As I mentioned past weeks as every other responsible start-up / growing company, we have been debating at the board and within the management team how to ensure we keep our cash for longer than originally planned just in case some of the more optimistic scenarios in terms of clients and revenues don't materialize. I did in fact share a link with you of the communication from Technorati (
Obviously this decision did past by cutting costs and fairly significantly. But it was clear to us that laying off people was just short term thinking therefore killing our most precious asset which is talent, aka our team. After many brainstorming sessions and discussions we found a way to make it happen but it will need all our employees to be aligned and to share some of the paint and agree one by one to these measures. In order for this measure to be effective and not just the only way out for employees we did engage the team and disclose a lot of financial information which we haven't disclose before - as for example during the monthly office meeting we share ongoing updates on client, business and product development but we have not shared company financial information neither present or forecasted.
Well the response has been phenomenal. We have had a couple of town hall meetings, lots of questions, but I have seen a huge level of commitment, interest and maturity. I always trusted this team but now I have been very proud of their reaction and I am very optimistic about the future and very excited to keep developing ourselves as a team. It is obvious that next quarters will demand more than 110% from each of us but we are going to have fun and build a better future
Interesting enough I was having a discussion today with Andrea and a friend of us Julia Cluett (
sharing information is a good technique to seduce people. I use that old trick with my children "I'm gonna tell you a secret"... and you can control the situation during a few minutes.
ReplyDeleteLater, you need to be trustfully and reliable, sharing secrets and listening advices or complaints. Be prepared to take actions with your team. Both of you don't be able to ignore each other anymore.
hmmm Jaime let me try to respond to you as I get the feeling I may have been misunderstood
ReplyDeleteI don´t think the value was on sharing the information. Indeed the value was perceived in finding options beyond the obvious cost reduction = cutting heads. But on doing so and asking everyone to make sacrifices both management and employees had to engage on conversations where the level of transparency and openness was well beyond what it have been before. There was a need to share much more financial information and performance indicators where employees did have to share much more how they felt about their work, their company and their worries
And I agree with you, there is not space for going back. Now we have to be transparent and more frank than ever and this will be an ongoing basis exercise