1. Entrepreneurship & Innovation
Culture in Silicon Valley
Gigi Wang
Managing Partner, MG-Team LLC
Board Member & Chair Emeritus, VLAB
HappyFarm Start-Up Workshops
12 November 2012
2. About Me
Born in Taiwan, grew up in US. English is 3rd language.
BS & MS in Engineering from Stanford, MBA from UC
Berkeley
Worked for 3 Fortune 100’s – Exxon, AT&T, Quaker Oats
Early stage or founding team of multiple start-ups
(InterNex, Pacific Internet in Singapore, truste.org, Ascend
– now Alcatel, UptimeOne, QALA, July Systems)
Currently:
o Managing Partner, MG-Team LLC – international strategic consulting
o Board Member & Chair Emeritus, MIT/Stanford Venture Lab (VLAB)
o Venture Partner, Silicon Valley, iGlobe Partners (venture capital)
3. It Starts with Culture
In addition to the excellent academic
institutions and R&D, governmental
support, and access to investment
capital, it’s the culture that really makes
a region like Silicon Valley so unique
and wildly successful
4. Need to Trust
TRUST begins with open-ness &
transparency
– People don’t trust leaders in governments or
management who aren’t transparent
Practice being open and sharing
information, build trust
Trust must be mutual or it’s not win-win
Where there is trust, the culture is good
5. Risk-Taking
RISK-TAKING: Innovation and
entrepreneurship requires risk-taking in
addition to passion.
Go beyond your comfort zone.
Work in new areas, interact with new people or
travel to new places (cultural tourism)
Failure is good. Making mistakes leads to
valuable experience and knowledge.
“I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” Thomas Edison
6. Collaboration
COLLABORATION: People need to share
ideas and work on problems together, even
competitors
Networking in environment of open-ness
• Kyiv Open Doors – April 2012
• Happy Farm networking events
In the high-tech market place, it’s not about
fighting over the existing pie, but GROWING
the pie together
7. Integrity
INTEGRITY: High level of integrity required
to be open and to collaborate effectively
Non-Disclosure Agreement (NDA) is standard
procedure and captures intent
Integrity is not just about being honest
Relationship Integrity – very key concept
o Not zero-sum game
o Make sure that it’s about “Give & Take” and that
“Win-Win-Win” is the objective, not “Win-Lose”
o Example: Andrew Mason (Groupon CEO)
8. Accessibility
ACCESSIBILITY: Provide budding
entrepreneurs lots of access to experience and
brainpower resources
Budding entrepreneurs Go to events, talk to
strangers. Take a risk and introduce yourself – no
need for formal intro’s (old European style).
Reach out with Facebook & LinkedIn.
Successful entrepreneurs and leaders Be
open and available. Talk to the young
entrepreneurs, share your valuable advice and
learning
9. Constructive Feedback
FEEDBACK: Absolutely critical to get
feedback to understand what you’ve done
right and what you’ve done wrong
Feedback needs to be “constructive” NOT
“negative criticism”
Delivering “negative criticism” to make one’s
feel more powerful or important is counter-
productive and destructive.
o Leaders need to be on the alert of this on their
teams or in their organizations
10. Empowerment
EMPOWER: Give everyone a chance to
contribute to their fullest with ideas and
decisions
“Innovation from the top down is orderly, but
innovation from the bottom is chaotic but
produces mega-success”
Examples: Google (Adwords product), Pacific
Internet, VLAB
As leaders, provide inspiration & direction, not orders.
Be there primarily to provide guidance and help address
emergencies.
11. Share the Wealth
SHARE, SHARE, SHARE
Equitable pay, travel guidelines, perks
Stock options – with employees, with advisors
Examples:
o Ascend Communications (now Alcatel) – generous
with stock and benefits, bought by Lucent for $21B
o Infosys (India IT company) – employees were rich
o Google – free lunches, massages, car washes, etc.
12. Jealousy (and lack therof)
JEALOUSY: The Silicon Valley exhibits a
much less jealous culture than many parts of
Europe and Asia
Instead of being jealous when someone else
does better, see it as an opportunity to have
a relationship with someone successful
It’s more constructive, and less destructive
for a company, for a region, for a country
13. Develop the Right Culture
Key characteristics include open-ness and
collaboration, high level of risk-taking, and
open and collaborative “people networking”
environment
How do we teach ethics and instill high
society and relationship integrity into the
next generation of global citizens?
14. What is Innovation?
Innovation is the creation of better or more
effective products, processes, services,
technologies, or ideas that are accepted by
markets, governments, and society.
Innovation differs from invention in that
innovation refers to the use of a new idea or
method, whereas invention refers more
directly to the creation of the idea or method
itself.
- WIKIPEDIA
16. How to Innovate
Understand the customers and the market.
o Hear your customers, not just listen.
o Very few succeed with just “gut” feel (Jobs,
Zuckerberg)
Conceptualize, Design and Prototype
Collect feedback, lots of it
Iterate, iterate, iterate
As leaders, promote the culture and develop
processes for innovation
17. An Innovation Framework
Five Disciplines of
Innovation, by Curt Carlson
o CEO of SRI International
o Founder of HDTV technology
SRI - hot-bed of innovation
o Computer mouse
o Cancer curing drugs
o Artificial intelligence on
iPhone
18. Five Disciplines (SRI)
Important Customer & Market Needs
o Need to address an important customer or market
need, not address an interesting project
Value Creation
Innovation Champions
o Someone needs to champion the innovation
Innovation Teams
o Multi-discipline skills required to bring to market
Organizational Alignment