KARLA PORTER

Ser­ial entre­pre­neurs have a vora­cious insa­tiable appetite for new and improved solu­tions. They are dare dev­ils liv­ing on the edge ready to dive into the unex­plored even in times of eco­nomic uncer­tainty. They do not suf­fer from the most com­mon rea­son peo­ple stay in jobs they love to hate; fear of failure.

Michael Van­Der­vort told me he was send­ing a guy my way who wanted to dis­cuss onboard­ing. A few tweets and emails later and we were on the phone. It was G.L. Hoff­man, a ser­ial entre­pre­neur and ven­ture investor/operator/incubator/mentor. Two of his com­pa­nies have trav­eled the entire suc­cess path from the garage to IPO. Cur­rently, he is chair­man of Job­Dig, and his blog can be found at WhatWouldDadSay.com or at JobDig.com. You’ll also find his thoughts all over U.S. News and World Report, Forbes, Fast­Com­pany, the Wall Street Jour­nal and other busi­ness pub­li­ca­tions and newspapers.

Of note is his project LinkUp, a job search engine with a twist. What makes LinkUp bet­ter than other job web­sites like Mon­ster or CareerBuilder?

The most sig­nif­i­cant dif­fer­ence between LinkUp and other job sites on the web is that we only list jobs from com­pany web­sites. Com­pa­nies inter­ested in get­ting their jobs on LinkUp must send us the URL of their com­pany web­site so we can link to them. This allows us to main­tain a much higher qual­ity data­base of jobs than you will find on any other job search site on the web today. There are no out­dated jobs that have already been filled, no ads posted by recruiters and head­hunters, and no iden­tity thefts or work-at-home scams. Linkup will always gen­er­ate the high­est qual­ity jobs available.

G.L. is quite per­son­able and friendly. He trav­els a lot and is a never end­ing foun­tain of ideas which he has most recently taken to doc­u­ment­ing in the form of Gruz­zles from his com­mand post in Min­neapo­lis. He wanted to talk about the appli­ca­tion of Gruz­zles in the onboard­ing process. That mor­phed into many other top­ics of dis­cus­sion. I had a sus­pi­cion Gruz­zles might be rul­ing his life and that he was obses­sively view­ing every­thing concentrically.

When did you cre­ate the first one? What was it? What inspired you?

GL: I was explor­ing a new way of pre­sent­ing a new busi­ness plan using sim­ple graphs and lan­guage.  I was try­ing to take the exec­u­tive sum­mary idea to a new sim­pler level.  The task was to find if I could explain a new busi­ness with cir­cles, with the con­nec­tions being the dif­ferenta­tors of the busi­ness.  The Gruz­zle came out of this experience.

Are Gruz­zles just a fad until you latch onto a new con­cept or are you com­pletely obsessed with cre­at­ing them as a lens to explore our existence?

GL: I am a bit obsessed on them now, just like I am when I get involved in a new com­pany.  I think there is a com­mer­cial prod­uct and I am try­ing to fig­ure out how to do it.  That is the fun part. What I am really obsessed about is our new job search engine called LINKUP.COM…it is the only place where some­one can go to find jobs ONLY from com­pany websites.

How do you take com­plex sit­u­a­tions and ques­tions and sim­plify them into a few inter­sect­ing circles?

GL: I am not sure to be per­fectly hon­est.  I do know that try­ing to make con­nec­tions amongst three dis­parate ele­ments stim­u­lates my own cre­ativ­ity, so I thought it might do the same for others.

Do you keep a note­book with you at all times or do you grab nap­kins in restaurants?

GL: I have note­books all over.  Some I can do in five min­utes, but most take a lot longer, days even.

Can you define Gruz­zles into categories?

GL: A pub­lisher con­tacted me and tried to tell me that there was a series like CHICKEN SOUP or DUMMIES in them.  I think there might be a place for a Gruz­zles for Baby­boomers, Golfers, Enrepre­neurs and so forth.  Although I am find­ing much harder to cre­ate the nar­row topics.

How do you think Gruz­zles can help mankind?

GL: I don’t think they are going to cure can­cer, but they might be a new way to com­mu­ni­cate in a dif­fer­ent, faster, fun­nier way.

How do you pick your next project? Or, do they pick you?

GL: Good ques­tion.  I am always recep­tive to new ideas, new con­cepts, new projects.  The chal­lenge is in pick­ing which one to spend the time on.  I am get­ting bet­ter at pri­or­i­tiz­ing, and know­ing where and how to spend my time.

What will you be doing 6 months from now?

GL: Not ice fishing.

I also asked G.L. if Gruz­zles keep him up at night. He said no but I’m not com­pletely con­vinced. I see him up at all hours on Twit­ter.

What uses do you envi­sion for Gruz­zles? Inquir­ing minds want to know.