From My Life

Okay, so Nandini kicked my ass in the Bloggers Face-Off last month. Maybe I suck at rapid-fire interviews. Maybe Instablogs is cooler than the b5media blog network. Maybe girls just get more votes.

It’s okay, I’m cool with it. No, really! ;-)

When Daniel first asked me for my responses to the questions, I actually wrote full answers, and we then shortened them for the face-off. Daniel has now posted the complete interview.

Since it’s just me in the interview I shouldn’t have any problems coming in first :-D

About a month ago I wrote our first ever real hiring post. In it I outlined a bunch of positions we had opening up either right away or “soon”. So far we’ve managed to either fill or redefine all of them! It’s amazing how hard hiring can be, but based on the amazing applicants we had from last round, I wanted to post an update – especially since two of the positions have been entirely redefined. In addition, wanted to highlight a new position our two!

Project Manager (aka: Project Ninja): Last time this was called an Operations Manager. As we looked at the job and talked to many of the (fantastic!) applicants, we quickly realized that this was really more about project management. We actually recently restructured b5 internally (no firing, pure positive restructuring… another post on that later) and this project got slotted in at the same time. Basically there are currently 3 teams at b5 Tech, Content and Sales. Each of these has the authority, responsibility and budget to Get Stuff Done. The Project Manager will be working as part of the Tech team (under Aaron Brazell) both to provide services to Tech’s “clients” and to lend PM-experience to other teams (especially Content) as needed. Ultimately Tech becomes all about implementation, so in addition the PM will be responsible for tracking projects throughout the company and ensuring balls don’t get dropped due to miscommunication or lack of communication. This is a Toronto-based position. We can easily move you from within Canada and (if you have the points) move you from elsewhere in the world.

Product Manager (aka: Product Rockstar): The last time we talked this was the Affiliate Manager position. It has since shifted *a lot*. Most of this was due to our recent on-site where we realized several of the positions we were thinking of having as part time could really be mashed up into one Special Projects kind of position. Then we (together with our rocking VC’s) realized that what this really was, was product management. Taking a concept, working together a spec and product plan, securing budget and then making it happen. This person will be leading the new Product group at b5, and should expect this team to grow quickly as products succeed/fail and as revenue for the unit increases and it becomes profitable. This is a new business unit. While we’re looking for a fantastic product manager with lots of experience, we also would like (not a requirement) someone who understands the blogging space, understands some of the dynamics of advertising and ultimately has shipped products. It’s what you do, it’s how you think, it’s what you love. This is a Toronto-based position. We can easily move you from within Canada and (if you have the points) move you from elsewhere in the world.

Server Administrator (aka: Server Ninja): We’re looking for an experienced server admin. We run LAMP. We run WordPress. We run clustered web servers and database servers. We have caching at the app level, the web server level and at the edge. We do a lot of file replication between web servers and DB servers. We want someone who’s comfortable in a high-performance, high-availability environment, but who understands that things need to “grow”. One day “soon” we’ll likely move from our current dedicated environment to a colo or self-hosted one, so comfort with hardware is pretty key. Experience in network stuff, multi-DC replication and failover, backup systems, etc is all very, very good. Like the PM you’ll be working under Aaron. This position can be virtual, though we like folk being in Toronto (seeing as how we move into our new office June 1!). If you’re virtual, we’d only ask that you speak English really, really well and that you really enjoy working as part of an open and dynamic tech team. This is also partially a support position, so great people skills are an absolute must.

Finally, we are always looking for folk in online ad sales at the extremely junior (ie: just started, really want to pound the pavement) and slightly more experienced (ie: 1-4 years, love what you do, want to sell in a new and challenging and fun environment). These folk can be anywhere in North America and even in Europe for one project.

So that’s it! Not quite as many positions as last time, but these ones will basically fill out the company so we can push this to a whole new level!