Last week I was part of a panel discussion for TiE on the New York startup scene. I was invited to talk about my experience as both a TechStars Alumnus and founder of Red Rover and AlumniChoose.

Before the event officially started, everyone was casually networking around the room. At one point a lady popped into my conversation and introduced herself and asked what I did. As soon as I finished describing AlumniChoose, she tapped the shoulder of someone nearby and said we needed to talk to each other. As soon as she brought the two of us together in a handshake, she walked away without saying anything. Then a few moments later, she tapped another person I was talking with and pulled him, mid-sentence, away from our conversation and into another one. I continued to watch her work her “magic” around the room and she kept repeating the same system over and over.

In Dance Floor Theory, we teach student leaders to be spatulas of the dance floor. In other words, we teach them to be facilitators of relationships and to focus less on the event and more on the introductions that happen from the event. In doing that, we want them to connect people together around shared interests. Then, once that relationship is started, move on to another group and make more connections. By the end of the night, everyone should, in theory, know everyone else, which makes for a great, long-lasting, dance party. Hence the picture above.

In theory, that’s what the lady last week was doing, but it rubbed me the wrong way, and here’s why…

• Genuine Interest – When she asked me what I did, I thought she was genuinely interested in what I did, but in reality, she was just trying to figure out who she could connect me to as fast as possible. It felt cold, which is the opposite of a relationship. Had she asked me a couple follow up questions, it would have felt much better.

• Right Timing – Knowing when to pull someone into and out of conversations is a bit of an art. But one good rule to follow is don’t pull someone out of a conversation mid-sentence, unless they want you to. This lady not only pulled someone out of a conversation mid-sentence, but it was within a few minutes of having her just introduced us together. We were just warming up our conversation, and she cut it off. A relationship takes time to build roots.

• Make It Natural - Once you see how a magic trick is done, the magic is gone. DFT is magical when done right, but like a magic trick, if you reveal to the audience how you are doing it, it’s no longer natural and feels forced. The lady last week made her ‘introduction game’ so obvious, that I then doubted the value of the introductions she was actually trying to make happen. She was going for quantity over quality and in doing so, her magic trick was reveled.

I suspect the lady thought she was being smooth and helping connect everyone to everyone else in the room. Overall, she probably was being more helpful than harmful, because most won’t even think to make introductions like she was. But the real art is in the practice of making it seem like you aren’t even trying and that you genuinely want to connect two people together because they actually should connect, not becuase you want to make your dance floor better.

After six months of exploration since leaving Red Rover, I’ve narrowed down my list of potential new projects to one that is most exciting. For now I’ll hold off on talking about the idea, but since this is my third (maybe fourth) time ramping up a new business, my goal is to be extremely transparent in the process by reflecting on my thoughts, and actions, on this blog so you all can share in the journey with me because it’s bound to be a fun, bumpy, and exciting ride. I’m calling the series “Founder Lessons.” So let’s get started…

When Kevin and I started Swift Kick seven years ago, I naturally thought we’d split the equity ownership of the company 50/50. Kevin refused and said he would never do an equal split again after some ugliness his last company because without a clear leadership structure both legally, and through an organizational chart, it would cause too many issues down the road. Plus he didn’t believe we were both going into the new venture as equal partners. He wanted to spilt the company more along the lines of 75/25. I understood not being 50/50, but a 75/25 split seemed insane to me. What did he know that I didn’t? Turns out there was a lot I didn’t know I didn’t know. To my benefit, we ended up starting Swift Kick at 51/49, though the equity conversation came up several times again throughout the years and it kept shifting through renegotiations and ended around a 75/25 split. The renegotiations were mostly initiated due to feelings of unfairness around the equity split. But mixing feelings with negotiations creates an ugly stew, especially when it isn’t based on a foundation of tangible facts.

As I ramp up my new idea, I find myself going back over seven years of notes to see what and how we ended up determining the equity each time. In doing so, I came across a little gem that I’m calling The Starting Founders’ Equity Equation. It’s a way create a foundation of tangible facts to determine what everyone is bringing to the table to start and thus what the equity spilt should be.

Here’s a description of each element…

• Idea / Vision – If the idea / vision were a tangible pie that equaled 100, who contributed what amount to the creation and generation of the idea up until this point?
• Capital ($) – If the company needs X amount of money (in this case I’m using 100 for X) to get going, who can put in what amount of that total to start?
• Unpaid Time – In the beginning, founders exchange a paycheck for equity. If the max unpaid time someone could put in is 100, what amount of unpaid time will each person be able to put into the business in the start-up phase?
• Resources – If you listed out the resources (knowledge, skill, connections, etc) that were needed to make the business successful and the max were 100 per person. How close to 100 would each person get?

Once you’ve filled in numbers for each element, add up the totals for each founder and divide that number by the total for all the founders combined and you will get a rational way to spilt up the equity that is based on a foundation of tangible facts. In this case, if founder #1 would’ve agreed to a 33/33/33 split then eventually it would’ve come up that he/she was the only one putting money in, or that he/she was the only one with contacts, or that he/she was the only one working for free. It’s better to work through this equation now than to face the argument later and try to renegotiate.

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Update 4/21/12 – Someone created a nice little calculator that helps you figure out the equity split.

The TechStars Bloomberg documentary aired tonight. Some people on Twitter were calling it the American Idol of start-ups. I honestly wasn’t sure what to expect. We, in Red Rover, were in the NY TechStars program for 4 months and they did a TON of filming. They must have walked away with 1000s of hours of footage so they really could’ve taken the story in any direction they wanted. And they did…

Within the first 10 minutes of the show, it was pretty clear what six companies they are going to focus on for the next six episodes, and Red Rover wasn’t one of them. What that means is that they are probably not going to use any of the footage of us expect maybe a few b-rolls of us interacting with one of the main six. If what happens on TV is reality, then it will almost seem like we weren’t even on the show or in TechStars :-/.

Having done the NBC Today Show wedding contest and now the TechStars Bloomberg show, I know that producers are out to create the best possible show and whether you like it or not, they are in charge. What happens in the end is up to them not you. Apparently a $1mm+ revenue generating enterprise software solution with a group of tall guys who dress sharp and work hard isn’t good for TV . Understandably, we didn’t have any big pops during or after the filming so in terms of a story…there really wasn’t one with Red Rover.

I’m still excited to watch the rest of the season though, as I love watching the start-up hustle. You can watch with me Monday nights at 9pm EST on Bloomberg TV, or streaming on their website.

It’s the end of August and most schools are gearing up for students coming back to campus. That means it’s also my busiest travel season. As an example, over the past three days I took three flights, stayed in three different locations, and rented three different cars. Fall travel craziness gets insane really fast.

But for me, it’s all worth it. The past three programs were almost euphorically amazing. Three standing ovations at three different schools. I crushed each program. I mean REALLY crushed them. I felt so amazing on stage and the students just got it. I mean they REALLY got it. I can’t tell you how awesome it feels to have people come up afterwards and tell me not just how excited they are, but also tell me how it’s going to change the way they think about their student leadership position…and life! I mean to be in a position where I get to do that to 1000s of students every month is freakin’ awesome.

Over the past seven years I’ve played many roles within both Swift Kick and Red Rover. Every position came with it’s own learning curve and challenges. But the excitement of trying to figure it out didn’t always sustain after I did figure it out. Doing trainings and keynotes is something that took me a long time to figure out, but now that I have, it is still just as exciting to me. I love building a speech from the ground up and then presenting it, and I love growing the Swift Kick community so we can impact even more lives with our work and message.

It took me seven years to figure out what within Swift Kick was most exciting to me, but now that I have, I don’t know why I’d want to do anything else.

Below is the tralier for an upcoming documentry airing on Bloomberg TV starting September 13th at 9pm that follows the behind-the-scense progress of ten tech companies here in NYC, including Red Rover. Click here to read the full story from TechCrunch.

It’ll be interesting to watch how each company is positioned as our personalities and business styles were all over the place. I suspect our Red Rover crew will be seen as the serious, enterprise company dealing with big money coming in and out.

Though I was interviewed and on camera a lot, I’m not sure how much I’ll be seen during the show as Kevin is Red Rover’s CEO. I did however have my share of practical jokes that were caught on camera, so we’ll see.

8/8/11 UPDATE: Bloomberg just launched their website for the show.

The concept of mob/herd mentality has been around a while. The basic idea is that individuals acting within a crowd loose their ability to make individual rational decisions and instead move with the actions of the mob whether right or wrong.

A couple weeks ago, during a Red Rover Happy-Half-Hour, the topic of Rebecca Black came up. The conversation started with jokes about her viral video and the massive amount of bashing that was happening online. Then Matt told us more about Rebecca’s back story. He humanized her which meant it was no longer funny to make fun of her.

She’s only 13 years old. Most of her online bashers would never be so mean to a 13 year old to their face. My wife said the online mob has basically dehumanized her like she’s an LoLcat. It’s ok to make fun of cats doing stupid stuff because they aren’t human. But Rebecca is. Makes me wonder about the idea of digital mob mentality.

If something were to happen to Rebecca, would/should everyone who made fun of her online be responsible? Or at least would they feel responsible?

If a group of adults relentlessly verbally abused a 13 year old at school and then that 13 year old went home and hung herself, the adults could be held legally responsible. Or at the very least should feel emotional responsible.

With online bullying (cyber bullying) on the rise in many schools, I wonder what kind of example we as adults are setting when we act the way we did with Rebecca Black. We can’t tell our kids to be respectful online when we ourselves disply digital mob mentality.

Today we had a last minute new mentor that popped into the #TechStars offices. Kevin was already gone for the day, so Dan and I led the conversation. While there was very little business value gained from the meeting because he was in a totally different industry, I gained a lot of value from being forced to talk through our idea. When Kevin and I are together in a meeting, it’s expected that he leads the conversation. He’s done it a million times and he does it well. I’ve told the Red Rover/Swift Kick story a million times too, but each time I tell it, I get better. I want to tell it more. I want to have mentor meetings where I’m leading because that’s how I get better. I don’t get better from listening all the time. And in the same breath I have a lot to learn and keeping my mouth shut and ears open is a good way to do that.

We have a lot going on right now and while some things are fires in the kitchen that need to be handled right away, other things are longer term projects that have incremental pieces that add up over time to a lot of stuff. This is where project management comes in. Set the milestones, tasks, deadlines, and resources needed, then execute. A great project manager sells..and gives piece of mind to the rest of the team. Through piece of mind comes planning ahead so it doesn’t come to a last minute crunch of sloppiness.

Kevin’s been calling me out over the past week on not giving him piece of mind on the projects I’m heading. It’s tough to hear and accept because I’ve done a lot of work both on the planning side and the “doing” side. But there is still sloppiness leaking out in my work. Each piece of sloppiness adds up over time and manifests itself as a lack of piece of mind for Kevin and the rest of the team.

It’s easy to just say I’ll make sure there won’t be any more sloppiness, but that’s a lot harder to make happen. I’m spending some time today to go back to my planning and see what I can do to better deliver that piece of mind. I suspect it’s going to revolve around prioritizing my upcoming projects better and dropping everything but the most important stuff. That includes the possibility of dropping a project or two. Right now I feel overwhelmed and I know, based on my past work, if I try and take on too much, then everything suffers.

Moving students from online connections to offline engagement is a goal of Red Rover. We want to help you find people who are excited about the same things as you within your community and then help you go do stuff around those interests. Facilitating connections around shared interests builds a sense of comfort which according to researchers, like Astin and Tinto, leads to increased participation and, ultimately, retention.

For FYE courses we co-wrote curriculum that uses Red Rover to help students understand the concepts of first impressions and digital identities.

We’ve received a collection of requests to write activities for orientation that use Red Rover to help connect students together better while at orientation. Below is the first, of many, outlines for ways to better implement Red Rover at orientation.