She was shocked to see what had been written about the Millville stuff!
Never email a list anything about a pending lawsuit ever again!
That’s what the lawyers say. Admittedly, that’s the way I felt when I read the Millville story. My old-style way of thinking was to hope that nobody even noticed while we contacted a PR firm to decide how best to spin things in case someone asked us about it.
But that’s not our business model.
Instead, our discussion settled on our policy of inclusion and we chose to tell you ourselves. Our goal is not to cover our butts and hide until the storm passes by, but rather to face the storm with a shaking fist shouting, “Is that the best you’ve got?”
It smacks in the face of lawyerly teachings as irresponsible and foolish. There’s been a better trend happening recently, however. One we feel is worth pursuing. A recent Wired Magazine article stated:
Now firms spill information in torrents, posting internal memos and strategy goals, letting everyone from the top dog to shop-floor workers blog publicly about what their firm is doing right – and wrong. Jonathan Schwartz, the CEO of Sun Microsystems, dishes company dirt and apologizes to startups he’s accidentally screwed. [...] In February, after JetBlue trapped passengers for hours in its storm-grounded planes and canceled 1,100 flights, CEO David Neeleman tried to deflect the blast of bad publicity by using YouTube to air his own blunt mea culpa. Microsoft, once a paragon of buttoned-down control, now posts uncensored internal videos – and encourages its engineers to blog freely about their projects.
We do still have secrets though we wish we didn’t have to. Some of our development ideas are patentable. Some of our potential business partners aren’t so forthcoming. Even the law prevents us from talking about some of our expectations. But the one thing we will not do is lie to you. You are the force that will drive us to completion. If we fail, it’s because we’ve let you down and I, and the rest of our staff, would feel sick about doing that.
April 12th, 2007 at 8:34 am
Love the honesty!
I was wondering when LiftPort was going to mention this (I kept hearing reports from the SE Journal, but nothing official here).
I guess every company has its first major hurdle to get through. Although its often the hurdles that define a great company from a future extinct one.
April 12th, 2007 at 5:16 pm
We were not ignoring the story – there was a weekend, Michael is on the road and we wanted to make sure we knew what was going on before we replied.
A lesson learned then. Next time – and there will always be a next time – post a place-holder; “we know there is a problem and we’ll have a response when we know what, exactly, is going on.”
Although its often the hurdles that define a great company from a future extinct one.
Everyone makes mistakes. Not everyone learns from them.
April 13th, 2007 at 5:57 am
Lawyers are after the easiest route to success. They are not interested in company policies, if it makes their job harder. They are like mechanics. Like a mechanic they want you to operate your buisness within some constraints that make there work easier. Being open is a new buisness strategy that Law and politics have very seldom been exsposed to. Openess is one of two new buisness strategies that the public is enjoying. The other being social programs. This is new age PR and it is the wave of the future. The Lawyers are just going to have to learn to deal with it.
April 13th, 2007 at 10:19 am
Lawyers are after the easiest route to success.
I’d have to disagree – years and years of school, bar exams – brother if that’s easy I’d like to see hard.
Aside: The lawsuit at the root of all this is simply the principles exercising prudent fiduciary management; not taking this action would mean they’re failing their own stakeholders.
Like a mechanic they want you to operate your buisness within some constraints that make there work easier
Disagree; it’s exercising prudent caution within the realm of their expertise.
A business works best when all the stakeholders are working together – business, legal, technical – they all have a part to play with unique strengths and weaknesses.
Brian Dunbar
LiftPort
April 15th, 2007 at 10:34 am
[...] the swears. We’re all still getting our heads into Transparency and a 24/7 attention cycle. Read something about a company on Friday and if there is nothing [...]
April 16th, 2007 at 6:22 pm
[...] the swears. We’re all still getting our heads into Transparency and a 24/7 attention cycle. Read something about a company on Friday and if there is nothing on [...]