Since taking over at CEO at Widgetbox, I have completely lost the blogging muse. The longer the silence, the more pressure I feel/felt to write something interesting.
Why is it harder to write?
Busier? Not really.
If not that, then what?
It finally hit me today. As a VC, I actively worked with nine to ten investments, met with scores of potential investments, and enjoyed a wonderful perch with which to observe start-up life, the venture process, and best/worst practices.
I could write, "I attended a board meeting today and observed x, y, and z." Or, "today I met a VP Sales who really understand the sales life cycle..." The anonymity of the comments provided cover that allowed for rich detail and candid observations on the week's learnings. The inability to tie a comment to a particular person, venture investor, company...etc makes for rich commentary and illustrative examples.
As a CEO, this is harder - it is not "a" board meeting but "my" board meeting - ie the parables and lessons leave little room to the imagination with respect to the source and people involved.
Furthermore, I am wary to turn my blog into a Widgetbox promotional vehicle and simply post about all the wonderful things we are up to at 1000 Sansome St.
I am working on a voice that can replace the lens into the VC world without Wbox chest-beating and/or Wbox confessionals.
In upcoming posts, I plan to comment on the VC vs operating role choice and my observations on what it is like to move from one side of the table to the other. I know it is the quintessential young VC question - and I hope to share my experiences with those thinking through the two choices.
Apologies for the radio silence - I am working to adapt my blogging voice to my new role.
Perhaps you just need to "tilt your frame"? i.e. "last month we noticed this about our company, and we had some meetings, and their was some resistance, but we are going forward with x, y, z".... i.e .the journey through the ceo process?
ReplyDeleteI would rather think that you should feel free to promote your company in your blog. What needs more caution is when you write about other topics, including what you learned from your management experiences.
ReplyDeleteIn this age of personal broadcasting tools, people broadcast even what needs to be communicated silently between individuals. The world will eventually find new ethics, but right now people seem overshooting. It's not different here in Korea. A politician recently said, "Stop talking to a microphone. Let's meet."
Will - don't be shy about pimping WidgetBox in your blog. We want to know about widgets and why you are psyched about them and what you are doing to make the WWW (wonderful world of widgets) even better.
ReplyDeleteI agree. After all, we've got to see what it is about that company that led you away from that comfortable perch at Hummer Winblad!
ReplyDeleteBut I also look forward to the new perspective.
Board meetings are not really blog friendly.
ReplyDeleteI also found it a bit hard to blog in the last couple of months. Maybe it is just a naturally introspective time of the year.
I usually read the NY times every day and then I blog about current events and my opinion of those events.