Anti Rework: The path from a startup to a business

A year and a half ago, I clicked the “Publish” button and an article appeared in the “I am Promoting” blog that determined the fate of the service, which is today the leader in the Russian b2b SaaS market. Since then, much has changed: positioning, design, company size, city of location, but the main thing remains the same. We make small business accounting convenient, understandable, we provide our clients with a high level of service and the support of expert experts.

My business is online accounting , which has everything you need for an LLC or an individual entrepreneur located on a simplified or imputed taxation system.

Under the cut, I’ll tell you about the main points that allowed us to grow from a startup with 4 employees to a company with representatives in 40 regions of Russia lit up on RTR, Echo of Moscow, Vedomosti and Forbes. I will also write how we differ from our competitors, and give you a promotional code for a discount.

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At once I will make a reservation that everything written further is not a guide to action. Moreover, all the principles contradict the stereotypes prevailing in the startup environment.

The success of My business is due to three components:

Reasonableness details

Each new feature of My Case is very deeply studied by methodologists. Yes, when implementing, we sometimes refuse any particulars, or consciously simplify certain points. But at the same time, we always have TK from methodologists, describing how everything should be correct. And if a particular case turns out to be not so private, programmers do not waste time trying to re-enter the situation, but simply open up the previously written TK.

The main thing is to parallelize processes, otherwise the development will slow down. Thinking should be ahead of development by 2-3 months. For example, a concept of functionality is being created, the start of development of which will begin only in September, and programmers once every two weeks post features that were invented several months ago. The development itself is built on a system very close to Agile: two-week iterations, TDD, Code Review, and other amenities. Work in this mode will inevitably require point number two.

Clear planning and control

The older the company, the more long-term planning should be. Now we have settled on a variant of very detailed semi-annual, abridged annual and estimated three-year plans. That is, now I can say with quite high accuracy what kind of functionality will be in My Business in a year and how much the company will earn in three years.

The plan helps to see every week what indicators the project should do, so that after a while it starts to bring a decent profit, and it gives you the opportunity to notice in time if something went wrong. There was never any hope for “maybe popret”. Everything was thought and thought out from the very first day of development. Well, it flooded, of course, not without it :)

Again, it is very important that with such planning it will not turn into an old school company where people think a lot, but do nothing. This is solved as follows:

• All plans are formulated as concrete, measurable, completed actions.
• Each week, plans are adjusted for adequacy, while you can give up completely on some tasks, but you cannot postpone the execution of each task more than once

These two simple things help to maintain flexibility and high pace, while keeping under control all the key indicators of the company.

Team

There are two, unfortunately, mutually exclusive approaches to team building. First: to hire a talented, creative with an awl in the ass, creative young people, who will have to grow with the project. And the second: to give preference to experienced but not yet lost in the eyes of professionals with experience in large companies. I chose the second option, and this was the key decision that determined our success. Having lost a bit in mobility, we acquired the "ability to kill." PR “My case” in the federal media, the Runet Prize, partnership with large companies to share data, traffic that grows even in “out of season” - all these are the fruits of the daily systematic work, which is taught to be successful, large (not state!) companies.

It’s a bit more difficult to put everything on the rails with mother professionals, but it’s worth getting a “steam train” as the company starts to go ahead, crushing everything that comes its way.

That's all. Revorke is a complete contradiction and what is taught in all start-ups. And yet, looking back, I can say that a retreat from any of these principles would lead to very unpleasant consequences for the project.

The most important thing with this approach is not to lose flexibility, it is actually difficult, but our example shows that it is possible.

About competitor

Everything written about a competitor below is my personal value judgment and nothing more.

Three months after the start of My Case, Kontur, which provides reporting services via the Internet, launched its project Elba with the same idea as ours. Each innovative start-up expert considered it his duty to write me a letter "Maxim, it’s useless to fight with the Contour, you will lose." Psychologically, it was one of the most difficult stages. But instead of falling into depression, we plunged headlong into work, finding out in parallel that, despite all its might, Kontur had not yet made a single project with a client base comparable to its electronic reporting services. As a result, no catastrophe happened, and, moreover, the analysis shows that Elba in general had no effect on our base of paid customers. Also, however, like us for them.

Imagine Moscow at the one end of which McDonalds opened, and Burger King at the other. Formally, they are competitors, but in fact they have no effect on each other’s income. Here the situation is the same. The market is large, and service penetration is still quite low.

How are we different

If you understand thoroughly, then, of course, you can find some functional differences. But still, by and large, we do the same thing. Differences - in the approach. I described our approach to business above: reasonableness of details, long-term planning, professional team. Take the opposite - get our competitors.

All this is reflected in how to implement the basic functionality of the services and what is being done for the user. Competitors - creative with an amateur roller in the main roles when shooting their employees, while at the same time we insure our responsibility for the sake of users' peace of mind.

None of my employees, especially managers, will ever act in a makeshift video, will not appear at a public event with earrings in their ears or hipster shoes, and will not allow you to place a photo of a stubborn employee on the company's official twitter account - as a result, all this results in the difference between approaches.

In terms of functionality, it is useless to compare us, even in a small business there are so many nuances that the list for an objective comparison will consist of at least 1000 points. Moreover, even if this is done, the information will become obsolete immediately after publication. Subjectively, someone likes one thing, someone else.

Perhaps that's all. If business topics are interesting to today's audience of “Habra”, I am ready to write articles on business in this blog about once a month. If not, then, perhaps, this text will be the last article in the blog "My business." Write in the comments, pliz, - it is interesting something other than technical articles, or not. If yes, then I will be happy to share many interesting things with the resource, without which “My business” at the start would be very difficult.

Promised promotional codes for discounts:

1) envd2500 - annual tariff for un employees without for 2500 rubles (instead of 3800)
2) ooo8200 - Full tariff for LLC for 8,200 per year (75% discount from the regular price)
3) leto2011 - any annual tariff will last until the end of 2012.

Ps. I am looking for a project manager / analyst who knows how to convey the vision of a product, analyze user requirements, ask the right questions, describe the integration of affiliate programs and translate requirements from the usual into a technical language. Managing the development team is not part of the responsibilities - this makes the technical director. Office - North of Moscow. Summary send to yaremko@moedelo.org

UPDATE

In kamentah great idea was expressed. I agree with her one hundred percent and repeat it here.

Thanks for the article, in fact there is a main idea in it (more precisely in discussing it). No matter who you are - Elba or MD. Both approaches can be successful. The main thing is not to be something average, but to have a ONE team with general principles of approach to business.


UPDATE

In the CIS, we do not plan.

There is money in Ukraine
In Belarus Assistant