It's About Time

Todd Krizelman

Co-CEO
theglobe.com
New York, New York

When it comes to time management, I have one piece of advice: Push yourself as hard as you can. Always push yourself, even when it hurts -- because every second counts.

I can't emphasize enough what a difference timing makes in our business. When you're on an IPO road show, selling your company to institutional investors, missing your next flight can mean losing out on millions of dollars. The timing of our IPO was of monumental importance. We decided to postpone the IPO because the market was weak. About a week before our sec papers were to expire, the market revived slightly. At that point, we had to decide whether or not to go ahead with our IPO. Goldman Sachs had pulled theirs; roughly 175 other companies had either canceled or postponed theirs. People were saying that we were heading toward a full-blown recession.

At the last minute, we opted to go ahead with our IPO, and the impact of that decision has been tremendous. It meant that we had more money sooner. It meant that we had more credibility and that we could easily rent more space. It meant that we could get deals done faster. Above all, it meant that we had a very high ramp rate. In the second quarter of last year, we had $800,000 in revenue. In the third quarter, we had $1.5 million in revenue. And in the fourth quarter, we had $2.6 million in revenue. We never would have achieved that rate if we hadn't gone public when we did. As it turned out, we were one of only two Internet companies that went public that week -- which put us even further ahead in the game.

Todd Krizelman cofounded theglobe.com with Stephan Paternot in their Cornell University dorm room in 1994. They started the business with an initial capital investment of $15,000, which they borrowed from friends and family members. Other investors include former Alamo Rent A Car owner Michael Egan, MTV Networks founder David Horowitz, PeopleSoft CEO David Duffield, and former Raychem president Bob Halperin. This month, theglobe.com is celebrating the first anniversary of its IPO.

Tim Draper

Founder and managing director
Draper Fisher Jurvetson
Redwood City, California

People waste a lot of time by not letting themselves fail. It's hard to let yourself fail -- to cut your losses and move on. But sometimes, that's the most expedient thing to do. I learned that lesson three years after starting out in the venture-capital business. One of the companies in my portfolio was going down the tubes. I spent a year and a half not only trying to raise funds but also helping to manage the internal workings of the company. It was a very emotional experience. Meanwhile, while I was spending 95% of my time on this failing company, six other companies in my portfolio were going public. When I finally came up for air, I realized that I'd wasted a year and a half trying to bail out a sinking ship.

On the other hand, you never know when a venture that looks like a total disaster is going to turn into a tremendous success. FedEx, for example, was started by a guy who would not let his business die. And one of our companies took 15 years and five rounds of financing to go public. Now it's worth a lot of money. So I would never tell entrepreneurs to cut their losses when the going gets tough. But I would say this: Pursue the business until you know deep down that it's not going to be successful. Then stop, and do something more productive.

Timothy C. Draper, a third-generation venture capitalist, specializes in early-stage investing. His firm has provided seed money for high-tech, high-profile companies such as Hotmail, Cybermedia, eFax.com, Four11, and DigiDesign.

O. Wayne Isom

Chairman of the Department of Cardiothoracic Surgery
New York Presbyterian Hospital,
Cornell University Medical Center
New York, New York

The key to time management in the operating room is knowing that the enemy of "good" is "perfect." When time is critical, you have to make intelligent compromises. Of course, the bottom line is that you work as fast as you can. The most critical stage is when you clamp the aorta, which is a vessel about the size of a garden hose. By doing that, you cut off the blood supply to the heart. That's the only way to get inside; otherwise, the heart would be full of blood, and you wouldn't be able to see anything. The longer the aorta is clamped, the greater the chance that the patient will die. And the less healthy the heart, the less time you have. So you try to repair the heart perfectly, but your most important goals are to keep the patient alive and to improve the heart's condition.