Bootstrapping by any other name

Filed in archive Bootstrapper Tips on November 23, 2007

Here's a thought for the day after Thanksgiving while enjoying leftovers from your holiday feast.

Raj Dash, who blogs regularly at Internet Ultrageek, mentions these other ways of looking at the bootstrapping process in business (or in life) culled from various traditions and cultures at Lifehack.org.

• Kaizen-a Japanese word for the process of ongoing improvement through slow degrees of change.
• Top-down design-an interesting counterpoint to Guy Kawasaki's precept in "The Art of Bootstrapping" (which Dash also recommends for further reading) of forecasting from the bottom up. Dash's idea draws from the world of software development and deals with design and execution, Kawasaki's from the perspective of marketing and assessing customer potential. Both are equally valid.
• Tunneling-using the resources of a current job to develop a better career (or launch a small business.) See also penelope Trunk's great ode to cubicle ambition at the Brazen Careerist. I'm a diehard proponent of this one particularly for the part-time entrepreneur. Read my "Rules of the road" for same here...but don't let your boss see it!
• Refinement-from mathematics, physics and to some degree software development again. Think of it as tweaking. Refer back to Kawasaki's bootstrapper post and his recommendation "Ship, then test". Most things cannot be perfect at first. This applies both to your business and to life. Act accordingly.

Dash has possibly one of the best definitions of bootstrapping in the generic sense that I have ever come across:

Small actions combined eventually produce a greater synergy and exponential growth or successes. These techniques can thus be used to build a new career, a new product or software application, slowly build a successful business, fix something that isn't quite right and so on.

These small actions, Dash argues, must carry you forward, but, of course, as bootstrapper Bijoy Goswami explains, the time factor is up to you.

Don't be afraid of misfires or having to retrace your steps. It's all part of the process. More on this later...