Wow Ken,
Thanks for all this. And, although you rate yourself as a C, I think that no matter what grade the person gives themselves, at the end, it’s the experiences and learnings
they portray out that matters most. This includes you Mr. Williams! The lopping of bottom 10% still happens this day and age at GE and Siebel I know, not sure where else. It’s a good technique to remove the laggards, probably not the most fair, but some thing has to give. The second point is, it’s a matter of factors in guaging performance. For me, the fact that Sierra was on top of the heap year after year, with the most amazing and state-of-the-art games, shows that there’s something great in upper management. Any top company that is able to year-after-year outdo themself shows something. I would have loved to see some of the financial statements from that time period… I can’t even find the public ones to see what was done!
I don’t know if you know this, but when I graduated from college in 1996, I sent my resume to Sierra. I was hoping to work on one of the gaming franchises, but Sierra did call me back for an interview in the greeting cards division. Were you around for this development? I didn’t think it interested me or would be a career move I’d want to make.