Why I Quit

The short answer to why I quit being a co-founder of a startup I really cared about is the startup didn’t care about me. I really did care about this thing we call a startup. I believed the startup could be a vehicle for positive change in the world. I quit my relatively cushy well paying job and put my family in jeopardy to pursue a dream of starting something that made a difference.

Everybody in the startup world tries to quantify and distil what it means to be a good founder, entrepreneur, a first employee in a startup. The truth is it’s a complicated convergence of many different factors. I found there was not a lot of emphasis on what it truly means to be a better company, business or organization. For all the talk about giving back and company culture; giving was not really a priority in the startup, I co-founded.

When we first started we created a company OS describing what was important to us as co-founders. This was supposed to guide our hearts and minds. But what I quickly found is a race against time and money. The pressure that ensues quickly pushes the company OS to the sideline and becomes a forcing function on personality, habits and dogmatic beliefs about how things should be done.

When we were in an accelerator program we quickly got into a practice of berating each other for saying the same word too much or overusing certain words because some people on the team felt it made us sound dumb. I came to hate this practice very quickly and started to feel resentful. I did not express this clearly, partially because I didn’t want to rock this fragile boat we called a team and partially because I knew there were bigger problems.

I guess it boils down to the fact that “we” as a company, organization, and individuals did not practice what we preached. I just didn’t see how we could affect change in a broken system if we could not take care of each other. This startup was and maybe still is becoming part of the broken system it was attempting to fix. Greed and mistrust seemed to be the tenants on which decisions were made.

If we can’t truly be better to each other when we are working so closely together and we’ve all sacrificed so much together. If we can’t empathize and sympathize with each other when we spend more time together than we spend with our families. I truly don’t know how we can make this a better place to live.

My experience in the startup world was not ideal and maybe no one’s experience is ideal. It really was more about watching your back; crossing your T’s and dotting your contractual I’s. I wish it was more about solving a problem making a positive change and the rewards will come to the ones who do.

Rent-Me-Denver Renewals

Customer spotlight this month is on Pioneer Property Managment a.k.a Rent-Me-Denver.

The Problem

The lease renewal process at PPM was a chaotic process creating a high risk of missing renewals. This chaos and risk affect the property managers making their job stressful and cumbersome. Property owners could be financially affected if the renewal was overlooked or not handled correctly leaving the property empty. Tenants were also affected. Without consistent, concise and clear communication tenants could not make timely decisions stalling the renewal process.

The process was managed using spreadsheets. Property managers were continually updating spreadsheets with the latest communication from tenants and owners using email as the primary communication channel. You can imagine what this process was like with hundreds of property renewals in progress.

The Solution

Since the primary channel for communication is email the decision was made to build tooling around email communications. Sticking with a communication method property managers were already familiar and comfortable with made lots of sense. The solution tracks email communication and gathers analytics around the state of an email thread with a tenant. This allows the property manager to understand where the state of the renewal lies. Also, much of the communication load is removed from the property manager using canned responses.

Leaving flexibility in the process is crucial. Tenants often have questions that can not be answered by canned messages. A human touch can often move the process along much quicker for tenants who have more difficult circumstances. This flexibility is built into the system allowing the property manager to choose the response, or write a custom response based on the managed conversation thread.

All put together this allows property managers to always understand the state of a renewal with a glance. Removing much of the burden of tracking the communication and initiating renewals manually.

Reducing the chaos and in turn reducing the risk allows PPM and their property managers to more easily and with more confidence manage the renewal process.

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The Tech

SendGrid’s API is leveraged to parse and push the email messages to the Lease Renewal app. Leveraging Sendgrid webhooks to push data to the Lease Renewal app allows for tracking the state of the email thread. Other data about the email can be tracked, wheater an email was opened or not. Allowing property managers even deeper understanding of the tenant.

Activti BPM acts as a state machine tracking the state of the communication process and keeping the workflow moving forward. Activity has a powerful XML based DSL allowing for complex decoupled workflow to built easily. Alongside workflow modeling tools makes for fast workflow modeling.

Java Spring server side app wraps up the Activti Engine and the integration with the Send Grid api’s. Connecting data about the lease renewal and the email messages is done using the power of Java Spring as well with the same app. These could easily be decoupled and deployed seperatly for a more service driven approach. A Restful hypermedia API based on HAL is exposed allowing for a flexible UI to be designed and built.

React.js is a UI technology designed by Facebook developers. Creating an easy to use interface that matched the needs of Property Managers was important. Reacts componentized model is used in the lease renewal app to do just that. React allows for modular UI components that can be easily reused. Leveraging React allowed for a very functional UI to be built quickly. Relying on the consistency of the RESTful (HAL) API to create a consistent experience that can be replicated across domains.

To get a better understanding of what we can do for you. Please schedule a time to talk using the link below or visit us a Symthia.com.

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Onboarding & Events Registration Process with NSE

Summary

Northeast Scientific Events wants to keep the onboarding and event registration process personalized but also organized. Symthia helped NSE accomplish this by creating the process and technology that keeps event vendors and hosts engaged while allowing NSE staff to easily manage the registration process.

The Process

NSE has two processes that we focused on. Onboarding new vendors and registering for events. NSE has a vetting process for new vendors. The process requires a user to signup using a form then NSE staff begin the vetting process that may or may not require additional information. Onboarding many new Vendors can be a chaotic process. Symthia helped to make this a smooth process by organizing and tracking the communication through our communication dashboard. Also, the Symthia virtual assistant keeps the onboarding process moving along even if the dashboard is not used. Symthia continually updates NSE staff with the state of a particular Vendor onboarding through email communication allowing the staff to use the tools they prefer.

Once vetted the vendor can now login to the NSE app and Register for an event. The vendor can now access the Koala events calendar while Symthia works in the background to manage the event registration process. Sending out the appropriate communication to all parties including NSE staff, event hosts, and vendors. Updating each party with the information they need to move the registration forward and make the event a success.

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The Tech

Symthia accomplished this with our powerful decoupled workflow engine. Which handles the communication and keeps the state of the process so nothing is missed, forgotten or lost.

The UI uses Koala Events Calendar (Symthia’s supported opensource calendar GUI) which allows for a very functional and flexible user interface that is integrated into NSE’s existing technology.

Summary

Registering vendors for events and onboarding new users is now easy for NSE with Symthia working in the background to keep the state of each onboarding and registration while allowing NSE staff to use existing tools like email. Symthia continually checks the state of the process and lets staff know when something needs attention.