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Startups Are Hard. So Work More, Cry Less, And Quit All The Whining

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Re: Startups Are Hard. So Work More, Cry Less, And Quit All The Whining

#71

Post by nostrademons »

itmag wrote: post #23
kingofspain wrote: post #8

I'm so glad I was pushing 30 before I really became aware of this startup scene. The general impression that comes off, to me at least, is work hard, stop moaning, accept pennies and one day you'll be rich - assuming that unlikely outcome happens and we don't use of the thousand ways possible to screw you out of any riches. To me at least, and as an outsider, I'd say things like this may hold up for founders, but as…

I'm in my early 20s. Startups seem to be the only way out of 40 years of mediocrity in TPS-land for me, so I don't really think I have much of a choice. It's startups or nothing for me. Or maybe I am being myopic? Are there more options to be had in life than mediocrity/wageslavery vs glory/startups?

I'd highly recommend working at a well-regarded, industry-leading company before assuming that startups are the only option.

I thought basically the same thing you did as a teenager, and when I was formulating my career plans after college, it was "startups or bust". It turns out that employees at Google, Facebook, Mckinsey, Goldman Sachs, numerous hedge funds, and probably even some old-economy companies actually have quite a bit of freedom to do their jobs with creativity and excellence. Good managers don't try to control employees - they manage them, so that the employee's natural talents and inclinations are matched up to the needs of the organization. And a manager at a fast-growing company probably got put in that position because somebody else thought he would do well at it, while a manager at a startup got that way because he hated his old job enough to quit.

There're certainly things wrong with big companies - I could probably name half a dozen areas where Google is dysfunctional and probably not fixable because the dysfunction is an emergent property of having 30,000 people work on a suite of products used by billions. But unless you've worked in both big and small companies, you don't have enough information to understand what dysfunction is inherent to being big and what dysfunction is just the result of getting a bad boss.

Re: Startups Are Hard. So Work More, Cry Less, And Quit All The Whining

#72

Post by xarien »

oinksoft wrote: post #5
xarien wrote: post #4

And that's why my hiring criteria has always hinged on the level of compulsion said candidate exhibits. Sleep needs to be a secondary concern when stacked against a deadline. Although, I will be the first to admit that every now and then I fully rest up and swear I'm going to get more sleep because I can actually see the productivity increase. That thought is often a quickly fleeting thought however....

> Sleep needs to be a secondary concern when stacked against a deadline. Do you tell the candidate this during their interview?

I wouldn't hire someone if I didn't believe they possessed the same mentality. Is it really a big deal given that the chances of having to pull all nighters in college to meet an assignment deadline is so common? How is work (especially in a startup) any different or less important?

Re: Startups Are Hard. So Work More, Cry Less, And Quit All The Whining

#73

Post by schrijver »

Caterina Fake, working hard is overrated http://caterina.net/archive/001196.html

> Much more important than working hard is knowing how to find the right thing to work on. Paying attention to what is going on in the world. Seeing patterns. Seeing things as they are rather than how you want them to be. Being able to read what people want. Putting yourself in the right place where information is flowing freely and interesting new juxtapositions can be seen. But you can save yourself a lot of time by working on the right thing. Working hard, even, if that's what you like to do.

Re: Startups Are Hard. So Work More, Cry Less, And Quit All The Whining

#74

Post by TillE »

nostrademons wrote: post #66
DanielBMarkham wrote: post #62

My favorite numbers for startups are that they have a 1-in-20 chance of succeeding. I don't know where I got those numbers from -- seems like I've heard PG use a 1-in-10 chance, but you get the general feel for the situation. You should work in such a way as to acknowledge those numbers. I'm not saying don't work hard -- far from it. Just work as if this is stage 1 of a 20-stage process, each stage lasting a year or…

PG also said that the 1-in-10 chance is an average , across many different people, and individual circumstances may dramatically alter those odds. Some startups are virtually certain to succeed. Others probably have a 1 in a 1000 chance. I think you're better off working really hard for a while - enough to fully explore the problem space you've gotten in - and then taking stock of the situation and learning your less…

> Some startups are virtually certain to succeed.

If your execution is good and your definition of success is sufficiently modest, that's probably true. But for big successes? It's hard to think of many examples, even in retrospect.

Re: Startups Are Hard. So Work More, Cry Less, And Quit All The Whining

#75

Post by nostrademons »

TillE wrote: post #74
nostrademons wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

PG also said that the 1-in-10 chance is an average , across many different people, and individual circumstances may dramatically alter those odds. Some startups are virtually certain to succeed. Others probably have a 1 in a 1000 chance. I think you're better off working really hard for a while - enough to fully explore the problem space you've gotten in - and then taking stock of the situation and learning your less…

> Some startups are virtually certain to succeed. If your execution is good and your definition of success is sufficiently modest, that's probably true. But for big successes? It's hard to think of many examples, even in retrospect.

I'm guessing PG's definition of success is "likely to generate a return on investment if YC invests". For that, there're a bunch that are no-brainers, even if they end up as just a talent acquisition. Parakey, for example: even if it failed, some company was bound to buy it just to get Blake Ross and Joe Hewitt (and Facebook did). Ditto Friendfeed; yes, it was ultimately a talent acquisition, but the founders and investors didn't do all that badly on it.

I don't think you could predict the overwhelming success of a Facebook or Google in any reasonable timeframe. However, you could probably be fairly certain that Mark Zuckerburg was sitting on something useful once he got a few thousand people to sign up.

Re: Startups Are Hard. So Work More, Cry Less, And Quit All The Whining

#76

Post by TillE »

lfittl wrote: post #68
itmag wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, that sounds like a dream come true. Got any pointers for me?

Rob Walling's book is a nice how-to for this kind of entrepreneurship http://www.startupbook.net/ (not affiliated with the author in any way, just enjoyed the book myself)

Seconded. I'm doing a radically different thing from Rob's focus on niche web apps, so a lot of his advice didn't directly apply. But as someone taking the independent/bootstrapper approach to starting a software company, I still got quite a lot out of the book.

I'd strongly recommend the podcast as well: http://www.startupsfortherestofus.com/

Re: Startups Are Hard. So Work More, Cry Less, And Quit All The Whining

#77

Post by nhangen »

DanielBMarkham wrote: post #62

My favorite numbers for startups are that they have a 1-in-20 chance of succeeding. I don't know where I got those numbers from -- seems like I've heard PG use a 1-in-10 chance, but you get the general feel for the situation. You should work in such a way as to acknowledge those numbers. I'm not saying don't work hard -- far from it. Just work as if this is stage 1 of a 20-stage process, each stage lasting a year or…

I'll take those odds any day of the week.

I don't complain because I'm the boss, but I suppose if I were an employee banking on big returns, I might be a bit more skittish.

This is why so many entrepreneurs are creating their own startups, for better or worse.

Re: Startups Are Hard. So Work More, Cry Less, And Quit All The Whining

#78

Post by stateless »

xarien wrote: post #69
rhizome wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interesting. How successful has this strategy of hiring only compulsives been for you? Assuming you're not joking, of course.

Pretty well even in a corporate environment. The word compulsion was used to polarize and by the comment score card, it did a pretty good job at getting a rise out of a few people. A more positively associated word to be used would be dedication and I find it to be a great ruler to measure the quality of candidates.

I couldn't agree more.

Re: Startups Are Hard. So Work More, Cry Less, And Quit All The Whining

#79

Post by harryh »

It's worth quoting pg here:

"Economically, you can think of a startup as a way to compress your whole working life into a few years. Instead of working at a low intensity for forty years, you work as hard as you possibly can for four. This pays especially well in technology, where you earn a premium for working fast."

http://www.paulgraham.com/wealth.html

I don't really understand all the backlash in this thread against hard work in pursuit of a big goal.

Re: Startups Are Hard. So Work More, Cry Less, And Quit All The Whining

#80

Post by caseysoftware »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #56
neilk wrote: post #51

This is insane . You realize that all the quotes are from a post called the author describes as a 'cautionary tale'? ( http://www.jwz.org/gruntle/nscpdorm.html ) I think jwz sums it up best in another post, where he talks about the best case scenario: becoming rich from your startup: I've known dozens of instant-millionaires so far (from Netscape as well as other companies), and basically, I don't speak to any of the…

I don't think people appreciate the money aspect enough. It does change people and not always along a vector you would expect. It also changes people who don't get rich. Your a low number employee and your company goes public, woohoo you are rich, but people who work with you and came later and are doing the same job as you are not. The cognitive dissonance is huge, people sometimes feel guilty that they are rich and…

"Your a low number employee and your company goes public, woohoo you are rich, but people who work with you and came later and are doing the same job as you are not."

You're leaving out risk and experience: * Employee #3 takes more risk than employee #30 who took more risk than employee #300.

* More importantly, even if they have the same roles when employee #30 joined, odds are that employee #3 was involved in quite a few other things in quite a few other roles and has had a fundamentally different impact on the team and organization as a whole.

Disclosure: I'm with a startup popular around here.. but my number is well into the double digits. ;)

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