It’s a lot harder writing a blog as an individual than as a Chief Executive.
As a CEO, you have an obvious and explicit agenda in nearly all communications – drive awareness for the company, its products and ideas. The same applies across internal and external audiences (the notion you can separate audiences is comically antiquated – ubiquitous social media renders listeners just as powerful as speakers).
As an individual, my agenda isn’t nearly so clear (at least one reason it’s taken me so long to post a first entry). On the one hand, I’d like to put context around some of the decisions I faced at Sun. There was almost always more going on behind the scenes than was obvious to the outside world, and some of that backdrop might be interesting.
In addition, I’d like to put my personal experiences in context. I’ve reconciled myself to the reality that such insights may only be of interest to my mother, but that seems like an acceptable downside – from which I’ll endeavor to protect you by liberal usage of the personal tag. If it’s interesting, have at it. If not, you’re in charge of ignoring it. (And for an interesting personal blog, may I recommend Mike Dillon’s – he was formerly Sun’s General Counsel (the top lawyer), and he’s decided to bicycle across the US to clear his head.)
As for those that read my blog in one of the eleven languages into which Sun translated it… I’m not sure I have an easy answer just yet. If you’ve got a suggestion or idea, feel free to leave it in the comment section.
More to come.
What I Couldn't Say... 