Social Networking Delivers Tangible Business Value

Those who know me have heard me preach the merits of LinkedIn for years. Although I cannot take credit for the mainstream adoption, the critical mass has finally arrived!

Social Networking Technology Boosts Job Recruiting (NPR)

When Crocs attack, an ugly shoe tale (Business 2.0)

This article is worth reading. It left me in awe and contemplating what the next big trend might be.

"Celebrities adopt them. Young people adore them. The company goes from $1 million in revenue in 2003 to a projected $322 million this year. Crocs Inc.'s IPO in February was the richest in footwear history, and the company has a market cap of more than $1 billion."

More than Job Demands or Personality, Lack of Organizational Respect Fuels Employee Burnout (Knowledge@Wharton)

"One of the biggest complaints employees have is they are not sufficiently recognized by their organizations for the work that they do. Respect is a component of recognition. When employees don't feel that the organization respects and values them, they tend to experience higher levels of burnout."

"It is often not the job that burns you out, but the organization."

A company's culture -- which, for the purposes of the study, is defined as "the unwritten norms and values surrounding how employees are valued as individuals" -- plays an important role in burnout, the researchers say.

VC Deals More Company-Friendly (CFO.com)

Q3 State-by-State VC (NASVF)

Small is Beautiful (Bill Reichert - Garage Technology Ventures)

This article hits the nail on the head. Bill’s assessment of the current state of venture capital investing and venture capital as an asset class is spot on.

Bigger is not better. Early stage investing historically has generated the highest returns, but the current generation of larger funds is allocating a smaller percentage of their funds to true early stage companies. Investors interested in generating disproportionate returns need to understand the new math of venture capital: Small is Beautiful.

There is a substantial population of companies with the potential for high growth and high profitability, but with likely exits in the $50 million to $100 million range. Some of these companies are in the traditional tech centers—Silicon Valley, Boston, Southern California. But there are also some brilliant entrepreneurs and great investment opportunities off the beaten path—in Denver, Portland, Chicago and Calgary. These companies don’t need $10 million to get off the ground; most of them only need $2 to $4 million.

Michael Porter Asks, and Answers: Why Do Good Managers Set Bad Strategies? (Knowledge@Wharton)

Some excerpts ...

Errors in corporate strategy are often self-inflicted, and a singular focus on shareholder value is the "Bermuda Triangle" of strategy, according to Michael E. Porter, director of Harvard's Institute for Strategy and Competitiveness.

Porter stressed that managers get into trouble when they attempt to compete head-on with other companies. No one wins that kind of struggle, he said.

Managers who think there is one best company and one best set of processes set themselves up for destructive competition. "The worst error is to compete with your competition on the same things," Porter said. "That only leads to escalation, which leads to lower prices or higher costs unless the competitor is inept." Companies should strive to be unique, he added. Managers should be asking, "How can you deliver a unique value to meet an important set of needs for an important set of customers?"

"Strategy has to do with what will make you unique," Porter noted. Companies also make the mistake of confusing strategy with an action, such as a merger or outsourcing. "Is that a strategy? No. It doesn't tell what unique position you will occupy."

"We have had this horrendous decade where people thought the goal of a company is shareholder value. Shareholder value is a result. Shareholder value comes from creating superior economic performance."

Managers often tend to let incremental improvements in operations crowd out the larger strategy of building a unique business that will retain its competitive advantage, Porter noted. To bypass this problem, managers must keep the competitive strategy in mind at all times. "Every day, every meeting, every decision, has to be clear.... Is this an operational best practice or is this something that's improving on my strategic distinction?"

Strategy is challenged every day, and only a strong leader can remain on course when confronted with well-intentioned ideas that would deviate from the company's strategy.