This guest blog post on “Lessons Learned” comes from Founder Labs participant Zuhairah Scott.
Many of you are likely familiar with Eric Ries’ blog "Lessons Learned", considered by many to be the bible for anyone looking to launch a lean start up.

I am no Eric Ries, but I've learned lessons during my month at Founder Labs worth sharing.

By Elizabeth Yin (Co-Founder, LaunchBit)
Every aspiring entrepreneur has to start somewhere. Yet when you decide to start a company, there's no guidebook to tell you what to do next. People might argue that "real" entrepreneurs need no such book, but a few years ago, I had wasted two years floundering and $20k of my savings on my failed startup -- I could have benefited from such a guidebook. So my best friend Jennifer Chin and I compiled the LaunchBit Startup Guide, which I wish I had had several years ago.

This guide is for new aspiring web entrepreneurs to learn to validate your business idea and build early versions of your first web prototype without coding. After my failed startup was over, I teamed up with Jennifer to try my hand at a different startup.

Today we build comparison shopping sites and use the Lean Startup Method to vet our business ideas before coding our sites. This process ensured that we either cut our losses quickly or achieve profitability. Over time, our process became formulaic. We share our learning and process in the LaunchBit Startup Guide.

This guest post is from Sally Grisedale about Customer Development for the Lean Startup - Notes from Alexander Osterwalder, Steve Blank, Cindy Alvarez and Hiten Shah speaking to Women 2.0 Founder Labs participants on January 23, 2011
In week two of Women 2.0 Founder Labs, the stars of the startup business world kept appearing to shine on us. This week we heard from Alexander Osterwalder the author of “Business Model Creation”; Cindy Alvarez and Hiten Shah from KISS Metrics on marketing strategies for startups and Steve Blank author of Four Steps to the Epiphany, discussing what makes Silicon Valley scalable startups so different from traditional business models.

"Learning to Pivot: Notes from Eric Ries speaking at Women 2.0 Founders lab" is a guest blog post from Sally Grisedale, a Founder Labs participant.
The first week of January 2011, I started a five-week program led by Shaherose Charania, CEO and co-founder of Women 2.0, to collaborate with engineers, designers and business leads on building a startup mobile business. By day five, 18 people had formed five teams and were pitching their ideas to a star studded team of mentors and advisors.

The Lean Startup philosophy helps entrepreneurs and managers do one important thing: make vastly better, faster business decisions. Bringing...

You are invited to join 6th Annual Astia Awards on Thursday, December 2, 2010 (6pm - 9pm) in Mountain View to award exceptional women innovators and recognize the investors and mentors who championed their success.

Women 2.0 CEO Shaherose Charania says, "They’re not like Facebook (in a good way)." The winners of the 2010 Women 2.0 Startup Competition...

Call for applications for Founder Labs: Mobile Edition this January 2011 in Menlo Park, California. Founder Labs is a 5-week pre-incubator for...

Week 4 at Women 2.0 Labs involved visiting advisors Hiten Shah and Cindy Alvarez from KISSmetrics.
From Women 2.0 Labs, Team MyStyleGroupie blogs about their learning experience pivoting.

Amanda Bradford's Story

I will always remember week 4 as the week of the pivot.

Here is a blog post from one of the teams at Women 2.0 Labs this fall 2010 in San Francisco.
Jen Costillo's Story

It was a day my team was dreading: Thursday presentations.

Every week over 5 weeks, each Women 2.0 Labs team presents the development of their idea and gets a chance to be properly torn down by the guest lecturer. The feedback is a once-in-a-lifetime chance but it can be a brutal wakeup call for teams who are deeply drinking the kool-aid all week.

This week's Women 2.0 Labs update comes after meeting Eric Ries in Week 1 of Labs.
Madhavi Jagdish's Story

After an intense week, we had a lively and engaging session with Eric Ries, creator of the Lean Startup methodology. He illustrated Lean Startup concepts using examples from past experiences including IMVU and current, like Food on the Table. Eric inspired us to talk to prospective customers about our ideas to make sure we weren't deluding ourselves that we had the best idea in the world (aka the reality distortion field).

The 4th Annual PITCH: Women 2.0 Startup Competition is open to early-stage ventures around the world, from high growth business ventures in web to mobile, from cleantech to biotech. Applying companies must have a female in the founding team, be in beta stage, and have received less than 3 million in funding. Deadline to apply is October 8, 2010.

Thanks for applying -- now hang tight! Finalists will be notified by October 19.

All applications will receive written feedback from at least 3 members of the judging panel. Finalists pitch live in at the 4th Annual PITCH Night on November 4, 2010 in San Francisco. Previous years' prizes included meetings with Michael Moritz (Sequoia Capital) and Tim Draper (Draper Fisher Jurvetson).

This year, winners receive meetings with iconic investors Esther Dyson (investor in companies such as Flickr, del.icio.us, and 23andMe), Matt Murphy (Partner, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers), Mike Maples (Managing Partner, FLOODGATE), and Naval Ravikant (Partner, AngelList). Winners will also receive a host of startup-friendly services valued at $17k.

How to Enter the Women 2.0 Startup Competition:

Quick Facts about PITCH 2010:

1. The founding team must have at least one female.
2. The founding team must have a technologist* on the founding team. A technologist is an engineer, scientist, mathematician, biologist, etc.
3. Your venture must be in beta. This means you should have a prototype (alpha or beta version) or the product is already in the market.
4. PITCH is focused on companies with high-growth potential.

Apply to PITCH: Women 2.0 Startup Competition

How to apply to the Women 2.0 PITCH Startup Competition -- there are 3 parts:

1. Fill out the application on Angelsoft. Once you start an application, you may edit your application anytime prior to the closing date of October 8, 2010. Application fee is $50 per startup.
2. Mail in your business model scribbled on a paper napkin -- Capture your creativity on the paper napkin with your doodles and drawings. Submit your business idea on a paper napkin no larger than 7×7 inches. Your name and contact info must be on the napkin so we can match it with your online application. Napkins must be received at 63 Bovet Road, #519, San Mateo, CA 94402 no later than October 8, 2010. Napkins will be exhibited to the public at PITCH Night. By default, your napkin will be exhibited. If you do not wish to participate in the exhibition, state clearly on a note and attach it on the napkin.
   
   
3. Film a 2-minute video pitch -- Think of this as a traditional television commercial, and the audience/viewers are your "perfect" customers. How will you pitch your product to them? The video should be uploaded along with your business plan through Angelsoft. Uploading video takes time and bandwidth, we suggest you do not wait until the deadline to submit your video pitch. Angelsoft will allow you to upload a video of up to 5 minutes long, but we strongly suggest you keep your video to 2 minutes -- you should be able to distill your message into a 2 minute video for uploading.

All applications will receive written feedback from the judging panel. Judges are investors and successful entrepreneurs who take time to review your application in detail and provide honest, constructive feedback on your venture and application. For a list of the judging panel, click here.

Finalists will be notified October 19, 2010 and invited to present at Women 2.0 PITCH Night in San Francisco on November 4th, 2010. If you are selected as a finalist, the entire team must present at PITCH.

This competition is in line with Steve Blank's position that startups model while companies plan -- hence, Women 2.0 is holding a business model competition rather than a business plan competition. Judging is based on not just the initial business model but what the team learned by pivoting, for example, avoiding the "beauty contest" of business plans where judges resort to choosing the best "paper exercise" plan (rather than the best business or the team that has made the most progress in figuring out product-market fit). Teams, whether they win or lose, finish the competition significantly more prepared to launch their business in the real world. Read more »

Investor Meetings for PITCH 2010 Winners:

Esther Dyson (Principal, EDventure Holdings)
Esther is an active investor at EDventure Holdings in a variety of startups, focusing on technology. Her portfolio of private space and air travel investments includes XCOR Aerospace, Space Adventures/Zero G (recently merged), Constellation Services, Icon Aircraft, Coastal Aviation Software and Airship Ventures. She has flown weightless on Zero-G four times, but hopes to go up again soon. On the IT side, Esther's investments included Flickr and del.icio.us, both sold to Yahoo! and Medstory, sold to Microsoft. Currently, she sits on the boards of 23andMe, Meetup, WPP Group, Eventful, Evernote, Boxbe and Yandex, the leading Russian search company. Esther sold her business EDventure Holdings, along with its Release1.0 newsletter and PC Forum conference, to CNET Networks in 2004. Esther left CNET at the end of 2006 and (with permission) has resumed doing business under the name of EDventure Holdings. She spends most of her time exploring new space, health care and IT start-ups and technologies, writing about them and actively (and with full disclosure) investing in some of them.
Matt Murphy (Partner, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers)
Matt manages the iFund at KPCB, a collaborative initiative with Apple focused on funding and building defining applications on the iPhone OS platform and the mobile internet. His expertise is in network communications, compute infrastructure, and mobile applications. Matt is either a Director or works closely with the management teams of Booyah!, GOGII, Pelago, Shazam, shopkick, Kodiak Networks, RGB Networks, Stoke, Aerohive Networks, and Puppet Labs. Previously, Matt was a board observer at Google (from initial investment to IPO), led KP's investment in Autonavi (NASDAQ: AMAP '10), and was a Director at Ocarina Networks (acquired by Dell '10), Peakstream (acquired by Google '08), Dash Navigation (acquired by RIM '09). Prior to KPCB, Matt led product management at a semiconductor startup (Netboost acquired by Intel) and worked at Sun Microsystems. Matt holds a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Tufts University and an MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business.
Mike Maples (Managing Partner, FLOODGATE)
Mike is the managing partner of FLOODGATE, and was recently named as one of "8 Rising VC Stars" by Fortune Magazine for his investments in business and consumer technology companies. Before becoming a full-time investor, Mike was an entrepreneur and operating executive who worked in a variety of senior management roles in high-growth companies. His background spans a variety of markets including consumer technology, small business, and the enterprise, and he has led various functions in product development, marketing, business development, and corporate strategy. Mike co-founded Motive, Inc., the world's leading broadband software company in 1997, and played key roles in its growth from raw start-up through sales of more than $75 million. Motive was one of the only successful technology IPOs in 2004, and the most successful infrastructure software IPO for the prior three years. At Motive, Mike was General Manager of Motive's Corporate Business Unit, as well as Chief Marketing and Strategy officer. Prior to Motive, Mike was responsible for worldwide product marketing at Tivoli Systems, where he managed the company's product portfolio from its early-stage development through its 1995 IPO and growth to a $750M line of business within the IBM Software Group. Mike began his professional career at Silicon Graphics, where he served in business development and product marketing roles. Mike holds an Engineering degree from Stanford University and an MBA from Harvard Business School.
Naval Ravikant (Partner, AngelList)
Naval is an entrepreneur and angel investor, a co-author of Venture Hacks, and a co-maintainer of AngelList. Previously, he was a co-founder at Genoa Corp (acquired by Finisar), Epinions.com (IPO via Shopping.com), and Vast.com (largest white-label classifieds marketplace). Naval has advised Bix.com, iPivot, and XFire, among others, and invested in many companies, including Twitter, FourSquare, DocVerse (sold to Google), Mixer Labs (sold to Twitter), Jambool (Social Gold), SnapLogic, PlanCast, Stack Overflow, Heyzap, and Disqus. Naval holds B.S. in Computer Science and Economics from Dartmouth College.