Businesses should try to be the best, not the biggest • Hacker News Board

Re: Businesses should try to be the best, not the biggest

#81

Post by meowster » Fri, Jan 29, 2021, 1:28 PM UTC

sunstone wrote: post #3

To push the metaphor a bit further isn't humanity itself a kind of cancer of the earth?

No. I feel like a lot of people aren't parsing the title correctly.

IF the purpose of the company.

Not the purpose of all companies. Humanity doesn't have purpose other than what we make of it. We can strive to maximize enjoyment while keeping population flat if we wanted to.

Edit: The title was changed, it was something like: If a company's sole purpose is to grow, then it is no different from a cancer.

Re: Businesses should try to be the best, not the biggest

#82

Post by lm28469 » Fri, Jan 29, 2021, 1:28 PM UTC

lnsru wrote: post #70

lm28469 wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The same with business: business is growing or dying I know plenty of people with small businesses that are neither growing nor dying, just paying the bills and making enough money to live happily. I'm kind of scared that people can't even imagine this is a possibility to be honest... Not everything has to be the next facebook and have 100% yoy growth

It’s weird when 30 years old company has only 10 employees while working in wide industrial automation field. The owner is just too lazy to go out of town and look for some new customers.

What if the owner is perfectly happy with his position. Why would you increase your work load and working hours to "grow" if you're living a good life already ? fomo ? lack of other meaning in your life ?

If your business supports your lifestyle what's lazy about just ... enjoying it ? Isn't that the very purpose of "work" ?

Re: Businesses should try to be the best, not the biggest

#83

Post by Nextgrid » Fri, Jan 29, 2021, 1:29 PM UTC

beyondcompute wrote: post #65

Just remember that during the “growth” company apparently delivers useful goods and services (otherwise people wouldn’t pay it money). In the process company might increase customers’ standard of living and productivity which in turn causes positive effects and growth elsewhere.

A lot of companies in pursuit of "growth" provide their goods/services at a loss and/or break laws or behave unethically in the process.

Often when investors finally seek a return on their investment and the company adjusts their prices to a realistic level (or that law enforcement catches up) the company withers away, often leaving devastation behind (such as wronged employees, business partners or customers).

Re: Businesses should try to be the best, not the biggest

#84

Post by paulryanrogers » Fri, Jan 29, 2021, 1:29 PM UTC

u678u wrote: post #72

Its basic evolution - any successful species is programmed to increase in numbers. A species that aims to stay static will die off when conditions change, and of course one that aims to shrink in size will not last. The cancer word is just clickbait.

Evolution pressures reward adapting and surviving. Unlimited growth is fatal. Bacteria in a closed jar will consume all resources put inside then die out.

Sentient species can learn to limit their consumption to maximize their survival.

Companies with sentient leadership can too.

Re: Businesses should try to be the best, not the biggest

#85

Post by melomal » Fri, Jan 29, 2021, 1:30 PM UTC

jspash wrote: post #36

I often question the motives of my company. It has only 100 or so employees. Has been in business for 25+ years. But we are on a continual drive to increase sales, hire new people, add size to the facilities. But it wasn't always this way. It only happened once it went public. Now we are working for the investors. They need to see an increasing return on their investment. Management choices are no longer about the cu…

Shareholder value above all else is what is important. Unfortunately, VC money needs to be returned to their shareholders too. It's a ponzi scheme and somebodies next big idea will be the catalyst for additional money and so on and so on. It almost feels like startups are the get rich quick scheme of the moment.

Re: Businesses should try to be the best, not the biggest

#86

Post by coldtea » Fri, Jan 29, 2021, 1:30 PM UTC

the-dude wrote: post #28

coldtea wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I find it reductionist to the point it loses it's meaning. Actually the whole human body is constantly growing, not just cancers. I'm am growing new skin cells as we speak, approximately every x3 weeks I shed old skin cells so need new ones. That objection is already covered in the very title used by HN (" If the purpose of a company is merely growth"). It's also covered extensively in the article. And your counter…

I can assure you there are plenty of people growing well beyond their first 2 decades.

And one way that happens is covered in the article: through cancer. The other is obesity. Both make the article's point.

Re: Businesses should try to be the best, not the biggest

#87

Post by p2t2p » Fri, Jan 29, 2021, 1:30 PM UTC

Oh my god, I needed that. I always felt that there's something wrong with this obsession with growth but could put it into worlds. Bit thank you to that human being for doing that for me.

Re: Businesses should try to be the best, not the biggest

#88

Post by jokethrowaway » Fri, Jan 29, 2021, 1:31 PM UTC

That's a great article.

I'd rather see a market full of small independent, ever growing operators than zombies drinking VC money before getting sold for a billion to some giant and become terrible.

Those small independent companies are all people who traded a life of soul-less employment for the digital equivalent of a mom and pop store.

That's the life and the society I want.

An interesting question may be, how did we get here?

Why there is so much money to invest? In other words, why there is so much inequality?

Part of it is natural, the Silicon Valley created a lot of value through technology and it's been rewarded nicely. But I think the answer is deeper and lies in the centralised economy we have, in corrupted government officials assisting monopolies creation through regulation and the government being a monopoly itself.

Re: Businesses should try to be the best, not the biggest

#89

Post by ComputerGuru » Fri, Jan 29, 2021, 1:31 PM UTC

oblio wrote: post #46

the-dude wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can assure you there are plenty of people growing well beyond their first 2 decades.

As far as I know we don't grow any new fat cells, it's just that the ones we do have get larger.

There is a maximum size after which individual cells will split. It becomes harder to regain your old shape because when you lose weight the existing cells shrink but never shed, so you can end up with new cells you can’t get rid of.

Re: Businesses should try to be the best, not the biggest

#90

Post by freeflight » Fri, Jan 29, 2021, 1:33 PM UTC

u678u wrote: post #72

Its basic evolution - any successful species is programmed to increase in numbers. A species that aims to stay static will die off when conditions change, and of course one that aims to shrink in size will not last. The cancer word is just clickbait.

A species that grows so much that it outgrows its own habitat will often end up destroying said habitat due to overpopulation, with ramifications usually going way past the species that actually triggered it.

That's why not everything that is natural is automatically "good"/sustainable.

Because if we go about it that way we might as well never have come down from those trees, as humans we can think ahead and conceptualize possible long-term consequences of our actions. That's an advantage not many animals have, we best make some proper use of it.