Rands In Repose: A Disclosure
http://www.randsinrepose.com/archives/2009/01/25/a_disclosure.html

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Whether you get to choose or not, there are aspects of management that you need to understand.

There will be drama. And there be those precious seconds when there is no one in your office wanting… something.

All about management in software dev companies...

Difference between Content and Process

career marketing

As you consider marketing yourself for your next gig, consider the difference between process and content.

As you consider marketing yourself for your next gig, consider the difference between process and content. Content is domain knowledge. People you know or skills you've developed. Playing the piano or writing copy about furniture sales. A rolodex of movers in a given industry, or your ability to compute stress ratios in your head. Domain knowledge is important, but it's (often) easily learnable. Process, on the other hand, refers to the emotional intelligence skills you have about managing projects, visualizing success, persuading other people of your point of view, dealing with multiple priorities, etc. This stuff is insanely valuable and hard to learn. Unfortunately, it's usually overlooked by headhunters and HR folks, partly because it's hard to accredit or check off in a database.

"The third idea, the one that I think is really available to a large number of people now without a lot of resources, is this idea of finding and connecting like-minded people and leading them to a place they want to go"

You can't have insiders unless you have outsiders. All tribes have outsiders. That's what makes them a tribe. If everyone is a member, it's not a tribe anymore.... So I don't think there's any problem at all for Apple with people saying they're elitist.

An interesting article on social networking and viral marketing concepts.

Barry Schwartz makes a passionate call for “practical wisdom” as an antidote to a society gone mad with bureaucracy.

Leadership

Apresentação de Barry Schwartz, no TED.

Most guides on management are written for big bosses at big companies, not people starting something new who want their team to be as effective as possible. (Hi, startup founders!) So herewith, a guide to effective non-hierarchical management.

Vary responsibilities (not efficient, but unhappy = worse efficiency) * Delegate responsibility (develop the team... either manage or work, not both) * Competent people get things done anyway. Ineffective ones let the excuses pile up. * proactive as well. People tend to suffer quietly * Part of your job is helping people decide what to tackle first. * stop procrastination is to sit down with someone and come up with the next concrete step they have to take and then start doing it together. * people are much happier and more productive when they have control over the way they work. Never take that away. * And if people fight back, know when to step back and say “look, you’re the expert. I was just giving my two cents.” (Hint: It’s right after they start fighting back.) * not to dictate or micromanage, but to have a Socratic dialogue to help figure out what the best answer is. *

A better way to think of a manager is as a servant, like an editor or a personal assistant. Everyone wants to be effective; a manager’s job is to do everything they can to make that happen. The ideal manager is someone everyone would want to have.

What they found, in short, is that the worst team member is the best predictor of how any team performs. It doesn't seem to matter how great the best member is, or what the average member of the group is like. It all comes down to what your worst team member is like. The teams with the worst person performed the poorest.

in some of the groups, the fourth member of their team isn't a student. He's an actor hired to play a bad apple, one of these personality types: The Depressive Pessimist will complain that the task that they're doing isn't enjoyable, and make statements doubting the group's ability to succeed. The Jerk will say that other people's ideas are not adequate, but will offer no alternatives himself. He'll say "you guys need to listen to the expert: me." The Slacker will say "whatever", and "I really don't care." The conventional wisdom in the research on this sort of thing is that none of this should have had much effect on the group at all. Groups are powerful. Group dynamics are powerful. And so groups dominate individuals, not the other way around. There's tons of research, going back decades, demonstrating that people conform to group values and norms. But Will found the opposite. the worst team member is the best predictor of how any team performs.

Groups that have a "bad apple" perform worse. A good leader, who asks questions, solicits opinions and makes sure everyone is heard can make a difference. See also http://liberalorder.typepad.com/the_liberal_order/files/bad_apples_rob.pdf

Social psychologists know that one way to be viewed as a leader in any group is simply to act like one. Speak up, speak well and offer lots of ideas, and before long, people will begin doing what you say. This works well when leaders know what they're talking about, but what if they don't? If someone acts like a boss but thinks like a boob, is that still enough to stay on top? - "More-dominant individuals achieved influence in their groups in part because they were seen as more competent by fellow group members," Anderson and Kilduff write.

"Speak up, speak well and offer lots of ideas, and before long, people will begin doing what you say" - Journal of Personality and Social Psychology Found at http://www.speakingaboutpresenting.com/presentation-research/speaking-enhance-career/

speaking up makes you look intelligent

http://www.fastcompany.com/node/54763/print fastcompany fastcompanyfastcompany NotoWal-Mart

""As I look at the three years Snapper has been with you," he told the vice president, "every year the price has come down. Every year the content of the product has gone up. We're at a position where, first, it's still priced where it doesn't meet the needs of your clientele. For Wal-Mart, it's still too high-priced. I think you'd agree with that. Now, at the price I'm selling to you today, I'm not making any money on it. And if we do what you want next year, I'll lose money. I could do that and not go out of business. But we have this independent-dealer channel. And 80% of our business is over here with them. And I can't put them at a competitive disadvantage. If I do that, I lose everything. So this just isn't a compatible fit."" A repost of an article doing the rounds a few months ago. Not saying nothing about Kindle.

There are a lot of parallels to Web design here.

"Wier traveled to Bentonville with a firm grasp of the values of Snapper, the dynamics of the lawn-mower business, the needs of the dealers, the needs of the Snapper customer, and the needs of the Wal-Mart customer. He was not dazzled by the tens of millions of dollars' worth of lawn mowers Wal-Mart was already selling for Snapper; he was not deluded about his ability to beat Wal-Mart at its own game, to somehow resist the price pressure. He was not imagining that he could take the sales now and figure out the profits later."

Jim Wier, the CEO of Snapper Mowers, flies to Wal-mart headquarters to tell them he no longer wants to offer Snapper mowers in their stores.

Interested ideas on how web2.0 changed how people think.

On the power of the internet: "People on the fringes can find each other, connect and go somewhere." On marketers' new challenge: "What we do for a living is find something worth changing, then finding tribes who spread the idea and create a movement." "You don't need everyone - you just need a 1,000 people who care enough that they will get you the next round and the next round...It's about finding the true believers."

Great presentation of Seth Godin on the third wave called tribes.

There are only three kinds of classic meetings: 1. Information. This is a meeting where attendees are informed about what is happening (with or without their blessing). While there may be a facade of conversation, it's primarily designed to inform. 2. Discussion. This is a meeting where the leader actually wants feedback or direction or connections. You can use this meeting to come up with an action plan, or develop a new idea, for example. 3. Permission. This is a meeting where the other side is supposed to say yes but has the power to say no.

Meetings are marketing in real time with real people. (A conference is not a meeting. A conference is a chance for a circle of people to interact). There are only three kinds of classic meetings: Information. This is a meeting...

"# Information. This is a meeting where attendees are informed about what is happening (with or without their blessing). While there may be a facade of conversation, it's primarily designed to inform. # Discussion. This is a meeting where the leader actually wants feedback or direction or connections. You can use this meeting to come up with an action plan, or develop a new idea, for example. # Permission. This is a meeting where the other side is supposed to say yes but has the power to say no."

How CEOs are using twitter

CEOs using Twitter.

From Digg's Kevin Rose to Sun's Jonathan Schwartz, 18 CEOs who tweet offer microblogging tips

# # Michael Merzenich on re-wiring the brain # Dave Eggers’ wish: Once upon a school # Ray Kurzweil on how technology will transform us # Alan Kay shares a powerful idea about ideas # Howard Rheingold on co

Top 20 TED Talks podcasts for busy school administrators Here are my top 20 TED Talks podcasts for busy principals and superintendents (in no particular order). These are the TED presentations that I think are most likely to interest, educate, and entertain administrators as well as make them think!

TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design. It started out (in 1984) as a conference bringing together people from those three worlds.

technology, leadership and the future of schools

Here are my top 20 TED Talks podcasts for busy principals and superintendents (in no particular order). These are the TED presentations that I think are most likely to interest, educate, and entertain administrators as well as make them think! Kevin Kelly on the next 5,000 days of the web...

Why follow people on twitter

Paul is a Senate hopeful and the son of former presidential candidate Dr. Ron Paul.

You can find just about anyone on Twitter, and leaders are no exception. Whether you’re looking for motivational speakers, authors, social media experts, or politicians, you can find quite a few interesting personalities. Read on to learn about 100 leaders on Twitter that you can learn from.

The roles of leader

quality. Not over-celebrating a team’s heroic recovery when they could have avoided a problem altogether sends a message about prevention versus damage control. People take their cues about interpersonal values—trust, honesty, openness—from CEO’s actions as well. Capital allocation is the CEO’s #4 duty. The CEO sets budgets within the firm. She funds projects which support the strategy, and ramps down projects which lose money or don’t support the strategy. She considers carefully the company’s major expenditures, and manages the firm’s capital. If the company can’t use each dollar raised from investors to produce at least $1 of shareholder value, she decides when to return money to the investors. Some CEOs don’t consider themselves financial people, but at the end of the day, it is their decisions that determine the company’s financial fate.

Would you like to be more creative in your copy and blogging? It’s really not as hard or mysterious as you might think.

Awesome

copyblogger

Are willing to TEST new ideas and compete with others based on results. Isn’t that what they mean by the “market of ideas”? Isn’t that what business competition is about? If you’re afraid of being wrong or losing, your creativity will suffer.

Think of creativity as a muscle. The more you use it, the stronger it gets. To increase your creativity, you simply need to “act” like a creative person. Not surprisingly, people recognized as creative tend to share common traits.

Psychology

Why is this no big surprise? "EVER wondered why the pundits who failed to predict the current economic crisis are still being paid for their opinions? It's a consequence of the way human psychology works in a free market, according to a study of how people's self-confidence affects the way others respond to their advice."

good stuff

Talks about employee retention, handling increasing complexity in the company, etc

Slide deck from Netflix outlines their employee strategy, how they do compensation, why they only aim for top performers, how their "vision statement" is different than Enron's, etc

Seth Godin sums up the sentiment that when it comes to the brand you work for, the buck always stops with you...even if the true responsibility for your brand's shortcomings arise from a different team/divison/location/etc.

Advice for both employees and employers

Changing Corporate Culture

d culture, instead of making the

"You change a culture with stories

# Do dramatic story-worthy things that represent the culture we want to create. Then let other people tell stories about it. # Find other people who do story-worthy things that represent the culture we want to create. Then tell stories about them.

So with that caveat, here is my list of ten traits I see in great companies. This is aimed at web/tech companies but I believe it can and should be applicable to all companies.

Interesting take on what makes a great company

Yesterday I got to do one of my favorite things. Our portfolio company Etsy invited me out to their new offices in Dumbo to talk to the entire team. Since they didn't ask me to talk about anything in specific,...

Yes! Yes! A thousand times, yes! Tactics are almost the cherry on top, but that's what people want: tips-'n'-tactics. Ugh. I can spot the ones who don't get it a mile away now that I've been speaking about marketing for a while. "TELL ME ABOUT TWITTER!!" Um, no. How about we talk about right behavior, and goals? And how about you get those squared away before I put you behind the controls of this howitzer. Which will be outdated, most likely, before you learn how to operate it properly.

The hierarchy of success I think it looks like this: Attitude Approach Goals Strategy Tactics Execution

"Most everyone has a style, and if you pick the wrong one, then all the strategy, tactics and execution in the world won't work nearly as well." "As far as I'm concerned, the most important of all, the top of the hierarchy is attitude. Why are you doing this at all? What's your bias in dealing with people and problems?"

Mark Zuckerberg

Priscilla Chan

분야나 상활별로 리더십에 필요한것? 을 설명하고 있다 영어 해독- _ -;

Administrators play a pivotal role in determining how well technology is used in our schools. The NETS for Administrators enable us to define what administrators need to know and be able to do in order to discharge their responsibility as leaders in the effective use of technology in our schools.

Managing a team means more than just doling out work. Chances are, you'll be dealing with different personalities and working styles and that you'll be juggling multiple deadlines at once. It's a job that requires both a high level of organization and what they call "people skills." Your job as a leader is to make each project fun, but also keep it on track and on deadline. The primary goal of a good manager is to get everyone focused, make sure everyone is communicating and keep spirits up. It certainly goes beyond organizing team parties centered around stale supermarket cake. Learning how to effectively motivate and manage a team takes some planning, the right tools and good communication. So, start taking notes! This article is part of a wiki anyone can edit. Got extra advice? Log in and contribute. For Each Project: 1. Compose a Mission Statement. Not a memo, a mission statement. You don't have to stay up all night waiting for a breakthrough (or a breakdown) to know your pr

All about project management

This was a hard chapter to write. It feels like a chapter that would work better in the final book. You have to have a mission and strategy and plan, right? So why does writing them feel like one of those make-work projects you have to do to keep investors happy? Come to think of it, you could outsource the production of your vision, mission, and strategy via Mechanical Turk?

The idea has to be one that just won't leave you alone. Such ideas often seem totally out of sync with current reality and are dismissed as crazy. That is because in the current environment they are crazy. The idea that everybody would own a PC was crazy in the 1970s, when Microsoft was starting out. People who are driven by these ideas very often feel doubt. On all sensible levels, the idea is crazy.

Creativity, Innovation, Team Building, Leadership, Brainstorming, Idea Champions

Good Ideas to create a atmosphere for innovation

mfortable speaking wi

Ted didn't know--or care--what anyone outside the investment team did. The senior managers were the people to impress, and his fellow analysts were the people to keep ahead of. He sometimes had a hard time getting the administrative team's help in closing trades, but he didn't let that stop him. In fact, he'd often mention his disappointment with administrative staffers at his interruptions--er, meetings--with senior managers.

The wise moves that outpaced a wily and ambitious colleague.

This is a true tale about two acquaintances of mine. One knew instinctively exactly how to get ahead in the workplace. The other thought he knew--and was dead wrong. Alot of us would probably act pretty much the way the latter did. I believe their experiences hold lessons for all of us.

** Posted using Viigo: Mobile RSS, Sports, Current Events and more ** The wise moves that outpaced a wily and ambitious colleague.

Dumb Little Man shares ideas to make the everyday person more productive in life. Expect to read tips on finance, saving money, business, and some DIY for the house.

tips that might help you at work.

# Being Practical Human beings are emotional and many fall for popular decisions. A practical decision made at right time with right attitude has the

"Here's what I realized: 1. My perfect is not their perfect. 2. They don't have a perfect. In fact, there is no they. There are 2000 individuals, each of whom wants something a little different. 3. The more perfect I think it is, the less willing I'll be to let anyone change it. 4. The only way to make it useful to everyone is to allow each person to change it to suit him or herself. 5. The only way people will use it is if they do change it in some way. 6. The only way I will encourage them to change it and make it their own is if I make it imperfect.

Unfinished, Half-finished, half-baked is sometimes best.

"Why won't this work for you?" -- a powerful question to ask, at the right moment. Really thought-provoking article exploring why perfection is so hard, and hinting at why projects fail.

It's a particularly insidious problem for fast-growing start-ups. When you're really small and you're just starting out, you don't have that many people, so keeping everyone in the loop on everything doesn't really take that much time. But as you get bigger, the number of people who might potentially get involved in any particular discussion increases, and the amount of stuff you're doing as a company increases, and the amount of time you can waste overcommunicating becomes a serious problem.

"Have you ever invited employees to a meeting just so they wouldn't feel left out? If so, you may be an overcommunicator."

awesome article!

This tale of two boys, and of the millions of kids just like them, embodies the most stunning finding to come out of education research in the past decade: more than any other variable in education—more than schools or curriculum—teachers matter.

After his two years were up, Farr went to law school, as planned.,

Worth having every staff read and debate this article.

Blog article by Peter Bregman - July 2009 HarvardBusiness.org

Why we need to fail

Business literature is packed with advice about worker motivation—but sometimes managers are the problem, not the inspiration. Here are seven practices to fire up the troops. From Harvard Management Update.

Business literature is packed with advice about worker motivation—but sometimes managers are the problem, not the inspiration. Here are seven practices to fire up the troops.

Something happened to management culture decades ago and now being a Master of Business Administration, especially from Harvard, is rather on the nose. MBA, it's being said, can also stand for 'Mediocre but Arrogant', or 'Management by Accident'. Reporter, Stephen Crittenden.

"Fedex.com makes shipping so fast and easy, even an MBA can do it " (sweet ad) - education shaping culture, heritages squandered - Transcript of Henry Mintzberg, Phillip Delves Broughton, Russell Ackoff, Rakesh Khurana, Will Hooper et al on MBA's, admittance, arrogance, attitudes, best-and-brightest, compensation, elites, quantity over quality, risk averse people taking risks, syndromes, Taylorism and scientism, professions (over practices) - "educating for hubris" - Warren Buffet turned down by HBS, unlike Dubya who "was certainly decisive, let alone divisive, and he was decisive in utter ignorance. The case study method does that" - Leadership? "That's a disease in the United States. Everything is going to be cured by leadership. Look, every time you talk leadership, you're talking followership" - failed models, over-confidence that we have the right-answer - fast tracks (when there is no short cut), credentials over merit

The failure of business schools.

Around two-thirds of workers say the most stressful aspect of their jobs is their immediate boss, their line manager (Hogan, 2006). While this will come as no

Around two-thirds of workers say the most stressful aspect of their jobs is their immediate boss, their line manager (Hogan, 2006)...

PsyBlog | As a result of the strict hierarchies, huge pay differentials, poor decision-making, greasy-pole climbing and feeling powerless to change huge bureaucracies, followers naturally develop feelings of alienation, and alienation kills motivation and productivity, along with any hope of job satisfaction.

Michael practices proximity management. Every month he meets informally with each employee group. No agenda. No speeches. Just conversation. That helps him solve problems: for example, the time guest check-in was being mysteriously delayed.

zen The Fine Art of Decision-Making – 7 Tips for Getting Decisions Made Easier: Get to decisions quickly and.. http://tinyurl.com/cd8qye [from http://twitter.com/maxOz/statuses/1347428173]

Reading about decision making: http://budurl.com/3sux [from http://twitter.com/gideonking/statuses/1379167330]

I usually just read these and go "that's nice" and move on. But I think I might put these into practice. and the masses go "yeah right Jay, I'll believe #5 when I see it"

More often than not, these agreements are made through email which is far from perfect. Noted tech blogger Robert Scoble suggested last October that the number of emails required to get something done is equal to the number of people involved squared, i.e. eight people results in 64 emails. Sounds about right to me.

v komentářích

Via @orian

I work with and associate with a lot of talented people in this space. On a rare occasion people mistake me for talented. This post is a great reminder that it’s okay to say no to some requests, in fact, sometime it’s a game changer.

Saying no to loud people gives you the resources to say yes to important opportunities.

The notion that you’re trying to control the process and prevent error screws things up. We all know the saying it’s better to ask for forgiveness than permission. And everyone knows that, but I Think there is a corollary: if everyone is trying to prevent error, it screws things up. It’s better to fix problems than to prevent them. And the natural tendency for managers is to try and prevent error and over plan things.

Must read! RT@amcafee: Cannot recommend highly enough this interview with Pixar's Ed Catmull: http://bit.ly/cYGtLY - (via @jmcaddell)

mindblowing interview with the CEO of pixar. all on leading a top-creative company and managing creavity.

Awesome insights. "The notion that you’re trying to control the process and prevent error screws things up. We all know the saying it’s better to ask for forgiveness than permission. And everyone knows that, but I Think there is a corollary: if everyone is trying to prevent error, it screws things up. It’s better to fix problems than to prevent them. And the natural tendency for managers is to try and prevent error and over plan things." "That fundamentally successful companies are unstable. And where we have to operate is in that unstable place. And the forces of conservatism which are very strong and they want to go to a safe place. I want to go to the same place for money, I want to go and be wild and creative, or I want to have enough time for this, and each one of those guys are pulling, and if any one of them wins, we lose. And i just want to stay right there in the middle."

50 discursos históricos disponibles online http://bit.ly/9rfeOi – Juan Diego Polo (wwwhatsnew) http://twitter.com/wwwhatsnew/statuses/13120160646

Interesting approach to dealing with big problems that you seem to have no control over.

This is a must-read if you’re concerned about the health of your personal brand, job, or company during the current economic recession. If one thing is out of sync, don’t let it cause panic, build up the other aspects of your business so that when we come out of this thing, you’re suddenly ahead of the game (and your competitors).

keeping it balanced

Talks about the increases of CEOs using twitter and other SoMe.

advice for ceo's who twitter

Social media, it turns out, isn't about aggregating audiences so you can yell at them about the junk you want to sell. Social media, in fact, is a basic human need, revealed digitally online. We want to be connected, to make a difference, to matter, to be missed. We want to belong, and yes, we want to be led.

On the surface this post was promoting Seth’s new book Tribes, but take a closer look and he’s explaining why mass marketing and yelling at your audience doesn’t work, and how social media reveals a basic human need that we want to be connected, to make a difference and to matter.

Awesome - can't believe I missed this one first time round.

Seth Godin's blog

ideas that spread, win

Seth Godin: "Social media, it turns out, isn’t about aggregating audiences so you can yell at them about the junk you want to sell. Social media, in fact, is a basic human need, revealed digitally online. We want to be connected, to make a difference, to matter, to be missed." [via:Adriana Lukas]

Presentatie - ontwikkeling van marketing

leaders

Simon Sinek has a simple but powerful model for inspirational leadership all starting with a golden circle and the question "Why?" His examples include Apple, Martin Luther King, and the Wright brothers -- and as a counterpoint Tivo, which (until a recent court victory that tripled its stock price) appeared to be struggling.

Inspirational leadership from the question of "Why?"

Don't bother me, because I'm in the middle of my most important task as CEO -- hanging window blinds.

Our company was built on the idea of hiring smart and productive people and then clearing the decks.

TED Talks About Leadership

Video about the first follower

I still remember that person... http://tinyurl.com/c67zl6 [from http://twitter.com/mrdoubleb/statuses/1380242864]

Yeah, but he really knows his stuff... /Seth's Blog/ - Every organization worth its salt has at least one ... http://tinyurl.com/d3x8pl [from http://twitter.com/jorgefsb/statuses/1365156152]

Deep technical competency is overrated compared with the ability to make excellent decisions and to create a culture where forward motion is valued and personal initiative is rewarded. The good news is that the bully knows this, and the only reason he gets away with being a bully is that he thinks he's got you bluffed. Call his bluff and odds are you'll have a much more cooperative team, top to bottom.

Deep technical competency is overrated compared with the ability to make excellent decisions and to create a culture where forward motion is valued and personal initiative is rewarded.

Every organization worth its salt has at least one guy like this. Someone who knows every technical detail, or has vast expertise in the parliamentary procedure. Perhaps he's the coot who knows every verse of the Bible or is the...

useful info

Well! This is my thoughts of the day “To have the courage to follow your heart and intuition”

"The first follower converts a lone nut into a leader" - Derek Sivers: How to start a movement (3 min TED video) http://bit.ly/9hglNx

Directions for about 25 well-proven games for groups are succinctly supplied by this free PDF book, aimed at community building.

Kevin Kelly: "Directions for about 25 well-proven games for groups are succinctly supplied by this free PDF book. These games originated in church youth groups, but I've seen them used at camps, large family gatherings, company retreats, and even a few tech meetings. They are aimed at building community, and are primarily ones that can be run indoors. I've played a number of these games as an adult over the years and they really are deep fun. It is amazing how fast you can unleash your inner kindergartner. Some of this group fun, like Silent Football, have been around since ancient youth camp times. I wish more folks would enliven their stuffy meetings and offsites with a few of these games."

fun games to play with groups, via CoolTools

Frank and Jen showed this.

Learned about this at the Principal Series from Frank and Jen on 12/11/08

Learned about this link to IT sites through the principals' series.

We learned about this at the afternoon workshop.

Frank and Jen showed us this on 12/11/08 at principal's workshop

Frank & Jenn taught us this at the Macomb Principals workshop on 12/11/08

IT Principals workshop 12/11/08

Principal's Series 12/11/08

shown by Frank & Jenn @ 12/08 meeting

Shown by Frank &Jenn @12/08

from MAC principals meeting

Shown by Frank & Jean @ 12/08 meeting

What makes a boss great? It's a question I've been researching for a while now. In June 2009, I offered some analysis in HBR on the subject, and more recently I've been hard at work on a book called Good Boss, Bad Boss (forthcoming in September from Business Plus).

1. Does the CEO know what to do? One should interpret this question as broadly as possible. Does the CEO know what to do in all matters all of the time? This includes matters of personnel, matters of financing, matters of product strategy, matters of goal sizing, matters of marketing. At a macro level, does the CEO set the right strategy for the company and know its implications in every detail of the company? I evaluate two distinct facets of knowing what to do: Strategy—At Andreessen Horowitz, we like to say that in good companies, the story and the strategy are the same thing. As a result, the proper output of all the strategic work is the story. Decision making—At the detailed level, the output of knowing what to do is the speed and quality of the CEO’s decisions.

To be uncharacteristically serious for half a nanosecond, yes, Woot has signed an agreement to be acquired by Amazon...

Wishing all CEOs were like this

(The funniest letter ever to announce a takeover) We think now is the right time to join with Amazon because...every company that becomes a subsidiary gets two free downloads until the end of July... we plan to continue to run Woot the way we have always run Woot – with a wall of ideas and a dartboard. From a practical point of view, it will be as if we are simply adding one person to the organizational hierarchy, except that one person will just happen to be a billion-dollar company that could buy and sell each and every one of you like you were office furniture. Nevertheless, don’t worry that our culture will suddenly take a leap forward and become cutting-edge. We’re still going to be the same old bottom-feeders our customers and readers have come to know and love, and each and every one of their pre-written insult macros will still be just as valid in a week, two weeks, or even next year. For Woot, our vision remains the same: somehow earning a living on snarky commentary and junk.

It's already legendary, and it's quite possible there will never be another internal email from a CEO as good as this: http://bit.ly/ckni1o – dick costolo (dickc) http://twitter.com/dickc/statuses/17474430910