FIRESIDE WISDOM PASSED DOWN TO ENTREPRENEURS

Tech retreat offers real connection at cellphone-free camp, writes Rick Spence.

At Red Pine Lake, in the high shield country east of Bancroft, Ont., a loon’s call pierces the stillness at Camp Walden. But on a September weekend, Canada’s most iconic bird had to compete with impassioned discussions about startup funding, virtual reality and the looming bitcoin bubble.

Welcome to Fireside, a threeday conference/retreat for tech entrepreneurs that attracted 400 entrepreneurs and supporters from Toronto and Ottawa, and as far afield as Boston, Vancouver and Australia. Founded by two entrepreneurial lawyers (and Walden alumni), Steven Pulver and Daniel Levine, Fireside asks attendees to “Disconnect to Connect” – which is a necessary flaw, since Walden lies outside cellphone range.

But turning a bug into a feature is not the only valuable business lesson taught at Camp Walden. Here are seven more gems from Fireside.

THE FUTURE OF VIRTUAL REALITY IS PHYSICAL

At a Friday afternoon session by a smoking campfire, Roel Vertegaal of the Human Media Lab at Queen’s University told entrepreneurs to get ready for a world of tangible VR. His lab is developing BitDrones: tiny quadcopters that can be programmed to swarm together to create any shape you want. It’s a crude first step toward creating “interactive, self-levitating programmable matter,” which can transform manufacturing, medical imaging, robotics and, of course, gaming. The next step, said Vertegaal, is to reduce the five- to 10-cm drones to the size of a fruit fly.

GROWTH PLANNING MADE SIMPLE

Nick Van Weerdenburg, founder and CEO of Rangle.io, offered campers a new way to plan for growth. Since his Torontobased web-services firm had no unique product to sell, he knew he couldn’t raise outside capital. Rangle would have to finance its growth through customers. So at its 2013 launch, he set two key metrics. Growth would average 10 per cent a month. And 80 per cent of his staff would be doing billable work 80 per cent of the time.

Van Weerdenburg said he invented that formula because he hates pen-and-paper planning. To meet his goals, he said, “I networked like mad,” corralling his first few clients (and several executives) at business events and conferences. It worked: when Rangle had eight staff, he stopped coding to focus fulltime on growth; he didn’t hire a salesperson until his workforce grew to 30.

“It was a simple way for me to manage the company,” he said. “We just focused on message, sales and branding.” When you build a service company based on cash flow, he says, “Every project has to advance your brand.”

SIMPLIFY YOUR MESSAGE AND OVERCOMMUNICATE

With Rangle now employing 150 people, communication has become Van Weerdenburg’s top priority. “Once you have 100 people, you need to focus on community and communications,” he said. “You have to really simplify your message. And you have to repeat it so many times that you get sick of it... If you’re not sick of your own message, you’re not communicating it enough.”

GO ‘INSIDE FINANCE’

At a session on early-stage funding, entrepreneur-turnedVC Christian Lassonde offered an insider’s look at venture capital. He explained why risk investors need high returns (“a venture fund should provide double the return of an index fund”), and warned entrepreneurs to read the fine print. “Founders are over-focused on valuation,” he said. If you let a VC write the rest of the term sheet, he said, “You can have any valuation you like.”

UP YOUR GAME WHEN SEEKING FUNDING

At the same panel, Boris Mann of Vancouver-based Frontier Foundry said entrepreneurs seeking funding should always be planning their next raise as well. “If you say this is the only round you need, I won’t invest in you. I need more growth, more return.”

Mann suggested entrepreneurs up their game by investing in other startups. “When you invest in other companies, you change how you think about your business,” said Mann. Examples: you become more accountable, he says, “and you recognize the importance of monthly updates.”

THREE WAYS TO BE MORE PRODUCTIVE

At an afternoon session among the pines, Georgia Dow, a writer, psychotherapist and two-time Brazilian jiu-jitsu champion, spoke on an evergreen topic: How to be more productive. She offered three key points:

Use a daily planner, said Dow, and ■ divide your work into 15-minute chunks. “That’s how I finished my thesis,” she said.

To get started on a project, just ■ write something down. Anything! “It’s easier to fix something than to face a blank page.”

Avoid energy vampires — people ■ and things that weigh you down, hold you back, ask unnecessary questions and waste your time. “Stay away from them,” said Dow. “Life is too short.”

SEEK NEW DIGITAL OPPORTUNITIES

Jeff Lehman, a former economist now serving as mayor of Barrie, Ont., discussed his city’s success embracing digital. Over strong opposition, his council recently deregulated taxi fares, so local cabs could compete with Uber. “Consumer choice will always trump regulation,” Lehman said.

In another bold move, Barrie paramedics recently reviewed their data on emergency calls. They found a few individuals were initiating a high percentage of calls. By checking in on these people, the city reduced the volume of calls from that group by half. Now city staff are working with Rover, a shared-parking service, to create more parking spaces around Barrie hospitals and transit stations. Tapping shared resources, said Lehman, will reduce the city’s need to overbuild facilities to meet peak demand. Lehman’s advice: “Push governments for positive change. If you see us doing something oldfashioned, call us out on it. We’re looking for wins.”