Move Fast & it’s Ok to get it Wrong … or, Move Slow & always get it Right?
This debate - and business philosophy - recently came up in terms of Facebook vs. Twitter. The difference in their magnitude of success is quite profound, and is worth consideration.
Facebook boasts 1.6B monthly users vs. Twitter’s 300M users. Facebook has long maintained Mark Zuckerberg as the face of the company, while Twitter has churned leaders, recently re-instating Jack Dorsey as CEO. Facebook’s Zuckerberg said in its 2012 IPO prospectus that a mantra of the company was to, “move fast and break things.” At Facebook, they would rather make mistakes than lose opportunities with new technologies, new features, or new product offerings. At Twitter, as Alexei Oreskovic of Business Insider notes, their mantra is to always “get it right” inferring that the company essentially moves at a “glacial pace” with innovation and rolling out new products.
Managing a company’s infrastructure always has its inherent risks with major considerations. After all, people’s livelihoods are a big factor, and leadership’s capabilities and convictions for the long-term certainly play into it. At the same time, technology and innovation (or, anything Silicon Valley-related) move at a pace unlike any other. The energy, the speed-to-market of the latest trend and the motivation to stay ahead of the competition (and typically garner additional funding) are real considerations for a leading tech company.
With Scrimmage being a rapidly growing technology company, it is always useful to look at these varying business models, reflect on them – and make adjustments to align with the culture, customer and product objectives, as well as threshold of risk, and our people.
Perhaps, your company’s philosophy is on one side of this debate, and how has this impacted your degree of success? I’d love to hear your thoughts, and what you have seen work, or not work to its potential.
For more thoughts on the mobile world at work, leadership, culture, and teams, follow us @wescrimmage and wescrimmage.com Happy Father's Day to those Dad's reading this post!
Facebook boasts 1.6B monthly users vs. Twitter’s 300M users. Facebook has long maintained Mark Zuckerberg as the face of the company, while Twitter has churned leaders, recently re-instating Jack Dorsey as CEO. Facebook’s Zuckerberg said in its 2012 IPO prospectus that a mantra of the company was to, “move fast and break things.” At Facebook, they would rather make mistakes than lose opportunities with new technologies, new features, or new product offerings. At Twitter, as Alexei Oreskovic of Business Insider notes, their mantra is to always “get it right” inferring that the company essentially moves at a “glacial pace” with innovation and rolling out new products.
Managing a company’s infrastructure always has its inherent risks with major considerations. After all, people’s livelihoods are a big factor, and leadership’s capabilities and convictions for the long-term certainly play into it. At the same time, technology and innovation (or, anything Silicon Valley-related) move at a pace unlike any other. The energy, the speed-to-market of the latest trend and the motivation to stay ahead of the competition (and typically garner additional funding) are real considerations for a leading tech company.
With Scrimmage being a rapidly growing technology company, it is always useful to look at these varying business models, reflect on them – and make adjustments to align with the culture, customer and product objectives, as well as threshold of risk, and our people.
Perhaps, your company’s philosophy is on one side of this debate, and how has this impacted your degree of success? I’d love to hear your thoughts, and what you have seen work, or not work to its potential.
For more thoughts on the mobile world at work, leadership, culture, and teams, follow us @wescrimmage and wescrimmage.com Happy Father's Day to those Dad's reading this post!
About the author:
Derek Lundsten
Having his career intersect with the mobile revolution of the past decade, Derek, as CEO, inspires the Scrimmage team everyday with his entrepreneurial spirit, positive attitude and quick business sense. He enjoys the art of the deal and bringing together respective business relationships, as he also serves on many advisory boards for various trade organizations and numerous start-up firms. Derek holds a Bachelor of Science degree from James Madison University with a double major in Psychology and Philosophy. Originally from just outside of New York City, he now enjoys the city life of Philadelphia with his wife, not to mention its venerable history.