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LONDON, United Kingdom, November 9th, 2023/Chainwire/--Design chosen by VEXT community to appear at Extreme E season finale in Chile. Veloce Racing will be fighting for the Extreme E Season 3 championship title in style with a special one-off chrome livery. VEXT As part of the recently launched VEXT, token holders were given a choice to cast their vote between three unique designs which will feature as the team’s livery at the Antofagasta Minerals Copper X Prix in December (2-3). The winning chrome design will be applied to Veloce Racing's ODYSSEY 21, and accompanied by a VEXT-inspired purple team kit. VEXT enables and encourages its growing community to vote on decisions that impact both real-world and virtual assets within the , allowing fans to be increasingly integrated and engaged within the Veloce eco-system. Veloce Media Group With tangible influence on the direction of assets, token holders are also able to transact across games and interactive sports features, with rewards such as tokens, early access to merchandise, and experience of real-world events. The were invited to have their say on Veloce’s Extreme E team as it continues to progress in the motorsport world, in this instance by voting for the British squad's livery for the final X Prix of the 2023 campaign. VEXT community This activation around Veloce Racing’s Extreme E livery is one of several community voting proposals already introduced via VEXT, and marks an innovative example of Web3 and real-world racing coming together. It marks another stage in Veloce taking steps towards achieving its ambitious vision of becoming a community-owned global sporting, entertainment and , where fans are invited to become a part of the Veloce journey and have influence on the direction of the groups future and its vast range of real-world sporting assets. media group https://www.youtube.com/embed/f89kZB5qIBw?si=O13hXYs2qIQtNyJN The reflective chrome livery will be on display in Chile for the final Extreme E double-header of the season, where Veloce Racing’s bid for the title reaches an exciting conclusion. The team currently sits third in the Extreme E championship standings, with drivers Kevin Hansen and Molly Taylor just 21 points off the top of the standings with plenty of points up for grabs in Rounds 9 and 10. Rupert Svendsen-Cook, Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer at Veloce, said: "It has been amazing to see the progress of VEXT so far, and the engagement we had with this governance vote is testament to the work we’re doing to evolve Veloce through Web3." “Integrating our community with proposals like this one marks another step towards our ultimate ambition, which is to become a fully decentralised global sporting group." “VEXT token holders have chosen a unique chrome livery for our Extreme E team in Chile. We can’t wait to see the virtual come to life in a real-world racing team, during a milestone weekend for Veloce and our fans as we also fight for the championship title.” The Veloce Groups network attracts over 35 million subscribers and nearly one billion monthly views across multiple digital platforms. With a focus on gaming and purpose-driven motorsport, the group is perfectly positioned to drive Web3 adoption. To start having a meaningful impact on the Veloce ecosystem, community members need to hold at least 1 VEXT. Find out more about VEXT and how to get involved here. About Veloce Media Group Founded in 2018, Veloce is a multi-pillared gaming and sports media group operating across some of the most innovative, fast-growing, and future-focused sectors in the UK. Headquartered in London, the Veloce brand comprises the industry-leading gaming and racing platform, Veloce Esports, and race-winning outfit, Veloce Racing, currently competing in the renowned Extreme E championship. As the world’s largest digital racing media network, Veloce has so far attracted over 35 million subscribers and nearly one billion monthly views with a focus on esports, gaming, purpose-driven motorsport, and Web3. Veloce is partnered with a number of high-profile teams from across the globe, running multiple gaming and esports team operations, including Mercedes AMG, Ferrari, and Yas Heat. Well established JV sub-brands, including Lando Norris’ gaming and lifestyle brand Quadrant, make up another key aspect of Veloce’s vast global network. For more information: | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Website Telegram Group Telegram Channel Twitter Discord Instagram YouTube CoinMarketCap CoinGecko ByBit MEXC Toobit Poloniex DigiFinex WhiteBIT Contact Head Of Digital Marketing Louis Broomfield hi@velocemediagroup.com This story was distributed as a release by Chainwire under HackerNoon’s Business Blogging Program. Learn more about the program . here

Veloce Racing's Unique Chrome Livery Chosen By VEXT Community For Extreme E Finale in Chile

ভেলোস রেসিংয়ের অনন্য ক্রোম লিভারি চিলিতে এক্সট্রিম ই ফাইনালের জন্য VEXT সম্প্রদায় দ্বারা বেছে নেওয়া হয়েছে

Die einzigartige Chromlackierung von Veloce Racing wurde von der VEXT-Community für das Extreme-E-Finale in Chile ausgewählt

La exclusiva decoración cromada de Veloce Racing elegida por la comunidad VEXT para la final de Extreme E en Chile

La livrée chromée unique de Veloce Racing choisie par la communauté VEXT pour la finale Extreme E au Chili

चिली में एक्सट्रीम ई फिनाले के लिए VEXT समुदाय द्वारा वेलोस रेसिंग की अनूठी क्रोम लाइवरी को चुना गया

Veloce Racing のユニークなクローム カラーリングがチリのエクストリーム E フィナーレで VEXT コミュニティによって選ばれました

VEXT 커뮤니티가 칠레 익스트림 E 피날레를 위해 선택한 Veloce Racing의 독특한 크롬 상징

Pintura cromada exclusiva da Veloce Racing escolhida pela comunidade VEXT para Extreme E Finale no Chile

Уникальная хромированная окраска Veloce Racing выбрана сообществом VEXT для финала Extreme E в Чили

Veloce Racing'in Benzersiz Krom Görünümü VEXT Topluluğu Tarafından Şili'deki Extreme E Finali İçin Seçildi

Màu sơn Chrome độc đáo của Veloce Racing được cộng đồng VEXT lựa chọn cho vòng chung kết Extreme E ở Chile

VEXT 社区为智利 Extreme E 决赛选择了 Veloce Racing 独特的 Chrome 涂装

As entrepreneurs, there are a few things we really like. One of those things is independence. Another is creative control. We're working to see our ideas come to fruition, and so to be in charge of our creative vision is a big draw. But as anyone who's gone through the entrepreneurial ringer will tell you, the idea of 'doing it all on your own' quickly dissolves when sh*t gets real. You lose money, your marketing strategy falls through, and the customers you thought would love your product just don't seem to care. In moments like these, you might receive this advice: "Get yourself a business coach." The fighter within you – the one that screams 'but I can do it on my own!' – immediately rebels at the suggestion. But should it? Why is it that we repel this idea of outside assistance? Why are we so reluctant to share our goals with the people who can help us reach them? I've got a few theories to share, followed up by some stellar advice from today's inspiration, Randy Haykin. Let's dig in. The Gratitude Network: Investing in a Better Future Randy Haykin was a super cool guest to have . He's a serial entrepreneur, angel investor, venture capitalist, and philanthropist. Most notably, he founded and runs , a 501c3 not-for-profit that provides coaching services to social entrepreneurs around the world. on my show The Gratitude Network Haykin has been an angel investor for more than 20 years, investing in more than 30 early-stage companies, including early stakes in AOL, Yahoo, Voquette, eTeamz/Active, Sharie's Berries, Napo Pharmaceuticals, Solazyme, EyeFluence, Table.co, FastPencil, LesConcierges, EnerAllies, CrowdOptic, Apploi, QASymphony, ePharmix, and Sculptology. (So, yes. He's been around the block a few times.) After all of that experience as an investor, though, Randy did something incredible. He started a non-for-profit that invests in world-bettering ideas; businesses that have the potential to change lives and flip social issues on their head. If that doesn't speak to the quality of this man's character, I don't know what does. Something the Gratitude Network really focuses in on is this idea of business coaching, which is what gave me the idea for today's newsletter. The Network provides subject matter experts to any of the people they invest in – completely free of charge. The results are nothing short of amazing. Here's an excerpt : from their website "To date, Gratitude Network has worked with over 140 Gratitude Leaders impacting children and youth in more than 60 countries. While focused on the broad categories of Education, Health & Well-being, and Children’s Rights, our Fellows are impacting children in Education Access, Teacher Support, Online Education, Poverty Alleviation, Girls’ Empowerment, Child Safety, and so many more critical areas." Where Coaching Comes Into Play I've got to admit, I had no idea that an organization like this existed. The entrepreneurial space can feel so surface-level at times; it was refreshing to speak to someone who is looking to effect real change in the world. And if you're an entrepreneur, that's probably what you're after too. You want to make a difference. You want your business to have an impact. But here's the thing: Impact doesn't happen overnight, and it definitely doesn't happen in a vacuum. It takes a lot of hard work, dedication, and – yes – coaching. There's no way around it; if you want to be the best of the best, and if you want to see all your hard work come to fruition, you need to learn from the people who've done it before you. Then there’s the factor of expertise. Entrepreneurs will always reach a point where their own expertise simply isn’t enough to support the growth they want to see. You might have the grit and determination and winning mindset, but sometimes, you really need guidance on specifics. Think marketing, HR issues, budgets, long-term plans, etcetera. But Does It Really Work? This is a fair enough question to ask. While I was researching, I found a fair few articles claiming that business coaches were a massive waste of time and money. The pattern I saw in these articles, though, was that the trouble started when people looked in the wrong places for coaches. They'd go for the cheapest or most popular coach, without taking into account things like personality fit and shared values. So, assuming you find a good match, what do you stand to gain from a coach? In of 87 companies, it was found that 99 percent of the people surveyed experienced a return on their investment in coaching. a 2020 study Another study found that with coaches last 5 years longer in business than those without coaches. 70 percent of entrepreneurs Google and Apple both employed the in order to reach the trillion-dollar valuation they enjoy today. help of a business coach The International Society for Performance Improvement found that business coaching has a . That's insane! 221 percent ROI It was so interesting to come away from the critical articles and read these statistics. Clearly, there's a way to do coaching well – and those are the Googles and Apples of the world, the ones that see great returns on their coaching experience. So, what was going wrong for the others? Why are there so many articles about the devastating waste of money that is business coaching? It could be because, as with anything, there are bad coaches out there. And when someone hires a coach without doing their research, it's likely that they'll end up with someone who isn't a good fit for them. Personality mismatch is one of the key reasons why coaching fails. I also realized, though – and this is where my chat with Randy Haykin came into play – there are actually a few more factors to think about when you're considering getting a coach. There Are Different Ways to Receive Coaching In speaking to Randy, I was interested to find out that coaching isn't so cut-and-dry. There are different ways to receive it, and the one you choose will depend on where your company's at. Taking Classes At times, all we really need is a bit of a kick in the backside. Maybe we need a lesson in productivity or a refresher on how to stay on top of our finances. At this point, you don't necessarily need a coach – you need a course. “One option if you're looking for learning is to take a class. Do an online class or an in-person class. In that case, it's the group soaking in the lecture, soaking in the reading, maybe discussing amongst the group," Randy explained. I can imagine taking this approach for personal and leadership development. I'm sure plenty of entrepreneurs would love to build their confidence and public speaking ability or gain a better understanding of how to manage employees. Randy made a great point about the group setting, too – it's super valuable to be able to bounce off ideas with other business owners. Consultants vs. Coaches In the discussion of business coaching, it's easy to get confused between coaches and consultants. What's the difference? “A consultant is someone you hire to solve an issue that you're not able to solve yourself," Randy clarified. This made sense to me; it's almost like a mini version of BPO. You recognize a gap in your skillset, and you hire someone to fill that gap until the issue dissolves. "The difference with coaching is that you're doing the work as the individual leader; the coach is asking all the right questions, assuming that you have the knowledge about your own space, and about the work you're doing, that they're trying to get you to realize what's the next step in what you need.” Here it is. The perfect explanation of what a coach actually does! So often, we assume that coaches instruct us on exactly what to do and how to do it. Coaches aren't an instruction manual, people. They're there to help us figure out what our next step should be. This is so valuable because it allows us to retain our independence and ownership of our business. We're not blindly following someone else's advice – we're taking their guidance and working it into our own plan. “If the coach is asking the right questions, you decide on your own what is the right outcome.” Are Coaches the Same as Mentors? Great question. Randy explained that, because the two are interchangeable at times, he's had to make a clear distinction. “At Gratitude, we call mentors Expert Advisors, because we found that the mentor word was confusing for folks. Some people view a mentor as a coach, some people view them as an expert – it’s sort of all over the place. But by calling people Expert Advisors, it's clearly about the subject matter expertise that they have.” I interpret this to mean that mentors are simply one type of business coach; the type you consult for very specific guidance on, say, marketing or finances. Some entrepreneurs might prefer more of a holistic, all-encompassing coaching relationship. When to Take the Plunge It's a good idea to be coached at some point in your journey as an entrepreneur – but when should that point be? Should there be multiple points, also? Randy explained it in an incredibly simple way: when you see a gap, it's time to fill it. “With a general coach, you'd be you'd be realizing, ‘we got a gap here. We are lacking knowledge on foundations’, for example. So, at that point, you're going to need to bring in some expertise.” By taking this approach, you won't be bogged down by unnecessary overhead. You'll also have a clear goal and timeline in mind. “It's at the point where you realize that you just don't know what you don't know, or that you're going to need some short-term expertise to bridge the gap and get you to the next step.” Where Should You Look? Ah – the next challenge. Where should you look for a business coach? For the people within Randy's organization, he provides coaches free of charge. But in the real world, you may find a fair price tag attached to quality coaching. That's why it's super important to do your research. "You could use LinkedIn or you could use friends and connections. You’d reach out and say, ‘Hey, we are doing great work with kids and education. We don't have a lot of money. But we love your background. Could you give us a couple of hours of your time to help us with this issue?’” I'm often amazed at people's generosity when you ask for help in the right way. The best people want to see you succeed, and they're willing to offer their time and expertise to help you get there. But How Do You Avoid the Bad Eggs? You'll inevitably come across a coach or two that just isn't the right fit. Once you've gone headfirst into a coach-mentee relationship, though, it's gonna be hard to back out. Prevent this by doing your due diligence upfront. Look for the red flags! The Overly Prescriptive Coach This is a coach you want to steer clear of at all costs. They're stubborn and narrow in their solutions, and they'll likely rob you of your own creativity and intuition. “Overly prescriptive folks who immediately jump to a prescription when you're trying to explain the problem is usually a red flag, because they're not empathically listening to what your challenges are before making a suggestion. It's like they have an idea already before they even get going.” The Self-Absorbed Coach Then there's the issue of people who think they hold all the answers. These coaches are so convinced that their way is the right way, and won't change directions for anyone. “Another red flag would be someone who seems to be leading you toward their service. To the hammer, everything looks like a nail. And so you're trying to tell them about your issue, and they keep moving you toward the thing that they do. And it doesn't feel like the right fit.” The Salesman Finally, you've got the coach that only thinks of what they can gain from you. This is the person who appears to offer their services for free (since you're doing such amazing work) but will inevitably push you toward buying into their product or service. “If they move you towards trying to sell you on their services as opposed to just helping you solve an issue out of the goodness of their heart...” Uh-oh. Get out of there quick. It might seem too simple, but the best way around these red flags is to ask around. Do more research than you need to. Reach out to people you know and trust, and see if they have any recommendations. Then, take the time to interview a few coaches before making your decision. This is an important investment in your business, after all – so you want to make sure you find the right one for you. Wrap-Up So here's the bottom line: if you see a gap that needs filling, now's your chance to find a coach. You don't have to wait until the need arises, though. You can also proactively seek out a business coach to help you get where you want to be. If you're at all interested in the area of socially responsible businesses, investing, accelerators, and entrepreneurship, make sure you head over and watch Randy Haykin's . He's had many years of experience in the space, and it was a pleasure to hear his insights. full podcast episode Thanks for being here! Also published here

Is a Business Coach Necessary?

I have poor command-line hygiene. When I fever-dream a useful pipeline into existence, I very seldom commit it to a shell configuration somewhere. Rather, I let dredge it up sometime later when I need it. My functions are not documented, have hideously short names and variables because I tend to code golf, and are specific to the use-case-at-the-time and not general. fzf I’ve since decided that this is the optimal approach. Take That Statement Back, You Deviant No! I actually believe this. I have reasons. The notion of a command or shell history in our profession is a profoundly under-appreciated mechanism. Consider the fact that – if you retain history and express of your operational tasks in the form of terminal commands – you may have the entire history of your work (apart from coding artifacts) within a few seconds’ reach. How do you create x509 certs with ? What’s the easiest way to check for among a fleet of hosts? If you can recall a few substrings from the commands that may answer the question, a history search can bring this lost memory to your fingertips to be re-used immediately. all all openssl Spectre Imagine how another profession may value this type of instant, infinitely-retained, zero-effort-to-record recall that translates into an immediately-usable action. A lawyer submitting a particular type of legal document? A teacher scoring a set of tests? You can probably think of more, but my point is that the concept of shell history at the intersection of white-collar software engineering work holds tremendous potential. Here’s an actual example taken from my own work. Your use case may be different, but one situation that I run into for a host that I’ve brought down for something like a kernel update. The feedback loop looks kind of like this: sometimes is unsealing a Vault instance Ah, I gotta unseal this Vault instance. Where was my unseal key again? Oh yeah, it’s in Bitwarden. I can grab it with : rbw rbw get 'Vault Unseal Key' Crap. What instance needs to be unsealed? I guess I can ask Consul: http :8500/v1/health/state/critical Oh. Can I get those nodes as a list of endpoints that I can use with something else? http :8500/v1/health/state/critical \
    | jq -r '.[].ServiceID' \
    | awk -F: '{ print "http://" $2 ":" $3; }' : This is a -example, because I don’t know that pipeline by heart. I start with the command, then slap on the command then filter iteratively, running the command between added pipes to see what I get in-between. Note sub httpie jq awk Okay. I’ve got my unseal key and the endpoint(s) that needs to be unsealed. I can glue them together with a loop: zsh http :8500/v1/health/state/critical \
  | jq -r '.[].ServiceID' \
  | awk -F: '{ print "http://" $2 ":" $3; }' \
  | while read -r h
      do
        VAULT_HOST=$h vault operator unseal $(rbw get 'Vault Unseal Key')
      done The final command here is brusque and sort of obtuse. It’s not hard to see how you could clean this up and place it into a neatly-codified shell function or script: a variable for my Vault unseal key, a function to extract a list of sealed hosts, and so on. But I do this kind of short-scripting a . And the “amount of little pipelines I write the time it takes to turn them into good shell scripts and I put into the right file and commit to my dotfiles repo” number would be non-trivial. So I just skip it! lot ⨉ really I used to judge myself for this. However, over the course of many years, the number of times that I’ve kicked myself for not recording my many pipelines in a script somewhere versus in my shell history is very small to non-existent. I did have one large regret: when I didn’t take them with me across my workstations. But did you know there are to help you carry around your shell history with you? That’s no longer a big problem! tools specifically designed So what happens when you wrap up large and sometimes-complicated actions within your shell history, do it often, and let your grow into a beautiful, terrifying garden? .shell_history You can get , and the overhead to both a) record those shortcuts and b) use them is essentially frictionless. With the power of something like at your fingertips, the becomes available at a moment’s notice. You aren’t constrained to what you felt was worth overcoming any barrier to recording it for posterity. Everything is there, and you didn’t have to think about documenting any of it. so much done fzf entire history of your professional career in command-line work As an example: I haven’t worked directly with low-level S3 metrics in a long time. But I recall needing to aggregate total traffic through an S3 bucket in the past. I can find the command to answer that question for you in about two seconds by typing : do Ctrl-r aws s3 statistics <RET> today="$(date +%s)"
for bucket in $(aws s3 ls | awk '{ print $NF; }')
do
  echo -n "$bucket "
  aws cloudwatch get-metric-statistics \
    --namespace AWS/S3 \
    --start-time "$(echo $today - 86400 | bc)" --end-time "$today" \
    --period 86400 \
    --statistics Average \
    --region us-east-1 \
    --metric-name BucketSizeBytes \
    --dimensions Name=BucketName,Value=$bucket Name=StorageType,Value=StandardStorage \
      | jq '.Datapoints[].Average' \
      | gnumfmt --to=si
done This probably can’t be used 100% as written for a similar task a few years later, but smash that , give it a quick edit, and move on. Not too hard, and you can see why committing this to something very formal like a shell function just isn’t worth the overhead. It was specific then, it needs to be adapted now, and using it in this context is a very good match for “take it from my history and tweak it”.¹ Ctrl-x Ctrl-e tl;dr Try this: Tweak your shell history setup to retain a of history. Maybe even setup something like to bring it along with you wherever you go (or at least use history integration to make your better) lot atuin fzf’s Ctrl-r Where you can, try expressing tasks or units of work within self-contained shell commands.²  This means longer and more strung-together shell commands, but that’s fine! Your goal is to gradually accumulate a library of small programs that can replace any actions of yours that may otherwise be manual. Your future self will thank present-day self when you can re-use a command that does something hard or complicated with a few keystrokes. Footnotes ¹ I’ll acknowledge that examples like break down a bit in a team situation. Although I can punch up our S3 traffic in one second, how do you disperse that knowledge and capability to others? Big repositories of docs and scripts can solve this, but my purpose in this post is to drive home the fact that low friction cost and low barrier-to-entry cost is what makes the history shine. Maybe there’s a good way to make that and team sharing work in tandem. ² There’s another post buried here about “command-line first work”, but suffice it to emphasize that I think there are great benefits to be had by consolidating as much work as you can into command-line form. Easily-recalled actions in the form of shell history are one benefit alongside many others like interoperability, repeatability, and more. Also published . here

Poor Command-Line Hygiene? Consider Load-bearing the Shell History

¿Pobre higiene de la línea de comandos? Considere la posibilidad de soportar la carga de la historia de Shell

Mauvaise hygiène de la ligne de commande ? Envisagez de porter la charge de l'histoire de la coque

खराब कमांड-लाइन स्वच्छता? शैल इतिहास लोड-असर पर विचार करें

コマンドラインの衛生状態が悪い？シェル履歴の負荷を考慮する

Higiene de linha de comando ruim? Considere carregar a história do Shell

Vệ sinh dòng lệnh kém? Xem xét Lịch sử vỏ chịu tải

命令行卫生差？考虑承重的壳牌历史

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Going from idea to MVP is both exciting and bewildering at the same time. A quick search of the interwebs reveals plenty of info about tech stacks, funding, a whole industry of motivational charlatans for startups. But, there’s precious little about the process of finding and working with an external development partner. It really hit me how absurd the whole process is when a fellow founder mentioned that he’d reached out to 150 agencies to build his startup’s MVP. He settled on one and was satisfied with the result. Nonetheless, the whole ordeal created more questions than it answered. Proposals varied by orders of magnitude. I don’t have a silver bullet, but here are a few points to help you out as you look for a team to develop your MVP. With a bit of work on your side, you can get much more accurate estimates and save yourself a lot of time and trouble in the long run. Describe your MVP in concrete terms Abstract ideas like ‘wouldn’t it be cool to make the Uber of cat toenail trimmers’ are great ways to chat over a few beers, but nobody can give you estimate from that. Such a description is a good place to start for an elevator pitch. Engineers, on the other hand, need to know what you’d like your app to do. Instead, say that you are looking for an app that lets a client create an account and search a database of cat toenail trimmer — who have their own accounts. Additionally, there is an admin account that handles disputes and customer service. Payment will be in-app using Stripe. That’s enough to give you a ballpark figure that should be within 30% or so of the final estimate. Think in user stories When you create personae and user stories, it’s much easier to uncover other features you need. As the owner of a cat with super long toenails I can find a feline pedicurist based on location, rating, services offered and price. Showing this to an engineer lets them know that your MVP needs a map integration, reviews and search filters for cat owners. For feline pedicurists there needs to be the ability to edit profiles based on price and services offered. Know your market Figure out how your clients are going to access your app. Is mobile a priority or do you predict more desktop users? Is iOS or Android dominant in your market, what about older browsers? This way an agency can present tech solutions that meet your business needs rather than vice versa. Racing to the bottom with price It’s tempting to scrape the bottom of the barrel and go with someone on a freelance site offering to work for $10 an hour. You can win the lottery and get a great engineer, but let’s be realistic. There are plenty of horror stories with agencies telling clients whatever they want to hear at price that’s too good to be true. These stories don’t have happy endings. You likely don’t need the most expensive coders on the market for your MVP. Try to balance quality and price. If you cut too many corners at the start, adding new features and scaling is going to be an expensive nightmare. Culture fit Be upfront with how you’d like to communicate with the team that’s building your MVP. My experience shows that having a single point of contact for most communication is the easiest. Nonetheless, it’s also important that everyone on the team is visible to the client. If you’re from a direct and cut to the chase culture, check that the team you hire shares the same values. Language is also a dealbreaker. Be upfront that you need to check the team’s English (or whatever your working language is going to be). Nobody can do everything Even the best agency can’t handle every kind of project. If the answer to every question you ask is yes, that should give you pause. If an agency seems to have no core area of expertise and chases after buzzwords like five-year-olds playing football — watch out. Have a ballpark budget and timeframe Conventional wisdom dictates that you hide your budget from vendors. In practice, I don’t really see the point of this. If an agency only takes on projects over $50k, but you’re looking to build a it’s better to realize this right away. $15k MVP The same goes for start dates and timelines. Be upfront about what’s flexible and what’s not. How to evaluate a proposal A proposal needs to have a detailed breakdown of how your MVP is going to be built. This is usually illustrated in weeks or sprints for each key feature. Ignore estimates that don’t do this. Murphy’s never far from any project, and giving perfect cost and time estimates before a single line of code’s been written is tricky. Nonetheless, detailed scoping minimizes risk and gives a solid baseline. This also makes it much easier to compare proposals. If two agencies have provided nearly identical scoping, comparing prices is much less of a black box. And the winner is… If you organize your app idea into user stories and features, you can get more accurate estimate faster. A bit of extra work at this stage helps with business decisions that pay dividends down the road when it’s time to add new features and scale. Originally posted on . eTeam’s blog

How to Get a More Accurate MVP Estimates

Innovation. Disruption. Startups. These words have been thrown around so much lately and with such different meanings that they’ve become useless. That’s unfortunate, since budding entrepreneurs need to cut through the hype in order to build sustainable small businesses. Startups shouldn’t try to be innovative. I’m not trying to call a urinal art or anything in the iconoclastic vein. I’m a startup founder, have spent my entire adult life in tech and have gone through a traditional MBA program. So what gives? First, we need some definitions. A startup is a small business. Obviously, the definition has some level of fluidity. We can adapt the two pizza rule into a general heuristic: startups have a founder, are new enough not to be entrenched company in their niche and are small enough for everybody to at least know everybody else’s name. the When I discuss startups, that’s the type of company I have in mind. The distinction isn’t merely academic — a company with five people and barely getting by is completely different than one with thousands of employees and millions of dollars in revenue. True startups have some great qualities and a vibe that established companies want to tap into. Calling myself a teenager when I’m in my mid-thirties isn’t going to magically bestow a youthful vigor. Mid-thirties is still young and not middle-aged…right? But, I digress. What startups do Startups are back scratchers. They fill a niche and solve problems that nobody else can get quite right. These problems can be perfectly mundane like hailing a taxi or booking a hotel. They solve specific business problems like managing the hiring process or automatic billing. The key is that there is some need that is not being met by existing businesses and tools. A startup comes in and adds something — it could be a better user experience for current tools that are nearly impossible to use or a startup could offer a solution that’s good enough at a fraction of the price. Photo by on Fleur Treurniet Unsplash Disruption as a positive force In most cases, startups are disruptive — stripped of its negative connotations, this means that startups focus on improving processes. You get something cheaper and faster rather than paying for features you don’t need. A simple example of this is typing a document. I never touch 90% of the buttons in Word, so I switched to an editor that’s a fraction of the price. For my needs it’s great, but it wouldn’t work for those who need a full-featured word processor. Most startups operate in this disruptive space. So what’s innovative anyway? It’d be hard to call the text editor that I happily paid ten bucks for innovative as far as technology goes. It might actually be closer to Vim (with all the innovation of 1991 software) than Microsoft Word — haters gonna hate, but Word has tons of cool features that are technologically innovative. So let me go back and qualify my initial claim: Startups don’t have to invent new technology, they bring fresh approaches to solving problems with existing technology. Over-engineering is expensive Building a rocket to cross a river when a bridge would do the trick doesn’t make a lot of sense. Once corporations get big enough, over-engineering becomes a common tendency. That’s why big companies are trying cargo cult startup culture. In the best case scenario, companies let small agile teams work with lots of autonomy to produce results within the larger enterprise. The result is the same as a startup — inefficiencies are found and replaced with automation or other forms of internal disruption. Choosing the right tools often ends up becoming a stumbling block for non-technical founders who fall under the sway of hype driven development. I’ve built successful startups with tried and true technology like or even . At the same time, I’ve seen other startups fail because they blow throw their funding with over-engineering. Ruby on Rails PHP It’s OK to not be an R&D powerhouse…at first Gather the wood for my stake, but small startups aren’t R&D powerhouses. Facebook made React they were already big. Google was long past their startup days when their coolest moonshots started landing. Elon Musk isn’t building a rocket in his garage. after Early stage startups innovate in ideas, find more efficient ways to solve age old problems and often use hacks to do so. Obviously, innovation is incredible and more necessary than ever as we need to feed billions of people on our planet. My argument is that the innovation small businesses engage in shouldn’t be compared to the capital intensive research that governments, academia and enterprises carry out. Why de-mythologizing innovation is important All this innovation mythology is demotivating to small-scale founders. Over the past few years I’ve worked with entrepreneurs that have wanted to reduce food waste in their community, automate billing for small companies and improve the safety of our roads. These startups have collectively employed dozens of people and positively impacted the lives of thousands of users. I’m inspired by each of these founders and what they’ve done in their communities. Moonshots are great — we all need an inspiring story from time to time — but, we also need to bring startups back down to earth. I’ve made it my goal to offer simple . That way, I can connect my expertise from the tech industry with the knowledge other founders bring from their backgrounds. Together, we can solve smaller problems and make the world just a little bit better, one startup at a time. MVPs to startups for under 15k Originally posted on . eTeam’s blog

Are Startups Really Innovative?

The fracas over Gutenberg and WordPress is the latest installment in the death of PHP. Take a deep breath everybody. Let’s ignore the trolls and take a look at what Mark Twain, Fidel Castro and PHP have in common — and more to the point, why PHP is still a reasonable choice for startups and small businesses. When did PHP start dying? It looks like ‘PHP is dead’ blog posts started cropping up in 2011 (let me know if you find older ones). If you search around Medium and the coding bootcamps that are popping up like mushrooms, the only common denominator is that everyone hates on PHP or simply ignores it. Apparently, it’s impossible to code in PHP with an oiled beard and ironic t-shirt while drinking overpriced coffee. Bullshit. Enough is enough. I talk to founders all the time that are ready to make questionable business decisions because of the anti-PHP echo chamber. Here’s the reality: . nearly 80% of the internet is running on PHP as of 2018 I guess PHP isn’t that dead after all. The myths PHP doesn’t scale. Riiiiiight. Wikipedia runs entirely on PHP and is the fifth most visited site on the internet. There’s also this little site called Facebook that uses PHP, ever heard of it? PHP is slow. Sure, old PHP can be slow. The argument is about as sound is saying that OS X is a terrible OS because my first Apple IIe was slow. PHP 7 is plenty fast, even . three times faster than Python Projects where PHP shines When I talk to business owners that need a website, my first suggestion is to look at a PHP-based CMS such as Drupal. Even building a custom CMS in PHP is well within the budget of most small businesses. I often get murmured responses, “but what about [super expensive niche technology X].” Don’t get me wrong, I’ve managed projects with machine learning, high-load systems and cutting edge JS. I’m not a luddite. I’m a businessperson, and that’s why I’m obsessive about finding exactly the right technology for each company I work with. PHP is great for putting together content driven websites. Most businesses I work with need sites that are easy to update, change copy, add blog posts and manage with templates. And all of this has be easy enough for non-technical staff to do without breaking things. The same is true of e-commerce. Business owners that need to focus on selling rather than coding, use platforms like Magento that work out of the box. Don’t worry, you can still sell beard oil from an e-commerce site that runs PHP in the background. I won’t tell anybody. There’s no need to stop there. Advanced frameworks like Symfony can handle complex business logic for a wide range of application. PHP is a great language to build APIs that play nice with modern front-end frameworks like React, Vue and Angular. The business sense of PHP Let’s go back to 80% of the web running on PHP. Translated into economics, that means there are a tons of PHP developers. The upside for you is that: Hiring developers is easier. Good luck finding a new developer for that project you decided to do with some obscure framework. much Development costs are lower because of the high availability of developers on the market and not needing to reinvent the wheel — there are plenty of open source projects to draw from. For whatever reason, fundamental business acumen is lacking in the startup scene. The next time you hear someone describing their simple web app with some verbal diarrhea about blockchain and machine learning, just nod and calmly explain why Laravel or Symfony would work just fine 99% of the time. In short, don’t believe your own marketing department’s hype. I can’t stress this enough for bootstrapped startups. Look at solutions in the PHP ecosystem. More often than not, you can execute your business logic for a fraction of the cost and development time by going with PHP. The perspective that senior developers bring True senior engineers bring a sobriety and broad perspective that you just don’t get when talking to ‘senior developers’ with two years of experience on the interwebs. When you use tried and true technology like PHP, it’s far easier to find an expert with 10 years of experience under their belt. For entrepreneurs, going with experienced engineers saves money. Build your MVP faster and with high quality from the start, rather than trying to ‘save’ money by hiring a team of juniors. Finder senior developers is far more realistic when using PHP and frameworks such as Symfony and Laravel. The nine lives of PHP We can always hope that 2019 will finally bring an end to blog posts about the death of PHP. Then again, maybe it’d be better if nobody else learned my secret. It’s because of awesome languages like PHP and Ruby that I can crank out using senior developers. MVPs for under 15k PHP is the Fidel Castro of programming languages; after all Castro outlived five US presidents who ordered his assassination. And of course, like reports of Mark Twain’s death being exaggerated, it’s patently absurd to call a language that powers 80% of the web dead. Viva le PHP! Originally posted on . eTeam’s blog

PHP is dead…Viva le PHP!

You don’t have to wade your way through a sea of buzzwords to find the right tech stack for your startup. As you get ready to , you also need to think about what technology you’re eventually going to use. present your app to an engineer This is the time that founders are most vulnerable to being bamboozled by . Ask a ‘hypester’ and you’re bound to hear that the current JS framework of the week is the option for your startup; ask a programmer’s programmer and you’ll get some moralistic sermon about Elm or Elixir. I’m sure these all have their niche, but I doubt any of them are the best choice for your startup. hype driven development only I’ve been working on the business side of tech for over a decade, including helping startups develop their MVPs. From this I can say a few simple points that every founder should consider: Go with proven technologies; as you grow and need more developers this will be critical for hiring. Don’t reinvent the wheel; client acquisition comes first during the early days of your startup, not R&D for some new technology. That leaves me with both an old standby and a newcomer as my number one recommendation for building an MVP: Ruby on Rails for your backend and browser based apps with React Native for iOS and Android apps. This one-two punch gets you to market faster and cheaper that gives you a powerful set of tools to build a great product. Ruby on Rails makes business sense Ruby on Rails has a strong following among developers. Clear cut best practices make it faster and easier to write and debug code. A robust community means that Rubyists can draw from tons of open source gems to speed up development. All of this matters to a business beyond the benefits of having happy developers. In cold hard cash, it’s compared to similar technologies. Developer time is usually the biggest expense when building an MVP, so it goes without saying that reducing this by a third or more is important for bootstrapped startups. Martin Fowler has a and the enterprise heavyweights Java and .NET — not surprisingly most PMs said Ruby on Rails was faster to build projects with. 30–40% faster to develop with Ruby on Rails detailed comparison of Ruby Saving on development costs isn’t just for cash-strapped startups. Established companies also use Ruby on Rails: Basecamp, GitHub, Airbnb and Hulu. So much for the myth that Ruby on Rails doesn’t scale! Rails gets the job done in less time, for less money and keeps your developers happy. Photo by on Artem Sapegin Unsplash React Native is the king of mobile apps Another way for lean startups to cut down on development costs is using React Native for both Android and iOS apps. You can when you create Android and iOS apps with React Native. You still get the boost that true native apps bring. reuse about 90% of your code React Native isn’t just for bootstrapped startups looking to bring their first app to the market. Facebook, Instagram, Skype, Uber, Walmart and other big companies use React Native Ruby on Rails isn’t always the answer True mastery of a tool is knowing when that particular tool isn’t the best choice. Hence the old adage that if a hammer is your only tool, everything looks like a nail. Ruby is great, but we also have other tricks up our sleeves when Rails isn’t a good fit. We have a client with a super high load app that processes millions of requests. Golang was clearly the best choice, so we wrote the app in Go. One of our engineers even devised a scheme to . black box test the Go app using Rails Other projects required machine learning and advanced data science. Python is a much better fit in this case, so plenty of our projects use Python. We also inherit projects with legacy code, especially PHP. In most cases it doesn’t make business sense to reinvent the wheel and rewrite the codebase from scratch in Ruby. Most commonly this happens when clients approach us to add new features to their Magento stores. While we advise clients to , there’s little point in migrating an existing Magento store to either of these platforms. open new stores in Solidus or Spree Other frameworks to consider Rails definitely isn’t the only framework out there. While you’re doing your due diligence, it’s worth taking a look at some other contenders. Laravel, Django and all-JavaScript apps with Node on the backend are all legitimate options for startups. There’s no harm in exploring other options, but at the end of the day those frameworks deliver more or less the same result. Rails still has the advantage of generally being cheaper and faster to build. Tech is still just a tool At the end of the day, you’re building a profitable business. Technology is the tool that gets you there, but don’t fall into the trap of technology for the sake of technology. Your end users aren’t going to care whether your tech stack is trendy; all they care about is that your app actually works. From a business perspective, you need to make sure your tech supports your needs, is maintainable and sustainable both in terms of cost and your expansion plans. That’s why Ruby on Rails on the backend plus iOS and Android apps with React Native is the way to go for most startups. Originally posted on . eTeam’s blog

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