Getting Organized

In an effort to transition smoothly from my fulltime job to working for myself (my company), my advisor suggested reading The First 90 Days. The First 90 Days is a book for people (mainly executives) transitioning into new leadership positions to help them quickly and efficiently “prove their worth” to a company. Although, a little different for my situation I hope to take the techniques and strategies and apply them to my role as CEO of my company. One of the first chapters talks about how each month of your plan should have a specific goal or outcome. For me, I have made month 1 (August) all about getting organized. Without a clear roadmap or known framework of getting organized, I set out to create my own roadmap. Ironically, the timing is similar to how freshmen in college start their university experiences in August. I hope to apply similar steps as I did when I was a freshman in terms of meeting people, getting into a routine, completing homework on time, and many other important areas.

Below I list out my approach and steps I have taken as well as what I have learned from each:

Meet with and talk with as many people as possible in the Chicago Startup Community in order to figure out my place.

In every community, there are a few key organizations and people that you must get to know if you want to be successful. Also, getting involved and serving on committees of the key organizations is another way to get connected. Through these first few weeks, I plan to get coffee with, go to meetups where they are speaking, or have phone calls with them. My efforts are to get my name and my companies name out in order to “build a presence.”

Find a strategic co-working space (office)

There are many places to work in Chicago with co working spaces popping up all over the city. My goal has been to find a space that fits best with my company at this stage. A place that has similar thinking people and companies in healthcare or IoT, that I can get to know and learn from. I am also hoping to find a space that hosts events and meetups. Lastly, hoping for a space that has mentorship and advisors to learn from. (future post)

Reconnect with connections from the past year

Since I have been in the city and working both jobs, I have met many people along the way that have given me great advice on the startup. I am hoping to reconnect with these people and share the exciting news of me joining the startup fulltime. Making sure my support network is there and people know who I am and what I am building.

Research and read about productivity hacks

In order to maximize my day and the time that I have, figuring out the best ways to focus and be productive are key. This will be a work in progress but by doing little things throughout the day to keep me focused will be key to my long term success. (Benjamin Franklin’s Daily Routine)

To-Do List

Similar to productivity hacks, trying to figure out the best process to follow in order to cross things off of my To-Do is important. For now, I am using Wunderlist to do so, but think I may switch to pen and paper if I can get used to that. From what I have heard and read, there are a few important components to the To-Do list. Each day you want no more than 6 items to do. Each night you should write those items down before bed. At the end of each day, you should have worked or touched every item. This means either breaking an item down into smaller chunks and doing 1 chunk or doing the whole thing and crossing it off. (The Ivy Lee Method)

Build a morning, night, and weekly routine

After talking to many entrepreneurs and reading about this transition online, I learned that one of the most important things to do was to build a routine that works for you. This is no walk in the park, as it takes time to figure out what the best routine for me is, but I will build one out and stick to it. The big goal here is getting the buy in from my self at the psychological level.

Inventory tools and fill in the gaps

Believe it or not, before even making the transition I was already using about 10 different software tools from Quicken Books to Insightly CRM. My goal in doing this was to write down each tool (and fees) and be intentional about what purpose each serves to ensure there is no duplication of tools. Additionally, I wanted to make sure there were no gaps. For example, I added Expensify for keeping track of expenses.

File Structure and Naming Convention

This is a big one that I am doing to stay organized digitally. Having a set file structure for all my documents is very important and keeping with it. Along with that, having a standard way to name files to ensure consistency is important too. One thing I have learned by doing this is, if you can eliminate the time it takes to think of a “good” name, then it can become an automated behavior. For example, every time I have a meeting with someone, I type up my notes in the same format then save the file: Name – month-day-year.

Startup Documents

This is a work in progress, but after talking to my advisor he said to be sure to have these 3 documents ready to go. 1) Investor Pitch Deck 2) Pro-forma Financial Statements 3) Operations/Product Roadmap

 

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This is not a complete list, but pretty close to it. I am sure as I keep going there will be more things to do in order to get and stay organized. If any new items come up, I will attempt to keep this up to date with an update as to which are new ways to get organized.