I am particularly fond of this quote (although it is here in it’s sanitized-for-public-viewing version), although I’d really rather pretend I heard it here first and not here.
In a startup, focus is critical, and therefore generally a good thing. But it can also be your undoing.
Just to prove that I’m not nearly as clever at all this as you might think (quit laughing!) I thought I’d post an example of a recent screw-up. Don’t worry, it all has a happy ending.
At the recent BarCampRDU, Logan and I had to good fortune to meet someone that would be a great asset to our company.
When you’re a startup company, recruiting tends to feel like finding a date in a bar or at a party. You’re the slightly odd guy in a room full of very normal people. Most of the folks you talk to look at you funny and suddenly get urgent calls from their friends. But then every so often you start talking to someone and they say something terribly interesting and profound. So you keep chatting and lo and behold, they get you. Wow. This is cool!
In this case, Logan and I were blown away. I’m a big fan of finding the right people rather than defining slots that need to be filled based on skill sets. Plenty of time for the latter approach when we’re a big company. For now, I want people that wear lots of hats, get what we do and will bring great ideas to the table.
But in this case, not only was the person apparently a great fit in the broad sense, they also had a skill set that is very important to our success in the near term.
Since we’re just not as cool as Trent and Sue when it comes to dating, we emailed the same day and set up a second date over lunch.
The second date was better than the first. This person clearly knows what they are doing. They even hold some slightly sacrilegious views (in a data management sense) that align perfectly with our view of the world.
The second date ended with an agreement to put an offer on the table and proceed from there.
Sounds good so far, right?
I’m a firm believer in being upfront. When you join a startup, there are all kinds of risks. I like to make sure folks know what they are getting in to — you’ll never here me espousing wild notions of how much stock options will be worth one day, or why you should work for us for free.
One of the realities for us is that we are pre-funding, so cash is a sparse resource. Hiring anyone full time is tough, so we like to get creative — part-time, deferred compensation, non-cash compensation (other than the pleasure of our company) etc.
With all that in mind, I came up with what I thought was an aggressive proposal that focused on the short term. I didn’t spend much time on the longer term proposal because (a) it was longer term and (b) as noted, we can’t hire full time folks just yet.
I sent the email on Wednesday. Friday came and went without a response. I somehow corrupted my Outlook address book and had a rash of emails that didn’t get delivered, so I called to check in. No response.
I’m not known for my patience when I think everything is aligned and pointed in the right direction but not moving forward. So the following Wednesday I sent another email asking what was up and asking for feedback. I got a quick response saying that the offer just wasn’t attractive.
What?!?!?
I’ll admit, I was irritated, frustrated and generally annoyed. How had this gone wrong? After a day of bitching about it, I reverted back to my norm: dig in and try to move forward.
Time for a follow up email. I explained the thinking behind the offer and the steps I’d gone through and asked for some clarification on where things had gone wrong.
I got a detailed response — so now we’re at least having a conversation. I had suggested a part-time arrangement because we couldn’t do full time. I’d also put a timeline on it so that the person wouldn’t feel as though we could just drag it out forever. I had paid very little attention to the details of the longer term position because it just wasn’t possible right now.
After all, it is all about me, right.
NO! Sometimes focus is the mind killer…
Turns out this person is working 60+ hours a week right now, so adding another 10-20 hours a week for 4 months just isn’t very attractive. Also turns out that they have avoided freelance work altogether because they don’t have the time.
So their real goal was the longer term position, even though they knew we couldn’t do that in the short term. So I blew it because I wasn’t focused on what we couldn’t do today.
Doh.
Live and learn. And most importantly react and DO.
So I proposed we start small and revisit the longer term plan. Get together for a weekend and just try working together. A weekend isn’t a huge commitment, right? If that goes okay, then we’ll figure it out from there.
One weekend in, I think we’re all on the same page and interesting things are afoot.
Screwup potentially unscrewed. But assumption really is the mother of all screwups…