When a co-founder steps back
Update: as of 9/1/21, Beau has completed his sabbatical and rejoined the team in a part-time capacity going forward. We are delighted to welcome him back!
Our co-founder and Chief Software Architect Beau Tateyama has decided to take a step back from Proof. He will be taking a 3-month sabbatical beginning June 1st, and after that, we will see. There is no sugarcoating it: this is a huge blow. We are crushed.
Up until now, Allison, Prerak, Beau, and I have been equal partners in Proof. Each of us brings a unique set of skills to the table, and we have all poured an enormous amount of time and energy into building and leading this company. If any one of us decided to leave, it would be near-catastrophic, and losing Beau is no exception. Beau is our strongest software developer. He is a genius and an artist. He is not the most vocal leader, but he doesn’t need to be. He mostly stays in the background pumping out brilliant code. And when he does speak up, people damn well listen. Proof will not be the same without him.
What happened?
About six months ago, Beau began floating the idea that he might not want to be part of Proof for the long haul. He had no intentions of leaving us in the lurch, but he said he was tired and unenthusiastic about the prospect of a several-year-slog “just running an algo platform.” Proof has been a grind, and that’s not changing anytime soon, but whereas Allison, Prerak, and I find many aspects of running Proof thrilling and energizing, it seems like for Beau it has mostly just been draining. Beau told us he would see us through to launch, but beyond that we would see. Ever since those early conversations, the four of us have had a running dialogue about the path forward. To Beau’s credit, he hasn’t checked out during these past several months; if anything, it’s been the opposite. Beau has worked with a great deal of intensity to tie up loose ends and leave our technology platform in a excellent position. Now that we are safely on the other side of launch, it is time for the plan to go into effect.
What happens next
I know this post reads as though Beau’s full departure is foregone conclusion, but the truth is none of us know what will happen from here. We will keep him on payroll during his sabbatical, and he will remain on the board, but he will have no formal responsibilities or hours, and his equity vesting will pause. At the end of the three months, we may extend the sabbatical, or he may return to work in a full or reduced capacity, or he may just decide to fully separate. It does hurt that Beau does not believe in Proof’s prospects to the same extent that the rest of us do, but the truth is he has made a tremendous contribution to Proof. We are extremely grateful to him, and it is the least we can do to be flexible and accommodating, and to give him the space and time he needs to figure out what he wants to do.
In the meantime, it now becomes far more urgent that we fill some of these open roles on the technology team. If Beau does decide to leave, those are some truly massive shoes to fill, and if he winds up returning in the end, even better. We have no shortage of important tech projects on the horizon.
It is no fun writing a blog post like this one. This is the hardest challenge we have dealt with as a company. This whole situation has just been a punch in the gut, but I am sure Proof will make it through. Mostly, we just want Beau to be well and happy. He is our friend and our partner, and we hope he finds what he’s looking for. Thank you for everything Beau, and good luck.
Thoughts from our CTO Prerak
Beau and I have worked together for the last ~16 years, spanning five different jobs, always moving in lockstep. In that time, we’ve built some major systems that we’re proud of and are still operating well today. We make a great team — we’ve been called the “dynamic duo” at times — partly because we have similar values and partly because we have complementary skills. As well as I know Beau, it is still hard for me to concisely describe what he brings to the table. He is well known for building super-reliable frameworks for trading systems. But that doesn’t include the numerous mission-critical business applications that he has built on top of those frameworks. Or the indispensable UI applications for trading and operations teams. Or the development tools and harnesses that have made his teams highly productive. Or the numerous support scripts and tools, the list goes on. For us, Beau addresses all of the real-life complications of technology so that we don’t have to deal with them. He’s a true enabler.
But that still isn’t the whole story. It is uplifting for the entire team just to have Beau around. You see — Beau is an expert craftsman — seeing him work in full swing, it is hard not to stand back in awe at the sheer mastery. He works with extreme meticulousness and rigor; apparently, that’s what it takes to never make a mistake! Beau is and has been an aspirational role model to many. Through his mere presence, he sets the tone for others around him. He inspires a strong work ethic and the strength needed to stay true to yourself always.
Those last two things — his work ethic and intellectual honesty — are the reason why he didn’t hold back when he felt less than excited about his work at the end of last year. He thought we had done similar work before, and it didn’t seem like all of the hard work was going to have a significant impact anytime soon (or at least not without a long grind). He’d rather spend the majority of his waking hours doing something that had a more immediate and tangible reward. He was thinking about this from a very high-level what-do-I-want-to-do-with-my-life perspective. He cared about the team enough to not just quit but instead get to a good logical stopping point in the build of our trading system and then take some time off.
Personally, I disagree with Beau on answers to some of the subjective questions (what will it take to succeed at Proof? what does success even look like?). But I do agree that it is important to find the time to take care of yourself and put your happiness and fulfillment ahead of any work or career considerations. As devastating as this is for me, both personally and professionally, I absolutely want Beau to be doing stuff that he finds fulfilling. And so we part, hopefully only for the summer. As far as I can tell, it is not only possible but also likely that Beau comes back to work with us at the end of summer.
So what happens next? Beau has already put his mark on the trading system, and for a v1 system, it’s in great shape. Over the summer, we really need to shore up the technology team and hire some folks who can do justice to the system that we’ve built so far. We won’t be as agile over the next few months without Beau, but we believe we can keep moving forward. We will continue our efforts to integrate with more EMS providers, more FIX networks, and generally prepare for a deluge of clients waiting to be onboarded. I happen to think the rewarding parts are only just beginning for Proof, after two years of a quiet build!
Of course, none of this is going to be easy, but I’ll say this to any prospective candidates reading: We have an impressive team and a solid system for you to work with and leave your mark on, and we’re willing to give out handsome equity stakes to those that believe in us enough to join us!
