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I recently interviewed Sarah Lacy, BusinessWeek reporter, Tech Ticker host and author of the book "Once You're Lucky, Twice You're Good: The Rebirth of Silicon Valley and Rise of Web 2.0" (scheduled for release tomorrow).

Sarah and I had an in-depth conversation about her new book, life in Silicon Valley, Twitter, her infamous SXSW interview, and much more.

This article is part 1 in a series.

You have a new book coming out, could you tell us more about it?

The book is called "Once You're Lucky, Twice You're Good: The Rebirth of Silicon Valley and Rise of Web 2.0". While it's about Silicon Valley, it's really written for people outside Silicon Valley who heard all about the dotcom bubble, heard all about the bust and then heard nothing about Internet companies for a long time. Then out of no where we started hearing about MySpace, YouTube and Facebook, a lot of these modern Web 2.0 companies. And there were a lot of misunderstandings about what this wave of companies meant. There were a lot of stories saying it's like 1999 again, but it couldn't be farther than 1999 again...

This Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, I will be a judge for the semi-finals of the GRA/TAG 2008 Business Launch Competition.

Applicants, then semifinalists, then finalists are competing for a prize that includes a $100,000 cash award and services valued at an additional $200,000, for a total grand prize of $300,000.

This event is conducted by the The Georgia Research Alliance and the Technology Association of Georgia with the goal of supporting the creation and growth of new technology companies in Georgia.

In addition to the cash and services award, entrants have an option to work with a mentor to further develop and refine their business plan. A group of Georgia's most successful high tech entrepreneurs has agreed to serve as mentors.

A preeminent panel of judges consisting of business leaders, entrepreneurs and venture capitalists includes:

Semi Final Judges:

Finals Judges:

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I recently had a chance to interview Marissa Mayer, Vice President at Google, who leads the company's product management efforts on search products. The 90 minute interview was filmed before a live audience at Turner Studios, and I'll publish excerpts here over the next few weeks.

DAVID ECKOFF: How do you evaluate and screen new ideas and products?

MARISSA MAYER: There's a vibe that comes from winning ideas. When I break it down:

First, I think of it as a new company within Google, to understand how we should invest. Is there a core piece of technology that would be interesting and repurposeful in any number of ways? For example, with 1-800-GOOG-411, it's expensive to process the calls and it might not pan out; but we're building a database that will make it possible to build a more robust speech to text model, which could be used in any number of ways... iPhone based search... it could help us deploy car based computers... it could help us do things like take videos and generate closed caption transcripts off of them rather than having them generated by humans.

Second, is this the kind of product that is easily articulatable and that will grow through word of mouth? Meaning, is it a very simple concept that people can express to each other on the street? Very basic concepts that are easily understood and used, instantly intuitive.

The third thing I look for: the overall vibe from the team. When you look at start ups, and founding teams, a lot of times it comes down to the verve and tenacity of the team. Eric Schmidt, our CEO, and I were talking once and I asked him "When you're looking across the entire company, what are you looking for? My area has become so broad, and it's really hard for me to be an expert in everything that I'm hearing about. I can't even imagine looking over the entire company. What do you look for?" And he said, "Sometimes, it really comes down to the vibe in the room. I'll just sit there and when a really good team comes in, I just get this visual image in my head of someone trying to take the mountain. I literally will see the presenters there, and I feel like they're just so fired up that in my head I unconsciously get this image of that team really charging the mountain and no one is going to be able to knock them back."

So that's really what you want: a piece of repurposeful technology; and a very simple and easy to understand idea; and you want a great founding team that's really fired up. So fired up that they won't take no for an answer and they won't fail.

I have a lot of friends who are entrepreneurs. I asked, "How do you decide when to start a company? When does that actual moment happen, when you start a company? I think that same thing is true when you start a product or a team." And he said, "The moment that you start a company is the moment you won't take no for an answer."

I had a chance to listen to Keith Cunningham's telecon the other night, and he had a lot of smart things to say about launching and running new businesses. Good reminders about important business concepts, including focusing on execution.

Here's the link to the MP3 of the telecon:

You may already be familiar with Keith Cunningham if you read the best selling business book "Rich Dad, Poor Dad", a lot of the info in that book came from Cunningham.

Related links:

James Hong from startup HOTorNot published a terrific read on his blog: "Reinventing HOTorNOT, Part I".

James talks about mistakes they made along the way, challenges they face, recruiting and retaining talent in silicon valley, and more.

Some great insights presented - and I appreciate his transparency.

The central theme of his post, "stop clinging to the past and jump into the future", is spot on for companies that face disruption and need to innovate.

A few of the nuggets from James' post:

"The other thing we did is start encouraging innovation again, rather than squelch it in fear of our any changes hurting the cash cow."

"...it is better to find people you believe in and take a chance on them than in trying to control and own them. People will work a lot harder if they are working for themselves and feel in control of their own destiny than they will for you."

"In the future of the web, the majority of value is in innovation and the quality of execution, not in the funding resources a company can provide... giving employees a healthy share, and a majority share in the case of spinouts they are primarily responsible for is not only not a bad idea, it's the BEST idea."

I'm looking forward to reading Part 2.

(Photo credit: valleywagprime)

This past week I attended a presentation "Beating the Odds: Characteristics of a Successful Business" by business teacher and author Keith Cunningham.

Here are some of the most interesting things I heard Cunningham say about the "6 big mistakes that people make in business."

1. An obsession with the product -- to the exclusion of good business judgment. Entrepreneurs fall in love with the idea for their product and develop blinders as a result. As Cunningham described it: "Mothers love their babies, and entrepreneurs love their ideas."

   The key point Cunningham made: a great product does not necessarily equal money. It's never what you do, it's how you do it that will determine your success. And how you do it is about management. It's not about the product.

2. The need for speed. Speed creates short term perspectives. Cunningham described two categories of time: that which relates to a crisis and requires speed; and everything else. People often throw the wrong kind of time at a problem.

   "Most entrepreneurs think that if they try to get 9 women pregnant, they can have a baby in one month," Cunningham said. "It doesn't work that way. It requires time."

   The faster you go, the greater the impact if things go wrong. If you're going fast on a bicycle and you fall, you might skin your knee. If you're going fast in an F16 fighter jet and you crash, people die! Taking the analogy further: two things are needed if you want to go fast, and people don't often think of these: experience; and a lot of dials and instrumentation (like in the cockpit of an F16).

   "All my problems started as a good idea," Cunningham said. "At the core of all my problems lies instant gratifcation, which is about speed."

3. Technical skills. The people who invent an Indy 500 race car don't drive it. The people who invent the space shuttle don't fly it. Being successful in business isn't dependent on technical competence.

   Cunningham argues that people with great technical skills acquired over 20 years often got one year of experience repeated each year for 20 years - and not 20 years of experience.

4. Irrational exuberance. Also known as "optimism on steroids."

   Irrational exuberance manifests itself in these forms: an inability to listen ("I'm the guru."); ignoring obvious risks; strengths morphing into weaknesses (for example, self confident morphs into arrogant); and an intense need to be right.

5. Failure to have a second idea. Because they love their first idea! Entrepreneurs all think they know enough, so they spend all their time defending their idea instead of learning from what they don't know.

6. Run out of cash. Cunningham remarked: "Running out of cash is a little like saying, 'how did he die? Well he stopped breathing.' But that doesn't tell the whole story."

   Some of the underlying reasons businesses run out of cash: lack of planning, obsession with the product, no niche, no value-add, no business skills, the need for speed, no cushion.

   In Part 3 of this report, I'll cover the most interesting things I heard Cunningham say about the solutions to the 6 big mistakes that people make in business.

Related link: Part 1: "Beating the Odds: Characteristics of a Successful Business". Notes from presentation by Keith Cunningham

(Photo credit: keystothevault.com)

This past week I attended a presentation by business teacher and author Keith Cunningham.

In his presentation "Beating the Odds: Characteristics of a Successful Business", Cunningham drew on his over 30 years experience launching numerous ventures and raising hundreds of millions of dollars for his own ventures to offer lots of practical advice on business.

His straight talk about business reminded me of lessons I have learned over my own career, but that all of us seem to forget or not commonly apply.

Here are some of the most interesting things I heard from the first part of his presentation: