The tale of Markus Frind

Filed in Thoughts on January 16, 2009



If you at all enjoy business, go read this article about Markus Frind: http://www.inc.com/magazine/20090101/and-the-money-comes-rolling-in.html

I very much liked this article.  It hit home with me in a big way.  The summary is this: Frind was a geeky software developer that started a website in his house.  Traffic exploded and he now nets $5 million a year and works roughly an hour a day.

There is a subplot throughout the article that really makes me smile.  Frind has an obvious disdain for conventional business wisdom and so-called business experts.  In a very unpolitical way, he makes it clear that he thinks that most businesses are run by idiots and the "experts" are kings among idiots.

The list of things where Frind bucks conventional business wisdom is quite lengthy.  He does not hire employees, does not seek to raise investment capital, is not trying to fix mistakes on the site, is not trying to really grow the site in ways that he could.  He does not look for mentors or partnerships and does not listen to his customers.  And as I mentioned, he only works an hour a day.

Now, I am not going to claim that there are not consequences to Frind's philosophy.  No, he will not grow as fast as he could, and in fact, his inertia could end up sinking him.  If that happens, it will probably happen over time.  By that time it happens, he will have a lot of money banked.  That is not a bad option--the alternative is giving up control of your company and taking on a lot of risk for the potential of a big payoff.  But for Frind, a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.

So, how much do I agree with Frind?  Not entirely, but he has some wisdom, and I know he is right in some areas.  Here they are:

1) Your time investment is not necessarily related to your paycheck.
It is tempting to think that you need to work hard to be successful.  It makes sense, but it is not true.  For me, I have found the opposite is true.  There was a period where I only worked a few hours a day and played golf every day.  That was a very profitable time. 

On the other hand, the past few years, I have worked full time on my business and it has not been nearly as profitable.  However, there is a big difference.  These past few years, I have been focused on long term growth and knew that my work would have little shortterm benefit.

Putting time into your business is an investment that may not pay off now but hopefully will pay off long term.  Frind's lack of time investment may come back to bite him if he aspires to be a billionaire.  If he just wants to be a modest multi-millionaire, he is doing just fine.

Now, here is the problem.  Forcing yourself to quit working as much is difficult because it is counter-cultural for most of us.  I feel guilty if I take four hours to play golf.  Frankly, I feel guilty if I watch more than a few minutes of TV.  In fact, I rarely have on the TV without the computer on at the same time.  I have to work hard at working less and you probably do too.

2) Most business "experts" are definitely idiots.
I just disabled all my RSS feeds and am going to add back a few of them on a very selective basis.  I had been subscribing to 20 or so of the biggest names in my industry.  I have found that reading them is a gigantic waste of time.  They regurgitate the same tired advice over and over while reporting on such interesting news as what Google employees ate at their holiday party.

If you need a consultant in practically any area, I feel sorry for you.  Competent consultants almost do not exist.  In fact, I have a theory that the term "competent consultant" is an oxymoron.  Competent people do not consult--they do things.  For example, the real ecommerce experts are not consulting; they are selling things online. 

So, what you read by so called competent consultants on the internet is almost always either fluff, flat-out wrong, or out-dated.  People that really know what is going on are not sharing their secrets for the world at large (and their competitors) to read.

3) Bootstrapping is under-rated.
Conventional wisdom says to find an investor, hire as many employees as possible and go for it all.  Other people like Frind see the silliness in that.  There is nothing wrong with bootstrapping.  Yes, you will grow slower, but you will almost certainly be happier and will sleep better.  In today's fragile economy, how much sleep do you think he is losing when he has almost no overhead and no debt?

Don't be afraid to grow your business the old fashioned way--slowly.  As someone very wise once told me, the best way to get rich quick is to get rich slow.



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Mark
1/17/2009 1:00:15 AM

Very good advice. I lost everything I had in a business because I wanted to grow too fast. I ended up signing the entire company over to the VC vultures.

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