07/07/2014

Admitting When You Struggle – Where Leaders Fall Down

By Michael Goldman

I dreamed last night that I pulled together the entire company for an impromptu meeting to discuss our company struggles and the immediate steps we need to take to turn things around.

Everything flowed perfectly, the right words, the right call to actions and the motivation was pure: winning.

In this dream I was working for a company that was struggling like no company had struggled before, at least not any companies that I’ve seen or heard of, and the entire management team sat confined in their rooms, towers of leadership, without communication to each other the challenge being faced by each and everyone of them: the company was not producing revenue and they didn’t know what to do.

In my role I was the VP of Sales, a role that I had worked in my career before within a couple of startups, but in this dream I felt stifled in a way that I have never felt in my life.

It was just as this dream was coming to its climax, or so I thought, that a key member of the management team sat with me after this blitz of an impromptu company meeting and asked me a simple question: what is wrong?

Three words: What. Is. Wrong.

It was in this point that the dam burst and I explained to him that I am going through the roughest period of my life and did not know what to do and felt incredibly stuck.

I felt so overwhelmed in both my professional life and personal life in this dream that I literally did not know how to move the dial forward at work and the cascading waterfall of stress in the office just seemed to paralyze me further at home too.  As one of the leaders at this company I stayed within my leadership tower, hiding from the very simple question and the impact was a delay in my taking action, a delay in getting the others leaders to act, a delay in empowering the troops below to act and a delay in the opportunity to grow the company with sales being stagnant. 

Human nature is full of pride and many leaders, at some point in their career, will undoubtedly deal with the challenge of this blog post: Admitting When You Struggle.

In my career I have taken many leadership positions, most recently working as an advisor the past 20 months for nearly a dozen startups taking on the leadership role to teach them, guide them, motivate them and help them grow their revenues by taking on the sales, marketing, product marketing, customer service and product management hats all within a condensed work period of eight hours per week.

Typically I worked in this advisory roles for an initial period of 90 days, to help give these startups both the right direction and kick in the rear-end to focus them, put in the right metrics, the right processes, hire the right people and point the compass in the right direction once they are ready to set sail on their own.

While not a single one of these startups I advised said the words, “I am struggling”, or “I need help” or “I don’t know what to do next”, they all did admit one thing: “We don’t know how to drive revenues.”

This is where I saw leadership come in, with each and every one of these startups, being able to show their desire to grow and saying they want my mentoring, advise and teaching on how to become a revenue-generating company.

If I were to wind the clock, go backwards in time to that initial conversation before they decided to bring me on as an advisor, I would have asked them the simple question: what is wrong with your startup?

I would have taken that question and then follow-up with questions that go a deeper into the psychology of the leadership team, helping them uncover where their obstacles exist and bring to the surface the most glaring challenges that maybe they have not yet been able to communicate before.

Any sales leader would tell you that they have faced both themselves, but also within their sales ranks, both above them and below them, the simple challenge of not being able to hit their company revenue targets, their team targets and their individual targets.

Sales quotas are put in place to drive the right behavior from each salesperson, managers are given sales quotas for their team and the heads of sales are given targets for the entire company.  In many startups this cascade of goals are not in place, instead some pie in the sky numbers that were promised to investors or across the spectrum a very conservative internal target that was part of a general one-year, two-year or three-year plan but not broken down into team and individual components, nor metrics and dependencies documented as to how teams such as marketing communications, product marketing, product management, customer service and engineering can support the revenue goal.

When the startup starts pointing their compass towards revenue, they tend to have either lofty dreams or conservative goals, many times somewhere in between that range, but the vast majority won’t admit their struggles openly and therefore do not take the steps to do what it takes to make a change.

Leaders are always falling down, some are particularly good at hiding their scrapes and bruises.  A hidden bruise, in this context, symbolizes the leadership’s lack of admitting to themselves and to their team that they are struggling with something.

I’ve seen this time and time again, from my first job delivering newspapers seven days a week as an eleven year-old for the San Jose Mercury News, scoping ice creams as a fifteen year-old for Baskin-Robbins, helping customers as an 18 year-old at The Home Depot, building a marketing team at NASA Ames as a 21 year-old, launching new products as a product manager at ActivIdentity as a 24 year-old, building a customer insight program at Mercury as a 26 year-old, taking on my first head of sales role at Arxan Technologies as a 28 year-old, closing enterprise deals at ClickTale as a 35 year-old to these past 20 months as a sales advisor to multiple startups including AppSee, Toonimo, UsabilityTools, xPlace and many others.

I’m now 38 years-old and through the evolution of my career, starting out in customer service and sales roles at retailers, through marketing communications and product managements roles at Silicon Valley high-tech companies, through sales roles at UK, Israeli, Polish and German startups the same challenge is faced: leaders fall down when they don’t admit their struggles.

The dream I had brought out that simple question, “What is wrong?”, which was such a basic question that none of the leadership team brought to the surface.  The impromptu company meeting brought the light to the situation, with not a single person being able to cast a shadow on what everyone was being challenged with and as the company meeting progressed, and the positive inertia grew the possibilities to solve our revenue challenge were appearing almost like it was magic.

At one point I found myself walking down a row of people that seemed to be growing exponentially with supporters as I headed towards the back of the room.  There was a troop of dancers, must have been eighty of them, all from California, building up a crescendo of buzz and then towards the back of the room was an NBA player, who I asked for some pointers on the outfits we would use as part of our tradeshow booth.

After the wave of excitement and rallying of the troops was over, everyone started heading out of the meeting and I headed back into the room to speak to my colleague who sat me down and asked me “What is wrong?”

It was after pouring out my struggles to him at work, the avalanche of stress I felt in not being able to find a solution and the impact it had on my personal life that I felt, finally, empowered and it was in that moment that I woke up from my dream.

Struggles are real.

Leaders fall down.

Leaders especially fall down when they don’t admit to each other and their troops that they are struggling.

I’d love to interact more with you on this topic, hear how you have struggled as a leader and if/how you overcame it.  Engage me on my LinkedIn or Twitter, I look forward to engaging with you!

 

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31/05/2014

Is Your Startup Still ‘Starting Up’? – Are You Doing What It Takes to Win?

By Michael Goldman

Today is the last day of May 2014 and tomorrow, Sunday, is the first day of the last month of Q2/2014.

If you are a startup you should be thinking in operational terms that you have just one month left in Q2/2014 and are about to head into Q3/2014, that’s the summer months of July, August and September, which tend to slow down sales deals and investment.

I am sharing in this blog post an email that I recently sent to one of my clients, a startup that I have been mentoring as a part-time consultant.  They have a chance of making it because of their unique product idea, the passion of their CEO and hard work of two other full-time members of the team.  What they miss, though, is the marketing process, sales process and investment process and my challenge has been to teach something to a set of co-founders that they have never learned before nor executed on in their careers.

That is a tough ask from a co-founding team, but they are plugging away, making progress and hopefully will be turning the corner to what can be a historic 30 days in their history if they look back a year from now as a succeeding startup.

What I have seen directly with statups, since my teenage years in Silicon Valley watching my family involved with startups and then myself jumping into startups is the same challenges and questions:

– Is the team working together towards measurable marketing, sales and investment results?

– Is the product aligned with what the potential customers are looking for before making a buying decision?

– Is the product roadmap aligned with what existing customers are looking for before making a renewal decision?

– Is the team measuring themselves on a weekly, monthly and quarterly basis towards marketing metrics, sales metrics and investment metrics?

– Who are the weak links in the startup and are the weak links doing what it takes to improve to a point where the startup sees measurable results from their work?

These are all basic business questions that any startup should be continually asking itself and from what I have seen in my experience working for on a full-time basis for startups, and also advisory basis, are weak areas for 95% of startups that I have come across.

Here is the email I sent today, the 31/05/2014, minus the identifiable information for this particular startup:

______________________________________________________________________

Subject: Metrics on your performance: Marketing leads, sales opportunities, potential investment

Hi [name 1, CEO and co-founder], [name 2, co-founder and finance] and [name 3, admin person],

I want to see a more operational effort from the three of you towards achieving what [startup name] needs: Customers, revenue and investment.

I’ve seen alot of effort by the three of you go into the [startup name] startup but we have very little measurable progress to date in terms of paying customers, revenue and investment.

If I am sitting in your shoes I would be asking myself these questions:
– Why is it that despite putting in many hours the past six months I see such small results?

– What is that I am doing individually, as a group, that is blocking me from my individual success and the team success?

– How can I do things differently?

You guys are the team, the ‘A’ Team to use a TV show analogy and I’m the dude that advises you, mentors you and tries to teach you.

I am not the CEO.

I am not the head of sales.

I am not the head of marketing.

I am not the head of product.

I am not the head of engineering.

I am not the head of finance/investment/HR.

If [startup name] is to survive, beyond August of this year it is up to the three of you.

The way I see it the company has 60 days before making a decision to either shut its doors or continue along without being to pay people on time or doing what it takes to win and actually make it to the next positive step in the evolution of the business.

At this point I see only [name 1, CEO] as the person directly contributing to leads, sales pipeline and potential proof of concepts.  I have not seen a direct impact on this by you [name 2, finance] , nor you [name 3, admin person] .  I”m talking about measurable results:

– Sales demos;
– Contract negotiation;
– Proof of Concept (POC) negotiation.

This has to change!

On Monday I have a working session with [name 1, CEO] to work on his sales demos, sales opportunities, contract negotiations, POC opportunities and POC negotiations.

I know that [name 3, admin person] is out, here is what I expect from you [name 2, finance] on Monday:
– Salesforce report showing how many leads created in the past week;
– Salesforce report showing how many demos scheduled during the past week;
– Salesforce report showing how many completed demos during the past week;
– Salesforce report showing sales opportunities for the next 60 days.

I also want to see progress towards investment, which is under [name 2, finance] current responsibility:
– Salesforce report showing how many investor leads created in the past week;
– Salesforce report showing how many investor meetings scheduled during the past week;
– Salesforce report showing how many completed investor meetings during the past week;
– Salesforce report showing investor opportunities for the next 60 days.

From a business perspective we are heading into the last month of Q2/2014 and are one month away from Q3/2014 which is a month that usually has seasonality, especially in Europe, which lengthens sales opportunities and investment opportunities.

What this means is that the next 30 days is actually the most critical 30 days in the history of your startup and what you accomplish will dictate if your business will be around at the end of Q3/2014.

I am rooting for you, I will support you within the terms of our working relationship and contract and know that if you execute according to my guidance you have a fighting chance of making it.

Lets do this!

Have a restful Saturday and I would hope that Sunday, which in Israel is the first day of the work week, is spent putting together the plan for this week, measuring your performance from the past week and getting your mojo elevated to have a kick ass week.

Startups are about entrepreneurial spirit, learning, growing, finding product marketing fit and shifting from the starting up a business phase to having enough stability to shift from survival mode to a small business mode that has a strong chance of either exiting in the next three years or thriving for the next 10 years.

Shabbat Shalom,

Michael
______________________________________________________________________

For the startup that you are currently involved with or are considering joining, you should be asking yourself the types of questions I listed in the email above.

Anybody can jump into a startup, but it takes focus, dedication and change to be able to execute on a startup with measurable marketing, sales and investment results.

Let me know what you thought about this blog and share your experiences.  You can engage me on Twitter at @MrMGoldman.

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14/05/2014

Homeless to Hacker – Call to Action and My Personal Homelessness

By Michael Goldman

I want to see the tech community, globally, step up in helping a spectrum of society which is largely ignored especially by the wealthy eco-system of startups, Venture Capitalists (VCs), angel investors, private equity, startup banking, accelerators and universities that help startups.

Homeless to Hacker is a concept I came up with in the Fall of 2013 after moving from Israel to Poland.  Homelessness is a problem I have seen directly, and experienced first hand, while living in cities like Jerusalem, Haifa, Paris, London, San Francisco, San Jose, Los Gatos, Poznan, Krakow and Berlin.

The idea is to have a long-term and sustainable approach to solving the homeless challenge, getting people back on their feet by getting medical attention, meals, safe living environment, startup training and if they make the selection criteria an internship and then hopefully they land a job!

There have been some exemplars in the high-tech industry, like Jeff Pulver, who have built awareness as to the homeless problem facing us on many continents and he has done some great work in getting the conversation started, fundraising at events that I’ve seen him put together in America and Israel.

My call to action from the tech community is to do what is missing: Continued and sustainable action to help the homeless.

There was a Tweet recently shared by my brother, Shai Goldman, showing that 50% of the homeless in New York City are actually children.  What a horrible reality to deal with and I’m personally upset at that statistic as I have two little children myself and can not imagine them being on the street!

I’ve had a personal experience of being homeless myself and knowing what it is like as a father to do everything possible to keep my kid away from this problem.

I’ll give you a short version of the story and might elaborate on another post.

I was living in London and was successfully building my consulting business in late 2007, landing contracts with great tech companies in London and a major cosmetic company in Europe. I was getting paid 500 Euros per day for my work, plus expenses, and things were going so  well that I was able to move into a beautiful new apartment with my five month pregnant partner and go from having nothing into the apartment to a fully furnished place that was getting ready for the arrival of my daughter who was due in mid-January 2008.

The day after Christmas, the 26th of December 2007, our neighbor attacked my now 8.5 month pregnant wife and in my protecting her attacked me as well.  This was a very strong man, eyes fueled with either rage or drugs, or maybe both, and all I could think about was protecting my wife and unborn baby.  Somehow I managed to get us into our home, keep the door closed despite him trying to break it down and was able to get my wife calm enough for her to call the police.  Lucky for us the police were just a few hundred meters away and showed up with an ambulance straight after.

As the paramedics were checking my partner and trying to assess the impact on our unborn baby, I saw more and more police show up.  We head to the emergency room in Northwest London and all my partner and I could think about was the topic of health and life: These are the most basic needs a human has and it was in this extreme situation that made it so obvious to both of us that nothing else really matters.  Money, material possessions and the luxuries they give us are not essential except for the basics we need to sustain our lives with basic food, basic clothes and basic shelter.

Once we got to the hospital we found out from the police that our baby should be fine, but would need 12 hours of observation by the doctors and then daily visits to the hospital, that my partner will be fine and we felt relieved that our family’s health was being taken care of.

What we were shocked to find out was that the police uncovered a major identity theft ring as a result of arresting our attacker, the man who was our upstairs neighbor for nearly four months, and that it might not be safe to come back to our home.  They explained that many computers were found, with initial data showing stolen IDs globally, a ton of stolen mail, countless fake credit cards and a network that spanned England, Nigeria, mainland Europe and other continents.  They asked us to give a statement against our attacker and press charges that way they can go after him and his network for what they felt was a larger case in identify theft.

My first reaction was how do I get my partner, who is carrying our soon to be born baby, into a safe and warm home while we await the birth of our girl due in just two weeks time!

My second reaction was what can the police do to protect us and help us if we are going to give our statement, testify in court and help them bring accountability to those that have hurt our family but also hurt countless families and individuals with the theft of their IDs.

The police, unfortunately said they could not provide us shelter nor protection so my partner and I decided to only give a statement as to the attack on us but not testify in court nor help with their larger case.

Given that it was not safe to come back to our home, as we were concerned for retaliation of what the police uncovered, we had enough cash in the bank to cover four nights hotel, meals and public transportation.  As I was only living in England for two years, building up my own business and England has more strict overdraft and credit card policies compared to America, we found ourselves in a situation where we were running out of cash, had most of our previous money invested in furnishing our large apartment and the payment from my consulting contracts were at least 60/90 days out.  Our family has no money.  Our friends in England seemed to all of a sudden not really to be our friends during our moment of need.

What resulted was us being homeless on new year’s eve 2007.  My wife stayed in the hospital for two nights, as the nurses were still monitoring our baby after the attack and were sympathetic to our personal situation of not being able to live in our home and not having the money to afford a hotel or new home.

I spent 48 hours running around to every government office I could find to get some sort of temporary housing for my partner, unborn baby and me. I was able to find two night’s in a type of homeless shelter with private room but then had to figure out a longer term plan.  We ended up being homeless for two weeks, with my partner going into labor on the 9th of January, 2008, and our beautiful baby girl born the early hours of the 10th of January, 2008.  Both my partner and baby daughter were healthy, warm and safe in the hospital.

The question, though, was where we go after the half-day stay at the hospital. In England the mother and child leave the same day of the birth.

One week before my partner’s sister arrived to help us while living in a homeless shelter, taking a 24 hour bus ride from mainland Europe to London and she kept my partner company while I was working.  It felt strange to be working, in a suit every day, knowing that at night I come home to a homeless shelter and knowing that I won’t get paid for my consulting work until February or March.  My European cosmetic client had a procurement system that meant not getting paid for 60 days until after the project was over!!!! That’s 500 Euros per day multiplied by five days a week as part of a 12 week consulting project.  Great invoice but zero cash during this time of need.

I told my partner that our child will never be homeless, will never live on the street or homeless shelter and that I will do whatever it takes to get us into a warm, safe and comfortable home.

My father arrived the morning of my daughter’s birth, travelling all the way from California and he surprised me by somehow wrestling up enough cash to be able to afford a basic apartment and cover the one month deposit and first two month’s rent. This was a miracle and I used all of my business skills to find, negotiate and move into a beautiful home that was priced at the same level as a two room apartment but was actually a two story home in an awesome neighborhood with our garden looking over the ninth hole of an 18 hole golf course.

We moved in, with no furniture except for our baby’s still boxed crib, sheets and blankets.  I kept my promise to my partner, thanks mostly due to the help of my father and whatever strings he had to pull to come up with money to help us.

While our daughter slept upstairs, we joined my father and sister-in-law for a kebab dinner on the living room floor with the dining room table being the cardboard box that was part of the crib by daughter was now sleeping in.

I know what it is like to have a ton of money, I know what it is like to be working with great invoices but zero cash in the bank as an entrepreneur and I know the feeling of being homeless.

What are you doing to help homeless people?

What is your picture of what a homeless person looks like?

Will you join me as part of the Homeless to Hacker initiative?

Join me, interact with me and share your stories. My twitter handle is @MrMGoldman

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12/05/2014

Jerusalem of Gold

By Michael Goldman

“I am Israeli. I am from Jerusalem. I am Jewish. There is no country like Israel. May Jerusalem of gold dwell in peace and tranquility. Amen.”

These are the words I spoke at the end of the video I made on the 24th of February 2014 while sitting in my room in Berlin, Germany.

The singing beforehand was inspired by my own two children, whom I have had the joy to sing many songs to while they go to sleep: In French, English and Hebrew.

Jerusalem, such a special place.

Life, such a sacred thing.

Higher power, what a warm blanket.

Singing, what a wonderful opportunity to project feelings, soul and emotions.

I was born on the 25th of June, 1976, in a religious hospital in Jerusalem, Israel, to my French mother and my American father.

My father tells me that he was not allowed to be present at my birth as the religious hospital had rules. He ended up getting a falafel sandwich with my uncle and close family friend, making it back to the hospital to have be presented to him through the tiny window of the birthing room door. He tells me that I opened and closed my hands while looking at him, explaining that I recognized him. I’m sure my soul did, even though my eyes as a newborn could not have worked so early as newborns usually can only detect light and motion.

My mother told me that I was born blue, as the umbilical chord was wrapped tightly around my neck. Many a friend and colleague have made fun of me when I recount that story, saying “so that explains it!” Haha, what do they know anyway….

The journey of life has been a mix of so many wonderful things, ups and downs, but there have been some clear constants in my life: Jerusalem, life, higher power, singing and family.

When I recorded this video I was sitting in bedroom in Berlin shortly after having a Skype call with my two children who were slowly slipping into their dream world.

I felt moved by their reactions to my voice, as I sang a few songs that I remembered growing up including a couple of French songs that my mother used to sing my younger brother and I.

As I write this blog post, on the 12th of May, 2014, I feel thankful to be able to express myself, hearing the words and prayer I had made in this video and feel this lightness and open possibilities as I prepare to go visit my children in Poland tomorrow.

While I have managed to live all over the world and may continue to live in new places, one place will always be home: Jerusalem, Israel.

The place of my birth.

The place of my people.

The place that I point my soul to when I need a tune-up.

It may be a long time before I step foot into Jerusalem again but somehow I feel like I am there when I sing Jerusalem of Gold, ירושלים של זהב‎.

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01/04/2012

You Don’t Understand It, So You Attack It

By Michael Goldman

I had an avalanche of thoughts triggered after reading a recent rant of yet another person hating on Groupon and it’s business model.

I started wondering why it was that human nature is such that it attacks people, concepts, ideas, religions, races or anything else that is different than the rest. I came to the conclusion that many people fall into this trap: You Don’t Understand It, So You Attack It.

It is close to a couple of major celebrations in Israel, the land which I was born and where I live now after 26 years of bouncing around between USA, France and England: Passover, or Pesach as it is pronounced in Hebrew, and Easter.

My ancestors and education, which are steeped in Judaism, have me excited to celebrate a tradition with my children in teaching them about how after 400 years under Egyptian slavery the Israelites escaped Egypt with the help of God.

My wife, who has an education and family history with a Catholic heritage, is excited to celebrate Easter and teach our children about the moral and religious significance of that holiday.

Both holidays share roots in Israel, a holy land, and both share the celebration of spring which in itself is not a religious celebration but a celebration of new beginnings.

Throughout my lifetime, as a Jewish man, and through thousands of years my ancestors and I were discriminated against because of our religious identity.  One of the common threads was human beings inability to tolerate something that they can’t understand.  The human mind is brilliant, the emotions that humans are capable of are amazing but when it comes to comfort, acceptance and tolerance human beings can be quite primitive.  The inability to accept a belief system or religion is different than yours, often times results in a person attacking what they don’t understand.

The history of Christianity, evolving from a sect to religion, had its own period of time being under attack because the Roman Empire could not understand why some people don’t pray to idols and others pray to a higher power. Christians and Jews were slaughtered by the Roman Empire, including in sports complexes throughout the Roman Empire including the Coliseum in Rome.

As I evolved my professional career, working at NASA Ames Research Center as a 19 year-old, moving to England as a 29 year-old and moving back to Israel as a 34 year-old, I have seen a massive lack of understanding by people for disruptive technologies, disruptive businesses and disruptive individuals. In this case, I use the word disruptive as a positive word because of the massive amount of changes brought to the world because of new technologies, new business models and new ways of employees.

When I read blogs, articles, tweets and rants over Groupon I think about the person’s inability to understand a new type of business model, with a new type of technology and a new type of employees. Just as many have ignorantly prosecuted and attacked human beings, because of their differences to others, many attack Groupon with a theme of this blog post: You Don’t Understand It, So You Attack It.

It takes an incredible amount of wisdom to try and find understanding, rather than simply reverting to basic human nature of attacking things you don’t understand.

For those celebrating the coming of spring, the holiday of Passover or Easter or those that are simply celebrating new beginnings, I wish you a wonderful chapter in life and ask that you put more weight into considering new ideas rather than attacking them.

Peace! If you want to engage in dialogue on this topic, please comment on my blog or reach out to me on Twitter: @MrMGoldman

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27/03/2012

LinkedIn + Twitter Got Me a Job

By Michael Goldman

Exactly two weeks ago I posted an update on my LinkedIn profile and Twitter account, this is a story about the power of a personal brand, a strong network and the use of social media to get four job offers within eight days.

The methodology I followed in exploring new avenues for a job is the exact methodology I have used the previous three years of my career in prospecting, cold calling and closing Entrerprise contracts with some of the largest consumer brands in the world.

On the 9th of March I shared a message with a targeted part of my LinkedIn network, focusing on individuals that I thought were relevant for finding a sales role in Israel, preferably with a SaaS or media company.  This is a process that everyone should use in a job search, marketing campaign or sales effort: Choose your target audience, use a contextual message and leverage social media to engage others.

I had used LinkedIn’s share button to forward a message I had originally posted on Twitter. I had previously connected my LinkedIn account with my Twitter account. Here was my tweet: “February had me over 200% of goal and my 3rd quarter over 100% of goal. Who is looking to hire a top notch salesman? I am transitioning. #in”

There was a very large response rate within 24 hours of my Tweet and sharing of the tweet with my LinkedIn network, resulting in job interviews with eight companies.  Introductions to these eight companies were made my two headhunters, one 1st degree LinkedIn contact and two companies proactively contacting me because of my LinkedIn update.

Once engagement occurred with these eight companies, I followed the second step of my methodology which was to learn about and validate if I want to continue the job interviews with these eight companies.  This is where I shifted from a volume based approach, engaging a high quantity of people, to a focus on quality as part of my qualification process. Just as potential employers are qualifying me and potential customers are qualifying if they want to buy a product or service being offered, I was qualifying the companies to see if I really want to work for them.  Following this method required tremendous belief in what you are selling, in this case I was the product or service being offered as part of a job interview. Naturally I had to build a strong mindset and confidence level to keep my potential employers engaged. Some of the tactical things I executed on was the use of LinkedIn search to see if I have direct connections with the eight potential employers, including those that had previously partnered with or worked for those employers. I also leveraged Twitter to learn more about the brand presence, including any positive on negative sentiment. Using the Twitter search and looking through a few dozen tweets gave me a sense of if this brand was being engaged online and if there is more positive or negative buzz about this brand.

Step three of my methodology was the executive summary of the company I had prepared before the face to face interview. Having a snapshot of the ownership structure, senior management, main products, value proposition for those products, customers, partners and company location gave me the ammunition I need to ask smart questions and have a highly engaged interview. This combination of thorough preparation for a job interview and leveraging my notes to ask contextual questions or make smart comments led to a highly positive and engaging interview. In sales this approach is also vital, adapting to the company you are selling to and showing that you can both tailor your message and show genuine interest in their brand and company direction.

Step four of my methodology is leveraging the new pieces of information I learned in the various rounds of interviews, leveraging the interface I had with several people in the organization to validate if what I am hearing is accurate and if the people I am interviewing with are people I want to work with. I leveraged LinkedIn and Twitter to identify who in my social and professional network are connected with them and both emailing and calling individuals as part of my effort to find references.

Because of a rational and professional methodology as well as leveraging the power of social media, in this case LinkedIn and Twitter, I was able to get four offers from the eight companies and have the high-class dilemma of choosing who I wanted to work with.

LinkedIn + Twitter Got Me a Job and I feel blessed to have moved quickly from one full-time role to a new job that will hopefully be a launching pad for the next 20 years of my career. I am thankful for both my abilities and the power of social media in both finding a great job, but also cutting down on much of the red tape that exists in traditional job searches. Good luck to everyone out there who is looking to close deals, build a brand and find a fulfilling job. Ping me on Twitter if you found this blog useful, my Twitter handle is @MrMGoldman

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23/03/2012

Gaming is Key to Uptake of Mobile Apps

By Michael Goldman

The past 12 months I have worked on and advised others on the development of mobile apps that focus on consumer shopping behavior and how to drive usage of these mobile apps.

My number one takeaway is that gaming, as part of the ego in social media, is key to adoption and engagement of consumers for a mobile app.

Consumers have a clear human psyche which is to gain pleasure, as part of this they use mobile apps to grow their network, their standing in their social network and as such things like points, scores and other incentives to use the mobile app is aligned with the consumers ego.

Many self-described social media experts claim that tools such as Klout, Kred and PeerIndex simply drive a gaming behavior and is not the way social media should be used.

In one specific article, authored by Brian Solis and Altimeter Group, there is a huge amount of ego by Mr. Solis is his claiming that social media should not be driven by gaming behavior and that scores from Klout and PeerIndex, for example, drive the wrong kind of behavior. He explains that there should be a social media strategy in place instead of worrying about scores.

My opinion is that Mr. Solis completely misunderstands that human psyche, people’s desire to gain pleasure and as such ego is a hugely important aspect to why human beings strive for a network, both offline and online.

I am in the middle of designing a prototype for a mobile app, and a key requirement is the user engagement of this app and how to motivate users to further engage with this app.  Stroking the customers ego, a topic I’ve blogged about for several years, is key to success of any web-based or mobile-based business.  As such gaming is key to update of mobile apps.

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19/03/2012

Job description I wrote – Head of Customer Success and Customer Experience

By Michael Goldman

The role: Head of Customer Success or Head of Customer Experience

– Design a high-caliber customer experience of the company’s product and interaction with the company’s team;
– Build a set of key performance indicators (KPIs), best practices, knowledge base and company business processes that align to a high-caliber customer experience;
– Partner with all company departments to engage both potential customers and existing customers to ensure that every touch point, including phone, email, website, social media and face to face deliver a superior customer experience;
– Head up the new initiative, called customer success, and deliver a business plan as to how the company should deliver a superior customer experience and evolve the customer success deliverables as the business grows;
– Work closely with the customers to continually understand the voice of customer;
– Interact and build relationships with the product management and account management teams, including the design of business processes that align to customer success;
– Design a set of self-use tools to ensure customers get the most amount of value from the company’s service, including a differentiation of tools offered to SMB (Small and Medium Business) customers as compared to Enterprise customers;
– Build a set of BI (Business Intelligence) reports that are visible to all senior company stakeholders as to how customer success is being measured and where improvements can be made
– This role is a highly-visible position at the company, as such team-building skills and being able to interface with senior management both inside and outside of the company is key.

Candidates background:

– Person applying for this role needs to wake up in the morning thinking about customer success and how to deliver world-class customer experience;
– Background needs to be in customer facing roles including account management, customer support, product management and sales;
– Candidate needs to have at least 10 years of software experience, SaaS specific experience as a particular strength;
– Language proficiency in English, as a native tongue, as a key requirement with proficiency in French and Spanish as a plus;
– Track-record of success in customer-facing roles, including the relationships built with large enterprise companies;
– Attention to detail a must;
– University degree a requirement;

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28/06/2009

Are you AMPLIFIED? – Your state is key to CLIENT success

By Michael Goldman

End of March 2009 was a key turning point for me in my career, I decided to use every moment in my career as key to ensuring client success by being in a AMPLIFIED STATE of being with my actions, words, tone of voice, attitude, perspective, psyche, communication (written and spoken), and optimistic tone to all of my client interactions.

The result?

I stand out with my clients and potential clients as compared to every single employee, vendor, partner, customer, shareholder, competitor and personal contacts because I have differentiated myself since March 2009 as outlined in the way my state of being AMPLIFIED.

The question is, do you as an individual, as a corporation, as a product, as a financial brand stand out in the abyss that is the financial crisis tsunami which we are all wading through globally?

If the answer is no, then flip the switch.  Turn up the dial.  Kick up the pace.  Pump up the volume.  Bring the intensity.  Differentiate your company brand image, your company product image, your company financial brand and your own personal brand by being AMPLIFIED.

Athletes use the terminology “I am BUZZING” when they describe being in the zone, being so focused and self-centered that nothing, no one, no obstacle will stand in their way.

A good analogy is when I played inside linebacker at Del Mar High School (Northern California, USA) and strong safety.  The moments, the games, the practice field scrimmages where I was in the zone was when I was AMPLIFIED.  I didn’t care what it took to get the football, the focus was so intense that literally I felt I could move mountains just with my state of mind being AMPLIFIED.  The moments that I had this extreme focus brought a BUZZ a sensation that is unlike any other.  A parallel feeling was when I ran my first marathon in BIG SUR, California, where I was so connected with the road being ran on, the ocean on the horizon, the mountains on the side of the road, the hawks flying up above and the thousands of other runners and so I crossed the finish line in joy, peace, feeling of serenity, moment of determination and tears of joy flowing as I embraced my family and friends that waited at the finish line.

All of this can be applied to a person’s job, a companies brand image, a companies product image, a companies financial brand and doing so will make your clients successful because of the AMPLIFIED STATE of focus required to differentiate as compared to the others.

Go on, ask yourself “AM I AMPLIFIED?” If no, get there because your AMPLIFIED STATE is key to your CLIENT success!

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19/06/2009

UK Innovation alive and well – Silicon Valley and Tel Aviv BE WARE

By Michael Goldman

My brother put me in touch with his UK contacts that are the movers and shakers of technology, digital media and start-up innovation.  His company was one of the co-sponsors of a networking event which one of my buddies was attending in London this week and the buzz and vibes were reaching decibels that normally are only seen in the tech sector in Silicon Valley (northern California) and Tel Aviv, Israel.

Having worked and lived in London for nearly four years, being brought up in Israel for the first 11 years of my life and spending 19 years in Silicon Valley,  I have to say that I am very very proud of the innovation happening right now in London and the rest of the UK.

Not normally known for its technology and service innovation, London has been on the map for its Financial Services, Advertising and Tourism industries.  From the ashes of the financial crisis tsunami which is still burning in London comes the eagles of innovation.

One company in particular is called AMPLIFIED STATE, a digital media, buzz analytics and marketing advisory that is moving at lightning speed the past 30 days and is about to launch its website, its first customer case study and build a web presence through social media during its 27th of June launch at the Apple event called http://www.CannesLions.com 

AMPLIFIED STATE is just one company that is rocking the innovative scene in London and my forecast is that the thousands of out of work professionals whom are desperately looking for work will be building up companies from the ground up and attacking the market with a level of innovation we have never seen in the UK.

While I am not a complete fan of British politics, the Queen and Football (not American Football, but soccer) there is a buzz, an essence, a presence, a momentum and ground swell that will have the UK being one of the thought leaders of innovation by 2010.

Just three years away is the 2012 Olympics, hosted in London and digital media has opportunities to build personal brand, financial brand, product brand and company brand for so many innovators, so many traditional British companies that are re-inventing themselves and an opportunity for the City of London, the politicians of the UK, the average tax payers to build a global brand image that will lead to an influx of investment in new UK-based companies.

Keep an eye out the next few weeks as to what AMPLIFIED STATE and its partners, competitors and customers are doing in the digital media space, truly fascinating stuff!!!

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