member for 1 year 24 weeks
I have put a lot of thought into this topic because the more women I share my business journey with, the more I find
many of them nodding their heads in
agreement. Whether you are starting out on a new business venture, or you
are the CEO of some Fortune 500 company, you have to learn to trust your
own instincts. That is what makes the difference between a good business person and a not so good business person. The more you are in tune with your gut, the better decisions you will make regarding the type of relationships you choose to implement in your plans for your company. It is the difference between success and failure. It also shows the difference between an experienced or seasoned
professional and a novice professional. Let's face it, not everyone has your best interest in mind. In fact, I
would venture to say most people have your pocket book on their mind and
will sell you twenty ways 'til Tuesday to get you to give up some of your green
backs.
Let me start with my experience in developing and creating the vision for this social networking site. When I started visualizing and imagining up this idea of an online community of interest for successful professional women, I had NO idea what I was getting myself into, or what I was doing. I have very little experience creating or developing websites let alone knowing anything about building a business model or business plan. I am a visionary. I dream big dreams and I make them happen. I am the person who connects people, gets in front of people and won't take no for an answer.
So, when the idea exploded and I realized there were some things I needed in order to proceed, I opened myself up for referrals and recommendations. Here is the problem, unless you know what you are doing and you know the people really well who are referring you to others, YOU JUST DON'T KNOW WHAT YOU ARE GOING TO GET OR THE MOTIVATION BEHIND THE PERSON REFERRING YOU!
For starters, I hired what I thought to be a website developer, which turned out to be a general contractor so I essentially was paying a premium on the development of the site, and everything connected to it. This person was simply referring the business to her colleagues and adding her cost on top of theirs. Honestly, had I known that, had that been presented to me like that, I would have never chosen her. I am fully capable of handling those decisions. Not to mention, that because I really didn't know much about website development, or for that matter, social networks, I hired a company that really didn't know how to build one. Lesson learned: $40k that could have been spent in much better, useful ways.
When I finally put two and two together and realized the website company was working on behalf of the contractor I started to ask a lot of questions. I was paying them, yet they wouldn't talk to me. I had to work through the contractor in order to get anything to the site done. In my eyes, that was a very unprofessional way to do business and I ended the relationship with all three sooner, rather than later. However, my ignorance left a deep whole in my pocket and a site that wasn't fully functional. On the good side - I got a portion of my MBA through that experience. I also really started to learn more about website design and development.
The second company I worked with were a great group of people. However, a community of interest or social networking site is very layered and complex. You can't go to a corporate site developer or a service website developer to build something this detailed. You really have to have some experience in many aspects to get one of these things off the ground and running properly. I have spent the past two months really bringing myself up to speed on many aspects of deploying and developing websites. I finally found a female owned company out in Colorado called Ping Vision. They built the beta site for Blog Her and MSJD. I am confident that we have finally found the "right fit" and the type of developer we should have used from the on set of the project.
This is just one of the many "learning" experiences I have had on this project and learning how to become a good CEO. My accountant Ron told me that I have gotten a really good MBA on this project and have learned so much through the many difficult lessons. One thing that sticks out in my mind more than any other is that each time I should have listened to my gut. However, I didn't because I thought I was ignorant and these people with all of their credentials and long resumes must be smarter than me. So, I pushed my gut feelings down and didn't trust my sixth sense. I have really learned to respect my judgment and my gut feeling. I am fully aware of what it is saying and proceed with much caution.
I have had several other painful business experiences that I will be sharing in the next few blogs. However, these experiences have given me the ability to grow in business acumen and become very sharp, direct and matter of fact. I speak my mind and am not afraid to tell people to "take a hike." Not everyone is your friend and some people get down right nasty when you say "no," or "not interested." I have also made it a point to become educated in business planning and modeling and website development. It will be a long while before someone pulls the wool over my eyes again. So, whether in business or play, listen to your gut, God gave it to you for a reason and I would venture to say 99 percent of the time you will be glad that you did!
