Career

As I mentioned Monday, I'm now another vendor puke - working for eIQnetworks to help security professionals do their stuff better. Given the flexibility, limited stress, and very comfortable economic prospects of continuing Security Incite, why on earth would I take a job?

Basically, a number of things came together - the first being my own restless soul. As I look back through my career, about every 2-3 years I've decided to do something else. Not always with another company, but I've changed my job responsibilities on a fairly regular cycle. It's been about 3 years since I left my last "job" and I was definitely looking to do something else.

Not a job, mind you. But to pretty radically change what Security Incite did and what it offered.

Then I got a call from an old friend and mentor, who asked me to come in and do some consulting in his new shop. So I did, and I guess the rest is history.

But I didn't take the decision lightly, I actually agonized about this more than I have any other career decision in my life. After I took a step back, I built a set of attributes on which I'd evaluate the job and the decision. Basically I went to visit the P.O.P.E.

No, I didn't really go see clergy to help me make the decision. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but it's not me. I tend to listen to my gut about big decisions and the following 4 buckets really helped my gut get some clarity. Perhaps these 4 topics will help you out in your next job search.

People

Ultimately working for a company is all about the people. You spend an awful lot of time with these folks, so you better enjoy hanging out with them. Additionally, they better be good folks and able to do their job. The key question is can these folks get it done? Besides Jim Geary, eIQ has a number of other top notch folks. If the people weren't up to the task, there is no way I'd have joined the company.

Opportunity

WIthout a market, it doesn't matter how good the people are. I've been there and done that. So the fact that I'd done more work on security management than probably any other topic was very helpful. I understood the customer problems, the issues with the existing products in the market and the fact that the space already supports at least two $100 million+ players, so there is a real opportunity there.

Product

If the product sucks, it doesn't matter how good the people are, or how large the opportunity is. You aren't going to get there. So I took a detailed look at SecureVue, eIQ's enterprise-class security and compliance management product. It's been in the space for about 18 months, and is in use in quite a few large, enterprise class customers. These accounts are happy and eIQ is winning head to head deals against the biggest players in the space.

More importantly, in my strategy role, I'll have a hand in pushing the product forward and making sure it continues to meet the needs of the largest customers and government agencies out there.

Exit

Finally, if there are limited potential exits for the company, the capabilities of the people or the market or the product just don't matter. The good news is that there are still quite a few large IT vendors that do security and compliance management pretty poorly. Of course, we have a lot of work to do to add enough value to make a difference, but at some point many of the "Big Security" players will realize that their offerings are lame and need to bring on something better.

eIQ has a lot of flexibility in looking at these strategic options a few years down the line. The company is entirely self-funded, thus far, so there aren't a bunch of pissy investors who have had their money tied up for 7 years and have little opportunity for liquidity any time soon.

Of course, companies are not sold, they are bought. So we need to just keep executing on our plans and at some point down the road, we're confident a partner will come find us. But without that flexibility and the prospect of a liquidity event somewhere down the road, the opportunity at eIQ would be far less interesting.

Final thoughts

I wasn't kidding when I said I agonized over this decision. I was really happy as a one-man band and doing quite well. But ultimately I fancy myself to be a builder and eIQ gives me the opportunity to build a strong strategy and marketing function. I'll be able to add a lot of value, almost immediately, and be able to work with some folks I really respect in a market space that I like.

So from that standpoint, it's all good. But one final parting thought is that my three years doing Security Incite has liberated me from worry. I started with nothing and built something and was able to support my family. If need be, I can do it again. So I'm not scared anymore about being able to pay the bills.

That confidence gives me the ability to take risks because even if it doesn't work out, I know I'll figure something out. Which is a good place to be.

Photo: "Pope's Blessing" originally uploaded by alykat

My kids love Scooby Doo. I love the typical refrain at the end, when the mystery is solved and the bad guy inevitably says, "those crazy kids" as he or she is hauled off. I read about how some of these Web 2.0 entrepreneurs are behaving and "those crazy kids" is right.

Facebook is back in the news, since evidently they are (once again) doing the mating dance. But in reading this post by Business 2.0's Erick Schonfeld (here) I am just appalled at the behavior of Facebook's CEO.

Check this out:

According to the WSJ, Facebook's 22-year-old founder Mark Zuckerberg's late-sleeping habits kept him from one 8AM meeting with Microsoft during acquisition talks earlier this year. And in previous discussions with Yahoo, he pulled this college move:

Around March, Yahoo was weighing a roughly $1 billion offer ... . At one point in the Yahoo negotiations, the talks extended into the weekend, says a person familiar with the matter. Mr. Zuckerberg, this account continues, said he couldn't take part because his girlfriend was in town.

Any wonder these deals fell apart? I get that this kid (and yes he's a kid) is anti-establishment since he had a business card with the title "I'm CEO, bitch" (here). I get that the "playing hard to get" game is perceived to drive up value. But this is ridiculous.

Now I'm all for balance. In fact, I got out of the corporate rat race so I could be more accessible to my family and happier as a person. But if I had $100 million on the line (if Zuckerberg owns just 10% of Facebook), I think my wife and kids would understand if I had to leave the house early for a meeting or work a Saturday or two.

I guess this guy's girlfriend is not the understanding type. Just imagine what she'll be like if they get married. Can you spell pre-nup?

Or maybe this guy is just a joke. I understand that Facebook has built a significant community. But the fact is, consumers (especially kids) are very fickle. In order to monetize the community (and make a $1 Billion dollar deal pay) they are going to need leadership for years to come. Taking off a weekend to get busy with your girlfriend, when you could be negotiating a life changing deal for many of the folks on your team is not leadership.

At times I've gotten fairly personal on the blog. Every so often you get to hear about the adventures of my kids and a bit about my motivations and philosophies (here and here). I appreciate you reading and hopefull that provides some better understanding of what makes me tick. As if any of you care...

But sometimes I read somebody elses work and it really resonates with me. I mean REALLY resonates. This post by Tom Peters (here) is that kind of piece. Of course, Tom Peters is a legend. He makes a boatload of coin by showing up and waxing poetically on stuff. But this isn't about money. It's about impact. It's about happiness.

I spent many years planning out my career progression. All with the goal of world domination firmly in my sites. When I was a kid, people would ask me what I wanted to do. To make my folks happy, most of the time I said "be a doctor." That's what was culturally expected. I never wanted to be a lawyer, go figure.

But one time, I was actually honest and said "I want to be king!" And I wasn't joking. Of what, you ask? "Of everything!" And that's what drove me for a long time. But as I've aged and passed the point where more of my hair was gray than less, I've had a change of heart.

Why? Because I see what is involved in being King. I've seen the sacrifices and the mangled relationships, the absentee parenting, and the fact that these folks see much more of their co-workers than anyone else. Days, nights, weekends - there is no end. I got to the point where I wasn't willing to make the sacrifices necessary to be King.

Someone else can do that, and more power to them. But they also should keep a good divorce lawyer on their speed dial and a top notch psychologist close at head to help their kids reconcile why their parent thought it was more important to work than to parent.

But this is my personal philosophy. I also believe in "to each their own." So far be it for me to be critical, I've just seen the movie and it's not interesting to me.

So basically, nowadays I live life one day at a time. I could do worse than to emulate Tom Peters and go "from speech to speech and Post to Post and book to book—with no thought about "impact." He also mentions a great quote from Southwest Airlines' Herb Kelleher: "We have a 'strategic plan,' it's called 'doing things.'"

My plan is to have no plan. That doesn't mean I don't think about cool things that I would like to do. Or go all in once I decide to do something. But I'm done trying to figure out how this will lead to that and how that will lead to buying an airplane. I never understood the saying "Success is a journey, not a destination," when I was a marketing guy. Now I get it.

I threw out the financial model for Security Incite once I figured out I could pay the bills. I'm entirely focused on the journey nowadays. I chase projects and opportunities that I think will be fun, where I can have an impact. I turn away work that won't keep me engaged or involve people I don't want to work with.

And I try to get things done every day. And I'm a much happier guy for it. But that's me.