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How a startup loses its spark

blog.johnqian.com

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Re: How a startup loses its spark

#241

Post by fnordpiglet »

halkony wrote: post #107
fnordpiglet wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But it doesn’t exist. For any task the number of contact points is almost always fairly small. Just because the possible N might be large most are occluded by lack of relevance to any specific task. I would note that the author categorically says it’s not possible for a startup like environment to exist in a large company. That’s what I disagree with.

How have you developed a sense for organizational friction? What observations of culture can I use to make an educated guess about how easy it is to do my work? I agree with your point that a large org does not guarantee what the author claims. The author claims that the organizational friction can be measured by productivity, but you recognize culture as the better diagnostic criterion. The big O metaphor does not e…

That’s the trick isn’t it? As “the boss” I’ve been able to self create my culture around me so it’s been easier. I have landed in management teams that were so oppressive I couldn’t even then. I’ve watched my peer leaders for signs. It’s very hard in an interview to know where you’re landing.

A few things I’ve noticed that might help:

* ask people in the team what they do and how they work, and how the team helps them work best. If they answer “oh I’m a programmer 2” and have wishy washy answers on the rest, that’s a bad sign. They’re being managed by a “by the book” manager. If they describe some complex role that isn’t out of the HR leveling guide, and a unique way of working that’s accommodated by the team, that’s a good sign. If you hear everyone in the team describing a role that’s unique and tailored to them, then that’s a great sign.

* this is controversial but I think any org that slavishly follows modern day agile / scrum can not be dynamic. Nothing more to say other than back in the 90’s Bay Area hanging with thought works and those folks, agile was something very different than today.

* the manager themselves should be very open to questions with thoughtful answers that aren’t rote. They should likewise spend more time understanding you than usual. They should be assessing your fit in their team - do you fill a gap? Do your weaknesses complement others strengths? Are you looking to turn the crank or are you looking to innovate?

Also, be aware of yourself. Not everyone does well in a dynamic environment. It’s more chaotic and less structured. If you like clearly defined and regimented work, go for the clearly defined and regimented team.

Re: How a startup loses its spark

#242

Post by fnordpiglet »

convolvatron wrote: post #91
fnordpiglet wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely. The most exciting work I’ve done that has literally changed our world was done at systemically important multinational megacorps, where we created environments of unfettered innovation and an assembled teams of amazing individuals working as a coherent team. I had some really great leaders early in my career that showed it’s not only possible it’s the only way to enjoy any role at any company no matter th…

big companies have resources that give you reach (channels, marketing, human talent, legal, international presence, longer term investments) that you can never get with a smaller company. being able to apply them effectively can really be really frustrating though. and there is always the danger that your two year development arc will be demolished by 'shifts in overall strategy' or 'belt tightening' or a reorg.

Yeh. But startups can and do fail, pivot, get restructured by their VC.

Re: How a startup loses its spark

#243

Post by p_l »

jotato wrote: post #120
samhuk wrote: post #54

I'll raise your spark for complete destruction. Here's an incomplete list that I keep around of the mechanisms that I've observed so far that have played a big part in the decline/destruction of an engineering team (and product thereof): 1. Too-technical leaders: As startup scales, there can sometimes be a mad dash to fill new leadership roles (e.g. VP of Eng, Arch, CTO, etc.). Super-star engineers present at startup…

One thing I'll add - or maybe it expands on too technical of a leader - is when a brilliant outside hire is brought in to fill the arch/principal/whatever role. Then they start looking at the app and questioning every decision calling everything they don't have context on "technical debt" I've seen it a few times. I told a new VP of Eng he was being asinine because he wasn't there for the original problem, decision,…

Sometimes it goes the other way around. New people hired from bigger company, advocating for solutions that are known to work if painful to start, opposed by "old guard" who finds nothing bad in their hundreds of SSH windows with root logins into machines and where the "technical debt" is actually reaching the point where it will result in losing important clients through a legal statute impacting said technical debt

Re: How a startup loses its spark

#244

Post by Throw10987 »

fnordpiglet wrote: post #66
Throw10987 wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am the most senior engineering IC by position and years of experience at my current company in a 100+ person engineering group. The only problems I deal with are non technical and organisational in nature, despite on paper being expected to code 30 percent of the time.

I’m sorry - I’d advise either making your role better or finding a better team. They exist.

Sound advice - currently going down the path of try to make the role better. It will however be a long journey, so need to work out whether I am sufficiently committed to the path. Also need to work out what the ejection criteria are, regardless of my commitment or not.

Re: How a startup loses its spark

#245

Post by ido »

doktorhladnjak wrote: post #230
aledalgrande wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I really like the approach of Netflix of 10 years ago where/when did Netflix go wrong? curious to hear from insiders

Netflix's competition changed. They were one of the few players in streaming. Now, there are infinite streaming platforms, all angling for their cut of the pie. For Netflix to continue to be profitable, it decided it needed to spend more on original content. Then I suppose the cost cutting came for other expenses. Hiring a bunch of very experienced engineers does not come cheap. Netflix was known for having the highe…

I’ve no clue about Netflix specifically, but at some point as an industry we have to hire some junior people in order to have new seniors a few years down the line…

Re: How a startup loses its spark

#246

Post by shivawu »

Zetice wrote: post #95

> If you find an idea that you think is both valuable to the company and interesting to you, you can just drop everything to work on it. What. How is an engineer deciding what to work on like this, even at a small startup?!

Engineers at small startups are generally founder minded. They’re like founders, and are passionate about the product and the problem. That’s how they get to decide/involve in the decision about what to work on

Re: How a startup loses its spark

#247

Post by ido »

denvrede wrote: post #199
F-W-M wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In Germany it is very hard to fire people but there is a six month period in the beginning, where one can be fired without reason. Is it possible to gauge a new employee during that timeframe?

I would say you can generally (from my experience >95% of the time) identify a bad hire in roughly a month, mostly in two weeks and then give yourself / them additional two to be very sure. We just hired for a management position a couple of month ago and I could tell from the very first meeting that it was a bad hire. I made sure with my team that I’m not totally wrong and then communicated my doubts to the C-Level.…

If you can tell from the first meeting, why was this person even hired in the first place? The only time i experienced something like that was when the CEO hired someone without asking anyone else to vet them.

Re: How a startup loses its spark

#248

Post by ido »

p_l wrote: post #234
dmoy wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not only that but you run into the very expensive reason why literally every large company has a lengthy documented process for firing (outside of layoffs of course, lol): Lawsuits

Honestly, european common approach of "trial period" is better for this. Details vary, but for example in Poland you can (simplified case): 1. Hire for fixed-length term of a year 2. First 3 months of that are "trial period" - you have minimal paperwork for firing during that time, effectively no chance of lawsuit (if someone brings a lawsuit that gets far enough for any paperwork to reach you, you have much worse th…

The problem (I’m not in Poland but I’m in Berlin, which also has strict rules about firing long term employees) is that senior talent has a lot of choice of where to go to so why should they bother with a place that would only give them a 1-year contract at first?

Re: How a startup loses its spark

#249

Post by ttymck »

g9yuayon wrote: post #128

I really like the approach of Netflix of 10 years ago when it was still small. They hired mature people so they could get rid of processes. Indeed, they actually tried to de-process everything. As a result, things just happened. Non-event was often mentioned and expected in Netflix at that time. Case in point, active-active regions just happened in a few months. A really easy to use deployment tool, Asgard, just happ…

Do you think this is thanks, at least in part, to the fact that Netflix is a rather narrowly defined product? It is a library of content and it streams to your screen.

In the places I've worked, the product is poorly defined. Not because we've neglected to define it, but because it's novel and amorphous and nobody knows what it should be, let alone what it will be.

Netflix on the other hand, in my view, has a clear goal: get video onto screens as efficiently as possible. It becomes much more of a pure technology problem solving situation.

Of course, I won't assume there aren't ongoing product development tasks constantly. I'm sure there's a massive back office suite, along with ads, etc.

But the overwhelming majority of the Netflix product "mandate" is pretty solid, so you don't need to spend a lot of time making sure folks are on the same page, or am I way off?

Re: How a startup loses its spark

#250

Post by dventimi »

fnordpiglet wrote: post #237
dventimi wrote: post #223

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I had some really great leaders early in my career that showed it’s not only possible it’s the only way to enjoy any role at any company no matter the size. I'm not persuaded anyone is in a position to know that there's only one way for people to enjoy work, and to know what that one way is.

That’s the secret. Most management is about the one way people work. The right way is to realize everyone is an individual and everyone has a different way of working, and what they enjoy about work. This forms a complex optimization problem for the manager, whose job, IMO, is to figure out the puzzle of how to maximize everyone’s individual value in the team. The way you do that is match their style of work and stre…

> All this said, I’m not the only one who does this. I have encountered a lot of [managers] that do this. They’re the ones people want to work for

How about people who don't want to work for a "manager"? Where should we go?

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