Dear Reader,
Sometimes all you need is one example to take a path less trodden. This became true for me in month 11 of Odetta's journey. I wanted to build Odetta differently from the “go big go home” models of Silicon Valley, and yet I also wanted Odetta to be really big. This was a source of personal tension (and perhaps remains one) as I compared growth avenues and considered relinquishing control to outside investors. One day, someone forwarded me a TED talk by a woman named Dame Stephanie “Steve” Shirley (who went by Steve so that people would reply to her emails) called Why do Ambitious Women have Flat Heads. Stephanie had built a remarkable software company in the U.K. in the 1960s, hiring brilliant underemployed female computer engineers at a time when women were not valued by employers. Her company ultimately employed more than 8K women, achieved $350M in ARR before being purchased for north of $3BN dollars, turned 70 of her teammates into millionaires, and changed the status of female computer engineers in Europe.
I read Stephanie’s book “Let It Go,” and I even managed to chat with her about Odetta. All of a sudden, I had an example of someone who had built something like I hoped to build, in a way I could imagine building.
Thank you to everyone who has taken the time to share their wisdom.
Happy Thanksgiving!🦃
Katharine
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Monthly Spotlight: Candidate Sourcing
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The labor market is white-hot, as in it's very hard and often expensive to hire right now. Candidates have a lot of options. So what we do is build lists of candidates who may be a good fit for your open roles. You share your job description, and some companies that may be a good fit to source from, and we will send you a list of candidates. Next, we can email their personal emails to see if they are open to a chat, and if so, we push towards a call with your recruiting team. Most HR teams are overburdened, and we know that we can save them 20-30 hours of internet research candidate search time for each open role.
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Founder Lesson Learned: Hire Underdogs
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Our entire team are underdogs. We all hail from overlooked places. We were overlooked for roles and overlooked for promotions. We were told that we were lesser, that we must sacrifice ourselves and serve. We were underestimated. When your entire team are underdogs, something magical, almost unexplainable happens. You outperform. So, the lesson is you can hire the safe, the top, the one everyone else would hire. Or you can hire the underdog; the one who is going to prove everyone wrong and then some.
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“I just wanted to send a note of gratitude and appreciation so you were aware of what an incredible job our Odettian Account Manager (name is hidden) has been doing leading the teams working on our account. Not only is she a hard worker who is always responsive to our team's needs, but she is extremely detail-oriented and catches errors that even our team misses and provides valuable feedback to our team on how we can improve our processes. We also have been blown away by how compassionate she is for our clients and how much she really cares not only about us as a client of yours, but also of our own clients and their wellbeing. She is always quick to problem-solve ways to help them out when they are in need and always helps assure them that things will be ok. We just wanted to make sure you knew how great she is so you can recognize her too as you see fit. More broadly, we've been so happy working with your team, and thank you for being such great partners!”
A spontaneous email sent on a Saturday by one of our happy clients,
November 2021
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“I am defined by my children and my spouse, but who am I? Apart from being a mother, a wife, a daughter, I want to explore that question a bit. I just feel that by staying at home, which is equally important, I have not had the chance to explore my own growth, and right now I need to know what growth for me could mean. Motherhood gets so monotonous sometimes. I am so happy to apply to Odetta. Here I am.”
(PS. This November 2021 applicant was recently hired and we are excited to provide a space for her to explore her own potential)
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“Our people tended to be working not just to earn a living but to escape from the domestic obscurity and impotence that society had ordained for them. They knew that the company trusted them to make sensible use of their time. They generally cared as much as I did that a project should be completed on time and on budget, and that it should produce a satisfied customer. One of the reasons why we thrived in its early days–when so many new enterprises fail–was that, simply by allowing our programmers and project managers to perform their duties when and where they pleased, I had surrendered a significant part of the control that employers traditionally exercise over those who work for them. By committing my company to making use of this pool of untapped talent, I gained privileged access to some of the best programmers in the country.”
—Stephanie (Steve) Shirley, Founder of Freelance Programmers, a Software Firm with Innovative Work Practices — and (Mainly) Women Employees
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