Promoting away a friend

Yesterday I experienced one of the best moments of my "career" (seems like a rather old-fashioned notion). I gave up one of my best performers to promotion. Martin Musierowicz, erstwhile director of strategic alliances at JBoss and my senior director of business development, became Alfresco's vice president of Strategic Alliances.

Martin deserves the title. He has been an exceptional performer for Alfresco, closing big deals with a range of incredible companies like Ricoh (announced), Quark (announced), and several others that either can't be announced or shortly will be. He has added materially to our top-line revenue growth - 300% in 2007 - and also importantly laid the foundation for a stellar market valuation. Big partners yield big valuations.

Still, it wasn't easy. I'm not a kingdom-builder; I really don't care how many people report to me. But I don't much like change and I liked the close, collegial relationship that Martin and I have enjoyed. We'll maintain this, no doubt, but it will change. We've always been peers but now he has the title to prove it. He'll probably say "No" to me more often. :-)

I hope that by the end of this Alfresco experiment I will have the opportunity to promote every person who reports to me. I can't think of a better indicator of success than to see my team succeed far beyond my abilities or imagination. I've tried to hire people that are better and smarter than I am. That would be the best demonstration that I've succeeded.

Anyway, congratulations to you, Martin. Be sure to come slum with me in the SLC sometime.

A perfect vacation policy

As mentioned on my "real blog," Fabrizio Capobianco and I skied Solitude (Utah) today. As we rode the chairlift, we mostly talked business and football (soccer). But I also got to hear about Funambol's vacation policy. I'm going to try to put it to work at Alfresco.

Fabrizio, being Italian (though he's now an American citizen - welcome!), gives his employees four weeks of paid time off. The problem, however, is that his American employees hadn't been using it. (Sounds familiar - Alfresco is a UK-based company. The Americans can hardly be forced to leave the office while during the summer vacation months it's hard to find a Brit in the office. I'm exaggerating, but....)

So he came up with a great plan. Two, actually. First, his employees stop accruing vacation days at six weeks. Meaning, once they have earned six weeks, they can't earn more...until they burn down their vacation days. (Novell used to have a similar policy when I was there, and probably still does.) This proves to be a good incentive to nudge people to take a vacation since the psychology is, "If I don't take some vacation, I'll be limiting my ability to earn more."

But I like his second idea even more. He noted that he's pushing to have everyone take one week off each quarter. His rationale is that nothing too terrible can happen in a week in someone's absence, and if their presence is absolutely mandatory every day than something is wrong with the company. This rings true to me.

In a week you can panic that so-and-so isn't around to sign X or do Y, but if you know they're back on Monday, it's not so bad. And if the company's success hinges on someone's omnipresence, that's a dysfunctional company.

I'm going to try this. I don't think I'm legally allowed to force someone to take vacation days. I'm going to have to think of some good incentives, therefore, to induce people to enjoy themselves. Myself, included.