Ted Waitt's success factors

During the recent Investment Capital Conference, lunchtime key noter Ted Waitt, founder and Chairman of Gateway, presented his top 10 list of attributes for the successful start-up.  And by every measure imaginable, Waitt has been phenomenally successful.  Gateway is 20 years old and still ranks as one of the great start-up success stories - $10,000 borrowed from a grandmother, assembling PCs to order, the cow-colored boxes, a barn in Sioux City, recent forays into home entertainment and the acquisition of e-Machines.  Today Ted spends his time fostering entrepreneurship, heading Avalon Capital Group and his philanthropy.

Waitt's 10 keys to success -

1. Vision - seeing things that nobody has done before;
2. Faith and Belief - in not only yourself but in what you are doing;
3. Naive - nobody around that told him what they were doing couldn't be done;
4. Ignorance - not the same as naive, rather ignoring nonsense, critics and naysayers who all knew better;
5. Common sense - and he is still amazed at how little there seems to be in many businesses;
6. Risk taking - having the guts to put it all out there;
7. Doing it while you are young - with age and families and material well-being, the risk from failure increases.  Do it while the need for certainty and conventional life style are less;
8. Persistence - staying with the idea through all sorts of trials;
9. Improvisation - being flexible enough to abandon what doesn't work and try new things as circumstance and conditions warrant; and,
10. Goal oriented - having the end game clearly in focus.

Waitt is an engaging speaker - funny, topical, brash and his stories sounded very familiar.  In fact, it was a throwback to much of what passed for start-up mantras during the bubble.  And it was in stark contrast to the rest of the day at the conference which featured more sober people doing sober things to achieve business success.  What was apparent in Ted but seemingly lacking in others who presented on panel sessions or at keynotes was passion and a sense of adventure.

You can argue the merits of the buttoned down, look at the numbers, serious people doing serious work approach versus the brash, confident, enthusiasm that characterizes successful start-ups.  In light of the excesses from five years ago the former approach is prudent, studied and justified.  And to be clear, the steelier proponents of doing things by the number and by the book were not without enthusiasm and confidence in what they were doing.  Richard Heckmann, the chairman of K2 who gave the early morning keynote, was every bit as enthusiastic and confident – but in a different way. The other executives who presented were doing well as indicated by realizing their strategic intents, improving stock price or general condition of their businesses.  And they knew they were not only doing the right thing but doing it the right way for their situation.

Yet there was something about Ted that was familiar to anyone who has worked with or participated in a successful start-up.  There is a quality in their leadership that you don't find on Mahogany Row at larger enterprises or those enterprises that aspire just to be large.  There is a curiosity, the sense of naiveté, a determination that gets reinforced by others challenging the plan or the concept and there is team building rather than hiring a collection of employees.  And then there was a feeling that Ted Waitt was fun - afternoon keggers, play some foosball and just hang out with fun.

I don't miss the nonsense that characterized the bubble period and I applaud the firms featured at this Investment Capital Conference that can get stellar results through judicious growth.  The adults seem to be in charge again and that is for the better.  But I do miss the fun - the people, the insouciance, the irreverence and the arrogance.  Like the bumper sticker says:  Please God, Just One More Bubble.