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After six years at Google working on everything from AdSense to
How does the LA startup community to San Franscisco’s?
After 12 years in the San Francisco tech and startup community, I've enjoyed shifting gears down south. The one thing that's obvious in LA is that there is a strong enthusiasm to build the tech community. Community is one of Hang Local's pillars, so I've appreciated that sentiment.
I think the community probably needs more engineering horsepower to contribute to the growing desire to build pure tech in LA. There are a lot of great engineers at great universities in and around LA and we should be keeping them in LA by offering them exciting opportunities in technology.
What’s the biggest lesson you learned while working at Google?
I'm extremely grateful for my time at Google and I learned a tremendous amount, so it'd be hard to pin me to one thing. It was interesting to see the company go from 1,000 to 20,000 people. In that time, I saw a lot of people come - and a decent amount go (obviously, myself included).
Life at Google is pretty good, so it's interesting to see why people leave. I learned that you’ve got to feel valued for your work and love what you do. If those things are out of alignment, then you're probably not happy and not doing your best work. Before we IPO'd, one guy asked at a company meeting if people would leave Google after the IPO. Eric Schmidt responded with something like, 'People would leave when they stop feeling valued'. I think there is a lot of truth in that statement.
Tell us about your life as a startup founder (the ups and the downs!).
Bootstrapping a startup as a solo founder has been challenging and I learned that, no matter what, there is only so much that can get accomplished in one day, especially when it involves writing code. Let's just say that I can't wait to hire a team shortly! But when I talk to people about Hang Local, they get it; it's rewarding when people connect with what you about what you pour your heart and soul into day in and day out.
How can the local startup community help you out in your current endeavors?
I'm testing out connecting folks to meet up around shared hashtags and I've set up a #builtinla hashtag for the 'Built in LA' community at 'http://hanglocal.us/builtinla' .... please give it a whirl and drop me a note.
