From Big Boom to Big Blue

JACK NEWTON - AUSTIN,TX
My former boss at Works, now he’s with IBM

What do you miss about the dot-com era?

The first thought which came to mind was the possibility that you could do anything ? any job you could talk yourself into ? as long as it brought value to the company. People were willing to take risks, especially on kids or folks who didn?t have tons of experience in the subject matter. All that mattered was intellect, optimism and energy. I got do a wide variety of tasks at the first company (Tivoli), including developer, technical instructor and manager, ultimately starting up their first web group. That was great for a guy with a degree in History.

The second thing I?ll miss is the opportunity to build teams the way I wanted to, with the people I wanted to hire. I got to build three teams in five years, and let me tell you, they were heavily populated with some bright, fun people who were glad to be there. I loved bringing on board people who needed to stretch their abilities to succeed, and watching them do just that time and again. Nowadays I work in an entrenched bureaucracy (IBM) with a whole lot of unmotivated, unhappy people. For the most part, my time during the “boom” was surrounded by groups of people who genuinely liked each other, liked spending tons of hours with each other, could rely upon each other, etc. I miss spending my days with my staffs at Works and Tivoli.

What are you glad is gone?
The endless hours of work. The phantom stock price calculations (I never took ANY job for pure money, I swear). The political chicanery of my last job at Works. But that?s about it. Mostly it was a fun, exciting time, and I was glad to be thought of as someone who had a part to play.

December 3rd, 2002