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How a janitor at Frito-Lay invented Flamin' Hot Cheetos (2017)

thehustle.co

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Re: How a janitor at Frito-Lay invented Flamin' Hot Cheetos (2017)

#91

Post by notahacker »

Ancapistani wrote: post #27
mdoms wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can probably just keep the casual racism to yourself.

Hold up just a sec here. I’m not sure I that “Indian” is a “race” for any common definition of the word. It’s a nationality, but my my relatively uninformed perspective it appears that there are many ethnic and cultural groups that comprise it. More importantly, you seem to be attributing malice to the GP. They are noticing a cultural difference and asking for context. While their choice of phrasing may seem to some…

I'm perfectly willing to believe this is a common thing in Indian culture, but sharing feelgood rags to riches stories involving seizing opportunities with smart capitalists is also a large part of the raison d'etre of HN...

Re: How a janitor at Frito-Lay invented Flamin' Hot Cheetos (2017)

#92

Post by [deleted] »

bserge wrote: post #16

This is a really nice story, but you know who the other hero is? The CEO who gave him the time and the opportunity. He could've easily told him to fuck off, as many would do. Who was he, what's his name? More often than not, we get nowhere without people in better positions helping us, it would be great if more people would keep an open mind like that. That CEO deserves recognition. And if you manage to climb higher…

[deleted]

Re: How a janitor at Frito-Lay invented Flamin' Hot Cheetos (2017)

#93

Post by throwaway2245 »

amelius wrote: post #34

Another way this story could have ended: CEO: Thanks for the idea! Goodbye, and don't forget your mop! (CEO shares go up by $20M) Janitor: Damn, I should have brought a lawyer. If only I had the money for one.

The story probably does end that way 99.9 out of 100 times.

Whose interest is it in that this is the story that gets repeatedly told as inspiration?

Re: How a janitor at Frito-Lay invented Flamin' Hot Cheetos (2017)

#94

Post by Guest42 »

kube-system wrote: post #85
Guest42 wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the distinctions between supports and essential to value get pretty subjective. Since 2008 the number of contracting roles has increased quite a bit and there are disputes as to whether Uber drivers (or engineers) are employees. I’d claim there is an unnecessary and unhelpful bias towards outsourcing (not saying that it’s always wrong, just more prevalent than ideal...).

Well, Uber drivers definitely directly support Uber's primary business. So I'd say that's a different situation altogether. (and they're not really outsourced, Uber directly "contracts" each one of them) Many businesses fail when trying to outsource staff that directly support their primary product or service. A more direct comparison to the issue of Frito-Lay's janitorial staff is something like: should Yellow Cab s…

Yes, the decisions could go either way depending on circumstances. I think for me this was a good example of needing to stay on topic. Original comment was that not paying a middleman is one potential benefit of keeping common services in house and that many if not most roles could be filled externally.

Re: How a janitor at Frito-Lay invented Flamin' Hot Cheetos (2017)

#96

Post by troupe »

Mulpze15 wrote: post #30

Richard Montañez has all my admiration for what he achieved. This is a beautiful story. Unfortunately, those kinds of stories also play into the narrative: be a good model employee, make sure the floors shine and trust that hard work, and great ideas will make you deservedly insanely rich. Because there are smart CEOs who will see all of that Cinderella, capitalist version. Too rare to be significant as a policy. Mos…

> make sure the floors shine and trust that hard work, and great ideas will make you deservedly insanely rich.

Generally someone who is known for doing a good job of whatever it is that they are doing and has a lot of initiative are going to have more opportunities than someone who doesn't really care to do a good job and has no initiative.

Showing up for practice doesn't mean you will be a great athlete, but not showing up is a good way to dramatically reduce your chances.

Re: How a janitor at Frito-Lay invented Flamin' Hot Cheetos (2017)

#97

Post by [deleted] »

GoodJokes wrote: post #88
bserge wrote: post #16

This is a really nice story, but you know who the other hero is? The CEO who gave him the time and the opportunity. He could've easily told him to fuck off, as many would do. Who was he, what's his name? More often than not, we get nowhere without people in better positions helping us, it would be great if more people would keep an open mind like that. That CEO deserves recognition. And if you manage to climb higher…

I just can’t even. What if there weren’t insane ladders to climb. This kneejerk reaction to lick the boots of a CEO is...disturbing.

[deleted]

Re: How a janitor at Frito-Lay invented Flamin' Hot Cheetos (2017)

#99

Post by rchaud »

KindOne wrote: post #5

If you don't want to read the twitter thread, you can read this: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20227175 (2019) https://thehustle.co/hot-cheetos-inventor/

Thanks for posting the original article. I remember it being posted earlier on HN. The second I saw the tweet about "Make sure they know a Montanez" mopped it, I knew it was the hot chip story, as that was a line I remember from the article.

Re: How a janitor at Frito-Lay invented Flamin' Hot Cheetos (2017)

#100

Post by phone8675309 »

BoorishBears wrote: post #86
Glench wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ooh! I'm happy to supply a feel-good story that is (as far as I can tell), unreservedly good: https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20200915-the-himalayan-in... "The Himalayan invention powered by pine needles" TLDR: man and wife move to poor rural region of Indian, see wild fire problem caused by pine needles, invent a machine that turns pine needles into electricity and cooking fuel, employ villagers to pick up pine n…

Two things I haven't seen anyone mention that seem important: 1. For the villages that have now "made it" economically, there are countless others that haven't, that still live in one-room houses. What about them? 2. I think it's worthwhile pointing out that the product that he created, while popular and financially successful, is still used in the same settings charcoal is. And while carbonized briquettes produce le…

Is this the "the world is hard, best to not try and let our corporate masters think for us" post that's in every thread on HN?

A story can have good parts and bad parts. It does not make you a bad person to like the good parts. It does not make you a bad person to pick out the bad parts. It does make you a bad person to take a dump on someone's comment to "own" them.

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