4. The business targets and rewards those who seek responsibility and not merely accept it
5.
6. Over-communicates about company progress, challenges, measures of performance, and relationships to mission objectives. Particularly in challenging circumstances, communication keeps up
7. Hires for capability and a positive, winning attitude. Roots out passivity, poor attitudes and passive dissent
8.
9. Work is fun. Energy is high. Whining is unacceptable
10. There is one ego in the company, the company itself. There is esprit de corps and a shared pride in the organization
11. Group pursuit of mastery in the company’s endeavor. This superordinate goal produces engagement, grit and determination. It releases greater creativity than more rote objectives and converts much more of work into something pleasurable
12. Motivation for staff comes from developing and maintaining the respect of their peers as much as from monetary rewards
15. The best idea wins, no matter from whom or where it came
16. Truth speaks to power, connecting leaders authentically to people, protecting the capacity to inquire and improve
17. Value learning and constructively harnessing the lessons of failure. Smart failure – fast, cheap and not the same way twice - is not harshly punished. Mistakes are disclosed as soon as they are known so that they can be corrected most quickly and cheaply
23. Regular company-wide meetingsWhile important, the incorporation of these items should take a secondary role until the company has validated product-market fit, or service-market fit. However, upon reaching the threshold of offering fit with market demand, instituting these contributing elements for an efficient and high commitment HRM rapidly rises in importance for a ramping-up business and pays long term dividends.<br />Conclusion<br />Founder aristocracies capture the hearts and minds of the founders, but not many other employees. Technical supremacies appeal to the scientific and engineering community, and can more easily grow to a larger size than the founder-centric model. But, for greatest adaptability and scale, the high commitment model is unequalled. <br />The high commitment blueprint comes though at a price of significant up front cost, as well as vigilant ongoing behavior from staff and management to reinforce, protect and renew this culture. Done well, it contributes to the highest comparative rate of business and financial success. It is adaptable and resilient. <br />The most important aspect of implementing and sustaining a HCHRM model is consistency of practices. This blueprint has particularly strong positive feedback among its many related supporting and contributing elements. It demands internal consistency of interrelated factors more than any other model. Done right, many aspects of HRM are achieved through social and peer mechanisms. With coherent practices, the high commitment model is the most robust and enduring for HRM in a growing high technology firm to achieve prosperity and lasting impact. <br />About the Author<br />David J. Litwiller is an Executive-in-Residence with Communitech, based in Waterloo, Ontario. His background is in wireless devices, precision electro-mechanics, semiconductors, electro-optics, MEMS, biotech instrumentation, and enterprise software. He serves as an advisor to various private corporations in matters of strategy, technology, operations, finance, governance, and business development. Mr. Litwiller is the author of “Rapid Advance - Mergers & Acquisitions, Partnerships, Restructurings, Turnarounds and Divestitures in High Technology”.<br />References<br />“Organizational Blueprints for Success in High-Tech Start-Ups: Lessons from the Stanford Project on Emerging Companies”, J. Barron and M. Hannan, California Management Review, Vol. 44 No. 3, Spring 2002<br />http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1511023<br />“Strategic Human Resources: Frameworks for General Managers”, J. Barron and D. Kreps, Wiley, Hoboken, NJ, 1999<br />http://www.amazon.com/Strategic-Human-Resources-Frameworks-Managers/dp/0471072532/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1311169351&sr=1-1<br />Zynga Inc. S-1 Filing, http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1439404/000119312511180285/ds1.htm<br />“Inside Intuit: How the Makers of Quicken Beat Microsoft and Revolutionized an Entire Industry”, S. Taylor and K. Schroeder, Harvard Business School Press, 2003 <br />http://www.amazon.com/Inside-Intuit-Microsoft-Revolutionized-Industry/dp/1591391369/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1311169208&sr=1-1<br />The HP Way http://www.hpalumni.org/hp_way.htm<br />“Startup Genome Report”, B. Herrmann et al, 2011 http://startupgenome.cc/pages/startup-genome-report-1<br />