Stanford University

Julien Genestoux of Superfeedr glory suggested Stanford as a place to visit while in the valley. If nothing else, I’m certain my wife Michelle will enjoy the Stanford Shopping Center. I’ve heard tales of legendary hackers and entrepreneurs conjured forth from the mystical paths of the University, and it’d be fun to check it out firsthand.

PARC, Google or Apple HQ

Ok, I admit it. I wanted to geek out and visit the Palo Alto Research Center. I mean who wouldn’t want to visit the birth center of ethernet and graphical user interfaces? My wife. Fortunately for her it’ll probably be closed by the time we show up in the area (6pm).

Now that I’ve vicariously experienced the phenomenal swag available at the store on Google campus via Louis Gray’s coverage, it’s taking an act of will not to go. Plus I know a few sharp Googlers (howdy Denny), but I don’t want to distract them from whatever techno wizardry they’re feverishly working on this week while I slack off.

I suspect a visit to apple headquarters would be much like my visit to Adobe in San Jose. I would walk into the waiting lounge and walk out, assuming I even got that far. For tech geeks like myself, there’s certainly a level of awe and respect for what Apple has accomplished in personal computing. Plus you know, dreams of finding out about all their secret awesome products in the pipes and perhaps some cocoa app building tips.

Sandhill Road

No, not to visit the many venture capital partnerships (my company isn’t ready for VC) but to check out the SLAC. Yeah I’m a science geek with a background in physics. It’s hard not to want to see a cousin to the local Brookhaven national labs that I grew up next to. My wife is a bio-science geek which means in theory I could convince her to check it out. But we’re going to be in the area after 6pm, which is far past any visiting hours. Probably not gonna happen.

What am I missing?

As an east coast native (hour east of Manhattan), I’d appreciate any suggestions for must visits while I’m in the area later. Preferable hacker meetups, startups that wouldn’t mind an evening visitor with a truckload of questions and maybe a few supportive ideas.

Steve Blank Shares His Life Lessons, You’d be Wise to Listen

In Steve’s post at the end of June, Agile Opportunism – Entrepreneurial DNA, he shares his early career experiences. He quit his old job and drove across country to Silicon Valley only to find out he was fired before starting at ESL. Turns out the manager who hired him, didn’t have the authority and had been fired. Steve rebounded instantly (maybe the wind got knocked out of him for a moment ), and talked his way into an training instructor job for a beleagured department in a crunch. After less than a couple months of 80 hour weeks Steve shipped out with the test engineers to Korea. His roomate at the time captured the essence of Steve’s serendipitous career discoveries, “You’re Not So Smart, You Just Show Up a Lot”. That concept goes hand in hand with my simple observation, although they may change course, legendary leader’s just don’t quit.

If you’re planning on building a business, at some point in your life you’ve gotta ask yourself a few hard questions:

1. Can I build my own destiny? The how is not as important at the start as the decision to move forward.
2. What am I willing to sacrifice to create a living/breathing business? Your loved ones will be puttting up with some long hours and mental/emotional distance as your conscious thoughts are consumed by a startup.
3. Why will customers/employees/founders come to me instead of someone else? The old unique selling point, but this time for your vision.

Some of those questions were at least partially inspired by Felix Dennis. They are questions that need to be asked and answered. It’s fine to dream about entrepreneurship or creating your own megabillion dollar world domination corporation, but the realities of that lifestyle are likely not to resemble what you envision (Impact Bias 1, 2). Countless hours of work (and you’ll love most of them) will consume any hopes at a social life until your business is breathing on it’s own. Delegation, deals, funding, cash flow, awesome customer service, corporate culture commandments, and legal counsel are all part of the journey from abstract concept to concrete corporation. The only ones who willingly go down this road are compelled by an inspiration they can’t easily communicate. I can feel this enthusiasm when I work on anything related to a small project I began about a month ago. How long before it blossoms into a business that consumes me?

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• Agile Opportunism – Entrepreneurial DNA (steveblank.com)
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• When should startups launch? (vator.tv)