My definition of an “A” player in your company is someone who has serious talent and cares enough to put in the necessary time to win. That’s it. That’s my definition. A large organization can survive with several non-A players and some do pretty well with very few A-players. In the startup world, with limited resources and limited time, you can ill-afford to not have A-players. The entrepreneurs that survive surround themselves with A-players. How stacked is your team?
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In poker and in business, it’s much easier than you think to go on tilt. The most dangerous thing about being on tilt is when you don’t realize you are on tilt. For those of you who don’t even know what tilt is - going on tilt in poker is an emotional state whereby you can no longer make good decisions. Most often than not, this occurs in poker when you are expected to win a hand and someone gets lucky to beat you for a big payday. It can also occur if you start winning quite a bit and you start thinking that you are unbeatable (not too dissimilar from Wall Street the past few years). If you can’t recognize when you are on tilt, you are bound to lose everything you have and seriously regret your decisions when you get your normal state of mind back. Recognizing when you are on tilt in poker and in business will not only save you dollars in the long-run, it will also keep you positive and sane when things aren’t working in your favor and keep you hungry and humble when things are working really well.
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I was turned on to this innovative Seattle startup that focuses on improving the lives of extremely poor through the use of educational loans. It is self-sustainable as 97% of the loans are paid back and can be used again to loan to more people in need. Ideas like this can change the world. I love it and that’s why I just placed my first loan in the program and started a group to compete in their March Madness Challenge - anything that ties in the sports world is very cool. Having been to Central America several times, I chose to loan to Evalesthy Mercado in Nicaragua. You can read about her story here. It is refreshing to see entrepreneurs tackle the issue of extreme global poverty and we need to support them. Whether it is Vitanna or another great Seattle-based organization like One Day’s Wages - if you have the means to give, please do. Each dollar is directly given to those who need it most, meaning 100% of your donations go to those in need. This is the new breed of non-profits and transparency at its best. If you don’t have the means to give, talk about the issues and raise awareness amongst your peers - it’s what I call “social giving”.
Who are some of your favorite non-profits or for-profits that are doing innovative work in solving global poverty? I’d love to hear about them! Perhaps, you are ready to embark on a new journey starting your own?
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Sounds like an oxymoron. Probably is, but I’d argue that viewing adversity with the right perspective pays real dividends. 2009 was a tough year period. The majority of the companies that I’ve invested in or have a relationship with have struggled in 2009 with the exception of the Cheezburger network. Whether it was sales, raising capital, doing deals, HR issues, break-ins, litigation, it just seemed to be extraordinarily difficult in 2009 to meet/exceed goals and grow. To their credit though, none have given up - maybe because I won’t let them. In my day job, even though we grew signficantly in traffic and revenues, we didn’t meet our internal agressive goals. In the spirit of being reflective, here are some of my thoughts on how to or why you and I should embrace adversity.
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One of my hobbies is keeping tabs on the real estate industry. I’m not a big investor in real estate, but I definitely enjoy talking about the latest trends in real estate. I love ribbing my realtor friends that I think their jobs are becoming extinct and it’s time to rethink their value proposition soon or they may be going by the newspaper wayside. I’m a big fan of Redfin, estately, Zillow, and other real estate sites that are bringing more transparency to the real estate market. I’m tired of the industry driving profits through being opaque and keeping broken models in place in order to preserve their position. That being said, I’ve turned a bit more bullish on real estate as of late vs my very bearish position about 6-12 months ago. I’ve completed two transactions recently and thought I’d share about those transactions in more detail and my thought process.
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One thing I like about the holidays is that it allows for some of us to take some time out to take a deep breath relax and reflect. As I’m taking stock of 2009 and reflect on the good, bad, and the ugly - it’s becoming awfully clear that I (and most of you) have not had much time to reflect and have spent too much of our time reacting. I am guilty of this and will be much more intentional about being more reflective than reactive in 2010.
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As a software entrepreneur the past 10 years or so, I’ve found cash and talent to be in limited quantities. It is increasingly difficult to get the most talented software developers and managers when competing against big companies (um, that big company east of Seattle) that can offer more compensation, benefits, and stability. It isn’t impossible, but it poses a hard problem for aspiring and experienced entrepreneurs. One of the most frustrating parts is that the talent is available and willing to work if the US would just let them do so. This is definitely debatable, but I’d argue that our economy and our workforce will improve in the long-term if we just relax our immigration policy. I admit there may be some short term pain, but the long-term gain will more than justify the short term pain. In fact, I think for the companies I’m involved with, relaxing the immigration policy would provide even more stable employment for our workers. Here’s why…
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Being a Seattle sports fan is really tough these days, but I figure there are lessons learned even in lost seasons. I’m generally the biggest optimist in the room when it comes to the Seahawks each year to make it to the Super Bowl, I’m now convinced it’s not going to happen. However, even in the ugly win against one of the worst teams in NFL this past Sunday against Detroit, I thought there was a good lesson to be applied to our businesses. The lesson is that there is nothing wrong with dinking away to success. Let me explain.
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This thought provoking video highlights how we’ve been using the wrong techniques to motivate others and it talks about the science of motivation. Studies have shown that our most used method of motivation using the carrot-stick method (i.e. reward performance and punish poor performance) does not yield the results we are looking for, in fact it probably is hurting the performance of your business. Given my capitalistic attitudes, this would require some real proof. After watching the video, it resonated with me and I’m working on bringing some of these ideas to life. These key motivational points are really good to keep in mind:
1. Autonomy: The urge to direct our own lives. This is great motivation for the entrepreneur, however for the employee it is really important to give them the ability to feel autonomous. Provide some guardrails and allow your employee to find their way to the outcome, the creativity may surprise you.
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The past few weekends, I’ve met with several folks working at Microsoft. Microsoft is a great place to work, free sodas, good compensation with stock, great health plan, and reasonably good job security. Plus, they have Bing, which I really hope shifts the search marketplace from a monopoly to a duopoly. The conversations I have often with folks at Microsoft is that they want to start a company badly, but just can’t do it for a variety of reasons. And, so I wonder - will they regret later in life that they just didn’t give it a shot? Or, will they just forget about it? What do you think?
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