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Gosh - I hope that isn’t a prerequisite to greatness? How does someone even get the human and financial capital to run projects like this? I guess your first a

Gosh - I hope that isn’t a prerequisite to greatness? How does someone even get the human and financial capital to run projects like this? I guess your first attempt with the first founding team has to ‘hit.’ Otherwise, how can you afford to triple headcount, management, etc?

wpietri 6y ago
I suspect that abusive behavior is an optimal strategy if you're working for abusive people. Organizations tend to be set up such that people like the people in power succeed. Jobs was a notorious jerk [1] [2] [3], so it's not surprising that similar behavior is what gets promoted. [1] https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/steve-wozniak-cried-jobs-kept-atari-bonus-267711 https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/steve-wozniak-cried-jobs-kept-atar... [2] https://www.yahoo.com/news/memoir-steve-jobs-apos-daughter-133000491.html https://www.yahoo.com/news/memoir-steve-jobs-apos-daughter-1... [3] https://www.businessinsider.com/steve-jobs-jerk-2011-10 https://www.businessinsider.com/steve-jobs-jerk-2011-10
- neycoda 6y ago
  Steve Jobs died from being a jerk, to himself, because he refused to take his doctor's advice about his diet and pancreatic cancer. A reality distortion field only works so long.
  - CyberRabbi 6y ago
    What was his diet?
    - mark-r 6y ago
      The exact diet doesn't matter, what mattered is that he believed changing his diet would cure his cancer. In the end of course it didn't.
      - cbozeman 6y ago
        The exact diet matters a metric shitton, because Jobs' hubris cost him his life, if instead he had realized he did not, in fact, know everything, he might still be alive. Pancreatic cancer eats sugar for-fucking-breakfast. [1] He was eating nothing but fruit, and even though fructose release is regulated in its binding with fiber, its still sugar. If Jobs had eaten nothing but bacon, steak, and eggs, we might still have him around. I forgot what folder my bookmarks are in, but there's scant - but compelling - evidence to support that a sugarless diet high in protein and fat quite literally starves pancreatic cancer. [1] https://jeccr.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13046-019-1209-9#:~:text=Excessive%20glucose%20may%20help%20cancer,pancreatic%20cancer%20cells%20%5B26%5D https://jeccr.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13046-019-....
        sebmellen 6y ago
        In fact, ketogenic diets have been shown to slow tumor growth in a number of cancers. See https://www.mdanderson.org/cancerwise/the-keto-diet-and-cancer--what-patients-should-know.h00-159223356.html https://www.mdanderson.org/cancerwise/the-keto-diet-and-canc....
        jelliclesfarm 6y ago
        > If Jobs had eaten nothing but bacon, steak, and eggs, we might still have him around. Maybe he didn’t want to be around..
        woadwarrior01 6y ago
        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warburg_effect_(oncology) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warburg_effect_(oncology)
    - carlivar 6y ago
      Nothing but fruit.
z3t4 6y ago
For most larger companies an engineer salary, or any human labour for that matter, is very cheap. FAANG could pay 10x more if they had to, but they don't have to because no one else pays more.
- dcist 6y ago
  I'm not so sure. If engineer's were cheap, you wouldn't have Steve Jobs colluding with other companies to suppress salaries: https://www.latimes.com/business/technology/la-fi-tn-tech-jobs-settlement-20150903-story.html https://www.latimes.com/business/technology/la-fi-tn-tech-jo...
  - mandelbrotwurst 6y ago
    That he'd prefer to pay less doesn't mean he couldn't afford to pay more.
abraxas 6y ago
I think this is due to the exponential payoff in a success scenario. Especially in high tech where certain initiatives can have a “winner take all” effect. I find it completely unsurprising that internally the tech giants function like a cluster of startups competing against each other. Capitalism is based on the idea of transplanting the survival of the fittest paradigm into the economy and that’s exactly how I’d expect it to look in practice. Especially as progress accelerates and massive wins become both scarcer and more impactful at the same time.
- neycoda 6y ago
  Internal competition on the same project shows a lack of confidence from management... it literally shows they don't know what to do, and are just throwing spaghetti at the wall, or aren't confident in their skills to get something deployed with what they choose. It's not solid leadership, it's dissonant. It also sets people against each other, creates better-than-you mental heirarchies between equal workers where non are necessary, and is essentially friendly fire in the workplace. I've never seen this end well. Capitalism isn't just economic natural selection either, it favors those with capital, and especially the most of it, and is easily exploitable by them to tip the playing field in their favor against their competition and those below them. Your analogy is bad in both cases; natural selection means one side dies, which is not what's being described here, and is not good for one side anyway, and capitalism is not as good as cooperation anyway. The latter is far more efficient.
  - spockz 6y ago
    I disagree that (internal) competition unequivocally leads to better-than-you mindset. If done properly, in an open and sharing mindset – one might call it scientific, with expectations and criteria defined up front and with the projects objectively compared against the criteria, then it will work. I have also this work. It takes effort to come up with criteria and metrics beforehand but that is what makes it different from throwing spaghetti at the wall .
    - cutemonster 6y ago
ako 6y ago
Because often time to market is more important that R&D costs or tech debt for the success of a company. If you win the market, the profits will compensate for the additional R&D costs, and you can release increments to address the tech debt. Customers actually appreciate this, as they are constantly looking for better, newer versions of the product. Time to market trumps everything.
lodovic 6y ago
If money isn't part of the equation, this may actually be the best approach. During the 2007 financial crisis I worked at a bank that had to develop risk software really fast to comply with regulations and prevent disaster. They had two teams work on the same project and once a winning team emerged, they killed of the other. But the result was used for only a year or two, and replaced by a long term solution which was developed by yet another team in parallel. As the saying goes, in software development, we can control speed, cost and quality, but only two at the same time.
- Drdrdrq 6y ago
  This is not a bad solution, as long as the teams are on the same side (and know it too). I strongly believe that toxic culture is neither needed nor useful, ever.
  - cutemonster 6y ago
    How can one create a climate where they're on the same side? And no one is afraid of "losing" and worried about problems that might cause? (Eg getting fired, even if managers say won't happen)
    - Drdrdrq 6y ago
      By having leaders who want this and who know how to achieve it. It is simply a matter of principles and trust (both ways). Granted, I have only seen this in companies up to 100 employees... :shrug:

wpietri 6y ago

I suspect that abusive behavior is an optimal strategy if you're working for abusive people. Organizations tend to be set up such that people like the people in power succeed. Jobs was a notorious jerk [1] [2] [3], so it's not surprising that similar behavior is what gets promoted. [1] https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/steve-wozniak-cried-jobs-kept-atari-bonus-267711 https://www.ibtimes.co.uk/steve-wozniak-cried-jobs-kept-atar... [2] https://www.yahoo.com/news/memoir-steve-jobs-apos-daughter-133000491.html https://www.yahoo.com/news/memoir-steve-jobs-apos-daughter-1... [3] https://www.businessinsider.com/steve-jobs-jerk-2011-10 https://www.businessinsider.com/steve-jobs-jerk-2011-10

neycoda 6y ago
Steve Jobs died from being a jerk, to himself, because he refused to take his doctor's advice about his diet and pancreatic cancer. A reality distortion field only works so long.
- CyberRabbi 6y ago
  What was his diet?
  - mark-r 6y ago
    The exact diet doesn't matter, what mattered is that he believed changing his diet would cure his cancer. In the end of course it didn't.
    - cbozeman 6y ago
      The exact diet matters a metric shitton, because Jobs' hubris cost him his life, if instead he had realized he did not, in fact, know everything, he might still be alive. Pancreatic cancer eats sugar for-fucking-breakfast. [1] He was eating nothing but fruit, and even though fructose release is regulated in its binding with fiber, its still sugar. If Jobs had eaten nothing but bacon, steak, and eggs, we might still have him around. I forgot what folder my bookmarks are in, but there's scant - but compelling - evidence to support that a sugarless diet high in protein and fat quite literally starves pancreatic cancer. [1] https://jeccr.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13046-019-1209-9#:~:text=Excessive%20glucose%20may%20help%20cancer,pancreatic%20cancer%20cells%20%5B26%5D https://jeccr.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13046-019-....
      - sebmellen 6y ago
        In fact, ketogenic diets have been shown to slow tumor growth in a number of cancers. See https://www.mdanderson.org/cancerwise/the-keto-diet-and-cancer--what-patients-should-know.h00-159223356.html https://www.mdanderson.org/cancerwise/the-keto-diet-and-canc....
      - jelliclesfarm 6y ago
        > If Jobs had eaten nothing but bacon, steak, and eggs, we might still have him around. Maybe he didn’t want to be around..
      - woadwarrior01 6y ago
        https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warburg_effect_(oncology) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warburg_effect_(oncology)
  - carlivar 6y ago
    Nothing but fruit.

z3t4 6y ago

For most larger companies an engineer salary, or any human labour for that matter, is very cheap. FAANG could pay 10x more if they had to, but they don't have to because no one else pays more.

dcist 6y ago
I'm not so sure. If engineer's were cheap, you wouldn't have Steve Jobs colluding with other companies to suppress salaries: https://www.latimes.com/business/technology/la-fi-tn-tech-jobs-settlement-20150903-story.html https://www.latimes.com/business/technology/la-fi-tn-tech-jo...
- mandelbrotwurst 6y ago
  That he'd prefer to pay less doesn't mean he couldn't afford to pay more.

abraxas 6y ago

I think this is due to the exponential payoff in a success scenario. Especially in high tech where certain initiatives can have a “winner take all” effect. I find it completely unsurprising that internally the tech giants function like a cluster of startups competing against each other. Capitalism is based on the idea of transplanting the survival of the fittest paradigm into the economy and that’s exactly how I’d expect it to look in practice. Especially as progress accelerates and massive wins become both scarcer and more impactful at the same time.

neycoda 6y ago
Internal competition on the same project shows a lack of confidence from management... it literally shows they don't know what to do, and are just throwing spaghetti at the wall, or aren't confident in their skills to get something deployed with what they choose. It's not solid leadership, it's dissonant. It also sets people against each other, creates better-than-you mental heirarchies between equal workers where non are necessary, and is essentially friendly fire in the workplace. I've never seen this end well. Capitalism isn't just economic natural selection either, it favors those with capital, and especially the most of it, and is easily exploitable by them to tip the playing field in their favor against their competition and those below them. Your analogy is bad in both cases; natural selection means one side dies, which is not what's being described here, and is not good for one side anyway, and capitalism is not as good as cooperation anyway. The latter is far more efficient.
- spockz 6y ago
  I disagree that (internal) competition unequivocally leads to better-than-you mindset. If done properly, in an open and sharing mindset – one might call it scientific, with expectations and criteria defined up front and with the projects objectively compared against the criteria, then it will work. I have also this work. It takes effort to come up with criteria and metrics beforehand but that is what makes it different from throwing spaghetti at the wall .
  - cutemonster 6y ago

ako 6y ago

Because often time to market is more important that R&D costs or tech debt for the success of a company. If you win the market, the profits will compensate for the additional R&D costs, and you can release increments to address the tech debt. Customers actually appreciate this, as they are constantly looking for better, newer versions of the product. Time to market trumps everything.

lodovic 6y ago

If money isn't part of the equation, this may actually be the best approach. During the 2007 financial crisis I worked at a bank that had to develop risk software really fast to comply with regulations and prevent disaster. They had two teams work on the same project and once a winning team emerged, they killed of the other. But the result was used for only a year or two, and replaced by a long term solution which was developed by yet another team in parallel. As the saying goes, in software development, we can control speed, cost and quality, but only two at the same time.

Drdrdrq 6y ago
This is not a bad solution, as long as the teams are on the same side (and know it too). I strongly believe that toxic culture is neither needed nor useful, ever.
- cutemonster 6y ago
  How can one create a climate where they're on the same side? And no one is afraid of "losing" and worried about problems that might cause? (Eg getting fired, even if managers say won't happen)
  - Drdrdrq 6y ago
    By having leaders who want this and who know how to achieve it. It is simply a matter of principles and trust (both ways). Granted, I have only seen this in companies up to 100 employees... :shrug: