It should never be about money

Thursday, January 10th, 2008

by Steve Potestio - Managing Partner, 52Ltd.

If you build it they will come. When trying to hire staff for your company, this is the mantra to have. If you build a positive work culture, and focus your efforts in maintaining a healthy environment for people to grow and develop their careers you will have an easier time hiring top talent. It also helps to do good work and serve your clients. Paying people well is part of what makes a positive work culture, but it’s not the only thing. Resist the temptation to throw money at people to get them to join your firm. Don’t make it about money. If you have other positive factors in place, paying competitively will get people over the hump and wanting to work for you. Securing the top talent is more about your overall package, which includes your company’s culture and environment.

When searching for a new opportunity, a vice-president of marketing states,

“As a job seeker I pay close attention to a company’s culture and how it’s sustained. This is key to how well I’ll be able to thrive in the company and how my contributions will be received. A significant amount of my waking hours will be spent in a workplace; a good culture will provide me a healthy, challenging and enjoyable experience. While a good salary is an important consideration it’s not my first priority or even second. If the culture is right, I know the salary negotiation process will be a positive one.”

When salary becomes the focus of an employment equation it is generally a bad sign. Of course, people want to be paid what they are worth, but job offers should be approached by looking at the big picture. If the focus is more on salary, chances are employees will leave again when someone else throws more money at them.

According to Rich Connor, senior vice president at Portland marketing firm, PMSI, “we encourage new candidates to think long term. What type of company do you want to be working for in five years? If someone is interested in stopping to build their resume or to get their salary increased, we are clearly the wrong fit and we have a pretty good nose for that. We like to see where candidates take the conversation…. Money, Culture, Responsibilities, Future Goals. We want to know their motivations for wanting to join our team. For existing employees, we find this issue to be a red warning light. When a valued team member wants more money to stay happy or leverages another offer, that it is a bad sign for us. We hate to lose any employee for any reason but, if their base level of satisfaction has fallen to money, the important parts have fallen away.”

Salary discussions are often an employer/candidate game of cat and mouse. What are your salary requirements? How much are you looking for? What does the position pay? Questions like these are used to strategize the employment offers being extended (and those accepted or declined). I advise employers and candidates to discuss salary history but to also factor in other criteria (culture, opportunity for growth, doing good work) when determining a fair salary. Removing the cat and mouse dialogue and opening an honest discussion for both employer and candidate is the best way to start a rewarding and healthy employer/employee relationship.

Hiring top talent should be more about attraction than about enticement. You can entice someone with more money, but you want to attract them with competitive pay and back it up with the larger package of what your firm has to offer. If you consistently hire in this manner you attract talent that is looking to further their career and make an impact in a positive environment, rather than the job shoppers who are looking for the next great offer to come along. You will also build loyalty and make it more difficult for others to entice your talent away.

Build the culture. Provide opportunity for growth. Support and mentor your employees. Provide competitive compensation and benefits. Do good work. Respect your staff and clients. And you will attract and retain talent. If it’s built, they will come.

Posted in Winter 07, Newsletter | No Comments »

Waste More Time

Thursday, January 10th, 2008

by Rick Albano - Sissyfish.blogspot.com

Wasting time. It’s something we all do pretty well, but invariably feel pretty guilty about, especially when bills are piling up, work’s bearing down, and-frankly-we’re not getting any younger. What’s your diversion? Craigslist? Cupcakes? Yacht Rock? Fantasy football? Pinot Noir? Roller derby?  There’s always something we’d rather be doing than sitting in a cubicle, staring at a screen.

As a freelance music writer in LA a few years ago, I scored a job interviewing bands for a living. For a lifelong music fanatic, this seemed like a dream scenario, but my enthusiasm eventually sagged when I realized was just another Hollywood hack, writing fluff copy to sell widgets in the form of MP3s.  One day in particular sums up my experience: I was sitting at a desk (after sitting in traffic for hours), being reprimanded over the phone by Liz Phair for not writing good interview questions. It broke my heart, because I loved Liz Phair, but at the same time, I thought she’d become a complete sellout. The problem was, I couldn’t ask her why she’d sold out, because I would have gotten fired. But wait-They couldn’t really fire me, because I was never even “hired” in the first place… But I’d been sitting at the same desk for two years!

So I finally split town, moved to Portland, and took up the most unlikely hobby I could imagine: surfing. It was a head-clearing, mind-opening, finger-numbing, humbling, exhausting, thrilling waste of time that was the exact opposite of work. After my first ride, in a smelly wetsuit on a lopsided old board, I was completely hooked.

At home I read everything I could about surfing. I discovered a surf blog based out of California http://novicesurf.blogspot.com/ (the only one I could find) and devoured it religiously with coffee. Then, I decided to start a weblog of my own called Sissyfish, as a way to record my weekly adventures through journal entries, sketches, photographs and even some half-assed poetry.

The blog became an obsession and a distraction, giving structure to my scattered creativity. As a frustrated illustrator, I now had an endless amount of exciting subject matter to draw from. Miraculously, Sissyfish also reenergized my writing, giving me a bullshit-free zone to express myself in. It loosened me up.  And people started visiting. The readership grew from my mom and a few friends to ten strangers, to hundreds of visitors a day. The other night I was at a restaurant and the waiter asked me if I was “that guy with the surf blog.”

Around that time, I met with the guys at 52 Ltd. and showed them a portfolio that was the result of a newfound awareness of my creative potential. It was a box crammed full of writing samples, illustrations and photographs. Brooks rubbed his chin and wondered out loud where I’d fit in. Then, we spent the rest of our meeting chatting about our shared love of surfing.

A week later, Brooks called and told me about a new Portland outdoor apparel startup called Nau. It turned out that the first web presence that the company wanted was a blog.  Called The Thought Kitchen, it would cater to the brand’s emerging community of artists, athletes and activists. I showed the creative director-who also happened to be a surfer-my own blog and offered a few insights I’d learned in my two-year experience as a blogger: Always use good images. Keep entries short and sweet. Invite dialogue from readers. I was hired.

My current gig as curator of Nau’s blog is the best thing I’ve ever been paid to do.  My responsibilities include facilitating online conversations about the outdoors, art, sustainability, design and sports like surfing. I’m encouraged to include drawings and photos and to write like I do on my own blog-honestly and with personality.

Call it “micro-marketing,” “niche branding,” the actualization of Web 2.0 in e-commerce, or whatever. I think my mom described it best when she’d insist, “Do what you love.” Those sentiments are echoed in a campaign by New Belgium Brewery: “Follow Your Folly.” Theirs is beer. For some, it’s porn. Mine is surfing. It was a waste of time that unlocked my creative spirit and made me a more complete and satisfied professional.

Posted in Winter 07, Newsletter | No Comments »