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This is a strawman. Nobody operates this way. You don't raise more money by hiring more people. In some markets you raise more by making more revenue even if un

This is a strawman. Nobody operates this way. You don't raise more money by hiring more people. In some markets you raise more by making more revenue even if unprofitable, which is not great but is very different than raising as a function of number of employees.

ShamelessC 4y ago
It’s not a straw man, you’re just debating the least charitable interpretation. It is true that VC-backed tech startups hire in large batches if they can ”afford to”. This “adds value” (for a potential acquisition or IPO) by attaining the intellectual property and time of said hired employees in writing. One or two of them are “good enough” to nail new record growth. Some survive by way of credentials, as their @stanford.edu email is good for leads/future hiring/brain drains. The rest are “scaled down” as they say.
- jamiequint 4y ago
  "founder model of get as big as you can, as fast as you can, by hiring as many as you can, so that the valuations keep getting bigger and bigger so you can cash out" I'm pretty sure I just directly interpreted what they said.
  - ShamelessC 4y ago
    Okay, well you win (?) but you realize this modification is essentially the same, stupid idea of excessive hiring of incredibly expensive engineers, burning lots of good will between effected developers when (planned, frankly) layoffs occur.
  - disambiguation 4y ago
    > This is a strawman. Nobody operates this way. You don't raise more money by hiring more people. In some markets you raise more by making more revenue.. heacount has been used as a proxy for revenue for a long time, though recessions often force companies to return to fundamentals. that being said this is a game where the rules are largely made up (i.e what weird signals are VC's in the mood for?) so treating either or as absolute and constant at all times is as much of a fallacy as the strawman.
Ancalagon 4y ago
To the contrary, this sounds remarkably similar to the way the startup Better Mortgage was/is operating to me.
cercatrova 4y ago
> You don't raise more money by hiring more people. Actually you do. VCs in Silicon Valley often look for "growth" ie seeing that you're hiring more people. If you raise 10 million yet keep the same 2 or 3 person team, they'll start asking questions and it's harder to raise your next round.

ShamelessC 4y ago

It’s not a straw man, you’re just debating the least charitable interpretation. It is true that VC-backed tech startups hire in large batches if they can ”afford to”. This “adds value” (for a potential acquisition or IPO) by attaining the intellectual property and time of said hired employees in writing. One or two of them are “good enough” to nail new record growth. Some survive by way of credentials, as their @stanford.edu email is good for leads/future hiring/brain drains. The rest are “scaled down” as they say.

jamiequint 4y ago
"founder model of get as big as you can, as fast as you can, by hiring as many as you can, so that the valuations keep getting bigger and bigger so you can cash out" I'm pretty sure I just directly interpreted what they said.
- ShamelessC 4y ago
  Okay, well you win (?) but you realize this modification is essentially the same, stupid idea of excessive hiring of incredibly expensive engineers, burning lots of good will between effected developers when (planned, frankly) layoffs occur.
- disambiguation 4y ago
  > This is a strawman. Nobody operates this way. You don't raise more money by hiring more people. In some markets you raise more by making more revenue.. heacount has been used as a proxy for revenue for a long time, though recessions often force companies to return to fundamentals. that being said this is a game where the rules are largely made up (i.e what weird signals are VC's in the mood for?) so treating either or as absolute and constant at all times is as much of a fallacy as the strawman.

Ancalagon 4y ago

To the contrary, this sounds remarkably similar to the way the startup Better Mortgage was/is operating to me.

cercatrova 4y ago

> You don't raise more money by hiring more people. Actually you do. VCs in Silicon Valley often look for "growth" ie seeing that you're hiring more people. If you raise 10 million yet keep the same 2 or 3 person team, they'll start asking questions and it's harder to raise your next round.