SW PHILLY!!!!!!!!!!!!! My name is Joey Aquino and this is me hanging out with a real wild African cheetah.

Freaked out at SW Jeddah

I am the fortunate one that will be coming out and facilitating your Startup Weekend! I just wanted to write to you all was simply to share some best practices on how you can dominate the event this weekend. After doing nearly 40 events and now actually working for Startup Weekend HQ, there are common pitfalls I see all the time. Here are 10 things to remember when going into this weekend!

1. Forget about the actual “launching a company” part of this.

Seems weird but even though we will all be launching projects, the main goal at Startup Weekend is actually about the experience. The experience of getting away from your day to day, the experience of learning the process of entrepreneurship, the experience of collaborating with amazing people within your community, all of which really has nothing to do with a specific business idea let alone the actual success of it. If you do have a goal for the weekend, it should be to learn something new.

2. Put yourself out there.

Now for us guys, this may be a little difficult because we may be used to going out to bars and constantly getting shut down for dates (well this could just be me but for my benefit will generalize). Usually the goals of girls at bars aren’t aligned with ours, BUT THIS EVENT IS COMPLETELY DIFFERENT! All of the people are here for the same reason and that is to get to know each other, launch awesome projects and have fun. The risk of intentions not being aligned when you introduce yourself to someone at this event vs. meeting a stranger at a bar is like night and day. And if someone does shut you down for trying to get to know them at a SW, they suck and you probably don’t want to know anyways In this case, you should try to meet everyone. Be respectful, be honest and have fun meeting your community.

3. Format for 60 second pitch.

If you are pitching an idea on Friday night, remember you will only have 60 seconds and when I say 60secs, we mean it. So a best practice on the format of your pitch can go like this:

- 5-10sec: Briefly saying who you are. Usually people stumble over this part and waste a majority of their time just talking about themselves. Think about the most attractive part about your experience and why it translate towards a successful project and only say that, nothing more.
- 10-20sec: What your problem is. Dive right into the core problem you are trying to solve.
- 10-20sec: Your solution. Make sure you have some type of brand name for your idea. The reason is that people will be hearing a lot of ideas and having a name will make them remembering yours a lot easier.
- 5-10sec: Call for needs to make this project happen. Think through the key people you want to join your team and speak to them.

4. Know The Judging Criteria.

The three that we will be using:
- Customer Validation/Business Model: Have you identified your customers? How have you validated your solution is what your customers are seeking? How has your customer interviews influenced your business model generation? Everyone should watch these series of short videos from Steve Blank himself that he made specifically for doing customer validation in a 54hr process:

- Design: How has engaging with users/customers influenced why they designed their product this way? Why does your product feel/look this certain way?
- Technical Build: In the 54hr process, what was your team able to accomplish and execute on? Do they have a functioning prototype?

5. Create a 100 person customer contact list.

Since customer validation will be absolutely KEY to this event, if you are pitching an idea generate a list of customers you can engage with over the weekend. Now, if you have a consumer facing product, generating a list of over 100 contacts via all your social networks should be extremely easy. If you have a B2B/Enterprise concept, think specifically of where or how you may be able to get in contact with the right type of person for feedback.

6. GET PAYING CUSTOMERS!

“95% of the 30 people that filled out my Survey Monkey survey said they would use my product” IS NOT CUSTOMER VALIDATION. “I will give you $20 to build this solution right now” (and you taking their money) is. I have seen many teams actually have paying customers at the end of the weekend which is the epitome of customer validation. This can definitely happen even before you have something functional so get out of the building and find that solution customers are in such search of they are willing to pay you now for it.

7. You aren’t going to change the world in 54hrs.

Your idea may be big and disruptive but you need to be able to execute something to show there may be some legs on this idea in 54hrs. Think strategically on what you want to execute on in the weekend and what would be the most valuable part of start collecting data on to validate your idea.

8. Users are different than Customers.

Customers actually PAY for your product or service while users may not. Think of Google. Everyone is the “user” of Google.com but we do not PAY for their service, advertisers do. Make sure when you are validating you are collecting feedback from the right group.

9. The first questions you NEED to be able to confidently answer:

- What is the problem you are solving?
- Who are your users?
- Who are your customers?
- What is your solution?
- How have you validated your solution?
- How big is your market?

10. Help someone else. 

I think a lot of times at these types of events we get into the mindset of “what can I get out of this?” The problem is that people who tend to have that narrow of a focus tend to lose out on most on the SW magic. There is something that happens when you let go of all expectation and go in with the mentality that as much as I get from the weekend I should give back as well. Everyone has something they can teach, give or offer and you will be amazed in how much greater of value you will receive after the weekend if you decide to give a little as well. This isn’t just about a 54 hour event this is about building a remarkable community you live in. Give a little bit!

Over the past several months I have started to realize how much I consume in life. Whether it is looking at my Instagram feed, going out to eat, constantly on pandora, checking my email, or watching t.v., these things things that have been created to solve a certain problem or to make for a more efficient world has become more like a drug that has turned off one part of my brain and made me addicted towards being fed something constantly. One key quality that I see in all successful people is the constant need to create/produce things. They have an instinct in their life to take action rather than to sit back and wait for something to be done for them.

A couple months back I had a great conversation with a friend of mine named Paige Pauli and we were discussing how we both felt like we were constantly consume information from because technology has given us access to so many new things but it wasn’t until she said, ” I have to stop myself sometimes because I feel like I am not producing nearly as much as I consume…” My over obsessive consumption habits had me even forgot about the other side to the equation. This immediately reminded me of a quote one of my mentors from back in Hawaii said to me which was,

“If you aren’t generating anything meaningful for this world, you minus well die. You are just sucking the world of its rare and valuable resources but not making it a better place.”

Had I fallen into this trap? Had I become a worthless human that just takes from the world but doesn’t produce anything for it? Well… maybe not to that extreme but you get my point. So… I started taking note of ALL the things I consumed in my day in a notebook.

Here is how my notes started:

1. 7:30am – Alarm on phone goes off, check my Gmail
2. 7:32am – After Gmail, check my Instagram
3. 7:35am – After instagram, check my Facebook
4. 7:37am – Brush my teeth w/ Crest and a Sonicare
5. 7:40am – Bump Pandora
6. 7:41am – Run water to shower and use Dial body + hair wash, Neutrogena face wash
7. 7:49am – Use 3 different skin cremes (I have 3 prescription cremes for eczema, not just super metro)
8. 7:50am – Apply Degree Deodorant
9. 7:55am – Check my Gmail
10. 8:00am – Checked GeekWire

… wtf? 30min after I wake up for the day I have consumed 10 things and I still haven’t produced anything. The list got far worse and it got to a point where I was just far too tired of tracking all of the things I consumed. Then I thought of a few things:

1. How many things do I produce throughout my day?
2. Is there anything in my day that I consumed that could be replaced by producing something instead?
3. How can I lower the things I consume throughout my day?

So I made the 1:1 Challenge and I am challenging you all to do this with me. The goal is that for 1 whole day can you Produce as many times as you Consume something throughout that day? Think of the Tom’s shoes model but for your life . Now I know this is nearly impossible but really try it. I am over half way through my day and it has been a very challenging but eye-opening experience for me. My current ratio is 20:13 (Consumption:Production).

Some quick ground rules:

1. You have to keep a log somewhere of all things consumed and produced. I am using a notebook because anything online would definitely tempt me to consume more via blogs or social media.

2. You can bundle actions such as “eating breakfast” as one point of consumption rather than counting all the different foods consumed during that meal.

3. Each point of consumption via application/web-app should be logged separately (i.e. EVERY time you check Facebook throughout the day or video you watch on YouTube should be a separate item)

4. Production can be defined by you but some examples I have used so far are writing this blog post, singing and beat boxing in the shower instead of listening to music (which was a hilarious experience), writing 5 emails is equivalent to 1 point of consumption, etc.

5. You have to tell someone that you are doing this to keep you accountable. I told my roommate and Turbo Tawnita.

Good luck and I would love to hear from anyone who takes this on this challenge. Reaching out to me and having an inspiring conversation can count as a production item!

The reason I am writing this is because I too once fell into this ignorance, maybe not to an extreme by any means, but without doing any actual research or actively pursuing understanding.

A fortune I got the night before I left for Jeddah

I just got back from seven days in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia and I cannot even begin to explain the remarkable and eye opening experience I had there. I want to write about my short trip to a place that not many people get to know in the hope that you will put aside whatever judgement you may have and even do some of your own travels.

Quick Saudi Arabia Facts (cited from CIA.gov):

Population: 26,939,583
Religon(s): Muslim
Language: Arabic
Major cities – Population: Riyadh (capital) 4.725MIL, Jeddah 3.234MIL, Mecca 1.484MIL
Unemployment, youth ages (15-24): Male-23.6%, Female-45.8%
Government type: Monarchy
Economy: Oil based economy. The worlds largest exporter of petroleum (possess 17% of the world’s petroleum reserves)
Labor Force: 80% of the labor force is non-national (71.9% of which is focused in the service industry)

Now, these are stats about the country — but let’s do a quick search on CNN.com on Saudi Arabia. Here are some of the first headlines you will read:

“Saudi Arabia beheads man for stealing”
“Saudi Arabia’s unsolicited monitoring of women’s travel”
“Two Saudi’s in human rights groups get 10 years in prison”

I believe these are the common headlines we are constantly fed and have been fed ever since 9/11. When I told many of my peers I was heading to Saudi Arabia, the reaction was one of caution because of this perception.

Now, if I were to give you three newsworthy headlines about my experience there, they would look more like this:

“Saudi Arabian’s, the most hospitable people I have ever met in my life”
This article would talk about the distinction between what the media portrays Saudi’s to live in a culture of hate that is flooded with violence, when in reality, every Saudi I met was more than generous and compassionate. They have a culture of caring for people, being a great host, and ensuring that your time with them is of great value. I was overwhelmed by how out of their way the locals went to ensure that I was happy.

“Saudi Arabia’s vision of hope for a better world”

The women of the winning team walking up to receive their award at SW Jeddah

This article would discuss a new generation of Saudi’s and their passion to create a new world for themselves. We have had three Startup Weekends in Saudi Arabia and they have each been the largest events we have held around the globe. There is this immediate sense to take action, to create, to do unconventional things, and to change the world for this generation — and it showed when I was in Jeddah. When I asked Sara Kabdeep (one of the winning team members at Startup Weekend Jeddah) what entrepreneurship meant to her, she said, “… Strength, independence, and a gate to endless opportunity!”. This epitomizes the viewpoint many of these young and aspiring Saudi’s have.

“One family shouldn’t be a way to judge an entire nation”
This article topic is something that I would want to make sure everyone understands clearly. On my drive to my hotel, a local and I engaged in some of the negative perspectives Saudi’s have and one thing that really stuck out to me was when discussing the monarchy of the kingdom. He said, “… you have to remember that Saudi is entirely run by one giant family, just one (as he sternly stuck 1 finger in the hair). How can you assume 30 million people are all the exact same?” You personally may not have agreed with some of the actions some of the wealthy leaders in Saudi took, but it’s absurd to label the other 30 million people with those negative assumptions. We are all different, we all have our own individual experiences that have crafted the people we are, and it is an injustice for people to not care enough to get to know others because they are too lazy to find out the truth. It is an injustice to label people who look similar with the same beliefs and viewpoints. It is an injustice to not think about how you would like to be treated and act that way to others.

There is so much I could write about my travels to Jeddah, but more than anything I would encourage you to experience Jeddah on your own. There are of course things to watch out for and cultural things you need to be aware of — but that is just like any other place you will travel to. I have been fortunate to have traveled to a handful of places around the globe and want to clearly make a distinction between “Traveling” and “Vacationing.” A vacation is all about a personal reset. Vacationing is going to a beach and relaxing for seven days to get away from your personal day to day. Travel is all about exploring, learning, and personal growth. Travel is challenging because it forces you to think differently. I am so thankful for the privilege of traveling to this amazing place and insha’allah I will be back to Saudi Arabia soon. Thank you to all of the amazing people I met in Jeddah; I am honored to consider you all great new friends.

Me with the organizing team for SW Jeddah

If you have never been to a Startup Weekend it is an event that focuses on experiential education for anyone interested in entrepreneurship. This comes in the form of a 54hr weekend startup blitz that brings together developers, designers and business people to pitch new ideas, form teams and spend the entire weekend launching the first steps of an actual startup. Mentors from the local startup community (investors, entrepreneurs and startupers) are brought in also to work with the teams throughout this process which is a phenomenal experience in itself. This is the epitome of “Learn by doing.”

I am looking for a crew of bday friends to join me and if you do I have a 30% bday discount for you. Who wants to join the bday posse?!

Here are some details: 

When: March 22 – March 24

Where: Facebook Seattle Office in South Lake Union

Site: http://seattle.startupweekend.org/

Group photo from Startup Weekend Vancouver

As “Kid President” would challenge you, “What’s your SpaceJam?” When the going gets tough, don’t give up or else you may never create those awesome things in life like how Michael Jordan never quit in basketball and ended up creating one of the world’s classics… “SpaceJam”

I have been fortunate enough to be surrounded by the inspiring Startup Weekend community who have chosen to take action in life to be awesome, so this video is dedicated to you! Let’s all continue to dance, be awesome and create lots of “SpaceJam’s”… LIKE A BOSS!

Group photo after Startup Weekend University of Hawai’i

I may have gotten the best draw out of the bunch because I was fortunate enough to travel to Bangkok, Thailand (#SWBKK) the first weekend and then to Honolulu, Hawaii for a university focused event (#StartupUH), the second. Bangkok and Honolulu are still both very early in their entrepreneurial ecosystem development. Neither places have any big home runs, vast amount of financial capital or the density of experience entrepreneurs but both are extremely passionate in nurturing a community until they find those key pieces. I always think it is very interesting to see the grassroots movement of startup ecosystem development and I would like to share a few key things I saw across these two communities that each grassroots startup movement needs.

1. Get “Leaders” to play the game

Susan Yamada (Founding CEO of TRUSTe) and I

Taking a page from Brad Feld’s book “Startup Communities”, there needs to be a clear understanding of people in your community who are “Leaders” and who are “Feeders”. “Leaders” by his definition are the real entrepreneurs. The experienced bunch who actually have gone through the startup trenches of being a founder of multiple companies, raised capital and can guide aspiring entrepreneurs through a battle field of chaos that is about to come their way. “Feeders” are everyone else who supports the community. Feeders are not less important but the point is that for a thriving community it needs to be lead by people who have actually gone through it, not necessary people who are passionate about the space. Now, by definition a grassroots movement would be lead by “feeders” but  to turn momentum into thriving community you need to get the feeders to play the game with you. Find out who are the key entrepreneurs in your community who have the potential to be community “leaders” and create seamlessly easy ways for them to start contributing and giving back. Create inspiring experiences which bring them back to the essence of why they are entrepreneurs and show them why your community needs their help to flourish. I have been to so many Startup Weekends who have invited coaches/mentors in who are those real entrepreneurs but they get so swept up in the dynamic environment that they ultimately join in on the fun and start working with a team. Get leaders to play the game with you and it will be a key element towards your community development success.

2. Understanding of the tribe boundaries

Look at any grassroots movement and one of the key parts is drawing a line in the sand and saying those who want to be a part of this tribe need to cross “this line”. Whether it is pledging to stay up all night walking around a track for Relay for Life or not cutting your mustache for the entire month of November with Movember, there is almost a minimum level of commitment or characteristic that define what it means to be in this tribe or out of one. This is the exact same thing that needs to happen with your startup community. For #SWBKK, their minimum requirement wasn’t just to give up their weekend working on startups but they literally had everyone sleep over at the venue and work for the entire 54hrs straight! They wanted to define their tribe in Bangkok to be a little bit more committed to the cause and the reception was phenomenal. How do you define your tribe and more importantly how do you want people to contribute to be a part of the movement? Here is a photo of some of the tents they set up for people to rest in at the venue.

Some of the attendees who slept in one of the tents at SWBKK

3 . Product/Market fit for communities

There is plenty of talk about customer development for your startup but the same principles need to apply for finding a “product/market fit” with your own startup community design. Product/Market fit happens when you have a clear persona of a customer that matches exactly with value you are providing them. Everyone says they want to be the “Silicon Valley of…” but the problem is that if Silicon Valley was replicated in your specific community, it would fail. Communities are so vastly different with completely different customers that you as community developers needs to be rapidly testing out as many new events, meetups, programs, etc. until you find exactly what your customers are looking for.

I had worked for a couple years at the university of Hawai’i in helping develop the startup scene on campus. My original strategy, since I had grown up on the west coast, was to simply take everything that was going on in the valley and plop it into Honolulu… lesson learned. I didn’t listen to my “customers” and ultimately spent a bunch of time and resources pumping out the wrong programs. A few years later now when I came back to University of Hawai’i for this event, there seemed to be something that clicked. The organizers of the event were the employees who ran the Pacific Asian Center for Entrepreneurship on campus and they were willing to test out something completely new. They were willing to let go of their initial assumptions, get something new out to their customers, test it, and gather feedback to see how they could improve their value propositions. And it worked! Don’t be afraid to test out new things but more importantly don’t be sold that the Silicon Valley cookie cutter works in your specific market.

4. Champion Social Media

Winning team of SWBKK Infinit Closet

We all know social media is a must but after over +80K miles of travel this year, one common trend across the board is that the most vibrant cities I have been to all have people who champion social media in their own startup community. And I am not just meaning someone to posts on Facebook every once in awhile or shoots out a tweet when you need something but I mean someone or group of people who are truly CHAMPIONING it. Leading innovative discussions and constantly fostering new conversations with their community. Vancouver was probably one of the best examples I had seen of this and it has drastically impacted the entire conversation of entrepreneurship moving forward. But most recently I noticed this again after the Bangkok event. A part of our global startup battle was that each winner of a Startup Weekend event happening that week would be included in a global voting process where the top 15 teams who were able to get the most votes were judged for our big prize. Not knowing what to expect from Bangkok because it is such a new community, I was thoroughly impressed to see the amount of social media activity that placed the #SWBKK winner to being #7 overall in the Global Startup Battle! The amount of support, conversations and community that was built online is something each ecosystem needs to have a strong strategy for if they want to flourish. Find those champions.

5. Entrepreneurship is about hope

Now this isn’t a tip but more so a reminder of the bigger picture of what we do. I met a girl at #StartupUH named Lauren who was inspiring to say the least. I had heard about her prior to the event because she is a deaf student at the university and we more so wanted to make sure the experience we provided was open and equal for everyone involved. Lauren is an entrepreneurship major and had the courage to not only come to our event but to pitch an idea, rally enough votes to get her idea selected, lead a team, work her ass the entire weekend and WIN the Startup Weekend UH event! Her relentless passion and determination are what carried her through the event and the continuation of her project post SW.

Lauren in the middle with her team “My Perfect Day”

Another attendee I met was named Tyson. He may be your typical engineer type who grew up in Hawai’i but had moved out to LA for a job. After chatting with him I found out he had attended the Startup Weekend in Santa Monica and fell in love with the dynamic experience that he booked a flight back to Honolulu 2 weeks later just to participate in this event. Un…real! He had mentioned to me that this was an environment that not only got him out of his daily grind but challenged him in something he was extremely strong and passionate in. He didn’t feel like an outsider, he didn’t feel put into a box he felt like he was at his peak. And that is what this is all about. In developing our new communities I think we all need to remember what the power of entrepreneurship really is and from what I have seen it is hope that you can be whoever you are suppose to be in this world. Through entrepreneurship you aren’t labeled by a disability, you aren’t molded into a box but you have the opportunity to be exactly who you are suppose to be. From a grassroots stand point, this is the WHY of what will resonate with your community and I challenge you to always reinforce the WHY before the what.

Good luck!!!

Here is a fun video I created that summarized the craziness, the fun, the inspiring moments of my trip.

Today marks the first day of one of the largest movements I have been a part of. Startup Weekend begins our “Global Startup Battle” which is our largest initiative for entrepreneurship education all packed into one week. Currently, Startup Weekends are held in 107 countries and just this year we are planned to do almost 600 events around the globe. Just this week we will be working with +10,000 entrepreneurs, +1,200 teams and be hosting 140 Startup Weekend events. We have become the single largest starting point for entrepreneurs and the catalyst for startup ecosystems all around the world. It is phenomenal to see the growth in entrepreneurship and I encourage you all to take part in your own local startup ecosystem somehow.

Check out this crazy list of where just my coworkers are going:

Me: Bangkok (#SWBKK) and Honolulu (#SWUH)
Adam: Japan (#SWFukuoka, #SWTokyo, #SWKyoto)
Brett: Ghana (#SWAccra)
John: London (#SWLondon) Stavanger (#SWsvg)
Danielle: Manchester (#SWManc) and Zagreb (#SWZagreb)
Tawnee: Sydney (#SWSydney) Brisbane (#SWBrisbane)
Zach: Davao (#SWDVO) Cebu City (#SWcebu)
Mitchell: Caracus (#SWCaracus)
Gus: Guadalajara (#SWGDL) Ciudad Juarez (#SWJuarez)
Anca: Bucharest (#SWVampire) (#SWLithuania)
Marion: Strasbourg (#SWStras) and Bretagne (#SWBZH)
Steven: Tulsa (#SWTulsa) and Copenhagen (#SWCopenhagen)
Keith: Victoria (#SWVictoria)
khalid: toronto (#SWToronto)
David: South Bend (#SWSouthbend)
Sheikh: Milwaukee (#SWmke)
Claire: New Haven (#SWNewHaven)
Franck: Boston (#SWBoston)

Good luck everyone! Get ready for a wild ride!

I have traveled: 64,242.36 miles around the world

I have made it into the 20+ Startup Weekend events club

I have logged 1080 hours specifically at Startup Weekend events

I have helped 1870 entrepreneurs launch a startup

On top of that, some of the unforgettable memories:

I have eaten everything from Norwegian Gråsteinbit aka Wolf Fish, to Mississippi’s award winning friend chicken and green beans.

I had no idea the fish I at in Norway actually looked like this…

I have celebrated in the city who won the Super Bowl

In Times Square right after the Super Bowl

I have crashed a Governors inauguration party

Governor Gregoire of Vancouver! Thanks for the open bar and free buffet!

I have watched a countrys soccer team compete in the Euro Cup

In Copenhagen watching Denmark play on a big screen TV in a park

I have rock climbed

Climbing w/ Climb Aloha at Makapu’u

I went to the university founded by Thomas Jefferson

University of Virginia

I went to SXSW first time.

Our SXSW party which has 17k RSVPS!

Some of the amazing people I have met this year:

Vinod Khosla
Steve Blank
Michael Arrington
Mitch Kapor
Kevin Systrom
Mike Krieger
Sebastian Thrun
Enrique Allen
Emily Pilloton
Dawn Lepore
Saras D. Sarasvathy

Out of all these experiences, it has been the Startup Weekend family that has made it all worth it.

To Marc and Franck, you guys are a true inspiration to me. You have taken this small event into a global movement that has only scratched the surface of its potential. You have taken a cool idea into a world class organization that changes the lives of people in over 100 countries. You have taken a fun weekend into a program that helps individuals find their lives passions. Thank you for letting me be a part of it.

To Adam, you were the first person I met at Startup Weekend and I personally thank you for not only guiding me in the right direction but you were the one that really brought me into the SW Family. Getting to know the inside of this organization and how the machine works, I have become astonished of your work ethic. It definitely has been a key to the growth of this movement.

The Smooth Operators; Shimmy Keith, Turbo, Ms. Reyes, JB, Milk Shake, and Brett Nakatsu Sauce, you are the lifeblood of this entire movement. Can you recall the first Startup Weekend event you went to? Just remember that you are spreading that feeling of community, passion, joy and enlightenment across the globe. That feeling is why Startup Weekend works and the work you put in allows for thousands of people every weekend to share what you felt originally.

London Ladies: Deb and Anca! I am absolutely astonished by what just you two have done for all of Europe. Especially being remote, the courage, strength and incredible entrepreneurial skills you have just to grow Startup Weekend to the level it is in Europe is mind boggling. You are a true inspiration.

Business and Marketing crew: The OTHER Joey, Gabe, Mitchell, Claire and Ludo. I absolutely think this team couldn’t have been better built. Every element of what business and marketing should be is pieced together so well with you all. The story of what we do continues to be created and told by the work you all do. I am excited to see where you take us on this journey.

EDU: Paul Bunyan aka Rhasta of reform aka Khalid! One of the most intelligent guys I have met. I am inspired by your approach not just with Startup Weekend but in life in general. The spirit in which you live your life with is infectious and the results have been shown with your success so far.

Ms. Finance, Ashley: From the first event I organized, I couldn’t believe all you do and I still don’t understand it! Your work ensure the sustainability and growth of this global movement. Without what you do and what you do ALONE, we would not be able to have the reach and impact we continue to provide.

Tech Crew; Steven & David. You guys absolutely rock. In the non-profit/non-technical world which our company actually is, you two are ones that open the doors for scalability and impact. It is remarkable to see what innovative people build at Startup Weekends, but when you bring that type of skill set that allows ideas to become a reality and combine it with the passion which flows through our company, that is when some world changing things can happen. I am excited to see where you lead the this company in the future.

Gus y Melina! My friends! Besides the fact that you are beginning to change the face of your countries entrepreneurial landscape, I am privileged just to call you my friends. Just in the short time we have spent together at work, I believe you two are some of the most genuine people and I am inspired by your positive spirit.

Google Guy aka Mr. Backflip; You are the closest I could ever get to a real ninja… which has been my ultimate dream in life. You may have the ultimate gig where you are changing the world as your job by day and I think you are saving the world by night as an actual ninja… my ultimate ultimate dream.

Sara,  you just rock! And you know it Community support it at the heart of what we are and I thank you for your positive spirit in helping our global movement.

New friends: Chris, Chris, Brendan, Jessica, Paul, Jamie, Marion; To see us continue to grow and be able to have amazing people join the movement is what it is all about. I look forward to seeing how we work together to ensure we continue to do our job but also bring in more people like yourselves.

Startup Weekend, you have truly changed my life. Thank you and I can’t wait to see where this next year takes me.

When people evaluate startup ecosystems they usually start analyzing at the point after a startup has already been formed (i.e. at accelerator programs). The problem is so many things happen in an entrepreneurs life before they actually launch a company. Entrepreneurship is a mindset that is developed through a series of experiences and strong ecosystems have elements that understand each part of an entrepreneurs journey and can take an individual and grow them into entrepreneurs that grow companies. In our model instead of starting at step 4 Startup Weekend really likes to play within the first three steps. We understand that it takes far more than generating more accelerator programs to grow entrepreneurship but communities need to inspire people to follow their passions. Communities need to create forums where people can discover their own tribes of entrepreneurship. And then communities need outlets and environments where their entrepreneurs can take action.

These steps are the very first pieces towards a developing ecosystem and Startup Weekend gets to see first hand the growth of communities all around the world from day one. I have been to over 20 Startup Weekends in communities all around the world and have been able to build a pretty unique perspective on community design and ecosystem potential. This is why I am writing this post and this is why I would say out of all the places I have been, investors need to start looking seriously at Vancouver, BC.

I recently just got back from facilitating Startup Weekend Vancouver and it was remarkable to say the least. Jesse Heaslip (lead organizer) and the rest of the Startup Weekend Vancouver organizing team absolutely KILLED IT!  I witnessed so many core fundamentals of an ecosystem that has tremendous potential that if I was an investor I would start building great relationships with the people there to get in on the ground level of something big. Here are my reasons why:

1. Growth

The demand for entrepreneurship in that city has just grown drastically. Startup Weekend is simply 3 days out of the entire year and our one event got the demand of 150 eager startupers that launched 17 startups and had another 150 on a waiting list which will be filtered into the next Startup Weekend Vancouver set to be in November. Besides SW, other key elements to the Vancouver ecosystem that are gaining traction are GrowLab (Vancouver accelerator program that was just featured in TechCrunch) and Launch Academy (which is a co-working space that is evolving into becoming more of a General Assembly for Vancouver).To add on top of those, the GROW Conference is starting to capture a lot of buzz within the entire north west. GROW is showing the early potential of becoming something like a SxSW but a NxNW.

Strong elements to the Vancouver ecosystem that are received so well build for bigger and bigger markets of entrepreneurs. Vancouver’s market is growing quickly.

2. Execution

In just 54 hours you have to push yourself and your team to the extreme limits to produce. One of our main judging criteria’s at a Startup Weekend is “execution” and to us that means in the time you are given what has your team done to show that you will be able to do whatever it takes to be a successful founding team. If you are building some software can you show us a functioning prototype that shows your high level technical skills? Have you gotten out of the building to test your initial hypotheses and found insights for new iterations or pivots? How many cycles of customer development where you able to do? Do you have customers for your business?

More teams at this event seemed to have a very intelligent approach in their entrepreneurship process. There were many iterations, pivots and restarts which showed the quality of startupers at ground zero. There was even a team that was able to get multiple paying customers who wanted their product and collected $25 that they showed to us on stage!

Dropped it like it was hot! $$$

The high level of execution at the first step of an ecosystem means that this pushes the entire step ladder to a higher level of quality. I chatted with 2x Startup Weekend Vancouver judge Boris Wertz, founder and general partner of Version One Ventures, and I had asked him about his initial reactions to the teams at this event versus the last and he was very impressed on the quality of the teams who pitched. To summarize his reaction, he thought there were far more teams at this event there were higher quality than at the last. The point here is that the community is learning and they are learning quick which is a tremendous quality to this ecosystem. The entrepreneurs in Vancouver just seem to get it.

3. Buzz

If you look at some of the hottest markets for entrepreneurship one of the core factors is there ability to generate buzz. In New York City and San Francisco they host the worlds biggest media sources. You have Mashable, TechCrunch, INC. Magazine, VentureBeat, Bloomberg, etc, then you have the major sources like the New York Times. Due to their HQ locations their own communities naturally get more buzz than the rest of the world would receive, thus pushing what is going on in their ecosystems a little bit further. It’s not necessarily that a place like New York city is launching more startups than a city like Seattle but part of the reason they are looked to be farther than us is simply because every launch in those areas gets huge media coverage. The ability to generate buzz is huge and this is something I saw Vancouver do first hand without the need of big media sources.

One small piece of proof simply came from our Twitter hash-tag. The Vancouver event used #VanStartup. We pulled our Simply Measured analytics from that event and in just 54 hours Vancouver had a Twitter impressions reach of 4.4MIL people. Let me repeat…4.4 MILLION! To give some context, Startup Weekend as a whole usually gets to that type of social media reach in two weeks, Vancouver did it alone in three days. This city really understands the power of social media and has the potential to generate an immense amount of buzz without the need of big media hubs.

4. Spirit

Startup Weekend’s are designed to create chaos. Friday night is not one for the shy because you are in a room with 150 other entrepreneurs who are trying to sell their idea and form a team from the same group you are. We purposely don’t make the team formation seamless and easy because part of finding a cofounder is being able to step outside of yourself and show your passion to the community. Some people fail and decide this doesn’t fit their style and some people just rise to the occasion and do whatever it takes to get the job done. Some people complain that their idea didn’t get a fair chance during the team formation process and some others decide there isn’t time to debate equality but I have to make the most of the situation in front of me. In Vancouver the spirit of hungry entrepreneurs not only filled the auditorium but literally flooded outside into the streets.

At 10:45pm Friday night we had to kick everyone out of the auditorium because the lights and security system at the venue was going to go off whether we liked it or not. Teams could have complained that we didn’t have a space to conclude the evening and attendees could have easily left but the complete opposite happened. People continued to do whatever they could to form teams and work in the streets until far after midnight. The passionate, determined and positive spirit of everyone at the event carried them through the entire weekend and it definitely had ripples effects on the community of what the true spirit of an entrepreneur is really like.

With anything the potential of something is only as good as the foundation it is laid upon and from all the places I have seen around the world, Vancouver is on its way towards becoming something remarkable. Investors, I am spilling the beans here but if I were you I would start making my way over there, building strong ties there and writing some checks because if not I will be writing up a follow up post in the future titled, “I told you so!”

*Photo credits to Albert Law: http://www.albertlaw.ca/