His was the ultimate reality show, even if it was a movie. In
May 1999, Kaleil D. Isaza Tuzman and his pal, Tom Herman, created
GovWorks.com, an Internet site that gave the public access to
government agencies. Almost as fast as it takes to click a mouse,
GovWorks went from eight employees to 250 and raised more than $60
million in capital. And just as GovWorks seemed poised for
greatness, it went bankrupt. This was real life, and the script of
the documentary film Startup.com, which followed the two
entrepreneurs through their odyssey, 24/7.
Today, Tuzman, 31, is president and managing partner of the New
York City and Washington, DC-based Recognition Group, which
restructures companies on the brink of disaster. He's also
written Beyond Success and Failure: The Evolution of an
Entrepreneur (Harvard Business School Press), due out in
2003.
What's the common denominator for
companies on the brink of ruin?
Content Continues Below
Kaleil D. Isaza Tuzman: Lack
of focus. I've talked to entrepreneurs of all ages, interests
and backgrounds, and they tend to want to do too much at once, to
be where they want to be a year ahead of when they should be
[there], and to expand the scope of vision so quickly that it
obscures the vision and sometimes creates a fatal blow to the
project. I think that's what happened at GovWorks. The company
today is called GovOne, and doing quite well, thanks to steady
leadership [that has taken it] out of Chapter 11. We weren't
successful in large part because I tried to do too much, too soon,
all at once.
What are some warning signs that
someone has a GovWorks instead of a GovOne?
Tuzman: One is the lack of
plateaus in planning. Large-business managers allow for more rest
periods in development. They set achievement thresholds, circle up,
celebrate a little, then gear up for the next climb. Entrepreneurs
sometimes try to climb the mountain nonstop, get exhausted and
fall. Another signal: More than one central idea in a company's
mission statement shows a lack of focus.
If I realize my company is in trouble,
what should I do?
Tuzman: Get your ego out of
it. You are not the business. We need to keep the right emotional
distance from our companies. Entrepreneurs who have that balance
are people who have their priorities straight-they put their family
first, faith first or whatever. You need something that gets you
back to the center, and that center is not the office. As an
entrepreneur, you already have that as a major focal point. You
need to counteract that force somehow. You need to annihilate it,
or it will suck you into the vortex.