As an entrepreneur (and a funder) priorities are constantly changing and it is often easiest to focus on the task in front of us as opposed to the “right” task. Should you spend time filling out this application for government funding or should you spend this time on a plane heading to visit a prospective customer? Should you spend time applying to speak at an upcoming conference or spend this time writing a business proposal? The answers to these questions are not easy and we juggle constantly…

It is with these thoughts in my mind that I bring you the “best of Entrepreneur Week”. There are a number of events this year that I think could be well worth your time…

Highlights for me:

• Chris Hughes, co-founder of Facebook and coordinator of online organizing for Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign – I’m expecting some major tips on grassroots company/campaign development
• Ali Asaria, founder of Well.ca – Always an inspiration and fantastic lessons learned that he willingly shares
• Tim Bray – If you don’t know who Tim Bray is, you should (not that I would ever “should” you)
• Andy Macaulay – WLU grad and very experienced agency guy (for all of you digital media types who need to learn more about this sector!)
• Entrepreneur Hall of Fame Gala – Celebrating our successful entrepreneurs (and now mentors)
• Jim Estill – Entrepreneur, serious angel and time leadership guru, has had a huge impact on many many companies
• StartupCamp – So refreshing to see entrepreneurs providing direct feedback to each other and I expect there will be a big turnout, this is where you will see all the “new stuff”
• Ideation Day – Some of my fave entrepreneurs presenting at this event
• Founders and Funders Dinner – Did someone say 40 funders (including angels hurrah!) and twice that many companies? (Disclosure: I don’t know exact numbers but the last one was awesome… and packed…)
• Strategic Partnering Day – RIM, Google, Intel, Microsoft, Celestica, Open Text, Sybase, Agfa, Rogers, On Semiconductor… I don’t think I need to say anything more

So just a few events that I believe will help you build your business. Of course, only you can decide what is the best use of your time.

Go here for more info and to register.

The consensus appears to be that yes, we do have great entrepreneurs and great innovation in this country. I for one believe this is true and have worked with a good number of entrepreneurs who have built (with their teams of course) very successful companies.

Lately, I’ve been spending a ton of time thinking about what we as a venture capital community and the broader technology industry can do to support these entrepreneurs. When I look around at the venture capital ecosystem in Canada (and elsewhere) most VCs are either out of cash or have very little cash left to invest (there are obviously exceptions and some VCs have raised funds in the last couple of years). I’m not sure that the majority of entrepreneurs have heard this message. When I look at the amount of time and effort that Canadian entrepreneurs invest in pitching their companies to VCs (here and elsewhere), it makes me want to scream. If we could harness this time and effort and direct it towards selling products and services to real customers, imagine how much revenue all of these companies could generate.

Looking at the funding process today, entrepreneurs pitch their companies to VCs who pitch to LPs. Wouldn’t it be great if entrepreneurs never had to pitch VCs? What if we turned the process on its head and built such great companies that entrepreneurs could choose whether or not to fund their companies with venture capital? And what if VCs had to demonstrate value beyond money for entrepreneurs to want them to invest in their companies…? And wouldn’t it be great if VCs never had to pitch LPs to raise new funds because of off the chart returns?

So how can we help entrepreneurs beyond providing capital?

* By helping them generate revenue more quickly *

Here’s what I’m proposing:

1. Entrepreneurs/companies:

• Map out your industry ecosystem: a) Types of companies you sell to (e.g. carriers) b) Types of companies you would partner with in order to sell (e.g. network equipment vendors)
• Identify the specific companies that fall into this ecosystem: a) Potential customers b) Potential partners
• Identify the specific person/people at each of these companies that you need to get in front of in order to sell your products (great tools for this include LinkedIn and Jigsaw). Figure out where these people are located. Group by geography. Plan trips to visit these regions.
• Search on LinkedIn to identify “connectors” who can introduce you to these potential customers/partners so that you can set up initial calls and then face-to-face meetings with them.
• Commit to building out your LinkedIn rolodex and sharing the connections you make with other entrepreneurs.

Now, these first few steps can be difficult and will take a significant amount of time. If anyone can come up with a cost effective way to help entrepreneurs work through this process, please weigh in below in the comments…

Communitech is one organization that has been supportive in finding creative ways to help entrepreneurs work through this process.

2. VCs and other supporters of entrepreneurs:

• Spend some time building out our LinkedIn rolodexes (many of us know many more people than the ones we currently have listed in LinkedIn).
• Highlight the market sectors where we have experience on our LinkedIn profiles.
• Respond to entrepreneurs who reach out to us for introductions. Go for coffee to learn more about them and their businesses. Introduce them to potential customers/partners and others who can help them generate revenue more quickly.

I spoke with a group of entrepreneurs last week on this topic — “Leveraging Non-Existing Networks Into Guerrilla Revenue Generating Strategies”. Many were skeptical at the beginning of the discussion but by the end, there was a real energy in the room.

I understand why people might hesitate to open up their rolodexes and connect people.

My response:

1. I am not proposing that we destroy our reputations by spamming our rolodexes with Canadian content . I am proposing that we spend a bit of quality time, interacting with entrepreneurs in our sectors and connecting them with potential customers/partners when/where we feel comfortable doing so.

2. We would be connecting our contacts with entrepreneurs who have developed products and services that have real value propositions. Our contacts may well benefit from being introduced to these entrepreneurs.

3. What good are our relationships if we don’t leverage them? We become more powerful and influential by sharing and connecting.

“He who receives ideas from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine receives light without darkening me” – Thomas Jefferson (tip of the hat to Michael Masnick)

Some ideas to get started:

1. I’ve been told that there are about 300,000 expat Canadians living in Silicon Valley (yes, 300,000). Have you reached out to a Canadian expat today?

2. There’s a small but mighty group called Canada Connects on LinkedIn. Same objective as this post. Please join to help get our Canadian entrepreneurs on steroids.

I’ll be the first to admit this plan is not perfect. Constructive criticism with suggestions for improvement are absolutely appreciated.

Panels
I learned quickly that it was a much better idea to pick a panel based on the speakers rather than how interesting the topic seemed. Panel discussions were hit or miss and the great ones usually had more to do with entertainment value. For the misses it wasn’t  necessarily because the content was of no value but because in most cases it wasn’t anything new. This isn’t a bad thing because I think for most people if you’ve been keeping up with industry news then you shouldn’t be completely blown away by new concepts during every panel discussion.

Networking – Parties (Free Beer) & Food (BBQ and Tex-Mex)
Networking, this is what SXSW is really about. If I wasn’t attending a panel session then I could usually be found in one of the many lounge areas talking to all sorts of people and I made a number of great contacts this way. At night there were plenty of parties to attend and of course you always had the option of chatting with someone while eating some awesome BBQ. If you decide to go to SXSW then attending the parties and hanging out is a must…I know, it sounds like a lot of hard work, but it needs to be done.

Experience
One of the greatest benefits is just being there to get a sense of the “scene” and to be part of the excitement. A kind of learning through osmosis I guess, something you can’t substitute by watching podcasts and reading twitter status updates. For the experience alone I would recommend attending SXSW.

In Hong Kong I spent a bunch of the time with money managers, bankers and a collection of other CFA type finance geeks. The mood was dour. Portfolios… hence fees are down by 50 odd percent. Real estate prices, while still out of sight, have been cut in half from a year ago and the high-end retail shops in Pacific Place looked like a post neutron bomb era scene in a sci-fi movie where all the people have been vaporized but everything else is intact.

Even more striking, several CFA charter holders were openly questioning the highest tenet of modern finance theory, the efficiency of capital markets. While sounding esoteric, to the great theoreticians of the past century this talk is akin to stoning the high priest on the steps of the temple!

Surprised, and frankly worried about what all this implied about the prospects for a near term economic recovery, I prepared for my next adventure in Shanghai. I diligently packed my bags, making sure to include all my preconceived notions that had been so generously provided me by western media and prior life experiences.

Here is an inventory:

1. China is poor, crowded and dirty. Check.
2. Like in East Germany of old, everyone has a job assigned by the government but they know they will never advance therefore they approach the job in a zombie like state. Check
3. I will get shoved around like in Toronto’s Chinatown on a Saturday morning. Check.
4. There will be armed military on every corner. Can’t forget that one!
5. Chinese people are prisoners in their own land, never able to leave. Check.

Arriving at Pudong International Airport I was immediately struck by the size of this beautiful modern facility. It was well organized and the immigration line moved more like a Disney attraction line than a state border… especially a border of a communist country. Imagine my surprise when I got to provide the border guard with real-time feedback on his performance by pushing an electronic display with a 1 to 4 ranking on it! Providing feedback on service quality is basically my favourite thing in life and here I get to do that for a border guard of a dictatorship! Wow. Make my day. Now wouldn’t that system be great at Pearson International Airport going into the United States. Maybe I will mention it next time I am passing that way.

Shanghai is a city of 9 million people. Is there traffic and smog? Sure. Did my personal space get infringed on a bit? Sure. But no worse than the Toronto subway system. I may have been spared though because many were too busy gawking at this non-Darwinian biological freak show mountain man crossing their path to even think of shoving!

It is also a city that proudly displays its history in layers. Traditional Chinese, English, French… In fact during parts of this history, the Chinese were not on the top of the socio-economic pig pile. For certain governments that would be reason enough to expunge it from the history books.

The current aesthetic is interesting. It is modern, urbane, creative and dynamic but it does not even hint at the traditional architecture that is the stuff of postcards. The current aesthetic is expensive — very expensive. And it is absolutely not just for tourists. In fact, I think the tourist spots are cheaper than certain other parts of the city. And, unlike Hong Kong, these places were crowded.

I did find that species “The communist zombie worker” that I was expecting. I had to look pretty hard though. More often I saw diligent people trying their hardest to serve you. I saw energetic people working to get ahead. And from my conversations, I concluded that there is a belief within the current generation that they can draw a direct line from hard work to achievement.

Three days later, as I was packing to leave, my bags were much lighter because I was leaving many of my preconceptions in the hotel. To be sure, China has massive challenges: unemployment, pollution, human rights to name a few. While they talk about increased openness and change my sense is there are some issues that won’t go away for a long time. But the people I met truly believe there is opportunity. They have hope and drive. That is a pretty powerful combination.

As I enthused on Twitter, my friend Derek Smyth, who is particularly adept at cutting me down to size, observed that I was “only 10 years late to the party.” He is not wrong. Some VCs have been active in China for over a decade. Indeed, some are pulling out because they don’t believe the returns are there. I haven’t done the research to understand why, nor do I think that is a good use of time. Deals that work in Shanghai may well be different from deals that work in North America. Am I going to be proposing a Tech Capital office in Shanghai at our next Monday meeting? Absolutely not. But China is a large, wealthy and growing market. It needs to be considered. We will be well served to nurture meaningful local relationships that help us fine tune product offerings and provide access to markets. That is what I will be proposing in the next Monday meeting.

As my plane climbed away from Shanghai I looked out the window and down there in the Huangpu River was a congo line of ocean freighters, as far as the eye could see, heading to the ports of Shanghai. Debate all you want about the economy, capital market efficiency, and whether I am late to the party but, like parking lots, congo lines of ocean freighters piled high with shipping containers never lie.