Archive For The “People” Category
There are easier places to work than Atomic Object. We don’t specialize in one industry or technology domain, so we’re constantly learning. We push hard to build the best app possible for a given budget, and ideas always exceed budget. We all contribute to our marketing efforts through the company blog. Everyone’s expected to understand [...]
People are the only valuable asset of an innovation services company. While reputation, client list, culture, standards and tribal knowledge are also valuable, those all derive from and are maintained by people. Considering how important people are to Atomic Object, it seems crazy, when I think about it, that I don’t have a reliable way [...]
I have been aware for some time that my position and the demands of my job at Atomic Object isolate me, to some extent, from a complete and accurate understanding of how employees are feeling and what they’re thinking. Because it seems like an important thing to know, I’ve always valued receiving insights from Atoms [...]
Conventional wisdom says to keep your personal friendships separate from your work relationships. Some companies supposedly even try to restrict friendships in the office. This idea seems, to me, similar to the naive strategy of keeping your life in balance by strictly limiting the hours you work. My belief about having friends in the office [...]
Might compensation games be distorting the entire US economy? I wrote last week about my belief that using money to motivate people was a bad idea. As a leader of a company, you need to figure out a fair compensation scheme, but you shouldn’t try to also use it as a source of getting people [...]
Compensation systems are small-scale wicked problems: They operate on groups of people, it’s difficult to run independent trials, the system changes with everything you do, unintended consequences are easy to achieve, and it’s hard to judge success. But if you’re the leader of a company you have no choice but to wrestle with this problem. [...]
Anxiously seeking work/life balance? Give up. You’re bound to fail. You’re bound to fail because you’re framing the problem the wrong way. The phrase itself is a false dichotomy. It’s not work OR life, it’s just life, and work can and should be as much a part of making it rich and fulfilling as all [...]
“We shape our buildings, and afterwards our buildings shape us.” —Winston Churchill Opening a new office in Detroit has me thinking about space a lot lately. Our first space in the East Building was 2000 square feet with a conference room in one corner and a tiny kitchen in the middle. That seemed to work [...]
Atomic has been interviewing candidates to be the managing partner of a new office we’re opening this summer. The role of managing partner is broad, with the ability to sell our software product development services high on the rather long list of skills. Considering the candidates from this perspective got me thinking about what it [...]
Helping entrepreneurs with their startup requires you to begin from a place of surplus, with a reserve of certain capacities not easily measured. The obvious sort of capacity — developer time, designer time, wall space, team space — is the kind we’re perennially short of at Atomic, but which can be readily measured and planned. [...]
