Lessons Learned from Previous Employment

Canfield Concessions (1988-1989)

Superb customer service can win you a lot of customer loyalty, but few will pay extra for it.
Growing a small business into a large business requires taking enormous risks.
Small, tight knit teams are vastly more effective than large ones.
Good judgement under pressure is a learned skill.
It's harder to teach people skills than it is to teach technical skills.

Working so hard that you don't sleep, doesn't make anything better.
If the owners of the company don't get along ... run far away.
When a company succeeds, there comes a time when the founders must delegate many of their previous responsibilities. Letting this moment slide by unnoticed, can be fatal.
If you can't bill correctly, it doesn't matter how good your reputation or technology is.
A great manager can make all the difference.
Surviving the loss of a key person, is never as hard as you think it will be.
A good manager puts their teams needs before their own and shelters their team from the pressures above.
Sometimes managing your friends really sucks.
Occasionally threatening to do the ridiculous will actually get things done.

Experienced businessmen can be worth their weight in gold.
There is an art to being pushy.
Big dreams take big balls.
After you've deployed your infrastructure is the wrong time to do your return on investment calculations.

The one thing that managers hate, more than anything else, is being surprised.
Working in a cost centre means that you, and your job, are at best a second priority.
In a support role your job isn't to do your job well, it's to maximise other peoples ability to do their job well.
Engineers don't like being wrong.
If people don't understand what you do, and why it's important, you will not be rewarded.
Being conscientious and staying focused is far more important than being smart.
It's possible to get accustomed to anything. Make bloody sure you are aware of what you've become accustomed to.

More than any other single thing, being successful at something means not giving up.
Everything takes longer than you expect. Lots longer.
In a volunteer based non-profit people don't have the shared goal of making money. Instead every single person has their own personal agenda to pursue.
Unfortunately "dreaming big" is more fun and less work than "doing big".
Process matters, how you get there will effect not only the end result, but how people feel about the end result.
During conflict, email is guaranteed to evoke the worst possible response from someone.
Nothing is as refreshing to the soul as receiving an unanticipated act of generosity.
One of the primary jobs of a leader is to act as a "lightning rod" for discussion. As such it is often more important to have an opinion, than to have the correct opinion.
When dealing with difficult situations it's vital to stay focused on the goal and not get pulled into emotional responses. My mantra was: "read, react, respond, reduce".

If you avoid confrontation you can never fix things.
If you don't ask for it, chances are nobody knows you need it.
Most people are incredibly generous when asked directly for help.
If you protect people too much, they will not learn the consequences of their actions.
Every company is held together by the supreme efforts of certain key people.
Effective communication is the largest challenge that every business faces.
Curiosity is worth looking for, especially in technical interviews.
Always assume that anything put in writing will end up on the public record.
Glamour is only visible from a distance.

The first time people see you in a suit, expect giggles.
Meeting work mates face to face is an absolute requirement.
The primary job of salesmen is to navigate their own companies bureaucracy on behalf of their customers.
Travelling for work can in fact get old.
Never try to out drink a salesmen.