After listening to Mr. Hall’s great presentation about the key tools to funding a start-up, I would like to share my wonderful experience in the Summer of ’09 as an online marketing intern at a local start-up, right here Montreal. More specifically, the type of environment I was surrounded with while working there. Known then as Openplaces, we were working towards revolutionizing travel planning.
By my 3rd interview, I came to realize that their human resources were very important to them. With limited funds, and only a handful of brilliant minds, they wanted to be surrounded with hard workers to accomplish a common goal. I also quickly realized that not only was this going to be a challenge to learn their core model, but to learn it fast – in a constantly changing atmosphere.
By the end of my first week, I had seen so many flow charts and different strategies that I was dreaming them. By the 2nd week, we revisited them and once again made some adaptations. Just when you thought for sure something would work, you would need to go in and tweak it. Needless to say, there were lots of things going on at once and almost everything was being changed (for the better).
One of the things I liked most about working there was not only the quickly changing environment, but also the way we went about finding out what worked. My boss would present a challenge, without necessarily having an answer, and let us figure it out (he had far more important things on his hands). Some tactics would work; others would be canned within a few days.
I remember one day on my way out the door, my boss looked at me and said, “When you’re biking home everyday, don’t think about what you want for dinner. Think about ideas of how this business will succeed.”
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