Category / business

by Diane Tate

Being Open about Being Open

Last year WebFWD (the accelerator program I run for Mozilla) had the privilege of hosting a few events with Black Founders, a fantastic organization doing great things for tech entrepreneurs. At one of the events I had the pleasure of meeting Chad Whitacre, chief promulgator of Gittip, a radically open organization seeking to change how value is exchanged. Gittip brought along their partner Balanced, a payments processing, escrow and payouts service.

Fast forward a few (or maybe 9) months or so and we all reconnected when Balanced came up with the idea of exploring how “open” extends not only to code, but to business practices. Balanced help us frame the topic with a quote from Eric Raymond, author of the classic work The Cathedral and the Bazaar:

“I expect the open-source movement to have essentially won its point about software within three to five years (that is, by 2003–2005). Once that is accomplished, and the results have been manifest for a while, they will become part of the background culture of non-programmers. At that point it will become more appropriate to try to leverage open-source insights in wider domains.”

I then had the pleasure of moderating a discussion of this with our 4 panelists:

  • Chase Adam, Co-Founder/Vision, Watsi
  • Jaisen Mathai, Co-Founder, Trovebox
  • Matin Tamizi, Co-Founder/CEO, Balanced
  • Chad Whitacre, Founder, Gittip

    • The ensuing discussion was rich, partly due to the broad range of perspectives of these panelists. For example, where Chad shared how he does not pay his staff, Matin stated that he embraces open as simply “good business practice” with a focus is to maximize revenue, margins and shareholder value. For Jaisen, operating in the open is a key vehicle to gain users’ trust: “It’s impossible to stab our customers in the back.”

    What ‘open’ looks like also varied among the panelists. Matin was careful to point out that many people hesitate operating openly out of a misunderstanding of their core value proposition and competitive advantage is. Typically this is NOT the product roadmap (which Balanced publishes), but it IS the brand, customer relationships and the culture.

    Most did agree that operating in the open – sharing product plans, rationale for making key business decisions, etc. – takes a lot of work. It takes energy, time and focus to ensure that these things are communicated in the proper channels, and questions are addressed. Nonetheless, “we’ve never had a debate that was not worth having,” says Chase. However, “it is a challenge to build mechanisms for ingesting all of the information” he adds. Example: Watsi exports all o ftheir quickbooks information (with key user information anonymized) onto their website – before it is audited. This means they got lots of feedback on what is not correct or needs fixing. The benefits of corrected accounting offset the cost of managing all of the feedback.

    Jaisen also shared that his definition of “Free Open Software” is less about offering software at no cost and more about offering a range of choice for software. Trovvebox has over 100 contributors to its source code and many offer strong opinions that help the team continually consider its choices in direction.

    What in summary would these panelists advise others considering running their businesses more openly?

  • Do it early. This was a common theme. It’s harder to open up elements of your business later on, when more stakeholders need to be managed.
  • Be committed. As mentioned earlier, it’s a lot of work to manage an open community and it will take a lot of energy. So be committed to supporting this at the outset, knowing the investment pays off later.

    • DianeGrillsPanelists

    Grilling is fun!

    by Diane Tate

    Agile Development

    Sometimes things are just fated.

    When my long-time friend Christy asked me to help her out with a panel she was moderating, a point kicked in (Christy is not only a dear friend but embraced the positive stuff way before it was trendy 😉 ). When I learned that the topic was “career agility” lots of points kicked in. There are few better words to describe my career than “agility” (though “diversity” is right up there). And the kicker? Learning that my former boss and amazingly inspiring leader Kirsten Wolberg was one of the panelists. The icing on the cake was having my spunky kick-butt girlfriend Dana attend. Indeed, the fate had been sealed.

    The panel was put on by Linda Holroyd, CEO of FountainBlue as part of her “When She Speaks” series focused on providing resources and insights for women in leadership in Silicon Valley. I was impressed by the number of repeat visitors to the series – many I met at the event make it a point to attend every one – and the degree of effort that Linda puts into ensuring that the program meets the needs and interests of those attending. There was ample time to get input from the attendees on the topic at hand and take questions.

    Certainly Kirsten and the other panelists Roli Saxena and Barbara Williams have very different career histories than I; what was encouraging was how much our individual perspectives aligned regarding the proactive steps that women can take to have a thriving, adaptive career.

    I personally touched on the need to stay curious and “social,” constantly connecting with people not necessarily germaine to your particular duties in your current role. A hungry mind and genuine interest in others will serve you well in the times when you need them and count far more than seeking to jump-start a “network” artificially in times of great need.

    The other panelists also touched on the need to constantly be learning (which curiosity tends to facilitate), and making the effort to discover what your own core skills are regardless of company or job title. While industries and products change, people do not: there will always be a need for strong <communicators, analysts, process people, fill-in-the-blank>. Take the time to flesh out what your core skills are and use them as a compass amidst the changes in your environment.

    Tied to this is focusing to what you truly care about – this can be either in the workplace or through involvement in outside activities such as non-profits and community service. The latter often provides a safe way to get involved with others you normally would not in the course of your routine life. And it is highly enriching and rewarding. If you have an hour to spare, you can actually view the entire panel here.

    IMG_5554

    Kirsten shared these buttons she encourages her staff to sport with integrity. If they can’t, she encourages them to explore how to get to that place – whether in the job or company they are at or elsewhere.

    In fact, “enriching” and “rewarding” were exactly what the afternoon was to me. What a treat that one’s own experience can (hopefully) in itself be helpful to others.

    Go forth and learn!

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    Having lifelong friends is a treat in itself.

    by Diane Tate

    The Gift You Need To Want

    “Feedback is a Gift”

    One of the most enlightened leaders I’ve had the privilege to work for often said this. As I went on to grow professionally (and personally), I have grown to increasingly appreciate the wisdom contained in this simple statement. Rather than being obvious or trite, effective feedback is quite elusive – and therefore precious – for a few reasons.

    Deliverers of effective feedback need to be willing to face conflict, and to take some time and effort to point out specifics to make the feedback valuable as well as communicate it clearly.

    And yet, regardless of how its delivered, recipients tend to react defensively (see “the 3 Ds“), or simply ignore it altogether.

    Which is a huge loss. Even if the feedback comes from a “biased” or self-interested perspective and is delivered terribly, there are always nuggets that provide important learning – if only because “perception is reality”: the wake you leave on others will effect your own life in various ways that you may be aware of or not.

    So when I saw a crazy-a** email inquiry come into our mailbox at WebFWD, my biggest takeaway was not how lame it was (details on that part at this blog post); rather, it was how valuable the actual response was that my colleague provided.

    For convenience, here’s the original email (sent to BCC):

    Hi

    I have a great idea that’s working and I have customers and revenue.  I need advice for experienced angels/ investors/ mentors in order to scale it

    Several questions if I may:

    1.       When are you accepting applications?

    2.       What do you offer?

    3.       What equity stake do you request?

    4.       What are the best mentors/ angels are you firm?

    5.       What differentiates you from all the other incubators?

    6.       When I visit you (I’m coming from london uk), where should I stay accommodation wise, please recommend me some places

    Thank you and I look forward to your reply.

    Regards

    …but, again, rather than reeling in my aghastness, what has stuck with me was Pascal‘s reply:

    Hi <first name of sender>,

    I can’t tell if you sent this email to me personally or to WebFWD (judging from your questions I assume the later – so I copied my colleagues on this response).
    Don’t get me wrong – but this email is probably the worst possible way to ask for help. You obviously sent this email to a bunch of people at the same time; didn’t take the time to personalize your email; don’t tell me what it is that you’re doing (a hair saloon? a new web browser? a cure for cancer?); clearly haven’t done any homework (the answers to your questions are all on the WebFWD website – if you happen to mean WebFWD – which I still can’t tell).
    If you really look for help and genuinely mean it – I suggest you treat the people you ask for help with a bit more respect. That way your chance that someone will actually help you increase significantly.
    Warmly,
    P
    This is so good, for so many reasons, including:
    • It sets up the feedback being delivered as being in the best interest of the sender: all of the input is intended to help the sender get the help she is allegedly seeking.
    • It provides 4 specific examples as to why the inquiry is so ineffective.
    • It shares the basic direction of the feedback straight away, as opposed to the proverbial “shit sandwich” approach that many afraid to provide constructive feedback hide behind, obscuring the ‘meat’ of the feedback in between a few fluffy bits of niceties that on their own would not merit any feedback.
    • It clearly took time and effort to craft, but if received with any degree of openness, will clearly help the sender.
    Blessed are those who are not only open to feedback, but who get it in such thoughtful, concrete ways. Here’s to a year of growth, through constructive, actionable feedback!