

Ask HN: How does one handle politics and bureaucracy in a growing start up? - deception

I joined a start up around September when there were a few people, about 4 at the time, and it's recently grown over the past few months to around 18-20 people.<p>We are all exceptionally smart individuals, but I feel that it's slowly becoming bureaucratic and it's demoralizing me and my work. Now, instead of focusing on the problems or tasks at hand -- which is an overwhelming task of itself, I have to worry about who's talking about who and what decisions are being made where.<p>Certain individuals are starting to have influential company wide decisions, even encroaching on "technical decisions" which seems to me like it might hinder productivity of a start-up. I guess what's really bothering me is that these decisions are made without input from others, and you're basically handed a "deal with it and shut up" card which kind of puts things in perspective.<p>For the most part, I feel that if you do a good job, you'll eventually be rewarded handsomely if a start up succeeds, but I feel that with all the politics, I might have to start worrying about what image is presented to the CEO, and by whom.<p>I guess it might be that we're quickly growing out of a start up phase and moving towards becoming a real company, but I am starting to see a pattern that I will have to step up my politics in order to ensure an appropriate role in the company.<p>I want to see how the HN community deals with these issues, because I haven't really seen or read anything that address this topic.<p>Thanks in advance for your feedback.
-D
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sabat
In my experience in and around startups: you minimize bureaucracy, and you
eliminate politics where you find it. Fire. Fire. Political gaming in a tiny
company will kill it.

