I am sure you folks have realized that I’ve been “off air” for awhile. The combination of helping out Daily Grommet and joining Pixability has shriveled my capacity for writing to zero. But, I am getting back on the horse and definitely have a lot of material from the “startup trenches” to share.

So that all said, today I want to focus on some of the missteps many of us take in managing our most precious resource – people. I want to point out three major ones I have seen lately in the entrepreneurial community:

1. Fishing problem. Almost daily I hear the question “do you know any good <insert profession>? We’re having a hard time finding anyone.” And every time I follow it up with: “So how have you been recruiting?”  I am always hoping to hear something unique, but sadly, I usually get the same answer. The vast majority of us are “fishing” for the same “fish” in the same overcrowded spots. For me, it is a déjà-vu of ’99, ’03, and ’05. Apparently we have learned nothing. Not only can we not find the people we need, but when we do, the compensation demands are often out of whack. Looking for people who fit the same “template” needs to stop! Searching for the talent in the same places everyone else does is simply lazy.
2. Hiring only “A players”. Paul English (CTO of Kayak.com) might be a great self-promoter and plenty of folks buy into his “hire only A-players” philosophy, but he and the folks like him seem to omit a major detail – millions of dollars in their “war chest”. Not everyone can blow $60K plus in headhunter fees to poach an individual from another company. If we are all only looking for “A players” (add “ninjas”, “gurus”, and “rock stars” to the played out lingo), we are missing out on a lot of talent. Why? Because especially in resource strapped startups, we MUST do talent arbitrage. Forget finding those perfect matches- we need to focus on looking for those “hungry”, yearning to prove their worth, excited to grow, and itching to learn.
3. Working for the sake of working. In startups we love to brag about how many hours we work – it is like a badge of honor. I say we need to stop this wasteful madness! If we do some facts-based analysis, we will see only 40 of those 80+ hours in the office are actually productive while the others are self-defeating. Some of the more progressive companies are discovering they can have more progress with their people working sane hours effectively, rather than allowing (or even pushing for) unhealthy overworking of talent. Energy drink infused work hours are very costly to the progress of the company. We should focus on making sure our people are working ONLY on stuff that moves our companies forward and obsess about how to make it easier for our teams to get stuff done, not about how long they are working. Smart will beat long any day.

To summarize: diversify your recruiting efforts, look for individuals rather than just clones, and focus on work productivity, not hours worked.

About the author:

Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius is a business operations leader with 12-year track record of helping companies manage growth, build diverse teams, harness technology, and get a lot more profitable. He is usually brought in to build new or improve older business processes, provide structure to a rapidly growing business, and create higher level of predictability for the executive team.To learn more about Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius please visit his site TheOperationsGuy.com

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I recently had a conversation with a friend about the importance of building a diverse team. It is a subject I spend a lot of time on, since my own personal experience and countless research articles have shown that a diverse teams deliver better product and increased efficiency. If you are interested in this research, follow professor Vivek Wadhwa on Twitter. He usually has links to it that do not require journal subscribtion.

Then my friend uttered something that I commonly hear – “are you saying you should engage in discrimination against the majority?” My answer that is: if that is what you call “discrimination”, then hell yes!

Not only should we avoid hiring clones of our current employees, but we should shy away from building an environment and employee benefits based on the “hot” formula that is only appealing to the majority. Hiring “blindly” and on qualifications alone is no longer good enough! Bringing great skills and knowledge onboard is no longer good enough! Every new person you add should bring in a healthy dose of a unique perspective, experience, culture, personal story, etc. The truth is – people like to hire others who are like them. So you must make an effort to hire outside of your “comfort zone”.

If you are still convinced that a monotonous team is just fine, here are a couple of questions to chew on:

• How will a crew of 20-something single white and Asian males with computer science degrees (usually from the same school) know how to create, market, and sell a product to a market that is NOTHING like them?
• How are you supposed to create an environment of innovation and creativity, when everyone on your team is the same? How do you stop the 100% guaranteed groupthink?
• What do you think a member of a different demographic group will do when they get your job offer, if they see an environment of mostly diversity-indifferent employees? How will that affect your efforts to make your team better?’

Still think this diversity “thing” is bogus?

“But all the candidates we get are from the same demographic group!”. This is a result of your “recruiting funnel” failure. If you can’t fill the top of the funnel with a diverse group of candidates, then your entire system will be broken. So how do you fix this?

1. Don’t be shy about finding very diverse companies that are doing well and copying their environment and benefits. Use this as a base and then utilize members of the diverse team you are building to help you further improve things.
2. Referrals are a good source of talent, but to make the top of your funnel attract the most diverse candidates, you have to use creativity. The more creative you get, the better the results. (Example I use a lot: you can find great future developers in music colleges and user experience designers in psychology programs).

“But I have a problem retaining people who are not [insert description of the majority demographic]”. This means you did not work hard enough or have not been open-minded enough about what motivates people different than you. Since this is a big topic, I will write more about this soon.

Until then, I would like to find out what were some of the more unusual places or strategies you used to find great talent. Post a comment, send me an e-mail, or hit me up on Twitter.

About the author:
Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius is a business operations leader with 12-year track record of helping companies manage growth, build diverse teams, harness technology, and get a lot more profitable. He is usually brought in to build new or improve older business processes, provide structure to a rapidly growing business, and create higher level of predictability for the executive team.To learn more about Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius please visit his site TheOperationsGuy.com

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Introduction by Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius: this guest post by Paul Morgan might have the language directed at mid to larger size companies, but the vast majority of principles mentioned are highly applicable to the world of technology startups. Yes, according to my personal experience and widely available statistics, most of you will not make it past the team of 10 and this may not help you. But a good number will and strong technical teams will become a huge issue. Having had a chance to grow companies past the 100-employee mark, I know growing pains show up much earlier than expected.

This will challenge most moderate to large companies involved in software development traditional views.  For the purpose of this discussion I will assume the technical team is involved in developing a web-based application. From the results you can pick and chose how you want to arrange your team.

Principles first

Before we do the people selection there are some key principles to establish:

1. Strong talent in a small team can be far more effective that average talent in a larger one.
   Well directed and motivated expert teams execute effectively. They tend to need more tender loving care because they can be precious about their output, but this is a small price to pay for the results that can be delivered. You will expect to pay that expert talent more, but you can offset that by recruiting fewer people.
2. Try to operate like the team is a small start-up
   The by-product of creating this environment is that the team feel  they can operate outside of the “red tape” that besets many larger organizations and start to get creative and innovative. Typical examples are removing all the “lock downs” that most corporate organizations enforce on company provided hardware. This doesn’t mean that it’s a free-for-all – the environments should be well thought through and consistent.  Also allow the team to work on a flexi-time basis.
3. Have a strong leadership team that is transparent
   If the team know their leadership have their support and trust them then they are less likely to want to fail and will go beyond the cause to get things done and done right. A leadership team that shows they have direction and can speak to the team about it, can be open an honest about how things stand will have the respect and therefore the backing of the team – this loyalty is an extremely valuable commodity.
4. Cultivate the environment where everyone matters
   Empowering the team and ensuring that everyone feels more than comfortable to give an opinion to anyone in the group at any level. This creates an environment where people get passionate about their work and team.
5. Shield the team from corporate noise
   Avoid team members getting caught up in meetings etc. that take away their time from doing the work they love. This is a value add that they will respect you for.
6. Communicate!
   Create effective communication strategies – canvass the team about what sort of information would be useful. Have at least one team meeting a week and consider having a “beer Friday” once a month – take the team outside of the work environment and let them talk. It’s amazing what you’ll find out!

Choosing the right people

Depending on how your organization is composed, this design will differ but the component parts are still valid. The groups listed here are not exhaustive. Other equally valuable groups include Technical Authors, Support and Deployment.

Architecture – They should be able to speak to emerging or established (recommended) platforms and methodologies at various levels of the application. Databases are well covered with Oracle, Microsoft or Neteeza as the main players and Apache for webservers so expertise in the middle-tier is important, e.g. Service Orientated Architecture (SOA),  javascript frameworks (thinking jQuery, MooTools, Tibco GI).

Development – it’s a good idea split the development team into support and enhancements. That way you can have more junior or offshore resources in the support space and put your key resources into the new development area. As the junior resources mature they have a career path opportunity into the enhancement team.

When selecting your development team look, consider the importance of:

• User Interface capabilities – understanding the intimacies of CSS & Javascript and how browsers interpret them
• Database optimization – On oft overlooked skill is the ability to craft good SQL; whilst this can be achieved through the DBA, having someone on the development team skilled in this area is a positive.

Business Analysts – Being able to understand the 50,000ft view and bring it to the 50ft view is really important. BA’s are more than glorified note-takers (as I’ve heard them called) – they’re key people to interface between business and technical groups. Ideal characteristics include the ability to drive and direct both business and technical groups through positive interpretation, being decisive, accessible and flexible to changing needs. This list isn’t exhaustive but it gives you an idea where your BA skill sets need to be. A great BA is worth 3 average ones.

Quality Assurance – This is another area where outsourcing is possible, however it is essential  that there are full time employees also on the team to drive and direct. The team should be able to offload a great deal of the core testing through automation – without this you lose the ability for the QA team to be flexible to changing landscapes and the cost of ongoing testing is increased.

Location

If you’re looking for agile/xp development then the team has to be located in the same office to be effective. Teams trying to be agile in multiple locations face many challenges and tend to fall back to the waterfall method, which is ideal in these situations.

Conclusion

There is much to cover about the perfect technical team. Technical ability is extremely important, but no more so than personality of the individual. A good work atmosphere is incredibly addictive and will nurture a creative and industrious environment. Getting highly skilled and motivated people will pay dividends way beyond the balance sheet.

About the author:
Paul Morgan has been lucky enough to be involved in many aspects of IT from training, support, develop and architecture and is now a program manager for a global corporation (Nielsen Corporation) across their internet and intranet presences. Prior to his IT career he spent 11 years in financial services in client service and sales roles giving him a unique perspective entering the IT realm of understand and move between the business and technical arenas.Originally from Oxford, UK, Paul now lives in Chicago with his family and enjoys his car, music and photography. His blog is at one7.wordpress.com.

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I feel like I correct perceptions about what operations professionals are and are not at least 2-3 times per week. Most folks, especially from organizations in technology-heavy industries, automatically assume “operations” is purely systems management.  While an operations person may really just be a senior network administrator in some organizations, the true responsibilities of a (business) operations manager/leader are much broader. Unless one specifies they are referring to technology operations, people should always assume they are talking about business operations.

Read the full article on The Operations Guy blog»

 

 

About the author:
Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius is a business operations leader with 12-year track record of helping companies manage growth, build diverse teams, harness technology, and get a lot more profitable. He is usually brought in to build new or improve older business processes, provide structure to a rapidly growing business, and create higher level of predictability for the executive team.To learn more about Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius please visit his site TheOperationsGuy.com

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I’m sure most of you have read my article “Time to end the frat house culture! We need more women in our midst.” I want to see more women in leadership roles and the ranks of techies, scientists, and entrepreneurs. This not only benefits society, but is also great for business (see my previous article for the data).

This article was inspired by several months of conversations with successful female professionals about the subject. I also had the pleasure attending a great event organized by MITX and Girls in Tech called “Lessons Learned: Women’s Careers in Review”. Here are 7 “commandments” that summarize everything I’ve learned so far:

Read the full article on The Operations Guy blog»

 

 

About the author:
Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius is a business operations leader with 12-year track record of helping companies manage growth, build diverse teams, harness technology, and get a lot more profitable. He is usually brought in to build new or improve older business processes, provide structure to a rapidly growing business, and create higher level of predictability for the executive team.To learn more about Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius please visit his site TheOperationsGuy.com

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• Defining the Difference Between (Business) Operations and Technology Operations
• What to Look for in a Chief Right Hand Person (COO, VP of Operations)
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EditMe is a two person startup. We consider ourselves a startup, because we’re still searching for the product/market fit that can result in scalable growth. But, we’re a bit different from your typical startup in that EditMe has bootstrapped every stage of growth by providing real value to customers who have validated (or not validated) the product through real dollars. In a world where most entrepreneurs spend a majority of the time refining their deck, it seems strange to ignore outside investors. Impossible even. Here’s how we do it.

1. Have super-high standards – start with the right people. I’m a firm believer in Joel Spolsky’s Guerrilla Guide to Interview – Find smart people who get things done. Joel writes this about software guys, but it can and should be applied to every person in the business. Sounds easy, but it’s actually not, especially when looking for co-founders. The best way I’ve learned to find the right people is through previous experience working together. Matt Wiseley, the founder of EditMe, and I have worked together in two prior jobs. I used to work for him. He used to work for me. We’re both partners now.

Another key is to find what I’ve heard described as “T” people. T-people have breadth of experience (the top bar of the T), but one area where they have deep focus (the middle line of the “T”). If your small team has breadth of experience it makes it a lot easier to have two-way, constructive dialogue about all aspects of the product, the business, and the customer acquisition process without running into obstacles caused by lack of comprehension. A deep focus in one particular area builds trust between other members of the team. Whatever you’re focused on, your team feels confident that you’re the expert on how to get it done, and will not require oversight by the others.

At EditMe, Matt is a true hands-on CTO who heads up all aspects of our Product, but has marketed this product to a successful tune of 5,000 customers before my arrival on the scene. Meanwhile, I’m focused entirely on Customer Development, Sales, and Marketing, but have contributed to the code base as well.

2. Get properly motivated – burn the ships. When the Spanish Conquistador Hernando Cortez landed in Mexico, one of his first orders to his men was to burn the ships. Aside from eliminating the option of going back home, this executive order brought stark symbolism to the fact that it is up to you to get things done.  Stop whining about lack of money, time, resources, and optimum market conditions. Start worrying instead about how to get revenue by building a product that people want. There is no one to blame but you. There is nothing left to do, but get it done. If you’re not properly motivated to overcome the seemingly insurmountable obstacles – then get properly motivated. There’s nothing wrong with faking it until you make it.

At EditMe, getting and staying motivated is a regular task, and requires being a part-time cheerleader. I love to make a big deal out of the good things, like our PC Magazine Editor’s Choice Award. And when things don’t go our way, that’s alright, that’s O.K. – we didn’t need it anyway.

3. Focus on execution – work smarter not harder. Even with the “smart, get’s stuff done” kind of people that are gung-ho and motivated, staying disciplined is harder than it looks. With such a small team it is easy to get sucked into the myriad of tasks and activities that all seem important (and probably are). But if these tasks and activities don’t culminate into a shippable product or end-result, it is all just wasted time. Fourteen groundbreaking insights in half-finished blog posts or strategic whiteboard sessions don’t have value. One mediocre blog post that gets a decent amount of inbound traffic has some value. I choose “something” over “nothing” at every turn.  This focus on execution is often described in the Lean Startup world as elimination of waste.

At EditMe, both of us have built entirely different personal systems to keep focused on execution throughout the day, but both generally follow the Get Things Done (GTD) methodology. We use a variety of to-do lists for daily tasks, issue tracking software for medium-sized goals, and our long term planning is done using our company wiki. We keep everything up to date as we move through our activities, which keeps track of decisions we make, changes to plans, and is a constant reminder on what’s important to achieve and when.

4. Laser focus – learn to say no. When there are two of you, there is too much important stuff for it all to get done. Learn to understand that while everything is important, there is still a hierarchy of stuff that’s more important than the rest.  Back to the ships for a second. When your ship is sinking, everyone needs to get into a life raft. That is important. But, if everyone jumps into the same raft at the same time, you’ll swamp it. Everyone is right back where they started (or worse). Analogy too gruesome for you? Go back to paragraph #2.

Staying laser focused requires constant evaluation and discipline. At EditMe our daily status calls and monthly retrospectives keep us honest with each other and laser focused on the critical objectives.

5. Measure what is important – your execution. Put flexible systems in place to measure your execution. And by systems I mean, whatever hacked up PHP script or spreadsheet gives you the data you need without causing too much pain to create. More importantly, don’t fall for the trap of “measure everything,”  or you will be just signing yourself up for more tasks and activities. Find the metrics that correspond directly to the units of execution and track those.

At EditMe, we measure the AARRR metrics described by Dave McClure , because that’s what important to our type of business. Sure, seeing the upward trend in features released and numbers of Twitter followers makes you feel good. Feeling good helps with cheerleading efforts and staying motivated. But, when we have to decide what gets in the life raft and what doesn’t – it’s easy for us to choose. We focus on metrics that tell us how well we’re executing.

About EditMe

Founded in 2003, EditMe is a lean startup focused on creating easy-to-use software supported by fast, friendly customer service. EditMe is a wiki where regular people build collaborative websites and feature-rich web applications right in their web browser without knowing anything technical.

About the author
Matthew Mamet is responsible for customer development at EditMe, and spends lots of time talking with potential and current customers to understand how to make EditMe better. Prior to EditMe, Matthew was Director of Product Marketing at PermissionTV, a SaaS-based online video product, and President of Embarc where he grew revenue and clients until leading the sale of the Agency to Garfield Group of Pennsylvania.

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Last week a founder of a software development company asked what to look for in a COO on answers.onstartups.com. Since this is a fairly common question to me, I decided to expand upon the answer I posted and further describe what attributes a great business operations leader/professional should possess.

Bit of background: I have been in operations for almost my entire career and have had some incredible mentors along the way. I spent 2+ fun years as the heading operations for an awesome software development company that we grew to 120+ employees by the time I had to move. It was an honor serving some of the smartest software development professionals in the market.

So here are the points one should consider when looking to add a Chief Right Hand Person to your team…

Read the full article on The Operations Guy blog»
 
 
 

About the author:
Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius is a business operations leader with 12-year track record of helping companies manage growth, build diverse teams, harness technology, and get a lot more profitable. He is usually brought in to build new or improve older business processes, provide structure to a rapidly growing business, and create higher level of predictability for the executive team.To learn more about Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius please visit his site TheOperationsGuy.com

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Six months ago, I was fresh out of a one year entrepreneurship master’s degree program and looking to join a startup or maybe start one of my own… I really didn’t know.  Finding your way when you’re a young, aspiring entrepreneur isn’t easy; there’s a lot of thrashing, uncertainty and mistakes.  Embrace this. Those scars will make you stronger and people will notice if you make things happen.

Of all the advice anyone could give an entrepreneur getting started, the one I think matters most is to HUSTLE.

As a young person, the best thing you can do is Hustle.  It’s the one advantage we have over those older than us that have that infamous word…Experience.  Hustle can make up for a lack of experience, especially if you hustle intelligently.

Here are the rules I’ve learned for making it as a young entrepreneur:

1) Ask For Help
This may seem obvious, but I find myself forgetting it often.  So, repeat after me: “I Can’t Do It Alone.” Really…you can’t. And more importantly, you wouldn’t want to;  there are people that know more than you do, have a key connection or can otherwise help you be more successful faster.  The only way you can get ahead is by asking others for help.

The key for getting help though is knowing WHO to ask to do WHAT, so do your homework on who is the best person to ask for what you need. Chances are, if they’re really an expert in that area, they can help you accomplish something that would have taken you much longer. Work smart, not hard.

2) Pay It Forward
No matter what stage of entrepreneurship you’re in…you can help someone.  In my experience, the most frequent and valuable help I receive are from other people at similar stages to me.  It’s also who I can help most; we’re sharing the same challenges and searching for answers to the same questions.  Chances are whatever you just figured out is also something 5 other young entrepreneurs are searching for too.

Look around you and help whomever you can.  Remember that there may have been a time when you were as lost and confused as someone you meet that asks for your help.  Give them a nudge in the right direction.  Karma will reward you.

3) Be Flexible
This could also be called “the best laid plans of mice and men.” No matter how great your idea is or how thought out your plan is, it will always change. Be prepared and don’t be afraid to correct your course along the way.  This also means you should be testing and listening to what you hear as you develop your idea or execute your plan. There’s no shame in changing your idea based on customer feedback and in fact is a sign of maturity as an entrepreneur. There’s no room for stubborn fools at startups.

4) Remember Your Priorities
In January, I pushed the limits on how much time I could devote to work and lost my priorities. I tried to keep building Greenhorn Connect: pursuing sponsors, managing the blog and continuing to go to networking events every night. At the same time, I was working a part time job for another startup, all while working on a 3^rd startup trying to get into TechStars.  I managed to crush it on all of them, but I paid for it in February.  I felt burnt out for most of February, was not always pleasant to be around and lost touch with way too many people who were important to me.

It’s very easy to get sucked into your idea and push so hard to succeed that you’ll give just about everything up.  This passion is great and important in being a successful entrepreneur, but you need to understand balance is important.  Running yourself into the ground with 100 hour weeks may seem like it works at first and may even feel like a badge of honor, but you will pay for it. The long term physical, psychological and emotional damages are not worth it.

I hope this helps. Apollo asked me to be a young voice on his blog and I’m happy to share my experiences.

About the author:
Jason Evanish is a young entrepreneur in the Boston startup community and co-founder of GreenhornConnect.com, a resource and events hub for Boston entrepreneurs. To learn more about Jason, you can find him on his blog at JasonEvanish.com or @Evanish on Twitter.

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In the late 90’s, the Six Sigma quality improvement process swept through the corporate world, led by early and vocal adapters such as Motorola and GE.  For those who are not familiar with Six Sigma, it is a process for making significant quality improvements through a rigorous five-step data- and statistical-based approach (Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, and Control).  The siblings of Six Sigma, such as Design for Six Sigma (DFSS) and Lean Six Sigma, expand its applicability to new product design and manufacturing flow. You can immerse your products from cradle to grave in the Six Sigma process to achieve total quality control nirvana.

While this may be great if you have the resources of a GE, and are involved with markets and products that are more mature and slow to change, I’m here to tell you that Six Sigma is anathema to the nature of the startup. Of course, I’m not proposing that quality is unimportant. What I mean is that the rigor and thoroughness of a true Six Sigma process goes beyond quality control into a near-obsession with perfection. Such an approach, which some startups do adapt, can lead to “death by measurement” or “analysis paralysis,” where more time is spent measuring results than actually achieving them.  This works against most of the attitudes needed to make a startup successful.  For some specific examples:

• Failure – The goal of Six Sigma is to avoid failure or a product or even a single aspect of a product at all costs.  The price you pay is time. This runs against the startup mantra of “fail early and often” – in other words, the belief that you don’t know what will be successful until you try, so you better try a lot.
• Precision – Six Sigma places a lot of importance on having a quantifiable understanding of customer needs (translated into measurable technical specifications) and sufficient data to statistically prove (or, at least, being unable to statistically disprove) conformance to these specifications.  Gaining sufficient data requires a large sample size which again requires time and, in this case, cost that you can’t afford.
• Perfection – The Six Sigma process is aimed at delivering six-sigma quality (3.4 defects per million).  Unless you are landing airplanes or performing brain surgery, you probably don’t need that. Better to move onto the next generation / iteration than to spend time perfecting the existing one.  By the time you do, the needs of your customers will be better filled by someone else who didn’t spend the time.

And another, perhaps even more important point (even for larger and more mature companies) is covered in this Industry Week article warning that Lean and Six Sigma can cause an “identity crisis”.  The view of the author is that these processes are very internally focused and not well-suited for building and maintaining close customer relationships.  As a certified Six Sigma Green Belt at one of the major corporate believers in Six Sigma, I can vouch that many times the pressure was just as much on broadening the specifications to improve our process capabilities as it was on improving the process itself. Some of the same points regarding speed and adaptability to changing conditions are also raised in the article.

There are obviously several good elements of Six Sigma that do apply for startups – for one, implementing controls (which was often the downfall of even well-executed Six Sigma quality improvement efforts) is important for creating consistency in any product or process. Additionally, the attitude that critical to quality parameters (CTQ’s) can and should be measured is also helpful to maintain (and that the measurement systems must be capable).  But beyond that, you are better served in a startup by focusing your “quality” efforts around really understanding what your customers perceive as quality, and how it is changing as they are exposed to new ideas.

Image credit: Brooks Elliott

About the author:
Greg Strosaker is a regular contributor to the Lean Startups Blog. He has previously worked for 13 years with General Electric as an engineer, has spent the past four years heading up marketing at several small- to mid-size material and industrial equipment firms.  Greg also runs the Constant Cogitation blog, where he discusses marketing, strategy, and leadership topics.

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“Cutting costs” has been the buzz phrase for the last decade or so. In some cases, companies got drunk on cheap money and plentiful investors, and in others the unchecked management flaws of greed and vanity led to company bloat. Whatever the root cause, we seem to be only treating the symptoms of the problem. We first look at our staff for the “fat”, then our business process, then… well by then it is usually too late. Although I have mastered the art of cutting costs, I am very aware of the reality: you can’t cut/lose fat without cutting into muscle.

So instead of treating the symptoms, how do we avoid the root cause of wasteful spending?

Read the full article on The Operations Guy blog»
 
 
 

About the author:
Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius is a business operations leader with 12-year track record of helping companies manage growth, build diverse teams, harness technology, and get a lot more profitable. He is usually brought in to build new or improve older business processes, provide structure to a rapidly growing business, and create higher level of predictability for the executive team.To learn more about Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius please visit his site TheOperationsGuy.com

Similar Posts:

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Call me old fashioned, but I cringe every time I hear another claim about how we are moving into the age of “careerism” and “just in time staffing”. Why? Because we always hear about this fad right at the tail end of every downturn.  It’s like herpes spread by some “experts” who never had to operate a company.

I am yet to see a substitute for a loyal team – during bad and good times. Earned loyalty takes time to build, compared to need-based loyalty, so you must build a strategy to foster earned loyality long before you need to “cash it in”.

What do I mean by earned loyalty vs. need-based loyalty?  Many people are staying with their current companies right now because of need-based loyalty – they have mortgages and car notes to pay. But this type of loyalty has no longevity because the company did not earn it. Yes, I said it: earning the loyalty is completely the job of the company and its leadership.

Progress is a #1 motivator for knowledge workers (money is not even in the top 3) and I think it is what helps keep people loyal. Here are some methods that could help build that earned loyalty…

Read the rest of the article on The Operations Guy blog

Photo credit: Celanth

About the author:
Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius is a business operations leader with 12-year track record of helping companies manage growth, build diverse teams, harness technology, and get a lot more profitable. He is usually brought in to build new or improve older business processes, provide structure to a rapidly growing business, and create higher level of predictability for the executive team.To learn more about Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius please visit his site TheOperationsGuy.com

Similar Posts:

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• Dangers of big titles
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In 2007, I was interviewing with a later stage stealth startup in Boston. During my conversation with one of the co-founders, I asked about her title. Her answer has stuck with me to this day. She said: “if you are in a startup and have a title, you are not doing enough work“! This sentiment resonated with me and made me think about why big titles are so dangerous.

I have worked for several very innovative “flat hierarchy” companies, where titles were irrelevant, that had rapid growth fueled by passionate employees who always went above and beyond to make customers happy. It is no surprise that at one company we had a 95% customer referral rate and the most loyal customers I have seen in my entire career. I also made the mistake of joining several companies that developed org-charts before they fully figured out what their customers wanted. The result was an environment of heavy office politics, innovation-squashing dictatorships, and clients leaving not too long after discovering the dysfunction. No amount of effort could turn these companies around and two out of the three went out of business.

So why are big titles so dangerous? Read the rest of the article on The Operations Guy blog >>

About the author:
Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius is a business operations leader with 12-year track record of helping companies manage growth, build diverse teams, harness technology, and get a lot more profitable. He is usually brought in to build new or improve older business processes, provide structure to a rapidly growing business, and create higher level of predictability for the executive team.To learn more about Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius please visit his site TheOperationsGuy.com

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• Defining the Difference Between (Business) Operations and Technology Operations
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I’ve recently been thinking about how I can further help the readers of this blog and earn even more good “business Karma”. Several of you have mentioned that you’d like a broader range of topics covered on this blog, so I have decided to take LeanStartups.com to the next level by expanding it and adding guest bloggers to my team. As we like to say in the world of startups – time to pivot.

I am actively looking for passionate practitioners of marketing, finance, accounting, recruiting, and staff development to share their expertise to help capital efficient lean startups increase the odds of surviving.

If you are interested in helping me, please shoot me an e-mail (see contact page) or just see me at one of the many events I attend.

In the meantime, I will be starting a separate blog covering startup and rapid-growth business operations, my favorite technology solutions, book reviews, and spotlights of the innovative stuff I see every day. The new blog is called The Operations Guy and you can find it at TheOperationsGuy.com .

Lastly, I have to thank everyone who has helped me brainstorm and work on my ideas. One is only as smart as people around him!

Photo credit: David ReeceSimilar Posts:

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Since an article I wrote in June of 2009 called “How a foosball table can kill your startup” is still sparking attention and conversation, I think the time is ripe for me to expand on the topic. Yes, I still believe that tchotchke “benefits” do nothing but waste money.  Instead, use your resources to attract new, retain your best talent, and improve your team’s happiness.

Here are additional issues for us to consider:

1. If we tracked the usage of Guitar Hero setups, foosball tables, pinball machines, etc., we would see that utilization of them is not really worth their cost and the rent we pay for the space they take up.
2. Often the toy/activity choice we make is driven by what we personally like. I highly doubt anyone actually thinks about how employees from other demographic groups perceive them. Therefore, we unconsciously create an environment of discrimination.
3. Innovation happens outside of the walls of our offices. Encourage your employees to get outside and network with their customers and spend more time with their families.
4. Employees are not stupid! We may be able to attract them with these “benefits”, but the novelty wears off quickly. The deeper we can tap into satisfying the needs of our employees, the more likely they will stay with us. Maslow’s hierarchy of needs is often ignored at our own peril.

So what do I suggest?

1. There is a MUCH higher ROI on well-being focused benefits. E.g. stock your office with free healthy snacks and drinks. Motivate staff to engage in group sports. Spend the budget on group company outings organized by the staff themselves. As an operations person, I always focus on keeping my team healthy, happy, motivated, and engaged.
2. Spontaneous rewards have tremendous ROI! Focus on rewarding exceptional performance the moment it happens (not months away during performance reviews). I have personally seen it do wonders to morale.
3. Enable your staff to be able to work in other locations from time to time and empower them to spend more time with customers (existing ones or prospects).  This takes a lot of planning and thinking through to execute well, but it has fantastic ROI and increases innovation and employee loyalty.

NOTE: the dynamics are a lot different in creative industries like industrial design, advertising agencies, marketing and communications companies, etc. Talent employed in these types of companies have different needs and motivations.

About the author:
Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius is a business operations leader with 12-year track record of helping companies manage growth, build diverse teams, harness technology, and get a lot more profitable. He is usually brought in to build new or improve older business processes, provide structure to a rapidly growing business, and create higher level of predictability for the executive team.To learn more about Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius please visit his site TheOperationsGuy.com

Similar Posts:

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• Dangers of big titles

Guest blogger Greg Strosaker

Guest blog post by Greg Strosaker As the Lean Startups blog grows, I want to start bringing in other subject matter experts to help better serve my readers. Therefore, I am very excited to introduce Greg Strosaker as my first guest contributor. Greg, who previously worked for 13 years with General Electric as an engineer, has spent the past four years heading up marketing at several small- to mid-size material and industrial equipment firms.  Greg also runs the Constant Cogitation blog, where he discusses marketing, strategy, and leadership topics.

Since my last post drew some attention from the marketing folks (and struck a nerve of those who refuse to grow and evolve), I wanted to bring in the perspective of someone in a different industry who makes a living from marketing.

An often-overlooked function for many start-ups and small businesses is Marketing.  Sure, you have a website, maybe some brochures, maybe a Google AdWords campaign.  But I’m talking about “capital M” Marketing – who are you, what are you all about, and how are you communicating that to your prospective customers?  Or, as Apollo pointed out in a previous post, how are you allowing your customers to shape who you become (while still maintaining your core mission)? Maybe you can stumble into some early successes while hacking your way through, but at some point you hit a wall, and you need to get serious to be able to scale.  Here are some basics to help you establish a brand and marketing strategy that you can build upon.  This post is about establishing and living your identity. If Apollo allows me back again for a future post, I’ll hit on more tactics, particularly in regards to inbound marketing.

One comment I frequently hear is that “anyone can do marketing”.  Sure, and anyone can do finance too, if it involves balancing a checkbook (OK, maybe there are some that can’t do even that).  And it is true that everyone in the organization should be involved in marketing, as your brand is more than your tagline – it’s the sum of your daily behaviors and decisions in the face of the customer.  I’m not saying you need to go out and hire someone “classically” educated in marketing. In fact, you may want to avoid that (said as someone not “classically” educated).  But you do need someone who at least pays attention to the topic, and has some basic sense of branding, listening to customers, and adopting strategies in response to market conditions and customer needs.  This may not be a dedicated role early on, but like any major initiative, you need a champion.

Just like raising a child, the marketing habits you establish early set the tone for later in your company’s life.  Here are the key elements to get right, to help establish good behaviors for when you need them most.

Establish your identity.  More than just your “brand”, you need to establish the values that your company offers, and how they differentiate you from alternatives.  You can’t build the rest of your marketing elements until you have a clear vision of who you are and what unique value you bring to customers.

Get consistent. Once you develop your branding elements (and there are many low-cost, even crowd-sourced, ways to do this on the web), you need to implement guidelines to make sure that all your communications incorporate these elements in a consistent manner.  I’m not just talking about logos, colors, and fonts. I’m talking about the tone of your communications, the message you offer, and the means by which you do it. This is the only way you can establish the necessary framework to maintain a genuine brand identity as your company grows, allowing each team member to “make the brand their own,” weaving it into their daily behaviors and decision-making.

Develop a framework for everything. To help enforce the consistency and avoid going out for expensive help every time you need a new publication, invest in templates and guidelines that you can then use to create your own material.  A little bit of upfront investment here will save you time and cost later, and speed your ability to put out new content.

Focus on testimonials. The proof of your value is best offered by the customers you have satisfied, so spend your time on building stories around your successes.  This type of content is flexible for use in a range of forms and media, from web pages to full articles, and carries far more credibility than internally generated “me too” type literature or web content. One potential low-cost use of such content is through application success profiles.

Be agile, but focused. Early on in your business ventures, you’ll find that you have to make “tweaks” to your message based on what you learn from your customers.   Don’t just “allow” for this – relish it.  But don’t let it take you too far from your core vision or message, unless you find that you were completely wrong in your initial business plan. If that’s the case, you have more problems than what smart marketing can solve.

This isn’t rocket science, but it takes discipline and focus. So stop yielding to the temptation to view marketing as just “glossing up” your website, and start thinking more strategically.  While seemingly mundane at first, only by getting things right initially can you possibly hope to continue growing your company into the future, without breaking the bank today.Similar Posts:

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I wasn’t able to make it to LaunchCamp Boston today, but was still able to virtually participate via the live video and Twitter streams. During a discussion on Twitter with two great marketing folks, Bobbie Carlton and Rachel Levy, I made several remarks:

1. Seasoned marketing pros should realize that “marketing” is becoming a dirty word (right behind PR) and evolve.
2. Marketing pros should stop fighting the fact that branding, PR, communications, content creation, “websites”, etc. are no longer being recognized as part of the marketing silo.
3. Businesses don’t need marketing teams, they need customer listeners/conversationalists who are deeply involved in customer anthropology.

Why is this my opinion?

1. Much has changed over the last decade with how customers interact with brands. A deeper transparency and conversation are now required to engage customers.
2. 2. The marketing silo is gone. Branding, listening, and communicating activities have transformed into something that engages the entire company – customer development. Customers define your branding, help you with content and product development, and provide your company with the publicity.
3. The marketing model of broadcast, analyze, and broadcast again is on its way out. Customers no longer tolerate being talked at – they demand that you listen to them. This new model is a constant loop of indentifying early adopters, developing products with the continuous feedback of the early customers, engaging mainstream customers with the help of those early adopters, and empowering mainstream customers to promote the brand. Rinse and repeat!
4. CUSTOMER ANTHROPOLOGY is the future. Strategies have changed and it’s no longer effective to have a traditional marketing model of yelling/broadcasting through the biggest proverbial bullhorn a company can afford (expensive launch events, advertising, PR, etc.). It is all about getting into your customers’ psyche, anticipating their reactions, and truly satisfying customers’ real needs. School-taught squeezing of customers into demographics, verticals, etc. is no longer adequate.

That all said, I may get a lot of flack for this article from my old-school marketing friends. Sorry, but a bit of constructive criticism is always good.  Please chime in the comments or send me an email. I want this to be start of the conversation, not just a one-sided article.

Photo credit: Carol Browne

About the author:
Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius is a business operations leader with 12-year track record of building scalable and capital-efficient operations for technology and professional services companies.
He specializes in business operations, corporate culture, human capital, and technology issues.
To learn more about Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius please visit his site TheOperationsGuy.com

Similar Posts:

• What to Look for in a Chief Right Hand Person (COO, VP of Operations)
• Dangers of big titles
• If your staff does not get it, neither will the customer!

I can’t claim I was early social media adopter, but I have been on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn for a while now and built a following.  I have met the majority of my followers in person. I am also not shy about reviewing businesses on Yelp and other sites, because I believe both positive and (especially) constructive negative feedback can improve businesses.

We have seen some massive changes in the last decade as the impact of word of mouth has grown exponentially as each new communication platform became mainstream. While a story of poor customer service experience used to rarely travel beyond a close circle of family and friends, everything has changed now that we have entered the age of social media. The tables have turned and the transparency and the accountability levels of the businesses are way up (intended or unintended). If you screw up, there will be video parodies of your business on YouTube and Yelp reviews containing the gory details – your (now former) customers will freely share their displeasure with thousands of their friends and followers before the dust has settled. Talk about a ripple effect!

But, as many companies are discovering, these are great times to turn customers into brand evangelists/promoters. The positive ripple effect aided by social media can be massive! Just look at Zappos, Amazon, Jet Blue, Virgin America, Apple, and etc,

So what can we, as business leaders, do to take advantage of this change?

1. Customer service should be the first place we invest in.  No more outsourcing! No more poorly trained and poorly paid script-reading robots!
2. Listen listen listen! Social media monitoring tools are available in every complexity and price range. Use them!
3. No, it is not fair, but the reality is that you need to take care of the “squeaky wheels” on public channels (like Twitter, blogs, etc.) first. Turn angry customers into rabid fans with a proverbial bullhorn. If it takes a CEO’s apology to satisfy an angry customer, then so be it.
4. All feedback channeled to your sales and product teams should be unfiltered! We tend to think our stuff does not stink, which is why I always advocate that sales people should also be doing collection on their accounts and developers, engineers, product managers should be answering customer support calls. Our dislike for unpleasant interactions makes us sell and develop products better.

Photo credit: Tom BlackwellSimilar Posts:

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The associated risks of starting a company are hard enough when you are young and unattached (though lack of experience and naïveté keeps you brave and motivated). But being in a long-term relationship, married, or a parent adds a whole new level of complications, risks, and motivations.

It is not surprising that VCs like investing in companies led by young, single, male entrepreneurs (some think this is because it is easier to control them and make them work 24×7).  But my own experience tells me that the vast majority of entrepreneurs are married and many are even parents. Our wives/husbands/partners are the true unsung heroes. Some of the most successful business people have a great supporter behind them.

Although I’ve mostly been an intrapreneur in my career, during my last venture I was a co-founder. Sadly, the company did not work out and cost me dearly. My wife was my rock through it all!  There is a reason I call her my “angel investor” – she is my biggest supporter and the best BS detector. Having someone really smart to bounce thoughts off of is an absolutely invaluable asset.

Here is what I have learned so far from my own marriage and business successes/failures:

• Business is second to family. No business is worth sacrificing your family for, and in fact, power, support, and inspiration can be derived directly from your “home team”.
• Communication with your partner is crucial! Especially when things go awry, walking around angry and frustrated will not help you or your marriage. But, if you communicate and use your partner as an advisor, you will get to a much better place faster.
• As the saying goes – perception is reality. Be honest with yourself, err on the side of caution, and set appropriate expectations. Allowing assumptions leads to painful consequences.
• Carve out time every week for your partner. No business conversations, emails, text messages, or voicemails allowed – just you and your better half.

Lastly, one of the biggest bonuses for an entrepreneur/intrapreneur with a great partner at home is that it forces you to think more clearly and learn how to sell your ideas. Almost every idea I could not explain well to my wife turned out to be a steamin’ dud.

About the author:
Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius is a business operations leader with 12-year track record of helping companies manage growth, build diverse teams, harness technology, and get a lot more profitable. He is usually brought in to build new or improve older business processes, provide structure to a rapidly growing business, and create higher level of predictability for the executive team.To learn more about Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius please visit his site TheOperationsGuy.com

Similar Posts:

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Since I don’t allow anonymous comments on my blog*, sometimes I get e-mails with long diatribes on why I am wrong. Some are quite extensive and come from people who take my critiques to heart (sometimes taking things too personally). Not only do I love these e-mails, but if you send one, be ready to have a dialog!

I am absolutely honored to hear comments in person or via social media. I enjoy knowing when my answers to a question on LinkedIn (or Answers.onstartups.com) or another blog helps someone. But the world would not advance anywhere if everyone agreed! Therefore, I also highly value feedback from those who disagree with me (as long as it is presented in civilized manner). My critics and detractors keep me on my toes! No one is right all the time and I often advocate that being wrong often helps us move our companies forward faster.

Here’s why I love my critics and why you should too:

• People who agree with you are much less likely to point out your weaknesses. Critics love to latch onto your weak points! Observe, listen, and improve!
• Without critics, one starts “drinking” too much of their own Kool-aid and believing their own BS.
• If no one is pointing out your weaknesses or predicting your failures, it means you are so insignificant that you are not worth someone’s effort to react to what you do.
• Critics are the cheapest way to get consulting. It is free advice you can use to your advantage.
• If no one in your company is criticizing your decisions as a leader, you have hired the wrong people! If no one has the testicular/ovarian fortitude to help you, you may be suffering from Napoleonic syndrome and surrounding yourself with brown-nosers.

* In my opinion, part of freedom of speech is accountability for your words. Since my blog is a conversation, I apply the same rules that I do in real world – if you have a comment, you can’t be a chicken and hide behind the anonymity of the internet.

About the author:
Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius is a business operations leader with 12-year track record of building scalable and capital-efficient operations for technology and professional services companies.
He specializes in business operations, corporate culture, human capital, and technology issues.
To learn more about Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius please visit his site TheOperationsGuy.com

Similar Posts:

• Defining the Difference Between (Business) Operations and Technology Operations
• What to Look for in a Chief Right Hand Person (COO, VP of Operations)
• Earned vs. need-based loyalty

I love startups and small businesses! It has been an unpredictable ride over the past 12 years, but I have always enjoyed working and meeting with some incredibly interesting people. I recently met Jason (founder of GreenhornConnect), and he invited me to write a guest blog post sharing some of the major mistakes I think entrepreneurs make. I have made tons of them myself and have also seen many others shoot themselves in the foot. But, perhaps this list will help you avoid some of the biggest ones!

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