Image from thomashawk on flickr. Licensed under CC.
I am so pissed. I am angry out of my mind. I am sick of accepting less than greatness from the startup community in Kansas City, and I am ready to do something about it.
Why are you so mad?
Every year, it seems like some of the most talented individuals with any kind of interest in startups and technology decide to leave KC. Don’t get me wrong, I am not mad at the people deciding to leave. I am mad at the ones deciding to stay. I want to live in a community where the people I like, the people I admire, and the people I would love to work with feel like they can achieve their dreams. I envision a city where the best and brightest couldn’t imagine leaving. There are lots of excuses and ways to explain this away. People are always moving to new places. This isn’t unique to KC. Bullshit. We are only losing the brightest, and I think there is a very clear reason why.
Hypothesis
If you have a goal, the first thing you have to do in order to achieve it is to get started. Do anything. Figure a few things out, and then keep moving. Step by step, bit by bit, if you do the right things, you will make progress. What if your goals are lofty? What if you get going, you develop some expertise, and you look around and realize there is nobody nearby that you can look up to? How do you raise the bar for yourself?
You move to somewhere else. Whether your goal is to become an amazing developer and one day start a company, to collect the business experience that makes you a great entrepreneur, or change the world through service, you want to have a community where you can look up to others that have blazed the path. As much as we all like to reference Robert Frost’s well known poem, there is something that is very much missing there. We may want to take the road less traveled, but very few of us are willing to step up and build the road ourselves.
Therefore, I believe that the reason we keep losing our best and brightest, our most promising and potent, is because we have accepted our place as the Kansas City Royals of the startup world. We find the promising and bright people full of potential, we get them started, and then when they are ready to make breakthroughs, we ship them out to other places. It is an important role, but I say we let someone else do that for us instead.
Say I agree with you. What now?
I don’t have an answer here. I am sorry to disappoint, but guess what? If we agree, we can start with something and try to figure out what makes a difference. Learn. Refine. Cut through the jungle and build some roads. That said, I have a few ideas where to start.
Let’s start by trying to build a real community. Wikipedia:
In biological terms, a community is a group of interacting organisms sharing a populated environment. In human communities, intent, belief, resources, preferences, needs, risks, and a number of other conditions may be present and common, affecting the identity of the participants and their degree of cohesiveness.
Traditionally a “community” has been defined as a group of interacting people living in a common location. The word is often used to refer to a group that is organized around common values and is attributed with social cohesion within a shared geographical location, generally in social units larger than a household.
So what can we take away from this definition? If you and I form the basis of a community, then at the very least we share some common values and have a social cohesion, or a propensity to stick together. We probably get an enhanced definition of ourselves from belonging to our community. If we can get to the point where we share common beliefs and values, we just might be able to build something special. But before we can get there, we are going to have to get to know one another more closely.
How do we get started?
Do you have serious goals for your life? I want to help. What do you stand for as a person? I want to know you for your values. Whether you are planning to change the world, or just experimenting with what you want to do in your life, I think the thing that makes the biggest difference is having real fruitful connections with other people. Let’s connect. Let’s raise the bar for one another. If you see someone that needs your input, don’t hold your tongue. Give them some constructive criticism. Know that they will appreciate it because we all want to make our community better, and that means making ourselves better.
This is the dumbest thing I have ever seen
If this is your response to this post, please quietly get the fuck out. The Kansas City startup community no longer has room for excuses or the people that make them. No more bullshit. It is time for revolution. If you ready to step up and help, then speak up and be heard, and let’s discuss out how we can make a difference.