Monday, December 1, 2008
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
Wednesday, October 15, 2008
how startups will save VCs in Canada
How Startups will save Canadian Venture Capital
From: jevon, 3 months ago
SlideShare Link
What the VCs are saying about the economy
Sequoia Capital on startups and the economic downturn
From: eldon, 5 days ago
Sequoia Capital recently made a presentation to its portfolio companies about how to try to survive an economic downturn. Here's the presentation
SlideShare Link
Tuesday, October 7, 2008
Edmonton Council for Advanced Technology Talk, October 7, 2007
I was asked to reflect on my experience in doing business internationally at an ECAT dinner this evening. Here are the slides I used for the talk.
Tuesday, July 29, 2008
Training ROI
Measuring ROI of Training
From: nusantara99, 1 year ago
Excellent presentation slides on how to measure ROI of training
SlideShare Link
Present this!
Brain Rules for Presenters
From: garr, 2 months ago
One of the best books I have read this year is Brain Rules: 12 Principles for Surviving and Thriving at Work, Home, and School. The applications for presentation are many. This is a book review of sorts, though I do not highlight all aspects of the book. I focus on the three rules that relate most directly, though all the rules have lessons. Just a fantastic book.
SlideShare Link
Mind Mapping and Content Management
A8: Mind Mapping for Effective Content Management
From: garethjmsaunders, 6 days ago
Workshop at IWMW2008 on Mind Mapping for Effective Content Management by Dr Stephen Evans and The Revd Gareth J M Saunders from the University of St Andrews.
SlideShare Link
Monday, July 7, 2008
Wednesday, June 4, 2008
Strategy of Giving
How to use giving to make profit?
From: Miikka, 3 months ago
Giving is a powerful tool for business if used correctly. But what is giving?
SlideShare Link
Another Pitching Slidedeck
The Art of the Pitching
From: huer1278ft, 1 year ago
From Garage Technology resource section
www.garage.com
Guy Kawasaki's Lecture Series
SlideShare Link
Sunday, May 18, 2008
Tuesday, April 1, 2008
Are economists brain damaged?
from Healthcare Economist by Jason Shafrin
Many economists espouse utilitarianism as a superior ethical framework to proposed alternatives. A paper in Nature magazine finds that "Damage to the prefrontal cortex increases utilitarian moral judgements."
Maybe there is some merit to the paper…economists have always been a strange breed.
Monday, March 31, 2008
Rethinking the Capital Game
Starting your business with NO outside money: No Capital No Collateral No Problem Small
From: GregFish, 2 days ago
Ideas and strategies for starting a business with nothing.
SlideShare Link
Future of Advertising
What's Next In Marketing & Advertising
From: paulisakson, 1 week ago
A presentation I gave internally at our agency last week (3/21/08) for our monthly "What's Next" lunches.
Quick background on these lunch sessions: Each month, three or four people are called upon to share either what inspires them or what's going on in a specific area. So far, I've seen some of our creatives talk to what motivates them and share trends and up-and-coming names in art and design; some of our tech team talk to emerging technologies, showing off what they can do and how they're relevant to our clients; and finally some of our modern media team share the newest ways we can help people find what they're looking for more easily and get more relevant information in front of them for our clients. Like I said, it has all been very fun to take part in as well as quite inspiring and energizing.
For this one, I was asked to share what's going on in marketing and where things are moving. What you'll see/did see is that I ended up using a little bit of what I've been posting about on my blog and some of what has been getting covered both within the trade pubs and on industry related blogs to give me the outline. If you follow the plannersphere and other social media and marketing blogs, then this probably won't be much new, but it might connect the conversations a little more. Or maybe not.
Mostly just wanted to share it since I did put a bit of time into pulling it together and was inspired by many of you who've been writing about similar subject matter. Also because what limited free time I did have last week went into putting it together instead of writing on my blog.
Note: Most of the examples in it are the more covered ones used to support the topics they're associated with. With limited time, I opted for the easy-to-find examples. Sorry about that. One that isn't as covered across the blogs and in the press yet is the My Vegas site. For more info on it see David Armano's Logic + Emotion blog where he has a detailed post on it.
As always, if you've got any thoughts, questions or comments...
SlideShare Link
Monday, March 3, 2008
Because a Reminder Never Hurt
Guide to a good venture pitch
From: arey_abhishek, 10 months ago
Guide to a good venture pitch.
SlideShare Link
Thursday, February 28, 2008
HIMSS Day 6: i got a beating
Google healthcare isn't what it is cracked up to be. Saw it in action. Privacy folks are going to go ape for a while over this development. Same with Microsoft's Health Vault. I almost got the feeling that Google's move was me-too.
Anyway, today was the wrap up of HIMSS 2008. I enjoyed this first HIMSS experience. I learned a lot. Here are my top 10 things I learned (in random order[the numbering is more for me to know when to stop]):
Now, to pack, dine, and hit the hay. Early start tomorrow on the trek home.
Anyway, today was the wrap up of HIMSS 2008. I enjoyed this first HIMSS experience. I learned a lot. Here are my top 10 things I learned (in random order[the numbering is more for me to know when to stop]):
- Cabbies that don't take credit cards are faking it. I am lucky to be alive.
- Get a gypsy cab driver to tell you how much it costs to go someplace after you ask him how much he charges by the mile. When you argue with him on price, make sure he is not under a lot of other stress. Don't ask.
- Trade shows should make a marketing pitch randomizer. Each exhibitor must scan their materials and some natural language engine can generate the 1 brochure to take home, rather than the 6" of treeware I have. Something like this would work for 90% of the companies at HIMSS08.
- The slogan would be: "Driving Healthcare Performance: managing data for actionable results".
- The positioning statement "Our EHR/PHR [electronic/personal health record] integrates with everything and can share all your data with all your systems for all your clinical activities --only if you use our integrated suite of applications."
Now give this to a show floor model to sell as she scans your badge. - The best trade show booth displays are bars. Sadly, their selection sucks.
- In Disneyworld, you can carry your beer wherever you want, even handing it to your kids.
- The sky in Orlando is actually yellow -- unless you tilt your head up 45 degrees to see the blue bits.
- There is no garbage on International Drive (the main conference hotel route going from Disneyworld, north past the Orange County Convention Centre. They should just extend the Disney show tunes.
- Every third marketing director in the US health industry is Canadian. They no longer say 'eh'. Turncoats.
- From hotel windows you can watch discrete, drive-by drug deals. Or, pimped rides are driven by people who wish to exchange a lot of family photos and polite conversation.
- Don't expect enlightenment from an economist. Mild amusement maybe, but not enlightenment. Today, Levitt (Freakenomics) was the closing keynote.
- stopping now....
Now, to pack, dine, and hit the hay. Early start tomorrow on the trek home.
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
HIMSS Day 5: daddy needs a new pair of shoes
In my room there are 2 queen size beds, a comfy chair, a TV, bar, dresser and desk with a nice view of a building site under some repair. I am on the 6th floor of this hotel and can see amusement rides in the distance. I am close enough to the freeway to hear a modest engine hum. The occasional fire engine does cause me to start on occasion. Thankfully, none of those have fired up during the evening.
I review the huge number of emails that have accumulated since last evening at 1230am EST when I shut down the computer. 2 new spam messages. I delete them and feel strangely productive. I get up and make a cup of coffee. I open the fridge for cream, but realize it is cold and empty. There is cream packets on the counter next to the pot. This cream is liquid, but need not be refrigerated. I am scared. Do I have the coffee black, or risk some strange cancer from milk that clearly has been there since before I arrived and not stored in a cool place. I gamble and take the cream.
After a large sip of awful coffee, I resolve to really take stock. I inventory everything I have done so far this week on the trade floor, complete an update to my company hit list and am amazed to see some trends emerging.
So, I make my plan: to wander aimlessly along the middle of the trade show floor asking more dumb questions and see what it gets me.
I grab my phone, my badge, and head out the door. I can barely walk to the elevator, 15 feet from my room. I am seizing up. I worry – how will I get this monumental task done? Why is my back hurting so much? I didn’t know standing tall could hurt so good.
I nearly sleep on the 5 minute bus ride to the conference center. I force myself out of my seat an onto my mission (in slow motion). My first stop and success, a double cappuccino. I run into Todd Herron in a similar state, reviling food, needing coffee and similarly requiring alternative footwear. We resolve to hit the show floor together. At one point, he enters a draw at random at the RIM booth while I talk to the another firm. He wins a new blackberry – lucky b*****d!
I found a number of interesting companies and ran into one of the fellow presenting companies at ALTIF and at the Venture Forum here. We negotiate the structure of a potential working relationship as we had discussed over dinner Monday. He knows we are also talking to other firms, but he happens to have a patent that will allow him to shut down several of the firms we are talking to. So…. If we can’t beat him, we find a way to work with him. Besides, he’s got cool technology that works.
I also met with a number of business intelligence companies with interesting technology very relevant to our new business needs.
I went out for dinner this evening to downtown Disneyworld with Todd Herron. I didn’t know Disneyland had a downtown, or suburbs for that matter. There is an inner harbor too. With the classic Disney show tunes playing from every speaker, I felt as if I was walking in a cold, windy, dark version of Charlie’s Chocolate Factory. What a bizarre experience!
After buying gifts for kids, we ate (much more modest portions than last night). We walked through the shops and finally headed back to our respective hotels.
Here I sit. I will take in a couple of sessions tomorrow. Finish my few meetings, gather our booth and like every other Canadian exhibitor, walk out with our booth over our shoulder, rather than via a forklift. My flight leaves at 8 am local time Friday, which means tomorrow has to be an early night. I need to get up at 230am our time to get to the airport in time for the 2-3 hours in security I am told to expect.
Good night from somewhere over the rainbow. Tomorrow is time to rolls some dice. Daddy needs a new pair of shoes.
HIMSS day 4: big booths, small pcs
Well, writing so late last night was not such a good idea. My eyes are as red as my tie today. Yes, I am wearing ties and suits in this heat. Well, I omitted the tie today. I am functioning on adrenaline.
So, today I visited more booths and learned more things in sessions. Some of the things I learned today are:
- Cappuccino smoothies are good when mixed with banana
- They wear Hawaiian shirts in Florida too
- I want the new Dell tablet or at last a tablet
- Some people can get into legal trouble based on how they treat their booth models (long story told by another lawyer)
- There is a business opportunity in renting Segways at a conference this size (heck if people will pay $100 for a CD of conference proceedings that are free online and in their delegate bag, surely they want to get to sessions faster)
- We are onto something big with our growth opportunity and if we listen to the Gartner Group analysis, we are ahead of the market and have to move fast or we will lose our opportunity.
I entered the south end of the tradeshow this morning. Some of the booths are 2 stories tall and the size of ½ a football field. Many large vendors have extra underlay so you walk on the moon and fall to a dreary thud as you leave their heavenly floors onto the main, packed isles. It takes me 30 minutes to walk one end of the trade show floor to the other without stopping and at a pace I walk down the street. This 1 million sq ft of tradeshow floor is over a mile long and at least a football field wide. Over this day, I walked that floor 5 times, not counting the weaving up and down the aisles talking to vendors. However, after 30 minutes of walking this morning, I nearly had a seizure from the throbbing lights and trade show props.
I retreated to a session.
What a session! The Harvard professor who also works for Elsevier (the worlds’ largest medical publisher) gave a great lecture on using CDS (clinical decision support) for improving quality. There were 600 in attendance --standing room only.
He described in great detail what is needed to change healthcare. It is our business plan for health. There are several CDS solutions he mentioned and showed that are like our Redengine online platform, populated for health. I talked with Jonathan after and I am headed to their booth this afternoon for a chat. I walked out thinking, we are thinking too narrowly with just dental. Our revolution is larger and our potential greater. We just need more fuel in the tank to hit the gas hard.
I am concluding that HIMSS is all about saving time for doctors and increasing revenue for HMOs. Revenue cycle management is the big new EHR application module this year. Every company will integrate everything if you use their product. Every company has analytical solutions that trigger annoying messages to healthcare workers (in Dr.’s own words at booths) when you don’t follow protocols. There are a number of firms that have hired pretty models to describe technical engineering applications in storage, authentication, HER/EMR and PACS (imaging) that you can only smile at as they experience pain in their faces trying to remember their scripts and scant training. In fact, you often have to fight wanting to laugh.
Also, I missed the GQ issue where Bluetooth earpieces replaced earrings for men as a fashion statement this year. They have also spread to women in running shows and skirts with large shoulder bags.
There are a number of companies here that are selling other very interesting products. Thin client solutions such as a virtualized PC that sits in a blade environment and is accessed by a $1200 dumb terminal into which a user plugs peripherals. It is used so if surgeons have a PC failure in a sterile environment they can push a button and carry on while the network administrator resets the virtual pc that crashed. Also on the hardware side are tablets. So, if the laptop (such as DELL’s new tablet) is $1500, the business case is all on support and failover. Interesting model.
I have found companies that sell furniture, some sell medical scanners, others content for license.
So, today I visited more booths and learned more things in sessions. Some of the things I learned today are:
- Cappuccino smoothies are good when mixed with banana
- They wear Hawaiian shirts in Florida too
- I want the new Dell tablet or at last a tablet
- Some people can get into legal trouble based on how they treat their booth models (long story told by another lawyer)
- There is a business opportunity in renting Segways at a conference this size (heck if people will pay $100 for a CD of conference proceedings that are free online and in their delegate bag, surely they want to get to sessions faster)
- We are onto something big with our growth opportunity and if we listen to the Gartner Group analysis, we are ahead of the market and have to move fast or we will lose our opportunity.
I entered the south end of the tradeshow this morning. Some of the booths are 2 stories tall and the size of ½ a football field. Many large vendors have extra underlay so you walk on the moon and fall to a dreary thud as you leave their heavenly floors onto the main, packed isles. It takes me 30 minutes to walk one end of the trade show floor to the other without stopping and at a pace I walk down the street. This 1 million sq ft of tradeshow floor is over a mile long and at least a football field wide. Over this day, I walked that floor 5 times, not counting the weaving up and down the aisles talking to vendors. However, after 30 minutes of walking this morning, I nearly had a seizure from the throbbing lights and trade show props.
I retreated to a session.
What a session! The Harvard professor who also works for Elsevier (the worlds’ largest medical publisher) gave a great lecture on using CDS (clinical decision support) for improving quality. There were 600 in attendance --standing room only.
He described in great detail what is needed to change healthcare. It is our business plan for health. There are several CDS solutions he mentioned and showed that are like our Redengine online platform, populated for health. I talked with Jonathan after and I am headed to their booth this afternoon for a chat. I walked out thinking, we are thinking too narrowly with just dental. Our revolution is larger and our potential greater. We just need more fuel in the tank to hit the gas hard.
I am concluding that HIMSS is all about saving time for doctors and increasing revenue for HMOs. Revenue cycle management is the big new EHR application module this year. Every company will integrate everything if you use their product. Every company has analytical solutions that trigger annoying messages to healthcare workers (in Dr.’s own words at booths) when you don’t follow protocols. There are a number of firms that have hired pretty models to describe technical engineering applications in storage, authentication, HER/EMR and PACS (imaging) that you can only smile at as they experience pain in their faces trying to remember their scripts and scant training. In fact, you often have to fight wanting to laugh.
Also, I missed the GQ issue where Bluetooth earpieces replaced earrings for men as a fashion statement this year. They have also spread to women in running shows and skirts with large shoulder bags.
There are a number of companies here that are selling other very interesting products. Thin client solutions such as a virtualized PC that sits in a blade environment and is accessed by a $1200 dumb terminal into which a user plugs peripherals. It is used so if surgeons have a PC failure in a sterile environment they can push a button and carry on while the network administrator resets the virtual pc that crashed. Also on the hardware side are tablets. So, if the laptop (such as DELL’s new tablet) is $1500, the business case is all on support and failover. Interesting model.
I have found companies that sell furniture, some sell medical scanners, others content for license.
This evening, I had dinner with a nursing consultant and a New York doctor. They were fascinated by what we are doing and asked when we hit other mainstream medical applications. I explained our criteria and they provided ideas on a number of items related to order sets for various conditions that may present opportunities.
BTW: ‘Order sets’ is the new term for ‘old paper forms that are now electronic’. Ah, the reinvention of Parsonian Discursive Communities. That is, groups that make their own words up to keep other out. I have taken to testing my knowledge of this strange new lexicon by asking the dumb questions, which upon some reflection, these health IT specialists must acknowledge are simpler ways of expressing things.
Needless to say, I am talking to lots of new people. Making friends, sharing ideas. I now have a large stack of playing cards.
I think I am developing a southern drawl from all the folks from the south I am meetin’ y’all.
Oh yes. I met up with, you guessed, more Canadians.
As I left the conference centre this evening, it started to rain. Not a drizzle, but a torrent accompanied by thunder and lightning. I was covered by a walk way, but laboured to breath as the humidity was 93% and temperature 25C. As I got off my shuttle, I had a 10 second run into the hotel, at which time I learned what it feels like to have a hot shower in suit. I dried just in time for dinner.
The taxi ride to the restaurant was an opportunity to tuck the kids in by remote control. We went to a place called Texas de Brazil – a packed restaurant. We ordered wine from a yellow pages thick wine list. We started with a 30’ long oval salad bar with a series of new and interesting meats, cheeses, seafood and veggies. Then once done the salad, we turned over a button at each of our table places from red to green. This signals a throng of waiters to being a procession of 4’ swords of amazing meats – garlic sirloin, tenderloin, pork chop, leg of lamb, chicken, spicy sausage. While you eat protein, they bring out plantain, garlic smashed potatoes and bread stuffed with brie. You eat until you are full. They tempt you some more. Then you turn over your button from green to red, sit back, moan and struggle to order from the dessert menu. Atkins diet extraordinaire (if you avoid the cheese, potatoes, plantain, dessert, alcohol and ….
As I write this, the rain continues. It is after midnight here now. I have had my video conference with Heather. I have written my log for the evening. Time to turn in.
Tomorrow at some point, I treat myself to a public beating by a massage therapist. Ahhhh.
HIMSS day 3: working the room
Today is the HIMSS conference kick off. I spent my morning learning and my afternoon doing laps (of the 1 million sq ft of show floor). I took 30 companies off my 100 company hit list and have the sore feet to show for it.
The bus drop off
The lobby off the side door
The main lobby from the 3rd floor and along the length of the conference wing. Yes the dots are people.
I interviewed companies in patient education, practice management and distributed information exchanges. We may have some content partners who are also very eager to partner with us based on our efforts. I had a good talk with the creators of Iguana, the HL7 integration application firm in Ottawa we have recommended on past projects. They are really from New Zealand. Not being technical we exchanged pleasantries and discussed the needs for our technical teams to reconnect.
I also discussed the clinical informatics degree programs with several US universities who offer them as masters and PhD programs. These programs are critical to our future credibility in this market.
Totally unrelated, but there are a lot of nurses here. I have moved up a generation as only the older ones start conversation or want a staring contest. I am flattered and saddened at the same time. Heather doesn't have to worry about a thing though, as she knows I am the lucky one in our marriage.
Anyway, today, I attended a couple of receptions. At lunch, I met more Canadians. DFAIT was trying to have successful firms brief the rest of us. Being Canadians, they shared nothing of value with fellow Canadians they view as competition.
Before dinner, we met up again at the CHITTA event we sponsored in part. There were 600 in attendance. We all hoped real customers would leave the convention center, walk across a busy freeway, and come meet and be worked over by foreigners. Just kidding. Some did. But really I met more Canadians, including a health informatics company working in Calgary with their health region. I reconnected with a series of Edmonton folks I had not seen in months. We discussed the pending provincial election, what everyone was doing so far from home and what the good things to experience in town are.
I left that reception early to walk a mile to another hotel next to the opposite end of the conference centre to meet a driver to have dinner with some of the folks from yesterday's fair. It was a good meal. We were clearly being worked over by the law firm that organized the venture fair we attended Sunday. We have more follow up with a few of the parties around the table.
The restaurant we went to was fabulous - Chathams Place. Small portions, great dishes. I had a killer beef carpattio to start, followed by the grouper in a light egg batter with asparagus. Yum. The company was also great. Interesting people doing interesting things.
From dinner, I was driven back to the hotel where it is a balmy 20C outside. I could chew the air though. It is so humid that a fog forms in early evening that lasts to mid morning.
There is also enough wild swamp around that street lights are not very dense. Hotels seem to rise out of a forest, like some Aztec ruin on a Disney trip. I thought about walking back to the hotel from the conference yesterday, but on the bus ride back, I thought I saw something moving in the water filled ditch. Since there are no sidewalks, I thought it prudent I bus it the three blocks.
Well, it is after midnight here now. I have to attend the new members breakfast in 6 hours. Better get some sleep.
Here are a few shots (though they do little to convey the sense of scale):
A 3rd of the East conference Centre wing which is 4 stories tall at the short part of the roof (I am in the West Wing, which is smaller).
The bus drop offThe lobby off the side door
The main lobby from the 3rd floor and along the length of the conference wing. Yes the dots are people.
I interviewed companies in patient education, practice management and distributed information exchanges. We may have some content partners who are also very eager to partner with us based on our efforts. I had a good talk with the creators of Iguana, the HL7 integration application firm in Ottawa we have recommended on past projects. They are really from New Zealand. Not being technical we exchanged pleasantries and discussed the needs for our technical teams to reconnect.
I also discussed the clinical informatics degree programs with several US universities who offer them as masters and PhD programs. These programs are critical to our future credibility in this market.
Totally unrelated, but there are a lot of nurses here. I have moved up a generation as only the older ones start conversation or want a staring contest. I am flattered and saddened at the same time. Heather doesn't have to worry about a thing though, as she knows I am the lucky one in our marriage.
Anyway, today, I attended a couple of receptions. At lunch, I met more Canadians. DFAIT was trying to have successful firms brief the rest of us. Being Canadians, they shared nothing of value with fellow Canadians they view as competition.
Before dinner, we met up again at the CHITTA event we sponsored in part. There were 600 in attendance. We all hoped real customers would leave the convention center, walk across a busy freeway, and come meet and be worked over by foreigners. Just kidding. Some did. But really I met more Canadians, including a health informatics company working in Calgary with their health region. I reconnected with a series of Edmonton folks I had not seen in months. We discussed the pending provincial election, what everyone was doing so far from home and what the good things to experience in town are.
I left that reception early to walk a mile to another hotel next to the opposite end of the conference centre to meet a driver to have dinner with some of the folks from yesterday's fair. It was a good meal. We were clearly being worked over by the law firm that organized the venture fair we attended Sunday. We have more follow up with a few of the parties around the table.
The restaurant we went to was fabulous - Chathams Place. Small portions, great dishes. I had a killer beef carpattio to start, followed by the grouper in a light egg batter with asparagus. Yum. The company was also great. Interesting people doing interesting things.
From dinner, I was driven back to the hotel where it is a balmy 20C outside. I could chew the air though. It is so humid that a fog forms in early evening that lasts to mid morning.
There is also enough wild swamp around that street lights are not very dense. Hotels seem to rise out of a forest, like some Aztec ruin on a Disney trip. I thought about walking back to the hotel from the conference yesterday, but on the bus ride back, I thought I saw something moving in the water filled ditch. Since there are no sidewalks, I thought it prudent I bus it the three blocks.
Well, it is after midnight here now. I have to attend the new members breakfast in 6 hours. Better get some sleep.
Off to HIMSS - the saga
February 23, 2008 - Edmonton, CA. Well today, I am off to HIMSS, the largest health IT conference in the world. This year, the event is in Orlando, FL. We are presenting at the Venture Fair on the 24th and then exhibiting the balance of the week. These next few entries will be about my saga on this 'grand adventure.'
Day 1: the trek
After a too quick goodbye to the family I had a good flight to Chicago, accompanied by a screaming 1 year old 1 seat back, and next to a 30-something single electrician going on vacation with his folks to Disneyworld while he tried to pick up the stewardess when he wasn't watching Family Guy on his PSP.
My trip to Orlando was shoved between a 300-lb biker from Tennessee and the wall of the plane. I had to buy my own dinner and bring it aboard as United has no food service. Prefab ham sandwiches never tasted so good -- especially since that was the 2nd meal of the day. Yum.
After landing, I called the hotel shuttle. My driver was aspiring to look like Inigo Montoya (Princess Bride) and spent more time primping his hair than holding the wheel of the bus. After a short drive, I discovered there are 2 Hilton Garden hotels in Orlando. Guess which one I was at? After 2 hours of waiting for a cab, I checked in, unpacked, and collapsed tired. Wake up call @ 0530h local time (0330h MST). There is a shuttle every 15 minutes from this hotel to my required destination, the Orange County Convention Centre.
Day 2: the pitch
While, after stumbling out of bed at 0330h MST, I had the conference shuttle drive past me at the hotel. I was able to catch a cab, since he was sleeping the parking lot of my hotel. But since he didn't take a credit card and I had no cash, I owe some taxi guy $10. He's coming back to collect.
Orlando has been VERY humid. I am walking in a room temperature fog with modest sunshine. This country is beautiful down here. However, Orlando is sort of like Vegas -- no sense of time. Everything was as bustling this morning when I left as when I returned this evening.
Anyway, I walked into the Orange County Conventions Centre to be overwhelmed by the scale. Imagine West Edmonton Mall (WEM) for conventions. All of WEM is 1/4 of this conventions centre. And there are others like it around Orlando. I walked around for 30 minutes before I found the room I needed to be at. Even the local 'Ask Me' guides didn't know where to go.
I registered for the HIMSS Venture Fair and was invited into a networking breakfast with 30 companies and 80 investor groups. My opening discussions with several investors and companies was about how much the health IT indices have dropped in the past 6 months on the public markets. Advice to the companies was to hold out for 6 months to avoid punishing valuations.
My first presentation (at 0930h MST) was to a small and intimate group of knowledgeable investors who are in the dental space. That lead to a 1:1 pitch immediately after with one firm. We were joined by another partner in the firm for more cross examination. They are reviewing our informatino and will get back to me next week for more information.
My second presentation was to a group of 15 people -- companies from China, India, Canada and the US. One of the people in the room grew Expedia.com from startup to $1B before she left as CEO. She is now starting a health company and did her pitch with no financials, just names of heavy hitters. I guess you do it right a few times and people stop asking for excel.
Anyway, I went from the presentations to locate our booth space and then wandered through the opening reception (my 2 mile walk for the day). I met some interesting people with big egos with companies the size of mine doing some neat things. Nobody I want to talk to again.
The conference I am attending has 27,000 attendees. Apparently, last week this place was host to a construction trade show of 150,000 people. So, at this 'small' conference, I have managed to run into a few Canadians, and am meeting them throughout the week. Who knew guys from Toronto and Alberta could get along. Guess we have to bond against the 'common enemy' as one guy put it.
Tomorrow I am attending a number of sessions and getting our trade show booth together, which in this conference is a speck on the tradeshow floor. Imagine the largest, most glossy car show, now elevate the booths to 2 stories and 1/2 to 1/3 of a football field in size. Now stretch that across WEM. I narrowed down the list of companies to meet from nearly 1,000 registered firms to 100.
Well, bed calls. Eyes heavy. Fingers weak.
Hope you had an interesting weekend too.
Day 1: the trek
After a too quick goodbye to the family I had a good flight to Chicago, accompanied by a screaming 1 year old 1 seat back, and next to a 30-something single electrician going on vacation with his folks to Disneyworld while he tried to pick up the stewardess when he wasn't watching Family Guy on his PSP.
My trip to Orlando was shoved between a 300-lb biker from Tennessee and the wall of the plane. I had to buy my own dinner and bring it aboard as United has no food service. Prefab ham sandwiches never tasted so good -- especially since that was the 2nd meal of the day. Yum.
After landing, I called the hotel shuttle. My driver was aspiring to look like Inigo Montoya (Princess Bride) and spent more time primping his hair than holding the wheel of the bus. After a short drive, I discovered there are 2 Hilton Garden hotels in Orlando. Guess which one I was at? After 2 hours of waiting for a cab, I checked in, unpacked, and collapsed tired. Wake up call @ 0530h local time (0330h MST). There is a shuttle every 15 minutes from this hotel to my required destination, the Orange County Convention Centre.
Day 2: the pitch
While, after stumbling out of bed at 0330h MST, I had the conference shuttle drive past me at the hotel. I was able to catch a cab, since he was sleeping the parking lot of my hotel. But since he didn't take a credit card and I had no cash, I owe some taxi guy $10. He's coming back to collect.
Orlando has been VERY humid. I am walking in a room temperature fog with modest sunshine. This country is beautiful down here. However, Orlando is sort of like Vegas -- no sense of time. Everything was as bustling this morning when I left as when I returned this evening.
Anyway, I walked into the Orange County Conventions Centre to be overwhelmed by the scale. Imagine West Edmonton Mall (WEM) for conventions. All of WEM is 1/4 of this conventions centre. And there are others like it around Orlando. I walked around for 30 minutes before I found the room I needed to be at. Even the local 'Ask Me' guides didn't know where to go.
I registered for the HIMSS Venture Fair and was invited into a networking breakfast with 30 companies and 80 investor groups. My opening discussions with several investors and companies was about how much the health IT indices have dropped in the past 6 months on the public markets. Advice to the companies was to hold out for 6 months to avoid punishing valuations.
My first presentation (at 0930h MST) was to a small and intimate group of knowledgeable investors who are in the dental space. That lead to a 1:1 pitch immediately after with one firm. We were joined by another partner in the firm for more cross examination. They are reviewing our informatino and will get back to me next week for more information.
My second presentation was to a group of 15 people -- companies from China, India, Canada and the US. One of the people in the room grew Expedia.com from startup to $1B before she left as CEO. She is now starting a health company and did her pitch with no financials, just names of heavy hitters. I guess you do it right a few times and people stop asking for excel.
Anyway, I went from the presentations to locate our booth space and then wandered through the opening reception (my 2 mile walk for the day). I met some interesting people with big egos with companies the size of mine doing some neat things. Nobody I want to talk to again.
The conference I am attending has 27,000 attendees. Apparently, last week this place was host to a construction trade show of 150,000 people. So, at this 'small' conference, I have managed to run into a few Canadians, and am meeting them throughout the week. Who knew guys from Toronto and Alberta could get along. Guess we have to bond against the 'common enemy' as one guy put it.
Tomorrow I am attending a number of sessions and getting our trade show booth together, which in this conference is a speck on the tradeshow floor. Imagine the largest, most glossy car show, now elevate the booths to 2 stories and 1/2 to 1/3 of a football field in size. Now stretch that across WEM. I narrowed down the list of companies to meet from nearly 1,000 registered firms to 100.
Well, bed calls. Eyes heavy. Fingers weak.
Hope you had an interesting weekend too.
Sunday, February 10, 2008
Product Management Overview
New Product Development Strategy
From: nusantara99, 8 months ago
Excellent presentation slides on new product development strategies
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Maslow and Product Management
User Motivation: Aproduct development framework
From: navneetnair, 4 months ago
A presentation made at dCamp Bangalore about using Maslow's Theory in determining feature priority...
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Sunday, February 3, 2008
More about Strategy
Strategy Grand Tour
From: arvetica, 8 months ago
This presentation was part of a workshop held at Arvetica. It is a general introduction to strategic thinking for those unfamiliar with the field and guides through the schools of strategic thinking, gives a better understanding of dateless strategy icons and management gurus of our time. Learn how their ideas apply to your business setting and your daily work in order to improve your strategic performance.
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Analytical Models for Strategy
Mc Kinsey Style Consulting Diagrams [ Templates] 15
From: gracekim1986, 3 weeks ago
Powerpoint presentation templates www.gazhoo.com mckinsey bain bcg deloitte touché kpmg e&Y pwc Andersen goldman sachs morgan Stanley credit Suisse jp morgan Merrill lynch securities consulting management marketing sales business internet presentations powerpoints ppt templates diagrams charts Booz allen accenture monitor group mercer buy sell
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some helpful reminders on leadership
Little Book of Leadership Powerpoint
From: PhilDourado, 3 months ago
Powerpoint version of the free ebook The Little Book of Leadership, from www.TheLeadershipHub.com . PDF version also available
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