From Cincinnati to Silicon Valley, DotLoop CEO explains his move

From Cincinnati to Silicon Valley, DotLoop CEO explains his move(gigaom.com)

18 points by pkananen 13 years ago | 8 comments

imroot 13 years ago |

I'm never going to speak negatively about any employer, but, as much as people are crying foul about the editing of the video, what you see in the video is very analogous to the type of person that Austin is in real life. Austin appears to be very appearance driven -- both in terms of DotLoop's public perception as well as in his persona -- and this video is a great extension of his character. I've been watching the comments on GigOm, and most of them are really spot on based on my experiences with the company.

Matt (who is a co-founder and CTO) is a brilliant technologist. I have some severe issues with Brian (imagine that?!), but, the team in Cincinnati is driven (they were on a Death March since mid Janurary for their new product, and pulled it out even with the mental burnout involved) and I have all the confidence and faith that they will continue to thrive even though they are now maintaining two different code bases with their new release.

DotLoop has always had a problem finding talent in Cincinnati (they hired me through a recruiter). There was an issue with culture when I was there, but the location of the office, environment, and management play into it. I don't expect that to change -- and if this video was around when I was looking for a new job, it would have striken DotLoop off of my list rather quickly -- and as much as I'd like to think that this will change with offices in Silicon Valley and Austin (based on their jobs page), unless they make some rather major management changes, (move away from a MBA/Management driven structure to an engineering driven structure), I don't see DotLoop attracting the type of talent that they're looking for.

The product is excellent for the market -- it's simple to use, and well suited for their client base, and I wish them the best.

cdmwebs 13 years ago |

We're not SF. We'll never be SF and that's just fine. We have a vibrant and enthusiastic tech community here in Cincinnati. We have a great city that's doing all the right things to attract and retain talent, too.

If there's one thing we're doing poorly, it's making those points known. After Queen City Merge, we started working on Made In Cincy to create a unified presence of tech startups, agencies and individuals. We're out here, doing good work every day.

yesimahuman 13 years ago |

I get shit all the time from my friends for not living in SF. I stopped worrying so much when I realized most of the companies I look up to aren't even there (Balsamiq, 37signals, Mailchimp, to name a few). To be clear, I love SF, but I just don't feel like moving. On the flipside, I really cringe when people get defensive about their location. Really, we are all connected, through the power of the internet.

jmathai 13 years ago |

I grew up in Cincinnati (20 years) before moving to the valley. What he says is generally true.

Obviously success doesn't hinge on location but if I had it to do all over again I'd have moved out here for my first startup in the early 2000s. I'm here for my second startup and the serendipitous opportunities are frequent and priceless.

I know people get defensive and he does sort of take a few jabs at Cincinnati (probably a dumb move on his part) but in the end much of it is true.

Edit: added more content.

_ouxp 13 years ago | |

I'm currently working for a software company in Cincinnati, and few in the tech community here would deny the benefits of SV. But there's a lot happening in Cincinnati, and great, friendly, intelligent people doing interesting things. I work with people who are core committers on major open source ruby and javascript frameworks.

Of note for you or anyone who might stop by or live in the queen city (email in profile, too if anyone wants to get in touch):

Cincinnati Web Tech Drinkup: http://www.meetup.com/Cincinnati-Web-Tech-Drinkup/

Cincinnati Coworks: http://cincycoworks.com/

QCMerge, a web conference held a few weeks ago: http://qcmerge.com

Made in Cincy (launched days ago in the wake of QCMerge): madeincincy.com

I've lived downtown for the last few years, and Cincinnati is having a renaissance. People are upset about what Austin said because the jabs aren't constructive, are increasingly unfounded, and certainly weren't fabricated by video editing as the company claims in its non-apology blog post.

jmathai 13 years ago | | |

It's been 4 years since I lived there but I keep in touch with several folks and talked with the CincyTechUSA guys last year. I agree a lot is happening and I think that's awesome.

But the truth is that for every link or event Cincinnati has there's probably 100 in SV. Not an exaggeration. Plus, like I said, the most valuable aspect of SV is the people. The density of technology entrepreneurs isn't matched anywhere else in the world.

It's just good to have insight for both worlds so you can make a decision on whether location plays a big enough role in your success and where you should be. For me I'd stay in SV as long as possible but my wife misses her family so we might end up back in Cincy. Starting up is 100s of micro decisions that play a role in your success - location is one of many.

TatianaDanger 13 years ago | | |

And we can drink with the best of them. Actually, remember that drinking scene with Marion in "Raiders of the Lost Ark"? Yeah, we need to have a drinking match like that at the next Tech Drinkup.

joshowens 13 years ago |

What a jerk! Cincinnati is a great place to have a startup.