War Stories: Managing growth means managing people

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War Stories: Managing growth means managing people

Thursday, July 27, 2000

By Sanjay Chopra, president and CEO, OnlineChoice

What is the one thing that is keeping me up at night these days? The answer is managing people, departments, projects, organization charts, responsibilities, communication issues within the organization, the employee handbook, vacation and training policies.

Sanjay Chopra, OnlineChoice

It then dawned on me, my startup is no longer a startup. OnlineChoice is looking more and more like a big, growing company.

Looking back, it is interesting to note that how I spend my day has changed. The time I initially spent managing projects is now spent managing people, working with them, planning and helping them become entrepreneurs. For me managing this transition is what will allow OnlineChoice to go from the embryonic stage to the growth stage successfully. The challenge is to replicate the thoughts and vision my co-founders, Bill Kirkendale and Marshall Cohen, and I had among the rest of the management team.

The founder/entrepreneur is like a candle giving vision and direction to individuals around him, but once you have more than fifty employees you cannot do that on your own. It is one's ability to recognize this and adapt to it that allows the company to grow effectively.

Last year, in August when we launched OnlineChoice, three of us were sitting around a single computer

OnlineChoice
Founded in 1999, Pittsburgh-based OnlineChoice is an Internet site where consumers can harness group buying power by joining buying pools to receive volume discounts on a wide range of vital services such as electricity, natural gas, long-distance telephone service, and home security. OnlineChoice is backed by Duquesne Enterprises, a subsidiary of DQE, Inc.; Lycos Ventures; Draper Triangle Ventures; and The Hillman Company.

-- with a broken mouse -- and working on the web site. By December, we had grown to twenty-five employees, but I could still sit with people and lead projects personally. Sometime in February that all changed - we had more than fifty employees, and my goal at that point became to get the top management team in place. Thanks to the Carnegie Mellon University Graduate School of Industrial Administration and my old friends, we now have a superb management team in place. These individuals are like candles themselves, who help me glow brighter and spread the vision and direction to the rest of the team.

It is imperative you find the right people to fill these positions. I have been extremely fortunate that along with my two co-founders we have the best management team: Sanjeev Madan, PhD. as COO; David Bonvenuto as CFO; Julie Kopko as vice president of HR and customer relations; Tara Vittone as general counsel; Anju Chopra as vice president of strategic partnerships; Vijay Shah as CIO and Rich Oprison as VP of Marketing.

However, it cannot stop at the management team; every employee has to be the best. At OnlineChoice, we do not hire employees; we hire athletes, who have the ability to exceed and achieve things far beyond what they think they can. When your corporate mission is to make America better and change the way the world will be shopping for essential services, your team has to be the best. At OnlineChoice, we believe in our noble purpose, which is to harness the power of the group to better serve the individual, making the world a better place.

It is imperative to be perfect internally, but equally important is having the best group of external advisors. OnlineChoice has accomplished just that, with names like Tim Draper, managing partner, Draper Fisher Jurvetson; Don Jones, managing partner, Draper Triangle Ventures; Raj Reddy, Carnegie Mellon University; Dennis Ciccone, managing partner, Lycos Ventures; Tom Hurkmans, president, DQE Enterprises; Rachel Lorey, vice president, DQE Enterprises; Joseph Manzinger, vice president, The Hillman Company; Sophia Losh, vice president, HomeStore: Jay Katarincic, partner, Draper Triangle and Lycos Ventures; Kannan Srinivasan and Jeffery Williams of CMU. These are individuals that guide me and help all of us spread the word.

Once you surround yourself with the very best, that's when your startup moves toward becoming a formidable company and you suddenly feel you are a big company! It is everyone in the company that makes it happen. For us to continue to grow effectively, it will continue to be the people. It's the people that make your startup a real company! Whenever I have a doubt, I say to myself, it's the people, stupid.

Earlier War Stories

Marcus Ruscitto of Stargate on not losing your focus while you diversify

Henry Wang of iventurelab.com on the 5 Ps of Pittsburgh start-up success

Tom Hayes of eSpotMarket on pinching pennies

Yitz Francus of e-Cruise on surviving the struggles

Michelangelo C. Celli of CommerBuilder.com on the value of true networks

Astro Teller of BodyMedia on how Pittsburgh almost lost his business

Matt Miller of Internet Venture Works on how Pittsburgh must start talking to the rest of the tech world

Sanjay Chopra of Online Choice on finding investors sometimes means finding yourself.

Dave Nelsen of CoManage on the physical challenges of managing in the New Economy

More on OnlineChoice

Internet start-up delivering lower bills (2/29/00)

Sister unit of DQE takes stake in e-firm (8/19/99)

Using the Web to get lots of buyers together - and save (8/6/99)

Have a question or comment about War Stories, or have one of your own you want to tell? Contact Ken Zapinski, New Economy columnist, at kzapinski@post-gazette.com.