Hello World.
After 19 months, my life in the internet startup world has come to an end. While I have plenty of musings regarding the experience, for now I’ll keep it simple with the fact that it’s good to be on the outside. Being that this was my one and only experience working for a startup, I have little basis for comparison. However, I have worked for many diverse companies and agencies and have come to learn how to tell when it’s time to move on. With this company, it was definitely time to move on. I’ll share more as the stories begin to assemble themselves in my head, but right now I’m happy to be employed by a successful agency that’s profitable, client-funded, and existing outside the heavy overhead of VC investors.
One initial reflection, after 3 days with my new employer: it is absolutely refreshing to be part of a team that values individual input, encourages team participation, and allows all employees independence and personal responsibility in their roles. Sad that this has become so foreign to me now. People tend to act in direct correlation to how they’re treated; if employees are treated like children, they’ll act as such. If given personal responsibility in their roles and the initiative to succeed, they’ll step up to the higher level and be much stronger employees and producers. Just try it—you’ll see.
Insecure employers talk at their employees, successful employers listen to them.
