What do you think their job is?
A few years ago, a friend’s former employee wrote a hit piece on him, gleeful about his “failure” — one of the companies my friend founded exited for a fraction of the money it had raised. This had been an ambitious company trying to solve real-world problems, taking on serious logistical challenges, and using complex technology.
First of all, reader, if you ever feel compelled to write a takedown on anyone, unless they are criminally awful, pause for a second. Are you so sure that you won’t make a similar, or worse “mistake” in the future? Are you sure that you are looking into the situation from the right angle? Maybe the mistake is in your outlook. I was raised to be judgemental, just like any good Catholic girl. It’s something I struggled with throughout my youth. With experience, observing my errors and learning about the world, I became a more compassionate, open-minded person. A few times, it was other person’s compassion and generosity that touched me and changed me.
Learning about robustness in Computer Science early on was formative to my personal growth. In CS, robustness is the ability of a system to be tolerant to errors. Postel’s Law summarizes it as “be conservative in what you send, liberal in what you accept.” As useful as this concept can sometimes be in software, it’s always game-changing when applied to real life. Listen more than you talk. Allow others freedom in their self-expression and check your own output instead. These are signs of strength and maturity.
Some people are so rigid that they devalue what others bring to a team. Though more common in technical people, it can happen with anyone in any part of an org. You know, the “Us vs. Them”, “I can do their job with my eyes closed,” “let’s ignore what they just said” crowd. They honestly believe that if everyone on a team/organization was just like them, and knew just what they know, everything would work perfectly. Mind you, they often don’t know about design, or fundraising, or product, or payroll. Their rigidity clouds their vision and makes it impossible for them to see or understand functions other than their own.
There are many excellent companies and products driven by technical people, by the way. Many times they start with that opinion: “I can do their job better.” It’s usually the case that to grow as a company, they have to grow in their mindset, learn new things, and become more flexible.
A healthy, strong organization is less like a photo of one person’s knowledge and mindset, and more like a 360 video: millions of photos that show the same object from millions of slightly different points of view, stitched together to form one complete, moving image. An accountant might think their CFO boss is foolish. “I’m sure they couldn’t do my job.” But a CFO’s job isn’t crunching numbers: it’s to have a complete vision for the company’s financials, of which cash flow and taxes are only one small part. A designer, a PM, a sales person, a CEO — they need to understand where you are coming from, but fully agreeing with your point of view might make them awful at their job. Being able to see and accept two (or more) realities at the same time is a super power. Even within an engineering org, leadership ladders often bifiurcate into architecture and people managing, because it’s so rare to find someone who is great at both. It may take diametrically opposed personalities to fill these roles.
Let’s focus on founders/CEOs for a moment. What are they good for? Sometimes they can’t even finish school! Well, for example, a good founder/CEO knows where the product is at and also knows where it can be. This is what we usually call “Vision.” Maybe for someone on the team the product is not perfect enough to see the market, or maybe they think that not openly talking about each possible “flaw” is lying. I am a perfectionist, and I always felt that my products weren’t perfect enough. I cringe about most of the stuff I write. Then I go to Upwork and see how glitchy their chat is (a key feature of the service, since it’s how you interact with the talent). The reality is, most products on the market have glitches or flaws. Growth can break the system. Users can interact with the product in different ways that show you both a possibly superior product design and also a path for growth. When a CEO holds a vision of where a product can be, they are not lying, they are being excellent at their job.
CEOs are also salespeople. They sell to investors, they sell to customers, they sell to employees and new hires, and they sell to the press. Good salespeople “see” their buyer and how they might match a product. Great salespeople “see” their buyer and paint a clear picture around them that’s so real, it’s tangible. We call this the “reality distortion field.” This is a powerful, sometimes scary skill, shared by amazing CEOs, inspiring leaders, and conmen alike. At my best, this is who I am, and let me tell you, sometimes, it’s not even intentional. There’s no turning it off. An RDF can trick and misguide people. It can also persuade us that we can do the impossible, motivate us to be our best, and convince us that the world can change and improve.
Of course, sometimes the impossible remains impossible just a little longer. Sometimes our best is not good enough. Sometimes the world doesn’t change as much as we’d like it to. These are hard problems. That’s why we are so moved by the visionaries who make it once, twice, five times. That’s why the winners are so handsomely rewarded. And that’s why investors, taste makers, and early adopters keep betting on them.
These are just some of the abilities a founder/CEO might bring to the table. They also assume most of the risks and the responsibilities. Hyping your startup while knowing that you might not make payroll in two weeks is incredibly stressful. It doesn’t matter why a company goes under or who made a mistake, the blame usually falls on the CEO. You know what they say, victories are group efforts, losses are the leader’s only.
The Bay Area is full of some of the most brilliant people in the world. We discuss and accept the value and cost of training fighter pilots in the millions, but we seldom talk about the value of the SV talent. Each individual is the receptacle of an incredible amount of capital: family resources, education, social capital, opportunity. No matter what they make and what’s in their bank account, a lot of the humans we cross paths with in the Bay Area can be valued at millions.
How about the cost of growing a CEO? Well, I’m doing just that, and let me tell you, it’s grueling. My daughter is literally fearless. Keeping her alive the first three years of her life was exhausting. She doesn’t feel pain like most people — she’s a proper superhero — except her skin tears and her bones break. Her intelligence and curiosity are without limit, which has been a problem with schools and teachers. On the other hand, at age 5, she is teaching herself math and to read and write (she has the materials available but we don’t work on it because we believe emotional development is more important at this early age). Her energy is boundless. She’s a natural-born leader. She always makes friends easily and convinces her crowd to follow her in her made-up games and adventures, and she always inconveniences the adults in her life. Keeping her away from bodily harm and emotional trauma is the toughest thing I have ever done.
A lot of these limitless, remarkable, unique, would-be leaders are left behind: maybe they end up traumatized by the people trying to bottle them up; maybe they end up in a life of crime or poverty; maybe they die at the hand of their own recklessness or curiosity. The cost of nurturing their skills and shepherding them on a productive path while not smothering them is sky high, for parents, teachers, bosses and professors alike. And that’s before we factor in the financial and social costs of raising and educating them.
Societies have always had their heroes and their explorers: fellow humans so brave and so stupid that they taste an unknown fruit to figure out if it’s delicious and if it’s poisonous. They venture into mysterious lands and they volunteer to fight the mighty monster. Many don’t make it into adulthood, most don’t make it into old age. We elevate them because we need them. Their peril is our collective gain.
Society is less like a uniform mass of people and more like a human body. The body needs all of its parts: hands, legs, brain, eyes, heart, kidneys, butthole. It’s easy for the hands to think that more hands are preferable: so much more could get done!
Superman was created in 1938, a year before WWII started. The men of the time thought more strength would surely solve the problems of the world. But science, food and sheer Russian troop numbers won the war, not muscles.
In the movie Limitless, the protagonist takes a pill that makes him super smart, and he suddenly becomes orderly, determined and charming. It makes sense that, to a screenwriter, being smarter seems like the solution to everything. But the skills gained in the movie (determination, charm, structure) don’t come from intelligence, they are related to emotional regulation and executive function. We want more of what we already have, even if it’s not what we need, because we are blind to what we lack.
The hands demand more hands. “Let’s trade in that smelly anus.” Except, you can live a long, healthy, fulfilling life with no hands. You wouldn’t last more than a few weeks without your ass.
Those vexing founders and CEOs are our own shiny, sunny, splendid fighter pilots. They are our heroes, and sometimes, our asses. Yes, they can be annoying, arrogant, and downright foolish. But that’s how we need them. The same way we need some of our engineers to be exacting, finicky and unyielding. Just not in a way that’s blind and downright offensive to the rest of the team’s strengths, vantage points and contributions. You are supposed to be a part of a whole, even if you can’t see how every piece fits in. Trying to understand someone else’s perspective while holding your truth will enrich you. So before criticizing, ask yourself, do you even know what their job is?
If you still can’t see it, maybe you’re the ass.
Today’s playlist is here.
