The Spirit of Hack Day

Two weeks ago, Yahoo held its quarterly internal hack day. Today Yahoo! holds its first Open Hack Day. The first I ever heard about a hack day was from Ken and the Jotspot guys. They had a hack day to have some fun and work on something that wasn’t on their normal “to-do list”. It […]

Reactions to my intrapreneur post

My post last week about Entrepreneurship/Intrapreneurship got lots of reaction, thanks in part to Dave Winer, who linked to it and helped it spread around. Thanks Dave! A few of the responses got me thinking. In particular, Ross Mayfield’s post sparked an interesting discussion. He said: But shouldn’t any knowledge worker be able to do […]

Entrepreneur vs. Intrapreneur

I first heard the term Intrapreneur from Guy Kawasaki and its something that has stuck in my head ever since. The term has been around for a very long time and simply represents: The spirit of entrepreneurship within an existing organization. Intrapreneur is a person who focuses on innovation and creativity and who transforms a […]

Strategic AND Tactical

Fellow Yahoo Chad Dickerson wrote a thoughtful post called Tactical is the New Strategic. He writes: big company managers routinely describe themselves as either “tactical” or “strategic.” Typically, those who say they are “strategic” talk down to those considered more “tactical”, directly or indirectly. This is wrong-headed.…I’m not saying that strategy isn’t important, just that […]

The importance of good people

In my job, I get to meet lots of people at startups and big companies, and more and more I’m reminded of the fact that successful companies are all about the people. Back in my startup days, VCs and advisors always looked really closely at the team and the people as a indicator of potential […]

They are a part of your team even after they leave…

VC Rick Segal has a great post about how to treat employees who are leaving your company. The Post Money Value: Exit Stage Left – Your last chance Over the years at Yahoo! and at other companies I’ve inevitably had to watch some great team members move onto new and different careers, take time off […]