It’s something I’ve been thinking about as well. I get a lot of young entrepreneurs coming through my office, and many of them would love to just be handed a manual so that they can educate themselves. Steve Blank’s 4 Steps to the Epiphany should be on local shelves, and there are a number of other business, marketing, and tech books that we should be able to just grab from a local store.

(To Americans that may be reading this and just screaming “Amazon” at the screen, Amazon.ca is a neutered version of the .com, and while we can order from the .com as well, shipping + the border take longer and cost more)

So, I suggest that anyone interested in having books like this in stock band together and approach some local stores about having a really great Startup / Entrepreneurship / Social Media section. As Tris found out, Chapters et al all get marching orders from Toronto, so the big box stores are going to be hard to deal with.

The two stores I have in mind (conveniently located in Gastown, of course) are Biz Books (focused on Film & TV because of VFS proximity) and the SFU Bookstore in Harbour Centre. I’ve sent Biz Books an email suggesting the idea to them, so we’ll see what they say.

Books to recommend? Leave comments and links below, and we’ll approach the stores and see what they say.

From those that responded, I compiled a list. If you have a song to add to the list, please comment. The holiday season is approaching and who doesn’t want an “Entrepreneurship ROCKS” playlist?

1 – Stronger – Kanye West

2 – Ride of the Valkyries – Wagner

3 – A Team Theme Song

4 – Eye of the Tiger – Survivor

5 – Combination Pizza Hut & Taco Bell – Das Racist

6 – The Great Escape Theme Tune

7 – Don’t Stop Believing – Journey

I know with all the entrepreneurs around, we can double this list easily. So, please feel free to add

Trevor O is one of the founders of Layerboom Systems. This was originally posted on his personal blog at http://trevoro.ca/blog/2009/09/02/how-to-get-started-in-vancouver-tech/

I’ve been meeting quite a few people who are new to Vancouver and are looking to get involved in the local Web and Tech scenes. There’s quite a bit going on, and Google is your friend, but if you want to save some time here are the best places to go, meet people and see what’s going on. There’s also a score for how nerdy or business-y (?) the event is on a scale of 1-10.

Do your research

Nerdy: 5
Business: 4

Find out what you’re interested and search for companies based in Vancouver that do what you love. If you’re enthusiastic people will make time for you. Ask someone out for coffee or a pint and just talk. Don’t try and get a job, just figure out what’s going on. Like any “scene” you’re likely to hear conflicting viewpoints. Keep an open mind. Look for and talk with local bloggers and tech reporters. Look for events happening in your area. If you’re interested in Open source projects, find out if the people who work on them are in the area.

Democamp Vancouver

Nerdy: 7
Business: 5

Like most unconferences, Democamp is a loosely organized evening event where the people that attend make up the conference. In this case you bring an idea, and the idea is your demo. You don’t have to present, and it’s a good way to meet people that are interested in starting something new, or are working a project already. Democamp doesn’t happen nearly as often as it should, so if you’re interested in helping out there, check out the site and get in touch.

Launch Party Vancouver

Nerdy: 4
Business: 8

Every few months local entrepreneurs who are launching their projects meet up to celebrate all their hard work. Walk around and talk with people and get to know the people behind these projects. Most of the time the executives are presenting but ask to chat with some of the developers if that’s more up your alley. This is usually a very social event where you’re bound to meet a lot of interesting people – just don’t be shy.

Bootup Labs

Nerdy: 8
Business: 6

Bootup Labs is a local startup incubator which helps companies go from “zero to fundable”. The offices are located at 375 Water St, in Gastown and house a rotating group of Vancouver based startups which are always looking for talented help. Bootup has an open door policy so if you’re new to the area you can generally just pop in, but I suggest getting in touch with them first to arrange a quick (<30 minute) chat. Everyone is really friendly, and it’s a good way to plug in, or at least get pointed in the right direction.  Bootup helps run a few of the events in town, so pay attention to their upcoming feed for things that are happening

Techvibes

Nerdy: 5
Business: 5

Techvibes is a tech community blog and business directory. It’s a really good way to get to know which businesses are in the area and what they do. They also publish a list of events happening in town that range from an Entrepreneurial to Developer focus.

VEF

Nerdy: 2
Business: 10

If you’re more into the business and entrepreneurial side of things, I suggest checking out Vancouver Enterprise Forum or VEF. VEF hosts events on a monthly basis and it’s a great way to connect with other like-minded individuals.

Developer Meetups

Nerdy: 10
Business: 3

There are plenty of developer meetups happening in town. The umbrella meetup for all of these is the VanDev network. Join that and you’re bound to meet quite a few people. The most popular is the Ruby/Merb/Rails meetup which has events on a monthly basis.

I hope that’s enough to get you started! Let me know if there’s anything else you want added to the list.

A good analogy is that you are selfishly manning a life raft to row to shore, which is weeks away. Your only provision is a case of pop. Do you invite others to join you in your boat?

To keep it simple, let’s consider the case of hiring helpers for a single (‘lead’) coder. These helpers will be less expensive and less productive than the lead coder, so the overall impact on when you run out of money and how much code you have at that point is not obvious.

And there is a training period where everyone is less productive. And an ongoing supervision/coordination cost for the lead.

I built a simple model that takes all these things into account. Contact me at BJFPalmer@gmail.com if you would like a copy of this Excel model so you can play with your own assumptions.

Using my assumptions, with a $50 k runway to support this team, results in the chart below. The dynamic seems clear — adding people shortens the runway much faster than it adds output. Adding a person shortens the runway by 33% and increases the output by 18%.

Runway and Output as a function of Team Size

We know having runway is super important since it provides time to learn from customers and iterate the product. In our paddling analogy this runway provides more time for a plane to fly over and point out the direction we should paddle.

Which I think means that it makes sense to add a person only if the fit is outstanding and you need their skills ‘to get to shore’. Back to the paddling analogy — you add a person if they fit in the boat and there is a headwind that requires their paddling output.

But this is just a model with lots of assumptions (which are very sensitive to exactly who we hire and what we use them for). The consensus at Jostle, which was based as much on intuition as this model, was to go ahead and add one “helper” to the team.

Know any great young developers looking for a startup adventure?