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Golden Oldies: If the Shoe Fits: Why People Join Startups

Monday, January 6th, 2020

https://www.flickr.com/photos/hikingartist/5726760809/

Poking through 14+ years of posts I find information that’s as useful now as when it was written.

Golden Oldies is a collection of the most relevant and timeless posts during that time.

First, Steve Wozniak’s comments from 2016 are even less true today than they were then. Secondly, money has become the all-consuming focus for most people regardless of profession, driven for some by necessity, but in tech more often by ego, stuff and an aspirational lifestyle. That said, startups as a source of wealth may be falling out of style, as you’ll see tomorrow.

Read other Golden Oldies here.

A Friday series exploring Startups and the people who make them go. Read all If the Shoe Fits posts here

I only partly agree with Steve Wozniak’s recent comment.

“I think the money that’s been made has attracted a different kind of people looking at technology today and saying ‘Oh my gosh, I could maybe have a startup and make a bunch of money,’” Wozniak said. “And the ones that come out of business school, money’s the priority. For the ones that come out of engineering school, being able to accomplish and design things that didn’t exist before is their priority.”

 Woz gives too much credit to the engineers.

It’s not just the biz school crowd that’s focused on the bucks.

The money bug has bit a good number of techies, too.

Years ago, no matter their role, people joined startups because they craved the bleeding edge, whether software, hardware or services.

This was true of both tech and non tech. In the words of Star Treck, they wanted “to go where no man has gone before” — or at the least go there differently.

Today the journey is more about getting rich and/or making connections for the future.

For decades I’ve told clients, “The person who joins your company for money/stock/perks will leave in a heartbeat for more money/stock/perks.”

That hasn’t changed, if anything it’s just gotten more so.

Image credit: HikingArtist

Golden Oldies: If The Shoe Fits: Hypocrisy And Greed In Startup Land

Monday, September 16th, 2019

https://www.flickr.com/photos/hikingartist/5726760809/

Poking through 11+ years of posts I find information that’s as useful now as when it was written.

Golden Oldies is a collection of the most relevant and timeless posts during that time.

How time and tech fly. I wrote this in 2017 and there’s been a lot of change since then. In short, while hypocrisy has skyrocketed, with the advent of Uber, Lyft, We, and others profitability has fallen way behind. Greed, however, is alive and kicking butt — think We’s Adam Neumann.

Read other Golden Oldies here.

A Friday series exploring Startups and the people who make them go. Read all If the Shoe Fits posts here.

Tuesday I cited a post by Scott Belsky on Medium talking about how employees are often conned (my word) by founders, especially unicorns, when it comes to the wealth that is supposed to flow from their ISO.

As pithy as the post was, some of the comments were even pithier. I especially like this one from  colorfulfool (21st comment)

If profitability were proportional to hypocrisy, there would be no failed startups in the Valley.

Not just true, but succinctly and elegantly stated.

Founders love to talk about the importance of transparency, trust and authenticity.

However, their stock plans and pitfalls thereof exhibit such a high degree of opaqueness and caveat emptor that they kick a hole the size of Texas in the fabric of the founders’ authenticity.

Another prevalent piece of hypocrisy is “change the world.”

Do you really believe that another dating app or being able to evaluate a new restaurant or another way to buy your groceries will change the world?

While they may impact one’s personal world, they certainly don’t have the impact of something like Mine Kafon.

What is proportional to the Valley’s hypocrisy is its sheer greed.

Actually, when I stop to think about it, the greed probably exceeds even the hypocrisy.

Image credit: HikingArtist

Golden Oldies: Entrepreneurs: Are Investors Watering Down Innovation?

Monday, August 19th, 2019

https://www.flickr.com/photos/hikingartist/5726811997/

Poking through 11+ years of posts I find information that’s as useful now as when it was written.

Golden Oldies is a collection of the most relevant and timeless posts during that time.

There’s not a lot on TV that I like, but I used to really enjoy Shark Tank. Past tense; haven’t watched in several years. Why? Two words: lifestyle products. With very few exceptions that’s what was being presented, whether an app, a product or a service. I understand that entrepreneurs create stuff that will get funded, and while I’m not saying they are bad investments or that the entrepreneurs don’t mean well, I am saying that I don’t care about them. They won’t change the world or even improve it. Uber and Lyft are good examples; they haven’t decreased traffic, as they claimed they would, in fact, they’ve increased it. Most in the “life style” category are focused on “personal care.” (Have you noticed that sometime in the recent past “personal growth” morphed into “personal care”?) More packaging in the landfills, more time on the screen, more focus on self — so not my mindset.

Read other Golden Oldies here.

Innovation isn’t nearly as mind-boggling today when compared to what startups were doing in the late Seventies/early Eighties when I started working with them.

That’s not surprising when you consider who gets funded these days.

A recent Reuters report found that the majority of Silicon Valley startup founders that receive Series A funding come from the same pedigreed cohort: either they previously worked at a large, well-known tech firm, a well-connected smaller tech company, they previously created a successful startup, or they come from one of three universities—Stanford, Harvard, or MIT.

Not surprising when you consider the attitude of Valley stalwarts like Paul Graham of Y Combinator, who publicly stated that he would be unlikely to fund someone with a strong accent or a woman.

It’s been 15 years since I first wrote about the proclivity of managers to hire people like themselves and more over the years showing it leads to homophily and the negative impact that has on a company.

It seems it’s no different for investors.

They are funding people like themselves who were raised, educated and worked along paths similar to their own who they either know or are introduced to them by a friend.

“Like a lot of the investments [Instacart] that have come our way, a friend of a friend talked to us about it, and told us about it, and encouraged the founder and the CEO to come and chat with us. One thing led to another.” –Sequoia partner Mike Moritz

When you fund from a homogenous group, no matter where they are, creativity and innovation are watered down, because those groups tend to be insular and badly interbred talking mostly to each other.

If you’re fishing from a pond of rich white guys, you’re mostly going to get ideas that address the needs of rich white guys.

AKA, people like themselves.

Image credit: Frits Ahlefeldt

If The Shoe Fits: Why Sleep?

Friday, April 19th, 2019

A Friday series exploring Startups and the people who make them go. Read all If the Shoe Fits posts here.

Jack Ma is the founder of Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba. He recently extolled the virtues on social media of working long hours, calling it a blessing..

Ma took to social media recently to voice his support of an intense work culture known as “996,” which refers to working from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m., six days a week. That all-consuming, life-force-sucking schedule is reportedly common among the country’s big technology companies and startups and Ma is okay with that.

And you thought the US was bad.

US startups have always been famous (infamous?) for working 80+ hour weeks and pulling multiple all-nighters conferred even more bragging rights.

More bragging rights, no matter the size of your company.

Sometime in the last 20 years, with the rise of giant tech companies, unicorns, unicorn wannabes, and other new(ish) companies, long hours got baked into startup culture and continued long after the company qualifies as a “startup.”

But even the Chinese government disagrees with Ma’s 996.

“The mandatory enforcement of 996 overtime culture not only reflects the arrogance of business managers, but also is unfair and impractical.”

Working excessive hours damages/destroys family, friendships, productivity, creativity, and a host of other things, but the first thing to suffer is sleep.

Besides the damage that lack of sleep does in the present, the long-term damage, while different, is as dangerous as football.

Considering how the tech world worships health, longevity and the possibility of extending their lives well past 100 they may want to rethink those long hours.

Not because I say so, but they might want to listen to Matthew Walker, professor of neuroscience and psychology at the University of California, Berkeley, and the author of the book “Why We Sleep.”

Image credit: HikingArtist and Tech Insider

If The Shoe Fits: Stop and Think

Friday, April 12th, 2019

A Friday series exploring Startups and the people who make them go. Read all If the Shoe Fits posts here.

Obviously, opportunity and entrepreneurs go together.

There are dozens, if not hundreds, of opportunities that could serve as the basis for a company.

It is a wise entrepreneur who at least tries to consider the long-tern implications of the opportunity they choose.

Not just the financial potential, but the possible effects on society and the world.

While no one can see the future, there is one thing you can count on happening.

Humans will act the same way online as they do in the real world — only more so.

More so, because they can indulge their worst thoughts/desires with little-to-no chance of repercussions and a much broader reach.

Anything that has ever been done offline will be done — more so.

Political dirty tricks will get dirtier,  bullying will be more vicious, the haters will be more active, and on and on.

Could Mark Zukerberg have foreseen this when he started Facebook?

Maybe not.

Did he try?

Probably not.

Did he even stop to think?

Unlikely.

Does he think about it now?

Only to deny it.

Image credit: HikingArtist

If The Shoe Fits: Authentic Selves

Friday, April 5th, 2019

A Friday series exploring Startups and the people who make them go. Read all If the Shoe Fits posts here.

Last Friday we looked at how culture is based on values and how often the values claimed aren’t, in fact, authentic.

Values are one thing, but the whole authentic idea is overblown.

How many times have you heard “bring your authentic self to work (or wherever).

If you’re like most people you have multiple authentic selves.

Think about it, the self you show your spouse is different than the self you show your boss and both are different from the self your friends know.

Yet they are all authentic.

Meaning each self adheres to the same values.

For example, if one self is married and another self has a lover both selves are authentic, since their basic value system accepts cheating.

Look around, not just at the people you’re close to or see frequently, but at the names you see in the news.

Compare what they say/do in various situations and you’ll find you can figure out very quickly what their real authentic values are.

Image credit: HikingArtist

If The Shoe Fits: Culture and Values

Friday, March 29th, 2019

A Friday series exploring Startups and the people who make them go. Read all If the Shoe Fits posts here.

Pundits and investors of all kinds, from lone angels to major VCs, say that your company’s culture is critical to its success.

Therefore, the most important question founders should ask themselves is what are my values?

Not what you say out loud, or agree to in order to fit in, or because they are good talking points, or to be PC.

You need to be brutally honest, at least with yourself, because, in the long run, whatever your values truly are will out.

Mark Zuckerberg claimed he wanted to do good by connecting people.

Larry Page and Sergey Brin wanted to organize the world’s information and “not be evil.”

But, in the long run, their top core value became obvious, echoing Gordon Geko’s, “Greed is good.”

Also long term, Andrew Wilkinson’s 2015 words reflect his values, I’m not a unicorn, I’m a horse.

Culture is based on founder values and sooner or later the real ones do surface.

This is where being “your authentic self” trips up a lot of people, not just founders.

Image credit: HikingArtist

Guest Post: Leadership: A Turing Test for Bosses

Friday, March 22nd, 2019

https://www.thepinkhumanist.com/articles/330-life-of-alan-turing-examined-in-a-new-graphic-novel

This recent post from Wally Bock seemed like a great way to wrap up this week’s commentary about values and bosses.

Alan Turing made many contributions to the Allied effort in World War II and to the many fields that have coalesced into computer science. He’s best known among laypeople like me for his “Turing Test,” a test of whether a computer can exhibit intelligent behavior like a human being.

My question for you is: “Could you pass such a test?” If I watched you work for a few hours, would it be obvious that you were a human being and not some kind of AI-powered, cyborg-boss?

In my career I’ve seen too many bosses who couldn’t. They imagined their job as passing on instructions and enforcing regulations. One of their favorite phrases is “I have no choice …”

Most bosses aren’t that way. They may not get everything right, but it’s clear that they’re human beings struggling to do the right thing. That’s probably where you fit, but let’s check. Is it obvious that you’re a real human being or do you act like a walking, talking bunch of algorithms?

Do you take time to have frequent conversations with your team members where you do something more than just pass on directives?

Do you strive to be fair to everyone while you make adjustments for individual strengths, weaknesses, and preferences?

Do you argue for your team or team member when something comes down from above that’s wrong or unfair?

Do you help your team members grow, develop, and succeed?

Boss’s Bottom Line

Human bosses who act intelligently are the best for human beings. That means more than passing on instructions and enforcing rules and standards. Show your humanity by acknowledging the emotion in the workplace and by using both your brain and your heart

Image credit: HikingArtist

If The Shoe Fits: Jerks and Brilliance

Friday, March 8th, 2019

A Friday series exploring Startups and the people who make them go. Read all If the Shoe Fits posts here.

A couple of years ago Dick Costolo explained why startups needed to hire “brilliant jerks” in order to succeed.

It’s stuff like that, especially from people like Costolo, that gives people permission to act like jerks.

Why?

Because people who tend to be jerks are usually delusional enough to believe that they’re brilliant.

But what about those who are brilliant (or what passes as such these days) and act like jerks?

Well, why not?

All they are doing is living up to expectations and, like Pavlov’s dog, the more free passes they get the more they will believe their actions/attitudes are OK.

In my life I’ve been around a lot of real brilliance and they had certain traits in common.

Without exception, they loved sharing their knowledge, building up those around them and helping them grow — no matter who.

That’s what truly brilliant people do; that’s why they are remembered.

The same goes for everyone who does the same.

Whereas the jerks are ephemeral and soon forgotten.

If they are remembered, it’s for what they did, as opposed to how they acted.

Steve Jobs is a good example, as is Jeff Bezos.

Think about it; what’s the likelihood that the brilliant jerks in your world are in the same league?

Image credit: HikingArtist

If The Shoe Fits: an Entrepreneur with Balls (Literally)

Friday, March 1st, 2019

A Friday series exploring Startups and the people who make them go. Read all If the Shoe Fits posts here.

It doesn’t matter which side you were on regarding the recent shutdown, because you were probably effected.

Maybe it was you, a relative or friend. Or maybe a friend or relative of a friend who couldn’t feed their kids or pay their mortgage/rent.

People were angry; some wrote letters, most unloaded online.

The more entrepreneurial (opportunistic) converge on Café Press.

But one entrepreneur went much further.

Greg Miller, founder of Neuticles, a company that sells testicular implants for neutered dogs so they appear unneutered, used his own product to make a statement.

As the shutdown has dragged on – it entered its 34th day Thursday – he is preparing to send his product to all 53 Senate Republicans, plus Vice President Mike Pence, with the message: ‘We are demanding that you gain testicular fortitude and have enclosed a pair of Neuticles to help achieve the necessity to stand up against the sole interests of this rogue president.”

Miller’s company, based in Oak Grove, Missouri, will spend around $13,000 on mailing plus the cost of the product.

He knows that sales are likely to take a hit from his actions, so why do it?

“I just want them to get some damn balls and think of America, not their political party.”

Male or female, entrepreneurs are known for being tough, in other words for having cojones, i.e., balls.

Greg Miller certainly does — in more ways than one.

Image credit: HikingArtist

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