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Posting anon for obvious reasons. I recently worked at a "high growth" software company (database vendor), A-round funded, that faced this. First decision was

Posting anon for obvious reasons. I recently worked at a "high growth" software company (database vendor), A-round funded, that faced this. First decision was to demote all the engineers from hiring titles down to mid/entry-level. The worse things got, the more product managers they hired and promoted. Then things got worse and they promoted more sales persons. A bunch of golfers managing a highly complex database product. This happens, even now, even with supposed software product firms producing highly technical products. Once it starts to happen, RUN.

NikolaNovak 4y ago
I wasn't there so I cannot speak to the particular case. But isn't there an equal but opposite startup death methodology where a purely technical team makes a great product, but doesn't have good market fit, or doesn't have good sales / sales team, or doesn't run the business well? The techie in my certainly feels like building a great product should be the most important thing. But the ... (experienced|jaded) person in me realizes that's only a part of the problem.
- sophacles 4y ago
  I've been around a few of these companies. There's problems with hiring enough software engineers to grow the thing without sales. If the technical solution or team are good enough, this company exits via aqui-hire, otherwise they die too.
  - kevin_thibedeau 4y ago
    The issue isn't that sales people aren't an important part of the business. It's that they have no business running a technology company. I've seen this in an established non-startup with thousands of employees. Tech founder dies and is replaced with a sales guy. PHB madness ensues.
    - scarface74 4y ago
      No company exists just to make products. They exist to produce products that will convince someone to give them money. They have every reason to run a “technology company”. All the technology in the world is worthless if no one is willing to spend money on it.
- marcosdumay 4y ago
  That one does not get a chance to grow, so they don't to fix things by hiring more engineers, and those post-mortem do not get written. Anyway, if the product is really great, then it must be easy to change it and try to throw at any different markets. It's quite common to see the people caught on that problem to switch into a consulting company that basically install the products for their clients.
winrid 4y ago
Sounds like they thought they had a solid product and thought they could survive by selling the crap out of it. Not always a bad move.

NikolaNovak 4y ago

I wasn't there so I cannot speak to the particular case. But isn't there an equal but opposite startup death methodology where a purely technical team makes a great product, but doesn't have good market fit, or doesn't have good sales / sales team, or doesn't run the business well? The techie in my certainly feels like building a great product should be the most important thing. But the ... (experienced|jaded) person in me realizes that's only a part of the problem.

sophacles 4y ago
I've been around a few of these companies. There's problems with hiring enough software engineers to grow the thing without sales. If the technical solution or team are good enough, this company exits via aqui-hire, otherwise they die too.
- kevin_thibedeau 4y ago
  The issue isn't that sales people aren't an important part of the business. It's that they have no business running a technology company. I've seen this in an established non-startup with thousands of employees. Tech founder dies and is replaced with a sales guy. PHB madness ensues.
  - scarface74 4y ago
    No company exists just to make products. They exist to produce products that will convince someone to give them money. They have every reason to run a “technology company”. All the technology in the world is worthless if no one is willing to spend money on it.
marcosdumay 4y ago
That one does not get a chance to grow, so they don't to fix things by hiring more engineers, and those post-mortem do not get written. Anyway, if the product is really great, then it must be easy to change it and try to throw at any different markets. It's quite common to see the people caught on that problem to switch into a consulting company that basically install the products for their clients.

winrid 4y ago

Sounds like they thought they had a solid product and thought they could survive by selling the crap out of it. Not always a bad move.