As many of you know, Startup Riot was this past Monday.  I gave a three minute presentation, on behalf of Servinity, along with 53 other startups.  Chris Morris, our CTO, joined me at the event and we both agree it was a great day.  I want to extend a personal thanks from myself and Servinity to Sanjay (pronounced “sun-jay”) for putting it together.  

Many people have already given terrific recaps of the event, including Lance Weatherby, Paul Freet, Paul Stamatiou, Stephen Fleming, Angus McRae, Dan Greenfield, Ashish Mistry, LenderFlex, Mathew Sweezey, Buddy Ray and Anand Amin, Scott Burkett, and event organizer Sanjay Parekh.    I purposely waited for others to post first because, rather than repeating what these guys have said, I thought I’d try something different.  Here’s a timeline retrospective of the experience of one entrepreneur (me):

Mar 10:  Startup Riot announced.  I apply to pitch immediately - and immediately volunteer to help in whatever way possible.  I have no idea why I do either, it just seems like something I should do.  

Mar 10 to May 10:  Sanjay sends many long, threatening emails to those presenting.  Anyone not scared about breaking his rules, especially going over 3 minutes, is illiterate.  Of course, the event went off without a hitch and right on time, so I commend his methods.

May 10:  I complete and submit Servinity’s slides (prepared to exact specifications).  The slides were modified from a deck I prepared to pitch to investors several months ago.  As I create the “Startup Riot Goals” slide, and bullet point Servinity’s needs for employees, customers and money, I start to understand why I’m doing this . . . at least why I am doing this for Servinity.

May 18:  I sit down to finalize my remarks for the event.  First run through I was at 7 and half minutes.  Uh oh.  Perhaps I should have done this before I turned in my slides.  Several hours later I’ve got my pitch down to three minutes even.  The fun is gone but the substance remains.  I’m a little concerned that I will need to speak fast to keep it to three minutes, but so be it.  I am not going to be the one kicked off-stage.

May 19, 6am:  I wake up considerably earlier than usual to go over my remarks, eat a full breakfast drink enough caffeine to speak in front of 250 people.  

8:45am:  Arrive at Twelve pursuant Sanjay’s instructions.  After reading the list of companies presenting six times while waiting for others to arrive, I make a mental note:  Next year, don’t arrive so early.

10:29 am:  Really enjoyed the keynote by Drew Curtis of Fark.  Drew is a fantastic public speaker.  This is unfortunate for the first round of presenters who have to follow him.

10:30 am:  Crap.  I’m in the first round of presenters.

10:30-10:48 am:  I am sixth to present.  As I watch the first five, I can’t stop thinking:  “Am I better than him?  Am I better than him?”  Not the right attitude, I know, but sometimes I can’t help it.  

10:48 am:  My turn.  I usually enjoy public speaking.  Not this time. I couldn’t hear myself talking and have no idea what I said - hopefully it was what I planned to say.  That meant that I was nervous.  I was nervous because I wasn’t as prepared as I should have been.  Or maybe I was just too concerned about running over 3 minutes.  Either way, I finished with over 30 seconds to go which means I spoke way too fast.  Oh well, I just hope I made it clear that we are not another niche social network.  They filmed the presentations, so as soon as the video is available I will post it here for you to decide for yourself.

11:15 am:  First break for lunch.  Too hungry to network now.  On the way to lunch someone tells me about a Tweet following our presentation:  “Servinity doesn’t suck.  Watch them.”   I’ll take it.

12:45 pm:  I take my seat as the timekeeper for the next round of presentations.  As mentioned above, I had volunteered to help for the day.  Timekeeping for one round was my meager penance.  I was ready and willing to do much more, but this was all Sanjay asked.  Of course, given his military disposition towards time enforcement, perhaps this was the most important job of the day.  

1:00 pm:  Presentations start.  I break out my stop watch and cue cards, and put on my enforcer face.  I really hope no one goes over the time limit.  Most are fine, but there is one presenter who gets close.  He looks down at me right as I drop the 15-second sign.  I nod my head and look him in the eye as if to say, “Yes, your time is up.”  It startles him.  He abruptly ends his sentence and walks off stage.  I felt bad.

Once I’d given my pitch and performed my volunteer duties, I was able to relax and enjoy the rest of the event.  We met some interesting folks during the networking sessions, some of whom I’m sure will prove to be valuable contacts.   I enjoyed many of the other presentations and regretted not bringing a laptop to follow the now infamous “snarkiness” on BackNoise.  (Btw, if anyone wants to let me know what was said during my pitch, I’d love to hear it).

Later in the day, as I stood talking to people whose names I’ve seen repeatedly mentioned in the Atlanta  startup community, I finally realized why I was so quick to get involved with Starup Riot.  It’s wasn’t for the obvious incentives I had bullet-pointed in my powerpoint slide.  Rather, Startup Riot helped me realize that I, too, want to be a meaningful contributor to the startup community.   Granted, I have a long way to go to establish myself as a credible business resource (although I am working hard on Servinity to do so), but that doesn’t mean I can’t contribute in other ways.

All in all it was a good day.  I made some valuable connections.  I got the Servinity name out there a little bit.  I even got my own name out there a little.  And I learned some things about what kind of entrepreneur I want to become.  With a better understanding of the “why”, I’m already looking forward to next year’s Startup Riot - and each and every event until then.