solitude

We underestimate the power of our Solitude.
Some confuse it with loneliness.
The connected world gives us no opportunity to spend time with ourselves.

We are a robot of deadlines, tasklist, or mobile notifications.
Everything has to be done on time in a defined way by someone else. Success depends on parameters defined by others.

But what about us? Our consciousness? Are we not built on how we see things and our thoughts? Is this hyperconnected world eating our Solitude?

When we are alone, we have time to think, observe and look back or forward. Our dedicated time without any external intrusion does wonders: it makes us creative and calmer. We start seeing the world through our lens without external influence.

battle

In the journey of building taghash, it has been at times that we are fighting a battle like David and Goliath.

After demos, customers would remind us how our competitors are superior or have a mandate to buy US vendors. It was a painful rejection earlier. We have now realized this will not change, and we should focus on delighting the customers who believe in us, however small we are, and trusting in solving their pain points.

We have started, and our battle is the pain of our customers who believe in us. We are lucky to have many dozens. We are profitable and happy solving, delighting a few rather than going into boom/bust and sale at all cost journey of a startup

death

What do we see in death?
Life in a different world or the end of a journey?
Death is celebrated and mourned in varied cultures. Some celebrate with wine post-cremation, and many others spend 14 days of mourning.

Death reminds us of the importance of the limited time allocated in our life. The limited time is for us to make the best of it and leave an impact.

Our legacy stays but not we.

anger

Anger has ruined many empires in the past. Anger kicks rationality to the dustbin. We end up taking uncalled actions and end up regretting life.

We are not perfect. Our ego and unmet expectations drive anger.

There is no cure for anger besides knowing the trigger, accepting it, and trying to be calmer. Food, sleep, and thoughts all have an impact on our actions.

Nero burnt Rome in anger and got his advisor, Seneca, killed/poisoned.
Many Indian kings have done treacherous things in anger and put

5P

In the last 4-5 years of building Taghash, 4P pillars have acted as guiding principles. I am thankful to Raja for letting me know about the “Jobs To Be Done methodology” and for giving me a copy of “when When Coffee and Kale Compete” by Alan Klement.

Alan Klement talks about “jobs to be done” in:
“Pain, Desire to progress, and Willingness to pay” methodology.

Marty Cagen talks about building product keeping:
“People, Process and Product” methodology.

In our case, we read, re-read, and built our version of it by adding Marty Cagen’s book: Inspired and Alan Klement’s teachings creating 5P.

Pain: Identifying whose pain it is?
Persona: Crafting ideal persona of user in pain.
Process: Understanding their current workflow and process.
Product: Building a product incorporating above 3.
Paisa (money): Identifying the customer’s pocket and willingness to pay.

Thoughts

Our thoughts and actions define who we are as species on this planet. Both virtues are interdependent.

It is easy to get lost in thoughts and take no action. At other times get intimidated and take uncalled actions.

Cultivating thoughts require solitude and processing externals and actions can be taught.

Aid

Software is an aid for efficient workflow, not replacement in most instances.
This realization makes product development easy.
It eliminates the resistance from the user, and they know your product exists to make their life less painful.

We cannot replace a doctor, engineer, lawyer, or Accountant with software.
But you can sell them your product as an aid that makes their life less painful. They will pay you for it.

We, humans, hate life threats be it a profession or personal.

power

A lot many of us in enterprise setup crave power. I am not sure if it is their ego or lack of confidence.

A successful organization provides returns to its stakeholders and delights its customers while treating the team well. Every member knows their responsibility well. Success and failure are transparent in front of all.

As the organization grows, the culture takes a back seat, resulting in absolute disaster.

The league of intelligent minds gets into a power struggle and ego trap. As a founder, finding the right leaders who can escalate through this and build a team on meritocracy.

soup

Building a product is like making soup and depends on three pillars: what? How? When?

What?
Knowing the customer’s pain or what to build is the first pillar.
We involve customers, do market research and conclude on what to build. Our sales and customer support team’s insight is valuable in upgrading an existing product or developing an adjacent product module.

How?
This part requires multiple teams together with design to development and customer support. The architectural overview and development stage are the key aspects of it. Then comes distribution to a specific customer group and getting feedback.

When?
A clear timeline for delivery falls in when. As a project manager and product lead, this is your responsibility. Most product fails because the team takes ages to ship or overbuilds them.

“What, how, and when ” mismatch screws up a product or organisation.