Saturday at the Office: Lessons Learned Part 2
By: Matthew Rodela on August 27th, 2008
Categories: Phase 1:The Implementation, Starting a Business
This post is the last of a two part follow-up to my Saturday at the Office experiment.
In my previous entry, I highlighted some of the challenges I faced during my first day ever working for myself from home. In this post, I’m going to share some of the things I found out in my research on Saturday and we’ll see how far along I am in my business planning.
The first thing I did Saturday morning was go to the library. I honestly haven’t been to the library since taking college classes almost 3 years ago. Although it can be a scary jungle of dusty books and arcane filing systems, the library is an invaluable asset for the small business owner. The tangle of links and false information found on the web can be dizzying at times…so it’s nice to be able to talk to a librarian, get some good solid (literally) information in your hands, and not have to pay a dime for it. I plan on spending much more time there in the future. On this trip, I set out to find books on the basics of starting a small business. I just wanted to see if all the info I was getting from the web would be repeated in these books, thereby validating it’s accuracy. Plus it’s nice to see everything laid out in nice easy-to-digest chapters.
I picked out 5 books that seemed to speak to me and my situation the most. I thought I would be able to flip through them all, target the pertinent chapters, take some notes, and be on my way. Boy was I in for a surprise. As it turns out, I have NO IDEA what information is pertinent to my situation. In fact, reading through the first book, I found that about 90% of the book could, in some way, be useful to me. So, I spent my entire morning taking notes on just this one book. I came back with alot of information, though. Plenty of links to online resoucres as well as insight into compentitive analysis and market research. I’ll be reviewing this book later, as I intend to post a review of the books I find useful in my situation.
My next task after the library was to apply what I had found to my business plan. Since I got so much information from the book and didn’t know exactly what to do with it, I just ended up updating the operations section of my business plan with more ideas that I have about services to provide and ways to market those services. Then I started viisiting the websties I had in my notes from the library. I got lost in pages and pages of statistics for about 45 minutes before I realized I wasn’t really getting anywhere. I started thinking to myself, do I really need to know all of this before I get my business going? And if so, how much is enough? These are questions not easily answered and, from what I’ve heard from others, there’s no clear cut path to follow.
In my previous entry, I highlighted some of the challenges I faced during my first day ever working for myself from home. In this post, I’m going to share some of the things I found out in my research on Saturday and we’ll see how far along I am in my business planning.
The first thing I did Saturday morning was go to the library. I honestly haven’t been to the library since taking college classes almost 3 years ago. Although it can be a scary jungle of dusty books and arcane filing systems, the library is an invaluable asset for the small business owner. The tangle of links and false information found on the web can be dizzying at times…so it’s nice to be able to talk to a librarian, get some good solid (literally) information in your hands, and not have to pay a dime for it. I plan on spending much more time there in the future. On this trip, I set out to find books on the basics of starting a small business. I just wanted to see if all the info I was getting from the web would be repeated in these books, thereby validating it’s accuracy. Plus it’s nice to see everything laid out in nice easy-to-digest chapters.
I picked out 5 books that seemed to speak to me and my situation the most. I thought I would be able to flip through them all, target the pertinent chapters, take some notes, and be on my way. Boy was I in for a surprise. As it turns out, I have NO IDEA what information is pertinent to my situation. In fact, reading through the first book, I found that about 90% of the book could, in some way, be useful to me. So, I spent my entire morning taking notes on just this one book. I came back with alot of information, though. Plenty of links to online resoucres as well as insight into compentitive analysis and market research. I’ll be reviewing this book later, as I intend to post a review of the books I find useful in my situation.
My next task after the library was to apply what I had found to my business plan. Since I got so much information from the book and didn’t know exactly what to do with it, I just ended up updating the operations section of my business plan with more ideas that I have about services to provide and ways to market those services. Then I started viisiting the websties I had in my notes from the library. I got lost in pages and pages of statistics for about 45 minutes before I realized I wasn’t really getting anywhere. I started thinking to myself, do I really need to know all of this before I get my business going? And if so, how much is enough? These are questions not easily answered and, from what I’ve heard from others, there’s no clear cut path to follow.
I can see the the big red “X” on the treasure map, but the trail to get there is still not clear to me. Thankfully, with tools like the Smart Start Assessment as my compass and you all, the supportive readers of this blog, as my crew, I’m equiped to make the journey and I’m confident I’ll stumble upon the loot in due time.
A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step.
-Lao Tzu
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August 28th, 2008 at 12:52 am
I think your experiences in your 5 year plan will give you 1000 times the value of those books at the library. However, situations will come up that you won’t know how to handle. Make sure that your next trip to the library includes a list of those situations so that you have a much more narrow scope and focus and not feel so overwhelmed about where to begin.
[Reply]
August 29th, 2008 at 4:55 pm
I think you’re correct. I just want to make sure I’m getting off on the right foot.
The problem is I’m still not sure what situations I may find myself in. I guess, again, those situations will present themselves in due time.
[Reply]