terrygold.com

Former Gold Systems building for lease

Some of my fondest memories of Gold Systems are from when we were located at 4865 Riverbend Road.  Long before starting the company I used to drive by the office park and think how cool it would be to work in those buildings, and it actually happened.  4865 was the second building we were in, and it was brand new at the time.  Jim and Jeanne Fetterman designed and built two of the buildings in the office park and they did a great job.  Our building had several balconies and it was a lot of fun to have meetings outside.  More than one snowball fight was started from the balcony too.

I don't care for Class A space, but I want people to feel good about where they work and it helps if it is interesting too.  This building was reasonably priced but very nice.  For a small company the building couldn't be beat.

Jim just emailed me and said there is space available again in the building, and the one next to it.  If you need about 3,000 square feet or less in Boulder, Colorado, be sure and check it out.  It's great space and Jim was a wonderful landlord.  He was always quick to do maintenance and when we broke the water line pulling fiber between the buildings and had to backhoe up his brand new parking lot, he was very gracious and understanding - but that's another story for another day.

Embellishing Resumes

One of the headlines at MSN.com today was "Resume Tricks - 6 ways to embellish without lying"

I see a lot of resumes - I don't read a lot of resumes - but I see a lot of resumes.  The resume has to be special, or from someone that we're seriously considering hiring before I will take the time to actually read it.  At best, I scan most resumes quickly.  If I have no reason to care about the resume, and that applies to most of the resumes I see, a typo or spelling mistake will generally cause me to hit the delete key.  (The only time I look at paper resumes is if someone at my company or the candidate hands it to me.  Mailing me a resume is a waste of paper I'm afraid.  Also, I'm a terrible speller.  My fourth grade teacher said I'd never be a success if I didn't learn to spell.  The jury's still out on that, but I do proofread and I always use spell-check, and I expect people who want to work here to do the same.)

The article referenced above is better than the headline suggests, so I'll give the author the benefit of the doubt.  A special headline editor probably wrote the headline to grab attention, but for me it was negative attention.  I have two problems with their choice of words.  "Resume Tricks"  I don't like it already.  According to dictionary.com, a trick is "An act or procedure intended to achieve an end by deceptive or fraudulent means."  Given that definition, if I have the slightest suspicion that a candidate is trying to trick me, I move on to the next person.  The consequences of hiring a dishonest person are too great to even take a chance on someone who might otherwise look good on paper.

"Embellish without lying" is an interesting phrase.  It might be possible.  Again according to dictionary.com, one definition of "Embellish" is "To make beautiful, as by ornamentation; decorate."  People rarely ornament or decorate their resume, so maybe I have the wrong definition.  (Tell you what, I'll carefully read the next decorated resume that I get - I promise.)  Perhaps the better definition and more common understanding is "To add ornamental or fictitious details to: a fanciful account that embellishes the true story."

Fictitious details could be degrees that weren't really earned, as the story mentions, or the more common kind of detail such as "saved the company $2.4 million."  How much is a person worth who saved a company $2.4 million - let's see - $2.4 million, probably more?  So why do I have their resume in my hand, surely they know we don't pay THAT well and the individual offices at Gold Systems are nice, but that will buy you a great HOUSE, even in Boulder.  My guess is that if they didn't just make up the number, that they were part of a TEAM who saved the company that kind of money.  When I see a resume that sounds like the person thinks they did it all by themselves, I hit the delete key.  More likely they were standing NEAR the team that did they real work, and they bailed when the project was done.

I LOVE seeing concrete assertions.  Why?  Because then I can check them out.  If you say on a resume that you worked for the fastest growing company in the world, I'm going to do a quick search and see if it's true.  If I don't think it is, I'm done, because I figure if you will lie on your resume, you'll lie on your expense reports and you'll lie to our customers.

As I said, the article wasn't that bad, but the headline was terrible.  It isn't OK to trick or embellish on a resume.

Marketing Blog

Sam Decker writes a blog about Marketing and I'm regularly finding interesting posts and links to other good marketing ideas.  I usually read blogs via a NewsGator RSS reader, most recently the beta version of NewsGator Mobile, so I don't often actually visit the websites of the blogs I read.  I happened to go to Sam's site tonight and noticed that he and I have similar tastes in books.  I was really surprised to see that he lists my blog as one he reads - thanks Sam!

Website fixed?

My web hosting company, PowWeb has up til now done a great job of hosting my website, but last week they migrated me to a new server but didn't save, or migrate, my CNAME settings.  I think I have it fixed now, but I don't do this stuff often enough to be sure.  Apparently after messing it up, PowWeb had no way to go back and retrieve the old settings.  Oops.

They did survey me after the fact to see how things went.  We'll see if they respond.

Minor website problem

My web hosting company is moving my site and it looks like I have a bit of a problem.  It's better now, but there still are some broken image links to fix.  I'm aware of it and I'm working to fix it.

Thanks!  -- Terry

Great PocketPC navigation applications

I just discovered a great application for my Treo 700w Windows Mobile Device.   Virtual Earth Mobile (VEM) is a tiny mapping application that connects wirelessly to Microsoft's MSN Virtual Earth.  Moments after downloading the app directly to my phone, I was typing in addresses and getting directions.  I've tried other applications that required me to load maps to the phone, and I never had the right map when I needed it. This application gets all of its data from MSN, so there are no maps to load.

It also seems to work world-wide which is a lot of fun.  I typed in "Spain" into the find field, and got a map of Spain.  Besides viewing maps, a click of the stylus will overlay aerial photos.  Give it two addresses and it will give directions formatted for the small screen of a mobile device.  You can even find local points of interest such as "restaurants."

If you happen to be reading this from your Windows Mobile Device, you can get the CAB file direct from http://www.viavirtualearth.com/VVE/Gallery/VEMobile/VirtualEarthMobile.cab

The developer, Jason Fuller, not only has released this as freeware, but he's made the source code available too!  I think this is going to be one of my favorite applications.  Thanks Jason!

Happy Anniversary Part II

June 28th was Gold Systems' Anniversary, and today is my 15th anniversary at Gold Systems.  My first day as a full-time employee was Independence Day, 1991.  I couldn't even spell entrepreneur back then!  We made our first sale in the first month, but didn't recognize revenue or take in cash until the 4th quarter of 1991 if I remember right.  I also don't remember when I took my first paycheck but it was much later in the year and it was either take a paycheck or go back to work at a real job.

Thanks again to everyone who helped make this all possible!