Is Microsoft the New Apple?
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I shouldn't have said I'm interested in Californian startups, I'm interested in startups in general. Specifically, lean organisations. Startups tend to be lean because they're growing rapidly and only do things that are completely necessary. Mature organisations do things because they've always done things.
I occasionally consult for a training company. They were pretty large and then went bust because they weren't making any profit. They were bought out and the new company was tiny. It only took on the old work that was highly profitable, and ditched all the less profitable work. They're now make a healthy profit and growing. It's sad that they had to go bust for this happen. It's partly because business owners are often more obsessed with size and revenue than profits. I think it's an ego thing. Too often work is taken on to keep staff employed rather than to make profits.
There's lots of books written about lean startups. I've just started one written by the guys behind Basecamp (a Chicago startup, not Californian). It's all good stuff, but there isn't much about applying lean/startup principles to mature firms. How do you get a mature firm to think and act like a startup? It feels like trying to turn an oil tanker around compared with a sail boat. This is my obsession.
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@Carnival-Boy said:
How do you get a mature firm to think and act like a startup?
Startups run very risky, it's not something that you normally want to do with a proven business model. The models used by startups are based on taking on huge risk in order to gamble on big gains. Most startups fail and fail hard. What startups do is not likely something that you want to do.
Lean and startup are very different. Startups actually don't run as lean as you think, they need to grow rapidly so often do exactly the opposite. This is what creates the really high risk.
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@Carnival-Boy said:
It feels like trying to turn an oil tanker around compared with a sail boat. This is my obsession.
But Oil Tankers rarely sink. Sailboats do all of the time.
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@scottalanmiller said:
The difference is that most receptionists out here have as many IT skills as most L1 IT people.
I'm not being funny but exactly how many receptionists have you met out there? I've probably met hundreds around the world and I have no idea what the IT skills of any of them are. Do you ask them their views on RAID5 when they bring you a coffee of something? I appreciate that technology firms are very big in Californian but are you sure you're not getting a bit carried away?
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Startups tend to hire tons of extra people in the hopes of inflating the apparent size of the business as quickly as possible as the primary value of a startup is threatening mature companies to get them to buy them out - often only to shut them down and make them go away. But sometimes to pass on the product to a major company to productize it. The bloat then gets passed on before it becomes a problem to the start up.
Start ups are rarely focused on making profit or being sustainable. They burn investment dollars in the hopes of striking it rich before things go bust.
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@Carnival-Boy said:
@scottalanmiller said:
The difference is that most receptionists out here have as many IT skills as most L1 IT people.
I'm not being funny but exactly how many receptionists have you met out there? I've probably met hundreds around the world and I have no idea what the IT skills of any of them are. Do you ask them their views on RAID5 when they bring you a coffee of something? I appreciate that technology firms are very big in Californian but are you sure you're not getting a bit carried away?
The difference is, out here they are all doing IT. At least in these kinds of firms, not at the local law firm. In startups the receptionists are actually doing physical IT. You can just watch them do it. It's truly a different world.
I've seen at least five just today.
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What were they doing?
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@Carnival-Boy said:
I've probably met hundreds around the world and I have no idea what the IT skills of any of them are. Do you ask them their views on RAID5 when they bring you a coffee of something?
That's because they are not doing IT. Most IT pros don't even know what RAID 5 is. It's actually a "less than half" skill. And even those that know what it is rarely know how to apply that knowledge. L1 people do not normally know about RAID.
Receptionists and secretaries commonly do tech support in start ups. Every startup I've ever seen, in fact. I'm not sure I've ever seen a receptionist who wasn't doing, at the very least, their own support.
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@Carnival-Boy said:
What were they doing?
The things that I've been saying. Things like setting up desktops for people.
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I thought that was the Office Manager's job?
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I find it odd that you want to run like a startup. Startups all hope to run like mature companies. Mature companies make profit and pay the bills. They rarely are living on borrowed time or digging themselves into an inescapable pit of debt. Startups appear cool and healthy because they don't have customers and don't need to make profit (or even have revenue.) But it is deceiving. The end is coming and they either strike it rich or, far more likely, die trying. It's a big gamble.
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@Carnival-Boy said:
I thought that was the Office Manager's job?
Office Manager is the politically correct term for a secretary in the US. No one is actually called a secretary here, its not considered "correct." So new, made up, inflated titles are used like office manager, personal assistant, executive assistance or leverager are used. But they are just secretaries.
A receptionist is in the same category but normally greets people at the door, rather than assisting a certain person or group internally.
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The sad thing is that being a secretary is a worthy, tough job. There is no reason for it not to get respect. A good secretary is invaluable. If I worked in that field, I would prefer the traditional term secretary. There is a reason why the third highest post in the US government is called the Secretary of State, not the Office Manager of State or the Personal Assistant of State. Secretary is actually a meaningful role.
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I like the movie "The Proposal" mostly because it is cute and entertaining but also because Ryan Reynolds plays a secretary and it shows what a tough, but important, job it is. A good secretary is an extension of the person that they support. They can work as a team and be very important.
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The secretary / office managers / receptionists that I have seen on the west coast (this includes Seattle, for example) are all very technical and you can tell just having a quick chat with them that they are power users and know their computers.
Having worked in big finance on the east coast, I've never met someone in the same job roles who is really ready to do anything more than write emails, check calendars, etc. Completely different in how they fit into the ecosystem. At a major financial I sat in a room with several secretaries (who had odd job titles to make them sound special) and they would need help with everything from plugging in the monitor to asking things like "what's a Mac?" Completely non-technical to the point that it made me sad for our education system (and these were secretaries driving BMWs and Mercedes, brand new, high end cars, owning ocean front homes in expensive markets, etc.) as they were barely out of college!!
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@scottalanmiller said:
Startups actually don't run as lean as you think,
I don't think most do for the simple reason that there is massive popularity for books on how to become a Lean Startups. No-one would buy the books if they were already lean. It's not that I want our firm to run like a startup, it's that I want to take some of the best bits of the best startups and apply to them our mature firm. I'm not going to take the worst bits.
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@Carnival-Boy said:
@scottalanmiller said:
Startups actually don't run as lean as you think,
I don't think most do for the simple reason that there is massive popularity for books on how to become a Lean Startups. No-one would buy the books if they were already lean. It's not that I want our firm to run like a startup, it's that I want to take some of the best bits of the best startups and apply to them our mature firm. I'm not going to take the worst bits.
I would just look for Lean bits, if that is the goal. It's not that what most startups do is "bad", it is that the needs and design of a startup is very different than the needs and design of a healthy, mature company. What might be the best possible thing for a Lean startup might still be horrible for an existing, profitable firm. Just as the processes that make Apple or Microsoft super rich would make a startup unable to survive.
Running Lean is great, but I would see if you can't find literature on running Lean as a general thing and avoid things that talk about startups entirely. A good book would not be one focused on startups. Best if it does not even consider them.
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Our receptionists are reasonably technical. Five years ago they were sitting around doing nothing when we were quiet. I soon got them to start doing some work for me. I'll take help from wherever I can get it, and they couldn't have been keener to take on new tasks.
Sadly, some firms take on receptionists based on looks rather than abilities.
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@scottalanmiller said:
Running Lean is great, but I would see if you can't find literature on running Lean as a general thing and avoid things that talk about startups entirely. A good book would not be one focused on startups. Best if it does not even consider them.
Definitely not. You should get influences from everywhere. Don't close you mind and think "we're this type of firm so we can only think about doing X". That's why mature firms fail.
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I agree that our education system in the US is failing us, but I'm not really sure it's the school's place the be teaching a product. Which is probably why it doesn't happen now, general skills that can be applied to nearly anything is their goal.
That said adding a requirement that students be required to take 2-3 computer courses that cover everything from manually building a PC to installing an OS (Windows, Linux and Mac OS) to installing applications (and verifying junkware isn't getting installed at the same time) to knowing how to check that a certificate on a website is valid, to restoring your Android and iOS cellphones, etc, etc, etc. This might be one of the best possible assets for computer security in the future.
hmm.... This makes me think. My wife often helps create curriculum for her college, when she was teaching HS she came up with a plan to teach stats to HS students, and they implemented it, maybe she could do the same here - with the goal in the end that ALL degrees should include this/these required courses, because frankly this knowledge is helpful for everyone today.
