Curiosity about the composition of networks and the activities of their components and users is what drove me to develop Snort, an open source cybersecurity project, in the late 90s, and then launch network security company Sourcefire, which Cisco later acquired. The lessons I learned as a first-time entrepreneur and "ideas guy" helped shape the trajectory and success of the company and the product set, not to mention set a new course for me personally. I still lean on those lessons today and would like to share some of the most impactful lessons here, to help other entrepreneurs make the most of their experience.
1. Focus on the journey, not the destination.
Whenever someone asks you what your exit strategy is, the answer should always be: I'm building a great company and good things happen to great companies. If you have a specific outcome in mind, you're going to structure your business for that outcome and that outcome might not be achievable. A more durable strategy is to optimize for building something sustainable, that has intrinsic value and will produce the opportunity for many options as time marches on.
2. Innovative ideas must come from within, but validate.
Everyone has ideas. However, relying solely on your gut as you execute them and turn them into reality has limitations, especially in a realm where that reality is reflected in growth rates and your success as an organization or as a leader. It's important to really know when you need to ask questions, and what questions you should be asking. There is only so much you can do yourself before you need to check in with people who have operational and functional hands-on knowledge of where you are striving to innovate. I test theories with trusted peers and potential users to sanity check and make sure I have a durable idea before I even think about executing it.
3. Early decisions impact the road ahead.
There is always tension between analysis paralysis and making a seemingly inconsequential decision that stays with you for a vastly longer time than you anticipated. When you're building a company, there are lots of decisions that need to be made but very few that will prove fatal if you're wrong. Knowing the difference between the fatal ones and those that aren't is important. Amazon categorizes these as Type one decisions and Type two decisions and each type requires different decision-making processes. Especially on the engineering side of things, you must understand the gravity of the decisions you are making in terms of how long the consequences are going to be with you, or with your customers/clients. Make decisions quickly but carefully. For potentially fatal decisions, work to compartmentalize them so if you make a mistake, like standardizing on the wrong type of technology, it's possible to create workarounds or to compensate for those mistakes down the road.
4. There's magic in metaphors.
As a leader, it's important to be able to build rapport with a wide variety of people because many times you'll need to be able to communicate with someone who has no foundation to understand what you're talking about. The world of cybersecurity is a good example. It is incredibly esoteric, so good metaphors give you a way to communicate that resonates with people, whether they are customers buying a product from you, bankers investing in you, or your family trying to comprehend what you do all day every day. Keep in mind that metaphors only work if you can simplify the technical, relate it to something else that is simple to a broad audience, and understand that analogous thing well enough to draw parallels. When you sit down and grind on the problem long enough you can come up with some really useful ideas.
5. Home-in on eternal problems.
Some problems never go away, like knowing what you've got on your enterprise network, what it is doing, and what's happening to it. So, coming up with durable technologies, the application of which will last for decades, is the game. How you architect for that will change over time in order to remain effective as infrastructure, devices, applications, and technologies change, but the fundamental need to solve the problem will remain. So, look for problems that will remain relevant and become an expert in that space, in your technology area, and in what is possible.
As an entrepreneur your opportunity is to change the way that people think and solve problems. It's exciting and what's driven me throughout my career. Hopefully these tips will help you find success on that journey as well.
BY MARTIN ROESCH, CEO, NETOGRAPHY@MROESCH
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