Walking barefoot on the Katana's Edge

Life has always been for me an adventure. As I near 50, I find myself more and more reflecting on my life, and what it all means. I have not done much personal stuff lately, and thought this might be a good outlet for me to blog about things in my life. I call it, Walking Barefoot on the Katana’s Edge.

Part One
I worked in Silicon Valley for eight years, and have worked in High Tech for almost 20. When I see the success of Google, I am amazed. Previous to founding Grupo Utopia, I worked for several startups. Two of them had in excess of 100 Million Dollars in startup funds, all of which they pissed away in a little over a year. Both companies were run by young, white Stanford Grads with almost no real world experience, and who with nothing more than a canned business plan and a PowerPoint Presentation, convinced some of Silicon Valley's top Venture Capitalist to bankroll their dreams. Both companies had proven CEO's at the helm, but were actually ran by young PM's (Product Managers in Silicon Valley Speak), who didn't know shit but considered themselves "Masters of the Universe." And that they were, at least as long as the money lasted.

At one company I had a GOLD American Express Card, in my name, with absolutely NO controls whatsoever on it. In fact, I never even saw the bill. It went straight to accounting, who paid it without even asking me about it. Once, we an executive photo shoot was planned and I was not told in advance, I came to work dressed in Jeans and a polo shirt. My boss, The President, sent me to San Francisco and told me to buy a couple of changes of clothes for the shoot, "something executive..." I spent almost a grand that day, and no one blinked.

Then there were the Friday Beer and Pizza bust. Every Friday, the company fronted for beer and Pizza for everyone on staff. This wasn’t much when the staff was a dozen people, but when it reached 100, you can imagine the weekly cost. There were also the fridges stocked with food and drink, and the morning bagel and donut runs. People regularly took six packs of soft drinks home with them, which were promptly replaced. This was all before the company saw a dime of revenue. The first day the company went live with a product, they took out TWO full page Ads in The Wall Street Journal. This despite the fact that at the time the product was only being sold in California. Another Million was spent on a commercial featuring animatronics dinosaurs... One that never even aired. The founders of the company were a bunch of guys in their early 20's that all knew each other. The company folded in less than a year and a half, I left about 8 months in, asked to leave by Management that "did not like my style," They paid me $60,000 for the privilege of getting the hell out of there. In the hot times we lived in, I was employeed again in two weeks.

The next company I worked for, (and the last), was run by a couple of veteran medical sales types. The idea was to get Doctors to use a handheld computer to write prescriptions for patients. The handhelds were given to the doctors free of charge, with the idea of getting access to statistical information on prescription writing, which would be turned over to the pharmacy companies, who would in turn pay a fortune for the information. The program was also supposed to help doctors avoid drug interaction problems by keeping information about other drugs the patient was using, and keeping the physician from prescribing something that could cause a dangerous interaction problem. The program was complicated and slow, and there were major problems with syncing the information with the companies computers back in Silicon Valley. The idea also relied on the Doctor's assistant sticking arround after work and initializing the sync, which worked "sometimes." Many of the Doctors ended up using the $500 handhelds to keep their golf scores and girlfriend/boyfriend's numbers.

There was also massive waste at that company as well. Weekly gourmet lunches for the entire staff, poor logistical planning that led to trainers having flights booked to far away cities at the last minute for training classes, resulting in thousands in unnecessary travel expenses. In other cases, units had to be shipped Federal Express overnight, instead of Ground, again because of poor planning. Favoritism ran rampant in the company, and the young Product Managers were running the show, despite not even being in accord on their own plans. After blowing through $300 Million Dollars, the company was sold after a year and a half. I again walked away with a nice parachute, this time about $40,000. Most of my time at Company Number II was spent just scratching my head trying to figure out how a good product, and a good idea, could be so royally fucked up by people smart enough to talk some real heavyweights into putting up $300 Million Dollars.

It was an interesting couple of years. Years that taught me a lot about what NOT to do if ever I got the chance to start a company. I unfortunately did not get $300 Million to start Utopia, but I have made the best of what investment I did get.

During my last years in Silicon Valley I kind of lost it. I worked for egotistical idiot after idiot. I made shit loads of money and spent it as fast as I made it. I lived an extravagant lifestyle, had affairs, partied my ass off, and started to believe the hype. But that is all it was... Hype. I attended parties in Million Dollar homes. I drove a $45,000 Dollar SUV. I spent thousands on computers and toys. I cheated with the personal secretary of the most powerful politician in the Bay Area at the time. And I enjoyed a lifestyle that like the Dot Com bubble could not, and probably should not, have lasted. To be honest, I probably would not be married if it had.

I was walking the knifes edge. Coming to Costa Rica did not at first help (But that is another story). What has helped me to settle down and get a sense of priority in my life, is for once having to struggle for something, and having my wife and family right next to me as I did it... Before I was a cowboy, a Digital Gangster/Celebrity, living large and enjoying the benefits of power and money. Take away those trappings and start all over again and it brings one a sense of perspective. I have found it.

UPDATE: This post has been picked up by CNet's News.com.

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Posted by: The Commissar at August 24, 2005 10:27 PM

Posted by: Cobb at August 25, 2005 11:23 PM

Posted by: Cobb at August 25, 2005 11:29 PM