Building a successful open source consulting company
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Presentation given at the FISL conference in Brazil, July 2010.
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Building a successful open source consulting company
- 1. Building an open source consulting company Nate Aune (@natea) www.jazkarta.com FISL 2010 Porto Alegre, Brazil Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 2. /me • Developer turned business owner • Founded Jazkarta in 2004 • Now 3 full-time staff and 10 subcontractors • Specialize in Plone and Python Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 3. Topics for exploration • Marketing • Recruiting • Pricing • Finances • Contracts • Open Source citizen • Project Management • your topics? • Services Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 4. Marketing Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 5. Marketing & getting work • Speaking • Blogging • Sponsoring • User group / consultants group • Networking / Partnering Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 6. Sales Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 7. Sales • Segment into markets (edu, gov, non-profit) • Do more listening than talking • Get a good sales automation tool (Salesforce.com) • Put a lead capture form on your website • Don’t make it hard for people to contact you Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 8. Pricing Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 9. Pricing / rates • How much do you want to make? • What are your costs? • What will the market bear? Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 10. $100,000 / yr $100,000/yr % 50 wks/yr % 20 hrs/wk = $100/hr Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 11. Costs of doing business (overhead) • Self-employment tax • Legal fees • Accounting / bookkeeping • Office space (co-working) • Telephone / Internet • Hardware (PCs, monitors) • Subcontractors Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 12. Market rates • What are your competitors charging? • How much will your customers pay? • How does the economy affect your bill rate? Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 13. When to raise rates? • When your customers don't blink an eye when you tell them your rate • When you have more work than you can handle • When you have an in-demand skill Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 14. Contracts Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 15. Contracts • Get in writing to avoid misunderstandings later • Get legal advice - don't do it by yourself • EchoSign saves time with digital signatures • Optional scope contracts Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 16. Traditional vs. Timeboxed Optional scope contracts: Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 17. Project management Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 18. Project management • Agile is aligned with open source development • 2 week iterations • 3 person teams (PM, dev, design) • Tools: ClueMapper, Google Docs, Dropbox Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 19. Resource planning Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 20. Global Team Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 21. Global team strategies • Group team members in same or close timezones • Make sure everyone is on IRC and uses it • Set up a mailing list for each new project • Skype calls every week to touch base • Issue tracker (ClueMapper/Trac) Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 22. Pros/cons of subcontractors • Pros • Only pay them when you have work • Can find top talent, specialists • Cons • More expensive • Can be difficult to retain if not enough work Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 23. Services Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 24. Services • Development • Training • Support Recurring revenue • Hosting Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 25. Training • Private onsite training • Public training • Training as part of a conference • Online training Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 26. Support • Open source = no guarantees • Retainer = insurance policy • Keeps the conversation going • Upsell support before the project is complete Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 27. Hosting • Easier to support if on servers you control • Distribute benefits across all customers • Upselling opportunities • Steady source of recurring revenue • Make sure you have a good sys admin Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 28. Recruiting Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 29. Recruiting • Read blogs • Attend sprints • Elastic staff • User groups • Internships Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 30. Finances Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 31. Finances • Get a good bookkeeper • Watch cash flow carefully (invoice often) • Seek next project while still on first project • Find sponsors to fund open source dev • Tools: Quickbooks, Freshbooks, Xero Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 32. Open source citizen Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 33. Open source citizen • writing documentation • contributing code • serving on board • sponsoring sprints • organizing user group Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 34. Thanks! Questions? Wednesday, July 21, 2010
- 35. Stay in touch • Email: natea (at) jazkarta (dot) com • Twitter: twitter.com/natea • Blog: blog.jazkarta.com • IRC: irc.freenode.net/natea Wednesday, July 21, 2010