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…
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I was recently overheard a conversation on the T (Boston’s subway) between two coworkers who were scheming on how to take more “sick time” without getting caught, brown-nose their boss to get what they want, and stay under the radar. These two individuals were corporate cockroaches!
I have an allergy to corporate cockroaches that no EpiPen can cure. They are the spoon of crap that ruins a barrel of honey and the rotten apples in a bushel of good ones. Nothing makes me angrier than those who try to game the system – their actions hurt both their team and company.
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Being in operations, I’m usually the right-hand-man for the CEO (and CFO), and have worked with some fantastic ones and a few who should have let someone else pilot the company. Not everyone is cut out to be a CEO and nowhere is this as evident and crucial as in startups. A good CEO can take the company anywhere he/she dreams it to go.
As I search for a head of operations position and talk to employees and founders of startups, one of the key phrase I am listening for is “my CEO [insert the rest of the sentence]”. That is what I want to hear. Yes, many will say “our CEO”, but there is a difference when someone adds emotion to their alliance and proclaims he works for his/her CEO.
Apolinaras 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. 
My late father used to say that great idea is the one that many people come up with independently.
So as I was watching MythBusters on the Discover Channel (my favorite show), reading David Armano’s blog post about unconventional marketing, and listening to Stephen Shapiro (innovation consultant) talk at our Revolve Nation entrepreneur networking event, I realized something that I have been practicing for a long time. Stephen Shapiro calls it “failing cheaply”.
Last November I was interviewing with a very stealthy (for a very good reason) startup in Boston. During my conversation with a co-founder Ellen (she is very stealthy too, so I will skip last name), I asked her what her title was. Her answer was something that has stuck with me to this day. She said: “if you are in a startup and have a title, you are not doing enough“!
While on my vacation in La Jolla, I was able to catch up to some great blog posts I bookmarked in the last month. I follow Jeremiah Owyang via Twitter and I read almost all of his blog posts. One that just caught my eye was How To Evolve ...
After spending some years with different types of companies, I feel the need to share lessons I have learned, mistakes I made, and successes that kept me going. You can expect me to provide you with extremely candid reviews, thoughts, and suggestions. I am not known to sugar-coat, so if you can’t stand the heat – get out of the kitchen.
