Untouchable

“When someone’s in their season, you can’t touch them.” – quote from one of the Baltimore Ravens fans in Episode 3 of Tailgate32

There’s many different words for it …. Being in flow, being in the zone, just being ON.

One thing that’s true: I have not been in the zone this last week or so. Like that realisation that the rock star lifestyle and the athlete lifestyle do not mix, sometimes it comes a bit too late for your own good. I’m now on day three of an illness induced by some poor lifestyle choices. I guess your body might adapt if you did this for long enough but that would be a negative adaptation.

Said it before and I’ll say it again; I want to go home. I miss my life. It’s a good life. Actually, no. It’s a great life. Am I trying to convince myself of this? Yeah, kind of, but it’s also true: my job is fabulous, I have amazing friends, my gym has a view to die for and some awesome coaches, and I’m kind of done playing around. I am a strange combination of stubborn as hell and easy to manipulate. Sometimes, with some people, I just lose all rationality.

It’s not that I’m trying to avoid a negative so much as I’m really trying to get back to uber-positive. That way you feel when you’re healthy, eating well, loving life, and feel like nothing can stop you. It’s just another manifestation of my really not having an ‘off’ switch. When I’m serious about my health nothing can stop me. When I train, I train. When I work, I work. When I party, I party. And how.

Brain fog is now clearing and I can see the path ahead. I’m a sprinter, and there’s some sprinting to be done. Can’t wait to stretch my legs.

So Sunday’s Broncos game requires a blog post all its own; mainly for the photos. I unfortunately spent a decent portion of the tailgate on the phone to JetBlue trying to change plans/get a refund for my plane flight which had been cancelled by the east coast hurricane Sandy (which also cancelled my return flight to SA, now rescheduled for 12 November). Then I think I must have been getting sick already because I was just not in such a marketing mood but the Denver tailgaters were awesome!! Super fun crowd, great weather, great food (Mexican/southwest influence), and some super awesome super fans! We met the Mayor (of something, but he had a long limo), and the Broncnator.

Things I learned: Denver fans hate the Oakland Raiders, John Elway is the greatest football player who ever lived, the old Denver Broncos logo looks like a drunken horse. Also that Denver tailgating vehicles are different from Minnesota in that Minnesota is much colder so they tend to be more things like vans with fireplaces or vans converted into bars, whereas Denver is more outdoor chairs & tables type setup. I didn’t really get to see San Francisco or Oakland but a little bit, and it is SO COOL to see how these cities differ and yet are the same.

One of the videos was saying how tailgating is really like the last great American block party. You can go, wander around, meet people, and share either your love of the local team or your story (in my case). The concept of super fans and people who drive hundreds of miles to every home game is fascinating to me – people really do come in all sorts. What I do love is the genuineness of the team love: everyone is SO friendly, it’s just sort of like Halloween every other week or so. As one of the Browns fans was saying in the video … the hardcore fans are there for the team. Not the owners, not anyone else: for the players. As someone with a couple of fans myself, I get this, and I actually really appreciate it.

So, good times. I got the opportunity to be one of the many people who carried a 100x50 yard American flag onto the field before the game. This is just not the sort of thing you get to do every day. Or maybe even ever. It was actually kind of surreal. What was even more surreal was to be inside the press box, where it was so sound proof that my brain literally could not comprehend what was going on out in the field with the audio play-by-play. Strange to see a crowd moving but be almost unable to hear them.

Luckily the boys wanted to go out to the stands to find some seats (well and get some beer), which we eventually managed to do up in the nose bleeds. I think it took us 20 minutes to get there though; you can’t seem to get from level 4 where the press boxes are to level 5 without going to level 1 first, and even then not all elevators seem to go to the same place. The game itself was not much of a game as the Broncos killed the Saints, but at least the home team won. I was in a bit of a daze, which only got worse upon my return to the RV where all I wanted to do was sleep.

In what turned out to be a lucky decision all the way around (I was especially laughing the next day when the windshield came off the RV somewhere in Wyoming), the boys wanted to concentrate on their production backlog on the road, so in a bit of a last-minute decision J and I stayed in Denver. I had been planning to stay with the crew through Seattle, the easier to get to San Francisco, but when I woke up the next morning sick as a dog I was very glad that I hadn’t woken up in a Walmart parking lot infecting a bunch of my friends.

And so it goes! Work resumes in earnest now, although Monday was almost a complete loss as my brain was NOT functioning in the slightest.

I’ve discovered something else interesting recently. Most people don’t seem to like to talk about their weaknesses or fears, no matter how close we may be. I suppose I don’t either, past a certain point. The question is where that point is. For me, my greatest weakness or greatest fear is a great conversation to have over coffee, so long as I respect and trust the person I’m talking to, of course. But on the other hand when it comes to something like sport, I sure as hell have to be in the right mood to receive coaching on my weaknesses. Why that is …. Interesting one. Possibly it just has to do with my level of security in various aspects of myself.

Have I said enough times yet that I just want to go home? I was hearing today how much my co-workers, gym-mates, and friends miss me, and in some cases I know just how genuine it is.

You can’t always have what you want, but I do think you get what you need.

So long as you keep the stupidity to a minimum.

• “Those fries will take a little longer to metabolise than candy corn.” – Ellie
• “Adorable! Aww, you spilled!” – Mike
• “That’s healthy food. I can’t eat that.” – Mike
• “So. That just happened.” – J
• “I took a photo of a drunken Bronco! Look!” “Um ….that’s the old logo!” – Ellie & Mike
• “The RV heals.” – John (my back, maybe)
• “I like to think it was for football.” – John
• “I like a good cult.” – John
• “You’re a CrossFitter? And you ate a chicken finger?” – Tamar
• “You are so easy to f*ck with!” – J
• “I don’t bring drama.” – Susan (TRUTH!)
• “I like to call it instant karma.” – Susan
• “Then you’re good at marketing your thoughts!” – Craig
• “Lemonade.” – Michael
• “Well, we all make mistakes. You just have to learn from them.” – Matt 

Minnesota Vikings & Denver, part 1

Thursday was a tailgate day. It started off when I went to the local globo gym to train because I thought I was going to die if I didn’t get some exercise. I was extremely excited to see that they had some Olympic lifting plates, and I used my Jedi mind trick to get to use them without having to pay. Then I did something I hadn’t been able to do in many months, which is toes-to-bar. And I did 50 of them as the finisher to my chipper. I’m still feeling them now.

After training I went back to where we were staying for a Skype call and some bloody Marys, after which our crew headed to a local corn maze. It was muddy, and snowing, and we were all dressed in Halloween costumes. Then we played in a corn bin. Mike and I buried Aidan so he could arise like a zombie, and I did headstands which were way harder than normal in the unstable surface.

…. And then came the tailgate itself. We drove the RV to the lot of the Minnesota Vikings, and did our thing. In my case, this consisted of walking around and meeting as many people as possible, talking to them about fandom, Minneapolis, and the project. There were some crazy things, trucks painted crazy colours, vans converted into bars or living rooms, people dressed up in all sorts of ways, and lots of weapons. Minneapolis Vikings, you know. Also, it was cold.

Mike, John, and I went to the game where we had seats above one of the end zones. It was a memorable game, not for the game, which was dreadful and I wasn’t really paying attention to it, but for the company. These brothers …. It’s great to watch them work together. It’s like everything you always wish you see in co-workers, but yet they are family. I guess it does have its down-sides, too, but doesn’t almost everything?

The next morning the crew hit the road early and I slept in as I was actually flying to Denver to meet Susan, who I hadn’t seen since Cape Town. It was awesome to see her again, and she knew just what I needed to eat which was a gigantic burger and fries. This comfort foot was especially necessary after I had received some bad news earlier in the morning, the upshot of which is that I am staying in this country a few weeks longer than anticipated. After lunch I had a Skype call, and then we went to Front Range CrossFit to train.

That was one of the most interesting experiences of my life. Now, I should introduce this by saying that I don’t normally drink beer and hadn’t done since goodness knows when …. But Tailgate32 does funny things to me. So I’d had some beer the night before, and my body wasn’t exactly happy with me to begin with. This was also my first time training at altitude so long story short I was fine until I got a bit winded …. And then I was completely unable to breathe! The best measure of this is probably the 370m row where my average 500m split for the first row 1:43 and on the second was 2:06!! That is a level of dying that I had not encountered maybe since I started CrossFit. When I finished, I felt like I was going to throw up and had a hard time carrying my kettlebell across the room. Such a cool setup they had there though: a separate Olympic lifting room, a contraption to help with learning the muscle up transition, and lots of big couches.

Altitude … not for the faint of heart! I can also understand now why people train at altitude or with oxygen deprivation and I hope to hell they don’t put Regionals in Joburg or Pretoria. Oh my word. Speaking of Regionals my competition season starts in three months which means I get serious in one month. This is a little bit hard to believe at this exact second. A lot of things are. I kind of feel like I’m in Inception and no longer sure what is real and what is not, or when I’m asleep and when I’m awake. And no I’m not drunk at this exact second.

I did get drunk Saturday night. The day started healthily enough with a team WOD at D-Town CrossFit which I completed with Tommy, the boyfriend of Susan’s friend. The team WOD was nice because by its very definition you’re not going to get too winded, and also it involved static holds. Turns out I’m pretty darn good at holding my chin over the bar. So something like 60 air squats, 60 ground to overhead, 50 burpees, 20 box jumps and a 400m run with a plate later we finished. I didn’t feel like dying or crying this time. This gym was cool for the bright green and the number of super cool t-shirts on offer. After the workout we went to a place called Snooze where I had some amazing poached eggs on harvest hash, and our crew shared three different kinds of gluten-free pancakes. Hello sugar bomb. But it was amazing … I hadn’t had pancakes in years. I can still taste them!!

The afternoon Susan spent studying and I spent working. My brain seemed not to be working too well despite vast quantities of coffee. This all made sense later, but in the meantime I was happy that I was able to crank some things out. Knocking things off your to-do list is always good.

Then the mayhem began. I had promised J when I saw him in Vermont that I would run a beer mile with him in Denver. I tried to back out of it because I was feeling very tired …. But he wasn’t having any of it and you know, I am an adult, and peer pressure is peer pressure but really I do feel badly about backing down from things I say I’m going to do. I think it was worth it to hear Mike’s surprise. He must have had me confused with someone who has a brain.

So in a beer mile, for those not familiar, you drink a beer, run a quarter mile, and repeat three more times. The trick is not to throw up, and I must say the altitude did not help me in any way: about 200m into the first run I started again feeling like I couldn’t breathe. So I slowed down, and survived. Now the amusing thing is that I’ve done beer miles before but I have never gotten anything approaching drunk from one. Until now. Again, I blame the altitude. Holy thin air, Batman.

Afterwards we had some food and a heck of a lot to drink at a bar called The Irish Snug. The Tigers lost, and I had a good time …. to the degree I can remember, that is.

I think where I ended the last post is about right. I think I like uncertainty so long as it’s managed uncertainty. Cape Town feels very far away right now, and I miss the stability of my normal, crazy life. I miss the mountain, Camps Bay, my company, my friends, and all the work I have to do.

I do try not to lie to myself though, which is difficult since you’re the easiest one to fool. I knew going into it that spending time with these boys would be stupid, and fun, in approximately that order. I just didn’t realise the extent of the madness. Kind of like agreeing to take this job.

Well hey the red pill is more interesting than the blue pill anyway.

• “Can we keep her?” – John
• “Why are you wearing that?” “….Because I have to.” – Ellie & Aidan
• “That wasn’t me. Oh wait, that was me.” – Ellie
• “Will you hold my wallet? I’m not wearing any pants.” – Aidan
• “I have corn in my pants.” – Aidan (the pants he didn’t have on)
• “I know you pretty well, Ellie.” – John (scary … now if he and Doug ever got in the same room at the same time I would need to be very afraid)
• “I don’t listen to girls when they talk.” – Mike
• “This is the most concerned I’ve seen you on this trip.” “Are you kidding, every time John has an idea I’m concerned.” – Matt & Mike
• “We’re not like normal Americans. I hate Americans.” – keeping this one secret
• “I’m also a sprinter, Ellie.” – John (he said it, I didn’t!)
• “I wish we’d seen the knighting ceremony.” – Dustin
• “You belong in a kung fu school. Uncle Gin belongs in a whore house.” – Dustin
• “Yeah but you don’t count [as a girl].” – Dustin
• “Good luck with that.” – Keet
• “I can’t help it when I’m awesome.” – Susan
• “You’re running?!!?!” – Mike
• “I’m not that drunk. Oh, wait, I am.” – Ellie
• “It’s a marathon, not a sprint.” – Mike

Tailgate32, Episode N

Or, me, five boys, one RV, a video camera, and a whole lot of laughs.

In case you haven’t picked up on it by now from my various references to it, this is what I’ve been looking forward to for many moons now, joining up with the crowd from the documentary Tailgate32. The only word that can come close to describing this experience is epic.

Six new states for me: Nevada, Utah, Wyoming, Nebraska, Iowa, Minnesota. I saw beauty I expected, beauty I didn’t expect, and, most importantly of all, I got to experience something completely unique and that I will never, ever forget.

I guess there are many sides to me. There’s the type A who always has to have a plan, and then there’s the Ellie who’s happy just to be a teammate and do what she’s told. There’s the side of me that is very refined and wants to dress up and talk to smart people and eat at fancy restaurants, and then there’s the side of me that loves seeing how other people live even though I really have no desire whatsoever to live in or near Boondocks, IA (yes, that is a real place).

There’s the side of me that cannot wait to get back to Cape Town and my life and my company and start training again, and the side of me that literally feels like I’ve run away to join the circus and I’m never going home. Or that I’m a guest star on a reality TV show.

I love people. We know this. Why I’m enjoying the hell out of myself right now is not the scenery, or the food, or the lack of internet, sleep deprivation, or several days without a shower and sleeping in an RV in the parking lot of Walmarts between Oakland and Minneapolis.

A lot of things might seem glamorous that are not so. This trip is a ton of fun, yes, but there’s some serious work that goes on. Just the same as you might think being a model is glamorous, or being a CEO is glamorous, or being a rock star is glamorous. There are moments, yes, but the grind is decidedly not.

After a couple 15-hour days on the road with this crew, we got to know each other pretty well. Of course within the first few hours of the RV leaving the Oakland lot, we were in the middle of a full-on party on the road. Work hard, play hard. In all seriousness though, I was under no illusions here: this is a tight-knit crew, here to work, and it was not a trivial ask for me to just jump on the RV with them. Three of them didn’t even know me prior to this trip, so I appreciated that much more that they let me into their world…. Because it is an intimate one. And they are boys, and I’m a girl. Not just any girl, sure, but, nonetheless, a girl.

What I can say is that even after such a short period of time I absolutely love them, even the ones I didn’t already love before we got going. Of course there’s quality time and there’s just time … quite a bit of this was of the latter variety but it was expected because we’re all working while on the road.

So I feel incredibly lucky to know these guys and to be included in the adventure even if for a short time. I also got to have some fun taking a break from my normal work to get beer sponsorships in upcoming cities – it’s actually super fun because the product sells itself. I have a healthy amount of respect, almost bordering on awe, for creating something out of nothing like Mike and John have done.

The punchiness of getting very little sleep while on the road, the never knowing when the camera might be on, the internet that works on either the computer or the phone but never both at once, meeting Dustin’s family in Nebraska, learning about NFL fandom, the post-modern experience of listening to a recording of Mike laughing and hearing the actual Mike laughing at the same time, and then there are the realisations I came to on this trip.

You don’t have to play the hand you’re dealt, it’s always a choice. Even if that choice is the right one, it means there is a path you’re not taking, and that can be … hard. And my favourite in a way, that in my work career I easily enough play to win, but in my athletic career and in my personal life, I play not to lose. My own personal Casablanca.

Fun stuff though. Even the Oakland game was pretty epic, there was this drunk fan in the tailgate before the game who was just the most amazing guy to watch experience homebrew for the first time. Raider Nation is a blue collar set of fans who are possibly the most iconic in the NFL. The game itself was memorable because the Raiders had to come back to tie it and then win in overtime. I love football so, so much.

Love is a funny thing. It can make you re-evaluate every single thing.

I love Cape Town. I love it so much my heart could almost break. But I also love America. Driving around Minneapolis, seeing all the houses without fences, and the autumn leaves …. I also love my company, and my life in Cape Town.

I think I need to get back there in short order before I do any more damage to my heart, liver, or digestive system. 

• “Who are you going to vote for? A President who can drink beer or a President who can’t?” – Raiders fan
• “He doesn’t even know how to use it!” – John
• “My life revolves around creating moments like this.” – Matt
• “I look at that thing and it just makes me feel defeated.” – Aidan
• “You’re not wrong.” – Matt
• “Everyone talks about how much they hate Oklahoma but I now fucking love Oklahoma!” – Dustin
• “I almost started an electrical fire at the Mercury Lounge.” – Mike
• “That’s not an accent. I’m just drinking.” – Aidan
• “Sugar’s not a drug. It’s a way of life.” – Dustin
• “Who ARE you that I don’t even know you and I’m telling you all this stuff?” “[laughs] It’s Ellie!” – Aidan & Mike
• “South Africa. South Africa is a country.” – Ellie (I was on the phone to T-Mobile support)
• “There are tumble weeds!” – Mike
• “Seven of the eight reviews gave it a zero.” – Mike
• “Well I spelled every state correctly … and that was hard!” – Aidan
• “Well I got three of them right … the three we’ve already been to.” – Aidan
• “This is awesome! I haven’t been to a truck stop in years!” “You were at one a few hours ago.” – Ellie & John
• “Loaded baked potato? That’s a soup?” – Ellie
• “Tailgating was invented in Nebraska?” “Well maybe you’d know that if you watched our videos!” – Ellie & Aidan (touché ….)
• “Is that your home? It looks like Walmart.” – Dustin’s dad
• “I just took a picture of somebody’s dirty sock!” – Dustin’s grandma
• “Do you want to come to Seattle with us?” “Yesssss.” “Are you going to?” – Matt & Ellie
• “How did Goat find his bucket list?” – John
• “’With such professional videos, I can only imagine how professional they are at tailgating!’” – John, quoting an iTunes review
• “Chris can be normal when he wants to.” “We should make fun of him for this.” – Mike & John
• “Yeah. I still don’t understand why you were licking your own arm.” “….I don’t know.” – Ellie & Mike
• “Well, have to is a pretty strong word.” “As far as I can tell, you’re not even able to right now.” – Matt & John
• “We’re meeting 100% Cheese-Free tomorrow.” – Mike
• “Is he lactose intolerant?” “No. He just really hates the Packers.” – Dustin & Mike
• “It was not a staged fight.” – Mike
• “It’s called Stockholm syndrome.” – Mike
• “Here, you want to see Mike attack a Dolphin?” – Dustin

Back in the Valley, looking in

Well, well, well. As I was driving on the 110 into LA Friday morning I saw a huge billboard for something or other, and had a gut reaction that I really have gone over to the dark side. Oh well, people make their own decisions. Is being an enabler really that bad?

So obviously I used to work in the Bay Area. Berkeley/Emeryville/Oakland is not exactly the Valley, but you know people, you do business there. I was also very young. It’s quite a thing to be on the other side looking in, and especially from the international perspective. Back in the day a big part of my job at Ask Jeeves International was to persuade the folks at “AJUS” as we called it, aka HQ, to make my priorities of supporting our overseas joint ventures their priorities, when the entire bonus structure and corporate goals were tied 100% to U.S. revenues.

The U.S. market is big enough that you can be completely insular and never even need to worry about international expansion, unless it’s purely opportunistic. For a lot of South African startups, the reverse is true: the SA market is so small that you must plan to sell into bigger markets (such as the USA) from the very beginning.

So it’s quite fascinating. We are the centre of our own universe but we do not factor at all in the minds of people in the Valley. Or most of the rest of the world, for that matter.

I also now really ‘get’ why people want to live here and work here. It’s one thing when you’re a bright young thing, you can work for a startup anywhere in the country. When you’re a mover and shaker, and you want to negotiate big deals and work with the best of the best, have those synchronicity moments, be connected to the other key industry players …. The Valley is the place to be. I mean, where else can you just randomly go and hear the founder of Instagram?

But then, my mind is also coloured by having spent a bunch of time with two South African expats. In some ways there is nothing more depressing than talking to an expat about why they left home for the greener fields overseas. Of course, the Bay Area is pretty special. At least it’s not San Diego (inside joke). I get it, too, when education is this bad, you have to think twice about raising children in the country.

It was great to have some face-to-face time with one of my board members. Lots of coffee, a glass of wine, two big meetings that were fascinating to me in their differences from each other. We also saw the insides of two different business incubators: Google Ventures and idealab. idealab in particular is iconic, it’s almost sacred ground in a place where you can toss a rock and hit sacred ground. But this guy, firstly I like him personally which helps, because it’s great when you are able to to tease and joke and enjoy the people you work with. More importantly though, he makes me want to up my own game by just stating over and over again the level of the bar we should be aiming for. He helps me keep the eye on the ball, and I appreciate that. He also brings up such things as death by tiger and python in business meetings. You’ve gotta love that.

Speaking of celebrities, I finally got to meet a Cape Town celeb who is famous for not living in Cape Town any longer, a homeboy who made it in Silicon Valley, the very entertaining and dynamic Vinny Lingham. Turns out we have a mutual acquaintance that we both, um, don’t particularly care for. Great moment there when he asked me if I knew this person … I should definitely not play poker because my poker face isn’t very good!

Anyway interesting week, including a whirlwhind exhausting day trip to LA, lots to think about, and as much fun as I am having I cannot wait to get home and back to my team. They are working so hard and I just wish I could be there more to support them.

My friend called me out a bit for some hedging of expectations that I had going on. It’s true; I remember when I was at Jeeves I knew that all sorts of fun stuff was being discussed behind closed doors by the guys running the show, and I wanted in. So it’s nice to be sitting on the other side of the door and I’m continuously and happily reminded that no, I’m actually not in over my head. I just wish there were more hours in the day or more people in the company, or that I was better than I am. But hey, it’s this level of pushing yourself that does make you better.

So this week saw me finally resuming my CrossFit (yay!). I did a workout of wall climbs, pistols, and ring rows, then the next morning some jerks followed by deadlifts and lateral jumps over the bar. This was interesting mostly for the insight that my old ankle sprain has residual effects not only in the inflexibility in the ankle but also in a very ingrained fear. Something to work on. Always fight those fears.

Possibly the most fun I had was at CrossFit One World. Not just saying this because my visit made their blog but it was also just a super cool vibe in the gym. Good coaching, looks like good programming, and a super fun group that I happened to train with.

Unfortunately I was a bit disappointed with my own performance: the rest period combined with over-working myself has left me a bit overweight and out of shape, and my central nervous system freaked out a bit at heavy front squats (when your legs shake just unracking the bar something isn’t as it should be). The metcon was pretty epic: deconstructed Grace, buffered on either end by a 400m run. I finished in a pretty decent time but I was feeling very weak – I’ve been away too long, I can feel that, but I’m still not fully healthy. If I were less resilient than I am, I might be starting to despair at this point.

A few themes for the week: simplicity, process, consistency. Oh, and trust your gut. If a partnership, or relationship, or friendship feels wrong, it probably is. If it feels right, it probably is. Cathleen and I were discussing many things but one of them is that notion that people tell us over and over again who they are but we ignore it because we want them to be who we want them to be.

Not unlike Mitt Romney, who got stomped in the second debate. The Daily Show had the best caption: “Second Presidential Debate: Now Featuring the President!”

Aside from work & training, I spent a lot of quality time with Cathleen in this week of Indian summer. I did manage a little bit of shopping, went to Napa Valley this time, attended the aforementioned talk by the Instagram founder, stopped in at the Tailgate32 RV all-too-briefly but we’ll be seeing more than enough of each other in the next week or so.

Stay tuned for the next episode.

• “No! You can’t die!” – Michael
• “It’s about leadership.” – Michael
• “Can I just call bullshit on you, though?” – Cathleen
• “It’s not as big as yours so it won’t take as long.” – Barack Obama
• “The bully got whipped tonight.” – Al Sharpton
• “What is a number, anyway? It’s nothing without context.” – Michael
• “I knew I liked you!” – Vinny (the enemy of my enemy is …)
• “It helps to get obsessive.” – Michael
• “The best country in the world right now is Palo Alto.” – Vinny
• “Pick one thing, and do it well.” – Vinny
• “It means you’re not getting full extension.” – Freddy
• “A year is a long time to be jacked up.” – Freddy
• “That was the quickest hi and bye in the history of the world!” – Mike
• “People who don’t live here underestimate it.” – Kevin
• “Simplicity is key.” – Kevin
• “Guess we are a service and not a product co[mpany.]” – Michael (I bought him a nice cappuccino)
• “You’re saying the company is the product?” – Michael
• “You were so confident that I thought – ‘how could I possibly be right about this?’” – Cathleen
• “I think you do tend to appreciate a place more when you don’t live there.” – Cathleen 

I wish everyone knew product management

One of my friend posted this to Facebook in the last week: “For twenty years I worked in an environment where the Company was better than the Product. In the past 11 years, this has done a 180 for me. Interesting….”

He worked for McDonalds for 20 years, the last 11 have been with software startups, including Exit41 where he and I overlapped by 6 years.

I found this one simple comment utterly fascinating and insightful. As an ex-Product Manager I do have a particular axe to grind, and that is that the product should meet the needs of the customers. No more, and no less. If you have a solid customer value proposition, and deliver on that value, sales & marketing becomes much easier. So much easier to sell a good product than to be like a used car or snake oil salesman.

I have a couple of thoughts on why it is that he might have had this comment. There are a few things that occur to me off the top of my head as to what makes McDonalds so damn good (the company not the product). But I’ll save that for once I’ve had a chance to pick the brains of some people I’ll be seeing in the next week.

I was wondering recently about the backgrounds of the most successful business leaders. I’m not talking the geniuses like Jobs or the guys who were lucky, good, and in the right place at the right time like Brin, Page, and Zuckerberg. I’m talking the normal people, the ones who get that first real leadership job in mid-career and either wildly succeed, wildly fail, or are just mediocre. Obviously there’s more to it than background: you have to have certain personality traits, charisma, vision, and the crazy ego to think you can go out there and kill it.

But here’s my own personal conceit: I feel like building a good company is just like building a good product except that your ‘product’ becomes everything. Your employees. Your sales approach. Your web site. Your marketing collateral. Your technical support team. Your partnership strategy. Your contracts. But just looking at everything holistically – the customer experience is broader than just the product you buy, it is everything from the sales experience to the after-sales support. So I wish everyone had the discipline of the product manager in terms of being able to understand what is really required; the difference between a desire and a requirement, and how to prioritise.

I also feel like everyone should work for a non-profit at some point in their career. This teaches you how to be extremely creative in a low budget-no budget situation. This is the best sort of lateral thinking you can engage in. Rather than ‘oh gee, this customer has no budget too bad’ rather ‘this customer has no budget but they can provide something that would be very valuable to us and might lead to a much longer-term relationship’ doesn’t take a huge stretch, but it takes a different way of thinking about things, and a willingness to be testing and exploring the waters.

I am finally now understanding how the lateral thinking and negotiation skills I learned are actually one side of a coin and the other is product management. Most negotiations are not fixed-pie one-time transactions, most are part of a much longer-term and broader relationship where context matters, trust matters, and being able to see the situation from your potential partner’s shoes is extremely beneficial.

Where did I leave off? Sunday my parents left for Baltimore to the south and I went with my brother to Burlington to pick up a rental car and drive to my domicile in Dover, NH. On the way I stopped by the boarding school I attended, St Paul’s School, to see Chad & Kathryn Green who now work there. Kathryn is a teacher and Chad is Associate Dean of Students. It was an all-too-brief visit but we caught up a bit, and unfortunately watched the Patriots lose to the Seahawks. Boo.

I had quite a laugh that the head of house in the dorm they were residing in, Simpson (where I had lived for my first two years there), is none other than Mark Bozek. I went to school with Mark Bozek and not too long ago I ran across a photo of him as a Third Former (he would have been about 14), standing in front of Ford with Jeff Giuliano.

Anyway, a dark drive without a GPS later I arrived in Dover at my friend Matt’s house. Knocked on the window, scared him, and was informed that I was lucky he didn’t leave his shotgun by the computer. Fair enough. Then we went out to a bar and then home, and eventually to bed.

Now this is another person of whom I’m a huge fan and who I see far too rarely. This guy has got to be more up to speed on world events, politics, history, (read: better read & informed) than 99% of people I know. Is he a software programmer? Business exec? Lawyer? Doctor? No, he works in the NH state tolls, drives a cab, and does landscaping. He also has a successful home vegetable garden, scavenges for free firewood which he splits and stacks himself, has a small herd of laying hens, and is considering raising lambs next year. One of the most interesting guys I know, and the most creative, and the most real. You should hear his thoughts on the death penalty; it’s hard to argue with them.

Moral of this story? Don’t judge a book by its cover.

I woke up the next morning all bright eyed and bushy tailed but I had forgotten how long driving takes, as I finally got a SIM card for my phone and then hit up Sichuan Gourmet for lunch with Rob only about 30 minutes after my original scheduled arrival time. The weather was a bit crazy; nearly 70 degrees and overcast. Not that I was complaining, as fall days go this one was to die for, and since I’m here for such a limited period I am enjoying being stopped at every traffic light, just looking at the trees, houses, etc. It is so beautiful here at this time of year.

One thing I don’t miss? The traffic. It was already starting at 5:45am heading into Boston Logan!! Insanity.

• “Brady doesn’t run.” – Chad
• “Give me a call. I’ll talk you off the ledge.” – Kathryn
• “Any one of my fucking chickens would make a better President than Mitt Romney.” – Matt
• “I wasn’t paying attention.” – Ellie
• “I mean … how often does programming go wrong?” – Matt