I have started a dotcom, and to build the dream my company is having sustainance problems. To solve that, we are developing a services division which has already started well, and is expected to do really good. A lot of people are of the opinion we should concentrate all our energies to this division and build this up. Till then, put the dream into hibernation and lets come back to it later. I think that simply doesn't work. We should work parallely on both. Probably with a slightly higher focus on revenues from the new division, but even a three month total hibernation is out for me. What do you people

-- Rishi Jain (rmipl@vsnl.com), November 01, 2000

Answers

Rishi, you can't be two different places at once, you want to know somebody who did that, ask the people at Exponential, but you can alternate to make sure every part of the organization is beating as it should and turn your head both ways if you are looking from the same place (viz organization structure rather than a specific location):

http://www.fastcompany.com/online/22/failure.html

Sometimes enterpreneurs branch off a company for accounting reasons, so that it protects the good part of the company by off-setting losses and accountants know more about why they do that, but in your case, you want to have committed teams who know they are working for one company.

Look at what happened inside Apple - watch the movie Pirates of Silicon Valley and see how the birth of the MacIntosh split the company into those who felt they were in the most dynamic part of the company and those who felt they were on the other ship.

It is not a question of putting the dream into hibernation as much as it is that the teams that work in those divisions all understand that they work for the same company and that having spent the energies in the other division that you are not going to amputate the company you initially created.

As I said, the one atom you have to be careful about splitting is focus, so yes, you can have the division and the company but you have to be clear of how people perceive the situation and also that by spending your energies in this way, you don't get your eye off the ball and lose the sense of the original big picture you were creating.

Thats my 2 cents worth.

Regards M.

M. To be or not to be that is the question: http://www.fastcompany.com/online/22/failure.html

-- Mark Zorro (zorromark@consultant.com), November 02, 2000.

agree that makes sense stick to on endeavor

-- ralph ishi (allen.hentges@premera.com), November 04, 2000.