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I remember “disruptive” when it was called “paradigm shift.” That phrase died during the tech-bubble along with “portal” and “think outside the box,” yet the concept has returned. Don’t follow along.

When I get pitched — usually by someone raising money — that they “have something disruptive,” a little part of me dies. You should be worrying about making something useful, not how disruptive you can be.

“Disruptive” is the in-vogue word for the opposite of “incremental improvement.” A disruptive product causes such a large market shift that entire companies collapse (the ones who don’t “get it”) and new markets appear.

Disruptive is fascinating, disruptive changes the world, ..read more

This is Part 5 of a 5-part series: Joy of Honesty in Business.

During the first year of Smart Bear’s existence, my software was crap. How did I get customers, and why were they so vehemently loyal to what was clearly a wobbly, new product from a teeny tiny company-of-one?

Because of folks like Tom.

So Tom calls up one day…

Now wait, understand this is already a newsworthy event! Remember we sell software to software developers, legendary for their phone-aversion. (I’m no exception!) So let me try that again:

Tom?called me. On the phone.

Tom wants to talk about new features. What a relief — for six weeks it’s been nothing but bug reports. Real bugs, I admit. In fact, Tom had single-handedly ..read more

So you’ve got your AdWords test all set up: Will people go for the headline “Code Review Tools” or “Tools for Code Review?”

Gee they’re both so exciting! Who could choose! I know, I know, settle down. This is how these things go.

Anyway, the next day you have 32 clicks on variant A (“Code Review Tools”) and 19 clicks on B (“Tools for Code Review”). Is that conclusive? Has A won? Or should you let the test run longer? Or should you try completely different text?

The answer matters. If you wait too long between tests, you’re wasting time. If you don’t wait long enough for statistically conclusive?results, you might think?a variant is better and use that false assumption to ..read more

It’s amazing how often “luck” comes up when people find out I started Smart Bear.

“You’re lucky to have your own business. I hate my boss.”“You’re lucky your business is still doing okay in this recession.”“You’re lucky that you sold your business.”

You’d think they’d be impressed with the hours I put in, with the ideas I had, with the way I handled customers, and with the stress of bootstrapping.

But no, success is “lucky.”

It feels dismissive, perhaps even insulting: It wasn’t you, it was luck.?Your decisions weren’t important, your ideas weren’t special; you’re lucky. Anyone could have done the same; time and chance happeneth to them all.

It’s easy to be indignant and dismissive right back:

So when I quit my job and worked 60 ..read more