Be Nice Or Leave
avc.com
Be Nice Or Leave
1–10 of 108 posts
Re: Be Nice Or Leave
#2Some time ago I was involved in founding a company and two VCs were working together to fund us. They'd come up with a term sheet and we needed to alter some of the parts of it.
So, we sat down with them and the CEO of our company laid things out by running through all the parts that everyone agreed on and framing the discussion as "and there are these two provisions that we don't, so we're really close".
The rest of the discussion was super-smooth because of the way it begun.
Re: Be Nice Or Leave
#3Can't seem to read the article as the server's not working.
Also, this submission gets 11 votes even though it isn't readable? Strange.
Re: Be Nice Or Leave
#4This is especially true for VCs. Since dozen of winners generate 90% of returns you should by all means attract the best companies. This is not apparent in stock market.
Apart from moral side and integrity. Defaulting to not being evil will yield the best return in the long term. You should do it even if your motives are purely selfish.
Re: Be Nice Or Leave
#5I think this all is based on a person's comfort level with conflict.
A) I can't sleep at night when I possibly was a jerk.
B)Other's sleep with a smile on their face.
Sometimes the room is full of type A or B and everything is good. 95% of the time the room is full of A + B and A thinks they are jerks and B thinks that A is just stupid.
Re: Be Nice Or Leave
#6I spent a long time in the South Florida IT job market. In an area with millions of people and thousands of companies, it never ceased to amaze me how many people in the field knew each other. One of the key factors in job-hunting, then, was your reputation. If you did good work and people liked working with you, there was usually something available. If either of those things wasn't true, life was more difficult. A consulting firm founder down there used to say 'People like working with people they like to work with'. It pays to invest in your friendships and your decency as well as in your technical chops.
Re: Be Nice Or Leave
#7There will always be conflict. I'm currently working with two of the nicest people I've ever met but we still have conflict and we still argue and 'fight' over big things such as direction of the company, goals for growth, etc.
It's a matter of how you fight - with these guys it's respectful arguing, sometimes raised voices, even talking over each other, but I know in the end that they're fair and we respect each other.
In my previous company I worked with one of scummiest people I've ever met and the fighting was quite different. He avoided it rather than addressed it, and he also seemed to take my disagreements personal. But from the outside it probably looked like he's 'nicer' than my current partners.
Re: Be Nice Or Leave
#8Pareto Optimal solutions start with this behaviour
Re: Be Nice Or Leave
#9There will always be conflict. I'm currently working with two of the nicest people I've ever met but we still have conflict and we still argue and 'fight' over big things such as direction of the company, goals for growth, etc. It's a matter of how you fight - with these guys it's respectful arguing, sometimes raised voices, even talking over each other, but I know in the end that they're fair and we respect each oth…
Heated arguments are not a sign of "not being nice", they're just a sign of differing opinions. If having a different opinion makes it impossible for you to "be nice", then you're not nice.
Re: Be Nice Or Leave
#10This was one of my key take-aways from Dale Carnegie's classic, 'How to Win Friends and Influence People'. I've seen it mentioned on various reading lists for those wanting to go into the business world too.
Funny thing is, when recommending it to a friend, they mistakenly assumed from the title that it was a book of underhand tactics, which couldn't really be further from the truth. There's a lot to be said for being genuinely nice to others.