Vivid Curiosity

It’s easy to have a lead foot, but that won’t make you quick. The key to speed is in fact braking, unless you’re running down a straight quarter mile but that’s hardly the case in a company. Speed is important, but agility is essential.

Go to workshops that aren’t for you, especially the ones where you’re a little over your head in someone else’s specialty.

Two weeks ago I stayed late to join in on a Test Driven Development (TDD) workshop we had at SlideShare. I really had no idea what TDD was before this. And for those of you like me, it’s a way of programming that integrate testing / debugging alongside the development of the code instead of leaving it all at the end. Now I’m not an engineer, but from what I can tell it reduces load off of QA testing at the end and helps focus in developers onto the task at hand.

Sounds a bit technical I know, but that was the point. TDD has absolutely nothing to do with my job description. It’s not going to help me with our SEO strategy or help me write our next press release. But it is going to help me understand and work with our developers, which at the end of the day is just as important if not more so.

If you have a multidisciplinary job, which everyone does at a startup, it is important for you to get a little bit of everyone else’s perspective. I need to make sure that if I’m out solving problems, not just asking for new features. Often I ask for something that is hard to do, but we can get at least 80% of the way there on something easy. Sometimes settling for the easy 80% is the right decision and sometimes it isn’t, but I knowing about that option makes the world of difference.

These things aren’t always easy to spot, but even if someone sees them, it’s hard to bring up if the higher up is merely saying “do this, code that. I need this done.” I’ve seen this happen with graphic design, user interface design, and even with franchise incentive programs. It happens everywhere.

So, be a better coworker and a better boss. Go to someone else’s workshop and get some perspective.

When you’re managing people, how you see them as employees below you is surprisingly different than the view their underlings have of them.

You often have this wonderful view of your personnel. They are smart, cheerful, energetic and easy to work with. But that’s just how they relate to you. We seem to assume that how we related to one person is usually how others related to them as well. But power structures definitely change that, and this is aside from them just sucking up to you and doing a 180 when you leave the room.

I recently realized that someone I used to delegate to who I really enjoyed working with was often viewed by others as hard-nosed and cold. When I worked with her a few years back, I always thought she was a touch quiet, but always stepped up to the plated when needed. She got along well with the other team members, which was not a surprise since we had an extrodinarily cohesive team.

But it did surprise me that she manages people underneath her in a very different way than she manages herself and her peers. It’s not always a bad thing, but it’s something to be cognizant of, especially if you have personnel problems.

It’s always good to get away from your desk, talk to people you don’t seen routinely and get a different perspective. The trick is, as the boss or the boss’s boss, getting them to be candid. And that’s a tough, but I’d say vital, managerial skill.

I’m borrowing the term focal point from game theory. But my point is web 2.0 companies don’t become interesting until their community becomes a focal point for an important segment of society.

It’s like being a watering hole. You’re the place to be, a gathering point. People can gather anywhere, but around the watering hole seems to be a natural place. And once that trend starts, it self perpetuates for a while.

Now watering holes are pretty good focal points, especially if:
1. They are the only source of water around
2. They are communal/public property
3.  Water remains highly useful

Now point 3 seems a little silly but bear with me. I think that successful Web 2.0 websites are a lot like watering holes. They just need to monetize. The water is still free, but they try to make money off of numerous side benefits to being a watering hole. Often they try advertising, sponsorships or other ideas. Some even let people set up shop near their watering hole (think of the iPhone app store).

You can see that MySpace lost on point 1 when Facebook got big. But I’m surprised at how little resources some Web 2.0 companies use to try and remain a focal point in society.

I’m also surprised at how often people with large bankrolls, venture capitalists, investment banks etc assume that something will remain a focal point. Sometimes these things just come and go. Think about all the clubs that used to be hot, but now aren’t.

I think bars and clubs are another interesting case study of focal points involving social status. “The place to be and be seen” is an aura some Web 2.0 sites have as well. But that’s a post for another day.

There’s already a site called ismichaeljacksonalive.com and the site is just a big fat NO

Now that is fast and rather intersting. Wonder if there’s anyway to learn from this that doesn’t involve celebrity gossip, death, or spam

So Project Natal sounds sorta cool, being able to play video games without a controller. But I mean, you really look a spaz in front of your TV. Plus I imagine hurting people and things everywhere. I think Wii might be cooler still.

My favorite part of video though is the Chuck Norris question around the 3:03 mark. How many push ups can Chuck Norris do? I love how they don’t give away the answer. Personally, I think it’s a trick question. Chuck Norris doesn’t push himself up, he pushes the Earth down.

I’ve seen a few people creating or asking for a “list” of social media destintaions to upload their content. And while I always am happy to add SlideShare to the list, I really fee like there shouldn’t be a list. It should maybe be a handful of places you name, if the list is more companies than you can remember, it’s clearly too big of a list. 

In social media you want your content in one authoratative place. Sure you can try a few places and see what works best, but please don’t try to upload it everywhere. You want to promote that place, send it links, build up a reputation. It’s much better to have one place with 10,000 views than 10 places with 1,000 views. I can’t imagine there being much extra traffic from each additional social media platform.

Even if all you care about is the total view count, who wants to spend their day uploading content and re-entering meta data? Doesn’t that just like a bad day?

What’d you do today? “Oh, I uploaded my slideshow/document/video to 10 different sites today, I hope I get a lot of views. ” Doesn’ t that just sound spammy?

So the Adamo By Dell micro-site is pretty cool. I definitely like the positioning. I like the high fashion models, the black & white look and feel. I even like the navigation bars: Discover, Admire, Commit. When was the last time a nav-bar alone made me want to click on the buy page? Though I wish you could order right on the page rather than having to go to dell.com. I like how the main co-branding is Adamo by Dell. Because in this case, Adamo is sexy and has some social currency to it. Dell is just along for the ride.

The story behind the product is nice (according to the marketing video), it definitely defines its own space. It seems to scoff at being compared with a MacBook Air. They’ve strayed away from Apple’s all white, smooth finished look and gone with different textures and patterns. But they definitely have some subtle direct hits against other premium laptops.

Adamo has enough ports to be productive, it isn’t flimsy or ‘too light’. (or ‘like a toy’ as they put it). They call the materials honest, and say they have a temperature to them. All in all, this laptop has soul. I liked the m1330 (yes I have one, so perhaps I’m biased) and this is a great follow up. I’ve been wondering who was going to step up to Apple. I think Dell is hitting its stride in both this design and marketing campaign. Now where are some sexy commercials…