After some reflection, I quickly came to see that I have been inherently operating under Baron and Hannan's "Commitment" typology for my social venture. As our start-up operates as a non-profit, attracting talented team members with money is rarely an option. While definitely our unique tech-based exchange offers some autonomy and freedom in innovative work, the majority of development has already been completed, and the remaining key actions are short-term projects. However, every member of the Birdbrain team has been drawn to the company through a personal connection to the mission, to get girls into STEM classes. It is clear that our team is connected through an attachment of love, and we would struggle to collaborate with someone who did not share that vision. This same motivation bleeds over into the selection category, as we would need to hire one or two full-time staff members to operate the Int'l Classroom Exchange. These new team members would be primarily responsible for integrating the new program into the existing curriculum and business model, and thus a fit with our cultural values would be imperative. As the exchange doesn't require extensive technical development to implement, hard or soft skills are not overly valuable. Lastly, as the CEO is currently reigning in business development in favor of laser-sharp mission focus, long-term potential, while valuable, takes a back-seat to present day personal integration.
The last category of Coordination and Control is where I see a significant difference in operational styles between myself and Birdbrain's CEO. As a former teacher and daughter of an anthropologist, my instinct is to rely on peer and cultural influences to control employee behavior and performance. I firmly believe humans are motivated by a need to be accepted and approved by their peers, and establishing a strong workplace culture is the best defense against slipping standards. However, the current CEO seems to rely more on professional control. Understandably so, as the few staff members he has taken on are at the tops of their respective fields and have the credentials to prove they are capable of autonomous professionalism. However, if I myself was continuing to develop this venture, I would recommend switching to my method, as the top echelon ecosystem he has created would combine naturally with peer acceptance to foster even further self-initiated professional development in his staff. However, I do not think the CEO yet recognizes the depths of his own great potential for spurring the development of his staff.
To this end, CEO's must always be conscious of their own role in the organizational heirarchy This idea dawned on me while reading Stephan Uhrenbacher's blog, "Basics for Organizing a Startup" (http://stephan-uhrenbacher.com/basics-for-startup-organization/735/) where he draws parallels between the lessons given for organizing a startup to the advice he recently gave his 6 year old daughter on cleaning up her room. While his lessons are not only insightful but practical, he fails to recognize perhaps the most significant lesson of his parable- that the Boss sets the culture. Workplace culture is the most persuasive tool to eliciting desirable employee performance, and workplace culture can only be controlled by the culture's authorities. The Boss sets the standards and expectations that generate the workplace culture, and their demonstration of adhereance to this culture is the best tool for directing employee performance. By teaching his daughter the underlying lessons for how to organize her room, Mr. Uhrenbacher demonstrated the standards that he expects from his daughter, and thus has a higher chance of seeing the standards reproduced in her later work. The same lesson holds true in business. CEOs need to remember that much like parents, they set the rules that any one under their roof must abide by.
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