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Pitfalls of Startup Team Building

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Re: Pitfalls of Startup Team Building

#11

Post by gmjoe »

paul_f wrote: post #6

Rule 5 is "there's no such thing as 10X engineers". Then to back it up, some faux data about Marketers is given? This was weak, IMO. The reality is that there are 10x engineers. They likely won't come work for you though.

Agreed. However, there's a caveat: not every organization needs 10x engineers. In fact, a lot wouldn't know what to do with them. So as far as they're concerned, they don't exist.

After all, a 10x engineer is still only 1x when it comes to adding new functionality to your CRUD app.

However, when you need a scalable recommendation system built in a weekend, that works on a sharded database, uses clever math to run with limited resources, and fits processing into an overnight cron job, and just works (without breaking down every few days over the next couple months), that's when the "10x" guy or girl is your only choice.

Re: Pitfalls of Startup Team Building

#12

Post by wheaties »

paul_f wrote: post #6

Rule 5 is "there's no such thing as 10X engineers". Then to back it up, some faux data about Marketers is given? This was weak, IMO. The reality is that there are 10x engineers. They likely won't come work for you though.

Um, no. There really aren't 10x engineers unless you're comparing someone with 2+ yrs experience to someone with 0 yrs. And by years experience, I mean years spent actually making things to completion. What you'll eventually find out is that there's 2x employees and 0.25x employees but very little above that. More than anything, it'll be the team dynamics and the company fit that determines who is or isn't in the upper/lower brackets.

Re: Pitfalls of Startup Team Building

#13

Post by gmjoe »

> Your culture is not: Ping pong tables & beer in the fridge

> Your culture is: Who you hire, keep & reward vs. who you don't promote (and why)

I wish more people realized this. It seems so rare to hear, but it's so, so, so important.

Re: Pitfalls of Startup Team Building

#14

Post by jroseattle »

paul_f wrote: post #6

Rule 5 is "there's no such thing as 10X engineers". Then to back it up, some faux data about Marketers is given? This was weak, IMO. The reality is that there are 10x engineers. They likely won't come work for you though.

I'm not sure where Rand was going with this, but I would articulate the line this way:

"There is no such thing as sustained, responsible 10x engineering after one achieves market fit." (How's that for sufficiently caveating?)

It's easy to do 10x-engineering at an early stage, but it gets progressively more difficult as products/services emerge. And as those products & services are iterated upon to find market fit, sustainability and flexibility become more important.

If every 10x-engineer also took the hippocratic oath, then we would be on to something.

Re: Pitfalls of Startup Team Building

#16

Post by crindy »

robleathern wrote: post #5
gngeal wrote: post #3

Before I clicked that link, I wondered why slides, of all things, should be the pitfall of startup team building. ;-)

slides are a pitfall in general since way overused, but these ones are good. I think they have some advice that's pretty right on based on the last 5 years running a startup, especially on the recruiting front.

For a second I thought the title was referring to the things you slide down at playgrounds.
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