LOL I sold and retired ten years ago. The now-parent company has pretty much completely rid themselves of the old culture. By the way, I never took a course in

LOL I sold and retired ten years ago. The now-parent company has pretty much completely rid themselves of the old culture. By the way, I never took a course in management or anything. My methods are all learned in the trenches. Theoretically, I'm working on a book that is about my experiences and why I ended up managing the way I did. In many ways, it was a bit like the Old West, with slightly less prostitution and better hygiene. Also less murder... Come to think of it, it wasn't that much like the Old West, but it was very different than what I read about today. The most important lessons I learned were to remember that I'd hired them to do things that I could not. As such, they knew their job better than I did. If I could have done it myself, I'd not have had to hire them. Hire people you can trust. You have to trust them to be adults. Give them clear goals and then get the hell out of the way so that they can do their job. Give them the tools they ask for, not the tools a vendor suggested. They have a reason they asked for a proprietary compiler, get it for them. Respect goes a long way and begins in the recruitment phase. It surely doesn't end there. To get respect, you have to give respect. Train, train, train. If you treat your employee right, you can absolutely train them and not worry about them being poached. Salary is actually a small part of overhead. Pay them well and treat them well. Our print room cost more than a senior employee. There's no reason to pay crap wages. At the same time, wages aren't everything. Everyone wants to make good money but when you're already assured of making good money, other things start to count. Help your employees in their goals. If you have a QA that wants to move to dev, don't offer to pay back their educational expenses, but pay their expenses outright, pay for their child care, pay for their books, and keep paying their salary while they work a reduced schedule. Really, if you're treating them right, they won't just up and go to a new company after you've trained them. I can go on, but there's a few things I've learned.