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My name is Jeff Rubin, originally from outside of Boston, Waylon Massachusetts
Yeah, the problem or need that we were trying to address at first was: people needed websites.
And you know, from 1994 to let’s say 1998 there weren’t a lot of people,
there weren’t a lot of programs out there,
you know, the FrontPage, the DreamWeavers, the Buildit that you can go to today.
And so at first the need we were trying to fulfill was just let’s build websites for anybody who needs it.
So right now, it’s probably fair to say eighty, eighty-five percent of our business is collegiate athletics
and fifteen percent is other.
So we pretty much deal with sports information directors.
And so we built Sidearm as a suite of components that addresses their needs;
that allows them to carry on their daily activities but without Sidearm, we had some clients tell us
that they would spend sixty, eighty hours a week in the office just trying to update their website.
And that was taking them sixty, eighty hours is now taking them two to three hours.
And so Sidearm obviously wasn’t us. We had to get to their heads.
We had to understand what they do day to day. So part of it was going down and watching them.
Going to games and seeing what they did and saying “We can do that, we can automate that.
Wow, you’re really doing stats that way? What if we built this?
Here’s how you’re doing a photo gallery? That’s ridiculous, let’s do it this way.
And we had built Sidearm 1.0.
And Sidearm 1.0 was really out there until 2007
in which case we just completely redid the software to Sidearm 2.0.
And that was after, you know, Sidearm 1.0 was really built for Syracuse University:
Division 1, pretty big school in terms of collegiate athletics.
Well all of a sudden when you’re working with D2s, D3s, NAI schools, Canadian schools,
There’s a lot more than what Syracuse University does.
So that was really the shift from Sidearm 1 to Sidearm 2 was
now we’ve had years under our belt of understanding athletics, knowing all the requests that we get over email over the years
all, everything we hear at the trade shows.
So, things changed in 2001.
After the dot com bust and we survived, and we said “Let’s change this.
And we really started focusing on content management systems.
We’ve always built business applications and we’ve always said what separates us is we build a CMS,
we build a content management system that fits your needs,
and so rather than you having to change your business processes to fit some kind of software,
we’re gonna build the software to meet your business processes.
And that was in all sorts of industries, right: with a lot of local companies in Central New York to national companies.
And that worked.
But again, in '01 it was this work for hire and we realized “Gosh, you know, we’re living paycheck to paycheck,
or project to project.” So what we changed was saying
Well instead of doing a one time engagement, isn’t everything I ever learned about continuing a relationship?”
Right? And so we said “Well let’s have them sign a three year renewable contract,
where they’re really leasing our technology and so they rely on us.
We had an opportunity to get into collegiate athletics and so this opportunity came through Syracuse University.
We had already done a lot of work at Syracuse University with various departments on campus, never in athletics.
And to go into the details, Syracuse Athletics was in a tough situation.
The company they were using for their website went belly-up. They were in a bind.
I went and met with the athletic director, Jay Krauthammel at the time, and his staff.
And it was myself going against a very large company.
And I said “Look, we’ve never done an athletic website, but we can build you a site that does exactly what you want it to do.”
Exactly what I just said a minute ago: “We will build it to meet your needs.”
So there’s a lot of risks and a lot of problems. I mean, every day there’s a problem
but I think this summer we experienced a classic case of a company growing too fast, too quick...
You go from 100 to 230 schools, it’s different than fifty to a hundred, it’s a big jump.
So we have our brand and our name based on customer service,
well when all of a sudden you’re taking on such a large number of schools,
it just wasn’t feasible to provide that same level of customer service to each and every client over the summer.
I mean we were just, everyone in here was just stressed beyond belief
and trying to get work done and we still are. And so again, you know,
we didn’t realize it at first until all of a sudden, lients starting saying
“Why aren’t you answering my email? Why didn’t you return my phone call?
Gosh, your support isn’t want it used to be.”
You hear it once and you say ”Ok, disgruntled client, it’s gonna happen.”
You hear it twice, three times, four times. And this is a small-sports information directors:
they’re a community. Word spreads quick. And so we, we made a mistake.
And we’ve acknowledge that mistake to our clients, we’re very open in saying
“Look, this is what happened, it’s the truth, we realize it, we’re doing everything we can
to hire the right staff and change our processes to make sure that we turn this all around.
Just give us enough time and we’re going to do it.” And that started with me, and all the senior staff
and all the part-time workers realizing that we had this issue.
Our business is based on websites, websites run on servers, servers are, they’re vulnerable.
Whether it be through a hacker, a hacker, whether it just be through an overloaded server, bandwidth issues,
an accident somewhere in Atlanta which caused an outage which took one of our servers offline. It’s tough.
The hardest part, I think, of running an organization or running a company,
is knowing when to give up control because you never want to.
I mean in 1994 I did it all, I did the programming, I did the design, I did the sales, I did the support.
Obviously one person can’t do it all. And every time you give up control, you know,
I lose a piece of what I love but at the same time, I’m able to expand.
And it always seems to work out but it’s hard to do.
You’re hiring your first full time designer, you’re hiring your fulltime programmer.
Well in '06 I couldn’t keep up with demos, with sales, and people were emailing saying
“I’m interested” and I wouldn’t get back to them because I didn’t have time.
So I made the decision to hire a full time sales person, which is scary.
You know, a programmer, I know what they’re doing for me, I’m know what I’m getting out of them.
Designer, I know what they’re doing for me, I know what I’m getting.
Sales, what if they don’t sell? And I’m still paying them.
Probably the biggest help for a number of years was my father.
And also a big piece of motivation as well was my father.
Growing up, he was an entrepreneur…
He helped me with contracts and with insurance and with problems
and he couldn’t help me with web development, right, he couldn’t get that part,
but anything with the business side.
There were others, there were sounding boards right here within the university.
Sorry. Folks within the iSchool, professors to bounce ideas off of,
ethical issues that come up, and you’ve got to make decisions in business.
you absolutely use books and resources from a technology standpoint.
God knows how many books I've read on whatever subject it is, you know,
so if blogs is the newest thing I'm gonna go out and read books on blogs or webcasting or wikis or you know, whatever it is.
I've got to stay educated and stay on top of it and figure out is this something that we can incorporate into Sidearm,
Is it a fad? Is it something that's here to stay?
You know, there are decisions we have to make.
Yeah. I think there’s a couple. Communication is number one.
I’m, I think, being able to communicate verbally and through all types of media and so, whether it’s a proposal,
which is a much more business oriented document, or an email or an IM or a chat, technical documentation,
I mean all these forms of communication that we do daily, is really what’s key to our success.
Number two, I don’t know if this is a skill, passion. Alright. You’ve got to love what you do.
It’s not just about creating the next best idea but it’s about creating something that you love
and working with that and if that gets you a million dollars,
it just brings you happiness because you love doing it, that should be ok too. �