I am often asked what I do for a living and since I am not a PR or marketing professional, describing what I do to an “outsider” is challenging at times. I can hide all I want behind my resume and a great group of people I have worked with, but in order to further enhance my network, I must “translate” the role of a business operations leader to those in other professions.
Reading Jeremiah Owyang’s excellent article “What’s Your Career Mission?” was a great kick-in-the-behind that inspired me to write down my Career Mission and the Value I bring to the table.
My career mission is to use my business operations, talent management, and technology background to build and maintain the backbones of sustainable growth companies.
So what puzzle pieces comprise my Career Mission and Value?
1. It all starts with people. Build the right environment, bring in talent, and retain your team by treating them fairly and helping them grow.
2. Without customers we are nothing. Act as a conduit between all levels of the company so everyone hears and sees the customers and never loses sight of the hand that feeds them.
3. Sharpen focus by clearing the path. Help those with the vision and the big picture of the company to stay focused on the mission by minimizing day-to-day distractions.
4.
Keep entrepreneurs out of jail or an early grave. Successful entrepreneurs hate risk (
just ask Jeff Bezos – founder of Amazon.com) and their success depends on eliminating risks one by one and moving forward. My mission is to sense those risks, warn the company about them well in advance, mitigate them, and neutralize the ones we miss as soon as possible.
UPDATE: 6/1/09 Link to BIP article
“So, what exactly do you do, anyhow?”. I lead business operations for startups and consult on many issues surounding day-to-day management, technology, human capital, and marketing.
About the author:
Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius is a business operations leader with 12-year track record of helping companies manage growth, build diverse teams, harness technology, and get a lot more profitable. He is usually brought in to build new or improve older business processes, provide structure to a rapidly growing business, and create higher level of predictability for the executive team.To learn more about Apolinaras “Apollo” Sinkevicius please visit his site TheOperationsGuy.com
