Archive for July, 2008
A big part of my role right now at FreshBooks is hiring software developers. We’re trying to grow this team, to be able to meet the challenges of our expanding business, and that means hiring hiring hiring.
I’ve talked before about the importance of finding great people. But I wanted to talk here about a potential strategy for doing so. I call it “Approach Three”.
Steve Yegge has an interesting take on the problem, and identifies two basic approaches to finding superhero-level developers:
Approach 1: Get Lucky
Approach 2: Ask Everyone in the Whole World
He recommends #1, reasonably enough. I agree that it’s far more likely to yield positive results. Desperate attempts to network are doomed to backfire since anyone can see through that sort of self-centered socializing.
I think there’s a third approach.
Approach 3: Be Awesome
Great people can recognize not-great people really well — that’s one of the skills you need to acquire if you want to be truly great at anything. If you want to be an awesome tennis player, you need to learn how to evaluate other tennis players so that you don’t spend your time playing against crappy players who can’t teach you anything.
So you need to be awesome. The best strategy for finding awesome people is to spend your time making yourself more and more awesome. The great thing about Approach 3 is that even if you don’t find anyone at all, you’re more awesome than you were. Which makes it even easier to attract even AWESOMER people.
Getting Awesome
Start with recognizing that software developers are not factory workers — software isn’t something you assemble, it’s something you design. The energy that generates it is creative, not mechanical.
Here at FreshBooks we’re focusing on a few key things to increase the awesomeness of our team. We’re making sure our developers get chances to work on stuff they think is important. We’re making it easier and faster to deploy safely and reliably. We’re now managing business priorities separate from day-to-day task management. We’re making sure our developers get to spend the majority of their time solving problems in code, rather than sitting in meetings or filling out forms. Or waiting.
It’s working out. Increasingly we get resumes from people who say, “I’ve heard fantastic things about your company — it sounds like the sort of place where I want to work.”
And there’s a very clear correlation between people who say that and people who seem pretty awesome.
Down the road, what we need to do is to focus externally as well — not just being more awesome, but finding better ways to broadcast that awesomeness. But that can’t take away from our basic need to be awesome. Without that, our broadcasting is just phony PR, and the truly awesome ones will see right through it.
In other news, we’re hiring. If you’re awesome, click here.
It’s long been a fascination of mine as to why people go into business for themselves – I’m a student of this entrepreneur’s leap of faith, and it’s something I always dig into when out to dinner with FreshBooks customers.
Why do freelancers go solo? Their reasons vary: some are pushed into it, some are pulled into it and some have never known another way. But any way you slice it, striking out on your own is risky and it takes courage. Here are the four reasons I’ve learned that people strike out on their own:
Freedom is its own reward
Freelancers want the freedom to choose. Whether it’s the clients they work for, the projects they work on, the people they work with, having the power and control to choose is energizing. When you work at an ad agency, you don’t choose the accounts you work on – you are told. As a free agent, if you don’t like the client, you can simply say, “no thank you, maybe next time”. That’s freedom.
Authenticity is Priceless
Ever lived in a scenario where you feel like you have to be someone different at work than you are at home? It’s awfully tiring to put on a “work” face everyday. Freelancers want to be themselves and they value working with people who value and encourage their individuality.
Responsibility breeds satisfaction
Ownership. Accountability. Responsibility. Whatever you want to call it, if your name is on it and you deliver, it’s satisfying. Having the authority to make the decisions you feel are necessary to get the job done right is freedom. Knowing other people are counting on you to make the right choices and to get the job done right, that’s satisfaction.
No one can define your success better than you
Surely the fourth reason people strike out on their own is money? Nope. Freelancers want to define success on their own terms, in fact they may choose to involve themselves in wide range of projects, each with its own definition of success. One project may be to pay the bills, while several others provide an opportunity to express themselves in ways that are hard to quantify in dollars and cents.
For those of you who’ve already taken the plunge or are thinking about it, check out this post about how to balance your time and build your business. And for those of you who are standing on the precipice, thinking about going solo, don’t let fear stand in your way.
I woke up this morning and wandered over to 37signals‘ most inspiring blog, Signal vs. Noise, to read Sarah Hatter pointedly asking How can anyone ever ask us why we don’t offer phone support?
At FreshBooks, we have a commitment that if you call us any time at 1-866-303-6061 from 9am to 6pm EDT Monday to Friday, one of us at the office will answer. I’d tell Sarah we don’t just do this because we’re friendly Canadians, but because it makes all the difference.
Sarah makes the fair point that as a civilization, Western companies have repeatedly stabbed a knife in the faces of their customers in the past twenty years. Try calling your local telco or bank to fix a billing issue, and you’ll likely to be on hold for 45 minutes. In this day and age, she accurately argues, no one expects to get phone support because other companies suck at it.
In a perfect world, calling a business for help would be quick, painless, productive, and human. But it’s not and it’s not going to be. That old time ideal of calling the local retailer or company and talking with someone after two rings was demolished by the call centers and overseas help desks that sprung up in the information age.
Here, I’d turn her argument around, and answer the question. The whole advantage of a small company is that they are more accessible. Indeed, she answers her own question why people want phone support.
Now, I know people want to pick up a phone and talk to a live human being. We all want assurance that our money is being spent on something maintained by human beings who speak our language and hopefully live in our same country. I get that instinct, because I share it at times.
Personally, I have to believe smart people wouldn’t trust their mission critical business to a company whose throat you can’t choke. At FreshBooks, many of our calls are people kicking the tires before they buy just to make sure we’re alive and responsive.
I’ll tell you the secret of why we answer the phone. Sarah is completely right: people don’t expect it. When we answer the phone right away, we have proved we’re a different kind of company. We demonstrate we put a priority on customer service.
Our motto here is Execute on Extraordinary Experiences Everyday. As Sarah points out, good customer service is in fact extraordinary in the sense that it’s abnormal. That’s sad because everybody wants it.
Therefore, if you want to truly brighten the day of a customer that wants to phone, answer the phone. It’s good for business! When a customer hits a wall, we can free their minds immediately by being a real human being that takes ownership of the problem and fights on their behalf. Those customers become your most loyal advocates.
So, why answer the phone? Because you can. Because it gives you a chance to turn a frustrated customer into your greatest customer evangelist. Because you’ll hear great stories from happy customers every day. And because no one expects it, and that makes you look extraordinary.
Still not convinced? Call me!
Early this morning we released version 4.6 which includes some new features we hope you will enjoy.
What’s new in this release?
A Redesigned Generate Invoice Page
Your generate invoice page has been redesigned to be even easier to use. In addition, you can now choose which details you wish to display or omit when generating invoices from your timesheets.
An Improved Search Interface
Your search tool in your account has been upgraded from a pop-up window to a slide-down interface which will hopefully save you even more time when searching for information inside your account.
There are more details about the release inside the application. Be sure to click your “4.6” link at the bottom of your account for more information on this release.
Here’s a great little tip for you shoebox accounting types out there.
Problem: when you look at your bank statements, it’s hard to remember where your income comes from. For example, maybe you deposited $1500 on July the 3rd. If you have 9 cheques for $1500 in your FreshBooks account, how do you know which on is which?
Solution: when you deposit a cheque, don’t give it to a bank machine, give it to a bank teller and ask them to “add a credit memo” with your client’s name (”ABC Corp”) or an invoice number (”Inv #2122″) when they enter the deposit. This makes it really easy to look at your bank statement and know who/where the deposits came from, especially at the end of the year when it’s hard to remember the details of your deposits.
People think they are smarter to purchase from big public companies with millions of customers and hundreds of products. It’s not true. Here’s why:
Misalignment of interests
Your interests are not aligned with the interests of big companies. To a big company, you are a number, but to a small company, every customer counts. Ask the CEO of a large company to take a moment to speak with a solitary paying customer, and they probably won’t make the time. Their customers are analysts, shareholders and partners. How does that align with your interests? It doesn’t.
Expert support
Since big companies often have many products to sell, they do a bad job of supporting individual products. Call a startup and you’re likely to be in touch with someone who knows more about the product than you’d ever care to know.
Innovation and continuous improvement
Small companies must innovate or die, whereas big companies are built on large complex systems and change comes slowly because change is risky. Continuous updates to a product you are using make it feel alive and exciting, and give you an edge. With stale products you risk falling behind.
Proximity to founders
I believe that successful businesses capture the spirit and value of their founders. In small companies, there is more interaction between staff, customers, founders and key leadership – this is not to be undervalued, and I’ll bet you can feel it when you interact with the business.
You are the tail that wags the dog
Do you want to have a hand in influencing the direction of the products you use? If so, buy from small companies – they are hungry for your input and they will use it to chart their course. Big companies make product decisions based on power point quadrants and value chains, whereas small companies draw on customer input and first hand experience.
Hat tip to Mark for inspiring this post.
The Elephant and Castle on King Street in Toronto is a big place. I once got lost trying to find people I DID know, so I made extra sure that a bunch of people I DIDN’T know would have a few signs to show them the way.
It’s possible other patrons raised their eyebrows at FreshBooks business cards sticking out of picture frames with encouraging messages like “This Way!”, but we didn’t receive any complaints.
A bunch of FreshBooks customers and a few of us FreshBookers gathered Thursday night to get together and talk about the ups and downs of running a business these days. We had Connie, the librarian-turned-social-networks-consultant. We had Emmanuel, the Flash programmer running his own studio. There were computer consultants, artist representatives, overseas traders and web developers. A diverse bunch, to say the least.
Josh and I shared stories about our respective times in Tokyo, and Kimberly confirmed for me the story about the flaming Taipei monorail I’d only ever heard from an insane painter (it was good to get it from a slightly more reliable source). I talked a great deal with Jerry about how the study of literature relates to software development, and James told me about a crazy spreadsheet wizard who can predict the future with spooky accuracy.
It was great getting together with all these folks and hearing their stories, understanding how FreshBooks can provide value to so many different types of users. Running your own business is a lot of work, and it’s pretty amazing to feel like we’re helping these folks realise their dreams. I was actually touched when I asked Emmanuel when he started up his studio and he said, “The same time I signed up for FreshBooks.”
I didn’t hear back from anyone who got lost in the place looking for us, so I assume the business card breadcrumbs were 100% successful. We’d love to show you pictures of the event, but to tell you the truth, we were all having so much fun we completely forgot to break out the cameras!
If there’s any way to start a week right, it’s to be recognized for all the hard work we’ve been putting over the year. We got quite the pleasant surprise yesterday when we found out we had been chosen by Backbone Magazine and KPMG as one of the PICK 20 top Web 2.0 leaders in Canada.
Winning an award is good, but when we saw the incredible caliber of our fellow winners, it made us blush. Here’s a hearty congratulations to our friends and fellow winners at ConceptShare, DabbleDB, Octopz, Standout Jobs, and b5media.
The whole staff at FreshBooks is very honoured. Congratulations to every company selected, and thanks to KPMG and Backbone Magazine for starting our week with big big smiles!
At Search Engine Strategies Toronto, Mike had the privilege of being interviewed by Greg Jarboe of SEO-PR, a company focused on improving public relations through search engine optimization. It’s no surprise then that Greg asked Mike to explain why SEO actually hamstrings your ability to grow your business’s reputation, and therefore your search ranking.
In case you are wondering, Mike was referring to our HOW Design stunt which Aaron made into a cool video.
A new season of parties
Earlier this spring, we did an epic trip from Miami to Austin, between Future of Web Apps and SXSW. We called that trip FreshBooks Roadburn, complete with blog and often goofy videos.
Well, it’s a brand new season! This summer, we’re tearing our way up and down the West Coast in an epic ongoing summer party. Naturally, we’ve coined this FreshBooks Sunburn.
All good parties start in Canada
Just like we kicked of RoadBurn in Toronto, we had to kick of Sunburn in Vancouver. At the end of June, FreshBooks threw a massive BBQ with the help of customers Redwerks, makers of the web 3.0 layout tool Kommonwealth, and Vancouver social media PR maven Colleen Coplick of Type A PR. Thanks, guys! And thanks to Boris Mann for flipping burgers and Tris Hussey for driving us around.
Photo credits Ianiv and Arieanna.
In Seattle, it never rains on FreshBooks
Yesterday, we shipped Saul off to make a splash at BizJam in Seattle. He was having a good time there until this slide popped up in the middle of Marketing Mentor Ilise Benun’s presentation and reminded him that he can never be rid of me, even on the other side of the continent. Mwahahaha.
At least he has our customers to entertain him at FreshBooks Supper Club dinners in Seattle and Portland.
California Dreamin’
Of course, you can’t really hit the West Coast without heading down to Cali. We’ll be at Summermash San Francisco and Los Angeles. And we’re sponsoring the ultra cool Twiistup in Los Angeles. I always wanted to feel a little Hollywood, and now is my chance!
Don’t miss our Tweet Up Happy Hour this Monday, July 14 from 8-10pm at the 21st Amendment Restaurant in the San Francisco Mission District (map).
The sun never sets on FreshBooks
Is this the end? Heck no! We’ll be doing round two around Gnomedex in Seattle, August 21-23, 2008. Get your tanning lotion ready. As the governor of California would say, we’ll be back!
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