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Growing By Shrinking

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113 pointspeteforde48 comments

I identify with, and am seeking for myself, a lot of things described here.

That said, the author is speaking from an intensely privileged point of view. Referring to selling one's time as a programmer as 'whoring' caused me to cringe.

I have strong aversion to growth for growth's sake now that I've lived and worked in Silicon Valley and the startups that go with it (I was CTO at a nutrition startup).

Things I've done recently:

1. Quit my job and went back to being an independent consultant. Looking to start a product company in the gap time between contracts.

2. Exercising more, in my case, 6 times a week minimum as well.

The real question is whether or not I'll be able to make something that bears revenue fruit or not. I've had small bits of success here and there before but nothing substantial or lasting. Current side project is just me scratching an itch, no real revenue potential.

I've been reading a lot in an attempt to learn as much as I can and prepare myself to be able to make something profitable. Mostly marketing and sales books, about to do another read-through of Patio11's stuff again.

Can anyone tell me what the aspiring micro-ISV/self-employed entrepreneur really needs to know in order to get ramen profitable? I know I need to build and experiment quickly - what else?

Edit:

My book log: http://bitemyapp.com/post/book-log-1/

I agree with orangethirty's "start selling". I just need to hoof it and do it. Not about to stop reading though :)

You need to stop reading and start selling. Go out (outside) and talk to people. See what they want to fix in their lives and fix it for them. Change them. Rinse and repeat. That's all there is to market research.

Example: I once sold a program to a furniture store because I went in to buy a sofa. They were doing everything with excel. I offered to build custom solution for them and they agreed. The program ended up being bought by 5 furniture stores. You never know who need what if you don't ask.

I agree with 'start selling' but disagree with 'stop reading', especially if he enjoys it. When an opportunity shows up from talking to people, the reading bit can really push you ahead in making the best choices and understanding the situation better.

So keep reading and start selling. Split your time up and make a schedule.

Move to India. You'll "get" Ramen profitable.

Fair point re: whoring, so far as we might have to agree to disagree.

Let me explain differently by saying that when I was young, I wanted nothing more than to get paid to program. I loved to code, and I needed to get paid — professional coding was the obvious answer.

The problem was that by my mid-20s I was really sad all of the time, and my work was at the root of it. I was programming and getting paid, yet the more work I did the worse I felt. I thought I had fallen out of love with coding.

One day it hit me like a lightning bolt: the reason you do something directly impacts whether you enjoy doing it.

Being a prostitute seems like it would be awesome. You get laid constantly and people throw money at you, right? Well, only if you ignore that you don't have any control of who, when, how, why or where in many cases. Awesome becomes terrible.

I get the same joy from coding that a painter gets from painting. A painter that can paint what, when, how, why and where they want is likely happy. A painter that has to paint what other people want on a schedule is often just struggling to pay the rent. They develop a toxic relationship with their art, and that's sad.

So yeah, I have had some great programming clients and worked on some really interesting code projects for money, but in the end it wasn't worth the sadness that my body was literally fighting back against. I was fat and sick all of the time, everything seemed like it was getting worse. I was disconnected from the chi.

However you want to describe it, everything started getting better as soon as I stopped doing it for other people.

So, instead of whoring your developer skills, you're whoring your technical knowledge?

I'm not whoring my technical knowledge. I discovered that I really enjoy sharing it, and it's a happy coincidence that people are excited to pay for it.

I love getting paid to program. The trick is in carefully selecting projects, teams, and clients plus actively setting expectations (e.g. staying in the driver's seat) such that you are not working on other people's schedules. Otherwise, yes, freelancing turns out to be just like having a boss. And that's no fun.

"I get the same joy from coding that a painter gets from painting. A painter that can paint what, when, how, why and where they want is likely happy. A painter that has to paint what other people want on a schedule is often just struggling to pay the rent. They develop a toxic relationship with their art, and that's sad." Love this quote Pete!

To go the micro-ISV route, take Amy Hoy's 30x500 class. Helps one start not with an "idea" and then selling that "idea". But with discovering and solving pains in a niche. Much easier, was a paradigm shift for me, after so many ideas and products that failed.

Here's the 30x500 class: http://unicornfree.com/30x500

Make friends with someone who has visibility into a good market. It's much more fruitful than the other way around - you are good at writing software so solve a known problem, not at solving unknown problem with software you already wrote.

In reply to your question about stuff micro ISVs need to know to get profitable, I'm currently expanding this post: http://www.layeredthoughts.com/startups/12-rules-for-buildin... into a full book with an essay per rule (and some extra rules) I'm about halfway done and hope to have it done by summer.

I agree with you. A small team of founders that are just developers who can design will outbeat ANYTHING that might have some VC money behind it.

You don't need business monkeys, or "UX experts" who can't code their JS/CSS. I hate it when iOS positions already have a lead designer who can't do Cocoa. It's such stupid notion. It's like saying we're looking for a CSS developer, we already have a lead HTML developer.

iOS products are logic + design. And a developer who can design is far more useful, cheaper and faster than a developer + ux monkey.

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5181963

"I like programming a lot. If I'm away from it for more than a couple weeks, I start to miss it.

The software industry deserves to choke on a dick and die, however. Fuck bad code, micromanagers, dopey "startups" that expect 14-hour days on the assumption that 0.0x equity slices represent real "ownership", closed allocation, and regimes in which programmers don't choose their tools. All of that can go to hell.

As software engineers, we're a defeated tribe. We work for businessmen, get little respect in comparison to the value we add, and often are pigeonholed into roles that are 3 levels below our creative and intellectual ability. We do most of our work for managers and investors who think we're losers because we don't have their jobs. To me, quitting programming is just running away. Programming was never the problem. We need to take control of this game. We need to take it back and make it good-- and fast."

Let the downvotes commence.

Sorry to deceive you but when I see the truth, I can only upvote it.

There is a lot of cruft in many businesses - so much inefficiency, that it can hardly be removed by joining in their ride. The software industry is not immune to that.

Therefore it just is more logical to do something by yourself.

After all, there are only 2 possibles outcomes - you do bring value, which will be rewarded by the market, or you don't - and at least, it won't last too long. Unefficiency is a pain.

Create your business. Sink or swim, with the added advantage (schadenfreude ?) of watching the inefficient ones drown while you swim around.

There no personal hate involved- I don't hate them, and in fact I may even feel sorry. It's the inefficiency that I hate.

Wow, well put. You're more eloquent than I am, making me feel like an obnoxious brute. But well put.

Although I wish was like you with the lack of personal hate, but I can't get my head around it. But kudos for doing so. I hope to get there one day. Thanks, made my day.

It's not that simple. My forever project (started in 2004) needs another month or so of polish, but after stripping out many features to ship a version one, is pretty much ready.

Build it and they will come doesn't work. I need paying customers, and being the type that works best when writing code (alone!), I'm about to start exploring options to find someone to market this thing for me, and turn my spare time over the last 9 years into something that makes real money.

But did you enjoy building your project? Did you learn from it or benefit in other ways?

It's most likely that you won't recoup on your investment if you only see this in financial terms. If you expand your definition of success it is possible that you have already succeeded.

Yes, I've already succeeded. And whether I've learnt from it or not (I have) is secondary to the fun I've had with it.

The money, any money is just a logical next step to a project that will never die, regardless of it's commercial success or failure.

I can't find your product from your Profile. So you're doing a shit work of getting the word out. Honestly. Marketing is EASY. It's Incredibly easy. You've just been scammed thinking it's hard.

Getting the word out is easy, getting paying customer is based on the value you offer. You failed #1, you won't get paying customers.

Of course they won't come. They don't know of you, but that's easy to fix. People just assume it's hard.

Ditto. I gave up lucrative, decently sized consultancy to go solo.

Before: Long commute to my office from the suburbs, 10+ hour workdays, lots of stress, kids would be asleep when I get home. After: 30 second commute upstairs, work out daily, lots of sunshine and bike rides to the park, etc.

I wrote about it here: http://planscope.io/blog/giving-up-a-million-dollar-consulta...

I'm confused first he says, "I’M DONE WITH WRITING CODE FOR OTHER PEOPLE.", but two paragraphs later he says, "All of my work comes by referral now, and I have an agent". So what exactly is he saying? That he just does other kinds of work besides software development now?

If that is the case then why is one 'whoring one self out' and the other is not?

Well of course it sounds bad when you put it that way (using all caps when quoting him)

What? In the original it was written in all caps as well.

Disclaimer: I'm not a type expert.

It's technically not written in all caps, the font that my blog theme uses for bolding renders as capital letters.

My personal jury is out on whether this is okay or not. Your comment leans me towards "no".

It does seem a bit more forceful than bold to me; maybe you could have a separate 'bold' font and a 'really really bold' font?

Pete's work consists now of being the technology and business strategy consigliere to various CEOs and other interesting people. If you'd like to meet with him. Let me know. I'm the agent, Ted Pearlman, he refers to in his post. http://usistwo.com/contact And I pay for the plane fare. :D

As Ted already explained, I'm advising companies now. I enjoy this work greatly.

Programming is my hobby, now. It's fun and it informs how I work.

Sounds great, but let's be realistic here: it's the N years of consultancy that allow this fantastic lifestyle, because it is the network built then that is being leveraged now. In other words, as fantastic as this lifestyle sounds (and it really does sound fantastic!) it's not something you can just jump into.

Yep. He calls coding for other ppl "whoring".. but he seems to forget that people pay you to do EXACTLY what others won't or can't do. If other people enjoy it as much as they enjoy sex, you wouldn't get paid a ton

If you enjoy coding for other people as much as you enjoy coding your own projects, then we are wired very differently - and that's just fine.

However, I have found that many of the things I used to think everyone could do are in fact skills that I now get paid to use because they can't do them. Go figure.

What can you tell me about the "agent". Are you paying him or her or is it a commission basis? How did you find someone you could trust?

Ted Pearlman (http://usistwo.com/) approached me, and I listened because he had an interesting opportunity that was relevant to my interests. He was also referred directly by Hampton Catlin, who I used to run a company with. After jumping on Skype with Ted, it was clear that we would be friends.

I'd prefer to let Ted discuss how he is paid, but I will point you to his Pudding Manifesto:

http://puddingmanifesto.org/

This is pretty simplistic view of labor and significantly ignores many of the reasons companies seek contract labor or outsource projects for development. The first thing you learn in microISV is that you need to determine as quickly as possible what is the actual, underlying cause a client (that is not a friend or foaf) is seeking your services. It has been my experience that it is rarely or never "we need some coders because we can't hire any."

I think we agree! I state rather explicitly that it took me 15 years of hard work and network building to find myself here.

However, I cannot rest on my laurels and for the record I'm just getting started.

This quote spoke to me:

> "Unspace was a convenient umbrella; an excuse for three friends with complimentary skill sets to share a small office"

In a lot of ways my company right now is just an excuse for me and my best friend to build cool software together and have our own office. It just turns out the money is coming with it and we are able to build a real business out of it.

We've had chances to raise money and grow but we know deep in our hearts it's not what we want. It was hard to be "okay" with this because everyone throws the VC stuff at you and makes you think you should be "going big" and killing yourself at 25. Understanding and being confident that we could still be a "big", important, and profitable company in our space by doing it "our way" has been a really big milestone of our personal and professional growth.

Great post.

There's a really amazing moment in "An Evening With Kevin Smith" (highly recommended!) where he recounts meeting some dick producer who admonished him over concerns of practicality.

"Kevin, making movies isn't about getting together with your friends and having a good time!"

[Pauses] "It isn't?"

Nice. Congrats on your move. I wrote a similar post exactly 2 years earlier when i decided to downshift from my job of about 10 years and go live in the mountains doing photography http://www.kettik.com/go/articles/16. Reading your post made me go down the memory lane and examine my own journey.

Fast forward 2 years and i have very mixed feelings about the whole thing. Monetarily its been a complete flop, failing to earn even a single paise in the past 2 years. But spiritually, the memories and experiences gathered along the way have been priceless. Sounds like a classic Mastercard ad, doesn't it :D

All this experience did motivate me to create my startup. I have to say that i totally resonate with your "the only code I write will be for my personal projects" line. It feels more fulfilling this way. But ofcourse there is no guarantee that this would arrest the rapid depletion of my bank balance (as opposed to taking up parttime consulting gigs). Only time will tell.

Coincidentally, I also love photography.

What I'm not sure about from your comment is whether you intended to do photography for money or because you loved doing it (or both!)

I made a decision a long time ago that I would never allow myself to be hired to take photographs, for all of the reasons around what we're discussing. I want to keep photography as something I do out of love.

It was a very smart decision to make.

I intended to do photography so that i could make a living doing something i loved. It seemed a great idea at that time.

But while i loved the process of taking the photos (i do mostly landscapes, which basically involves patiently waiting for something magical to happen http://saravk.kettik.com/go/photos), i didn't quite enjoy the process of turning that hobby into an income generating endeavour. So i guess i finally came to the same realization as you did. To keep my passion and profession separate.

I also realised that i didn't lose my love for coding, especially when working on my own projects. So i'am now working on a solution for my original problem. To find a way to help travellers create, share and monetize their content.

Best thing I have read in months. Bravo!

I've done similar stuff, and I'm in a similar situation to yours - although I'm only at ~8 years and not 15. I also get all of my work from referrals, although I participate in (paying) startups too - on my own terms - and drop it if it moves away from what I'm interested in doing.

Never been happier.

Hey - if it took you 8 years instead of 15, that's a good thing! :)

Isn't the point of quick growth to work hard in your early years and retire early? Sell, IPO, or just plain bank.

Yes, you could have a happier life if you worked at a more relaxed pace (there's a guy on HN who works 3, holidays 9), but you'll most likely be working for longer. Wanting to work for longer assumes you will remain fit to work for all those years, mentally and physically. That's not as guaranteed as you'd probably like to think at 25.

My advice: Push yourself, but keep a sharp eye on life balance.

Each to their own!

I happen to really enjoy my "work" and I don't imagine I'll ever stop, so your strategy doesn't have the same payoff for me. As I state in the article, I'm not optimizing for a financial reward but somehow the money keeps getting better as I push it further off my priority list.

That assumes working extra hard in your younger years makes you rich before 30, which in a vast majority of cases does not happen, no matter if you work for a startup, bigco or on your own.

Rich or comfortable wealth or your own personal limits?

You can retire to a lifetime of minimum wage and no more work ever for just $200k. A good software engineer could back that up in under 5 years. Play video games all day stress free till death if that's your thing. (not recommended).

Indeed, not recommended - I'd call that just waiting for death.

This. I'd say it's much closer to certainty that you'll enjoy a better lifetime work/life balance by prioritising work/life balance from the start rather than putting everything into hitting a home run. There are good reasons to start a startup; the expectation of retiring rich in your 30s isn't one of them.

Wanting to earn all your money in the first quartile of the average workspan also assumes you'll be mentally and physically prepared to use your later life to enjoy all those things you missed out on. Even looking at the apparent success stories, I'd be surprised if none of today's greying CEOs and bankers ever dreamed about spending time doing something other than increasing their assets...

Best phrase "optimize for happiness instead of money" !!!

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