After 8 months, I had all sorts of ideas on what my "first" post will be like. Some long, drawn out 5-parter on what I've learned all this time, perhaps? Some Michael Jordan "I'm back" one-liner? I was even mulling just hammering out a regular post and pretend the 8-month gap never happened. I had all sorts…
My wife has been in labor in the delivery room for the past 8 hours. We are eagerly expecting our fourth child. I can hear Typhoon Ruby's din just outside the window almost seamlessly combine with the whir of the air-conditioning unit. I write this helplessly alone on a leather couch at St. Luke's hospital, waiting for…
At work, when we talk about hiring (which we talk about A LOT nowadays), I usually tell my co-managers that I am very interested in hiring "entrepreneurial-minded" people. Then I'd get often asked: What does that mean? That's a question I've been mulling about for ages. What exactly is it? How do you evaluate if someone has…
STORM is scaling fast. Founded in January 2013 (a spinoff from my original HR startup, STORM Consulting), STORM is bent on transforming the way companies manage benefits. I'm fairly confident STORM has been among the fastest growing local startups across these last 2 years, revenue-wise. We've been blessed. In 2013, we proved our new business model could…
These past few months have been crazy in STORM. We started the 2014 with about 16 employees. We're ending the year with around 50 employees and 60 more job openings. After 5-6 years hovering at around 10-15 employees, we're now scaling at an unprecedented level. It's been all sorts of crazy, but its been fun. It's a…
So sorry for the lack of posts last week. I poured water over my laptop. Of course, I did something phenomenally short-sighted when I tried turning it on to see if it still worked. It did. For around 2 minutes. Until it permanently died. I tried writing on my tablet, something less comfortable than writing on a…
For as far as I can remember, I've always loved writing. I enjoyed paragraph writing in grade school. There was always a sense of accomplishment and satisfaction when I felt a paragraph was complete, when I felt every word I used was the right one. It was simultaneously art and science for me. This love for word construction…
So, you want to put up a startup. You want to take the leap. But it's sooooo hard to let go of the cushy job you've spent numerous years cultivating... You worry about the sudden disruption of that bi-monthly cashflow you're now so accustomed to and built your life around. So what now? Here's a solution -…
See that bottle of Pepsi in the picture? I started this Thursdays Unplugged session by accidentally dropping the closed bottle, and then proceeding to absent-mindedly open it. The result was an explosion of cola and pride, mostly on my shirt (which, incredibly, looks the same in the picture). It was all uphill from there though! With…
The older we get, the more permanent our decisions become. In high school, the biggest decision we made was probably what school to take (a lot of people I know didn't have a choice in this matter as well), or perhaps what course to take. We could then easily shift courses. A lot of people I know…