4 ms·
Here's an idea: instead of paying your employees $800k, how about you cut their pay to $80k. See how many of them are truly in it for the mission.
by briga 2mo ago
Here's an idea: instead of paying your employees $800k, how about you cut their pay to $80k. See how many of them are truly in it for the mission.
- mirzap 2mo agoAnyone who thinks people work for anything other than money is delusional. Anyone who works for "the mission" is an idiot - no company or billionaire running a company cares about you. They will let you go in a heart beat.
- breppp 2mo agoHe is right, when a startup becomes successful the hiring pool becomes different. For example, you won't see people who came for politics-sake before real money is on the table. This can kill the culture and make the actual people that were shipping unhappy
- dijit 2mo agoI’m aware of this (consciously) but I would really do my job if it was unpaid, in fact: many do (and did) in the form of side projects and volunteering and FOSS. I was always weirded out by the “only in IT for the money” crowd, which is a lot more than the people in it for passion these days it seems, and I might be an extreme case, but consider that while I run an IRC community- I do not write open source software.
- janalsncm 2mo agoI do a ton of side projects that personally interest me. I’m mainlining hard technical problems with zero need for permissions or waiting on bureaucracy or jira tickets. If a decision needs to be made, I don’t have to wait until next week when all of the “stakeholders” are available to talk about it. I figure it out myself. If my day job was a side project I wouldn’t work on it at all.
- dijit 2mo agoto be fair with you, I have a huge intolerance to that bureaucracy, likely in part due to my passion. I think it would genuinely be the same for me.
- mrheosuper 2mo agoI disagree, while money is a really important factor, that's not the final. Personally, I've changed to lower paid job to work on something i am more interested in.
- mirzap 2mo agoI agree. We all make these kinds of trade-offs sometimes. We trade some amount of money for peace of mind, more interesting work, better colleagues, a healthier environment, and so on. But I never buy the "mission" story, or the "we’re a family" line. We’re not a family, and I’m not on a mission. I’m fine with the word "vision." I’ll be part of your vision if I find it interesting or if I believe in it too. But I’m not on a mission to achieve it. To me, "mission" implies sacrifice and renunciation - whether that means sacrificing your lifestyle, your time, or your family. I’m not doing that.
- matwood 2mo agoI'm fine if leaders talk about mission and vision as long as it's to inspire and not in lieu of money. The right amount of money is table stakes. The problems start when leaders begin replacing money with mission, and people buy it. I know a lot of people didn't like the harshness of the scene in Mad Men where Don tells Peggy, that's what the money is for, but people would be good to remember it. I tell people who work for me if someone offers you a lot more money than I can, take it!
- ruperthair 2mo agoI agree with you, but I don't think the parent post was arguing for money being the only factor, just a big one. Would I work 9-5 for no money: No! Would I move from a shitty 9-5 to a less shitty one while taking an affordable pay cut: Yes.
- deleted 2mo ago[deleted]
- win311fwg 2mo ago> Anyone who thinks people work for anything other than money is delusional. I work so that I am given food, shelter, entertainment, etc. at some point in the future in exchange for what I have given. Money is just the IOU that records the promise that I will receive those things later. I'm sure there is someone out there who is driven by the desire to collect IOUs and nothing more, but everyone (else but me)?
- matwood 2mo agoI agree with you mostly, and it’s important for everyone to understand. With that said, not everyone maximizes for only money.
- mirzap 2mo agoYup, I agree. I’m just clarifying what I meant by my original comment here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49206654 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49206654
- MattPalmer1086 2mo agoI turned down a better paid, lower stress role recently where I would have been working with good people I liked and had worked with before. Main reason was a sense of mission. If I screwed up in that role, a billionaire would have been a tiny bit poorer but literally nobody else would care. My current role involves critical global infrastructure, everyone would notice if we screwed up. Having said that, money is still very important. I am pretty well remunerated - more would be nice but I'm not hurting.
- ASalazarMX 2mo agoPeople can work for passion, some times even contrary to their own self interests, especially when you're starting your career. You hopefully grow out of it when you become established because companies don't pay large salaries for passion. I've not seen smart professionals put passion before money unless it's their own company, and that's becaue they expect to earn quite a lot in the future, so it's usually money first, and that's OK because you need it to live comfortably.
- deleted 2mo ago[deleted]
- Frenchgeek 2mo agoLet's start with the CEO's pay.
- Maxion 2mo agoNah just go a step further and offer dorm accomodation and some slop for food, and then let people volonteer.
- worldthruword 2mo ago"Ask not what your Company can do for you —ask what you can do for your Company". - Anthropic CEO.
- keeda 2mo agoMaybe more like "Ask not what AGI can do for you -- ask what you can do for AGI." ;-)
- hahahaa 2mo agoThe good ones go work for OpenAI. And they lose any chance in the race.
- ASalazarMX 2mo agoGuess they should stop whining then. I can't see why is that a problem, maybe they'd like to pay less so they can pay more themselves?
- ben_w 2mo agoThere will be be plenty of people, they just wouldn't be in Silicon Valley. Or possibly anywhere in the USA. $800k/year in the UK is "Buy nice house in commuter belt in one year without bothering with a mortgage, three years if you want somewhere or something fancy but still not aristocratic, ten years if you do want aristocratic".