It becomes extraordinary when you get to share a beer and hear unbelievable stories with said person — all while it goes down in Duke’s Bar in Homestead.
Yup, the Pittsburgh Technology Council brought the infamous Bill Campbell to town as part of its Venture Out series to arm local entrepreneurs with business-building knowledge from the world’s top business minds.
In case you don’t know Bill Campbell, he’s a Homestead native and hero/legend in Silicon Valley. There’s not enough space to review his resume, but the highlights include being on the board of Apple since 1997, a close friend with Steve Jobs, mentored Jeff Bezos and has been running Intuit.
So after a sell-out crowd at the PTC event where his presentation was a mixture of tall tales, business advice and the occasional F-bomb, Campbell gathered an entourage of high school classmates, business associates and other notables, including Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Charlie Batch for a few rounds of beers and a deep-fried, Homestead-style buffet at local watering hole Duke’s Upper Deck on 8th Avenue.
Magazine spreads and pictures of Campbell at various Homestead charity events dotted the walls. While I was talking to Batch about his Best of Batch Foundation (batchfoundation.org) that helps local underprivileged youth and their families, Campbell wanders over and puts his arm around Batch with a Bud Light dangling from his free hand.
Campbell instantly engages me in the conversation and before I knew it, we were talking about Ray Lane of HP and Kleiner Perkins. I was telling Campbell about his presentation in Pittsburgh last year. Campbell gave me an earful about Lane’s investments. As the conversation progressed, I couldn’t believe I was swapping stories with one of the world’s most brilliant technology and business minds. It was quite surreal.
So there I was, smack dab in the heart of Homestead talking to two of the coolest dudes I’ve ever met. I can’t believe that guys like Campbell and Batch would talk so openly and candidly with a pip squeak like me.
Just goes to show you that you can take the man out of Homestead, but you can’t take Homestead out of the man!
Bill is a class act. So is Charlie. Goes to show you that Pittsburghers are solid people and they rarely forget their roots. No BS at all. Bill and Charlie prove it.
So back to Campbell’s presentation earlier in the day. He was pretty adamant about not having media. We convinced him that a little coverage would be a good thing. I almost scored an interview for TechVibe Radio, but five solid, quiet minutes proved impossible.
So I took notes furiously. I wanted to glean a few nuggets of wisdom from his fast-paced presentation. I came away with a few sound bytes for lack of a better term. Here’s what I got:
- Invest in people, not companies.
- Get the best engineering manager that you can afford.
- Hire big right off the bat.
- Hire a financial person to pick up the loose balls.
- You MUST have complete passion for the product.
- VCs need to help their portfolio companies get better at what they do.
- Tech communities need a strong VC presence to survive.
At the end of his presentation, Campbell was asked about his passion for giving back. He went into a long answer that ended with him choking up just a bit recognizing the work of Batch. I’ll go ut on a limb and end this with a direct quote from Bill:
“I wish everybody would do for their home towns what Charlie does for his!”
http://www.techburgher.com/breaking-news/brush-greatness-hanging-bill-campbell/
