i-factor sanjib sahoo techweek 2014 presentation
TRANSCRIPT
How to Embrace the
“I-Factor” Necessary to Assure Startup Success
Sanjib Sahoo(@sahoosanj)
CTO tradeMONSTER Group
Embrace Failure. Eliminate Fear.
Create True value.
Chicago is home to 34 Fortune 50052% of the Fortune 500 have disappeared since 2000
A Startup is born in Chicago every ~48 hours
About 75% of the startups fail.
~ 32 million total trades per day~6 billion total quotes per day
~10-12 billion total messages on busy days
Day = 6.5 hours
Trading Systems: Market Data/Day
Trades QuotesEquity 31,102,669 1,096,023,600
Option 902,370 4,519,638,000
Futures 792,112 30,412,934
Total 32,797,151 5,646,074,534
May 18, 2012, Nasdaq's system failed during the Facebook IPO and contributed to $500 million in losses
August 22, 2013: Nasdaq’s Security Information Processor (SIP) system had a software defect that caused a massive 3-hour trading halt throughout the industry
Recent Outages and Glitches
August 1, 2012 Knight Capital Group lost $461M from a software bug – Wall Street Journal
April 24, 2013 CBOE system failure halted trading in S&P500 options for 4 hours - NY Times
Wed, Jan 8, 2014 E*TRADE was down from 10:30am to 3pm – Wall Street Journal
Wed, Jan 8, 2014: Scottrade was down from 9:40am to 10:45am – Wall Street Journal
tradeMONSTER: Went from a small Chicago startup to industry leader in 5 years.Mission: Making a difference in people’s lives. Empowering people to trade “Anywhere, Anytime.”
Ranked as the top 2 online trading company in the nation Many times first in the industry: disrupting the trading industry’s user experience with innovation. Growing 164% in revenue year over year in the last 4 years.
“In a city that is looking for its next big tech hit not named Groupon, tradeMONSTER might be the answer.” – Sun Times, Chicago
Calculated Risks Focus on Business value Focus on User Experience Ability to fail fast
Organizational
“ I-FACTOR”
Get Basics RightInstead Risk = Bad Assume Calculated Risk = Innovation= True Value->Success!(56% of projects in the industry fail to create value)
Cool technology does not cut it. Technology is a medium. Business value is key.
Failure should be accepted. There is no safe disruption, only varying risks and rewards.
Success can come with passion and belief. Understanding from a user’s perspective is critical.
Changing outlook towards Failure 40% fail= 60% success
The failure to take on value-adding projects is worse than taking on projects that fail
Small failures provide great opportunities to learn
A focus on acquiring gains will lead to better results than a focus on avoiding losses
Failing fast and moving forward is a big win
Don’t try to preserve past investments, it delays value creation
Attitude is even more important than Ability
"Ability is what you're capable of doing. Motivation determines what you do. Attitude determines how well you do it."
Remember: You don’t hire innovators or entrepreneurs, you hire a spirit.
Growing own Leaders…Leaders grow leaders, not followers!
Foundation Phase Flat organization Hiring strategy Inclusive management style Tough love
Growth Phase Identify talent Acquire business knowledge Cross training Technical leadership (horizontal and vertical structure)
Optimization Phase Acceptance of leaders within team Conflict management Overall vision development People management
@ Connect with customers, Stakeholders, business peers, team, social and public mediaDisrupt traditional governance, think beyond and think of value creation. Engage in Innovation. Take measured risks. Focus on Value.Transform businesses with a data-driven model to create a competitive differentiator!
-Having an Innovative idea is not enough.-Understand ROI and map innovation to a business case. -Map how the proposed innovation is going to
help in customer acquisition/customer retention
Evaluate business case for a competitive differentiator and creating value1
-Analytics/Data-Focus on User Experience. -Focus on Why: Have a mission!
Remember: Innovation is meaningless without generating true business value. You don’t just have an IT strategy, you have a winning strategy for your business.
-Reduce risk by testing the technology fit and capability. -Prototyping and Analysis helps.
Execute Proof of Concept2
Remember: Not every technology or product is right for every organization. Don’t jump for something cool, work on something that fits your goals.
revenue impact
Determine
competitive edge
define feasibility
Demonstrate revenue and business Value Analysis3
Innovation is a joint plan. At this stage, risks have been hedged, all stakeholders are aware and organization is staged to launch a disruptive project.
Initial release cycles focusing on framework and technology challenges
Focus on complex challenges first. Don’t wait too long!
Short 4-6 week development cycles to analyze risks/value
Create an agile development plan4
Remember: You can’t have an innovative idea for 2 years. You vet it constantly and change your approach if needed!
tradeMONSTER’s tech team was at technexus in the initial days…!
Analyze risk; fail fast and move forward
For new and emerging technologies (like mobile) and innovation, short cycles help to detect failure and minimize impact.
At every step (with short cycles) analyze overall impact and risk and value proposition. Balance risk and value. Value and governance.
5
Remember: Failing Fast is a big WIN. Innovation can be incremental.
Case 1 : Positive response to Open Source/Web 2.0 /Push Innovation
Business advantage was the platform to be built. Huge cost benefit with Open Source.
POC was built on non-mission critical media website.
Clear need of a platform our core business made the competitive advantage and ROI
Short development cycles of 8 releases in a span of 15 months.
Streaming frameworks on browser focused on first and then went ahead to plug in functionalities
99.99% Uptime
Case 3: Positive Adoption of HTML5 Clear need for a competitive and compelling mobile
solution for future and existing customers
In Mobile tradeMONSTER was far behind its competitors (Customer Acquisition/Retention)
World’s Greatest Trading Platform for Options Traders, but very basic mobile trading solutions (SAS model)
With the advent of tablets replacing notebooks, missing out on revenue from trades from growing customer base and losing out on our vision “Anywhere, Anytime”
POC done on a non-mission critical project
Small development cycles built, focusing initially on framework challenges of HTML5, focused on performance, security, rendering, caching issues
“The new app reflects bleak future of PCs”
“A trading App that broke several myths”
Best Mobile Platform in North America 2013 “this is a terrific, comprehensive platform”.
08/2006optionMONSTER Media launches media/news portal: optionMONSTER.com
10/2008 tradeMONSTER launches trading platform
03/2010 tradeMONSTER ranked ‘Best for Options Traders’ by BARRON’S
02/2013 tradeMONSTER launches new mobile platform (HMTL5), Ranked #2 Overall in North America
08/2005: optionMONSTER Holdings, Inc. incorporated (now: tradeMONSTER Group, Inc.)
03/2014Ranked #1 in Options trading 5 years in a row and 2nd in overall ranking of online brokers by BARRON’S
Revenue
Accounts
164%
264%
Make a choice! Be Breakfast or Have Breakfast
Create your Organizational I-factor or be dead.Technology is a medium. Business value is key.
Eliminate fear to fail.