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You're not the CEO - You're the Fucking Janitor

zachbruhnke.com

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Re: You're not the CEO - You're the Fucking Janitor

#31

Post by rachelbythebay »

smiler wrote: post #26

Seriously, does anyone take anyone seriously who calls themselves CEO, CTO or CFO of a 5 man company? How about owner or founder. Maybe it's a cultural thing but here in the UK we'd definitely laugh at someone calling themselves that unless it was a company of a considerable size.

There was a similar phenomenon some years back when Linux (and other systems which could run on ordinary computers) started getting big. People thought running their own machine and/or having root was a big deal.

They had to be reminded that "you aren't really a sysadmin until you have some users". It seems the same would apply here.

Re: You're not the CEO - You're the Fucking Janitor

#32

Post by zbruhnke »

jayzee wrote: post #28

What's wrong with being a janitor?

Nothing at all. That's something I think I did not portray clearly enough in this post. There is nothing wrong with being a janitor. Someone has to do it, the point was really to display that you have to do anything and everything necessary to make your company successful. Titles are bullshit and egos should be checked at the door.

Re: You're not the CEO - You're the Fucking Janitor

#33

Post by swlkr »

Working in a cubicle isn't glamorous either.

At my last job I took out the trash when it needed to be taken out and I was a software engineer, that's just common courtesy.

Being a CEO would be an upgrade for me in every way no matter how many articles swear that it's the worst thing in the world.

Re: You're not the CEO - You're the Fucking Janitor

#34

Post by Mz »

blhack wrote: post #25
michael_nielsen wrote: post #2

Seems appropriate to quote an old HN comment ( http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3905794 ): "After the first night of the 2008 SciFoo conference at Google, @gnat Torkington's twitter stream contained a gem: 'At SciFoo opening session. 300 people standing around networking. Meanwhile, Larry Page is quietly unpacking chairs at the back of the room.' (from memory, not exact)" The CEO (or any leader)'s job is to make s…

I'll share a story an interaction with a company that I worked heavily with while we were launching (this is a startup in a fairly niche, non-technical space. A smallish company with around 200 employees): The "CEO": This guy had a large stake in the company. It was his baby, and while the "CEO" title (which I think gets way over applied) fits him, his official title is "managing partner". While we were in the proces…

how do I/we get back to that?

If I am reading this correctly, you currently have around 200 employees and presumably started with less than that. If that is correct, break it up into two separate groups smaller than 150. Any time any part of the company grows beyond about 150 people, repeat. (Read "The tipping point" for longish explanation why. Short version: The typical human brain is designed for a "tribe" size of about 150.)

Re: You're not the CEO - You're the Fucking Janitor

#35

Post by ams6110 »

pbiggar wrote: post #17

I heard an anecdote a while back. One day, the employees of a small company arrive at work to discover that someone has taken a shit on the floor. Who's going to clean it? The owner of course. He didn't hire anyone whose job is to clean shit up, he can't reasonably expect any of them to do it, so he has to do it.

At the last small company I worked for, I came in one morning to find the CFO plunging the toilet and mopping the floor where it had overflowed. I laughed and made some comment about dedication to the company, he laughed and said well we don't have a cleaning staff so someone's gotta do it.

Re: You're not the CEO - You're the Fucking Janitor

#36

Post by molossus »

With all due respect, when you submit your own blog post to HN, you could at least have the courtesy to take 5 minutes to proofread it. And when you don't, it comes across as unprofessional and undermines any ethos you may have had, and I am very unlikely to read past the second paragraph.

Re: You're not the CEO - You're the Fucking Janitor

#38

Post by _b8r0 »

In the UK we tend not to use CEO, we tend to use the term director or managing director.

In my day job I'm the technical director at Mandalorian. It's a cool job, but I'm generally pretty overloaded and usually underpaid. I don't do it for the cash or free time, that's for sure, but I do love making a difference for our customers. In a strange way I took this approach to 44Con. Everything I do at 44Con is about making sure the delegates have a good time and learn something. If we need to put leaflets on seats, I'm out there. If a delegate has a problem, I want to know so I can fix it.

A large part of startup success seems to be sales, but we shouldn't undersell the delivery and relationship aspects. If your customer is struggling to deal with you, then you're doing it wrong. If your customer has problems that you just can't fix, you're doing it wrong.

I'll be the first to admit I've failed on both parts on occasion, sometimes simultaneously, but it's our ability to learn from these things that sets the smaller guys apart from the bigger.

I'm the equivalent of a CEO at Mandalorian, but I'll proudly clean toilets if it makes for a better experience.

Re: You're not the CEO - You're the Fucking Janitor

#40

Post by batgaijin »

dmlorenzetti wrote: post #24
zbruhnke wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for the feedback. I typically italicize and bold things in an effort to break up the black/white monotony of my site but I'll keep the advice in mind and maybe go back and make some edits. As for the 'fucking' I agree, it was actually pretty hard to write too. I grew up in a middle class family in the South most of whom would be appalled by the way this post was written(the language) but I thought it put some…

My reaction to your use of "fucking" wasn't that it appalled me in some moralistic or linguistic sense. Rather, I felt like it (partially) undermined the point of your post. The post is about how being CEO isn't all glamor, and includes doing dirty work as well. And you make clear that you feel the janitor, unlike a figurehead who merely signs documents, contributes something useful and necessary to the enterprise. U…

The fuck.

What is up with this opinion? Fuck means sex. Why do we call these words obscene? Do you honestly think those words entered daily use? "Grab the fucking milk" said without any emotional meaning. People would actually reason more.

It's a prohibition on words, that makes them mean more artificially while contributing no logic to the discussion.

How dare ye try to elate an emotion in me! How dare ye!

Edit:I'm an idiot and wrote an argument to something you didn't say, but I'll leave it here cause it took me 5 minutes to write on the phone keyboard.

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