If you expect all incoming outsiders to be excited about your company and have decided you can't convince those who aren't to become excited, you've got a cult,

If you expect all incoming outsiders to be excited about your company and have decided you can't convince those who aren't to become excited, you've got a cult, not a company. Dissenting views? Skepticism? Interests that might not align completely with our delicate, fragile startup? Shun! Shun! It's incredibly insecure. Maybe for the first ten hires you need that kind of alignment to get the culture vector pointing in the right direction with a significant magnitude. But after that? Having to defend your ideas to internal skeptics makes you stronger. Hiring rose-glasses yes men might let you coast for a while, but when the end comes, it will be swift (see e.g. RIM). EDIT: I can maybe see doing this quietly, though it would be pretty hard to swoop in as CEO and rescind an offer without letting your employees on the interview loop know. I really think it's the public aspect of this behavior that bothers me. Just think: what kind of chilling effect does this have on employee speech internally? It really projects a "get in line or get out" mentality.