I am Founder, Hear Me Roar
Hello, I’m a founder. (waits for applause to die down)
You probably know me from my Ted Talk, How to Increase the Productivity of Your Two Minute Work Week Through Charcoal Enemas. In the small possibility that you haven’t seen that (and you really must), let me introduce myself. I found things. Like, innovative things. What can I say? I was destined to do this.
From the moment I was born, I’ve been a disrupter. I mean, literally: I punched my mom’s IV over and almost killed her 30 seconds after I emerged. And I didn’t stop there. Toasters, phones, barbie dolls, my mom’s makeup, my brother’s model dinosaurs: as a child I disrupted them under my feet and crushed them into oblivion. It’s like I’ve never been satisfied with the status quo or something. I’m surprised it’s taken me this long (I’m 25!) to get VCs to fund the incredible amount of crushing I do on a daily basis.
You may not have heard of my company yet because we’ve just emerged from stealth mode. We’re called superb.ly, and we’re changing the world by allowing startups to startup faster by giving them easier access to larger piles of cash. Skip the pitch, skip the driving around Sandhill Road begging for money. Just input the name of your startup into our Success Engine™. Based on that name and our sophisticated algorithm, we present the odds of your success to our long list of VCs. If the odds are good, they invest. Here’s a hint: the rounder the letters in your name and/or the more the name sounds like a drunken frat boy with marbles in his mouth trying to pronounce any superlative adverb, the higher your chances of success.
Now that superb.ly has raised $50 million (and we’re prerevenue!), we’re building up our team. We’re looking for designers who code, coders capable of having a conversation, and data science engineers who weave pixels of data into beautiful unicorns with wavy hair that can crush things in a sick fashion.
Our benefits are a real value add. We have unlimited vacation (though no one has taken any yet–they love their jobs), flexible schedules (as long as you work a minimum of 80 hours a week and are in the office for the 15 team meetings each week), and dog-friendly offices. We are family-friendly and love hiring mothers because they are the most efficient workers in the world. One of our mothers delivered (haha) the last lines of code for her project during the final hours of her labor! I was nervous she might not make the deadline, but I called and gently suggested that her job may not be here when she gets back from her week-long maternity leave, and she pulled through! Got my ROI on that one.
Our office is in the up and coming Tenderloin neighborhood. Be careful of the homeless folks sleeping outside of the building. A fun fact is that many of them used to live in this building before we evicted them. Now we have marble floors, music piped into the bathrooms, and soylent on tap. Just the essentials.
Our salaries are competitive and you will receive equity. There is about a .1% chance that your .01% equity will ever be worth anything, but it will serve as motivation for you to devote 90% of your waking hours to our cause. Most importantly, if you work here you can sleep peacefully at night (we provide cushions under the desks for this) knowing your skills and dedication are going to change the world. Your life will have meaning.
One of the things I’ve always said I would do as a founder is practice radical transparency. None of this whispering behind closed doors that goes on in outdated corporations. As an employee, you will know everything that happens here. All communication occurs over Slack. For example, if I have a problem with another employee, you will know because you will witness as I tell them they’re posting to the wrong channel in Slack. The General channel is for general announcements; the Random channel is for posting gifs of teacup persian munchkin cats playing patty cake! Jesus, how many times do I have to say it?
Being a founder is truly the highest calling. I’m so happy that I can stand here as a beacon of inspiration for you. Who knows, you might be able to achieve this level of success too. All it takes is hard work, resilience, and humility, always humility. A hefty trust fund doesn’t hurt either.
