Category

business

Ted Murphy
In business

Why Here?

This past week was full of job interviews for me. We are adding four new sales people and some engineering talent at IZEA. Over the years I have interviewed and hired hundreds of people at my companies. While each interview is unique (yesterday I interviewed someone dressed as Lobster Claus) I always ask one question that is the same.

Why do you want to work here?

I have had candidates respond with some awesome answers to this question, but more often than not people fall flat on their face. Here are some of my least favorite answers:

  • To make more money
  • So I can work downtown
  • I hate my current job

The reason I ask this question is to determine the motives of the candidate and see if they have done any real research about the company. I don’t want to hire people seeking a filler job. I want to hire people that have done their homework, understand our services, appreciate our culture and have ideas on how they can impact the company in a positive way.

Interviewing is a lot like dating. There are plenty of companies out there, just like there are plenty of people.

Imagine you are on a date

Girl : Why do you want to date me?

Responses from Boy…

Boy : I really need a girlfriend.

Boy : You live close to my house.

Boy : I hate my current girlfriend.

Boy : I want more sex.

Yeah. Those wouldn’t go over so well. The same is true when you are on a job interview. When someone asks you a question specific to the company be sure to respond with an answer that is specific as well.

Employer : Why do you want to work here?

Candidate : I have been looking for the right company for some time and I think ACME is the one for me. I have done a lot of research on your website and through searches on other sites. I understand your products, your culture and appreciate your involvement in the community. I believe I am a great match for the position you have open now and I think we can grow together in the future.

Of course, that response only matters if you mean it. If you provide an answer like that expect the employer to be so happy that they will want to dig deeper.

Ted Murphy
In inspiration

Egg Your Team On

The Atomic Egg Drop Challenge

I am a big fan of simple team building exercises. I find that most people get so caught up in their daily work that they really don’t get to know their coworkers. I created a fun, fast exercise that managers can use to liven up a meeting and re-energize the team. The below team building exercise works well for 12-40 people. It takes about 25-35 minutes from start to completion. The cost is variable, depending on the prizes you provide your team.

You will need

  1. Several cartons of eggs (depending on your team size)
  2. A ladder or step stool
  3. A tape measure
  4. Some cleaning supplies
  5. A watch or timer
  6. Some prizes

Getting Started

Split your group into teams of 2-4 people, depending on the total number of participants. You want a maximum of 10 teams. I suggest making people team up with coworkers that they don’t interact with on a daily basis. Once the teams are split up provide each team with 3 eggs and read them the instructions below.

Team Member Instructions

  • You have 15 minutes to construct a container for your eggs that can withstand an 8 foot drop.
  • You can use anything within the office that is not of value to create your container.
  • You are not permitted to use a conventional egg carton in any way.
  • Your carton must be no larger than 4 x 4 x 4 inches and contain all 3 eggs (this is a really important requirement, make sure people understand this).
  • You need to name your carton design and present the thought process and its virtues to the other teams prior to the drop.
  • In order to complete the challenge all 3 eggs must survive the drop without cracking.
  • Each team that breaks no eggs will receive a (insert your prize here, gift cards are nice and easy)

Facilitator Process

After you read your group the instructions start your 15 minute timer. Call off the time remaining at 5 minute intervals, with a 1 minute warning. When the time is up bring everyone back into a room together. Call the first team to the front and have them share their creation and thought process with the group. Measure the carton to make sure it is not bigger than 4 x 4 x 4 inches. If it is too big that team will be disqualified, but you should still drop the container.

Climb up your ladder or step stool, hold the egg container 8 feet from the ground and get your team to chant a countdown…. 3… 2… 1… drop! Some of the containers will pass, others will fail. The mess doesn’t get too crazy, but you want to make sure you are doing this away from any carpet or walls just in case. Repeat this process until every team has gone, then bring the winners to the front and celebrate their victory.

If you try this with your team please let me know how it works out for you.

Ted Murphy
In travel

Order the Meat Hammer

Union, Las Vegas

A few weeks ago I had the pleasure of attending Blog World Expo in Las Vegas with the IZEA crew. We had an incredible time at the event, but one of the highlights of my three days was dinner at Union, located in the Aria hotel. I was invited to be a guest of The Light Group by my friend Manya for a private VIP dinner with some great people including Jason Keith, Chris Heuer, Kristie Wells, Justin Levy, Stefanie Michaels and Scott Stratten. The company and conversation was great (and got even better as the night went on), but the food was ridiculous.

Manya started our meal with mini kobe beef burgers, multiple orders of surf and turf and an assortment of other little appetizers. Everything was going well, then we moved on to the main event and I made a critical mistake. When I asked the waiter what to order he suggested the tomahawk rib eye steak, but after trying the kobe mini burgers I made the decision to ignore him and order the American kobe flat iron steak. That was stupid.

When the first tomahawk rib eye steak came out it was a spectacle. Not only did it smell amazing it looked like a weapon you could carry into a medieval battle. Our table quickly dubbed it the meat hammer. It was beautiful in every way and tasted fantastic. My kobe steak was good, but the meat hammer put it to shame. I was definitely out-ordered, and if Scott and I were forced to take arms I am afraid he would have had a superior weapon.

Tongue Tip

  1. Always go with the waiter’s advice, especially at a nice restaurant.
  2. If you can secure the private dining area at Union (seats 20) go for it. It is incredibly cool.
Ted Murphy
In business

General Boarding

If you follow me on Twitter or Facebook you know that I travel a good bit for business. My Facebook status updates from TripIt make my profile seem like a fan page for a flight control tower. Because of my travel frequency I often get comments like “you must be double platinum status” or assumptions that I am riding in first class.

The sad truth is that I have no status, nor do I fly first class. I board with everyone else in general boarding. Quite often I am wedged between two large, sweaty people eating fried chicken, playing Neil Diamond on the loudest possible setting without headphones.

How could someone who will fly over 100,000 miles this year have no frequent flyer status?

Company First

Over the past few years I have raised $14 million from the investors that backed IZEA. During that time I have always done my best to treat each dollar as my own. Actually, I treat my investor’s money as more sacred than my own… because it is not mine.

While I spend money on things that can grow the business, increase productivity or create a better work environment, overall I am a tightwad when it comes to my personal spending. I don’t stay in fancy hotels (we usually sleep 2 employees to a room), I rent compact cars and I always book the cheapest flight, no matter the carrier.

The reason I don’t have any status is because all my miles are spread amongst many different carriers. I could book more expensive flights on the same carriers, but it would cost the company more money, sometimes hundreds of dollars per trip.

VC Money Isn’t an Entrepreneur’s Trust Fund

If you are lucky enough to have raised some capital from a VC or other investor to fund your dream you are in a very special place. Hopefully the day will come that you create a huge exit for your investors, your employees and yourself. At that point you can live your life like Jay-Z, dropping cash like it is going out of style (actually still a bad idea, even when you have the money).

Until that point you need to buck up and take one for the team. The money in your startup’s bank account isn’t there for your creature comforts. It is there to build a better future and deliver returns for all your stakeholders.

I will see you in row 19. I call aisle.

Ted Murphy
In inspiration

Crazy Until It is True

The above image was painted by my father, sometime in the 1960s. It depicts a future city where whisper quite high speed electric trains would “float on air” and travel hundreds of miles per hour between distant locations. As a child I remember uncovering futuristic paintings like this hidden in little nooks of our home.

While my father has great artistic talent, the images he creates are rarely designed to be art. They are visualizations of the world of opportunity he sees as an entrepreneur, engineer and visionary. Each drawing, painting or video he produces has a story… a reason for being. This painting focused on his fascination with linear induction motors. He believed that high powered magnetic coils would be used to levitate and propel all sorts of things, including trains. The magnets would be used to create a friction-free rail, reducing noise and energy consumption while increasing the speed of the train.

At the time my father’s floating train sounded like science fiction to most people. Fast forward to today and it doesn’t seem so crazy… because it is starting to be true. High speed trains are popping up all over the world, many of them using a variation of magnetic levitation and propulsion technology.

While he never built his train, he did use his vision to build and sell a company. He invented the original baggage handling system for the 747 airplane.

Big Visions Take Time to Mature

One of the hardest things about being an entrepreneur with a big vision is that the market rarely matures as fast as you want it to. New ideas scare people. They disrupt the old ideas, causing the people vested in the old ideas to dismiss or even attack the new ideas. The bigger the new idea, the more resistance, the longer it takes to gain acceptance. It is one of the reasons why we still have gas powered cars.

Celebrate The Victories

Your big vision may take years (or maybe even decades) to come to fruition. If you want to see it through it is important to celebrate and contribute to the milestones along the way.  My father knew he didn’t have enough time or money to build a new type of train, but he could help advance the technology that would be used on a bigger scale in the future. He scored a win for himself and a win for the big vision at the same time. I am sure it puts a smile on his face every time he hears about a new high speed rail project.

Tongue Tip

You may not change the world overnight, but the world won’t change as fast without you.

Ted Murphy
In sales & marketing

Ted.me version 2.0

Ahhhh…. that new blog smell. It is kind of like that new car smell only my new blog smells more like bacon. I spent a lot of time on this new design. I wanted it to be something similar to a standard blog format, yet unique enough to set it apart from the thousands of standard themes and millions of blogs out there.

A Visual Identity

Last year at IZEAFest my keynote was all about personal branding. A huge part of any brand is the visual identity associated with that brand. With the launch of this blog I now have a consistent identity system that I can apply to all of my online and offline activities. I have already updated my Twitter account. Soon you will see the launch of the Ted.me store where you can purchase Ted Head branded merchandise.

I hope you like the new look. A big thank you to Matt for coding this bad boy.

Ted Murphy
In business

Fuel The Love

In my Love It or Leave It post I spoke about my desire to hire and retain people that love their job. Ben Spark made a long, heart felt comment on that post that got me thinking. While my love it leave it concept sounds straight forward enough, there is a second part of that equation that I didn’t address at all.

The Employer’s Role

martyIf an employer wants people to love their job it is their responsibility to create a culture and environment that feeds their passion and fuels that love. The employer needs to provide room for growth, embrace the individual and promote creativity.

People often assume that it is easy for me to instill passion in employees simply because of the space we are in. They think that because we make cool software, have young professionals and work in an upbeat office that everything magically falls into place. That is not at all true.

Our executive team has to work at it, commit time towards it and invest money in it. In some ways I would say it is harder for companies like ours because of the type of people we employ. I have found that some of the most creative, open and expressive job functions (like software engineers) require even more effort by management to create the right environment. The more creative the person, the bigger the appetite for stimulus, change and challenge. Managing large groups of smart, creative people can be difficult. It is something I struggle with at times and continue to work on.

So yes, I want employees to love their job. But I also acknowledge that as the CEO it is my responsibility to create something worthy of their love. Employers aren’t perfect. Employees aren’t perfect. The hope is that we can love each other for what we are and continually grow together.

6 Ideas to Fuel The Love

No matter what type of company you are or people you manage, creating the right culture and environment to fuel the love isn’t easy. However, I have a learned a few tricks over the past 15 years that can help.

Annual Company Retreat

Once a year take your entire company someplace fun for a couple of days of off site team building. Mix down and dirty work sessions with play, brainstorming and a little booze. This is a great way to remove employees from the daily grind, give them an opportunity to share ideas and spend some time with each other outside of work. These events do wonders for creating bonds between team members. I have been doing these for years. I have skipped them a few times to save money and always regret it afterwards.

Hack Day

Once a month cram your team into a room and have them work on a concept that is not directly related to their day-to-day job. Think of it as day devoted to innovation within your organization. This allows people to create and chase down their own pet projects. The goal is to have a proof of concept by the end of the day. We have been doing this for a couple of months at IZEA with our development team (thank you for the original idea Adam). It has already produced some new ideas that were adopted by the organization. I plan on rolling it out to other parts of the company over the course of the year.

lilyPuppy Love

Let your employees bring their dogs to the office. I have found that having dogs in the IZEA office (as long as they are well behaved) increases employee morale, stimulates employee communication and contributes to a happier work environment. I had never been able to prove this in the past, but now there is actually research on the subject.

Flexible Start Time

Not all people function best in the morning… some people are just night owls. If people are starting each day grumpy or exhausted you are not setting a good stage for their time on the job. Allow your team members to choose their work hours. At IZEA we let people start their day any time between 7-10am. They have to pick their start time and stick to it so there is consistency, but it gives them some flexibility in their life. This can reduce employee stress and make for happier parents if they need to work around a school schedule.

Hire Women in Management Roles

I am blessed to be surrounded by smart, strong female managers at IZEA. Not only are they hard workers, but they also provide me with a unique perspective that I have never really had before. Like it or not women are generally more compasionate and emotional than men. I embrace this difference and seek feedback from them, especially when it comes to sensitive subjects. They often think of things differently than I do and help me tackle problems in a way that “feels” better.

No Offices

I have written about this before. One of the biggest things you can do as a manager is make yourself available to your team members. Get your ass out of your office and go sit with your team.

Ted Murphy
In gear, travel

iPad GPS

Motion X GPSI do a good amount of traveling for my job, often to cities that require me to rent a car. In the past I have packed a Garmin portable GPS in my bag to avoid the daily fee charged by the rental companies. While the GPS itself wasn’t all that big or heavy it was another thing I had to pack, and made my computer bag even bulkier to lug around the airport.

When I purchased my iPad (aff link) I decided to see if there was an alternative. I did a search through the iTunes store and found a wide variety of GPS apps, some with expensive one time fees, others with monthly or yearly fees.

After some consideration I went with Motion X GPS Drive (yes, I am an iTunes affiliate as well) and I think made the right decision.

How I Use it

I place the iPad somewhere in the center console area. At first I was taping it to the dash to simulate the positioning of a built-in GPS unit, but found the GPS works just fine when positioned lower. It also looks less ghetto when you don’t use tape : ) The screen is big enough that you can see it when placed at a lower angle, and the voice navigation keeps you on track when you aren’t looking at the screen.

What I Like

The app itself is cheap, only $2.99 for purchase (the iPhone version is on sale right now for $.99). If you want to activate voice navigated turn-by-turn it is only $24.99 for the whole year. Compare that to a $49.99 one time purchase for the TomTom App or $69.99 each year for the AT&T app.

I like that I can get the same app for my iPhone and the iPad and that the interface is consistent. The UI is clean, easy to use and reasonably cool. I have found the directions to be spot on and the software is always able to find the location I am searching for (Internet permitting).

What I Don’t Like

ipad_gps2Apparently there is no built in map data. Every time you want to put in a location you need to have Internet access, which means it won’t work so well on the road for wifi-only iPad owners. Even though I have the iPad 3G I find this to be an issue at times because ATT cell service is so unreliable in big cities. Note that once you put in your destination you don’t seem to need Internet connectivity again while you are in route.

I wish that the software told you the name of the street you need to turn on, instead of a generic “turn in 500 feet”. It would also be nice if the recent and saved locations synced between my iPhone app and iPad app, since they are both authorized by the same account.

You Should Know

If you purchase the iPad app and iPhone app along with voice navigation you can only use voice navigation on one device at a time. This isn’t really a problem for me, but I could see it being an issue if you are sharing these devices.

Overall

I give Motion X GPS Drive 4/5 tongues. It is cheap to try (they give you a 30 day demo of the voice navigation for free) and provides 90% of the features I really need and care about. I just wish AT&T coverage was better.

Ted Murphy
In business, life

Love It or Leave It

I have a confession. I have a lot of gray hair. I mean A LOT. I get my hair cut every two weeks so that gray wires don’t stick out from the side of my head. In the morning when I have some fresh product in my hair it is disguised, but towards the end of the work day those little bastards always make an appearance. I have no doubt that my life as an entrepreneur has accelerated this process.

It is stressful running a company. There are constant ups and downs. Team members, clients and luck come and go. I never stop thinking about work. Ever.

I could probably have an easier life. I could probably punch a clock at some big organization, flying under the radar and collecting a paycheck. I could probably have long brown hair, sleep 8 hours a day and take up origami. But I don’t.

I Love My Job

I don’t know how to make a paper unicorn because despite all the challenges I love my job. I love the brilliant, zany, completely unpredictable people I work with. I love creating solutions to problems. I love putting smiles on customer’s faces. I love the constantly changing technology landscape. Yes, it is stressful. But it is stressful because I care so much. I care about the people. I care about the products. I want everything to be perfect. I think about it constantly because I am so excited by the potential.

tedandashley

You Gotta Love It Too

A few months ago I did something pretty radical. I gathered every IZEA team member in a room and made a simple proposition – If your heart isn’t at IZEA and your not going to bust your butt for your fellow team members I will cut you a check and you can graciously bow out. A few team members took the offer. While I was sad to see them go I believe it was a good move for each of us. We left on good terms, and while were weren’t a perfect match long term, they cared enough to wrap things up in the right way. I wish them the best, I want them to find the job that truly inspires and excites them each day.

That was the start of my love it or leave it management policy. From hiring to retention I am trying to surround myself with people that are passionate about the organization and their role in it. They may not like every aspect of their job throughout the day, but at the end of the day they need to love what they do. They need to see the vision, care about their fellow team mates and bend over backwards to satisfy customers. It should be personal. It should mean something beyond a paycheck.

Life is Too Short

This is as much about life as it is about business. Yes, people that are passionate about their jobs tend to perform those jobs better. From a management perspective it makes sense. But on a higher level I believe everyone should seek what they truly enjoy. If you collect a big paycheck but feel no passion what is the point? You will never reach your true potential if you are motivated by money alone.

Your job should pull at your heart strings. It should make you want to do better, to be a better person. It should keep you up at night with excitement (and concern when appropriate). It should bother you when you screw something up. If it doesn’t you should step back, evaluate, and see what is missing. You may be able to find or rekindle that passion at your current organization. Perhaps your boss or another co-worker can help you make the connection.

…or maybe not.

If not you should do yourself, your co-workers and your company a favor and graciously move on. Life is too short for all of us.

Ted Murphy
In inspiration

All Hills Break

At midnight this morning I embarked on my first ultra-marathon. The event was held in the desert, two and a half miles outside of Las Vegas. While I knew that it would be a challenging run, I had no idea what I was getting in to.
ET Marathon MapA typical marathon will bring you up and down many times over, giving you periods of challenge and relief. You can physically see high points along the way and set periodic goals for yourself like “get to the top of this hill”. This run was different. The first 13 miles were uphill, in the dark with no end in sight. There was no horizon, nothing to fixate on, no way of knowing when relief would finally come. My timer broke right before the race. My ipod gave up on me an hour into the trek. It was lonely. Isolated. I hated not being able to see the road ahead or understand the pace at which I was progressing. I felt like it would never end.

The Dark Road

On the bus ride home I couldn’t help but reflect on what I had just endured. This run seemed to parallel so many facets of life. At times we all feel like we are on a dark road, running uphill towards the unknown. Sometimes we put ourselves on that road, and other times the sun sets around us. Either way it is an uneasy feeling to run into the abyss.

Perseverance

I know a lot of people are dealing with their own uphill battles right now. Unemployment and foreclosures are off the charts. The fallout from the economy is tearing apart lives, relationships and impacting personal health. But I am here to tell you that there is hope. No hill goes on for eternity… even the longest hill eventually breaks. It may be tough to remember that when you can’t see the top, but I promise it is there. If you keep running you will eventually make it over the crest.

Ted Murphy

Run Harder

The only way to reach the top of your personal hill faster is to run harder. Don’t slow down. Don’t let the darkness disorient you. Don’t lose focus. Don’t let the little setbacks cause you to give up and walk. Visualize yourself reaching the top and imagine how good it will feel coasting down the other side. You can get through this. You own this hill.