Moving to America

Summary: Why I moved from Sydney to San Francisco with my startup (RecruitLoop), and how we’re pursuing a ‘dual-base’ strategy.

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We decided in late January to relocate from Sydney to San Francisco. It had been bubbling for a while. But then things moved quickly.

Within 4 weeks of pulling the trigger, we had a US company setup. Passports back in our hands with visas approved. Flights booked, bags packed, and most possessions sold. A removalist van left with the remaining few boxes at midday on a Sunday. 30 minutes later we were on our way to the airport. Literally.

Why the rush? We’d been offered a demo spot at Launch Festival, one of the biggest startup events in the US. It seemed a pretty solid entry point. The biggest names in tech along with 5,000 attendees. We arrived in country with 12 hours to spare. In reality, it was helpful just to have a deadline of any sort, to force the decision.

The logistics of getting into the US, as an Australian founder, couldn’t have been easier. I’ve said to a few people it felt like cheating. The visa process was remarkably simple (thanks Geoff!), which I’ll write about separately. As it stands, I (and my wife) can live and work in the US for the next 2 years, extendible almost indefinitely. It cost less than $3,000 upfront to ‘flip up’ to a US company. Which I’ll also write about separately. I believe this will become an increasingly common path for Australian startups. More also later.

The more important factor is why we made the move.

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Sydney to San Francisco: The First 2 Weeks

An article first published in the Sydney Morning Herald, sharing some experiences of moving to the Bay Area.

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Debate is raging in the Australian start-up community. Can we build and support high-growth companies locally, or do you need to be in Silicon Valley? But this is a false choice, and I’m working to prove it.

At the start of March I packed up my life and moved with my wife from Sydney to San Francisco. I’d launched a company, RecruitLoop, an online recruitment marketplace and video interview platform, 18 months ago with three other co-founders. We’re now chasing international growth. 

But here’s the thing: we didn’t make a choice to ‘leave’ Australia. It was never an either/or decision. We found another way, keeping a foot firmly in both camps, with my three co-founders remaining in Sydney.

This might seem like a risky strategy. In our view, it was the best one we could take and will give us a competitive advantage in both markets. The US brings market size, access to capital and partners. Australia brings world-class talent, generous start-up grants and proximity to Asia. 

The ‘dual-base’ strategy has been adopted by many established local tech companies (Atlassian, BigCommerce, NitroPDF). And we think it will become increasingly common for early-stage start-ups seeking the same benefits.

But how to make it work? 

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How I’m Getting Sh*t Done With Trello

What’s this about: Sharing a simple approach (and live example) to manage tasks and projects, using Trello.

I’m a sucker for productivity hacks.

It started with paper, back in the corporate world. Every week I’d take a fresh A4 sheet, and split it into 8 squares. Each square was a workstream, or project. I’d add all my tasks, then take great pleasure in crossing them off when complete. This sheet of paper would go with me everywhere, in the back of my notebook.

This worked for a while. Aside from getting stuff done, one of the great (unintended) benefits was the perception of being incredibly organised. If a task came my way, I could whip out the paper and just add it to the right section. Good upward management, in a world where perception can quickly become reality.

But life changed in a startup. Being productive became an ongoing pursuit: More like a treadmill, with constantly varying speeds and gradients, than a static snapshot that could be refreshed weekly.

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The One Thing You Can Do Best Globally

I’ve heard this sentiment expressed in different ways for startups.

“Find your one thing”

“Focus”

“The OMTM” (one metric that matters).

At SydStart today (Sydney’s biggest startup event), it was repeated in a way that somehow stuck with me:

Find the one thing you can be the best at globally. Make sure everyone on your team fully believes it. Then pursue it at the expense of anything else.  - Dominic O’Hanlon

Thinking about it this way just raises the bar.

A startup may have found its ‘one thing’, but if a dozen other companies can do the same or better, it’ll never make a dent. 

Avoiding Startup Bravado

I enjoyed a post from Brad Feld today about ‘having a wake for failed startups’.

He encourages startup founders to celebrate failures as an inevitable part of the journey. More so, it’s a call for others in the community to lead the celebration, because people going through it are very likely swamped by negative emotions.

We experienced this recently at the Fishburners community in Sydney. A friend had thrown everything behind a startup over a 2 year period. Then an international player in the space made a move that instantly cut off their oxygen. It was gutting to see. He’s now back in real job, re-fueling before the next adventure.

The founder led something of a wake himself, sharing lessons for others in the community. It was a seriously admirable, stoic reaction. I’ve wondered at length how I’d respond in his position.

Brad’s post prompted me to consider the flipside of this approach. Something I think hinders the constructive recognition and acceptance of failure. Something I call Startup Bravado.

Startup Bravado, in my mind, is driven by a fear of showing weakness in any form. An outward display of over-zealous assurance, which in all likelihood masks the same struggles faced by any other startup founder. It’s possibly a defensive mechanism, but one that is self-defeating.

What is it exactly? Hard to define, but obvious when you see it:

  • Constant insistence of how much we’re killing it
  • Loud celebration of vanity metrics as a measure of success
  • Resistance to admitting any uncertainty or weakness, even in a ‘safe environment’.

All these actions come down to personal style (and Australian founders are often accused of leaning too far in the opposite direction). Often they can be excused as part of the media game, or a pitch to win investors. I can handle that, and have no doubt been guilty of both.  

But there’s a fine line between the visionary founder, marching onwards towards a future only they can see, and someone who’s succumbed to Startup Bravado. Even then, I find the third point above detrimental in almost any situation. And the one most likely to prevent a constructive celebration of failure.

Founders of (non-competing) startups should be the ultimate ‘safe audience’. They know the struggle. They represent a risk-free time to let down your guard, admit weakness and offer support. No matter how well things are going, there’s always room for improvement. These conversations are critical to either preventing failure (however minor), or recognising and accelerating it, by moving on to other things faster.

I certainly get more from those type of open conversations, and think the startup community would benefit if everyone dropped the Startup Bravado.

Unless of course you’re always killing it. Then I’d love some tips.

The recruiter ‘moneypot’ (or, why people don’t like recruiters)

The recruiter moneypot

Last week I shared the best recruitment article I’ve ever read, which documented the ethical deficiencies of many agency recruiters with damning, real evidence. A classic honeypot.

One of the big issues was the repeated examples of recruiters poaching staff from the very company they were trying to work with. Poor form, and a practice that contributes massively to the cynicism and mistrust many people hold towards the recruitment industry.

So I was blown away when I saw a tweet yesterday, referencing an article from last month with some chest-beating from an agency recruiter about this exact practice: ‘When is a client not a client?’

The author is a ‘passionate recruiter’ who despises ‘the cowboy recruiters who give the industry a bad name’. That’s a good start.

But this post is a brazen ‘you’re either with me or against me’ statement to justify when and how he draws the line between real clients, and ‘fair game’ for poaching staff.

As he says:

Companies in my marketplace broadly fall into two categories. I will either be working with them (i.e. a client), or they are a source of candidates.

Fair enough, perhaps. But then how to decide who’s a bona-fide client, and just some bozo who may have paid me once but isn’t a current favourite?

It is not just because they have called out of the blue and given me a job spec to work on, especially on a contingent basis. Similarly, just because we did some business together  at some point in the past, it doesn’t necessarily make them a client today. And they are definitely, absolutely and categorically not a client if  terms and fees have not been agreed and signed.

And in case there was any confusion…

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3. Accounting
Our primary measurement of revenue is a non-GAAP accounting principle known as Adjusted Consolidated Assumed Income (ACAI). ACAI is an ancient accounting remedy that can slow the aging process of most balance sheets and rejuvenate the face of any company, no matter what the medical community or the FTC might tell you.

McSweeney’s Internet Tendency: Prospectus for Silicon Valley’s Next Hot Tech IPO, Where Nothing Could Possibly Go Wrong.

^ this is too good

Source: mcsweeneys.net

You can’t please ‘em all

We have live chat installed on our site. It’s a great feature for live feedback, and has helped with many solid leads and conversations.

Sometimes, someone drops in and gives us a real kick.

This is too good not to share somewhere. We must be doing something right…

Cranky pants