Founder spotlight: Chiedo (Inc.)
One of the goals of INITIATE is to boost the voices of founders and entrepreneurs who are looking at business from a different perspective. This is the second post in our ongoing Founder Spotlight series — you can read the first one, on Sarah Rumbaugh of RelishMBA, at this link.
One of the first things I learned about Chiedo was that he already had several business ventures under his belt before he graduated high school. Each experience has taught him more about success as a tech entrepreneur, from mastering his craft to marketing. His name is his brand — he prefers to go without his surname — and his largest achievement so far is Chiedo, Inc., the parent company for Chiedo Labs and Chiedo Marketing. Having spoken with him in several contexts, including our panel on Inclusivity and Entrepreneurship in Tech a couple of weeks ago, we realized that his was a voice we wanted to share.
During one of our first conversations at a local meet-up, a group of us started swapping stories about how were first introduced to tech and programming. Amidst the usual jokes about Oregon Trail and other popular games, Chiedo shared with us the story of how his father had bought him a computer — in parts. He was welcome to play with it as soon as he figured out how to assemble it. It was this kind of strong mentorship that Chiedo credits for sparking within him the passion and dedication he feels for his work today. And his father didn’t just encourage him to excel in tech: he also helped Chiedo start his very first business in elementary school! The ability to see others’ potential and to support it was one of his father’s gifts to him as as mentor, and Chiedo continues to seek ways to do the same for others as a founder and as a technologist.
Fail fast and fail cheap
Lest you think that Chiedo’s meteoric rise to President, CEO & Founder of multiple start-ups was singularly blessed, he will quickly tell you about the lessons he has learned from failure. One of the strategies he has honed over the years is to find a way to get to the casual and personal as quickly as possible with a prospective client. This is not to take away from the professionalism that he and his companies offer — but rather it becomes a kind of litmus test. If it’s hard to get a sense of the person and their priorities from the start, then it’s not a good recipe for a lasting partnership. He also spoke quite openly of lessons learned from over-confidence and certainty in the past, and how he dealt with the resulting disappointment. “Fail fast and fail cheap,” he told the audience of our panel. Indeed, big risks are frequently made up of numerous smaller risks, and it’s worthwhile to find each ‘little win’ in your pursuit of the larger success.
“There is a romanticized view of working for yourself, due partly to a culture of NOW NOW NOW,” Chiedo wrote recently. “But working for yourself is hard and often you’re working to reap the benefits LATER LATER LATER.” Keeping the long view in mind is critical, in his opinion: the small victories add up to big ones and burning out too early in the process can be even more damaging than the failures you will encounter on your way.
More mentorship needed
When I asked Chiedo his perspective on how he felt the tech world had changed in the last five years, he felt that he could best explain it in terms of his own changing perspective. Starting as a novice and student to gaining proficiency in his field, his own perspective on tech has evolved from that of someone seeking answers to technical questions to the person offering those answers. “The tech community is only getting more fun,” he replied candidly, “most people like to share what they learn and collaborate with others.” And he sees himself in the position to facilitate this kind of collaborative learning, not just on his own team, but in the larger communities of software development. While he continues to learn and grow as a technologist, he sees his primary role as being a mentor when people are in need of one. “Knowledge and experience are nothing if you don’t share them,” he says. “I was gifted to have an upbringing with a father who pushed me to think creatively as an entrepreneur and as a mentor. I feel an obligation to mentor those that I can who weren’t gifted with a similar upbringing.”
This article was written as part of INITIATE, a project sponsored by CoshX Labs to find new ways to explore business and entrepreneurship. You can follow us on Twitter, and visit our website to learn more about our efforts.
