Surprisingly good read, only distracted by a bit of her self aggrandizing.
Susan Fowler had her 15 minutes, or more like about 2 years of fame when her blog post about the internal horrible practices going on at Uber. She brought to light and confirmed the sad truth of the dishonest, greedy, factory-like people mill that Silicon Valley has become.
I feel we need more of these stories, all of these stories, so we are lucky that she was willing to tell this story. There was probably a lot of personal pain Susan endured to relive some of her terrible experiences. Uber HR was just a shield for management, not a safe place for employees to try to be treated fairly.
My only criticism was her several stories about how she was a super-human who could learn any subject in a few months, deserved several “extra” college degrees and even felt she was a super-engineer no matter what. Could’ve done with less of that.
However, this book is pretty amazing, and her contribution to helping women in tech seek equality cannot be underestimated.
If you’re reading Linkedin on a Saturday. you’re probably thinking about it. One way to start the change is to adjust your speed, even a little bit. Whether up or down, the change flushes out the cache in your brain and gives you new energy.
SLOW IT DOWN
Right now we’re all slowing it down. I think that’s a good thing, breaking the zombie patterns we’ve all been in for so long, slogging our way through life’s daily routines. It’s all been stopped now, for the first time ever in our lives. Amazing.
I’ve had many times in my life when it was a good time to slow down, usually after an intense run of a few years in a growing company. When helping companies to grow faster and grow correctly without blowing up, my pattern is usually a lot of travel, a lot talking, frenetic schedules, pushing as hard as feasible on several parameters.
I see posts from people in different phases of their career where they advocate one of the above — “You need to speed it up” or “You need to slow it down” or “ Work Harder” or “Work Less”. Or “Here’s how to meditate” or “Drink More Coffee!!”
The truth is that it’s different for everyone based on where they are in their own cycle of life. Almost every time after slowing down for a few months, taking a well need rest for my mind and body, I realize it’s time to speed it back up, get out there more. I’m always surprised and have to psych myself into speeding up again. Moving slower and becoming more present and silt can become intoxicating. But it doesn’t “pay the bills” as they say.
Many years ago, Tim Ferris wrote one of the most popular business books ever, “The Four Hour Work Week”. In it he advocates trimming back the unnecessary busywork thing in life to give yourself more free time. The cover is a drawing of someone lying on a hammock between two palm trees, the iconic vacation lifestyle. With his constant self promotion and social media activity I’m guessing he no longer actually works only fours per week, but I get the point, and was doing many of the things he said for years before his book was published.
I’m famous among my business associates for cutting out any fat from business meetings, conversations, etc. At first it pisses them off, but then a few months or years later they often tell me they “get it”. I don’t believe in business for business’ sake type time wasting meetings.
One hobby/aspiration that helps to slow it down is art. Either making or studying some type of art, especially if it’s non-digital art, will give you a whole different view of your world and compartmentalize work and business. By design many art activities are slow and quiet and contemplative. Pop into a museum in New York or L.A. and everything changes.
So slow it down when you can. Disconnect, meditate, sleep.
SPEED IT UP
Then there are the times when you need to speed it up, move faster, be more productive. After this quarantine is all over, it will take some work for all of us to speed it back up. Our “speed it up” muscles are atrophied a bit.
I enjoy this phase as much as I enjoy slowing it down. Recently I visited a model city of the future, a “smart’ city where they showed us the advances in lifestyle that can increase your productivity through better eating and more exercise, as opposed to drinking Red Bull and working more hours. A smarter way to speed it up. At first I wasn’t sure I agreed but then I kind of got it. Eight hour days at higher productivity instead of twelve hour days with burn out as a result.
Moving faster, steadily increasing your speed, becoming more efficient, being “on” when you need to be. These are all healthy things for your productivity and creativity. many very successful people are called “Manic” types. The manic sessions are where they create, see beyond, and usually bother the people around them. I sometimes get these bursts, try to limit them ,but allow them to take over once in a while. I’m writing this right now because of a creative surge I felt this morning from reading a great article on predictive analytics. I felt that I should not only consume great stories but also try to write something useful, and to do it quickly.
Part of speeding up is to reduce the amount of time spent. Elton John was famous in his early days for spending very little time writing his songs. During the making of the Yellow Brick Road album, h e would receive lyrics for three to five songs every morning from his writing partner Bernie Taupin, then create finished songs within a couple of hours. Many of these songs went on to become his greatest hits.
Slow it down, speed it up. Try being more conscious about doing this and you may find a new rhythm and balance to your life. Enjoy this forced relaxation right now, as we’ll probably never see such a thing again.
It all started with a heated discussion I was having with one of my WordPress agency partners. Anyone who knows me knows that I’ve been heavily involved in the WordPress ecosystem for a long time, and it’s a fairly different world than my other world –– the high growth tech startup ecosystem, so I get to see both of them side by side often.
This article is about the latter, the high growth tech startup ecosystem.
Among my WordPress friends and other people on the technical end of my social spectrum, there’s often a negative connotation to the term “scaling a business”. It’s kind of like the word “ambition”, which is a negative when pushed to an excess.
Everyone welcomes growth, right? It means more revenue, more income. Yeah but it also means more problems, bigger staffing, higher risk. So no, many people today are just looking to make a good, steady living, be able to pay their expenses, have study income without having a boss.
That’s why a lot of them turn to the agency or freelance model.
Also, web development agencies aren’t really inherently scalable. They are a linear model –– the more hours you work the more you make. You provide a service, get paid for labor. Many of them do scale to a certain size, but it’s linear, based on more labor, reselling other peoples labor.
“Why do you want to Scale?”
A developer and good friend of mine recently learned that I did a lecture series for several years called THE SCALABLE STARTUP. It is a topic I’ve discussed for almost my entire career and very central to my business philosophies. To some people its magic, to others it is confusing or frustrating. People react one way or the other.
My friend Amit asked me “Why do you want to Scale?” As if it was a bad thing. He equated “scalability” to big corporations, growth at any cost, greed, etc., was very negative on the word and concept.
Amit also felt that it ruined the collegial vibe that a tiny company has. “If you mess with a good thing, you can ruin it.” he said.
Now before I continue, let me state that I have a great amount of respect for this person, we were co-founders in a past company, and I’m part-time developer myself so I understand the comfort of a small team that has jelled and works together well. Simple, clean, manageable.
I get it, the dream life of the digital nomad, laptop on the beach in some exotic country or up in the mountains in a cabin. The lone wolf. I love it. I’ve done it! It’s a very romantic notion, and the right thing for many, for some period of time.
But I also don’t think it’s realistic in the long term for most. Grow or die is my motto for tech companies or even a small agency.
My opinion on this frustrates some people.
I never have been against “engineered’ growth –– the practice of trying to purposely, exponentially scale a business. In fact, I prefer it.
Why? Because no company can make their revenue stay exactly the same month after month, year after year. Also exponential growth usually includes some type of unique technology, which provides higher margins, escape from linearity, and protection of the hundreds of competitors all agencies and freelancers face.
The Magic Ingredient
Scaling is the magic ingredient for startups to actually persevere as a business. Anyone who’s felt the power of stable reliable growth knows what I mean.
Continuous growth, at least a little, and a growth mindset together create a positive pressure on a business, force them to expand and continuously improve. It’s more difficult –– adding people, scaling infrastructure, fighting with bigger competitors, but I believe it’s worth it. For any business.
It’s also an incessant challenge –– “We must keep growing!” To me that’s a good thing.
Often when a growth company stalls, they start looking to sell or merge their company, to prevent the slide back down the revenue curve and all the painful things that come with that. That’s O.K., and often provides some wonderful outcomes that wouldn’t have arisen if they weren’t set up as a scalable business.
Growth, scaling, growth, pizza…
One wonderful model for me is my friend Jace, whom I am helping to create a new food ordering startup. There are hundreds of food ordering startups already, so why would anyone do this in 2019, right?. Most will fail.
But we’re approaching it in a very different way, looking beyond the present. We’re designing the platform and pricing so that growth is very slow at the beginning then increases over time. We’re building proprietary technologies that we will use ourselves then expose to the world. Etc., etc.
We’re building scalability into everything.
Excitement
Growth businesses are also more exciting for a company’s team and friends and family and customers. As you build long term relationships with customers, investors, employees, they thrive on your continuous growth and actually help you to continue to grow.
I understand and respect the linear businesses, and I love the simplicity of the agency model, but they are vulnerable to change and competition in the long run.
So consider the scalable model for anything you do.
“The energy of the mind is the essence of life.” – – Aristotle
Find yourself a partner or two, ASAP. Don’t be too hasty, but having a partner makes an enormous difference. The #1 wish of most business minded founders is to have a technical partner, a “tech cofounder,” but they go about it all wrong. I can’t drive around Silicon Valley without thinking of Hewlett and Packard, one of the best partnerships in history. They were both technical, quite similar in some ways but there were also several lesser known major differences in their personalities and beliefs. They supported each other to the end and made everything around them stronger because of it. A great partnership is about equality in the right places, and if it is maintained, the resulting energy is much more than the sum of its parts. In most great partnerships it’s impossible to discern who the leader is; both partners support the other almost more than themselves.
This has organically happened a couple of times for me – someone I’ve worked with in the past asks me to write them a recommendation and then spontaneously returns the favor. It’s a very cool gesture and it reinforces the relationship for the future.
Below is an example for a startup entrepreneur I just went through a short mentoring process with, Greg Weinstein. Greg will do very well with his company, I could’ve written a lot more about his attributes.
I recommend (get it?) you try this – swap a recommendation with close present or past colleagues; it will enhance both of your social business circles and create new connections.
It’s hard to derive extra value on linkedin, rise above the fray – this will help you do it.
#networking #linkedin #social_marketing
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Gregory A Weinstein has recommended you on LinkedIn
Gregory A Weinstein Gregory A Weinstein Founder and CEO, One Fulfilling Life
To: Tom Nora
Date: August 22, 2013
Gregory A Weinstein has recommended your work as Founder, Marketing, Community Development at Startup Workshops.
Dear Tom,
I’ve written this recommendation of your work to share with other LinkedIn users.
Details of the Recommendation: “During the early and critical stages of the conception and start up of One Fulfilling Life, Tom provided us with thoughtful, wise and nurturing insight and guidance. He was our “Board of Directors” and the fit seemed very natural and intuitive.
It was an awesome opportunity and I relish the experience. His guidance saved us a lot of time and money and more importantly kept our momentum moving forward in the face of what could have been crippling obstacles. If your a tech start up and especially if this is your first business venture Tom’s your man. Catch him if you can!!!!!
Thanks Tom”
Service Category: Business Consultant
Year first hired: 2013
Top Qualities: Expert, Praxis High Integrity Systems
