7 ms·

In my experience running your own business is all about relationships. The fact is someone with capital to spend can deploy it to anyone, so why should they dep

by euix 3y ago

In my experience running your own business is all about relationships. The fact is someone with capital to spend can deploy it to anyone, so why should they deploy it to you? Are you their cousin? Did you go to the same school? Met at a mixer? Before there is even a discussion about what you know and what you can do, or what your product is there is the question of who you are. I have been doing some Data Science consulting on the side and last year we did some analytics work for a government lottery and that contract came to us because one of my partner's girlfriend had a relationship with the team who needed the work done. Otherwise you would never hear about any of this stuff that is constantly flying around in the airwaves. The problem with this advice is that it's not any advice. Saying business is about nepotism is unattractive and doesn't really help you, other then to say, either you are social and good at forming relationships or find a partner that is. And moreover, you can't sell this advice in a coaching class. If you aren't a social butterfly the only way is to build those relationships over a long period of time and create trust.

carlosjobim 3y ago
That sounds like a narrow idea of what kind of businesses a person can start. If you target the general public with your offers, there is no nepotism or relationships involved. That's the beauty of an open society. All businesses started as small businesses, we tend to forget that.
CharlieDigital 3y ago
I worked in a bootstrapped startup for 10 years. When I left, my network was very narrow (industry focused). I did a hard reset and ended up first working at a YC company and then another SV VC backed startup. When this second startup pivoted they asked if I wanted to stay on or accelerate my vesting. I left because there was something else I wanted to build. But now being connected to this network, the founders of the company I left opened up 8-10 VC calls. Nothing changed about me, my capabilities, my skills, my knowledge. But being plugged in to this network definitely has benefits. The bias is obvious in the tech industry. Lots of companies get funded that aren't true VC scale businesses. I spoke with another YC founder that ended up folding his startup doing an open source product. I asked about his pitch to YC and how he framed his business model and he said he basically didn't have one. As much as we think tech is a meritocracy, there's a lot of bias, nepotism, and favoritism.
- throwaway2037 3y ago
  Deeper question: Does this mean that SV VC needs to work harder to find people without networking connections?
  - CharlieDigital 3y ago
    No; I think they are generally incapable of it. A lot of this ultimately comes down to trust. Unless they want to do a lot more due diligence (FTX anyone?), trust is the shortcut. Trust in institutions (Stanford, MIT, Harvard, ex-FAANG, ex-McKinsey, etc), trust in people (connections), trust in the individual (serial/repeat).
Hermitian909 3y ago
> ... Met at a mixer? ... Saying business is about nepotism is unattractive and doesn't really help you I think it's unhelpful to consider this level of socialization "nepotism". A word often associated with a rich parent giving their child with no experience a directorship at a big company. Not only is the energy different, but it misleads people into believing business could be anything but social. Business deals largely run on trust that the other party will do what they say, and hopefully do it in good faith (many people believe this isn't so because of the legal contracts we sign, in fact the need to use a contract in court is a failure of a business relationship). The only way you can build that trust is by entering someone's network of trust - you can do that through word of mouth or by talking to them, but you have to do one of them. A 30 minute chat at a mixer is great way to give signal that you're at least not obviously a fraud and perhaps worth talking to.
OmarShehata 3y ago
> The problem with this advice is that it's not any advice It sounds like very good advice, or rather, information. If I believe this, a few decisions I might make are: (1) spend more time networking, and following up with people I've met, whether at conferences or local events, even if they are outside (2) recognize I have a handicap if I am not a social butterfly and think about ways to counteract it (or realize this as another factor working against me and decide not to start a business) I don't think you need to be a social butterfly to have a large network. I think you just have to show up to a lot of things. Which might feel like wasted time if you don't frame it this way.
ozim 3y ago
I think people jump into "nepotism" too quickly and usually I find people who jump to that - to be not to be really negative but still - <losers>. Building and keeping relationship *is work* even with your wife or kids it is not given. Building and keeping business relationship is even more work when you have to convince someone you don't know that you are worth something. I call out nepotism only if you can clearly see someone is hired and does nothing or has no experience or skills for what they were hired for. I got my friends/people I know hired to the company I work for, it was not walk in the park, I had to convince my friends that company is good place to work as they were highly skilled, which took me months ... guess what ... I had to spend also quite some time convincing managers that guy I propose will fit and then they still had to go through interviews and probation period. From the outside or other employees perspective it might have looked like "X got Y into the company because they know each other and X is on good terms with management", they did not see how much work it was to "get good terms with management", they did not see how much legwork and checking up on my friends if they are available took.
- antod 3y ago
  > I got my friends/people I know hired to the company I work for, it was not walk in the park, I had to convince my friends that company is good place to work as they were highly skilled, which took me months ... guess what ... I had to spend also quite some time convincing managers that guy I propose will fit and then they still had to go through interviews and probation period. That sounds very far away from nepotism. Nepotism is giving relatives or friends the job without any qualifications and/or treating them different.
  - ozim 3y ago
    That is why I replied to parent poster. He wrote like it would be that getting business from someone you know is already sign of nepotism but there is more to it.
- polygamous_bat 3y ago
  This comment reads like a classic "X-ism doesn't exist because Y people have it hard too!" No one is saying that Y does not have it hard. The claim about X-ism is that people with X never even had the chance that Y did. In your case, sure, someone worked hard to convince their boss to hire their friend, but the people who don't have those connection (i.e. because they are from marginalized backgrounds/different country) just don't have a single chance of being hired, regardless of how qualified they are.
ryandvm 3y ago
This. I was one of the founders in a software development co-op and the unfortunate truth was that almost all of our work came from connections one of us previously had. The good news is that if you do good work, and we did, that web of connections grows exponentially. But yeah, it's hard to tell somebody just getting into it that it's all who you know, but it's true.
- frankc 3y ago
  I think what ozim is trying to get across and I agree with, is that "it's who you know" does not imply that its just a good ol boys network for it's own sake. Working with people you know and trust is normal. There is no way you can suss out in an interview loop or a client meeting what you can from a recommendation from someone who has with direct knowledge through experience with that business partner or employee. Managing relationships is part of the job and part of career building. For the career part, I have found that just being competent and nice goes a long way, without having to do aggressive networking.
taneq 3y ago
> The fact is someone with capital to spend can deploy it to anyone, so why should they deploy it to you? Observation 1: A corporation isn't a single entity, it's a stack of humans in a trench coat. Observation 2: Humans choose what's familiar and what's worked for them in the past. Observation 3: Humans usually get promoted based on their choices. Corollary: Make the people who engaged you look good, and they'll keep sending money your way.
doctorpangloss 3y ago
> The fact is someone with capital to spend can deploy it to anyone, so why should they deploy it to you? By that logic, people have big families, they have lots of friends. Why choose one family member or friend over another? > I have been doing some Data Science consulting I'm not trying to "gatekeep" here. Consulting is, for the most part, an ordinary employment relationship.

by euix 3y ago

carlosjobim 3y ago

That sounds like a narrow idea of what kind of businesses a person can start. If you target the general public with your offers, there is no nepotism or relationships involved. That's the beauty of an open society. All businesses started as small businesses, we tend to forget that.

CharlieDigital 3y ago

I worked in a bootstrapped startup for 10 years. When I left, my network was very narrow (industry focused). I did a hard reset and ended up first working at a YC company and then another SV VC backed startup. When this second startup pivoted they asked if I wanted to stay on or accelerate my vesting. I left because there was something else I wanted to build. But now being connected to this network, the founders of the company I left opened up 8-10 VC calls. Nothing changed about me, my capabilities, my skills, my knowledge. But being plugged in to this network definitely has benefits. The bias is obvious in the tech industry. Lots of companies get funded that aren't true VC scale businesses. I spoke with another YC founder that ended up folding his startup doing an open source product. I asked about his pitch to YC and how he framed his business model and he said he basically didn't have one. As much as we think tech is a meritocracy, there's a lot of bias, nepotism, and favoritism.

throwaway2037 3y ago
Deeper question: Does this mean that SV VC needs to work harder to find people without networking connections?
- CharlieDigital 3y ago
  No; I think they are generally incapable of it. A lot of this ultimately comes down to trust. Unless they want to do a lot more due diligence (FTX anyone?), trust is the shortcut. Trust in institutions (Stanford, MIT, Harvard, ex-FAANG, ex-McKinsey, etc), trust in people (connections), trust in the individual (serial/repeat).

Hermitian909 3y ago

> ... Met at a mixer? ... Saying business is about nepotism is unattractive and doesn't really help you I think it's unhelpful to consider this level of socialization "nepotism". A word often associated with a rich parent giving their child with no experience a directorship at a big company. Not only is the energy different, but it misleads people into believing business could be anything but social. Business deals largely run on trust that the other party will do what they say, and hopefully do it in good faith (many people believe this isn't so because of the legal contracts we sign, in fact the need to use a contract in court is a failure of a business relationship). The only way you can build that trust is by entering someone's network of trust - you can do that through word of mouth or by talking to them, but you have to do one of them. A 30 minute chat at a mixer is great way to give signal that you're at least not obviously a fraud and perhaps worth talking to.

OmarShehata 3y ago

> The problem with this advice is that it's not any advice It sounds like very good advice, or rather, information. If I believe this, a few decisions I might make are: (1) spend more time networking, and following up with people I've met, whether at conferences or local events, even if they are outside (2) recognize I have a handicap if I am not a social butterfly and think about ways to counteract it (or realize this as another factor working against me and decide not to start a business) I don't think you need to be a social butterfly to have a large network. I think you just have to show up to a lot of things. Which might feel like wasted time if you don't frame it this way.

ozim 3y ago

I think people jump into "nepotism" too quickly and usually I find people who jump to that - to be not to be really negative but still - <losers>. Building and keeping relationship *is work* even with your wife or kids it is not given. Building and keeping business relationship is even more work when you have to convince someone you don't know that you are worth something. I call out nepotism only if you can clearly see someone is hired and does nothing or has no experience or skills for what they were hired for. I got my friends/people I know hired to the company I work for, it was not walk in the park, I had to convince my friends that company is good place to work as they were highly skilled, which took me months ... guess what ... I had to spend also quite some time convincing managers that guy I propose will fit and then they still had to go through interviews and probation period. From the outside or other employees perspective it might have looked like "X got Y into the company because they know each other and X is on good terms with management", they did not see how much work it was to "get good terms with management", they did not see how much legwork and checking up on my friends if they are available took.

antod 3y ago
> I got my friends/people I know hired to the company I work for, it was not walk in the park, I had to convince my friends that company is good place to work as they were highly skilled, which took me months ... guess what ... I had to spend also quite some time convincing managers that guy I propose will fit and then they still had to go through interviews and probation period. That sounds very far away from nepotism. Nepotism is giving relatives or friends the job without any qualifications and/or treating them different.
- ozim 3y ago
  That is why I replied to parent poster. He wrote like it would be that getting business from someone you know is already sign of nepotism but there is more to it.
polygamous_bat 3y ago
This comment reads like a classic "X-ism doesn't exist because Y people have it hard too!" No one is saying that Y does not have it hard. The claim about X-ism is that people with X never even had the chance that Y did. In your case, sure, someone worked hard to convince their boss to hire their friend, but the people who don't have those connection (i.e. because they are from marginalized backgrounds/different country) just don't have a single chance of being hired, regardless of how qualified they are.

ryandvm 3y ago

This. I was one of the founders in a software development co-op and the unfortunate truth was that almost all of our work came from connections one of us previously had. The good news is that if you do good work, and we did, that web of connections grows exponentially. But yeah, it's hard to tell somebody just getting into it that it's all who you know, but it's true.

frankc 3y ago
I think what ozim is trying to get across and I agree with, is that "it's who you know" does not imply that its just a good ol boys network for it's own sake. Working with people you know and trust is normal. There is no way you can suss out in an interview loop or a client meeting what you can from a recommendation from someone who has with direct knowledge through experience with that business partner or employee. Managing relationships is part of the job and part of career building. For the career part, I have found that just being competent and nice goes a long way, without having to do aggressive networking.

taneq 3y ago

> The fact is someone with capital to spend can deploy it to anyone, so why should they deploy it to you? Observation 1: A corporation isn't a single entity, it's a stack of humans in a trench coat. Observation 2: Humans choose what's familiar and what's worked for them in the past. Observation 3: Humans usually get promoted based on their choices. Corollary: Make the people who engaged you look good, and they'll keep sending money your way.

doctorpangloss 3y ago

> The fact is someone with capital to spend can deploy it to anyone, so why should they deploy it to you? By that logic, people have big families, they have lots of friends. Why choose one family member or friend over another? > I have been doing some Data Science consulting I'm not trying to "gatekeep" here. Consulting is, for the most part, an ordinary employment relationship.