2Paths Team Blog

Yesterday, I attended a Forum for Women Entrepeneur’s social for mentors and mentees. It was there that I sat with my most recent mentor Louba Rapaport and my adopted mentor Gonzalo Naranjo. Sitting with them was like putting on an old glove - familiar, trustworthy, and cozy. Now I’ve only known Louba for a little over half a year, and I’ve known Gonzalo for even less. But the relationship I have forged with them seems like we’ve known each other alot longer. Louba and Gonzalo started a company called Alterna Technologies Inc. in Calgary from the paper napkin stage, and brought it to a company of 200 employees before signing out and moving onwards. They then started a consulting company called Resnotio, offering primarily sales and positioning consultation. It was in that capacity that I first met Louba as my formal mentor through the FWE. The first conversation I had with her was in the midst of some angst to do with one of our clients. What struck me out of that conversation was the depth by which she was able to listen and diagnose the problem, but also the no-nonsense approach she then discussed with how to deal with it. Having dealt with a number of sales and marketing type organizations, I am always a bit wary of the pitch and the lack of delivery from many of this sector. But this was the first time I really felt like I was getting real value. She was dealing with real issues and offering very considered solutions. It just all made sense and provided great clarity.

From there, our mentor/mentee relationship grew, and in October, 2Paths decided to retain Resnotio for more formal back office sales processes and that was when I first met Gonzalo Naranjo who provided an equally dynamic and very complementary role to Louba. In this capacity, we remained until recently in December when Gonzalo was asked to be the CEO of a burgeoning bio medical device company called Pulse Tracer. I haven’t seen Gonzalo much since then until yesterday at the FWE event, and we got to catch up if only for an hour. Gonzalo is ramping up a financing phase for Pulse Tracer, and Louba is busy as ever with Resnotio which doesn’t surprise me one bit.

Afterwards, walking towards Louba’s car for a ride back to the office, I discover one of Louba’s quirks, and that is she has favourite parking lots that she loves to park in despite the lack of proximity - in this case 6-7 blocks! On the way, we talked and laughed and discussed all sorts of things happening in the world and in our lives. What struck me as the most memorable of our walk was the life and positivity in those two. I’m obviously endorsing them as smart business people that I respect and trust immensely, but more than that, they are no nonsense, down to earth people full of energy and life - who could want anything more!

Fun photoshopping

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(thank you digg)

Direct, client-side data access. Scary for the Bad Things ™ that could happen but cool for the potential interactions.

Link - Dynamically insert javascript and css

Young Folks. Played it once, it’s in my skull

I’m sure most people use a common password amongst many online sites, saving a few passwords for more critical data. But if one of those sites gets compromised there is the *chance* that you’ve used your common password for a larger or more important site. The chance of a Bad Person working this out is slim, but possible given identity theft or a targeted attack. Tada, there is a firefox extension that makes a hash of the domain + your password, so if the site is ever compromised all the Bad Person gets is your encrypted password, which only works on your site.

Small, simple idea that takes into account peoples likely behaviour

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The ability to send im’s via quicksilver was the only thing missing from my mac experience. And now it’s here - I’m amazed at how simple and easy this was for someone to put together.

Send im’s via quicksilver

Firefox extension so you can resize textarea’s.

[Update 20070125] Most form elements, not just textareas

You might have noticed we’ve taken to using a quote from Einstein in our marketing material:

Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler. ~Albert Einstein

Of course, we are happy to simply have an association with one of the great minds in our civilization, but there’s more to it than that. The phrase itself is very appropriate to our philosophy for software development.

Einstein was convinced there was an underlying order to the universe. With his gift for creating a simple thought experiment — what would one see when looking in a mirror when traveling at the speed of light? — he was able to distill an exquisitely elegant expression of that order, his special theory of relativity, that is sufficiently detailed to capture the relationship between energy and mass. Hence the quotation.

With software development, it is all too easy to implement vastly complex solutions to business problems. There is much to be gained from a disciplined pursuit of a simpler solution that still solves the problem at hand. The result is likely easier to use, easier to maintain, and less costly to develop than the result of unbridled approach to development.

While we don’t necessarily agree that there is an underlying order to the business world, we are committed to finding the simplest solution that meets the needs of our clients.

There are many common activities that all businesses must deal with, and there are many kinds of software out there to help: Business Development, Human Resourcing, Compensation, Finance, Regulatory, to name just a few. Then there is Supply Chain Management. Unless you are strictly in the people business, chances are there is a supply chain management element to your business. You likely have unique terminology around it that is specific to your business, your staff has a collection of sticky notes to track how to deal with exceptions, and they pass on rough instructions to their colleagues in hopes the supply workflow can continue when key personnel are away on vacation, as it is an integral piece of your business.

If this sounds familiar, then you are like many businesses who we, at 2Paths, speak to about streamlining and automating their supply chain management process. The question businesses struggle with is whether to build or buy software for managing their supply chain. Should you buy a packaged software package for a handsome fee, and handcuff yourself to years of expensive annual licensing fees? Or should you venture into the great unknown of custom software development, and risk leaping into the great void of unknowns, of which cost and process are at the forefront?

With one client, I used the following example to help understand the single biggest difference between the ‘build or buy’ question as it related to their supply chain management decision. When I was working as an engineer at BASF ten years ago, we went through one of the first major Supply Chain Management - SAP - implementations. It took two full years, and every employee in the organization felt its pain during the implementation. If you asked the employees at BASF today about that implementation, not a single person would have a happy memory of the experience, even ten long years later. Why was it so painful, you ask? The main reason is that BASF had to overhaul its entire workflow to fit the supply chain management application, which was behemoth and inflexible. Exceptions, which were previously accommodated by easy work-arounds, were no longer possible, and were, in fact, suddenly incredibly time-consuming. Everyone had to rethink how they did their jobs, and in some cases, do extra work to fulfill activities required by the application. The soft costs associated with adjusting the workflow to that application were exorbitant, and difficult to quantify at the time.

In sharp contrast, a solution devised by a custom software development company, like 2Paths, is built exactly according to your organization’s workflow. This way, there need not be any changes to your workflow — unless of course we discover process inefficiencies while analyzing your business processes, which then provides an opportunity for positive change. The end result is a solution designed to fit your unique business. Since the software includes no unneeded modules, everything is pertinent, and because the system is designed in concert with the customer, built with intuitive navigation in mind, training is easy and you do not require an elaborate User Manual. Like your favorite web applications, there is context-sensitive help for unfamiliar steps. 2Paths supports every application we develop, so in the unlikely event you do need personal help, we are ready to provide assistance.

Additional functionality requests are addressed promptly and efficiently, which is a sharp contrast to making a request for new functionality to a large, ‘packaged’ software provider, whose release cycles are often booked a year or more in advance, and even then requests are in competition with many other client’s requests. Another advantage of the custom solution is the platform independence. Our customers are not required to install anything on their laptops or desktops because our applications are always secure and web-accessible. Managers can approve audit reports from their hotel rooms when on a business trip, or from the comfort of their own home.

And of course, you may need supply chain management today, but down the road, inevitably there will be talk of billing (finance), sales forecasting, and other related business functions that can be integrated into the custom application. For many growing companies, it makes sense to solve one piece of the Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) puzzle at a time, rather than being overwhelmed with an application that is over-engineered for where they are at. With a custom solution, the client gets the application they need at the stage their business is in at the appropriate time, and can build on it as required. They enjoy a suite of solutions designed to effectively respond to their evolving needs. These days who can resist the word ‘custom’, and frankly, why would they?