Sketchnoting: Seed Investments at Perkins Coie

Last Thursday, I went to Perkins Coie for a panel that they hosted on fundraising - Seed Investments: How To Be Attractive to Early Stage Investors and the “Right” Seed Investment Structure For You. As a first-time entrepreneur with my background, experience, and focus in product and design, fundraising is completely new to me and I’m learning everything I can about it before we’re ready to start raising. Here’s my sketchnote on the event – sometimes I find that drawing out visuals gets my mind to make connections better.  

Click to view a larger version of the sketchnote. The panelists included: 

• Topher Conway, Partner, SV Angels
• Michael Glaser, Partner, Perkins Coie LLP
• Ajit Medhekar, Member of Band of Angels, Former Venture Partner of ARCH Venture Partners
• Richard Melmon, Managing Director of Bullpen Capital, Co-founder of Electronic Arts

What’s not included in the sketchnote above are the panelists thoughts on seed-stage deal structures. Some believe that founders shouldn’t do debt, others are saying restructure so you receive pre-common instead of preferred, but the most common is still convertible debt. One of the panelists mentioned that founders should just do an equity strategy because it’s transparent. Keep things simple in the seed round and focus more on your product and building out your company. Most importantly, talk to your lawyer first about the various structures. They represent your company and therefor have its’ best interest at heart and can break down the benefits and downsides of the various structures. If you invested some of your own money, you should put it in a nonconvertible note (I’m not sure what the reasoning for this is, or what other options there are – a lot of what was discussed are things I’ll need to look into a bit more).

If you have any advice on fundraising for first-time entrepreneurs, then definitely pass it along in the comments below!

 

You’re Not a Founder If You’re Getting Paid

Edit: This post was syndicated to Women 2.0 on April 5, 2013 and can be viewed here

I recently went to an event on Fundraising where Ajit Medhekar, part of Band of Angels, sat on the panel to discuss early stage fundraising and the various seed investment structures (I might share my crude sketchnotes…maybe. Stay tuned!). He mentioned that if you’re getting paid, you’re most certainly not a Founder, specifically if this is an early stage company where all you really have is seed investment. Barely 40 minutes later, I met a founder who’s considering shutting down their company because it wasn’t performing well. They sounded defeated and heartbroken, but this is a tale that’s all too common in Silicon Valley. As they were telling me their story, they kept bringing up how they had to make so many sacrifices (welcome to entrepreneurship – expect to stay hungry and foolish), how they couldn’t spend like they used to (evidently for this Founder, it was designer labels – congratulations, you’re learning what it means to make short-term “sacrifices” and live like no one wants to, so you can one day, live the way most people can only dream of), and how once they raised money they had to give themselves a salary which was reduced considerably from what their market rate would be. Wait…what?! Pause for a second.. they were giving themselves a salary?!

It’s not that I wasn’t interested in them as a person, but that’s about the time I excused myself from the conversation. If you’re a founder of an early stage company and all you have is a small seed investment you really shouldn’t be giving yourself a salary. The only people that should be receiving a salary are your early employees, specifically your engineers, designers, and possibly even a community/sales person depending on your needs. When this founder told me they were taking a salary, I about lost all sympathy I had for their trials and tribulations. First of all, it’s a massive turn-off to investors, and second, if you’re giving yourself a salary, you probably don’t have your skin in the game or are not dedicated enough in your product or in building your company (and if you’re not dedicated towards your own vision, why should anyone else be? 

Starting a company is not glamorous at all. If you can’t pull yourself away from owning labels, driving a fancy car, or you’re not capable of making incredibly hard sacrifices and being really really really stressed out, you really shouldn’t start a company. Sell that fancy car and pay for that designer you think will work for free – seriously, we know we’re as highly sought after as engineers and there are startups willing to pay us a very nice salary…explain why we should work for free sans equity? (This is a story for another time, and not mine to tell).

There are so many things I’ve had to give up when I decided to take the plunge: buying a new car (you don’t need a depreciating asset anyways..), buying new shoes, buying 1st world necessities, buying anything really, traveling, fine dining, a salary, a social life, my sanity (just kidding..kind of..) etc. Expect there to be fairly significant changes in your social life – it’s not that you won’t be able to relate to your non-tech/startup friends, just that you’ll realize fairly quickly how different your priorities become (not for everyone, but for a lot of them). It’s also not really necessary to be best friends with the whole world. It’s great to have many friends, but they don’t all need to be your best friend. That being said, you still want a few close friends – as a founder, any given day can be your absolute best, or your absolute worst. And on those days that it’s your absolute worst, you really want those closest to you there. The friends that remain there when you “make it” (whatever that means) or don’t, are the ones worth having in your life forever.

Forget about relationships, unless you’re already in one, and they’re absolutely supportive and wonderful! Hold onto those. However, if you’re seeing someone who’s clingy (seriously, what’s up with this new trend of incredibly clingy guys?), is high maintenance in that they need a lot of attention (another ridiculous trend – what’s up with that?), or you’re having to sacrifice important things you need/should be doing to build your company or product in order to spend time with your significant other, consider moving on. Overall your significant other should be adding to the quality of your life when you’re having to sacrifice so much already, not creating more stress or strain than necessary. But I digress..

…the point is, if you’re not able to make massive sacrifices, and if you’re expecting to take home a salary (i.e., anything that goes beyond paying your basic expenses of rent, food, non-spa gym membership, etc – in which case, that’s not a salary, that’s barely surviving), then you should seriously reconsider building a company. You shouldn’t be a founder for the sake of being a founder, nor should you start a company for the sake of starting a company.

Design: Skeuomorphic vs. Flat vs. Skeuominimalism (Almost-flat)

(Originally posted on Quora at samihah.quora.com on March 17, 2013)

There’s recently been a lot of backlash against Skeuomorphism, partly because design has seen an oversaturation of skeuomorphic design to the point of ad nauseum, and partly because there’s value in design being as minimal as possible (some of this is related to the interconnectedness between engineering and design, in that heavy design elements can weigh down product performance). With this trend of moving away from skeuomorphic design, we’re seeing more designers adopt Flat design into their work. Perhaps the most famous example of flat design is Metro (design language) (yes, I know it’s no longer called Metro, but it’s what’s most familiar to people, so for the sake of this post, I’m calling it Metro). There’s another design language that’s been gaining momentum, and it’s a happy medium between skeuomorphism and flat design: Skeuominimalism (or more commonly known as, Almost-flat design). We’re seeing skeuominimalism in a lot of Google products – the Google Maps app for iOS being the most significant example.

Since a lot of non-designers and people interested in design are curious about the various design languages/styles, I’ll break down each of the three mentioned above.

Skeuomorphic Design:

Perhaps the most famous examples of skeuomorphic design come from Apple. They pioneered the adoption of skeuomorphism in design. Skeuomorph, is literally defined as, an object made to resemble another material or technique. In software product design, specifically iOS apps, we see this a lot. Take, for example, Calendar (iOS/Mac App) - it’s made to resemble a real calendar with tears at the top to resemble pages that have been torn. In a real calendar, there’s use for the tears in that, those are actual pieces of paper that have been torn from the app. In digital, there’s no purpose to it other than the aesthetic. When comparing Apple’s hardware design to their software design, it’s interesting to note how different in design philosophy the two seemingly are. Apple’s industrial design is all about being as minimal as possible with clean lines, and as little details as possible. Apple Human Interface Guidelines, and their overall software design philosophy, is filled with details from drop shadows, to gradients to make elements look more 3D and an overall focus on making objects appear more tactile (even if the medium is digital). If you need another example other than Apple for skeuomorphic design, check out LinkedIn’s iOS app. It feels like skeuomorphic design on steroids.

(Example of skeuomorphic design from a Dribbble designer)

Perhaps it’s because of my admiration of Dieter Rams and his 10 Principles of Good Design, or maybe it’s because I’m completely sick of seeing skeuomorphic design being overused, but skeuomorphic clearly violates the most basic of design principles: Good design is as little design as possible.

Flat Design:

Flat Design is often perceived as being on the opposite spectrum of design languages from skeuomorphic design. As previously mentioned, Microsoft’s Metro design language is the most famous example of flat design. Flat design champions clean design, and a focus on colors and typography. Because of the increased adoption of 2x/HiDPI screen resolutions (“retina” screens for you plebians – just kidding..), as well as increased performance and development speeds when design is clean and there aren’t many design elements that need to be loaded or created, we’re seeing more companies adopt Flat design philosophies. The increased adoption of HiDPI screens make it possible to focus on typography in UI design since these screen make thin fonts readable.

(Example of Flat Design from a Dribbble user).

Skeuominimalism (aka, Almost-flat Design):

I’m not sure if Skeuominimalism is an actual word or if I made it up – but it’s essentially flat design with elements of skeuomorphic design. The focus on skeuominimalistic interfaces are on colors, shapes, and to an extent, typography. Shapes and colors are used to add dimension. The use of subtle drop-shadows are okay since it can create a level of dimension in design that’s not over-the-top or tacky. While Google has the most famous examples of skeuominimalistic design, my favorite examples come from LayerVault. Their website uses interaction, colors, and shapes to create dimension and a delightful user experience. The focus is on the content and their product goals instead of shiny UI. Even though the focus is on educating the audience on their product, they still maintain a level of elegance in their design without the UI being obtrusive and affecting the user experience. If you study the UI, you’ll see that rather than gradients and other fancy layer styles, they use colors and shapes to create depth but are still able to maintain a clean interface.

(Example of Skeuominimalism from Allan Grinshtein - isn’t it just breathtaking? I highly recommend going over to http://layervault.com and fully experiencing the UI with it’s beautiful UI and interactions).

While I’m more favorable towards skeuominimalism, that’s not to say that designers should completely drop skeuomorphic or flat design. There’s a time and place for everything. You should always design for your users and what makes sense for your product. So if it makes sense to use skeuomorphic design (example: social gaming, where the UI often should be more skeuomorphic so that it’s invisible and matches the feel of the game), then by all means, you should be using skeuomorphic. Don’t adopt flat design or skeuominimalism because it’s just now becoming “trendy.” Adopt a design language that makes sense for your product and the vision of the product.

TL;DR: Skeuomorphic=Apple, Flat Design=Microsoft, Skeuominimalism (Almost-flat Design)=Google. Do what makes sense for your product and users, and not just what’s trendy.

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“…And your work will be as good as your ambitions.”

Do We Have to Give Up Our Femininity?

Edit: This post was syndicated to the Women 2.0 blog on February 6, 2011, and can be found here.

I recently had a conversation with one of my lawyer friends who’s very stylish and fashionable, about blogging. It’s no secret that I have friends who choose my clothes for me since I’d be completely lost on fashion without them. I was recommending a few blogs that some of my fashion-forward friends run/own, and T (we’ll call her T), said I should start a blog. I told her I already have one and she said I should get all of my friends to follow it. The rest of the conversation went something like this,

Me: Well, my blog is kind of boring for anyone not in tech because I mainly talk about tech or anything related to tech. Which is fascinating to me, but boring to non-techies.

T: So? Start talking about other things. Cater to your audience. Give a makeup tutorial or something. That way girls will see it and go, “oh! She’s a nerd but also girly!” and can relate to it.

Me: But…I..my audience IS tech..

I NEED this. Anyone know if Toys “R” Us has any in stock?

I then started to explain why I couldn’t/wouldn’t talk about other things and realized that I’d been compromising my femininity. As women in technology, do we need to turn our noses up to anything that’s remotely feminine or girly to be taken seriously? Conversely, do we need to be ultra-girly in order to be relatable by girls, or by women who aren’t on the development side of product development – in either design or engineering? Why is it that when a guy finds out that I like video games but hate shopping, I’m no longer considered, a “normal” girl, or that I’m “practically a guy.” What does that even mean? And what does it mean to be considered a “normal” girl. What IS normal?

I’m used to being the only girl, or one of very few women, in a group (whether it’s a work group, a conference, or a meetup), but this ratio needs to change – and not for the sake of just changing the ratio, but for the sake of having more voices heard, and creating a level of acceptance that women can kick ass while still being “girly.” A woman that I knew (we were the only women in a group of guys), completely shunned anything feminine. It’s fine if you don’t care for the color pink, or shoes, or sparkly things, but is it really necessary to turn your nose completely up at women that do? Interestingly enough, none of the guys cared if any of the women were “girly” or not since they cared more about the work we did (THIS is the kind of environment that should be encouraged everywhere).

Maybe I AM weird – but when I was growing up, I admired people like Steve Jobs and Bill Gates. I thought Madeleine Albright was pretty bad ass. But I also loved Buffy the Vampire Slayer, the Spice Girls, and Destiny’s Child (all of which had messages that girls can kick ass – none of that Twilight shit). I was obsessed with science, but wanted to play with makeup (my parents were strict – there was no playing of makeup for me until I reached my Sophomore year of High School). I do love video games, hate shopping, love the color pink, could talk about software product design and development all day, and am obsessed with anything that sparkles (squirrel! Kudos if you get that reference), but I’ve been unintentionally hiding that side of me that loves shoes and the color pink.

Instead of outcasting women that hate shopping but love to play video games (pretty sure Fifa is the best game in the world), or looking down on women who love glitter and pink (hot pink glitter shoes – I NEED to find this), we should encourage women and girls to enter technology as a “builder” regardless of what their outside interests are. I love that there are organizations like Hackbright Academy (we need one that teaches women design also! I’m talking, fundamentals of UX, Photoshop, HTML/CSS) and Women 2.0, I just wish there was more outreach to the younger generation of girls to let them know that it’s okay to be feminine but also love traditionally male-dominated “geeky/nerdy” things.

We shouldn’t have to compromise our femininity to be taken seriously.

Adventures of a First Time Entrepreneur – The Plunge

I recently decided to take the plunge and start a company – it’s something I’ve been wanting to do for awhile, so I figured, if not now, then when? Someone recently asked me how I could give up the comforts and security of a paycheck and what possesses someone to start a company. I think there are a couple of answers to this. Certainly, there are people who are in it for “fame,” whatever that even means. And there are even others that are in it for money. But most of us – or at least most startup entrepreneurs that I come across – are in it because we want to work on something that excites us, that we believe in, and that solves a problem.

For me, I always knew I wanted to work on a product that users loved, and build a company that’s focused on the team and culture. I just wasn’t sure what exactly I wanted to solve because every few days I’d come up with something different – and something new would excite me (blame it on my designer mindset). I knew the right problem for me to work on when I couldn’t stop thinking about it – when everything else just seemed less exciting – and the existing solutions people were using for this problem were incredibly ad hoc. After a few months of constantly thinking about it and thinking about how I could solve it, I figured that this was what I should work on. I became obsessed. It was all I could think about, dream about, breathe about. I turned down offers (nice 6-figure ones) and security for risk and instability. But I’m okay with risk – and money isn’t a motivating factor for living life. I don’t care about brands/labels (I mean, I shop at Urban Outfitters and Target..), I don’t care about driving a fancy car, and it’s more important for me to constantly be progressing in life.

Will I fail? Maybe. Will I succeed? Well that’s the goal..

 

Photo Cred: Flickr user: Hankplank

Finding a Cofounder is Not Like Getting Drunk Married in Vegas

Seriously. Let me explain. I was working away at a certain cafe in SF that’s known for being a bit of an internet/tech hipster spot (by that I mean, standing room only for PC owners…I jokes), minding my own immersed in Photoshop and pitchdecks when all of a sudden, I couldn’t help but overhear the conversation ensuing at the next table. A well dressed girl walks up to the guys at the next table, smiles, introduces herself, and starts chatting one of the guys up. She then asks if he’s a software engineer – he affirms that he indeed is. This is when things start getting awkward. She says she’s looking for a cofounder who’s an engineer. *Cue, “wtf” face.* It’s incredibly awkward to ask someone you literally have known for all of 2 minutes to be your cofounder. Starting a company or working for a small startup is not like running a bake sale at the local high school. It is not easy.

Bad decisions: marrying someone you don’t know at one of these. Other bad decisions: starting a company with someone you don’t know.

Would you go up to someone completely random and ask them to marry you? (Okay, maybe if you needed a greencard). Likewise, you don’t just go up to someone random and ask them to be your cofounder. You might think you have the best, most unique idea in the world, but you probably don’t. There are probably 10 other people that have come up with the same idea. It’s really the execution that matters, not the idea – and to execute an idea well, you need to work with someone you know decently well. Tap into your network and figure out who you trust, who you get along with, and if you’ve worked with that person before and you work well with them – then that’s even better. If you guys are friends, then that’s just the cherry on top.

If you just ask someone random to be your cofounder, you probably shouldn’t start a company. There WILL (operative word being “will” because it’s inevitable) be differences that arise in product execution, fundraising strategies, even milestone timelines. When you start something with someone you know, you have an underlying foundation of respect that goes beyond the startup. Even with teams where the founders know each other, it sometimes doesn’t work out. I’m not saying it never works out with two (or three) founders that don’t know each other – just that it creates a weaker team.

Speaking of which, the team is probably the single most important unit for an early stage startup. Your idea might change, you might pivot your product, but if you have a strong team, then that’s something that can get you through some of the toughest of times. That’s what you’ll lean on during your ups and your downs. I’m not saying that the girl and the guy at the coffee shop would have automatically failed. Just that their chances of succeeding would be significantly smaller. Needless to say, the engineer was not amused – he thought she came over to hit on him, hah. He also seemed to understand that, much like a marriage (of which I know nothing about, but I can imagine), or a long-term relationship, it’s really important to know, or get to know someone you’re considering to start a company with.