The ramblings of a PHB

I'm trying to become a better people and product manager.  I think I'm OK now,
but we can all stand to improve.  My manager has been suggesting books to me
and I'm starting to actually read them.  The latest one I've read is Good
to Great, (you can read some excerpts
at FastCompany).  I highly recommend reading it.  It has some really
important fundamental lessons, such as the idea that getting the right people on your
team is more important than having the right ideas, because the right people will
come up with the right ideas.  It's so important to have the right people on
your team, and I'm fortunate that we have so many great people at Microsoft that we
have such a great pool to pick from.  

The other story that stuck with me was a story about Nucor steel, which located its
steel mills in the midwest, so they could get former farmers, with a strong work ethic,
to work there.   Their strategy was "hire like 5 people, pay them like 8
people, and work them like 10 people". That's a very interesting and clever idea,
and it's basically what Microsoft has done as well.