I’m sitting in a panel “Social Design Strategies” at South by Southwest Interactive. What a privilege and a pleasure to be here. I can’t believe I’ve never attended this before.

So far the best panel by far was “Art of Speed”, with people talking about how to build successful, profitable companies very quickly. The strongest speaker on that panel was Michael Cassidy, who has built and sold 3 companies for $10-500 million. His most recent sale was a company that sold for $500 million in 500 days. Wow. That made me sit up and pay attention.

One of his great points was about culture and hiring. He does one-day funding rounds and one-day offers for new hires. Also, on the first day of a new hire’s employment, everything is in place. They have a computer, email, and a task list. None of the typical, “Ah, your computer is not quite ready, just sit here and read these manuals.”

Going to pay attention now. More later.

[tags]sxsw,sxswi[/tags]