In my previous blog post Do’s and Don’ts of a Job Interview I described the importance of the first ten seconds of a job interview from the interviewee’s standpoint. In this post I will dive into the importance, limitations and traps of the first ten seconds, but focus instead on the interviewer’s standpoint.

The Caveman Brain

Have you ever noticed that when you talk with people you have never met on the phone, you always try to picture what they look like? You try to imagine what their face looks like, if they are tall or short, slim or heavy, if they have dark or light hair, all based on their voice. Of course, when we actually meet the person we usually realize we were completely wrong. What happened was your brain tried to classify the voice into a collection of labels, such as: height: tall, skin color: fair, hair color: brown, weight: somewhat heavy, background: maybe from New York, and so on.

Your brain is doing this because in our early evolutionary stages, for the last tens of thousands of years up until the last few centuries, we needed the ability to make quick decisions based on very little information. You literally had to take one look at someone and decide if he or she was a friend or a foe. Can you trust him or her in a deal? And by “a deal” I mean trading a sheep or a goat. It is much easier for our brain to make decisions based on small number of factors, so we learned to classify anything and everything, and we continue to do so to this very day.

We look at people and make snap decisions about them. We decide that they are fat or thin, black or white, American or foreign, straight or gay, Republican or Democrat, etc. Our brain quickly classifies people all the time, whether we want it to or not. We’re often not even aware of it. I call this part of us the Caveman Brain.

What this has to do with me?

You are probably thinking that this has nothing to do with you. When you’re interviewing someone for a position at your company, you are a professional and experienced interviewer, with a list of questions, tests, and clear criteria for an ideal candidate. So what does this have to do with you?

The reality is it has everything to do with you, because we are people not machines. How many times in the past when you interviewed someone did you get a “bad gut feeling” about him or her? How many times did you “sense something is wrong”? How many times could you “not put your finger on it, but…”? This is our Caveman Brain hinting us towards what it concludes is the best assessment of this person.

Remember that it has nothing to do with intelligence or experience, it is a deeper and more instinctual reaction, like fear, that you can’t control unless you are aware of it. With that in mind, let’s talk about how the Caveman Brain affects the interview process.

The First 10 Seconds of the Job Interview

Our Caveman Brain quickly categorizes anything it sees into small sets of classifications and informs us of its decision, and this happens within the first seconds of seeing our interviewee. Of course for some it takes longer than ten seconds and for others it takes less (they call themselves “intuitive”). The point is that very quickly, before the intelligent part of the brain has had any time to collect substantive information, our Caveman Brain already made a decision and told us about it. Before you asked a single question, some part of you already classified the person, already put them into a neat little box and labeled them.

Let me be clear, I’m not saying we’re all bigots that make snap decisions about people based on their appearance and other shallow factors. I’m just emphasizing the fact that the instinctive safety mechanism nature embedded in us many, many generations ago is still there, and we need to be aware of it when meeting new people.

The goal of a successful interviewer is to reverse the order of things: let the intelligent brain think and collect information, so it can make an informed decision and then let the Caveman Brain add some “gut feeling” to the mix.

Put on a Blindfold

Think of yourself as a judge on “The Voice” TV show, where candidates are judged on their talent before their appearance is even known. I don’t suggest literally covering your eyes, although that would be interesting (should probably try it one day) but rather mentally blocking yourself from focusing on the exterior. Be mindful of the fact that some part of you will want to immediately analyze and categorize the person in front of you, and blindfold it. It’s not simple, but with practice you can do it.

Discuss Anything but the Interview

Take the first few minutes and discuss anything but the interview, talk about the weather, traffic, a movie, etc. It will put the interviewee at ease which should put your Caveman Brain at ease as well. I, for example, go to the waiting area and walk with the candidate, offer the interviewee a drink, chit-chat about something for the first two minutes.

Start with the Intelligent Brain

Some people do just the opposite; they move directly into the interview. They will wait in their office, briefly welcome the candidate and jump right into business. This approach, although it sounds cold and impersonal, has a great advantage: you put your intelligent brain in the driver’s seat from the get-go. It’s harder for the other person, but as the interviewer it’s much easier since you don’t need to shift gears/brains. Again, because this is much less personal make sure to be extra nice.

Post-Interview

Think about the candidate and the interview for a few minutes after the interview is over. Once the person is not in front of you, the Caveman Brain is no longer in charge and the Intelligent Brain is in the driver’s seat. Think, analyze, process and write your thoughts down. Talk with others who interviewed the candidate about their thoughts, and evaluate other perspectives.

Final Thoughts

Doing this is hard, I know, but it’s much harder to find really good people. Now that you know about the Caveman Brain you’ll be more aware of it and hopefully take its suggestions with a grain of salt. There’s nothing wrong with your gut feeling, after all it helped your ancestors survive for generations, just don’t let it drive your business while the Intelligent Brain sits in the passenger’s seat.

It wasn’t an easy ride for Microsoft, and there were many competitors along the way: IBM with OS2, different Linux operating systems, and of course Mac OS. But Microsoft kept the status quo, partially because of competitors’ mistakes, good products they created (sometimes, not always), and people’s tendency to stay with what they know. But the main reason that everyone wanted Windows was software. Everyone needed software because everything was implemented as software. Every game, productivity tool, utility, chat, email, etc. (and there were millions to chose from) had software you needed to install, and they all run on Windows. Other OSs had only a tiny fraction of the software built for them, which is why everyone flocked to Windows. The masses would not think about buying a Linux OS because it could not run their favorite game and Word. It was a market Check Mate.

But in the past few years things have changed. The Internet evolved, became faster, reached more people, and new types of sites were created. Not just for consuming content but for sharing content (aka, web 2.0) and lately for productivity and collaboration. You can now do everything online, you can chat, check your email, create documents or spreadsheets, work on your photos, play tons of games and everything in between. If you think about it, what software did you install on your computer lately? There are only three categories that still require installation: Anti Virus/Security, Office, and sophisticated games (i.e. Call of Duty). Everything else you can do online. There are other niches like Photoshop and movie editing but for 99% of consumers, that short list is pretty much it.

So, if everything is online do you really need Windows or just a browser? This exact question is what Google wants everyone to ask and Microsoft dreads. With less than 45% browser market share and dropping Microsoft is not even situated to control the browser market. Google was smart and fast to promote their Chrome browser, which is biting at Microsoft’s IE market share like nothing we’ve seen in the past. I guess when billions of people come to your website each day you can promote your product pretty effectively.

Microsoft was late for the smartphone market and is now in a long and expensive uphill battle. Even though Windows 7 phones are very good and not just another icon based smartphone, it’s a hard sell for the iPhone addicts market. Google is coming fast from behind with Google Docs and Spreadsheets, conquering the Microsoft Office market share and not just on the consumer space, but also in Microsoft’s backyard, the Enterprise space. Microsoft was also late for the tablet/slate market and is working extra hard to catch up with the iPad. While Apple just released version 3 of the iPad (read my though on it here), Microsoft’s slate is still in the works. To top it all off, Mac sales are at an all time high and, if it was once, too expensive and all around strange to buy a Mac, more and more are flocking to Apple stores and buying one. It feels like Microsoft is under attack on all fronts and is losing ground. Not an easy situation to be in.

The question we need to ask is the following: is Microsoft the type of company that, when major challenges arise, will make tough choices and come out on top?

I believe so. I’ve been paying close attention to what they are doing and I strongly believe they are making a comeback, and it’s called Windows 8. It’s not just another OS with nicer icons and cooler drop shadow effects. Microsoft is making some brave decisions here that, no offense, we’ve seen coming more from Apple than Microsoft. Windows 8 is significantly different from anything else currently in the market with its Metro style, navigation and user interaction. They are basically betting the house on this one and they know they can’t lose. Playing with my Windows 8 tablet (slate) I was fairly impressed. It’s very different from anything else out there and its something we haven’t say about a Microsoft product in a while: IT’S COOL! It’s designed in a way that tech babies as well as dinosaurs can understand, which is very important to Microsoft. They have about 500 million Windows 7 users that they hope to convert to Windows 8. They integrated a store into the OS and are working hard on getting as many apps as possible ready for launch. Windows 8 will work on all computers from tablets/slate to heavy servers, which is a huge advantage to developers and consumers alike. Since Apple brought the importance of installing applications back from the grave, I believe Microsoft will take that approach with a thunder. This time, Apple simply followed Microsoft’s gameplay not the other way around. Apple only called them “Apps” instead of Applications or software, but Microsoft invented the concept.

Doing a pivot in a startup is easy, turning a ship the size of Microsoft is hard, slow, and risky but it looks to me like they are doing it right and with a lot of though. I would not bury Microsoft just yet; more likely start buying Microsoft stock while the price is low, before Windows 8 hits the shelves.

The bill will allow the parents of any kid under the age of 18 to request any social networking web site like Facebook to remove ANY personal information from the site, within 48 hours upon request. In addition it prohibit from displaying any personal information for any minor under the age of 18 without consent.

The best part of is that the bill will impose a civil penalty, not to exceed $10,000, for each violation.

Ouch!

Social Networking Internet Web Sites Privacy – SB 242 Corbett

See the best team in LA talk.

There is a know assumption that people that are more environmentally friendly, drink from reusable cups, don’t use paper, and buy Hybrid cars, are better, selfless, elite.

However, the research below shows that that’s not necessarily the case. It seems that thinking about green stuff and buying green stuff is different. Simply put, people who buy green products cheat, lie, and steal more than people who don’t! The research state that: “mere exposure to green products and the purchase of them lead to markedly different behavioral consequences. In line with the halo associated with green consumerism, people act more altruistically after mere exposure to green than conventional products. However, people act less altruistically and are more likely to cheat and steal after purchasing green products as opposed to conventional products”.

So much for conventional wisdom.

Do Green Products Make Us Better People

The research can be found in Social Science Research Network and will be published in an upcoming issue of Psychological Science.

• Outsourcing best practices
• Do’s and don’ts of outsourcing
• Top mistakes people do when outsourcing
• What can and should you outsource? Architecture? Code? Support? Content creation? Testing? Other?
• How to find outsourcing solutions?
• How do you manage a remote team?

We are joined this month by James Siminoff, founder/CEO of PhoneTag and Aaron Hawkey co-founder and CEO/CTO of Cramster.  Both have extension experience in identifying and working with outsourced teams to build their technology companies.  Plus this month’s event will be moderated by Alon Shwartz.

These events are put on in conjunction with our friends at DealMaker Media. TO SIGN UP FOR THIS EVENT, CLICK HERE

The event is free and is followed by a reception and mixer at the Docstoc Offices in Santa Monica by the 3rd Street Promenade. The venue holds about 140 folks, ALL PREVIOUS EVENTS WERE FULL WITH STANDING ROOM ONLY. If you are not one of the first 140 to RSVP and confirm, we will have a waiting list.

Thursday, May 28th 6:30pm – 8:00pm (Townhall)…. 8:00pm on, Reception
Cost: FREE
This event is capped at 140 attendees.
Confirmation will be required or your spot will be given up for our waiting list.

Santa Monica Public Library (Auditorium) 601 Santa Monica Blvd.
Santa Monica, CA 90401

TO SIGN UP FOR THIS EVENT, CLICK HERE

About Startups Uncensored

Startups Uncensored is a free monthly speaking series, townhall, and networking event for entrepreneurs and technology aficionados, hosted by Jason Nazar, CEO of Docstoc.com. These monthly meetups are centered around different topics meant to help startups build their businesses. The event, brought to you by DealMaker Media, contributes to the growing Los Angeles technology scene by bringing together various entrepreneurs, angel investors, venture capitalists, social media experts, and professionals in the tech field. The format of the series typically includes a 45 minute presentation or panel followed by 45 minutes of questions and answers, and its co-hosted by notable CEOs and Investors.

This post is for everyone, married, singles, with children and without. I tried to focus on a few, non-common, lessons I’ve learned along the way. If you don’t have children but plan on having some in the future, please continue reading at your own risk. If you do have children, please sit down…

A starting Point

You really though it will be easier than this, didn’t you? You though you can do it all with time to spare. I can almost hear it “I can do/manage multiple projects at once, how difficult can it be?” or “I’ll just have to be more efficient” or “I will change!” or “my wife will help…” or probably all of the above. Instead, it became your life’s biggest underestimated challenge and you find yourself in an uncharted territory. It is very challenging to have a demanding job while raising a (mentally) healthy family.  I’m not going to tell you that it’s going to be easy or share some “tricks” I’ve learned that will make it all better and easy. There are no easy answers or 10 golden rules that, if followed, life will be rosy and simple. Than again, if you read this post you’re not looking for a simple and rosy life.

However, I will tell you that it IS possible. I will tell you that you don’t have to choose between your carrier and your family! You just have to adjust some things in your life, people’s expectations (including yourself), think about it as much as you think about issues as work, and make even more sacrifices.

Ready?

Balance

Think of your life as a triangle with the following sides: your family life, your professional life, and your personal life.  This triangle needs to fit into a 24 hours timeframe. You can’t increase one side of the triangle without shortening another. The first instinct we have is to believe we can cut our personal life to zero, but it really doesn’t work. Everyone needs some time for themselves, to charge batteries, to enjoy life, to take a break. We don’t even notice it we just end up in front of the TV or with friends or at the gym or at another conference, which cuts the family side of the triangle.

Once you realize the triangle of life and understand that every part of the triangle needs to be represented, you start understanding the need to balance. Many years ago, when my first son was born, my wife kept telling me I have to stop working seven days a week. I didn’t understand what she’s talking about and kept saying I’m only working six days, at most. So she started taking notes every day, when I left and when I came back, when I started working at home and when I finished. After a few weeks she showed me the list. I was shocked. I was working seven days a week, at least 12 hours a day. I didn’t even notice. I realize there was only one side to my triangle and I need to make room for three. I needed to balance my life.

Share is Caring

Many people don’t tell their husband or wife almost anything about their professional life. Yeah, there’s the chit-chat about office stuff and the usual “How was your day honey?” but with no real substance. Starting a business, working on a tough project or any other challenging effort impacts our life and resonates on the other sides of the triangle. There are no firewalls in our head; there is no switch we can turn On or Off when we get home. You can take your clothes off your body but not your mind off things.

The answer is to make everyone at home part of your professional life, your wife/husband, your children, your parents, everyone! The more they understand what it is you do and how important it is to you, the more they’ll help, the more they’ll empathize, the more happy they’ll be when you are, and the more understanding they will be when you’re not.

Once you start sharing you’ll realize how much you gain by it and in ways you can’t imagine. When I explained to my older son what is Docstoc and what I do, he was so exited he started thinking with me about new features and how to make the site better. Many times, before he goes to sleep we think together about new features, the product roadmap, and the features he wants. He’s ten years old.

Be More Efficient At Work Not At Home!

It is important to be efficient, to be able to achieve more in a given unit of time. If you prioritize your tasks in order of importance, you can usually accomplish half your daily list, if you’re good. If you finished your list for the day, you did something wrong… at work, it’s all about efficiency.

At home it’s NOT! You cannot and should not be efficient with your kids or your wife. The concept of “quality time” is nonsense, as you cannot efficiently play with your kids. You cannot efficiently prepare them for life. You cannot have an efficient relationship with your wife. If you need to finish stuff at the office better stay late that day and come early the next day. It’s better than coming “somewhat late” both days and spent seven and a half minutes with them.

Sleep

Our society made us believe that sleeping is overrated. We find ourselves sleeping less and less stretching ourselves to the limit. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy stretching myself to the limit but I also understand what it means.

The problem with sleeping less is that we use most of our energy during the day, at work. That leaves very little energy when we get back home. We’re tired and cranky and don’t really enjoy what is an important part of our life.

Dude, get some sleep, you’re a mammal, a human, it’s natural, you need it.

Get Energize – With Them

A lot of people get energized when they’re by themselves, with friends, hiking, running, reading, watching a movie, etc.  Think about doing some of these activities by with your family. I’m not talking about a family trip to Vegas or Hawaii. I’m talking about doing whatever YOU need to get energized but taking someone with you.

I really don’t like floor games, it’s boring and hurts my back. I do like hiking and biking, the air and the wind are great for recharging. So I spend less time playing Chatters and Ladders and more time hiking/walking/biking with the kids. Find what YOU like to do and see if you can fit your family with you.

Last Words

Someone once told me that you could either be a businessman or a family man. I believe life’s ultimate purpose and challenge is to be both especially if you want to make a positive change in the world. It doesn’t matter if you’re an entrepreneur, a Rabi, or the president of the United States, you do better if you do both.

P.S.

If you’re lucky you’ll also have a loving, understanding, and supporting wife with endless patients that will help you along the way. I certainly do. Thank you Orit, I love you very much.

I’ve been an entrepreneur and in the startup business for many years now. I’ve also been involved and/or interested in conflicts and wars in Israel and other places to the point I began to see similarities between these two worlds: Startups and Wars. That said war is very, very different from business, especially when war is due to religion, philosophy, business, and other non-life-essential topics. At best, I categorize war as “necessary evil” and this latest war in southern Israel certainly qualifies.

But there are similarities too. For example, starting a startup is like starting a war. First, you think you’re right and you have the right. Many others have done the same thing before successfully and you’re smarter than most of them. Yes, you’ll need resources and funding but you can start relatively small and grow. It doesn’t have to be “shock and awe”…

You will need to get support from your investors/cabinet and other influencers/politicians. You will find yourself maneuvering between them making sure everyone is as happy as possible, even though you are the commander in chief.

You also have one or two a basic exit strategies, which makes perfect sense for you and your supporters. These strategies of course changes one month after you launch your product/attack. Both have casualties (though very different of course) and you require special talent/forces to do the job as efficiently and effectively as possible. No wonder they call startups “an uphill battle”.

On both there is some “turning point” that redefines the effort. Some breakthrough or event, some added ingredient that, when looking back, changes the picture and drives toward the win. But that point, the “win” is the most difficult thing to achieve. I think that beyond the obvious difficulties like funding, resources, competition, politics, etc it is actually the very definition of what WINNING actually means. And it is very different for each effort.

From all the different slogans I heard about wars it is the following, from the early days of Israel that caught my ear: “The Eager to Win Is a Prerequisite of Winning”. Seems pretty obvious but it’s not. Many people which are directly involved in startups (and wars) are doing it for different reasons: fame and glory, money, it is fun and cool, other people’s expectations, to prove that you’re right/can and other reasons. Most times, all these reasons fade the original reason they started this effort in the first place. “The Eager to Win” beyond anything else has to be at the top of the list .You can be famous and have some “action” while doing it but unless you want to win, you will not. Unless you remember why you started, chances are things will not work out.

We are working on it right now at Docstoc.

Last words

Without going into “war is bad”, I want to express the reason for this blog entry: learning from experience. Maybe it is best to learn from bad, sometimes, horrible examples to do some good in the world.

Alon

From the first day we started Docstoc people have been asking me “why .Net”? I’m being asked this by technologies, of course, but also from other, non-tech people like private investors, VCs, SEO experts, marketing guys, potential hires, partners, and any random guests that just happen to stop by and say hi to Jason (of course…). Thank God my 9 year old son hasn’t asked me that yet…

I think it became a “style question” that make people look like they know/care/understand such as “what is your business model?” or “what is your current runway?” or “what do you think about the effects of the economy on high-tech?”. But unlike these questions, that try to understand something, the “why .Net?” is a charged question. What people are really asking is “why not X” where X can be anything but a Microsoft technology. This X can be PHP, Python, Ruby on Rails, or even Java. Man, sometimes I’d rather say we developed the site in Assembly and I’m sure I’d get less raised eyebrows.

Well, seriously why .Net?

After all, it’s a Microsoft product and, as we all know, Microsoft is all about world domination and the end of free and open source software as we know it. Basically Microsoft is evil and we should avoid its technology at all cost, not even touch it with a stick. Why pay money for something that suppose to be free? The whole notion of a company trying to make money from selling software makes me sick.

Ok, enough with the sarcasm. Let’s talk seriously.

Our job as technology leaders (CTOs, CIOs, and other fancy titles) is to find and implement technology solutions for world/business problems. That’s it! We are not politicians. We should not have hidden agendas. The concept of LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySql, PHP) VS. Microsoft must change. We need to choose the right technology just as we choose the right people. Can you imagine group of CTOs that hire only white developers vs. group of CTOs that hire only black developers? It is clear to that the way we thought since the 90s must change. The walls between selecting only ONE side of the technology fence MUST end.

The reason we all choose side is very simple which it is the answer I give to the “why .Net?” question. All startups in the history were developed using the technologies that the CTO knew and liked. Very simple, nothing more. Everything else is silly rationalization. I’ve seen many examples of successful startups built in PHP, Java, ASP.Net, CGI, ROR, and many others. All scale, all run fast, all are successful. Startups rarely fail because they used one technology vs. another. They mostly fail because they run out of money.

Starting Docstoc I’ve decided to break the walls, which I was part of. I’ve decided we will use the right technology for the right solution, regardless of the source. Although we use .Net for the platform and the site, we use MySQL as the database (yeah, not SQL Server), MemCached for caching, Lucene for full text search, and other open source technologies. Most of these had a matching Microsoft technology but it was simply not as good or just as good.

Last, let’s talk money. Can someone please tell me which company is spending more on hardware, software, license, hosting, traffic, storage, and support, MySpace or Facebook? Is one more successful than the other because of the technology they use?

I rest my case.

Alon

I will use this blog to talk about topic I believe are of interest to many technology entrepreneurs which is a group I found to be quite unrepresented. These topics range from tips for successful outsourcing, SEO tips, why .Net (or why not), how to get a great team, and many others.

More coming soon.

Contact me at alon at docstoc.com