I sit on the board of directors for the alumni association at one of my alma matters, The University of Colorado. As part of that I occasionally run into folks doing small business start ups and I get a chance to advise them on how to approach things such as venture capital and angel funding.

The other day, one of my colleagues in on my league leading hockey team (19 and 1) and I were discussing his idea. It is in a totally different business space than I normally work in, and yet, I found my self saying some of the same things to him that I say to my teams at work.

* Have a plan for what you want to accomplish

* Know what you are trying to accomplish This actually translated into "How do you get paid" and a discussion into attracting the right kind of talent for your business model. VCs and angels may invest in you (make no mistake, they are investing in you) but, you got to be able to tell them how they get paid.

* Good enough is important. Hal Stern calls this "Close enough for Jazz" in his blog on diminishing returns. I don't have his same eloquence, but, he nails it. We can spend years making the product better. However, at the end of the day you got to get paid. In order to get paid, you got to ship. There is an inflection point between quality and shipping, and, it isn't always easy to discern, but, the ones that win ship early enough to get paid and not so early that their customers hate their product.

* The best way to run a business is to run. By run I mean be nimble, meet the needs of the market, respond with alacrity to your core customers. One of the firms I advise was waxing eloquent about their patent portfolio (all one of them) and were a little stunned when I explained to them that patents were for big companies, not little companies. This is not to dissuade you from seeking a patent. However, a patent is best defended by an army of pit-bull like lawyers that bill at $800 an hour. This will bust a small company in about 10 minutes. If you think that litigating a patent infringement is a good business model, well, you are in a different space than I am and I can't help you. The best defense is to turn the product frequently with innovation, get known as a market leader and then get bought by a company like Crocs. Or, grow so fast and so big that you too can afford an army of trained attack lawyers. Either way, a patent is no real protection until either very bad things happen or you get very big. Run, run fast.

* Show continuity of product or business. I constantly talk to my teams about the factory model for software. Do a few things, very very well, turn it out, do a few more things, turn it out and so on. This regular cadence of releases teaches our customer base that there is continuity to our operation, that they can expect something fruitful in a reasonable period of time ( I like 4 to 6 month intervals) and that we deliver instead of boiling the ocean. The same thing applies to the start up. A one hit wonder is uninteresting. Even the iPOD had a continuity of new product offerings.

* Leverage the value chain. Frankly, there are many things we can do reasonably well and only a few we can do really well. I am convinced I that there are people out there that can sell sand to a crab in the middle of the Sahara. Get them to sell your product. Do what you do very very well. Buy or acquire the rest. (Some folks c all this core competency.)

Anyway, I think it is important to understand the business model and to turn products and software at a sustainable and rational pace.

My thoughts for a lazy Friday afternoon.