April, 2008 – David Hughes

29 April 2008

Let My People Go Surfing

A tweet from Ryan Carson yesterday, led me to Howies about page; a page which Ryan described as “inspiring” and I can see why.

There are two sections of Howies our beliefs page that I think are fantastic:

The rocking chair test
Every product we make has passed the ‘rocking chair test’. This is something we use to guide us along the path we are taking. So when we are old and grey and sitting in our rocking chairs, we can look back on the company we created with a smile. That’s why we go to the trouble of using the best quality materials to make sure our clothing lasts longer. The longer our products last the less impact they will have on the environment, and the bigger our smile will be

Fun
We are trying to get the balance right between work and play. Whenever a real nice day comes along, it’d be a shame to waste it. So if you phone up and no-one answers, don’t worry. We are out there doing what we love. So leave a message and we’ll get back to you in a while

I think the rocking chair test should be adopted by all companies as a measure of success – are you proud of what you are doing and have done? Does it make you smile?

Howies “policy” on fun is clearly influenced by Let My People Go Surfing by Yvon Chouinard – owner of Patagonia; a book that I hadn’t heard of before but found on Howies site in their stuff we love section.

Yvon Chouinard allows his staff to use flexi-time to go surfing when conditions are good. Very cool and very much in keeping with my previous article; Yvon Chouinard clearly treats his people like grown ups. As with Carsonified I bet the people at Patagonia feel valued and trusted and so just naturally give more to the business and enjoy doing so.

The book sounds really interesting, so I’ve ordered a copy to read on holiday next week.

It’s a shame that so few companies have this enlightened approach but good to see that there are some brave and visionary leaders out there that do.

14 April 2008

Treat Your Staff Like Adults and See What Happens

I’m attending the Carsonified seminar Future of Web Design later this week and popped over to their (lovely) site to check some details; I noticed “We’re hiring!” on the homepage and thought I’d have a look.

Now I knew that Carsonified has a four day work week, but was hugely impressed by the other benefits their staff receive:

4-Day work week
It’s not a typo :) The whole office is closed on Fridays, so every weekend is a 3-day holiday. We still pay you a full salary and give you 35 days holiday.

Your very own iPhone, 23″ Cinema Display, Aeron Chair and MacBook Pro
Working at Carsonified isn’t just a job – it’s a lifestyle. We want you to love working here, so we provide you with some of the best kit in the industry.

Idea Week – A full week of madness
Occasionally we turn off our email, shut down our machines, and let the creative ideas flow. For the first ever Carsonified Idea Week we came up with HugMyMac.com – it was a blast :)

So not only do they work 4 days a week and get 35 days holiday, they also are given the best tools there are to do their jobs and the whole company takes a week off to stimulate creativity and working together.

Fantastic.

So do you think that the team at Carsonified feel valued? I bet they do.

Do you think they feel trusted and empowered? Hell yeah.

Do you think they work hard and create great events and applications? Uh huh…

I’ve worked in a number of massive corporations that should, in theory, find it easier than Carsonfied to treat their staff as valued assets to the company, but you know what they just don’t. I’ve worked for companies that appear to view their staff as little more than a necessary evil to be tolerated and limited rather than inspired and allowed to create.

I was then struck by this quote from Maverick: The Success Behind the World’s Most Unusual Workplace by Ricardo Semler over at Signal vs. Noise

We simply do not believe our employees have an interest in coming in late, leaving early, and doing as little as possible for as much money as their union can wheedle out of us. After all, these are the same people that raise children, join the PTA, elect mayors, governors, senators, and presidents. They are adults. At Semco, we treat them like adults. We trust them. We don’t make our employees ask permission to go to the bathroom, nor have security guards search them as they leave for the day. We get out of their way and let them do their jobs.

Another enlightened approach to working and to staffing your business.

It seems that 37Signals also now have a four day work week and a cool set of benefits for their staff.

My company may never employ people, but if it does Carsonified and 37Signals are the benchmark that I’ll be aiming for.

14 April 2008

Net Neutrality is “A Load of Bollocks”

I was amazed to see this item over at Boing Boing just now.

Virgin Media, a UK ISP, have a new CEO Neil Berkett, who in an interview with the Royal Television Society’s Television magazine attacked the net neutrality and went as far as to state “this net neutrality thing is a load of bollocks” and that companies that didn’t pay Virgin would be put into internet “bus lanes”.

I’m stunned that any business person would openly state this as an intention and would do so in such a loutish and belligerent manner.

I pay my ISP for a connection to the internet; I expect to be connected to all of the internet equally – I don’t expect them to throttle or accelerate different sites.

If you have an account with Virgin may I humbly suggest you look at moving to another ISP. If you are with another ISP that starts to act in this way publicise it in any way you can and then move to another ISP.

The only way to hurt companies like this is to vote with your feet and kick them in the bottom line.

5 April 2008

Severely Dissapointed

My wife and I were due to take our little girl to see the Terracotta Warriors exhibition at the British Museum tomorrow but upon checking the museum’s website tonight we found that the exhibition is closed tomorrow for “security reasons”.

Tomorrow is the last day of the exhibition (yes I know we should have gone earlier but we wanted the day to be part of my wife’s birthday which was earlier this week) so we now will be unable to see the terracotta warriors in this country.

My first thought was that the museum just wanted to pack up early but then it dawned on me that tomorrow is the day the Olympic flame travels through London and that significant protests against the Chinese actions in Tibet are expected.

I fully support Tibet and abhor the recent actions of China but am saddened that the risk to these Chinese artefacts is so great that the exhibition must be closed early. That somebody would attack and damage such a global treasure saddens me almost as much and China’s human rights abuses.

It’s a messed up world out there…

4 April 2008

Have You Got Your Train Ticket?

A great story taken from The Art of the Start:

Albert Einstein was on a train. He couldn’t find his ticket after searching through his all his pockets and bags. The conductor approached him and said “Dr. Einstein, everyone knows who you are; I’m sure that Princeton can afford to buy you another ticket.”

To which Einstein replied “I’m not worried about the money, I need to find the ticket to figure out where I am going!”

And a great question – have you got your “train ticket” – do you know where you are going?