5 ms·

How Square Defangs Difficult Decisions

43 points by mgav 11y ago

ISV_Damocles 11y ago
Anyone else read this article as an advertisement of Gokul Rajaram to other companies?
pbreit 11y ago
This reminded me of the preposterous "RASCI" at Ebay. I never know what to think of articles like this where the subject matter basically is an example of the opposite. Square probably has some of the worst decision-making amongst peer companies. It had pretty much a monopoly on new age SMB card present credit card processing and has appeared to throw much of that away by deciding to go into all sorts of unrelated businesses. It ceded $5b of market value to Stripe. Has been ridiculously slow to expand internationally and bring out Apple Pay devices. And continues to burn precious resources on unrelated, losing businesses like food delivery. And now SPADE? Serenity now.
- jpollock 11y ago
  RASCI is a great model to reduce stress. If people are making stupid decisions that you don't agree with, if you're not Responsible or Accountable, it makes it much easier to let go after you've informed the people who are. After that, it then becomes a decision of whether or not you wish to be part of the organisation, and not whether or not you're doing a good job.
- icelancer 11y ago
  Completely agree. Square promised and promised an API for payments and I bothered them and bothered them when my business was small and fledgling. They never delivered, Stripe stepped in, and then Square half-assed it with the Marketplace. Now I ship seven figures through Stripe and I'm sure many other businesses do as well. There is no reason this should be the case.
  - chillydawg 11y ago
    Voting with wallets is a magical thing :)
- bhahn 11y ago
  > It ceded $5b of market value to Stripe Not just Stripe. Braintree, I've heard, is comparable or bigger.
dpeterson 11y ago
Actually, when I get successful I want to publish bullfu__ery like this as though it's valuable information
BinaryIdiot 11y ago
This entire article should have stopped after this quote: "Consensus means no ownership. What’s important is not that everyone agrees, but that everyone is heard and then the right person makes a decision." The rest just reads like typical, big company bullshit non-content. But the first few paragraphs? I agree with that a whole lot. After being in many, many, many meetings where multiple people "own" something and it's almost impossible to get anything done. But one owner? Even if you don't entirely agree with the direction it's at least crystal clear.
- windowsworkstoo 11y ago
  Yep, well said. Decisions in 10 minutes or the next one is free. 50/50 calls decide by a coin flip, otherwise the right call is always obvious
  - marcusgarvey 11y ago
    This reminds me of what I've heard about MasterCard. Their CEO wanted to empower any employee to come up with good ideas. So, if an employees sends an idea to their manager and the manager doesn't respond, the employee has the right to do it. But it sounds like the recipe for a shitshow, so I'd love to know if this is really the case.
    - dawnbreez 11y ago
      I would argue that the employees are in a better position to make the decisions than the CEO is. They have all the info right there; the CEO has either no informatipn, late infotmation, or inaccurate information.
    - EliRivers 11y ago
      This is similar to one of the most effective techniques I have for decision making. I send an eMail to the people or person who holds the responsibility, stating "I'm going to carry out this action tomorrow; <describe decision I've made and action I'm taking>. This is your chance to stop me." It is fantastically effective.
eitally 11y ago
Regardless of the framework jargon, this process is something most successful executives internalize pretty early on in their careers. Besides being common sense, it becomes obvious very quickly that, except in edge cases, making quick decisions transparently based on as much data as is available will lead to the best result. Even if the best result means iterative failure until the actual best outcome is reached. A lot of people don't believe this at first and pretend the "gut feel" method is best. Don't fall into that trap. In the best case you'll have the same decision outcome, but you'll have alienated your organization in the meantime. In the worst case, you'll have made a terrible decision... and also alienated your organization.
clarkevans 11y ago
I think the process described has a flaw -- it has the role of "Approver" and requires the Owner to "Run your decision and the process by the Approver." This is problematic, since, at that point, the Approver becomes the new Owner, and, the Decision will be formed in a way that the Owner thinks the Approver will recognize (and perhaps not the form they believe in). In effect, this statement invites micro-management. Interestingly enough, the author knows this approach is problematic, because they say immediately after, "Again, the default of the Approver should be to monitor the decision process, not result." Alternatively, a Vision/Retrospective process might work better, where by the Owner's manager (the business structure) provides the higher-level vision and then looks at the Owner's decisions and executions in retrospective. If the poor decisions are consistently being made, it's a problem of vision or staffing. Asking the owner to get approval for each decision removes the owner's necessary authority, and hence undermines their ability to forge consensus and execute with needed autonomy.
stephen 11y ago
Makes sense (other than the awkward "Defangs" word in the title; I guess using "Makes" was too clear and boring). Reminds me a bit (just in terms of having an explicit process) of Andy Grove's Ideal Decision Model: Free Discussion, Clear Decision, Full Support. In particular, I liked the Full Support stage of Andy Grove's process. Granted, could devolve into "fall in line or you're output" in weak cultures, but in stronger cultures I think it makes sense to acknowledge that everyone needs to accept/support a decision, whether it was their pick/favorite/etc., for the decision to be successful. That tangent aside, I also liked the Square notes@ email list.
pluckytree 11y ago
I’ve seen a lot more success with the "hire smart people and get out of the way" methodology of managment. If you allow people the freedom to work together and make their own decisions in a mature manner, you don’t need these childish techniques for making decisions. In practice, this probably makes people feel like they are in some bizarro world than that they are an adult entrusted with real responsibility. A manager’s role can be reduced to keeping people on track and helping settle contentious decisions, whether by mediating or making the decision themselves. If I was interviewing for a company and I found out they used techniques like this, I would get up in the middle of the interview and walk out.

43 points by mgav 11y ago

Anyone else read this article as an advertisement of Gokul Rajaram to other companies?

This reminded me of the preposterous "RASCI" at Ebay. I never know what to think of articles like this where the subject matter basically is an example of the opposite. Square probably has some of the worst decision-making amongst peer companies. It had pretty much a monopoly on new age SMB card present credit card processing and has appeared to throw much of that away by deciding to go into all sorts of unrelated businesses. It ceded $5b of market value to Stripe. Has been ridiculously slow to expand internationally and bring out Apple Pay devices. And continues to burn precious resources on unrelated, losing businesses like food delivery. And now SPADE? Serenity now.

jpollock 11y ago
RASCI is a great model to reduce stress. If people are making stupid decisions that you don't agree with, if you're not Responsible or Accountable, it makes it much easier to let go after you've informed the people who are. After that, it then becomes a decision of whether or not you wish to be part of the organisation, and not whether or not you're doing a good job.
icelancer 11y ago
Completely agree. Square promised and promised an API for payments and I bothered them and bothered them when my business was small and fledgling. They never delivered, Stripe stepped in, and then Square half-assed it with the Marketplace. Now I ship seven figures through Stripe and I'm sure many other businesses do as well. There is no reason this should be the case.
- chillydawg 11y ago
  Voting with wallets is a magical thing :)
bhahn 11y ago
> It ceded $5b of market value to Stripe Not just Stripe. Braintree, I've heard, is comparable or bigger.

dpeterson 11y ago

Actually, when I get successful I want to publish bullfu__ery like this as though it's valuable information

BinaryIdiot 11y ago

This entire article should have stopped after this quote: "Consensus means no ownership. What’s important is not that everyone agrees, but that everyone is heard and then the right person makes a decision." The rest just reads like typical, big company bullshit non-content. But the first few paragraphs? I agree with that a whole lot. After being in many, many, many meetings where multiple people "own" something and it's almost impossible to get anything done. But one owner? Even if you don't entirely agree with the direction it's at least crystal clear.

windowsworkstoo 11y ago
Yep, well said. Decisions in 10 minutes or the next one is free. 50/50 calls decide by a coin flip, otherwise the right call is always obvious
- marcusgarvey 11y ago
  This reminds me of what I've heard about MasterCard. Their CEO wanted to empower any employee to come up with good ideas. So, if an employees sends an idea to their manager and the manager doesn't respond, the employee has the right to do it. But it sounds like the recipe for a shitshow, so I'd love to know if this is really the case.
  - dawnbreez 11y ago
    I would argue that the employees are in a better position to make the decisions than the CEO is. They have all the info right there; the CEO has either no informatipn, late infotmation, or inaccurate information.
  - EliRivers 11y ago
    This is similar to one of the most effective techniques I have for decision making. I send an eMail to the people or person who holds the responsibility, stating "I'm going to carry out this action tomorrow; <describe decision I've made and action I'm taking>. This is your chance to stop me." It is fantastically effective.

eitally 11y ago

Regardless of the framework jargon, this process is something most successful executives internalize pretty early on in their careers. Besides being common sense, it becomes obvious very quickly that, except in edge cases, making quick decisions transparently based on as much data as is available will lead to the best result. Even if the best result means iterative failure until the actual best outcome is reached. A lot of people don't believe this at first and pretend the "gut feel" method is best. Don't fall into that trap. In the best case you'll have the same decision outcome, but you'll have alienated your organization in the meantime. In the worst case, you'll have made a terrible decision... and also alienated your organization.

clarkevans 11y ago

I think the process described has a flaw -- it has the role of "Approver" and requires the Owner to "Run your decision and the process by the Approver." This is problematic, since, at that point, the Approver becomes the new Owner, and, the Decision will be formed in a way that the Owner thinks the Approver will recognize (and perhaps not the form they believe in). In effect, this statement invites micro-management. Interestingly enough, the author knows this approach is problematic, because they say immediately after, "Again, the default of the Approver should be to monitor the decision process, not result." Alternatively, a Vision/Retrospective process might work better, where by the Owner's manager (the business structure) provides the higher-level vision and then looks at the Owner's decisions and executions in retrospective. If the poor decisions are consistently being made, it's a problem of vision or staffing. Asking the owner to get approval for each decision removes the owner's necessary authority, and hence undermines their ability to forge consensus and execute with needed autonomy.

stephen 11y ago

Makes sense (other than the awkward "Defangs" word in the title; I guess using "Makes" was too clear and boring). Reminds me a bit (just in terms of having an explicit process) of Andy Grove's Ideal Decision Model: Free Discussion, Clear Decision, Full Support. In particular, I liked the Full Support stage of Andy Grove's process. Granted, could devolve into "fall in line or you're output" in weak cultures, but in stronger cultures I think it makes sense to acknowledge that everyone needs to accept/support a decision, whether it was their pick/favorite/etc., for the decision to be successful. That tangent aside, I also liked the Square notes@ email list.

pluckytree 11y ago

I’ve seen a lot more success with the "hire smart people and get out of the way" methodology of managment. If you allow people the freedom to work together and make their own decisions in a mature manner, you don’t need these childish techniques for making decisions. In practice, this probably makes people feel like they are in some bizarro world than that they are an adult entrusted with real responsibility. A manager’s role can be reduced to keeping people on track and helping settle contentious decisions, whether by mediating or making the decision themselves. If I was interviewing for a company and I found out they used techniques like this, I would get up in the middle of the interview and walk out.