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ClubFixit: Diary of a startup
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November 29, 2000: 8:28 a.m. ET
Part 6: Being a CEO at a dot.com startup isn't all glamour and luxury perks
By Staff Writer Hope Hamashige
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NEW YORK (CNNfn) - Sometimes a job title sounds a lot more glamorous than it really is. As CEO of a startup company, Sean Mullin's job title is one that fits into the category of jobs that probably sound a lot more impressive than they really are.
"Sometimes people hear CEO and most people are like, 'That's cool,'" said Mullin. "But there's so many loose ends that have to be tied and a whole bunch of little stuff, and I end up doing all of them."
Being the CEO of any company sounds good, but when that company is a startup still seeking funding, there's little room for the CEO to have a big time CEO-sized ego.
No room for ego
In the interest of keeping costs low, Mullin has few of the usual trappings of most big-time corporate CEOs. No corner office with sweeping views of the Manhattan skyline. He's got no intercom connecting him with a neatly dressed executive secretary who takes care of his menial tasks and brings him coffee at regular intervals.
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There's definitely a lot of junk work and I have to do it because it needs to be done. Sometimes the most important stuff I have to do is the least glamorous.
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Sean Mullin
CEO, ClubFixit |
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More often than not, Mullin clambers down the few stairs from his sleeping loft to the office/living room/kitchen, switches on the computer and, voila, ClubFixit is open for the day. He can work in his sweats, yawning, hair unkempt and nobody will know except Jack, the fluffy, white cat who keeps him company all day.
Also in the name of cost containment, Mullin the CEO takes on many menial tasks that in a large corporation would fall to somebody else in the company. When secretarial work needs to be done, Mullin the CEO does it. When photocopies need to be made, Mullin the CEO runs down the street to the nearest photocopy shop. And when the office needs to be cleaned, Mullin the CEO becomes the janitor.
"It's just me and Phill and Phill is in charge of technology, so a lot of the trivial stuff falls to me," he said. "There's definitely a lot of junk work and I have to do it because it needs to be done. Sometimes the most important stuff I have to do is the least glamorous."
No job description for startup CEO
Some of his responsibilities fall clearly into the realm of tasks that belong to the CEO, like writing and rewriting the company's business plan and meeting with potential strategic partners. Likewise, hiring attorneys and reviewing the legal documents they produce are things many CEOs might undertake. Also, Mullin takes the lead in trying to attract that all-important angel investor or venture capitalist.
But making company letterhead on the computer? Yep, that's his job, too.
At the moment, ClubFixit is in the middle of its first major sales push. Now that the company's Web site is up and running and being hosted by Conxion, the rush is on to get the first few clients.
Getting a handful of plumbers, general contractors or painters signed on as clients of ClubFixit will serve several purposes. It will produce a little money. Not much, but some.
More importantly, however, Mullin and the ClubFixit crew will be able to learn what kind of demand there is for the technology services they are offering. Once they have a few clients, they will have a lot more insight into the technology needs of small businesses involved in the fields of construction and repair. Having a small client base also may help them attract venture capital and strategic partners.
The marketing push has created an unusually large load of administrative tasks for Mullin. For the time being he has had to set aside the more intellectually challenging work while he tries to get the word out about ClubFixit.
On a couple of days recently, Mullin has been completely occupied with sending out hundreds of postcards to roofers and plumbers who are listed with the City of New York. To save money, he had the postcards printed on large sheets of poster board. When they arrived, Mullin the CEO sat down on the floor of the office with a pair of scissors and cropped the sheets into individual postcards.
It was also Mullin the CEO who typed the names of the various repairmen into a database, made mailing labels and stuck the labels to the postcards. It is also Mullin the CEO who bundles up the postcards and walks them to a nearby post office to stamp and ship.
When a potential client wants additional information about ClubFixit, Mullin the CEO prints out some information and drops it in the mailbox at the end of the block or faxes it over to the client.
In between all of his other duties, Mullin also is spending a little time every day making a few pitches over the phone to potential clients culled from lists of repairmen he has received from the city.
"It's a lot of work and that is definitely something I wish I could hand over to a sales department," he said.
Hoping it all pays off
And on one recent afternoon, when a Manhattan-based general contractor called ClubFixit to say he was very interested in the services ClubFixit was offering, it was Mullin the CEO who took the subway uptown to Washington Heights to meet the contractor who had called.
That meeting he had up in Washignton Heights, by the way, landed him his first real client. Technology chief Phill Legault and a freelance designer have been working on getting that client's site designed and functioning and it should be up in the next day or two.
Mullin spent the major part of one afternoon talking with this client about the kind of technology he currently uses in his business. It was a good learning experience because Mullin finally got a real first-hand look at the types of services -- other than setting up e-mail and a Web site -- that will help this general contractor streamline his business operation and ultimately make more money.
Besides, Mullin has resigned himself to a new reality in the world of technology startups. Money is out there for startup technology companies, but it's not as plentiful as it once was, which means he and the crew will have to make some sacrifices, including doing all the grunt work themselves.
"We have to be a little more patient. Starting a company and immediately getting 100 employees isn't going to happen because capital is more scarce than it was," he said. "Maybe one day I'll be in the corner office and having martini lunches and that won't be that bad." 
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