Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Bhavesh Radadiya on September 17, 2011 at 3:54pm

Co-founder comes handy in such case. Someone who shares the passion, problems and vision. 

 

Another big question is, where do I find this co-founder?

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Permalink Reply by Girish Khera on September 18, 2011 at 12:57pm

exactly!! how do i find a team that is going to care as much

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Permalink Reply by Kanchan Yadav on September 17, 2011 at 4:23pm

Agreed Bhavesh. Two is company!

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Permalink Reply by Sugumaran Uppili on September 20, 2011 at 2:58pm

I had been in the other side Alok. And now I can very well understand what you mean. Many a times I still used think, how better I could have done things at 2win when I am now in the receiving end.

 

 

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Permalink Reply by Bhavesh Radadiya on September 21, 2011 at 10:45am

 

Q: Why am I the 'One Man Army?

A: Because you want to eat the entire cake and not willing to share. 

 

Was thinking about this yesterday and concluded this bitter fact. Yep, its hard to find a co-founder but mostly, we are not ready to share. And that's why this agonizing question of one man army arrives.

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Permalink Reply by Aditya Babbar on September 21, 2011 at 1:51pm

Bhavesh

 

I think that view is a bit obtuse.

 

The intent of the discussion, was not aimed at a co-founder / finding a co-founder / the want to eating the entire cake (so to speak) ... it was headed towards the employees and the so-called subject matter experts, who work for you and get paid, end up NOT concentrating on the simple details like alignment, typos, bad formating, no love for the customer in terms of a flow, etc etc

 

If you as an entrepreneur are obsessed with detail and all you can think of is making a fantastic product, and you realise that despite the incentivisations, you can still point out issues in the deliverables, you are the army.

 

Since they get paid a salary or have a stake, you would expect a productivity level and a feeling of ownership and pride in their deliverable. If you do not see this in pure tangibles, there really is no reason for you to share this cake.

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Permalink Reply by Bhavesh Radadiya on September 21, 2011 at 3:11pm

Agreed. My intention is not to side track the discussion but rather point out some certain points that ends up leading into such position. 

This dilemma is kind of a growing pain.

In a company, as you grow big, its becomes impossible to look into everything that is going on.. in and around company. Those tiny little details matter but no matter how hard you work, you will not be able to reach everywhere. And that's when we feel like Why am I the 'One Man Army?

Let's say you have some loyal people who care about those details and look into this. You can then distribute departments among them such as marketing, operations, QA etc. and you are set. Once a particular department is assigned to a person, you won't have to look into that. 

Ok, but how long? Main question here is, why should they care? Salary does its bit but only upto a certain level. Then on, person thinks.. if I can do this all by myself, why should I work for him? And they'd leave.

This is where I thought sharing an equity would come handy. Person would feel ownership and do their bit like you'd do yourself.

Just my two cents. 

 

 

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Permalink Reply by Alok 'Rodinhood' Kejriwal on September 21, 2011 at 3:30pm

Absolutely incorrect. No one is that silly. Also, what does 'share' mean?

equity?

How many people care?

Pay the highest sums of money and you still don't see ownership.

its a DNA - its missing.

See the number of entrepreneurs here who have shared the same thing - its not as if everyone became greedy!

 

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Permalink Reply by Bhavesh Radadiya on September 21, 2011 at 4:43pm

I analyze myself and ask myself - Why do I care about every little of those details? Why do I not even a minor goof up let by and correct it immediately? Why do I care that each of our legitimate customer should be happy?

Not only because I founded this company but also because the result of this goof up will directly impact on what this company (eventually I) earn in the long run.

Ofcourse it would be silly to share equity to everyone. My point is that whenever we come across someone eligible enough who cares like you do for the company, they needs to be compensated well - be it salary, equity or anything that actually makes sense as per the growth and not as per 'the industry standards' because those standards can find them the job elsewhere as well. 

Yep, another solution to this could be accurate measurement of the performance where the person is compensated accordingly. Setting the measurement standards may not be possible in every situation though. 

One relevant example

When our kid does something silly, it's "cute little kid". When neighbor's kid does something similar, they are "dumb little kid". Why this difference? :)

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Permalink Reply by Aditya Babbar on September 21, 2011 at 5:19pm

Its not about equity OR standards of measurement to measure performance or the lack of it. Its more banal than that. 

 

If I were to put it mildly, if everyone came to work with their brains (in most cases) and with their brains ON (in other cases), we would launching error-free products at breakneck speeds and certainly have no problems being the best, and I do not just mean your firm and my firm, but an overall corporate India.

 

The breed and the DNA Alok refers to and what we have been pouring ours heart out upto now essentially is about the souls who when asked to do a job will do it, but will not spend that extra 5 mins making it perfect and error free. The DNA Alok refers to is not-really-concerned and just ensuring they can add 1(their input/work) to the 1(idea) to make 2. The DNA and construct is not allowing them to think what if I take the 1(the idea), add 1(my input and what is required of me) and spend a few mins to create an error free product(1) and then see if I can add value to it(1). If you notice that extra 5-10 mins, adds 1.5 - 2 times the value. 

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