Introducing: ProjectSpark!
My major goal in life is to get rich – or at least make a comfortable living – by starting up new businesses. I’ve talked about this a bit in the past. In fact, I famously (to me) blogged about how I was looking for someone to invest in me on the Alagad blog. For a while, I was tweeting a new business idea every day via @dougsIdeas.
I really enjoy taking an idea from concept to reality. However, the problem is that I’m just one person. There’s only so much I can do in a day. Furthermore, I’m not skilled at every little thing that any project may require. I’m not a designer (I submit http://supporting.us as evidence). I’m not a copy writer (but I play one on TV). I’m not a user experience guru. I’m not an information architect. I’m not a mechanical or electrical engineer. My ideas cross a many boundaries and there’s only so much I can personally do.
My other problem is that I lack contacts, or at least the knowledge of how to leverage the contacts I do have in my network. I don’t have a rich uncle who will be an angel for every little idea I have. I don’t have money to pay people to do things that I may not do well.
Most successful projects and businesses don’t come about from the lone efforts of a single person. It takes a village, so to speak. (I volunteer to be the village idiot!) So, I’ve decided that perhaps I can build a team of like minded people. What if a programmer (me), an MBA, a designer, a writer, a social media expert, a sales specialist, and an angel all came to work together? Why does it have to be just one of each? Why not more? What if they all worked together really well and enjoyed the experience, while remaining focused on the ultimate goal?
So, here’s my concept: I’ll start detailing what I think are unique and compelling business ideas here on this blog as often as I can. Maybe one a week? Maybe more or less often, time will tell. I’m thinking I could add a poll to the post to gauge general interest in the idea. Perhaps readers who think an idea is good, who think they can help out, and who want to own part of the business can offer to join a team to build the idea.
The idea would be to build a team to create the business. Anyhow who participates would get a reasonably large share of the company. Ideally, if four people work together, they’d each get 25% of the company, assuming they all put in roughly proportional effort. The group would share in creating the company, running the company, and reaping any benefits and profits that may bring.
Obviously there are a lot of details that are completely undefined at this point. For example, what happens if someone joins the team but doesn’t deliver or under delivers? How are potential team members filtered for quality and fit? How should compensation be handled? How about failure? And what happens if no one ever wants to join any team?
For now I’m going to ignore that last question and let my optimism cary me. I can’t be the only person who wants to work with a great team to accomplish something awesome. If I put these ideas out there, maybe these people will find me. And, failing that, maybe this will lead to a future job as a Conceptual Idea Guy™ for some lucky company. Who knows?
I currently invision that participants would all be putting in sweat equity and paying for things we need however we can. So, for example, I’d put in hours and throw in money as I can and I’d hope others would too. The goal, of course, would be to generate income for either a big ultimate pay off or, at least, a steady stream of income. Once one project gets its sea legs we could put a management team in place and act as directors. Profits could potentially be reinvested in whatever the next project would be.
In the end, I’m hoping to build a close-knit team of entrepreneurs with complementary skills and who work together well and thrive in a startup environment. Perhaps this is a pipe dream, but it can’t hurt to try!
And so, with that, I hereby commence what I shall now call ProjectSpark! Interested? Comment below or end me an email at doug@doughughes.net.
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