meritocracy.net

The 12 Phases of Becoming a Blogger (for an average guy)

So it's been awhile since I've posted, but mostly because I've been guest-blogging over at Brazen Careerist so it's not for lack of effort on my part.  I've actually been writing a lot, in fact.  Just not posting here.  It's interesting to be writing on someone else's blog, as it creates a whole new dynamic for me.  It's a little strange really. 

I think many bloggers like me go through a series of steps in their blogging career.  I'll call them The 12 Phases of Becoming a Blogger (for an average guy).

1. I can't do a blog.  I'm not qualified.
2. I could do a blog, but no one would read.
3. If I did do a blog, some people would read.
4. Once I started a blog, I would run out of things to write about.
5. I'm going to try blogging, but I don't know how to set it up.
6. People would probably help me set it up, so I'm going to try and do this.
7. I now have a blog, and it's hard to fit writing into my life, but I think about things diferently.
8. I've been writing a little bit, and I'm running out of things to say.
9. I'm starting to fit blogging into my normal weekly routine.
10. I have way too much to write about that I no longer have the time to write about everything I want to say.
11. I've met a few people through my blogging.
12. Blogging has changed so much about my life.

At least that's how it went for me.  Every step for me in my blogging experience has been from other people pulling me into the blogosphere.  In that, blogging is unlike so many other things in life.

I had a pretty funny example of Radical Transparency happen to me today while in a meeting with my executive team at Google.  We were having an offsite at The Four Seasons Hotel in Palo Alto, and discussing the strategic direction of the Online Sales and Operations group and some other topics.  At one point we got to talking about the people side of the business, and the idea of employee engagement.   Google's employee base is a pretty happy bunch of people, as that's why we won the top spot on Fortune's 100 Best Companies to work for in America this year. 

So I'm new, and trying to make an impression and generally contribute to the discussion, even though my head is spinning from trying to get up to speed in my new job.   And then right in the middle of the meeting I say, in my most profound voice, "Someone once said that most jobs are too small for the human spirit..."  Now, I really believe this is true.  And apparently, it really resonated with the team, because a bunch of the leaders in the room were nodding their heads and asking me to repeat it so they could write it down. 

So here's where it get's funny.  One of the leaders says, "Hey, let's find out who said that..." as in, let's found out what famous person coined such a remarkably insightful proverb.  So I think nothing of it, and 1-2 minutes later, this guy starts laughing and says, "I found out who came up with that quote."  And everyone looks, and he points at me.  The only reference on the entire Internet to that specific phrase is by yours truly in an interview with Jason Goldberg a year or two ago.  You can see for yourself here.

So, you have to be careful what you say in a Radically Transparent world, in more ways than you might think.

How to Break a New Year's Resolution in 44 hours or less (or yet another post on JobsterGate 2006)

I promised myself right around the holidays that I wouldn't comment on the current events at Jobster but low and behold here I go.   If you are still getting over the New Year's Nog, there's a lot of buzz about it and indeed the blogobuzz has even hit the mainstream news media (an admittedly low bar).

So much for that resolution.  By my math it lasted roughly 44 hours into the new year.  Damn.  It is now starting to remind me of that old kid's game.

Let me start out by saying that I've been a fan of Jobster since they were but an idea and some PowerPoint decks and a couple of us Seattle recruiting types were sitting in a conference room at Ignition Partners in Bellevue with Phil, Jason, several VC types, and a couple of other people whose names I now can't remember.  We were discussing the merits of technology to provide an improved referral system to be used for recruiting.  Anyone that wants to make recruiting easier or cheaper (or both) using technology in smart ways has my support.  And the ideas Jason and team were presenting were indeed new approaches and innovative. 

I think the whole recent event is an interesting case study, but for different reasons than others have blogged about.  I suggest that we pause and remember that the blogosphere is just another form of media, for better or for worse. 

It is more interesting that the evaluation of Jobster's probability of success was not evaluated in the blogosphere to a great extent prior to the recent kerfuffle.  Not many (if any) posts proclaiming their value proposition as 'new' or 'highly valued'.  Not many (if any) blog posts regarding whether their suite of offerings were creating results for customers or not.  And this is 3 years into the Jobster evolution.

What I have observed are old-fashioned back-channel conversations:  live, person to person dialogues between recruiting minds to get the straight scoop on whether Jobster's offerings were credible and worked as advertised.  I must have had 15-20 of these types of conversations in the last 24 months, given that Jobster referenced Starbucks and me in some of their marketing efforts, particularly early on.  People call me or email me and others I know, and say, "hey, can you spend 15-20 minutes with me and tell me about your experience using the Jobster tools, I'd really like the straight scoop...?"   I got a call like this as recently as this morning. 

There were plenty of back channel conversations happending at ERE in Hollywood, Florida last fall, and at every other event I've attended, particularly given the approach that Jobster has taken to market their services (in many ways as The Next Big Thing).  Lots of whispers, lots of sidebars over coffee, lots of "Wow, they are spending a lot on marketing (but this sure is a great party)..." types of discussions.

Yes, the most recent developments are noteworthy and somewhat significant because the blogosphere is once again creating its own news and it is a case study in transparency and communication.  There's a great post at Copywrite, Ink on the communication component.  In general terms, I do think those (Shannon, Amitai in particular) posting in the blogosphere showed an appropriate point of view in recognizing that the Seattle Post Enquirer Intelligencer 'news' commentary was...er... speculative.

The irony is that in many ways, the recruiting blogosphere has not done a good job of picking up the whispers, which I think would have been a true sign of the power of this (relatively) new media.  I think this day is coming and fast.  This transparency will be good for business, although few startups are likely to listen (see TechCrunch for loads of examples). 

From my perspective, nothing has radically changed at Jobster recently, despite the 'breaking news'.  Jobster is still following the same direction, or what some have called lack of direction, as they were 6 months ago.  Their product offerings are inherently the same as they were 6-12-18 months ago, or at least from what I can tell. 

What is most interesting about this story is that given all the transparency created in the blogosphere, why haven't more people suggested that things might be trending towards 'askew' at Jobster most recently than now?   As a former customer of Jobster's, a relatively tenured recruiting guy in the industry, and a follower of the burgeoning recruitment technology trend, I cannot share with you the primary business problem that Jobster is designed to solve.  That is a significant business problem for Jobster. 

I spoke to this a little in my recent post regarding complexity.  Technology works best when it solves real-world issues; and therein lies a quantifiable ROI.

I would suggest that there are only 5 demand-side business problems that exist regarding talent acquisition (comments welcome):

1. The Scarcity Problem - how to find the talent when it's hard to find (enter search tools, other widgets, headhunters, specialized sites, et cetera)
2. The Abundance Problem - how to find the talent when it's too easy to find applicants (enter online screening, assessments, et cetera).
3. The Compliance Problem - how to do #1 and/or #2 legally, lest the government offer your organization some assistance.
4. The Efficiency Problem (the Mo' Better Problem)- how to do #1, #2, and #3 cheaper and faster. 
5. The Strategy Problem - how to do #1 and #2 today, while building for the future and taking into account risks and opportunities inherent in a dynamic talent marketplace.  In other words, what works today might not work tomorrow, so let us take tactical and strategic steps to be prepared.

There are of course similar supply side business problems that companies like Indeed.com , Emurse.com, and yes even Jobster have taken a swipe at optimizing.  It's not clear how Jobster fits into this matrix either.

This episode suggests to me that we in the blogosphere should do a better job of transparently dialoguing about the whispers as opposed to letting the news break after the fact. 

If we do that, then we will know the recruitosphere is really humming and a benchmark of the blogging world.