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Starting up? Just read this!

By Dave Blake | March 9, 2008

What a great post – how to save money running a start-up - by Jason Calacanis of Mahalo (and founder of Weblogs Inc). But boy, did he ruffle some feathers. In my view some people just took him too seriously and missed the fundamental points he was making about keeping costs down and hiring the right people.

Here’s a rundown on some of the tips offered by Jason.

* Buy cheap tables and expensive chairs. Tables are often a rip-off.
* Fire anyone who doesn’t love working at your business.
* Buy everyone a second computer monitor, they save time.
* Buy an expensive coffee machine to prevent people leaving the office and spending money at Starbucks
* Get a fridge in, stock it full of sodas
* Use Macintosh computers and don’t buy more than a couple of copies of Microsoft Office. Most people can use Google Docs.
* Buy your hardest working staff extra computers for home use
* Don’t bother investing in a phone system; people use email, IRC, chat or mobiles.
* Outsource all Human Resources and Accounting functions
* Allow and encourage flexible working hours
* Use Google mail, don’t bother with stuff like Exchange servers
* Recruiters? Dump ‘em. Save money by doing your own using LinkedIn and FaceBook.
* Same with PR agencies on fat retainers. Use good freelancers on a project basis.

While I don’t necessarily agree with all these suggestions, I’m sharing this wavelength. Everyone starting up or running their own small business ought to sit down and come up with their own list, particular to their organisation. But start-ups have really got to pay particular attention to their costs and to the people they hire, otherwise it’s going to be much tougher to get to that break-even point. If start-up employees aren’t prepared to give their absolute all and ‘share the vision’, then maybe they would be better off somewhere else.

Topics: Start-ups |

One Response to “Starting up? Just read this!”

  1. excellent post dave, wonder how many startups would have avoided the deadpool had they heeded some of this advice

    Posted by: bill johns on March 10th, 2008 at 5:10 pm

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