The tone of a workplace comes from the top. Employees mirror back the strengths and weaknesses of those who manage them. My company has layers. I work for a division of a larger organization. We were once an independent company. Our group has a much different flavor than what you find in most workplaces, even among the divisions of our parent company.
What distinguishes my work environment from many others stems from its history as a Silicon Valley style startup and the personalities of the founders who created it.
When computers started to become mainstream opportunity abounded. Far more people were needed to fill the demand for hardware and software than there were people with the skills to create them. Salaries went up. Companies had to fight for workers. Smart and creative people had more in mind than money though, they wanted liberty.
Despite the fact that it is risky to leave a comfortable, high paying position, for the unknown, skilled people started leaving corporate life to forge their own companies. They had an advantage too. They could react to the market faster and get innovative products out before the large corporations. They left behind corporate pretense and its encumbering bureaucracy. They brought their inner-selves to the workplace.
Silicon Valley flavor startups had business practices “suits” would never approve of, such as bringing your dog to work, not having dress codes, and only having meetings when necessary. These things seem undisciplined, or even reckless, to corporate culture, but breath life into creatively driven individuals.
The founders of my division brought five significant things to the table when they formed their startup: Integrity, respect for individuals, opportunity, desire, and freedom. What they lacked was organizational and business experience. In time, they learned about that. They gathered expertise to create and manage a profitable sales channel, a pipe if you will, and ironically, they learned it from corporate dudes. They had dreams of making it big.
When a larger fish came along, it seemed like a good thing to merge with them (a different company than the one who owns us now). It didn’t turn out that way. In my personal opinion, speaking solely as an individual, they were nothing more than vampires. They squeezed us trying to get every drop of blood out, with the intent of tossing aside the corpse when it was dry.
The details of what transpired next I can only imagine. The founders realized the work they put their lives into was in the hands of the undead. I don’t know what it cost them personally, but I firmly believe it was substantial. Somehow, they got us out of that trap. Our division was sold to the company who owns us today. As Martha Stewart says, “It’s a good thing.™” We went from vampires to vision– a good match. Years later, our heart is still beating. Yet, we are something of an oddity in this large corporation. We still have that startup flavor. It’s because the same guy is still at the top of our division.
Software is a mature industry these days, and a lot of things have changed. The market is saturated. It’s harder to stand out. Innovation takes longer and costs more. There are far fewer startups, and even fewer succeed. Large corporations have gained back an edge simply because they can afford the vast resources needed to compete. It’s not the wild frontier anymore. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. I believe the industry needed to grow up some… for the sanity of all. But, I still believe most corporations can learn a thing or two from startup history.
Work life needs to be personal in some way if it is to rise beyond mediocrity. Robots assemble. People create.
Companies that don’t learn this lesson will simply produce dreck. Many corporations don’t care what they produce other than sales. Unfortunately, that’s not limited to corporations. Mediocrity is easily attained and masses achieve it.
For example: Just scan the iTunes App Store for iPhone applications and see what you find. The last I heard there are over 100,000 applications. I’ve tried tons of them. My best guess, judging from the sampling I’ve seen, is that there are maybe 500 applications that would be considered great by some segment of consumers. There are another 500 that might be deemed decent. There are probably 9,000 that are at best described as lukewarm, and 90,000 that are just flat out worthless. Everyone, it seems, wants to crank out an iPhone app.
I don’t expect this situation to harm the iPhone. Apple adapts. But Apple is also a large corporation. They make mistakes and they are sometimes unreasonable and stubborn. What ultimately saves the day for consumers is when they find and choose what’s better over lesser products, lesser support, and companies with lesser values. This forces those companies to change policies that inhibit progress.
As I reflect on the management styles I see in the software business, I ask, “How high is the bar companies really want to leap?” It seems to me that what suits deem as reckless actually works pretty well when you have good people. Good people just need good ideas to work at achieving. They want to be a part of something great. But if all a company wants is a commodity to sell, they don’t need good people to accomplish that.
Somewhere between the ways of the old wild west Silicon Valley startup and old school corporate practice is a better model. That’s where I’d like to set the bar.
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