The Grassy Road

Yahoo panel: There's no such thing as work-life balance

2012-01-24T13:37:00.001-08:00

Oh the irony of posting on this right after my post on the Iron Lady! She had no balance too.

For a while now I have been outspoken that I think balance is a myth and we are unfair to young women coming up to spin the myth that they can have it all. They can't any more than men can. Business is just too competitive.

So it was fun for me last week to be on a panel at Yahoo on Breakthrough Leadership Lessons and to be asked about work-life balance. Never the shrinking violet I just went for it as you can see here - and was relieved they laughed instead of chasing me out of the building!

Tears for the Iron Lady

2012-01-19T13:26:00.000-08:00

I did not expect to cry in the film the "Iron Lady".

For many years now if people ask me who I most admire I would say Margaret Thatcher. She was the first politician I ever voted for. I lived through the disfunctional 70s in England and I watched in admiration as she rose to power, broke the back of the unions and got England back onto a healthy financial footing.

But as I watched the movie my chest felt a crushing ache and tears kept sliding down my cheeks.

Tears slipped out as I watched Meryl Streep's extraordinary portrayal of Mrs Thatcher's dementia. Living on a daily basis with my mother-in-law's dementia is upsetting for us and so painful and frightening for her. We help with the confusion, try to explain what's happening at any moment and grieve for the loss of her confidence and clarity. For a woman as brilliant and powerful as Margaret Thatcher to lose her mind must be heartbreaking for her at the moments she realizes it, and for her family.

Proud tears leaked out as I watched Mrs Thatcher win the leadership of her party and then became Prime Minister. She was the first woman in the Western world to win the elected leadership of a country. England has a history of very strong female leaders in Elizabeth I and Victoria, but Thatcher broke the thick glass ceiling of the English white male establishment (which is hugely powerful still today in English society) and smashed it with her drive, intellect and conviction. She was charismatic and extraordinary as she did it and I will never forget the thrill I felt as she won.

I listened to my mother's tears sitting next to me in the dark movie theatre as the film showed the day Airey Neave was killed by the IRA with a car bomb. Lord Mountbatten was also killed by an IRA car bomb in 1979 and I still remember her crying that day, grieving the man she had known as a little girl.

Don't get me wrong - it's a wonderful film and Meryl Streep's skill in her craft has to be seen to be believed. But if you connect with the tragedy of dementia yourself, or the intensity of the politics of the time, take tissues.

33 years after I voted for her the first time I still think of Margaret Thatcher as one of the best role models for me that I have ever seen. I saw her in person once in San Francisco, years after she was out of power, on stage with George Bush Snr and Mikael Gorbachev. Even then she was a force, leaving the other two in the dust with the power of her personality, her intellectual clarity and her conviction. Simply marvelous.

Progressive states of long offsite meetings

2012-01-12T08:56:00.000-08:00

Long meetings can progressively sap energy and create altered states of being. Yes they can.

We went offsite as a management team for 2 days this weekend to talk through our strategy and 2012 planning. 11 of us in 2 houses at Pajaro Dunes, lots of flip charts, heated discussions, cooking together, walking on the beach and generally spending time together thinking about our business. It was really fun but, even so, it was intense and, combined with long discussions late into the night about the state of the world accompanied by some excellent wines, pretty tiring for some.

Two of our jokesters memorialized their progressive states of mind as they helped clean up after the meeting. They sent me the photos - the editorial is all mine.

Yeah! This two day offsite thing is a great idea, they're ready.

A few hours in and Ryan is already wondering, he's seen enough of these type of meetings to be healthily cynical, but Nima's still gung ho.

Second day and Ryan's mind is wandering but Nima's using caffeine to push through - "There's the mountain guys let's go for it!"

Ryan's rolling his eyes at Nima's enthusiasm, just as Nima starts to wind down .

But as Nima finally falls asleep in response to Penny's energizer bunny, Ryan stoically keeps pushing forward.

Thanks Nima and Ryan - it was fun - and despite the warm sun and sand, amazingly productive!

Techniques for Advantage-Makers

2012-01-10T17:33:00.000-08:00

I had the great pleasure of traveling to Bangalore before Christmas to attend the first full India Grace Hopper Conference. I'm on the board of the Anita Board Institute so I had two hats on for the conference i) as the resident board member to meet, greet and press the flesh and ii) to be on a panel hosted by our India MD, Aparna Gupta.

The first was fun to meet so many new people who are running India-based operations. The second was, as these things usually are, very interesting.

The term "advantage makers" comes from a book by my friend Steven Feinberg called The Advantage-Makers: How Exceptional Leaders Win by Creating Opportunities Others Don't and the panel put together experienced execs from the US and India to talk about some of the techniques that work.

Some good stories in here - from IBM experience, from old Oracle days, from ThoughtWorks and what we've learned -- and my experience building companies. I spoke on the need to pull back and look at problem more completely - pulling back above the traffic to see how to get through it.

The best and worst of days at the Hanakapiai Falls

2012-01-03T11:05:00.001-08:00

Everything hurt. The backs of my calves, my ankles, my lower back, much of my exposed skin from bug bites. How, I asked myself, did I end up in this situation?

It was completely self induced, and it was one of the best of days.

Yesterday we hiked the Kalalau trail on the North shore of Kauai - starting from the end of the road past Hanalei. First leg was the 2 miles to the Hanakapiai Beach up and over about 1000 feet. This beach is stunning with crashing turquoise waves - but a killer. The sign above the beach says the beach is "Deadly" and uses notches to show the number of lives taken by the waves. Over 60 notches. Is that the value of a life - one notch?

Then the hike up to the Hanakapai Falls. Up, up, up, often climbing hand over hand over rocks and dragging our feet through fudge. Walking on a 2 ft wide ledge of red sludge. Crossing the river four times in our hiking shoes and walking on in wet socks and oozing shoes.

And about 1400 feet up I was having to talk myself into finishing. Everything hurt and I had a pounding headache. The "trail" was continuous climbing over boulders and my 20 year old hiking buddy was scampering in front of me with chipper comments like "not far now" and "keep on coming". But I just won't quit. A stubborn witch.

It was, of course, worth it. The falls are indescribably beautiful, the water ice cold (exactly what I needed to cool off) and the water crashing down pulsed and massaged my aching deltoids. Bret arrived 5 minutes after us (taking less than half the time on the way up!) and observed that I had lost my sense of humor - but a bag of Maui chips later and some electrolytes and I was once again smiling.

Down was harder than up! Mud, slick rocks, a dropping sun, mosquitoes, and my lovely husband whistling along with useful comments like "honey, it's like childbirth, you'll forget the pain and want to do it again".

Maybe I'll only remember the spiritual beauty of the Falls and forget the pain by the time the spectacular bruises on my butt fade!

Don't drop off the grid if you support my customers

2011-12-31T10:17:00.000-08:00

Sometimes I can be a hard ass.

We have a very flexible vacation policy at FirstRain, but I also have a deeply held principle that customers come first, ahead, even dare I say it, of vacation. Preparing for the break this year (when I encouraged everyone to get some down time) I also had to give some pointed input to my customer facing team. I have no problem with our R&D guys dropping off the grid. I do have a problem with customer facing employees dropping off the grid unless they have several layers of backup to make sure customers are supported - and if they are on the grid I do expect them to check email once per day to check for customer critical issues.

Here's the note I sent to the sales and support team on checking in during vacation... if you touch our customers in any way...

Team

I want to be clear with you on my expectations for customer and sales support during the break.

It is imperative that our customers, and our sales team if they are working on deals, have uninterrupted support from the pre- and post-sales team. This does not mean you do not take a break, but it does mean you need to be organized about their support.

Some ground rules

- check your email at least once a day. We are a small company where customers form personal relationships with you. If they contact you by email you need to see it, so not checking your email is not OK. If you see a customer request forward it on to the person who is covering for you and ask them to respond to the customer and service their request. Likewise with sales.

- do not put an out of office message up that customers would see - if they are working so are we.

- if you cannot check email once a day then forward your email to someone else to cover for you so the email to you gets answered promptly

Your time off is important but you need to do it in a sufficiently connected way that customers are always supported, and if you cannot stay connected then you must forward your email to someone who has agreed to check it for you.

Any questions - call me or email me.

Penny

I take vacations. No question. I love spending time in warm locations with my family. But I am connected almost all the time and if not (I was off grid on a kayak up a river yesterday) I check before I leave - and give a heads up if needed so someone can cover for me.

Yes, maybe I am a hard ass, but customers always, always come first.

Techcrunch, Penelope Trunk and the damaging stereotype in pursuit of traffic

2011-12-12T06:32:00.000-08:00

When someone takes a strong, clearly personal position and claims it is the majority is it journalism, controversy for it's own sake or an unprincipled pursuit of traffic?

Penelope Trunk's recent blog Stop Telling Women To Do Startups is one such example that begs the question. With statements like :

"Here’s a post by Tara Brown wondering why women don’t comment on VC blogs. Here’s the answer: Because women don’t care." We don't? All of us? Are you sure? Maybe we are just very focused in the use of our time as we run tech companies.

"Women can do startups. The thing is, most don’t want to." Do you know these "most"? If you lived in Silicon Valley you'd know many, many women do want to. I mentor them continuously.

"For the most part, women are not complaining about the lack of VC funding in the world. They are complaining about the lack of jobs with flexible hours." Are you not listening to the number of women trying to figure out how to break in?

I guess this type of "stop changing things we are quite happy not having equal opportunity" thinking is not new.

In 1852 the publication of Uncle Tom's Cabin played a strong role in the anti-slavery movement by popularizing the discussion on the wrongs of slavery. In response the pro-slavery South published a series of novels romanticizing that slaves were happier and better off being slaves than being free.

In 1913, as women campaigned for the vote, Helen Kendrick Johnson wrote Women and the Republic, stating the reasons why women did not want the vote - "Because the influence of women in social causes will be diminished rather than increased by the possession of the parliamentary vote."

In no way do I equate the issue of equality of opportunity for women in tech startups to the struggles of the anti-slavery movement or women's suffrage but come on Penelope, do you need to, in our own little world, repeat the pattern and stereotypes?

Today less than 5% of venture capital goes to women led startups. Startups are not only fun they are also a way to create products and personal wealth. It makes sense that women want to get funding too. And they should be encouraged to try if they are interested.

For many women, maybe not you, career and family go hand in hand. You snark at Sheryl Sandberg but she, like me, and many others, is having both a vibrant career and children. Many of us enjoy the challenge and the role model we create for our kids - oh and by the way have happy, normal kids.

Don't stereotype us with generalizations like "I think you’d be really hard-pressed to find many moms with two young kids who wants Sandberg’s life. Which is why women are not “leaning into their careers” like Sandberg says they need to in order to get to the top." Many women ARE leaning into their careers and I take my hat off to them. I know it's hard but it's also fun, rewarding and creates more opportunity for the next generation of women.

But maybe this is about ad traffic? Maybe this is about creating a platform for yourself as a speaker and a blogger ? If so your strategy is working. But you are doing a disservice to the women working hard to build an equal role for themselves in the male dominated field of technology.

How much candor is too much?

2011-12-11T08:49:00.000-08:00

A week ago I spoke to the MIT Sloan Executive MBA classes of 2012 and 2013 about being a CEO. As you can imagine within an EMBA class -- made up of professionals with an average age of 40 – many of the students are entrepreneurs, or are considering whether to develop into a CEO/GM/entrepreneur so my experience could be helpful, or at least interesting to them.

I find that in a setting like this story telling is the most interesting way to communicate. I’m not teaching, I’m simply sharing experience. And I try to be light hearted so that it doesn’t get boring. But sometimes I do wonder if I am too candid. My talk centered around huge challenges and how I dealt with them. I started with one of my worst low points when my confidence was in the tank and described the abyss. As I posted before this happens to everyone at times and as a CEO you must not let on, not quit and find a healthy way to cope.

Then I shared three really tough experiences:
- becoming a CEO, finding out I was clueless and struggling to work out what really mattered in this new, amorphous job

- switching industry from EDA (software for semiconductor design) to the Information industry and going back to first principles (customers) to figure out how to develop the strategy

- having my market melt down on me not once, not twice but three times (April 2000, Sept 2001, Sept 2008) and figuring out how to change and survive each time.

I truly believe people learn much more from mistakes than from successes and so sharing my mistakes, with plenty of self-effacing humor, exposes that everyone is haunted by the same thoughts of failure. Finding ways to deal with the problems and thrive is what you need in 99% of companies. Some are right place, right time but most morph their strategy several times before they get it right.

The feedback from this talk was a first for me. My audience was probably 70% male, 30% female and at the end of the talk and Q&A both men and women came up to chat with me and ask me more questions. The feedback was positive (whew!) but about my candor. Specifically one student voiced that most speakers come in and talk about all the great things that happened and what they did, not all the things that went wrong and the mistakes they made. But how much candor is too much?

This talk was not taped but if it had been could it hurt me if pieces were take out of context?

Candor is amusing, it’s compelling and sometimes it makes people uncomfortable but it is usually unforgettable because it is pointed and rare. Cindy Gallop is an extremely brave example speaking on makelovenotporn.com and the pornification of our culture – and people listening to her are uncomfortable but they will never forget what she said. Candor is also often simple – like Steve Jobs’ Stanford commencement speech. Nora Denzel in her Top 10 Career Tips makes fun of herself and women as a group in a charming, funny way.

Candor is also self-indulgent. For me, it’s easy to laugh at myself. It takes more work for me to be serious.

I am serious in front of customers when talking about our technology and how we can help them. I am serious when speaking about the changes impacting the information industry. I am serious when working with investors of the private or public companies I work with. With my employees I strive for serious transparency.

But me and my experience? It’s hard to be serious about that!

And that leads to the question. As a female CEO, where there are not very many of us, do I hurt women when I am candid and share my mistakes and challenges more than a male CEO would? Do I help the student but confirm that women are less serious about their careers and themselves than men?

I take everything seriously in business. But when I am talking with peers – as I consider the students at the Sloan MIT EMBA program to be – I try to be candid and share in a way that will help them see the “man behind the curtain” to demystify the leadership role.

After all, the only way to walk on water is to know where the rocks are - and that takes mistakes and learning.

Should CEO's have to invest in their companies?

2011-11-29T12:09:00.000-08:00

If CEOs had to invest in their company's stock with their own money would they make better CEOs?

There is a lot of healthy discussion stimulated by Occupy Wall Street going on right now on the income disparity in the US, and more importantly the lack of upward mobility, but the focus of the discussion is sometimes misdirected. As Fortune points out "The much-referenced 1% -- the global elite that controls a disproportionate percentage of global wealth -- is not made up solely of hedge fund managers, investment advisors and traders. It is made up of executives and leaders of non-financial firms in every sector" ... and their pay has been set by their company boards.

CEOs behave the way their boards pay them. The majority are hard working, well meaning executives who care passionately about their companies and their careers. But they are human and how they are rewarded will impact their behavior.

Investors want the CEO to focus on Total Shareholder Return - this is seeking positive return over time - and it is not clear that stock options are aligned with that. Stock options are of high value if the stock price goes up and worth nothing if the stock price goes down, but they don't have negative value to the option holder.

Jim Collins - author of Good to Great - took an extreme position on NPR earlier this week that CEOs should no longer be granted stock options. His position is that CEOs should be required to invest their own savings into their company and that this would lead to longer term thinking on the part of the CEO, and shared risk as well as shared reward. Here's an excerpt:

INSKEEP: So you are saying you want to attract a different kind of executive by requiring each executive to take a chunk of their life savings, and throw it into the company.

COLLINS: Yup. What it would say is, if you're not willing to put your own skin in the game, if you're not willing to live with the same kinds of potential costs and consequences for a failure to manage well that you're going to expose everybody else to, then you're not showing that you are truly ambitious, first and foremost, for this company doing well over time. And therefore, you don't deserve to be an executive in this company.

The way some boards are now dealing with this issue is by granting RSUs (Restricted Stock Units) instead of, or along side of, options. RSUs are outright grants of shares - the executive owns the shares once they have been granted and they can be set up so the grant happens on a vesting schedule or based on company performance.

Because these are actual stock grants they are like cash compensation. They are taxable on the grant and are liquid so they act as a supplement to cash bonuses. In many cases you will see a CEO or EVPs compensation has several components - cash base, cash bonus, stock options and RSUs and the options and RSUs will have some time based vesting component and some performance based vesting component. Then the company will have a holding requirement for the board members and the executives that they must hold a multiple of their cash compensation in stock and as a result, the CEO does build up ownership in the company over time - aligning their long term interests with the shareholder.

But all this complexity is not the same thing as asking a CEO to put his/her own money into the company up front. For me, it's a good idea. I invested in my last company Simplex, and I have also made a significant investment in FirstRain. It's clarifying to me, and it aligns my interests with my investors... and combined with the opportunity cost of the time I put into FirstRain my investors are very clear that I am in with both feet and for the long term.

But to require a CEO to do this? The discussion between the board and the CEO would certainly be interesting and would give the board insight into the CEO's motivation. What isn't clear is whether it would make hiring a world class CEO more difficult. And in cases where the company is a turnaround, or the board is mercurial and inconsistent (think HP or Yahoo) requiring an investment could be too high risk for the incoming CEO.

But Jim makes a very valid point. If you are not willing to put your money in alongside of your investors, and so share financially in the risk (as well as reputationally) are you less committed to the long term growth of the company?

Disclosure: I chair the compensation committees of both JDSU and RMBS and the topic of how to align executive pay with long term shareholder return is a continuous, active discussion as we strive to continuously improve and motivate excellent executives. While we have holding requirements we do not have up front investment requirements.

Mobile/Digital and the creation and destruction of value in the technology market

2011-11-23T13:58:00.000-08:00

Sitting in a presentation by a team from Qatalyst earlier this week I was struck by the extraordinary creation and destruction of value technology has seen over the last 7 years.

A "duh" moment - of course each company's ability to understand a strategic sea change that's happening, and react to it, determines their fate - but the last few years give an extraordinary example of billions of dollars of shift in a very short time frame.

The strategic shift is the move to mobile and digital content; the creation and destruction of market cap is dramatic.

When Google went public in 2004 Apple was worth $12B and Amazon was worth $16B -- today they are worth $361B and $103B.

Apple drove the shift to the smart phone and pioneered the market place for digital content. Amazon understood the power of digital content and understood the immense power of the cloud first.

Likewise Qualcomm and ARM are at the heart of the mobile device and they have benefited from the shift from "Wintel" to the new world order of "ARM/Qualcomm/Apple/Android" - both more than doubling in value.

In contrast companies in the old school of the PC and old phones have been flat to crushed. Microsoft is worth 25% less, Nokia is worth half and Dell has dropped by 70%.

Sure, companies have large swings in value based on changes in the market, but it is fascinating to see the value shift so explicitly, in such a short period of time, and so much a part of the world I live in. I live (through FirstRain) in the world of mobile devices, cloud computing, unstructured data processing... we live here because this is where absolutely the highest productivity is, both for my engineers and for our users. On-premise is a thing of the past. PCs too will pass. In just a few years we'll wonder why we ever had lap tops and kept our content locally. And I can't wait!

Source: Qatalyst, CapitalIQ

Company Market Capitalization Over Time ($Bn)

Fidelity, FirstRain and the iPad

2011-11-16T05:51:00.001-08:00

The iPad is changing the world so fast sometimes it is hard to believe. We released our iPad app in early October. It's such a hot, sexy app that now I lead off with it. Every time I meet with a prospect the first thing I show them is the Business Web on my iPad (usually pre-configured for their market) and then I'll describe what we're doing and why.

And to my delight I find that many of our prospects and customers are investing so heavily in the iPad that they can immediately relate to how FirstRain fits. But more fun than that is the new apps I get to see, often before they have been released. BI apps, sales apps, fashion apps... the world is going iPad.

Today Fidelity announced a major update to their iPad app - this time including FirstRain content. Fidelity has been our customer for many years now, but over the past few months it's been exciting to work with them on integrating our sector and stock research into their iPad app.

Like we have done online, we are providing Fidelity with Hot Topic research, centered around sectors and trends - what's rising? what should you as an investor be paying attention to? when you see a topic you want to drill in on, what are the recent developments that help you understand it?

You can download the new Fidelity iPad app for free on the iTunes store. To see hot topics, open it up and click on Research (tab at the bottom of the home screen). Chose hot topics and you'll see the key active sectors and what's changing . We identify what's changing and what's hot using our analytics technology - identifying clusters of topic, detecting anomalies, comparing them to past patterns, analyzing the new pattern to see if it shows a rising event. Here's the landing Hot Topics screen this morning:

You see a list of sectors - swipe right to see more. Within each sector you can then drill down into a topic and see the latest business web news and understand what's behind the trend. For example here -- drilling in on Automobile Fuel Efficiency:

The topic research page shows you not only the news you need to read but also the stocks related to the trend that you may want to do deeper research on, and the volume of conversation on the Web on the topic you are researching so you can get a sense of how active it is.

Good apps on the iPad are simpler and easier, and more pleasurable to use than web apps. There is something about the simplicity combined with the tactile experience that changes how we feel about using the application, especially for non technical people and the older generation. We have only had the iPad for 2 years now... it is just the beginning of a sea change that will sweep how we all interact with both professional and consumer applications.

Is your fish fresh?

2011-11-08T09:19:00.000-08:00

A story against myself. In a restaurant in the fishing harbor in Naples yesterday, I spied sea bass on the menu. Since it was Monday and I know the fish market is not open on Monday I ask "Is your fish fresh - when was it caught?".

The waiter grins at me and says "One moment - I'll check".

I'm thinking "I know I saw the fish display on the street side, maybe they were caught on Saturday, but then why is he grinning at me?"

Our waiter returns with a whole bass on a plate and presents it to me to check the eyes, at which point this fish flips it's tail and jumps up above the plate. I came out of my chair laughing!

I am happy to report he was delicious once dead and grilled with lemon and olive oil.

Engineering is the way to bring jobs back to America

2011-10-25T12:45:00.000-07:00

We are facing an ongoing threat to America's global economic leadership and increasing the number of engineers in our workforce is one powerful way we can change our destiny as a country.

In Silicon Valley we have one engineering job open for every two engineers that are employed - this means it is hard to find enough qualified workers and so companies move jobs offshore to India and China where they graduate many more engineers than we do. Today we simply do not have enough people trained in the "STEM" areas to staff the technology build up that is happening (STEM -- Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics).

When Steve Jobs met with President Obama earlier this year he made this case strongly. From Walter Isaacson's new biography... "Jobs went on to urge that a way be found to train more American engineers. Apple had 700,000 factory workers employed in China, he said, and that was because it needed 30,000 engineers on-site to support those workers. 'You can't find that many in America to hire,' he said. These factory engineers did not have to be PhDs or geniuses; they simply needed to have basic engineering skills for manufacturing. Tech schools, community colleges, or trade schools could train them. 'If you could educate those engineers,' he said, 'we could move more manufacturing plants here.' "

But today not only do we not graduate enough engineers, women are a huge untapped resource. Less than 10% of our computer engineering graduates are women, and less than 20% of our total engineering bachelors are women - a criminal loss of potential contribution from half our workforce.

Technology is an area that is a wonderful example of American leadership. Leadership, innovation and the place where we can say "Made in the USA" with pride. Google, Apple, Amazon and Facebook - all are growing, innovative global technology leaders. All are changing the world today in dramatic ways. All are essentially American and all need more engineers. Google and Microsoft both invest heavily in change agents like the Anita Borg Institute for Women and Technology precisely to change the ratio of men to women in engineering and so produce more qualified engineers to grow their businesses.

Just as in the Second World War we had a national shortage of skilled workers for manufacturing, today we have a critical shortage of technology workers. Women and education are the two keys to the solution.

Seventy years ago the Rosie the Riveter campaign moved 6 million women into the workforce. These women were trained and they showed that they could do the work - building the planes, ships and munitions necessary to win a devastating war.

Senator Gillibrand of New York talks about a revival of the Rosie the Riveter campaign to galvanize women to become more empowered and she speaks about the need for women to get Off The Sidelines and get more involved in politics. She's right, and it's bigger than that. The low percentages of women who graduate with technology degrees in the US shows the untapped resource. Getting women involved and into technology creates more jobs for both men and women in manufacturing and the ecosystem around the technology jobs.

We are in the middle of a 100 year technology revolution, analogous to the industrial revolution that dramatically changed the Western way of life through the 18th and 19th centuries. This technology revolution is taking us through a series of engineering inventions - the computer, the microprocessor, software applications, the internet, mobile devices and there is more to come we can only imagine.

It's time for Rosie the Engineer and Robert the Engineer. I'm a Silicon Valley high-tech CEO and I see the need first hand. We need our political leadership to invest in STEM education, and especially for our girls to bring them into the technology. It's time to put programs in place to motivate our students to get technical degrees so they can get jobs when they graduate. We need engineers, the technology jobs pay more, and they create more jobs in America for everyone.

Teamwork is about alignment of interests

2011-10-20T09:55:00.000-07:00

Teamwork comes in all shapes and sizes... and species. It's about knowing that your goals are aligned and you have to cooperate to reach your goals.

For example, if you don't share the plate nicely you don't get to share in the plate cleaning. And even if you are a cat, if you've been raised with dogs since you were a kitten you quickly figure out how to think like a dog, and act like a dog so you get the same treats as a dog.

It's All about Expectations folks

2011-10-20T08:00:00.000-07:00

I have a pet peeve that got me thinking. My peeve is people who say "I'll call you" or "I'll email you some times to connect" and then don't. It's the modern equivalent of the Hollywood brush off "Let's do lunch". One of my service providers did this to me last week and it's annoying and unprofessional, and it got me to thinking again about how important expectations are.

Satisfying other people really is all about setting their expectations, and it's especially true in business.

The ultimate is meeting your quarterly numbers. AAPL was slammed because they missed their financial expectations even though profits had grown dramatically. If you say you are going to report X and you report X-1 you are going to get dinged in today's short term market. It's a no win for the public company CEO and the great ones understand it's a long term game, but the CFOs make their stripes on setting expectations right consistently.

Next is product schedules. There is discipline to this skill. You want to be aggressive to stretch the team and yet hit the dates you set because the rest of your business team is planning on it. Literally. Planning customer roll out, planning PR, so major delays play havoc with customer expectations. I very much admire my business partner YY and her ability to think through every aspect of the product release, set the company's expectation at 95%, consistently deliver that 95% and sometimes deliver the upside of 100%. Everyone's needs are met and our products leap forward every month.

Then there is your relationships. Californians seem very friendly at first, and then are hard to get close to. The English are frosty at first and then warm up. In business, be clear about your relationships. Are you work colleagues or friends... can your companion truly be him or herself in all his or her dumbness at times, or do they always need to be wary ? Are you loyal or fickle at heart? Obviously you can't signal this early in a relationship but there comes a time when you can, and it's just more efficient.

Arrive when you say you are going to arrive. Being late is the ultimate in bad manners - it says you think your time is more important than my time.

And if you tell me you are going to do something for heaven's sake do it or don't tell me in the first place! It just makes me grumpy.

A 1959 view of the race between India and China

2011-10-16T10:25:00.000-07:00

Re-organizing some drawers this morning I was intrigued, and very distracted from my cleaning, to find a newspaper page under the drawer lining from the (London) Times on May 5, 1959.

Page 10 (the page I have) is full of the new rift between India and China. The crushing of the Tibetan uprising had just happened, the Dalai Lama had just fled to India and Mr Nehru was deploring the first time peace had been broken on the India - China border in 2000 years.

But the piece I found most fascinating looking back with today's eyes, is the piece on the need to ensure India succeeds in forming a democracy because it is the "bulwark" of freedom in Asia. It's chilling to read across the whole page stories so heavily influenced by the fear of communism. The reports range from French atomic testing in the Sahara (at which the French Prime Minister says that the health of the "local people and livestock will be guaranteed 100%"!) to Sir Winston Churchill flying in a jet for the first time to visit President Eisenhower in "a new time of crisis" - all written through the lens of English reporters.

Given how deep the fear was in 1959 it is truly marvelous to see the vibrant, powerful democracy India has become. It is still a young country, challenged by social unrest, corruption and dangerous neighbors, but for a country that was forged in fire only 64 years ago, it gives me hope for us all to see how democracy is thriving and rapidly improving the quality of life of the Indian people.

Here is the report:

INDIA AS BULWARK OF FREEDOM

Need for U.S. Aid

Vice-President Nixon and some leading Democrats joined to-day in urging economic assistance for India, lest failure in that country should lead to the downfall of democracy in Asia. The need to bolster India against the pressures of Communism, and particularly against China, was expressed or implicit in most of the statements; but Mr Nixon put this in clearer perspective in saying: "If there were no Communism and no Communist threat there would still be poverty, disease and need. Our primary interest must be the victory of plenty over want, of freedom over tyranny".

This was the first session of a two-day meeting sponsored by the Committee for International Economic Growth and it was address by the Indian Ambassador, Mr Chagla, and Senator Kennedy, as well as the Vice President.

Mr Chagla described India as the battleground for a great a decisive battle between dictatorial and democratic methods of solving the world's problem of poverty; if democracy failed in India, freedom would be the casualty over the whole of Asia and Africa. Senator Kennedy took up the same theme, giving a warning that India must at least equal the pace of China in moving from economic stagnation to growth. The United States must be willing to join with the other western nations in a long-range programme of loans and technical assistance designed to enable India to overtake China.

And the race is still on....

Why a CEO's personal blog helps the company

2011-10-06T13:29:00.000-07:00

I was delighted that my blog was selected as one of the top 10 CEO blogs by Chief Executive Magazine this week. Given all the exposure and risk a CEO already faces why, you may ask, blog?

At the heart of my reasoning is that transparency is a good thing for a CEO. It's important the CEO is an active communicator, it's important that she is well understood by all her constituencies and a blog can be a powerful additive to the traditional communication platforms.

We have a FirstRain blog - MarketMine - on our web site. It's a good vehicle for us to comment on our industry, market developments at FirstRain, showcase customers, and for my team to write and share their views in an open forum.

But for a CEO blog Seth Godin set the bar high when he posted many years ago that blogs need
"Candor
Urgency
Timeliness
Pithiness and
Controversy - Does this sound like a CEO to you?"

I agree - this is a tall order - but if you can do it then it becomes both interesting reading and a vehicle for people to get to know me... my opinions on industry, technology, corporate boards, gender equality issues and, then sprinkled in just occasionally, a personal post about a vacation or a swimming race.

You can get to know me and what I care about very easily by reading my writing. You'll know where I stand on a number of business issues, what developments matter to me as CEO of FirstRain, and, if you want to, how to connect with me. It's a powerful recruiting tool for prospective employees to understand our culture, and many customers read it as a way of staying close to FirstRain.

More challenging is blogging on the Huffington Post if I think an idea is interesting to the Business section readers (I'm not qualified to write about politics or celebrities which are their highest traffic sections!). HuffPo has a huge readership and so posting there carries significant responsibility, but overall I get positive feedback from people who find it helpful and so I strive to share my experience, and expose readers to our business at the same time.

But it is not without risk. As a visible person (I sit on two public company boards) I do also have to be very careful that what I write never breaches confidentiality, while controversial is never in bad taste, and does not embarrass my companies even indirectly. This is hard at times - I am not without strong opinions! Sometimes I want to write on an idea that even I know is a little out there and I'll ask my team for advice - and so far they have corralled me well.

We are swimming in a social media world. It's one of the characteristics of today's Web that makes the need for FirstRain so strong in our customers. They need to understand, with great precision, what's developing in their markets. One of the best ways I can stay on top of the emerging trends is to be a part of that world myself - blogging and tweeting and collaborating so I understand first hand what the benefits and challenges are.

John Kador characterized me as " fearless in mixing the personal with the professional in her blog". I should have told him about the deep breath I take before I click on Publish Post each time!

Here's to the Crazy Ones

2011-10-06T13:25:00.000-07:00

Mourning Steve Jobs.

To remind us all of his unique and powerful impact on the world, here is the 1997 Think Different ad with Steve's voice over, rather than Richard Dreyfus who voiced the national ad. Watch, feel the goose bumps and the tears well up.

Two of my loves just merged: FirstRain and the iPad

2011-10-04T14:47:00.000-07:00

We announced the FirstRain iPad app today. Now normally I don't blog about FirstRain product feature this and technology that on Grassy Road, but this one is just too delicious to ignore.

Our new iPad app marries the elegance of the iPad with the precision of FirstRain's business Web. It's visual business monitoring - slick, fast, cool, beautiful, powerful - all the adjectives we can't use in a press release but want to say. I truly love it and it's now how I stay on top of my customers, our industry and everything else business wise that I need to know in a few minutes a day.

If you are in sales, marketing or purchasing, or you are a partner in a law firm, or a librarian, or a MI or CI professional, you are going to want a FirstRain subscription and this app. You are missing developments in your market, your customers, your vendors TODAY that you can now see real-time with the gentle swipe of a finger.

How to fire a CEO

2011-09-22T11:55:00.000-07:00

Let's face it, CEOs get fired all the time.

CEOs with less than 5 years of experience are more likely than the long standing ones to be fired (as found in the University of Miami business school study) so it's going to happen all the time but there are ways to do it, and ways not to.

Yahoo's firing of Carol Bartz is a great example of how not to. Don't fire a CEO over the phone, don't underestimate their balls, don't fire them without an agreed on communication plan.

Carol is known for her courage and her balls of steel. She had put a strategy in place where she told the board there would not be revenue growth until 2012 and - whether you think she was right or wrong in her strategy - the board should have predicted she'd be mad to be fired over the phone with no warning, with lawyers waiting for her.

And her response - to send an email to all 13,000 Yahoo employees - was classic Carol. And much more fiery than one of the last tech female CEOs to depart, VMWare's Dianne Greene who went away quietly after a difference of opinion on her experience. And now there are none...unless the rumors are true and Meg get the job below...
Post ed: She did!

How to #1: If you are firing a powerful personality manage the communication by meeting with them in person! Or get someone you trust to do it for you, in person.

Mark Hurd's departure from H-P provides more to chew on. In Mark we had another strong CEO with a strained relationship with the board. Facing allegations of expense fraud, a sexual harassment suit, broken trust and the specter of bad PR, the H-P board fired their CEO and entered months of he-said, she-said. In this case the ousted CEO promptly went across to another silicon valley giant, Oracle, and one known to have a tougher, less PC culture. H-P sued and then promptly settled 2 weeks later once they realized how important the Oracle business relationship is to them both.

How to #2: Make sure you have a strong separation agreement when you fire the CEO so if they take another job you can live with it and don't have to sue, and then settle. List the companies you really don't want them to go to, especially if you are in California, and put some financial teeth into it.

This weeks roiling H-P rumors also highlight How to #3: Don't let leaks come out of the board room. Ever. Especially if you are thinking of firing your CEO. The level of detail coming out of the H-P board room is astonishing for such a large public company.

You can tell a company has not been doing a good job of succession planning when a board member needs to step into the breach. Usually there is someone who can take over in the interim, even if it is only the CFO. But in Axciom's case, firing the CEO after a bad quarter, even the CFO didn't want to "keep commuting from Florida to Little Rock". Must have been a tough gig the new CEO Scott Howe took over - I wish him luck.

It's never pretty when a CEO is fired but it can be done smoothly, take for example the firing of BNY CEO Robert Kelly- a deliberate, confidential process followed by the promotion of an internal leader, Gerald Hassell, into the top spot. Pfizer also, when CEO Kindler abruptly left was able to replace him with an internal candidate Ian Read.

How to #4: Do a good job of succession planning on a continuous basis so if you do need to remove the CEO you have internal candidates to seriously consider.

Which leads to the question what does it mean when the board has to fire the entire senior team as the Cadence board did in October 2008. They were lucky to have a strong board alternative ready to step in and turn the company around, because there was no one senior enough internally left standing, although indications are the CEO, Lip-Bu Tan is investing in How to #4.

Of course there are many more ways to fire a CEO but in the end the hiring and firing of the CEO is the single most important thing boards do. They are accountable to the shareholders and the CEO has more impact on the strategy, execution and leadership team than anyone else, so the decision of who to put in that position vastly outweighs any other decision a board makes.

It sounds easy. Be clear about what the company needs, have a clear and transparent process within the board for nomination, have a strong succession planning process so you are developing internal candidates, keep confidentiality.

But it's not easy. It is incredibly difficult because companies, and human beings, are complex. Of course board's make hiring mistakes, or the needs of the company change, or the market changes and a CEO may no longer be a good fit.

So if you do have the misfortune to have to fire a CEO, at least make that a well managed, dignified, confidential process.

Rome: A short stay guide for the busy professional

2011-09-21T14:40:00.000-07:00

Rome is, no question, my favorite city in the world. My friends know it and so I am frequently asked where to go if you have a few days.

Here's my list, biased by my love of the ancient and the baroque, but if it is your first time in Rome you'll get a broad, and deep experience in a few days if you visit these sites. They are listed in priority order if you are short of time.

And remember - wear comfortable shoes!

1. Villa Borghese Gallery
Extraordinary collection of art and sculpture established in the early 1600s by Cardinal Scipione Borghese. Best collection of Bernini statues in the world plus several milestone Caravaggio paintings.
Note: The museum limits the number of people admitted at any one time so buy tickets on line 2 weeks before you leave at http://www.rome-museum.com and get the audio tour when you go in - it's very good. Be sure to go upstairs too, the Titians are upstairs.

2. Colosseum and the Forum and the Palantine
They are next to each other and in half a day you can get a strong sense of ancient Rome. There is a new tour of the colosseum which just opened which takes you up to the third floor and down into the hypogeum.
You can buy tickets at the same site (above). For the Forum and the Palentine (the area above the forum where the palaces were) get the audio tour. It's worth the 2-3 hours to walk around and absorb the deep history of the site.

3. Vatican Museum
Whether you approve of the Catholic Church's accumulation of wealth over the last 2,000 years or not, the Vatican collection is not to be missed - including ancient Greek statues, the map corridor (look up), the Raphael rooms and the exquisite Sistine chapel.
You can buy tickets at the same site or go very early and wait in line. The audio tour is a bit preachy for my taste so read your guidebook or pick up the small paperback book in the museum.

4. Castel St Angelo & St Peters Basillica
Both by the Vatican. St Peters is glorious and took over 100 years to build, Castel St Angelo is really interesting view into an old castle used as a prison and a refuge for the Papacy for a thousand years, and it was originally Hadrians tomb. Good audio tour for Castel St Angelo. Climbing to the top of the cupola of St Peters is hard work but worth it for the view. Don't climb it if you are claustrophobic.

5. The Pantheon
2000 year old Roman temple. Beautiful and fantastic engineering - the science to build a dome like that was lost for 1500 years and reverse engineered when Brunelleschi was trying to build the cupola in Florence!

Near
6. Piazza Navona
Fun (expensive) cafes, street performers, lovely Bernini fountains
Near
7. Caravaggio paintings in Santa Lucia de Francesi.
Three paintings of St Matthew. Very famous and very beautiful. If you have time go to Santa Maria Di Poppolo too - has two amazing Caravaggio paintings in it.
Caravaggio changed the course of western art between 1590 and 1605. He was the first to paint religious subjects in profane modern settings but more importantly he invented a style of strong characters in dramatic poses lit from a single point of light against dark backgrounds to increase the sense of drama - called chiaroscuro - and changed painting forever.

8. Take a half day tour to Tivoli.
There is a bus tour for half a day, or hire a driver for a whole day. Goes to Hadrians Villa and Villa D'Este. Villa D'Este has to be seen to be believed! Cardinal D'Este was Lucretia Borgia's son, extermely wealthy even for those times and he built a palace with a hillside of hundreds of beautiful fountains. He diverted a river to create it!

9. Spanish steps
At the end of Via Condotti which is the fashion district. Gelato from the cafe to the left of Via Condotti if you are looking at it from the steps (the chocolate is fantastic). Sit on the steps and people watch. Watch your wallet in any crowded area in Rome!

10. St Clemente
A church from 1200, built on top of a church built in 400, built on top of old roman streets and a Mithraen temple from 50. You can take steps down to each of the four layers which have been excavated. Weird and wonderful.

11. Caracalla baths
Built in 300 could bathe 3000 people at a time. Absolutely enormous, even as a ruin. Beautiful place to walk around and absorb atmosphere.

12. More museums...
The Capitoline Museum has a magnificent collection of statues and art. The Museum of Rome by the train station has amazing whole rooms preserved from the palaces from Caesars time, like Livia's dining room, and gorgeous mosaics. The Palazzo Barberini has a lovely art collection and gives you a sense of how the rich lived in the 1600s. Palazzo Doria Pamphlii has so many paintings they are hung three high up the walls. More Carevaggio paintings here.

13. Aqueducts and the Wall
Be sure to look out for them. You'll see them as you wander around. Rome was fed by aqueducts more than 150 miles long and protected by a huge wall. Both times Rome was sacked ( in 400 and again in 1527 ) it was to try and break the political power of the city over the rest of the world and both times they destroyed the aqueducts to siege the city. If you are really nerdy like me go to the Museum of the Wall at Porto Sebastiano.

Restaurants
Ninos - wonderful traditional Roman food - Via Borgognona, may need a reservation - and they definitely frown if you get too loud...
Life- fun, inexpensive and delicious on Via de la Vita
Giggetto at Porto Octavia - in the old Jewish district. Has the best carciofi (artichokes) and eggplant Parmesan in Rome.
Don't eat on Via Veneto - it's a rip off to trap tourists. Get off the main streets and look for little cafes.

Most museums are closed on Mondays so that is a good day to see churches and ruins. Most churches are closed for a long lunch. Always check opening times in your guidebook before setting out. It's a walking city and can be hard to get a cab so take really, really comfortable walking shoes. The metro is quite safe too.

Have a marvelous time!

WSGR and conflict waivers in Silicon Valley

2011-09-20T13:16:00.000-07:00

I've used Wilson Sonsini as my outside counsel for more than 15 years now. Like many a tech CEO, I was introduced to Larry Sonsini very early on as a green CEO, grew up with the firm, stayed loyal because of their incredible advice, got frustrated by their lack of follow through on the small stuff, and became fast friends with several partners at the firm. A very typical Silicon Valley tech story I have in common with CEOs at large and small companies in the valley.

But because WSGR is so successful in tech they often find themselves on opposite sides of a conflict and have become masters of the "conflict waiver". Both parties sign that it is OK that the same firm represents both sides because different partners are in the lead and they promise not to talk between the sheets (so to speak).

Which is why when @alacra1 (that's Steve Goldstein) tweeted out this cartoon I laughed out loud. If you have ever done a lot of business with WSGR you've seen this movie.

Thanks to stus.com for the brilliant cartoon.

5 leadership keys for women

2011-09-16T09:10:00.001-07:00

Do women lead differently than men? Yes, usually. Do women face more barriers than men? Frequently. But do women often hold themselves back ? Yes.

I gave a leadership talk and Q&A, at a tech company in Silicon Valley a couple of weeks ago where I was meeting with female leaders in a hardcore semiconductor company. Because it's hardcore it was a small group, and because I grew up (professionally) in a hardcore technical environment like that I spoke to the things I have seen women do that hold them back as leaders - and how to flip these challenges around and turn them into advantages.

Here are the 5 keys to leadership as a woman (although not exclusively...) and each one is the flip side of a common weakness:

1. Embrace making decisions - they are fun

Companies need people who are decisive and courageous. A common issue with new entrepreneurs and young managers is that they hesitate to make decisions. It's tough when you don't know what to do, but it's better to make a decision quickly and decisively, and be ready to change it if you are wrong, than to hesitate, hash it over many times, or wait for someone else (your board, your team, your boss) - or even worse time and delay - to make it for you.

Making decisions gets easier when you learn to trust yourself and your judgement - you can feel in your gut and in the tips of your fingers what to decide. Never underestimate your own intuition - it's not a myth, it's real.

I simply did not understand or trust this until I read Blink (the voice is my head is uber-critical) but now I love the feeling. I am not always right, and I definitely need and value advice, but I learned to trust, move forward fast, knowing that if I am wrong I'll also figure that out quickly, or someone I trust will slap me.

2. Never ask whether, ask when

This is a mindset that many men are good at. They come out of of the womb asking when they'll get that raise, when they'll be promoted, when they'll go kill that bear, not whether. Women so often talk about whether. Should I push for that promotion, should I ask for more money, will I get funded, will they promote a woman, will they like me?

Working with mostly men, and a few women, I see a pattern in the successful women. They don't ask whether they have a right to what they want, they assume they'll get it. They don't particularly care what other people think of them, they care about getting the job done. They act like they are competent, it's in their future, they are going to get it, and there is not any question of whether, just when.

3. Hire your betters

The fastest way to build a great team is to hire people who are smarter and more experienced than you in their field, and if you are technical these are probably mostly men today.

It can be intimidating to interview people who are senior to you - I know. It can be downright frustrating when you talk to men who, when they meet you, talk down to you because you are blond and forget that you are interviewing them (can you tell I've been through this?). Remember, you don't need to be "the man" - you need to get the job done better than anyone else.

Stay focused on your vision for your team. A group of people who work for and with you, all of whom are smarter than you in some dimension but who want to climb the hill with you. Plan to grow into being their leader and if they are good people they will give you space to do it. Give in to fear of being usurped and you'll fail because you don't hire a strong enough team.

I confess I used to always try to hire my "elders and betters". As time goes by the first becomes more difficult, but thankfully the second is still easy!

4. Speak up and be sure you are heard

I have often heard the complaint that a woman will say something in a meeting, not have her idea acknowledged and then a man will say the same thing and everyone will jump on a agree. There are even TV ads that make fun of this reality.

Given that this does happen, develop some tactics that help you be heard, and help you confirm that you have been heard. State your input and then ask a question that causes your co-workers to engage in your idea. Repeat yourself in different words. Go to the white board to sketch your concept - whether it is a process or a product idea - it's really hard to ignore the person at the white board. If you are in an online meeting call on a co-worker by name to get their direct input on your idea. What does not work is speaking your piece and then waiting - that is the easiest way for you to be dismissed.

5. Put the company first and get results

And finally - the playing field is not level. Fact. Deal with it. To lead men and get ahead in a man's world you need to work harder, be smarter and be more ambitious than the men around you.

The CEO lives in the place where the company and it's results are all that matter to her. So practice that. In everything you do put the company first, ahead of your needs. Ahead of office politics (I wish I had known this from day one - I had to learn this one). Drive to results, be sure you get recognition for your results, and you will get ahead and become a leader.

Male dominance of tech is not going to change quickly so don't complain, or hesitate, just get on with it. And if you are a leader - men, and women, will follow you. When you look over your shoulder you will know.

Raising over $31,000 for the Ovarian Cancer Research Fund

2011-09-07T00:01:00.000-07:00

Earlier this year I set out a challenge for myself to do a really long swim for my mother, and on Monday that crazy idea grew into something really big for FirstRain and for the Ovarian Cancer Research Fund.

We started doing athletic competitions at FirstRain back in 2008 as a way to build stronger teams inside the company and this Summer I decided to encourage Rainmakers to get involved in a series of events building up to my personal challenge of a 2.4 mile ocean swim off Maui.

And to my delight many of my coworkers have been with me all the way – and into the race! All summer Rainmakers have been training with me in the pool, competing in the Splash and Dash series and yesterday two of them did the Maui 'Aumakua Swim too. We’ve been doing relays, running, teaching each other how to swim better and generally having fun and becoming friends.

The race yesterday was on a spectacular, perfect Maui day. The water was crystal clear and we were swimming over coral reefs, fish and the occasional turtle. Thomas and Jordy did the 1 mile distance and were both very pleased with their times and I beat my time goal in the 2.4 mile distance.

2.4 miles is a very long way to swim if you don’t compete all the time. It was a huge personal challenge for me but once I set my pace I pushed through, absolutely determined to finish because I was raising money for OCRF, I was on a mission and I was supported by so many coworkers, friends and family.

My mother was diagnosed with stage 4 ovarian cancer 18 months ago. She has been through treatment and is in remission but we know the fight is not over. Unfortunately today there is no effective early detection method for this disease and so the statistics are tough. Over 22,000 women are diagnosed with the disease each year in the US and over 15,000 die from it. My goal was to raise as much money as possible for OCRF to help find a detection method and ultimately a cure.

And the result was donations of more than $31,000! Truly fantastic generosity from many, many people. We put out a FirstRain press release on the news because the achievement is, to a great extent, the result of my coworkers wonderful involvement and support. It’s a privilege to work with such terrific people.

Several Rainmakers have asked me what we are going to do next Summer – any suggestions for what we should do next?

Why are Women Funded Less than Men? - a new conversation

2011-08-30T07:42:00.000-07:00

If you are thinking of starting a company, or raising venture capital, and happen to be female then Pemo Theodore's new ebook is for you.

Why are Women Funded Less than Men? a crowdsourced conversation presents a thoughtful collection of advice on how to do it and the challenges you face, drawn from a fascinating set of video interviews. Pemo interviewed VCs, entrepreneurs and advisors, asking them all to speak about the issues and challenges facing women trying to raise venture capital.

In a world more than 95% run by men, and 95% invested in by men, advice for the female entrepreneur is invaluable, and by presenting the advice in short video form, Pemo makes it very easy to absorb and enjoy.

Raising venture capital has never been a problem for me, and as I watched the videos I found myself thinking was I lucky, good, or just really ignorant of the challenge? I very much resonate with the advice to not be aware of your gender as you pitch, to be aggressive and to ignore that you know most VCs are not women friendly - your idea is still great.

I also resonate with the advice from Janice Roberts at Mayfield Fund that you can empower yourself by choosing the right VC. Finding the right investing partner is critical - my advice on how to pick a VC is in this post.

Many of the contributors speak about how important confidence is. So many women let themselves down by expressing self doubt. DON'T. VCs are already taking enough risk - they won't invest in someone that reveals their fears - and men don't let on no matter how scared they might be. Be confident, project confidence, and your investors will follow you.

As I said in my forward for the book:

While the facts are that only 3-5% of venture capital goes to female entrepreneurs there is simply no good reason for this to be the case. Women are as strong and smart as men, and often have the advantages of better management skills and stronger team building ability. But today's venture world is dominated by men looking for the classical male style of leadership and until that changes women need to adapt to the current rules of the game, get funded and win so they can change the game.

It take confidence, courage and authenticity and a healthy dose of advice and encouragement. This wonderful collection of advice, shared experience and often humorous stories will be an inspiration to any female entrepreneur. Pemo interviews across the spectrum: VCs, entrepreneurs, those who have succeeded, some that have failed, all that have learned and share their experience with you. It's a terrific resource if you are raising money from venture capital, plan to do so for your next brilliant idea or are a VC yourself wanting to unlock higher quality deals by tapping into the female advantage.

The complete videos of Pemo interviewing me on raising money are here and here too.