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Interesting. A couple of follow-ups, if you don't mind: Where did the acquisition lie on the talent-/product-acquisition spectrum? Also, how did those pervers
by paulbaumgart 16y ago
Interesting. A couple of follow-ups, if you don't mind:
Where did the acquisition lie on the talent-/product-acquisition spectrum?
Also, how did those perverse incentives seep into the former start-up's culture? Was it a result of working closely with people already at the acquiring company who bought into the system? Were the executives at the acquiring company directly to blame? Or something else?
- benreesman 16y agoThe acquisition was done for a number of reasons, but most paled in comparison to obtaining a particular piece of software (web browser and JS VM for tiny feature phones) and the team who wrote it (and went on to maintain and extend it). In addition a couple of the founders of the startup went on to be important members of the management team at the new company, so I guess both. The folks who came from the startup got scattered into every corner of the new company both organizationally and in some cases even geographically and as a result the values of the startup just sort of diffused into the larger company and when we wanted advancement we quickly learned to play by the new rules. At least I did.