Sorry blogging has been a little slow the last few weeks. We’re busy on numerous fronts.

We’re finally settled in to our new office. If you are in the Pioneer Square neighborhood feel free to stop by or invite us for coffee. We also love to host lunch and learn sessions with other startups, who are using similar technologies but who aren’t competitive with us. The basic idea is to bring the engineering teams together, feed ‘em lots of pizza and soda and get them talking technology. We can learn so much from each other, not to mention establish back channel ways to support each other over time. If you’re startup is interested in lunching and learning, let me know.

We received some great coverage yesterday on ZDNet. Read the article if you haven’t already. It’s a good overview on why we decided to build our user interface in Flash instead of Ajax.

I’m in Silicon Valley currently and have been here for a few days. It’s been a great trip so far, with a busy agenda again today. I love demo’ing blist and the receptivity has been off the charts.

The application continues to evolve at an awesome pace. I don’t say it enough but I’m super proud of the team we’ve assembled and the work they’ve done to date. Justin, Jeff, Paul, Chi, Amir, Aaron and Matt - keep up the great work.

We’re hiring. We welcome introductions to great contributors.

We’re ready to expand the team again, for several disciplines, but for this post I’ll focus on software engineers. If you are a phenomenal software engineer, or know one, drop me a note at my first name dot last name at blist.com. 

What’s in it for you?

1) You’ll get to work on a really cool product that’s resonating well with our target audience.

2) You’ll get to work on some fun and interesting technologies - Flash (Flex), ActionScript, Ruby on Rails.

3) You’ll get to try to solve some really challenging problems:

    a) Creating the world’s easiest database by changing the metaphor of what it means to organize data

    b) Developing a massively scalable, high performance, distributed data store

4) You’ll get to work with people who are as passionate about technology as you are.

5) You’ll get in early enough to make a huge difference.

6) You’ll get to work in fast paced environment without undue bureaucracy, heavy specs or too many program managers. We employ scrum with very rapid, two-week sprints.

7) You’ll get paid pretty well, including full benefits and stock options.

What kind of software engineer are we looking for?

1) We value technical diversity. We don’t care so much if you’ve worked with Flash or Rails as long as you’re smart, resourceful and have demonstrated excellence in programming in other environments.

2) We build software from the bottom up, so you should have really strong fundamentals. Usually this means you have an undergrad or masters degree in CS or EE from a top university, but we’ve been impressed by more than a few folks who’ve come through other paths.

3) We’re looking for people who want to get in early on something that’s going to be big.  These folks are attracted to the big systems challenges and opportunities of a Google or Facebook, but those companies are now too big for them.

4) We look for people who can be stars if they chose to work alone, but who’d rather work in a small, nimble team where everyone’s contributions matter.

5) We think past success is an indicator of future success. We look for people who can demonstrate how they’ve solved big problems in the past and how solving those problems really mattered.

6) While we care a lot less about what languages you’ve programmed in the past, we do appreciate people who’ve experienced building Internet software that scales.

7) We look for people who have a really strong passion for what we’re building. Read up on us on our website and TechCrunch. If it doesn’t interest you, by all means don’t apply. Life’s too short. Have some fun while you’re here.

What Next?

If you’re interested, send me an email. If you have a current resume, great. If not, we’ll get that later. I like to look at code, so send me some. Send me the solution to the following programming challenge:

Without using any built in date or time functions, write a function or method that accepts two mandatory arguments. The first argument is a string of the format "[H]H:MM {AM|PM}" and the second argument is an integer. Assume the integer is the number of minutes to add to the string. The return value of the function should be a string of the same format as the first argument. For example AddMinutes("9:13 AM", 10) would return "9:23 AM". The exercise isn’t meant to be too hard. I just want to see how you code. Feel free to do it procedurally or in an object oriented way, whichever you prefer. Use any language you want. Write production quality code.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Excel is two-dimensional. Columns run horizontally. Rows span vertically. Initially we think of data as having two dimensions as well. In fact, two key terms in database lexicon are rows and columns, just like in Excel. Here’s an example of what an Excel database of some fictitious people might look like:

In reality, however, data usually has three dimensions. Rows describe items. Columns are singular attributes of those items. Lists are plural attributes of those items. Observe how adding a column for the names of each person’s children necessarily morphs the structure into a third dimension. Here’s what that Excel database might look like with a list in a cell:

The way I’ve drawn that table is OK. The problem is that I had to grab each row and adjust its height manually.  Another option is I could have selected all the rows and navigated to Format –> Row –> Height and set the height for all rows to some arbitrary height. The problem with that, of course, is that the appropriate height differs from row to row. Jacob has three kids, Paul has two and Kim has one.

Maybe a better approach is for the software to allow you to enter a list of items in each cell, but be smart about how it shows you that data. Tighten it up. Maybe decorate it with a little triangle to suggest there’s more here than you see, but when you hover your mouse over the cell, show you all the values. Maybe it would like something like this:

What do you think?

One of the things I love about blogging is that it allows me to share with the world some sense of identity about who blist it. This is the first of what I hope are many annual Thanksgiving posts in which we candidly share some of the things for which we’re thankful.

1) I’m thankful for the American economic system that encourages entrepreneurship. Ideas can be incubated. Capital can be raised. Products can be brought to market. Employees can viably work for fledgling entities. Wealth can be shared by all the direct and indirect contributors. These possibilities exist in part because we have an economic system that supports it. I’m happy to see this economic model spread to eastern Europe, India, China and Vietnam among other places. Access to resources has the ability to dramatically and beneficially change the lives of so many people in need.

2) I’m thankful for the Internet. Without it we wouldn’t be able to successfully market blist, much less deliver it. It seems like eons ago, but it was only 10 years ago when the thought of sharing an application with someone meant the recipient had to painfully install software on their PC. Now, it’s as easy as sending a link. So thanks to Al Gore for inventing the Internet.

3) I’m thankful for a sacrificing, supportive family who not only allow me follow my dreams but adopt my dreams as their own. You know you share too much of the passion when your two-year-old asks "what’s a blist?" at the dinner table.

4) I’m thankful for courageous, visionary employees who had the strength to join us when all we had was a vision in our minds eye of what we were building.

5) I’m thankful for the advice of others. We learn so much through our own successes and failures as well as from those generous enough to share their experiences with us.

What are you thankful for? Share your thoughts by posting a comment below.

What’s it like to work at blist? Well, for comparison, my wife is an engineer at Google, so we can share our impressions of working at blist versus Google:

* At Google, you play video games and foosball for entertainment.
* At blist, Kevin tells you jokes.

* At Google Seattle, you work in Fremont, where the yuppies have displaced the artists, but the wholesome vibe remains.
* At blist, you enjoy the historic downtown neighborhood of Pioneer Square - also Seattle’s ground zero for bar-fights involving professional athletes.

* At Google, you get free snacks from the mini-kitchens.
* At blist, you go to the ‘Saveway’ around the corner – no, not Safeway, Saveway.

* At Google 0.004% of employees are Mudders and it’s indeterminate if any can ride a unicycle
* At blist, 33% of employees are Mudders and at least half of them can ride a unicycle

* At Google, the halls are covered with Google Doodles.
* At blist, the walls are bare brick.

* At Google, a chef prepares your (free) lunch.
* At blist, you have a choice of food from all over Pioneer Square and the International District.

* At Google, the conference rooms are named after things in Seattle.
* At blist, we just have ‘the conference room’ – and we’re getting furniture any day now.

* At Google, you don’t even notice when the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, or Slashdot writes about you.
* At blist, you celebrate with everyone when TechCrunch writes an article about us.

* At Google, your employee number has five digits.
* At blist, it only has one.

blist is hiring brilliant engineers, so definitely drop us a line.

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Pioneer Square is the place to be for Seattle startups. It’s no secret that geographical concentration fosters the creativity, contacts, conversations, and sense of healthy competition that lead to successful entrepreneurial ventures. Since we moved in to Pioneer Square from the wilds of Kirkland last week, it really feels like we are right smack in the middle of a dynamic innovation hub – and that’s inspiring. Here are just a few of our interesting new neighbors:

- Avvo
- Bluedot/Faves
- Cozi
- Digital Railroad
- Eyejot
- Flowplay
- GalleryPlayer
- GridNetworks
- Illumita
- Payscale
- Pi Corp
- Pluggd
- Redfin
- SiteScout
- Shelfari
- Shiftboard
- Snapvine
- 3guppies
- Trailfire
- Wetpaint
- Yapta

As many of you know, we recently moved from Kirkland to the Pioneer Square neighborhood of Seattle. I wanted to share some of the motivations behind the move. The simple answer is recruiting. This is where the top talent wants to work. We want to hire top talent, so it boosts our chances of hiring these kinds of folks. If you’re an investment banker in the New York area, you want to work in Manhattan, not in New Jersey. Many software engineers in the Seattle area want to work in Pioneer Square, not in the suburbs.

If you weren’t already aware, studies show that companies most often locate themselves where it’s a convenient commute for the founders. We wanted to be a little more thoughtful and deliberate and locate the company where it best positions us to succeed. We subleased in Kirkland for 8-months, paying attention to the recruiting challenges of our eastside location. I’ve already received a few emails from candidates we interviewed previously who wanted to work in Pioneer Square and weren’t attracted to our old location in Kirkland.

So how’s it been working in Pioneer Square? We like it. Two-thirds of our employees now have a commute from the suburbs into the city. That includes me (I think I now have the second longest commute). We’ve all decided to ride the bus to work. The bus is peaceful and relaxing, a nice 20-minute ride to visit with other bus riders, read the newspaper or think about the day. It feels good taking public transportation, doing a little to help the environment. Near the office there are lots of great restaurants and places to quench your thirst after work. I even walked to the Seahawks-49ers game on Monday night.

The biggest downside is that people who visit from the eastside may not be aware that parking is tight in Pioneer Square and they drive in for a meeting and call you circling the block asking where your parking garage is. No such luck. We need to learn to manage people’s expectations better. Take the bus if you can. If not, there’s a moderate amount of 2-hour on street parking for $1.50/hour. If you plan to stay longer than 2 hours, Qwest field has parking for $10/day and Qwest event center has parking for $5/day.

So wherever you are, when your lease runs out, be thoughtful and deliberate about where you move. My vote is to locate where you can recruit, not for the CEO’s commute.

I’m sure most readers of the blist blog are already passionate TechCrunch readers, but in case you missed it, blist was profiled on TechCrunch today. A lot of you have asked when we’re going to release some screenshots of our application and we agreed to let the cat out of the bag and show a sneak peek of some of the user interface. I encourage you to go check out the post and the screenshots if you haven’t done so already.

Tomorrow is moving day! We’re moving from Kirkland in to the heart of the startup vibe in the Pioneer Square neighborhood of Seattle. Most of the guys are meeting one last time tomorrow morning at the old office in Kirkland. We’ll be packing up the U-Haul and trucking our stuff over the bridge by late morning and hopefully will be moved in and cabled up by noon.

Our new address is:

blist
101 Yesler Way
Suite 502
Seattle, WA 98104

Look for blist to host Seattle Lunch 2.0 in the not too distant future.

If you’re a tourist visiting Seattle and you Ride The Duck, quack your duck whistle for us at First and Yesler! If you take the underground walking tour, you’ll start and end your trek just across the street from us.

This move could be dangerous. I’m a huge fan of warm chocolate chip cookies and tangy pulled pork sandwiches. Fortunately or unfortunately there’s a cookie shop on the ground floor of our building and a great BBQ house across the street. For the record, I weigh 164 pounds. Let’s check back on November 9, 2008 and see if if I’ve gained any weight.

I’ll post early next week on what motivated the move from the suburbs to the inner city.

There are a number of books on how to manage direct and indirect reports. Most are useless. A few are good, to pretty good. That’s a different topic for a different day. Today I’d like to write about another related topic. I haven’t seen much written on how to manage your boss. In my opinion it’s an under-appreciated skill and probably more important than managing subordinates. Here’s my 6-point advice on how to manage your boss:

1) Partner with your boss. The key thing to remember is that a partnership is either win-win or lose-lose. Align goals and work together on achieving them. Understand why her goals are important to her and to the company and learn to appreciate them yourself.

2) Eliminate all surprises, negative and positive. Manage her expectations. The last thing in the world she wants is for her boss to grill her about some problem in your organization she isn’t aware of.

3) If you yourself are a manager, make sure your boss understands who the key contributors in your organization are. From time to time her boss will ask her who the rising stars are. You want the names of these people on the tip of her tongue. The success of your organization hinges in part in your people observing that they are being recognized for their contributions and are being given opportunities to grow and assume more responsibility in the company. I remember 8 or 10 years ago when the CEO of our company was in the elevator with one of our rising engineers, the CEO said “David, I hear you’re doing great things. Thank you. We appreciate your efforts.” He was bouncing off the ceiling for a week and shared with me “I didn’t know that the CEO even knew my name!” The corollary to this is that you need to have the courage to share who isn’t performing. If you say that everyone is a star, you’re indicating either that you can’t gauge and measure individual contributions or aren’t strong enough to handle the discontent of an underachiever.

4) Communicate in her style, not yours. If she likes raw data, give her raw data. If she likes to schmooze every day over coffee at the start of the day, use that forum to update her. If she prefers to debrief by phone on her drive home, accommodate her. If she won’t read long, prosy emails, adopt bullet form. If she suffers from email overload and some fall through the cracks, don’t use that medium.

5) Keep her informed. Use her communication style. Memo. Status Report. In-person daily updates. However she best digests information, keep her informed.

6) Make her successful. Early career employees don’t appreciate the trickle down theory well enough. If the company succeeds, management is rewarded. If management is rewarded, individual contributors are rewarded. It’s horribly self-destructive to think you can succeed while allowing your boss to fail. If you secretly want your boss to fail, do everyone a favor and quit before you get fired. Life’s too short to have so much animosity and you’re only fooling yourself.

Learning to manage your boss is a skill that will contribute to your company’s success, your boss’ success and ultimately to boost your own career.