Busy, busy, busy.
When I joined Carbon IQ I had certain ideas about what I would do: I would do things my way. I would create schedules that made sense. I would do unstintingly quality work. I would speak honestly and openly with my coworkers, and politics and game-playing would not exist and above all I would remember that we are all human begins, and a business is there to support the humans who work for it, not the other way around.
Everything I thought about owning your own business is true– you get to do the quality of work you want to do, you can take off at 2 p.m. on a Wednesday to catch a matinee and finish the work on a Sunday without people looking at your strangely for either, and you learn all the time. What I didn’t know I’d do was all the support jobs, from office manager to bill collector. You pick up envelopes, you call a client to inform them they are three weeks late in payment, you scan news groups trying to figure out why they heck PDF’s won’t print…. The big advantage however, of a small business over freelancing is you aren’t completely alone. I called the client because Noel didn’t want to deal with it anymore, and Noel edited a proposal I was writing when I couldn’t see straight anymore. Gabe coaxes the printer to print just when I’m willing to pour coke on it, and I tweak the JavaScript rollovers that are trying to make Gabe insane. We are all there for each other, in a pragmatic unsentimental and immensely comforting way. There are no politics, there are no games and the business is the human beings who work there. period.
A small company is the hardest work I have ever done in my life, and I have never learned so much either– I have no question I’m a better IA for it, as I understand business issues viscerally. My empathy for a businesses need to survive is at an all time high…
I wouldn’t trade this opportunity for anything in the world. It’s been scary, frustrating and awakening. These have the best six months of my professional life. I look forward to the future. Thanks, Noel and Gabe!