Every year the Silicon Valley hosts a number of galas to rival the Oscars. These are for geeks. They are hosted by large successful corporations in America that mint money hand over fist each year and then like a strange historic ritual throw big parties to appease their imported slaves.
These corporations by virtue of being based in the Silicon Valley of California tend to be in the software development business. Some of this software runs back and front office functions for other larger companies while some build portals or websites where millions of people gather to read, be entertained or gather information. By and large they either build the hardware that makes the guts for microprocessing or the software that runs on these machines. The machines have varying form factors from large screens that can replace an entire wall to miniature versions like mobile phones or watches that users can wear and be distracted every waking second.
After using talent from impoverished countries hungry to prove their worth, these companies smartly package their wares and churn billions in profits each year selling these bundles to other businesses that cannot grapple with sheer size of their own operations using the traditional paper and pencil.
Now I also have the ability to simply show up at any of these conferences as part of an IT alumni that helped implement some of this very software to clients nationwide. In one of these events hosted by Salesforce.com (a cloud based services company - no its not heavenly or mythic but just jargon for using sharable computing resource) I recently attended an interview by its CEO of other client company CEOs which akin to the Oscars was a lot of back slapping each other by very very rich people.
Self adulations aside (and Marc who heads Salesforce is a charitable being, no doubt and more power to him for doing that) the interview with Yahoo's CEO was both informative and also indicative of what is going wrong with the American go go work culture.
She talked a lot about how product design as a discipline has evolved and what is required to design good products - some obvious but lost in the noise - like listen to your customers - see how they might use your product - and how to be a net enabler of the strategy that the company has defined for itself and mostly get out of people's way to let them do what they do best - design.
What came out in one of the questions about her work life balance (another mythical concept/oxymoron that America has invented because it makes for good press) was that she is not a superwoman although the media might portray her as one. Mother, CEO, Philanthrope and globe trotter are not on everyone's resume. She does have all those qualifications.
What of it? Well she made a point of telling the 10,000 attendees that she had to change on her way to the conference in the backseat of her car. That is how life is these days for the elite of silicon alley. Large back seats to change wardrobes.
Unless she had a child throw up on her outfit whilst doing homework in the car on the way to this conference (since that was the only bonding time today) I am not sure what her change of clothes had anything to do with the spirit of the question. Secondly if that was supposed to underscore the multi tasking power of this wonder woman then I am sorry but its lame.
I am not trying to be sexist, as in fact a lot of male executives that I have known in this area tend to showcase the same habits - I say that is good for them but not for me. I will never emulate that simply because I am aware of my limitations mentally, physically and emotionally.
That some folks can indeed haul themselves for long hours consistently similar to an athlete that can run marathons is testament to their prowess but to expect it of your teams is cruel. To that extent I am handicapped and so are a lot of others that may fall in the big bell curve.
Many successful individuals to a large extent are also that because of a series of lucky accidents that the ever so humble Warren Buffett often cites as one of the gifts he has received and that capitalism has futher enhanced his wealth because of where he happens to reside.
These corporations by virtue of being based in the Silicon Valley of California tend to be in the software development business. Some of this software runs back and front office functions for other larger companies while some build portals or websites where millions of people gather to read, be entertained or gather information. By and large they either build the hardware that makes the guts for microprocessing or the software that runs on these machines. The machines have varying form factors from large screens that can replace an entire wall to miniature versions like mobile phones or watches that users can wear and be distracted every waking second.
After using talent from impoverished countries hungry to prove their worth, these companies smartly package their wares and churn billions in profits each year selling these bundles to other businesses that cannot grapple with sheer size of their own operations using the traditional paper and pencil.
Now I also have the ability to simply show up at any of these conferences as part of an IT alumni that helped implement some of this very software to clients nationwide. In one of these events hosted by Salesforce.com (a cloud based services company - no its not heavenly or mythic but just jargon for using sharable computing resource) I recently attended an interview by its CEO of other client company CEOs which akin to the Oscars was a lot of back slapping each other by very very rich people.
Self adulations aside (and Marc who heads Salesforce is a charitable being, no doubt and more power to him for doing that) the interview with Yahoo's CEO was both informative and also indicative of what is going wrong with the American go go work culture.
She talked a lot about how product design as a discipline has evolved and what is required to design good products - some obvious but lost in the noise - like listen to your customers - see how they might use your product - and how to be a net enabler of the strategy that the company has defined for itself and mostly get out of people's way to let them do what they do best - design.
What came out in one of the questions about her work life balance (another mythical concept/oxymoron that America has invented because it makes for good press) was that she is not a superwoman although the media might portray her as one. Mother, CEO, Philanthrope and globe trotter are not on everyone's resume. She does have all those qualifications.
What of it? Well she made a point of telling the 10,000 attendees that she had to change on her way to the conference in the backseat of her car. That is how life is these days for the elite of silicon alley. Large back seats to change wardrobes.
Unless she had a child throw up on her outfit whilst doing homework in the car on the way to this conference (since that was the only bonding time today) I am not sure what her change of clothes had anything to do with the spirit of the question. Secondly if that was supposed to underscore the multi tasking power of this wonder woman then I am sorry but its lame.
I am not trying to be sexist, as in fact a lot of male executives that I have known in this area tend to showcase the same habits - I say that is good for them but not for me. I will never emulate that simply because I am aware of my limitations mentally, physically and emotionally.
That some folks can indeed haul themselves for long hours consistently similar to an athlete that can run marathons is testament to their prowess but to expect it of your teams is cruel. To that extent I am handicapped and so are a lot of others that may fall in the big bell curve.
Many successful individuals to a large extent are also that because of a series of lucky accidents that the ever so humble Warren Buffett often cites as one of the gifts he has received and that capitalism has futher enhanced his wealth because of where he happens to reside.
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