What I've Learned at Microsoft
My time at Microsoft was one of the highlights of my career. During my nine years there I was on the original Excel team, helped bring out OS/2, started the initial vertical marketing group and launched Microsoft corporate licensing (initially called “Select”). I even spent time in Microsoft Germany with responsibilities for sales, channel and marketing to enterprises. It was a great run.
I learned a lot of things at Microsoft and I’m thankful for all of it. I’m especially grateful for the friendships I made – even if they’re hard to maintain when you live far away from Seattle.
After years of contemplation over the thousands of lessons I learned there, here are the five I consider imperative:
Vision Matters. Microsoft is known for publishing its corporate vision statements as the company evolves. Its current vision statement is “to help people and businesses throughout the world realize their full potential.” This vision presents a very inclusive global target market for both individual customers and all kinds of businesses. It also makes a bold promise about what Microsoft’s products can do, and what can be achieved by anyone buying and using them.
Microsoft didn’t burden its vision statement with buzzwords, acronyms, industry terminologies or specific technology references. It’s a big vision for a big company with a big product line. It’s simple enough, though, that any of the company’s approximately 181,000 employees can articulate where the company is going.
Strategy Matters. If there ever was a company that embodied Michael Porter’s thoughts on Competitive Advantage, it would be Microsoft. The company’s overall strategy for competitive advantage aligns perfectly with its strategies for growth. Such alignment optimizes execution at every level of the organization and, by extension, its employees, partners, channels, etc. Historically, the company prizes an iron grip on market share (“never give up a fraction of a percentage of market share”) and aggressively attempts to penetrate new markets. Product and market development and diversification (e.g., services and support) are secondary but important sub-strategies pursued simultaneously.
Execution Matters. Execution involves the tactical and practical skills needed to put strategy into practice, which allows for turning an operational plan into reality. Those tactical skills are book-ended with setting priorities in the beginning and a rigorous assessment or post-mortem at the end.
Perhaps the most significant and often used skill I learned at Microsoft was the ability to mix many elements: crafting strategy, executing tactics, communication, and understanding all the in-betweens. Early on in my career at Microsoft developing and deploying field marketing and channel programs was among the “in-betweens” I spent a lot of time on. The most elegant strategy done in the Microsoft Way is worthless if you don’t have the capabilities, discipline, and skills to turn that strategy into actions that result in business performance.
Brand Matters. A brand is a specific – hopefully, unique – combination of the corporate or product logo, marketing communications and digital marketing, type font, design, colors, personality, price, support and services, etc. In other words, it’s a bundle of attributes.
Microsoft’s brand is worth billions. But brand Microsoft was something to leverage, promote and protect from its inception.
Microsoft’s brand matters because it made it easier to sell products and services, added value to the technology, and counter-balanced commoditization when competitors entered the market. Brand Microsoft was defined by, and chosen for, its unique and distinguishing promises. People bought brand Microsoft because they trusted it. Consumers were willing to spend extra time implementing Microsoft products – even when there were bugs or other challenges – and pay more because they believed in it.
Most of all, People Matter. Employees are essential to any company. They create technology, products, and services that companies bring to the marketplace. They are the face of any organization. They use their skillsets to make a difference in meeting customers’ demands and needs. Ultimately, they are major contributors to company profits and market valuation.
I learned at Microsoft that the company and your business unit were better off hiring the smartest, hardest-working, independent, and intuitive people. That took patience and a willingness to thoroughly and critically sift through a ton of resumes.
For startups especially, implementing these five things –- sometimes living by them --increase the odds of business survival or success. Today, new businesses and products are being launched at an unprecedented rate. Entering the market, rapidly creating consumer awareness, dominating a market segment, conveying product differentiation and user preference is more easily accomplished with a strong brand.