Don't Start a Company to Be Your Own Boss • Hacker News Board

Re: Don't Start a Company to Be Your Own Boss

#21

Post by cryptoglyph » Wed, Oct 23, 2013, 4:32 AM UTC

He makes some excellent points—that self-employed or start-up CEOs do have many stakeholders.

That said, the second sentence in this statement is false:

"First, if you have investors, you are working for them. They are providing the capital for your business and you have a fiduciary responsibility to return their investment with profit."

Yes, you have a responsibility to investors to do everything reasonable to give them a return on investment, but the type of investment may or may not create a fiduciary relationship. And it's important not to be glib about what fiduciary duties actually are and when they arise.

Re: Don't Start a Company to Be Your Own Boss

#22

Post by einhverfr » Wed, Oct 23, 2013, 4:53 AM UTC

I think the article has a point and yet misses the point. If you start a company and don't have investors that can fire you, it is true you still don't work for yourself but for your clients, employees, etc.

Nonetheless there is a huge difference in that the ability to terminate a relationship with a boss is possible from either side, without you losing your position in your company. It's wonderful being able to tell a client that if they are going to micromanage you, they can take a hike.

Re: Don't Start a Company to Be Your Own Boss

#23

Post by einhverfr » Wed, Oct 23, 2013, 5:16 AM UTC

gregpilling wrote: post #16

I had a franchise that I got in 1990. I remember when I called a mentor/friend in the business the first time that I got the flu. I asked him "How do I or who do I call in sick to?" . My mentor's response was - "just contact everyone you were going to do business with today", which was about 60 people. An impossible task. I went to work sick. Not the best job situation, but the reality if you are a sole operator.

It is a good opportunity to write a simple scheduling app to automate such a task if you need it.

Re: Don't Start a Company to Be Your Own Boss

#24

Post by saraid216 » Wed, Oct 23, 2013, 5:46 AM UTC

tchock23 wrote: post #15

I found the order of the bosses in the post to be interesting: Investors -> Employees -> Customers. Not sure if that was on purpose, but I would have put it in the opposite order if the subtext of the article was how to successfully be your own boss...

The ordering doesn't actually matter. Failing one of them is failing all of them.

Re: Don't Start a Company to Be Your Own Boss

#25

Post by jrgnsd » Wed, Oct 23, 2013, 6:51 AM UTC

ngsayjoe wrote: post #20

princess3000 wrote: post #8

The word boss has a pretty specific connotation and your clients and customers aren't that. Yes, if you work for yourself you're responsible for delivering work to your customers and they have some control over you due to that but it's incredibly different from the relationship between a salaried employee and his singular supervisor.

Agreed. I started a successful company becoz i don't want to have a boss, and i'm really glad i did it!

*because

Re: Don't Start a Company to Be Your Own Boss

#26

Post by bambax » Wed, Oct 23, 2013, 7:56 AM UTC

I don't have investors, and I don't have employees, so I don't know about that. But I have clients, and they're not my boss, or my bosses, at all.

They ask for stuff, they wait for me to tell them what's possible and when it can be delivered, they're interested/engaged in the process, and they're happy to get the product in the end; they say thank you; they pay the bills I send them.

They don't tell me to sit here or there and do this or that.

Re: Don't Start a Company to Be Your Own Boss

#27

Post by route66 » Wed, Oct 23, 2013, 7:58 AM UTC

I don't want to go too recursive, but have you ever worked for a boss who became one because he/she did not want to have one?

Remarkable features I found were: Trouble delegating work (it's out of their hands), don't want to be hampered by decisions made in the group, resorting to "because I don't want it" where factual arguments are asked for.

For your energy, attitude and stamina it seems better anyway to have a positive drive ("I do because I want...") and not being steered by avoidance.

Re: Don't Start a Company to Be Your Own Boss

#28

Post by qwerta » Wed, Oct 23, 2013, 8:22 AM UTC

bambax wrote: post #26

I don't have investors, and I don't have employees, so I don't know about that. But I have clients, and they're not my boss, or my bosses, at all. They ask for stuff, they wait for me to tell them what's possible and when it can be delivered, they're interested/engaged in the process, and they're happy to get the product in the end; they say thank you; they pay the bills I send them. They don't tell me to sit here or…

+1, I would add that bosses I had before I went on my own, were actually very nice.

Re: Don't Start a Company to Be Your Own Boss

#29

Post by xenonite » Wed, Oct 23, 2013, 8:39 AM UTC

WalterBright wrote: post #10

jpwagner wrote: post #3

Being your own boss is great... ...if YOU are good at being a boss! If you allow your employees (ie YOU) to slack, then that's not being a good boss.

I've had my boss sacked many times, but the replacement boss turns out to be exactly the same.

maybe it wasn't the boss, but the team forcing every boss into a similar pattern.

Re: Don't Start a Company to Be Your Own Boss

#30

Post by xenonite » Wed, Oct 23, 2013, 8:45 AM UTC

jayfuerstenberg wrote: post #19

What people don't always remember is that having a single boss means having a single person in charge of your fate. Having 10,000 bosses/direct customers dilutes that power greatly. Individually, none of them have any power over you. Only as a unified movement can they amass the power of that single boss. There is every type of boss out there in world and I don't mean to say they are all to be feared, hated. But the…

If you and your boss respect each other well, everything can be great. Then, one does not need to distribute the power to people you know to a much lesser degree.