By Dmitry Shuster
When you are standing close to the end with the bottom nowhere in sight, do you take the risk? We might not recognize it immediately, but all of us take risks in one form or another. It does not not always need to be a grand leap of faith. What's most important is that we become accustomed to taking risks and diving into the unknown, particularly in our professional careers.
Rick Hess is no stranger to taking risks, and the risks he took throughout his career did not always end with a reward. Early in his career, he made a bold move by leaving a mature technology company, Digital Equipment Corp, to join a fairly new start-up called Oracle (then a $20M company). Many of his closest friends and relatives, including his father, felt it was too risky of a move, but Rick felt this move was a necessary one for the advancement of his career. This turned out to be a beneficial decision that yielded new learnings, promotions, and connections, including developing a relationship with Larry Ellison, one of today's greatest technology visionaries, and finding one of his closest mentors, John Luongo.
Afterwards, seeking the next challenge, Rick left Oracle for another Silicon Valley firm with a lot of promise. However, the advancement of his career was cut short due to discrimination . Two days before a major stock vesting event, the CEO of the company fired Rick after he acknowledges he was gay.
“I decided that I didn’t need to lie to anyone anymore.”
A leading employment lawyer in SF asked Rick, "Would you like to have a career in Silicon Valley after this?" Rick said yes. The lawyer then suggested that Rick not pursue a lawsuit for unlawful termination. Rick reluctantly obliged, deciding to not pursue legal action after a clear case of sexual harassment and discrimination perpetrated by one of Silicon Valley's most successful CEOs. (Rick refused to tell us who this person was, although he made it clear that he was not Larry Ellison!)
Rick took an understandable position, especially given the era in the nineties, when the attitudes towards sexual orientation were not as progressive as today, but this decision did not come without a price. Rick's decision to not take a risk was costly for his confidence and self-esteem. Rick is certain that his career would have advanced even farther (and perhaps his net worth would have grown substantially) if he stood up for himself at the time. Nonetheless, Rick's transparency may have cost him that job, Rick is relentless in his pursuit to ensure that actions like this do not happen again, especially in Silicon Valley.
This experience opened Rick's eyes to the widespread issue of diversity, which he believes continues to persist to this day. Promoting diversity is now one of his biggest passions, and he believes that it is absolutely essential for success within not only corporations, but also the economy at large. The United States is more diverse today than it has ever been in the past, and we must encourage this level of diversity to thrive across all businesses, regions, and levels of society. It is this diversity that makes us unique and drives the entrepreneurial spirit of America. "Don't believe that you can't do it," says Rick when referring to taking risks and helping to democratize success. "You can."
Today, Rick strongly believes that Silicon Valley is a land of opportunity; a place where failure and effort are respected and where people can dust themselves off as they continue along their paths to success. "It allows you to take risks and fail", says Rick Hess. It's a "badge of honor" that can provide invaluable lessons and learning experiences as we go back to the drawing board. The most important thing is to learn from the risks we take, to internalize the lessons, and to apply them to our future endeavors.
Taking risks means we are going forward. It may not always seem that way, but often times risking something - money, complacency, honor - for what we believe in means we are breaking out of the status quo. Have you ever felt regret for doing something that didn't turn out as expected? Have you also regretted not doing anything at all? I think we can easily discern which regret pains us more. In modern society, the stakes are high but we are more likely to regret not trying than trying and not 'succeeding' instantly. Success comes in many forms - actually taking a risk, no matter how big or small - is one of them and the first step towards future prosperity.
