My father is the chapter president of his club in Connecticut. He swears by it. I have been to his club twice and plan on going to one in San Francisco tomorrow, the rhino club I believe...
My father is the best salesman I know. He could sell noise-canceling headphones to deaf people, and I want to earn that confidence by going to toastmasters.
I worked at the Clarkson University library for three years and learned the software used to manage library databases is a huge contributor to the problem. I'd love to do something about it if the chance presented itself.
I think that's the real message of the article. I don't think it's about the coffee market in NY, or in general - it's about making sure you think and measure before you leap.
Starting a business is a huge deal and consumes huge amounts of your time. If the sums don't add up - that is, you're not going to be profitable unless you work as slave-labour in your own business - maybe you shouldn't do it. I think this is a trap that many educated people fall into that don't have direct business (or time billing) experience.
This is applicable to tech as well - if you build a product, sell it super cheap (say, software @ $20 per year), and it takes around 1 hour per year in technical support per user (per year), you need to consider that when pricing. It may not be worth it. Or you may just have your pricing or business model wrong.
"The most dangerous species of owner ... is the one who gets into the business for love... and pretends that love means total ignorance is okay... who refuses to confront the reality of business, and when he/she can no longer ignore that reality, refuses to come up with problem-solving approaches other than whining or shutting down."
