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You Weren't Meant to Have a Boss

paulgraham.com

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Re: You Weren't Meant to Have a Boss

#81

Post by ippisl »

pg wrote: post #35
alf wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Humans also weren't meant to build pyramids, send men to the moon, or write operating systems. Big organizations are needed for big problems. But I do generally agree with the article that big organizations are not the best place to develop as a programmer.

Big organizations are needed for big problems. The jury is still out on that one. The trend lately has been in the other direction.

I think that it's mostly a symptom of machines replacing humans. for example , in the past we needed humans to connect us to each other so we can collaborate. now we have the forums , search , etc...

Taking this trend to it's extreme , when we have human equivalent robots and AI , one man could build anything he wants by commanding machines to do the work.

Re: You Weren't Meant to Have a Boss

#82

Post by ivankirigin »

pg wrote: post #38
mindcrime wrote: post #24

Or rather, a large organization could only avoid slowing down if they avoided tree structure. And since human nature limits the size of group that can work together, the only way I can imagine for larger groups to avoid tree structure would be to have no structure: to have each group actually be independent, and to work together the way components of a market economy do. That might be worth exploring. I suspect there…

Me too. But the organization doesn't have to be a "firm" in the usual sense...

Meetup is trying something like this: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/08_24/b40880886...

I haven't heard an update for how it has gone.

Re: You Weren't Meant to Have a Boss

#83

Post by iamwil »

Uchikoma wrote: post #69
iamwil wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We only need that many people because our tools weren't sufficiently advanced at the time. We had to invent a lot of things on the fly there.

So today this could be done by 2 founders without bosses? (the topic of this thread)

like matt said, I think eventually yes. It seems silly to us now, just as it seemed silly back a couple hundred years ago that you can run a farm with just a handful of people and even produce more food.

Re: You Weren't Meant to Have a Boss

#84

Post by nfriedly »

> [1] When I talk about humans being meant or designed to live a certain way, I mean by evolution.

Do you think that humans will eventually evolve to work better in larger groups if they keep getting pushed that way?

Re: You Weren't Meant to Have a Boss

#85

Post by etruong42 »

What are we "meant" to do? Some people enjoy the active lifestyle full of exercise and unprocessed foods. Others don't mind eating whatever is convenient and enjoy other pursuits. Some don't even have the choice and would be (presumably) happier with either.

We can talk about what diet leads to greater cardiovascular health or what employment strategy is more productive. But trying to talk about something as amorphous as having more "meaning" is a lost cause.

Re: You Weren't Meant to Have a Boss

#86

Post by [deleted] »

pg wrote: post #38
mindcrime wrote: post #24

Or rather, a large organization could only avoid slowing down if they avoided tree structure. And since human nature limits the size of group that can work together, the only way I can imagine for larger groups to avoid tree structure would be to have no structure: to have each group actually be independent, and to work together the way components of a market economy do. That might be worth exploring. I suspect there…

Me too. But the organization doesn't have to be a "firm" in the usual sense...

[deleted]

Re: You Weren't Meant to Have a Boss

#87

Post by ajju »

pg wrote: post #38
mindcrime wrote: post #24

Or rather, a large organization could only avoid slowing down if they avoided tree structure. And since human nature limits the size of group that can work together, the only way I can imagine for larger groups to avoid tree structure would be to have no structure: to have each group actually be independent, and to work together the way components of a market economy do. That might be worth exploring. I suspect there…

Me too. But the organization doesn't have to be a "firm" in the usual sense...

Ricardo Semler has done this with his business(es) in Brazil. His book about this, 'Maverick' is a decent read. http://www.amazon.com/Maverick-Success-Behind-Unusual-Workpl...

Re: You Weren't Meant to Have a Boss

#88

Post by ippisl »

iamwil wrote: post #66
alf wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

By "big" I mean problems that require many distinct, intelligent decisions. These problems always has and always will require very large groups of people working cooperatively. For example, the Apollo program at it's peak employed 34,000 NASA employees and 375,000 contractors [1]. This is really a point of semantics though, not really worth debating. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budget_of_NASA

We only need that many people because our tools weren't sufficiently advanced at the time. We had to invent a lot of things on the fly there.

But when you have many tools and building blocks , the problem doesn't require many intelligent decisions anymore , and isn't "big" by the definition given by the parent thread.

Re: You Weren't Meant to Have a Boss

#89

Post by JeffffreyF »

quanticle wrote: post #7

You weren't meant to have a boss. You also weren't meant to read, work on computers, drive cars, fly, or even practice agriculture. Its very easy to criticize any modern institution on the grounds of, "Our H. Erectus ancestors didn't do it, so it must be unnatural." Rather than snark about how the phenomenon is bosses is somehow unnatural and antithetical to human existence, why don't we work on creating institutions…

Why don't we address the fact that institutional oppression is unatural?

Re: You Weren't Meant to Have a Boss

#90

Post by Uchikoma »

mattmanser wrote: post #78
Uchikoma wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So today this could be done by 2 founders without bosses? (the topic of this thread)

Eventually, yes. For example right now a duo are preparing to do a manned space flight, which would have been unthinkable 30 years ago. http://copenhagensuborbitals.com/ http://copenhagensuborbitals.com/personel.php

Me: This works with 2 people. You: Yes, look, here they do it with 22 people.

2 of them are described as "Lead" which is contrary to the point you want to make: "You Weren't Meant to Have a Boss."

Additionally the problem of putting someone in space is different from putting someone on the moon and back again.

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