Chapter 5 – n00bs
July 29th, 2009 (Story)Business at Explorer Micro was booming. People were ordering PII’s and PIII’s from us faster than we could build them. There was a stack of paper 3 feet thick underneath the printer of unfulfilled customer orders. People were flocking to the internet to find the best prices on computers and we had them. What we were losing on margins, we were making up for with volume. It was time to hire some more employees to catch up.
Of course, the best and easiest way to find a new hire is to ask your current employees if they know of anyone who could work on computers. Of course any high-school age kid knows far more about computers than 99% of the “old” CEOs out there.
First off the block was Justin. He was Mark’s neighbor. Justin’s mom liked to yell out to him, “Justin, I need to talk to you!” with her lips pursed and voice coming from the back of her throat. So, this became Justin’s tagline…the phrase we would all yell out (in faux mom-voice) whenever he walked in the door.
So, after Justin came Dave. Dave was living with Justin for the summer (his parents lived in Canton). Dave and Justin were inseparable. They hung out together, drank together, passed out in the back of trucks together…they were best buds. Tony of course got the brilliant idea to put Justin on the phone for customer service. He would answer the phone in a different accent every time – usually Chinese: “Exploha Mahcwo, how may I help you?” He would carry the accent for a while and then immediately switch back to a standard midwestern accent to see if the customer would notice.
Dave on the other hand liked to build computers. He sure had a temper though. If he stripped a screw or his screwdriver slipped, he would pick something up and throw it. And so began the infamous battle of the screws between Dave and Allen.
interesting that you picked this story up again—makes me think there is hope for my poor neglected blog:)