired by Gary Novosel, Founder of The Food Medic. In our interview, he gave a piece of advice that really resonated with me: if you’re afraid of starting your business, write all your fears down, and then put them aside. So here we go, fear #2 – no one will want what I’m trying to sell.

Isn’t that the age old story of rejection – people won’t like me, I won’t be good enough, or, the worst – I won’t be relevant. What I say and think and do will not matter and no one will care. Ouch – painful ideas and thoughts that we work very hard to suppress, and yet at least at one moment of weakness in our lives, we’ve all felt them.

One of the fun things of starting a business and making a product or service is continuous improvement. The enemy of good is perfection – so don’t wait perfection to get the idea out the door. If you do, that product will never see the light of day. You’ll tweak and tweak and tweak, until someone else beats you to the punch and puts together a similar idea.

And what’s the very worst that can happen? People won’t by what we make, we’ll get feedback, change the product, and try again. Not so bad, right? Or maybe it’s just not reaching the right audience, or a wide enough audience. Or maybe it’s an idea that just needs time in order to b adopted by the market.

I was thinking about this fear all day today, wondering how I’d write this post and put it in perspective. As I rounded the corner toward my apartment this evening, a bunch of little kids ran up to me to drag me to their lemonade / cookie stand. For $0.10 I could get my choice of a cookie or a glass of lemonade, or for $0.20 I could get both. These kids did not have one bit of fear telling me about their business and the cost of the goods they were selling. I envied them.

I walked toward my apartment, happily eating my chocolate chip cookie, and honestly, it was the best cookie I’ve ever had. Entrepreneurship is alive and well among kids, so couldn’t we just model our own behavior after their fearlessness? It’s at least worth a try.

business, career, entrepreneurship, fear, money

My Year of Hopefulness – Putting fears aside

Christa Avampato

In yesterday’s post, Gary Novosel of The Food Medic gave the advice that all entrepreneurs should write down all the fears about starting their own business, and then put them aside. I really took his advice to heart as I have a lot of fears about starting my own business. As I reviewed my list I realized that it’s longer than I thought it was and that there are probably a lot of people who share the same fears.

To overcome fears we have to look our fears in the face and not blink. I really want to start my own venture, and the best way to answer these fears is to write them out and then write a remedy for each of them. Since these thoughts may be helpful to readers who are also interested in starting their own businesses, I wanted to write them as a series on this blog with the hope that I can replace fear with hope:

Fear #1: “I won’t make enough money.”

Start small and grow slowly. Whenever we begin something, we naturally wish for success in a big way. What seems more sustainable to me, and will likely generate more happiness, is a steady flame rather than a flash in the pan.

If we can keep a steady job while starting our own business on the side with our free time, that releases some financial fears. The trick is to be present at a job when we’re there, and present working on our business in our own time. I hear from a lot of entrepreneurs that they are frustrated that they can’t spend all their time on their business because they have to keep a day job. Finding a few nuggets of our job that inform our own business idea eases that frustration.

My friend, Dave, is interested in a portfolio approach to his career – a lot of different ventures that each earn a small amount of money and keep him interested and engaged. Entrepreneurs place a lot of pressure on themselves to earn all their income from a single business idea. That might work, or we might find that we’re happy earning a portion of our total income from a business venture, at least in the beginning.

Concern about earning enough money from my business laid to rest. Fear #2 for tomorrow: “No one will want the product or service my business produces.”

books, business, career, entrepreneurship, Examiner, health, technology

My Year of Hopefulness – The Food Medic

Christa Avampato

Today I am thrilled to publish a recent interview with Gary Novosel, Founder of The Food Medic. The Food Medic is a website that provides information of good nutrition’s ability to combat disease. On the site, Gary provides information on the health properties of specific skills, what foods have great benefit to combat specific diseases, and delicious recipes that are easy to prepare.

All of the interviews I do for Examiner.com really motivate me to work on my own business ideas. Gary’s story is one with real heart, so much so that I even found myself tearing up when he talked about several life-changing experiences that prompted him to start The Food Medic. He’s also written a cookbook to capture many of his insights and delicious recipes, appropriately titled The Food Medic Cookbook.

Gary’s journey is a wonderful lesson in the power of kismet and following your passion! He also has great advice for people who are interested in starting their own businesses. Check out my interview with Gary on Examiner.com by clicking here.