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Reflections on Being a Female Founder

tracy.posthaven.com

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Re: Reflections on Being a Female Founder

#101

Post by paul »

ClassAndBurn wrote: post #20

Tracy was the best CEO I ever worked for. Hands down. She listened to everyone and made PlanGrid a place where everyone was empowered to make change. Her passion to solve problems was obvious and raw. She attracted people who were similarly passionate. I knew she had it harder than others when I saw one of our own VC's caller her a "little girl" while doing a fireside chat with her at PlanGrid. In spite of it all she…

She’s also one of the best founders I’ve ever worked with. Her talks at yc are my favorite — incredibly honest, personal, and insightful.

Re: Reflections on Being a Female Founder

#102

Post by rumanator »

daleharvey wrote: post #25
rumanator wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If the industry was gender-biased, then that would mean you would see more female founders, not less. No, because the base population is not uniformly distributed to begin with. I've participated in interview rounds for software engineer positions where the volume of candidates was already showing a gender ratio of around 20-to-1 male/female ratio, where half the male candidates never had a single CS lesson in thei…

how many women do you think there are in the world?

> how many women do you think there are in the world?

If you had any interest in having an intelligent discussion on the gender ratio in IT you would have asked relevant questions such as "why are entry-level IT jobs seeing a gender ratio of 20-to-1", or "why are women deciding not to work in IT".

But no.

Re: Reflections on Being a Female Founder

#103

Post by muchosandwich »

ClassAndBurn wrote: post #20

Tracy was the best CEO I ever worked for. Hands down. She listened to everyone and made PlanGrid a place where everyone was empowered to make change. Her passion to solve problems was obvious and raw. She attracted people who were similarly passionate. I knew she had it harder than others when I saw one of our own VC's caller her a "little girl" while doing a fireside chat with her at PlanGrid. In spite of it all she…

Also seconding! I've worked for a diverse spread of founders (some good, some bad) but Tracy stands out as truly exceptional.

Re: Reflections on Being a Female Founder

#104

Post by cvlasdkv »

orpheansodality wrote: post #81
tialaramex wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One thing that bugs me: Women I know who wrote software kept finding new roles where they'd be in management instead and then they moan that they liked writing code and miss it. Maybe that tells us that sexism in software development is prevalent and they wanted out, which is no fault of theirs, and maybe they just wanted more money - but it definitely sucks overall. I find blind technical interviewing easy because I…

Just based on what I've seen and the women I've talked to - a lot of women in tech are encouraged to move into management because (for a variety of societal reasons) they've just upskilled more in EQ than many of their male peers. See also: the pressure to be glue [1] 1: https://noidea.dog/glue

There is also overwhelming pressure on minorities to not only succeed and be perfect but to gain positions of power to make it easier for those that follow. It's incredibly difficult to do that as an IC (for either gender).

Re: Reflections on Being a Female Founder

#105

Post by ClassAndBurn »

jasonwatkinspdx wrote: post #100
_pzdn wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

man, that sounds like a trashy thing (for the VC to have done).

I worked for a woman cofounder. It's incredible the things some VCs told her, including trying to get the other founder to drop her from the deal explicitly because of her gender. Make no mistake about it, the ugly goes way deeper than just a bad comment here or there. Thankfully the trend is toward better.

I'll second this; this was said in public to people that reported to her. What happened behind closed doors was likely much worse. Tracy's example of not using Mother's Rooms shows she was protective of that part of herself and not willing to even touch it when fundraising.

Re: Reflections on Being a Female Founder

#106

Post by muchosandwich »

BillFranklin wrote: post #34
quixoticaxolotl wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I worked at PlanGrid during this event. The exec in question received an offer from one of the Big 4 at an equivalent (and possibly more senior - this was in late 2017, so memory is fuzzy) exec-level position, and simply sent word they wouldn't come into the office the next day. There was no two-week notice or polite exit interview - they just vanished. It was not common news that Tracy was pregnant at the time, so I…

Ah I see, thank you for explaining that. I misinterpreted that sentence.

There was and still is a lot of speculation about why exactly he left.

Re: Reflections on Being a Female Founder

#107

Post by alexpotato »

_7fvc wrote: post #98

I started a company 8 years ago. I went through startup literature. I tried to follow the advices. We got our product going for 2 years. But we couldn't make it big. We eventually transitioned to contracting work. We were basically working for a bigger company. Except we had the freedom to work from home. We're about to fold during this pandemic. I'm happy with the choices I made. My take away lesson is most of the s…

I think it was Maciej Cegłowski, founder of https://pinboard.in, who related the following story:

- He had a competitor who couldn't make the product work given revenues - He ended up buying the competitor

- Because his infrastructure costs were much lower (I believe due to NOT using AWS whereas the competitor did) he was able to make money on the cash flow from the competitor because he ran his business more efficiently.

This story struck me because it was a vivid reminder that two companies, in the same industry and with the same product can have VASTLY different operating models when it comes to people, costs, infrastructure etc.

I 100% believe you are correct in that pattern matching plays a role. That being said, it's important to add that there are "a thousand right ways and a million wrong ways." Just because one of the 1000 is the hot ticket doesn't mean it's the only way.

Re: Reflections on Being a Female Founder

#108

Post by jariel »

_pzdn wrote: post #23

This was an interesting read. I found it well written and kind of sad, if optimistic and hopeful. Personally, I would love to see a lot more female developers. I am betting there is no significant difference in inherent potential talent between the two genders, so why are almost all coders I've worked with male?

" I am betting there is no significant difference in inherent potential talent "

I don't think it's talent, more so motivation, interest, cultural dissonance, choice - and of course all the 'bad stuff' like environments that are directly or indirectly not very conducive.

Most fields have some kind of gender asymmetry. Have a look here [1].

If one were to take some time to experience a handful of those fields, I bet the answers to why 'software' has asymmetry would be similar.

I guess I'm saying the issue may have specific roots in tech, but probably more or less rooted in more broad, cultural issues.

[1] https://careersmart.org.uk/occupations/equality/which-jobs-d...

Re: Reflections on Being a Female Founder

#109

Post by dpoochieni »

belorn wrote: post #42
satyrnein wrote: post #38

I wish there were a clear bad guy here, but most of the hardship seems to have been caused by more diffuse social pressures. What could we have done as an industry to improve the author's experience? Maybe just having more female founders around in general (by removing any barriers) would make some of these circumstances more commonplace.

Many times in the article she perceive male founders as stoic machines that regardless of health or mental state would go to work and operate as if nothing is wrong, and then goes to copy that. That is a stereotype that is hurting both men and women, and removing that would resolve a lot of the hardship.

And hope the stereotype is working for at least someone, or maybe we are completely irrational

Re: Reflections on Being a Female Founder

#110

Post by dpoochieni »

belorn wrote: post #97
microcolonel wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it really hurting them? Seems like both she and the people she sees succeeding as leaders act that way. Being indomitable and regulating your emotions seems to be part of the formula for effective leadership; why would we expect otherwise?

Pretending that physical and mental health problems does not exist is a problem. It is sad aspect of human life that we reward social status and monetary rewards to those who are successful at hiding it, and punish those that either refuse or fail. It seems worth to ask if there is a better way. It also seems that in a time where we care about inclusivity and diversity we need to let go of the perception that only pe…

I think it is even innate to look up to those kind of leaders. Obviously there are exceptions but they inspire confidence (at least in me, n=1)
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