Run Outside

I like to run outside.  The fresh air, the music playing in my headphones and the fact that I can lose myself in thought and creativity to the point that I nearly forget I am running.

Running outside my entire life I have developed a bit of an opinion about running inside.  That it sucks.  No offense yet to anyone who runs inside.  I get that for some of you it is easier on your knees, etc., etc., etc.  But for me it simply sucks.

I had to run inside earlier this week when it was 11 degrees outside.  How do you do it?  Seriously, I had to spend my entire time trying to not run off the damn thing.  I could not get the elevation figured out so it was like I was running at the coast the whole time.  Even when I increased the elevation it was nothing like climbing a real hill.

After three miles and about busting my ass at least that many times I ended my “run”. 
I did not think much about running inside again until the temperature went up and I was able to run outside a couple days later.  During my run I realized it was not so much that I was running on a treadmill inside the other day that drove me nuts.  It was the fact that I came to a harsh realization.  Life can easily become like running inside.  You are getting on a machine and running getting nowhere.  Isn’t that the same way you feel when you go to work some days?  You are basically walking into a machine and spinning wheels or helping spin some huge wheel with others.  You get places, you have earnings calls but the movement is almost invisible.

When you are outside you are exposed.  You smell the fresh air as well as the exhaust of a passing car.  You feel the pavement change to concrete change to grass.  You feel the air hit you as your run either with or against the wind.  One of my favorite aspects of running outside is the external stimuli you get that takes your mind into areas you would never go sitting at a desk or looking through some window running inside.

When you are outside your mind reacts.  I have come up with some great ideas while running.  My wife can attest to whenever I come in from a run at home I usually go directly to the notebook and start writing in order to get my ideas down right alongside the sweat and heavy breathing.
For me to present a clearer picture I would like to enlist the help of my friend Jackson Pollock:

OK, well they are not really Mr. Pollock’s work but his inspiration was there!  The pictures are actually the work of the work of the Milam family.  As you can see, the “Milam” on the top is a bit drab.  For what I can see, it is two little dots.  One kind of looks like a sperm.  And the “Milam” on the bottom.  Well that is a little more exciting is it not?  I felt that for some of you visual Jacks, that the “Milam” representations of Treadmill and Running Outside might make my point clearer. 

Outside (no pun) of simply running you can continue to draw parallels between other inner and outer focus points.  Are you an introvert or any extravert?  Are you risk averse or do you take more risks?  Are you comfortable with status quo or are you always trying to shake things up?  Are you more interested in showing off your bod and socializing or are you more of a metaphysical kinda person?

I do hope I have not offended too many indoor runners.  If I have, then come tell me how much you disagree with me while I am running outside!

Reloading, Runways and Tatoos

In the world of entrepreneurship you have lots of stories about successful entrepreneurs starting with an idea, growing it and making millions.  These stories make it sound so appealing.  These stories make you want to quit your crappy job tomorrow and start something new.  The reality is the path less taken is tough with few making it out of the woods on the other side with a profitable business, let alone millions of dollars.

I am one of those stories of who got stuck in the deep dark woods of Entrepreneurville not once, but twice.  The good thing about the woods is you always end up finding your way out at some point.  My most recent exit from the woods took place on a beautiful September day in 2009 when I called some good friends at a great company and I started reloading.

 My second startup, BigLeap GPS, was a location based company focused on finding lost seniors and children by use of a very small GPS device or phone.  After a letter of intent was presented to me and I stopped fundraising I felt I had made it successfully to the other side of the woods, or at least I could see the light.  Well then came the Great Recession and everything changed when the letter of intent disappeared and overnight I had no runway left.  So I did what many of us have done, I started extending my runway by consulting and finding short term gigs to help me continue down the path.  When everything started falling apart around me, this was when I knew it was time to end the ride.  Hence the phone call to my good friends and a great company where I remained for almost 4 years.

Over those nearly 4 years accounts were paid, mortgages were caught up and overall happiness returned to the Milam household.  When you pour everything you have into what you believe it takes some time to build back up, pay off your debts and start looking for what is next.

Looking back I have come to realize my first two ventures were not failures in any sense of the word.  They sustained my family for more than 4 years, I learned more about all aspects of business then I could have ever learned by doing anything else, and each day that I lived that life I became closer and closer to making it.  Both businesses that I started are still in existence.  They are still doing what I set out to do.  But I personally ran out of runway both times but I did make it further down the runway each time.  Sounds like I like the pain.  Like some folks who like tattoos not for their beauty but for the pain and just keep going back to the needle.  I am convinced I am going to keep going back to the needle until my body is covered (I really only have two tattoos that is).

It feels good to sit here and write this especially after everything I have been through.  I am glad my drive to create took a break for a little while so I could get back on solid financial footing.  All creative juices tend to freeze up when you are in a machine.  Once out of the machine it is hard to turn back on.  I used to not even try to be creative.  I would write, create, and think of all the possibilities in my life and business all the time.  When you unplug and are removed from that creative culture you have to try super hard to be creative.  I compare it to trying to boil water on the sidewalk to get the creative juices moving again.  So I have plugged back in and surrounded myself with those friends who are experts at sidewalk cooking.  Don’t eat the eggs however, kinda crunchy.

I was initially embarrassed to re-enter the loving network of my entrepreneurial friends.  It was hard for me to swallow big and reach back out.  I had disappeared for about 4 years inside a big company with little outlets for a tattoo loving entrepreneur.  What I found, by the way, was the exact same community that I had left.  The same friends remained who would do anything for me if I needed them.  Some of those friends were with me in the woods, some are still in there.  I have faith that they will make it.  I have faith we all will make it.

The Death of an Entrepreneur - Part 2

I must admit writing the first post about the Death of an Entrepreneur was therapeutic. It was good to get off my chest those things that I wanted to share. I wanted to get out in the open those things that every technology entrepreneur should consider before doing whatever they are planning on doing.

Problem is, most entrepreneurs must die. There is no way of saving them. They will read my post and then do what I did. They will say "this time it is different", "I will do that later after I get to this stage"... blah blah blah.. and then death.

No matter what you read, or who tells you anything about how to be successful or even how NOT to fail.. guess what, you are going to do what you are going to do and it will happen. Kinda like riding a motorcycle. It is not a matter of if you will wreck it is a matter of when and how bad.

My hope is when you fall you skin your knee. I hope you can bandage it up and keep going. But also understand sometimes you will hit a tree with no helmet going 450 miles an hour while texting and picking your nose.... what I will not understand is if you forget about that tree you hit.

The next time you set out down the road going 450 miles an hour with no helmet my hope is you will at least not text or pick your nose. Chances are you will get further down the road past the site of your last disaster.

I have learned so much from my start up experiences but what I learned and the way I learned them is going to be completely different from the way you learn, however one very basic concept is universal..

Please, please, please remember your mistakes. Remember the skid marks and your blood and skin on the highway in the places you fell.

Entrepreneurs never die. They get beat up, bruised, smashed, crushed, eaten, smacked and ripped from limb to limb but they live. Some how they keep breathing and dreaming and planning... do not let that ever die!

The Death of an Entrepreneur

Here we are coming to the end of a hard, dirty, bullet ridden road. Blood has spilled and the last breath of air enters our lungs. Guess what? This is not the end of the story.

An entrepreneur never dies. They just some how continue to rise from the dead. I know this first hand because I died yet here I am. I am taking yet another breath of air and blood is some how getting to my brain, at least enough to write this post.

What I would like to do is describe the things that lead up to my death so you can avoid following in my path.

1) Your family is #1, #2, and #3. If what you are doing is putting their well being or roof over their head in jeopardy, do not do it. You must be ready well beyond any doubt before you risk the financial pressure and struggles of being an entrepreneur. If I ever strike out again, I will have more money than myself or my family knows what to do with.. with that being said...#4

4) Have so much money in your back pocket that you can not sit down. You better freaking have a mint saved up. Either that or an extremely low requirement for money each month. I had no business starting my last venture. I had no business starting my first venture for that matter because then I had no money and no experience. At least this last time I had one of those two things. One extremely important factor is money. You have to live, eat, and have shelter. You need money for that. Either have a source of revenue prior to starting your venture or have it saved up. Your run way will end if you don't way way too soon. The key and secret to success is runway. You must allow yourself the time you and your business requires to grow and develop into what it was meant to become. A short runway equates to the stress of having to grow fast or die. This pressure is not good or healthy for anyone.

5) Get someone with some sense of finances on your core team. If that person can not dedicate the time or resources to you find someone else. This person needs to watch your money like a hawk and own your ever changing business plan and financial docs. If you are going to require outside funding at some point this (#5) is an absolute requirement for success. I do not care if you have a CPA from Harvard (if that is even possible) you have to build a business and the last thing you need to do is worry about accounting or financial documents until you need them to present to an investor. I had found an ace with sales and accounting skills to help me start BigLeapGPS but his runway was shorter than mine. Looking back, I knew I had to replace him with someone to help in those aspects I was not strong and I didn't. Shame on me!

6) Yes, for the most part, means Hell no screw off. DO NOT listen to the vast majority of people because they are full of shit and are not willing to back anything they say with anything but more shit. I wasted 98.99% of my time on dung spewers. Imagine if I had just stuck to the few that were actually for real in their intentions to work with me and allow us to grow our businesses together. Problem is it is tough to weed out the crap because they are the ones that always sound so good. Keep in mind that 1 out of every 25-30 discussions you have will turn into anything worth your time. People for the most part want to tell you what you want to hear with no intention of ever doing what they say they will do or what you think they will do.

There are more points to address but this is all I can muster tonight.

I have mulled over this post for I know 4-5 months. My intention is not to send future or potential entrepreneurs for the hills. All I want to do is make clear what I learned through dying you can change and adapt to while you still have blood left in your body.

I wanted to make sure I hit home as best I could that it may be exotic thought to start a business and make it successful but the absolute truth is we hear much more about successes then we do of the failures. The successes are those who find their non-shit blower(s) before the runway ends and who have time to still grow their business before an even better funded, more experienced start up doing the same thing eats their lunch. The process is a challenge. It was one of the greatest challenges of my life.

I do want to end this post with something positive... If an entrepreneur dies, they come back stronger.

So worst case, at least you have that to look forward to... Good luck and don't die!!! Get it right the first time....

Hello, I am Joe. I am a bootstrapper.

I wrote this blog as if I were walking into a treatment facility. I am committing myself for the reason of being a bootstrapper. I walk in and everyone says, "Hey Joe, what are you in for?" And I say, Hello I am Joe. I am a bootstrapper. Well what does that really mean? Let's talk about the meaning of "bootstrap" first: "to help oneself, often through improvised means." Every time I read that definition I have to laugh a little to myself because it is so prefect, particularly the bit about improvised means. If you are bootstrapping a business, you are living improvisation firsthand. The only way for a business to not be considered bootstrapped is for it to bring in enough revenue to cover its costs and the costs of the (now very simple) lives of its owners/entrepreneurs.

Although I am a bootstrapper, I have had help along the way. I have received some funds from friends and family to get my business to 2009. In January 2009, I hoped to bring in additional funding from other sources, but the economy's nose dive had other plans for us. That other plan was continued improvisation. But here we are in July, and we are still doing it! We are not just surviving; we are driving! We are going out and developing other markets; we are getting more players involved; we are not stopping. You stop, you die. We believe way too much in what we are doing at this point to die. We believe in our hearts, souls, and minds that our product will make a difference, be successful, and (in our case) save lives. You don't bootstrap if you don't believe. We believe!

So what does it look like? Bootstrapping means no vacations to the beach when everyone else on Facebook is going and snapping pictures. Bootstrapping is living well under whatever means you were used to. So instead of a dinner at Lattitude you have dinner at home, $1 rentals from your local supermarket vs. going to the movies. Bootstrapping is really just living more simple lives then you were probably used to living. And I ask you, is that so bad? Imagine applying the rules of bootstrapping to a family that currently has a good income. Imagine for a second if you acted as if you were improvised by saving vs. spending. WOW! I know I would be in a different place if I followed my own advice today.

The craziest thing of all is that bootstrappers bootstrap by choice. Most of us left paying jobs with normal hours to pursue our dreams, and most of us brought others along for the ride. Our passion propels us out of our comfort and into improv-land. It's an odd place to be; the air seems thinner, like it's hard to get a full, deep breath. It's a steep climb, but we know in our hearts that when we unfasten our bootstaps at the summit, the view will be phenomenal.

Are you a bootstrapper? Please share your story and pictures with us...

I have included a picture of my running shoes which are also my grass cutting shoes and pretty much everything else shoes, for the simply reason that they are my boots, they represent the number of miles I need to get out of every single investment I make.

A Business Case for Connecting

I believe it is going to take a mixture of unique methods to kick start our economy. I am not an economist and do not know how to better spend money none of us have. What I do know is the power of making connections to help our community and yourself down the road. This act may very well be one of the strongest things we can do to boost our economy.

For example, you know someone who makes socks and you know someone who distributes socks well invite them both to lunch or send out an introduction e-mail. There may be nothing there or it could turn into the type relationship that transforms both their businesses. It is not up for you to decide. It is up for them and what can come from them getting together. I bet right now if you think about it there are at least two or three sets of people either in your industry or not that you have thought of to connect together. Do it. Get these people together.

I recently called a lunch meeting with two of the premier wireless leaders in the Upstate. The result of that meeting was two gentlemen who have been in the same industry and in the same geography for more than 10 years coming together on a business idea that could end up being huge for both companies. Prior to this meeting they had never met face to face but when the introduction lunch was called, there was no hesitation.

I did not get anything directly out of the lunch introduction. But I might down the road. I believe that for every good thing you do you are rewarded by 100 virgins, no really, I believe everything comes back around in multiples of three. For every good thing you do, you get it back x3. Plus it just feels good to do something positive in business when everything else around us is so negative.

Please, take a few moments right now to introduce at least two people together who you have been thinking needed to meet. Use Swampfox use Linkedin, you whatever you have, heck... maybe an e-mail or phone call.

Please share your successes in this post of when either someone connected you with someone that had a fundamental change in your business or a connection you made between two individuals or companies that resulted in something very positive.

Fear vs. Belief

While I was out running the other night I realized something seismic: belief conquers fear. More specifically, I had conquered my fear of entrepreneurship through belief. While there are many important steps to building a successful start-up business, none is more important than this: the day you realize that your belief in your idea, product, or service is bigger than your fears and anxiety about the business and its future. The day you realize that is a good day.

Leading up to this moment I remember feeling and even saying to some of you that I felt like you could punch me, stab me, shoot me with whatever you had, and everything would bounce off. This feeling was me overcoming fear and believing more and more in what I was doing and the direction we were heading.

In this path I have traveled for nearly 2 years, there have been the highest highs and the lowest lows. And by lows, I mean stress so intense it resulted in temporary loss of vision in one eye. That's scary. And that's it, really - the lowest lows were fueled by fear. The highest highs were fueled by my belief being validated that things were going to be alright.

I am not going to sit here and tell you I am not going to have more lows. I know I will, and I know they could happen any day. But I also know when they do happen, I will pull through and get on top again.

Belief is easier when you start getting external validation. One such validation of our business and overall business model is the fact that we are slowly growing while other much larger competitors are failing. Much larger, better funded, "better lead" companies are fizzling out of gas, and we are just sitting there watching them fall from the sky like bugs hitting the zapper. Why?

It is not because we have a better product or a better portal or a better idea. It is our model. Our approach to getting business done. Talk about validation of belief! Hiding behind patents seems to be worthless. We have patents, but your only true defense in this global market is execution. No start up has funding to protect its patents against a bigger player, and the time wasted in the courts is time wasted focused on your market.

When you have no money things are tough, but when you have no belief, things are impossible.

TechCrunch50 or not, we are getting ready to Launch!

Here we are.... 1 1/2 years later, we are almost ready to announce to the world our ideas and products on how to effectively reduce the number of missing, lost, and injured children worldwide. I really want this to be drilled home with anyone who reads about or knows anything about BigLeapGPS. We want to bring lost, missing, injured, and kidnapped children home quickly and safely with the world's smallest GPS protection technology that most everyone will be able to afford. We are excited and you should be as well... more coming soon... very very soon!

We were close but no cigar, this year...

Hello everyone... I had to remove all press related to BigLeapGPS and our magic sauce to the GPS market last month because we were on the short list for this year's TechCrunch50 in San Francisco. We ended up not making the cut this year but it has done nothing but motivate us to get it done next year. Here is the website, we were up against some fantastic companies... www.techcrunch50.com. There were over 1000 submissions from 49 different countries. Again, I feel it was a great honor to have made it as far as we did.

So with that being said, BigLeapGPS is moving forward at quite a tick right now... we have our prototype under development as we speak... should be ready to demo in November of this year. Our website is being put together by Orangecoat ... www.orangecoat.com and is going to be a showstopper... not to build it up or anything. But we should be releasing the website, our press release on our official launch, and other things very very soon so please stay tuned....

This has been an amazing trip so far. Thank you to everyone who has been apart of this and I look forward to us all celebrating the success of BigLeapGPS for years to come....

BigLeapGPS LLC. receives investment from private source and SCLaunch!

Submitted by: Joe Milam on Aug 08, 2008 at 3:12 pm Tagged with: Investment, start up Source: BigLeapGPS LLC.

BigLeapGPS LLC., a disruptive GPS technology start up focused on the licensing, engineering and delivery of the world's smallest personal GPS device, is pleased to announce receiving seed investment from a private source as well as a product development grant from SCLaunch!

“We are excited that after a year of hard work we are finally on our way,” said Joe Milam, the founder of BigLeapGPS, LLC.

BigLeapGPS LLC. is a company that is focused on delivering safety and peace-of-mind through the application of wireless networks, GPS location and software technology.

The BigLeapGPS device is a non-obtrusive, easy to use, and highly customizable solution for use in multiple markets from asset tracking to personal protection. All BigLeapGPS devices are tied to a 24/7 web portal for accurate, real time and historical device location anywhere in the GSM cellular world.

The BigLeapGPS story started nearly one year ago after an unsuccessful search for a small GPS device for protecting children. The passion for child protection translated into some amazing innovation that will change the way manufacturers build personal GPS devices.

For details on their technology please contact Joe at jmilam@bigleapgps.com

See 4 other posts submitted by Joe Milam. Find articles, people, and videos related to: Investment, start up

My "Stinky" Motivation

Here is a funny story I wanted to share about one of the core elements that continues to motivate me to create and launch my ideas...

About 4 years ago I had an idea... underwear that would absorb any gas issues one would have. Let me say this was not a personal issue, I just thought it was a good idea... that small note was for all of you who were snickering out there. So basically the underwear would absorb your stinky gas and instead of making your neighbor in the car suffer they would instead be treated to the smell of roses, a fresh breeze, Hell... anything but what it actually smelled like. So I called up my brother-in-law who is a chemical engineer and asked him how we could do it. After he laughed for a while he said he would think about it. Well, we never talked about it again.

So I was sitting in traffic in Atlanta one afternoon when low and behold I heard something I could not believe. An interview with some guys who had done what I thought up a few years before... http://www.flat-d.com/technology1.html .

I called my brother-in-law up that night and told him what I had heard... I told him right then, that this would not happen again. And again I am not sure he heard me because he was laughing still at me.

This was my one idea, albeit a stinky one, that got away and I now look at every good idea I have very closely because I DO NOT want what happened with my underwear to happen again.

I know a lot of you have similar stories of ideas you had that you did not carry through with but someone did.. if you have them, please post them as a reply to this.

These missed opportunities should motivate you to create, create, create and not just come up with an idea and sit on it or in the case of my idea, take it a step further and gas it to death.

Today was a good day

The trip of an entrepreneur is more up and down then the biggest, fastest roller coaster in world. It has the lowest lows followed by some highs that would empress Cheech and Chong. Today was a good day and helped to remind me of the value of your close network of friends, advisers, and family that you are consistently surrounded by and get all the necessary support you need. I am so thankful to have the network around me that I have. So much so that I know without a doubt that I would be nowhere near where I am with BigLeapGPS as I am now without it. I did a presentation to an entrepreneur class at Clemson several months back and I kept coming back to my network. I kept saying that everything I have and have been able to do was based on that and a student piped up and said, "How can I get in on this network?" I told him to come to InnoVenture 2008, he came, and I introduced him to my network. It is not rocket science to find the people around you that can help, it is building a relationship and trust with them before anything is asked of them that makes a great difference. To go as far as even doing something for them because any supportive network is a two way street and will never work if all you do is take and take. Give, give a lot and things come back many, many times over. Of all the investments, sales training classes, self help groups, whatever else I have invested in in the past to better myself - my network has by far been my greatest investment.

Idea creation is nothing compared to what you do with it

Everybody has ideas. As anyone, so what was or is your great idea that could change the world? What is your paper drink umbrella or your paper click or your post it note? Most everyone will have at least one idea if not many that are truly unique and would be a game changer if they had taken the idea further than just saying, "Hey, what about this?" Don't get me wrong, having great ideas are very important but what is even more important is you doing something with them or sharing your ideas with people that can do something. There is absolutely nothing wrong in sharing a concept with a mover and a shaker especially if you know yourself well enough to know you are not going to do anything about it. Please, share your game changers with someone, chances are if they move forward with anything you give them it will come back 3 fold in your favor.

The American Idol Business Method

Think about it for a second in business terms rather than music. What if you had the ability to take a list of product ideas and concepts, present them to the world and let the world tell you which ones they like best and would/will buy when they are produced.
Think about what this concept cuts out for a business. 1) research on what the customer will buy. 2) product pre-production costs based on estimates rather than exact interest figures. 3) the risk of developing a product that would not sell.
The most popular TV show in the world is nothing more than a product advertisement and they are getting paid by the viewer to tell them which products they will pay more money for. The business model for American Idol is genius. You get paid to figure out what product to produce then you get paid on the finished product.
How can we apply those same terms to business and effectively deliver a list of products, ideas, or concepts to the market at large and make the potential customer care enough to provide feed back and at the same time get excited enough about the finished product to turn around and buy it when available?

At Test - The true value of an idea - Can we make Greenville Wireless?

Submitted by: Joe Milam on Jun 21, 2008 at 8:57 pm Tagged with: idea creation, Wireless Source: BigLeapGPS

When I had coffee with John Warner in the Fall of last year to talk about my BigLeapGPS idea; we had met at Port City Java on a busy morning. I asked John to sit outside because I was, at that time, like most other idea guys... I was very careful about who I talked to and who was listening. John made a point to me about my concerns. He said if I stood in the middle of Port City Java and announced to the customers what I was doing with BigLeapGPS and how I was going to do it, no one would do anything about it. No one would steal this idea I hold so close to my heart and I guess number one point is no one will implement what it would take to start a busienss around it. I believe those comments now more than ever being reminded of the trials it takes to get a start up started.
So with all that being said, I have an idea and I want to share it with the SwampFox community and I want to see if anyone will actually construct a business case around this idea and do something with it. Here it is:

Many of you may remember that back in 2003 I installed one of the first business sponsored Wi-Fi networks in the country right here in downtown Greenville. Well after the keys to the wireless network were given to another company to run it has not run very well, if at all. I have an idea on how to get a working wireless network back up in downtown Greenville as well as provide a marketing medium for the participates in the network.

In summary, get a lot of restaurants, bars and other businesses in the downtown areas all up and down Main Street to allow you to install a small piece of software on their existing wireless access point or sell an access point for $95.00. Set all the network names to the same SSID or network identifer, something like freeGVwireless.com whatever the website address is. And have all the access points redirect anyone who logs onto them to this www.freeGVwireless.com website where all the participating businesses are highlighted.

Forget having cities spend hundreds and millions on Metro-Wi-Fi projects, build the networks organically from the centers of commerce.

The key here is to have the participating business pay very little if anything for the exposure on the website because they are helpig fuel traffic to the site. This is where you need to be creative on how to generate revenue from this model. There is your challenge SwampFox... let's see if we can figure this out. If this is NOT a good idea, please let me know that as well and let me know why.

As always, I am an e-mail away with any questions. jmilam@bigleapgps.com

Here is the link to the software:
http://www.dd-wrt.com/dd-wrtv3/

Thank you and good luck!

Cranking up the wheel

It is truly hard to believe my last post was in December! I guess that is what happens when you are really trying to launch a business. So with that being said, if you see someone trying to launch a business and they have blog entries every day or so... are they really building a business?? Anyway, BigLeapGPS is still moving forward. We have two investors behind us to help get things rolling and I have found some invaluable advisers who are giving their blood and sweat into this project right there with me.

It is amazing to look back over the short time, also a year now, that I have been developing this business to see the things that have changed and the things that have remained the same. In many areas of life change is not looked at as always good. In a start up it is absolutely essential to success. Without almost constant change and business plan tests you will not get very far. You have always got to listen to the ones around you who are more experienced. These people come into your path at different times. Stay true to your goals but remember there are many ways of getting there and it is best to follow the paths well traveled.

With all that being said I feel it is important to publish the BigLeapGPS story and goals as they are today. I do hope these goals are reached in one way, shape or form down the road. The actual way we get there is yet to be determined all I know is I believe in it and the people around me. When you have that, what can stop you?

The birth of BigLeapGPS

By the way, I have not shared with anyone outside of FastTrac or my close friends and associates what business I am developing and going to be launching. It is called BigLeapGPS. It will be the world's smallest personal GPS tracking device focused initially on child tracking. From there the uses are limitless. Keep an eye open for the site to go live as we have a few more developments happen. www.bigleapgps.com Nothing is there now but I promise it will be.

This idea came about at the end of August 2007 when my wife Chris and I were talking in the kitchen. Let me tell you first off that like must of you I am full of ideas and have been spouting them off to Chris since we met. This idea was the first one where she stopped what she was doing and told me this was my best idea yet. The idea was to incorporate a small GPS tracking device into a piece of jewelry for a child to wear so it would not be detected by a kidnapper.

Well here we are 3 months later, I have a business plan, an investor pitch, an amazing engineering company behind me and an entire entrepreneurial community beside me. Things are looking very promising and if I have my way about it, we will be manufacturing and selling this product before the end of 2008.

Please let me know your thoughts on this concept and if you are a manufacturer of a product or set of products focused on the child market for ages 3 through 8 please get in touch with me as I would like to validate my idea of incorporating my technology with your product.

Please write and let me know your thoughts... I am also interested in the political viewpoints many of you have. I know the reasons for me bringing this product to market is to return lost and kidnapped children safely and quickly. However, I am sure a completely different position can be taken and I want to hear about it.

Soccer vs. Swimming - A Classic Dilemma

I remember vividly when I was 9 years old and my mother had, at this point, been taking me from soccer practice to swim meets to soccer games to out of State meets for swimming... it all came to a head one day after soccer practice when she asked me, "Joe, I really need for you to choose one sport over the other because I can not continue to keep this up for you." My mom posed the first major decision I had to make in my life. Do I continue playing soccer or do I literally dive full time into swimming. Well, the way my mind worked then is a little different than now... I decided to swim because I was starting to get really good and because girls swam more then they played soccer. So there you have it. I chose swimming and ended up swimming my way to 6 State records, national rankings in several events and most importantly a swimming scholarship to Clemson. I would say the life changing decision I made at 9 years old worked out pretty well.

I bring all this up because all entrepreneurs must make a similar decision at some point. They have been doing one thing for a while, maybe their entire professional career, and here is something to take them away from the norm and into something completely different. Again the move, change, or whatever you want to call it was brought on by something inside you going, you have got to make a choice. Well, now it is something inside and no longer my mother. To choose doing what you have been doing or to do something you have never done before and hopefully something that has never been done by anyone else either.

I never looked back to soccer after I made my decision to swim. Sure, I would play it in the backyard or with friends but I never wanted to go back to what I was doing prior to my decision to swim. I made the decision to swim and that is what I did. An entrepreneur must have the same drive and determination to make the decision and not look back. Every bit of focus and energy must be dedicated to making your goal a reality.

What was the first major decision you ever had to make and how did it affect your life?

I am back... Finally!!

Hello everyone! I am very sorry for the small disappearance. One of the things I quickly learned as I started to build a business is the lack of time for everything. Being the father of three young children, the husband of a very busy and driven wife one barely has time to eat.

Since my last post in Sept. there have been a lot of things that have happened. I will start by saying the FastTrac TechVenture class was by far the best thing a tech-driven entrepreneur could do for their efforts. I started by new business venture planning at the same time the class started. By the time the class was done in 11 weeks, I had a solid foundation on which to build.

I hope to be able to fill in more details shortly and try to get this blog caught up again. Not to say I have any extra time but I feel this medium is extremely important and I want to do whatever I can to help guide and maybe inspire like minded individuals to dive in and take a swim in the entrepreneur waters...