Job Searches: Focus on the Company, Team, and Vision, not the Daily Duties

I talk to a lot of people who are thinking about their career and are considering going to grad school or changing jobs (or looking for their first job). Entrepreneurs are highly opinionated people, so everything I say has to be taken in the context that it's my particular view of the world. But I strongly believe in one key piece of advice: always focus on the long-term happiness factors. The company, its market, its financial health, its culture, the opportunities to progress, etc., are extremely important to your happiness and success. Your salary and daily duties (i.e. your core job description) are short-term factors that can change and absolutely will change if you perform well.

If you're choosing a job with a long-term view (hopefully you are), you will quickly accelerate your career if you work with smart, successful people.  You'll learn from them.  You'll grow.  You'll help build the future of the industry you're in.  Having the ideal job description should be a far distant priority. If you prove yourself, you can move into new roles at a good company, but you can't quickly change a weak company into a great one.

I would rather take out the trash for Reid Hoffman or mop floors for Larry and Sergey than be an  SVP at a meaningless company with a mediocre team. In my first job out of college (I worked for Cypress Semicoductor in Silicon Valley) I ended up moving back to the east coast for personal reasons.  One of the directors gave me a powerful piece of advice: "always surround yourself with the most clever people you can find."  I didn't completely understand the power of that statement at the time, but it is extremely true.  I like the use of the word "clever" vs. smart because it's not rocket science intelligence that always leads you to the next big thing, but rather the cleverness to quickly adapt in changing situations.  So when you're looking at a job, find a place with clever people where you'll be happy for the long-term.  Then figure out what you'll actually do on a daily basis and use it as a launching point for bigger and better things.  If you were an engineer at Google during the early days or a product manager at PayPal during its hyper growth, do you think you'd be whining about the job description you had at the time, regardless of what they asked you to do?

How to Make Your LinkedIn Profile a Magnet for Hiring Managers

Throughout the process of starting and building a company, I have become a fanatical user of LinkedIn. I use it heavily when seeking investors, clients, employees, and partners. It's also a great way to answer the question "Who is this person and what have they accomplished in their career?" This post addresses that question, which is what I try to answer every time somebody emails me about a job.

I think that a resume should be a slightly more detailed version of your LinkedIn profile, but LinkedIn should tell people 90% of what they need to know to judge initial interest. There are four core aspects to deciding if you are a good fit: your general background (school, jobs, etc.), what you have specifically accomplished (products built, sales generated, rankings in school, promotions), what you are capable of (extrapolating past success to future endeavors), and your personality (fitting the culture of the hiring company). Below are my guidelines for making these four points come across strongly. Remember, succinctness is key. Your goal is not to list as many jobs and responsibilities as possible. Your goal is to make a strong impression that defines why somebody should hire you. The fewer words you use to make that impression the better. "First man on the moon" doesn't take 3 pages, but says an awful lot. Get as close to that as you can come.

Include a Picture

Managers don't hire resumes or credentials, they hire people. If they see a picture you become a person instead of a resume. Make sure it's professional and one of your better shots, but the point is not how you look (though it's funny how much personality can come through in a picture). The point is to make it slightly personal. Studies have shown that people are more drawn to blogs where the writer includes a head shot of themselves. You start to feel connected with the person even though you've never met (just like you feel connected to your favorite TV characters when you know they're not real). Seeing faces matters.

Include a Little Personality

You have to work with your colleagues every day, most weeks you see them more than you see your family. Personality matters. Share it. Own it. Just don't overdo it. This is a balancing act where you want to describe what makes you tick (aka be interesting) without posting too much information. You want a career where you're being compensated well, doing something that you excel at, AND doing something that you love. If you state what you love doing there is a much greater chance that you'll find gratifying roles throughout your career. If you don't know what you love doing, then you should focus on that, experiment, and figure it out. People change over time so this will be a moving target and that's natural.

Describe Your Differentiation and Value

At the surface level, there are lots of people just like you. So if you're an engineer, what specifically sets you apart? If you're in sales, what aspect of your career gives you a slightly unique angle? Think about this carefully. You can get jobs with just the base requirements, but breakout careers are built on differentiation. There's a reason why LeBron James is worth more, he's different from the rest of the pack. Companies don't have game tape to see how you're differentiated, so you need to explicitly tell them. Do it in 2 sentences or less.  Put this front and center in the summary section.  Literally tell them why they should hire you.

Make Frequent Updates

You can set LinkedIn to not notify your connections every time you edit your profile. This gives you the freedom to make frequent, small updates, without flooding people's feeds. Then you can change the setting if you switch jobs and want to broadcast your move. By keeping your profile updated and edited over time, you're always putting your best foot forward. You'll be ready when that breakout opportunity comes your way. The biggest moments are frequently unexpected, so always be armed and dangerous. Let everybody know what you've accomplished and what sets you apart.

Make it Authentic

Don't be an "energetic, go getter who leverages synergies to deliver value." Use real words to describe who you are, what you do, and where you'd like to go. Being honest with yourself is where it all starts. Honesty makes a powerful statement and will help put you in the right place. The corporate world is compared to a rat race because so many people act like lemmings and follow a herd mentality. Here's the great thing, you don't have to follow. You can lead your career down the path that brings the most success and happiness to you. Reid Hoffman's book The Startup of You does a great job illustrating how to think like an entrepreneur during your career. This mindset can help you generate opportunities that build and take advantage of your abilities and experience, while being mindful of market realities. Just remember, success without happiness isn't really success, is it?

Learn in Your 20's, Earn in Your 30's

"Learn in your 20's, earn in your 30's" is a simple mantra that I love. The specific ages are not important, but the message is. By focusing on learning now you can exponentially change your ability to earn down the road.

Picture two college classmates, let's call them Bob and Sally. Bob is making $150K/year by the time he is 35. Sally is making $1.5M/year by the time she is 35. What was the difference in their career trajectories? It did not matter that Bob made a 20% higher salary out of school. Sally sacrificed on starting salary to learn, grow, and find the place where she could succeed over the long haul. This happens all the time. Being on the best long-term track is soooooo much more important than the size of your current paycheck, especially when you are young.

Why do most career services offices have this backward? I have nothing against career services offices or the people that work there, but they are stuck in a bind. It is very difficult to measure the long-term happiness and success of your graduates. It is easy to measure your graduates' employment rate and first-year compensation. So that is what people measure and it is the key metric used in magazine rankings every year. Students are naturally pushed to take jobs when they are available and to think about pay in a stronger way than they should.

To maximize your long-term success, you need to identify what you truly want and then pursue it with a vengeance regardless of what people tell you. Sometimes you have to accept advice from various sources and then draw your own conclusions and pave your own path.

Entering my second year of business school, I turned down a job offer at a consulting firm where I interned during the summer. I wanted to start my own company and decided there was no time to look back. I not only turned down the job offer, but took one of their employees with me. A manager from the firm ended up quitting his job to join my startup. I then proceeded to graduate and make $25K/year as we got the business off the ground and searched for funding. Let's just say I didn't earn a gold star in the recruiting category for that move. But I am exponentially more prepared to succeed now that I have experienced the adventure of launching a business. I have learned how to build a team, how to hunt down customers and earn credibility, how to raise funding, how to build a scalable product, how to deal with tricky management issues, how to work in a rapidly changing market, how to build successful partnerships, and ultimately how to create and run an organization.

Regardless of my personal financial outcome as a result of Seamless Receipts, I am confident that this experience will pay huge dividends throughout the rest of my career. But it was tough at the beginning. I had to think different and resist outside pressures. I encourage you to do the same. Don't suffice for a good career. Shoot for greatness. Throw your starting salary out the window and do something awesome regardless of the compensation. You'll be better off for it no matter what happens in the short-term. You may not make it on your first shot, but in my opinion subscribing yourself to a lifetime of mediocrity is the biggest risk you can take. Pursuing a passion on the other hand, I don't see much true risk in that.

7 Rules for Getting Hired at a Startup

Working at a startup is a drastically different experience from working at a large company. Your office space is different, your job is different, your pressures are different, and even your boss is different. So why would you approach getting a job at a startup the same way you approach getting a job at a big company? Many people do and it's a big mistake. After spending a lot of time reviewing candidates and hiring team members, here are seven of my rules for getting hired at a startup.

1. Engage with the company on social media

Every startup is fighting for exposure. Use that to your advantage. List your target companies, start conversations with them on their social profiles and listen to what they're saying. Startups are run by small, tight-knit teams, and there are real people behind those accounts. Engage with the company early and learn about them before you ask for a job.

2. Do NOT mail a word doc resume and cover letter

I get lots of emails for people seeking jobs. By necessity, I apply a quick set of filters and either flag the person as interesting (to be researched), respond to set up a meeting, or simply delete the message. If you send a Word doc it shows that you didn't even take the time to PDF it. If you send a resume, send a PDF. What I much prefer is a link to a well-written LinkedIn profile and any relevant websites (such as your blog). LinkedIn should clearly describe your education, your work experience, your successes, and your specific interests as a professional. If there is a powerful message on your resume that doesn't come across on LinkedIn, then either update your profile or highlight those points in the body of your email. Additionally, Never send a cover letter as an attachment. If you apply to a job at a big company, fine, send a cover letter - they might expect it. But if you're sending a busy entrepreneur an email, the email is your cover letter! Do not make them open a separate document because they probably won't. Make the communication short, succinct, and easy to respond to. Making a specific request is better than simply saying you're interested (ask for a meeting, a brief phone call, etc.).

3. Do your diligence (this is for your sake too)

Get to know a startup well. Read about the team, their background, their successes and failures, their investors, their competitors, and get to know their market. When you talk to them in-person it should be an interesting conversation about the battles they're fighting. You shouldn't learn anything in an interview that you could have learned with an hour on Google ahead of time. Entrepreneurs want to hire people who are proactive and know what they're getting into. If you don't learn the details about the company you want to join before considering a career move (a major, life-changing decision) then why should the entrepreneur think that you will do your homework before pitching a prospective client or making a technology decision? Behavioral patterns are important, so don't go into an interview and tell someone that you don't know much about their company except what you read on their website.

4. Start doing your job during the interview process

A lot of hires happen through personal networks because referrals provide the best filter for people you can trust. If you are not getting hired through a referral, expect the interview process to be thorough, especially for senior roles. In a small company you will have a tremendous impact on whether or not the business is successful. Just as important, you will have a large impact on the atmosphere in the office. One bad apple truly can ruin the bunch. Taking on an employee is as risky for a startup as it is for you. Entrepreneurs need to know that you excel at a level above your peers and can be immediately productive. The best way to prove this is to take on a project. There is usually a creative way to propose a project that has a small level of commitment, but lets you demonstrate your abilities. Additionally, this gives you a much better sense of how well you work together, which is critical for both sides to know. If it doesn't make sense for the situation, at least find a way to spend time white boarding technology ideas, sales strategies, or relevant issues for the role. Going through the process of analyzing and solving a problem with the team is a great way to preview your working relationship. Resumes and small talk are nice, but they do not simulate what it will be like to tackle a difficult problem together, in a small office, for hours on end.

5. Make it personal

When you join a small business, it's not just a job. You are joining a team and probably a team full of personalities. A huge part of whether or not you mesh with the company will be based on your personality and how you interact with the team. That is not superficial, that is real. Culture matters, personality matters, and how much you enjoy spending time with your team matters. Joining a startup is like going to battle every day. If you like the people you are in the trenches with, then the battle is fun and exciting. You will enjoy the challenges, the late evenings, and the pressure of working in a high-risk, high-reward role.

6. Show, don't tell

Talk is cheap. When demonstrating your abilities, don't talk generically about how you're a diligent, hard-working go-getter (could describe anybody). Show the last site you built. Describe the revenue boost you generated over the last quarter. Showcase a product you delivered and describe the go-to-market strategy you used to get traction. Whatever type of role you are looking for (engineering, sales, marketing, finance, etc.), the company wants to know that their investment in you will immediately start paying off. So prove to them that it will. If you can't yet - then take on a project that will prove it. Propose an extra project at work, build something on the side, help a friend launch their company. Excuses abound everywhere and ideas are cheap. The true definition of an entrepreneur is somebody who takes the initiative to take those baby steps and move forward. Little by little, every day. Rome wasn't built in a day and neither was Amazon, Google, or Apple. So start now and build something.

7. Hit the ground sprinting

Speed and timing are crucial when launching a new venture. Hastily making progress, building a team, delivering a product, securing partnerships, landing clients (or users), bringing in funding, and iterating before your cash runs out is not easy. It requires hard work and constant execution. If you meander, you may find yourself terribly lost. If you sprint out of the gate you will learn in a short amount of time whether or not your plan holds up. Most products and business models need to be iterated on and fine-tuned over time. Learn quickly, fail fast, adjust and move forward. Startups can't support this model unless the whole team is in-sync. So be quick to respond, show that you can think on your feet, and make it obvious that you'll hit the ground sprinting.

The Game Tape is Your Resume

Brian Cushing, a linebacker for the Houston Texans, said on ESPN that in the NFL "the game tape is your resume." There is no need to write your accomplishments down in a file. The game tape simply tells it all. People know who threw in the towel and who fought until the bitter end, leading their team to victory. These days, the same mindset holds for entrepreneurs (and increasingly for business people in general).

It was always true that if you were a corporate executive or commanded lots of press, the world would catch glimpses of your performance through the Wall Street Journal or other business publications. But most people do not land in the national limelight on a regular basis and thus enters the paper resume, a bulleted list with inflated job descriptions and carefully tuned action verbs. If hiring managers only had a game tape, then they would know exactly how you lead, how you think, and how much you contribute to the world. Hell, they might even know if people respect you (does that come through in a pdf resume?).

Congratulations, you now have a bunch of free tools to create your own game tape and show it to the world. Twitter. Facebook. Your blog. LinkedIn. Online videos. Online discussions. Your corporate homepage and bio. Your participation in community events. Go ahead and Google yourself, that's the best test of your background and performance (that even applies to dating now, it's not just for hiring managers and investors anymore). Many people have predicted the death of the traditional resume (it can even be considered amateur if you send a resume to a VC or a startup during a job hunt). My point is less about the decreasing need for a resume and more about the increasing need for a game tape. It gives a slightly raw view into who you are, how you think, how you behave, and ultimately how valuable you are to an organization. The more honest it is, the better it will help you end up in the right place over the long-term.

When Union Square Ventures posts a job, they start the process by asking for nothing more than a link to the applicant's online game tape. No resume. No cover letter. No words that have been carefully crafted for this particular job. Just show me your game tape. Others have followed suit as well (I'm not positive that USV was the first to do this, but they certainly drove the point home).

When LeBron James turned the world upside down with his free agency, he was recruited by everybody who could afford him. Why? They had seen him play. It wasn't his talent alone that mattered, it was the fact that everybody had seen him play, and they had seen him play a lot. If the exact same LeBron James declared free agency and floated his resume to people who had never seen him play, what kind of contract do you think he would have gotten? So why would you expect different in the business world? Don't wait until you need a game tape to make one. Make it as you go. Tell the world who you are and how you think. Share some thoughts, take part in discussions, and let your game tape represent you truthfully as you go through your career.

I am not praising LeBron for the way he announced his decision or for his media circus. I strongly believe in loyalty and if he was leaving Cleveland he should have told them that face to face in a closed office. I've said before that features can fail and products can fail, but your loyalty can never fail. Ever. People with the best game tapes actually tend to be those who are content in their jobs and aren't going anywhere (Chris Dixon, Fred Wilson, etc.). My message is that you should represent yourself well and show the world your game tape. Let them see you play. Good things tend to happen.

Buffett on Business School

I recently watched a special on CNBC featuring Bill Gates and Warren Buffett. It was filmed in November at Columbia Business School, but I caught a re-run. One moment that struck me was when a Columbia student asked Buffett (who got a masters from Columbia Business School) what the most valuable part of his degree was.

In his response, he explained that he was lucky to have found his passion early in life and knew exactly what he wanted to do after business school. Given that, he had already read a lot of the material they covered. So he didn't feel that he gained any incremental knowledge while being there. But he did gain the inspiration and confidence to launch into the next phase of his career (which obviously turned out quite well for him). The class work didn't change his life, but the experience and the close interaction with his professors was extremely valuable.

Buffett has a knack for distilling subjects into concise, simple ideas. His response sums up the experience I had in business school as well. I've been a nut about technology and entrepreneurship for awhile so I didn't gain much incremental knowledge from business school about running a startup. But I engrossed myself in the entrepreneurial community, spent time with successful entrepreneurs and early-stage investors, and launched a business. A passive walk through business school for the diploma, the course work, and some networking, is a horrible investment. But used properly, it can be a great opportunity to refine your interests, experiment, make a few mistakes, and launch the next stage of your career with a vengeance.