I must admit, I've avoided starting this blog for years. I'm not sure why, I suspect I just invested my time doing other things, like discovering Bend, Oregon which we moved to in 2006. Or maybe it's been trying to learn the game of golf, a game I had not played a lot prior to moving to Bend. In any event, here I am.
I've been wanting to get some of my thoughts down about my career and to share some of my stories and thoughts about being a founder of two startups: Mustang Software, Inc and Specialty Match Network, being a CEO and head janitor, and my experiences performing three corporate turnarounds (Web Associates, Starbase Corp and Mustang).
I guess I should start with a little background. I’m a self-taught businessman, basically that means I like many in the 1970s got bored with college and decided to quit after two years. That is pretty amazing in itself because until then, I pretty much finished whatever I started. It’s in my DNA, something I got from by Mom and Dad and being the youngest of 5 kids. My three brothers (Tom, John & Bill) as well as my sis (Catie) are all driven, achievers. We all understand the importance of having a good work ethic, probably from all those Saturday chores my mom had us do. :)
I started Mustang Software in 1986 with $5k to my name. I was 28 years old and wanted to be in the PC business. I decided to buy a couple of books and learn how to program in Turbo Pascal and created the Wildcat! BBS system. It took nine years to grow the business from scratch, no VC money, just persistence. I took the company public in 1995 with a $25 million valuation, reinvented it in 1997 (which I’ll explain later), and sold it to Quintus Corporation in May 2000 for $290 Million. Quintus later became part of Avaya. It was, as they say, a nice ride. I made a lot of great friends and am proud of the fact we built a great company. Mustang Software, Inc. I can truly say, is how businesses should be done. It was a great team of people: they were the assets of the company. If you were part of the Mustang experience, you know what I’m talking about.
Since 2000 I have assisted in two turnarounds. In 2001 as CEO of Web Associates, an Internet professional services company, I led the reorganization, which resulted in a return to profitability. I was recruited by Michael Klein (who passed away recently in an aircraft accident), the creator of Yahoo! Groups. Michael had invested in WA and it was in trouble. Comerica came calling to collect their line of credit and I walked into a shit storm at every turn. Again, great people, just needed direction and focus. With their help we got the company turned around and profitable. Comerica got their line paid off (including interest). Today, Web Associates (rebranded to Level Studios) is an amazing agency still creating awesome strategy, creative media and technology for HP, Apple and others. Tom Adamski and Alex Mahernia are super talented and even though they were pissed when I decided to leave WA after a year and turn the CEO job over to Tom, I knew it was his time. If I’ve learned anything over the years it is to trust my gut. Level Studios is an awesome company with a great culture and yes, I’ll take a bit of credit for getting them on the right track.
In 2002 I became President & CEO of Starbase Corporation (NASDAQ:SBAS), an enterprise software company specializing in software configuration and requirements management. Here again, another shit storm but on a much bigger scale. The company had 300 employees, multiple locations (including the UK), great products… and 6 weeks of cash. It had gone through 25 private placements and burned through all of its cash. There was finger pointing, serious political problems and a Board of Directors as split as I had ever seen. Somewhere a long the way, the Starbase leadership forgot it wasn’t their money in the checkbook and that it belonged to the Shareholders. I had success and failures at Starbase. I saved more jobs then we lost. We made it a whole year without raising any money and made payroll and payables each month. In the end, we sold the company to Borland Software Corporation in January 2003. It was the best move.
I left Borland in March of 2003, Dale Fuller Borland’s CEO is a good guy, a strong leader, I would have just been in his way. I later got sued by some Starbase shareholders who felt I sold the company too cheap and Borland stepped up and honored by indemnification agreement and hired Wilson Sonsini to defend me. In the end, the court found no fault in how I managed the sale and stated if I hadn’t done the sale the company would have likely gone bankrupt and shareholders would have gotten zip. I can’t thank Dale Fuller and Keith Gottfried enough for standing beside me.
Since 2003 I have been working on social media projects with my long time friend Scott Hunter. Our most promising project is EventMingle – event based social networks for the tradeshow industry. We have two versions: Tradeshow Edition which are 16 week custom communities that operate around the tradeshow date allowing speakers, attendees and exhibitors to connect online, network, build their calendar and custom walking maps. EventMingle Communities is our new year around communities for clients who operate multiple tradeshows within a specific industry. This version is getting ready to enter beta. We have some great people working at EventMingle and I’m happy I can help out as a visionary, director and mentor.
Today (May 2009) I’ve been interviewing with companies seeking a turnaround CEO, interim CEO or senior executive skilled in change management. I’m looking for my next challenge. I guess I have decided that I enjoy the challenges of start-ups (Mustang and EventMingle), however it’s the turnaround that really drives me.
I’m using the blog to help me get some of my thoughts organized, gathering ideas and concepts I have learned by leading change in both organizations I have founded and created, as well as those I have walked into as an outsider. I don’t think you can appreciate the challenge of a corporate turnaround until you’ve done a public company which included full disclosures every 90 days for all to see and grade. I have done two (MSTG & SBAS) so I speak from experience. In this blog I’m going to share some of my ideas on how I would fix some of the broken business models I see on a daily basis. I hope you’ll enjoy reading it and will comment often, even if you disagree with my points of view.
Cheers,
…Jim