

Our Startup's One Guiding Principle - rmorrison
http://blog.comprehend.com/our-startups-one-guiding-principle

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tomjen3
That is a horrible principle. It is fine if you don't want assholes (and I
agree with that) but without egos all you get is a bunch of yes men who
fundamentally don't care (they have no skin in the game) whether your company
does great or not.

What you really want is people who are not assholes, who have strong opinions
backed by good arguments (ie they prefer mac over linux for a reason, but are
not blind devotees) and who can be persuaded by objectively good arguments.

There is nothing wrong with big egos, so long as they have the ability to back
it up.

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CoffeeDregs
Hmmm... I don't want to go against the grain too much and I kinda agree with
the blog post, but the guiding principle strikes me as vague. Companies of
more than a few people are going to have mismatched personalities and some
egoists. There are going to be struggles, there are going to be painful bits
and happy bits. Rather than saying they won't exist or that we'll try to keep
them from happening (neither of which seems practical), I'd prefer to give a
foundation upon which to base the company's thinking. Also, we have a keg-
erator in the office and I'm not sure how "no egos" guides that thinking.

This actually is a concern for me: I'm a partner in a web marketing/dev firm
and we've had discussions about how to define and build our culture. After
writing this comment, I think I'll suggest along the following lines:

    
    
        1) Take care of each other and of our clients.
        2) Enjoy (1)

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seregine
Much like "perfect objectivity", "no ego" is an impossible goal unless your
company has no humans working for it. It's really bad to set impossible goals
(or to phrase them in such a way) because you'll immediately start going back
on your word, making compromises, and inventing justifications. And then that
becomes your company culture.

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mcherm
Really? Because I think "Don't be Evil" is, if interpreted strictly,
impossible to achieve completely. And Google has not succeeded in achieving it
completely. But it HAS been a major influence on the company's culture and
outcomes. I think "No Egos" is similar: simple, clear, laudable, and
challenging.

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jen_h
I like it, but I don't know where we'd be without our egos - much good work
would never get accomplished. I, for one, would be worthless without ego.

My favorite "guiding principle," when faced with a tough question, however
politically incorrect it may be, is:

"Don't be a jackass."

I think the connotation captures a good number of the edge cases in scads of
morally ambiguous situations.

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rdl
"The No Asshole Rule" is a pretty good book on this subject and philosophy.

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pilgrim689
Second startup I hear phrasing it as "no ego". I get pedantic on that word
choice. I think "don't be an asshole" is way more accurate :P. For example, I
have a very strong ego (ego is defined as high self-esteem, high self-
importance), but I always admit I know nothing about something, or that I'm
wrong, or that someone made a valid point that trumps me, or I've made a
mistake, etc. In fact, I'd even say that it feeds my ego to do these things.

But this concept of open-mindedness is hard to phrase in a catchy way like "no
ego", admittedly.

~~~
lawrence
Well said. I think you need a little swagger to handle the overwhelming odds
against you as a startup. What you don't need are assholes.

~~~
rmorrison
There is nothing wrong with a little swagger, or confidence. However, adopting
"no assholes" isn't quite enough: a non-asshole can still let their ego get in
the way of their work and their team. For example, by refusing to admit fault.

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orofino
Id and super-ego are alright though right?

In all seriousness, and as some other have indicated, there are some good and
bad points to this. Those who are most capable can often be the worst
offenders in terms of ego. In many cases, realizing how good you are at
something allows you to actually excel at that thing, others who may question
their abilities may not perform as well due to fear.

On the other hand, it is truly important for people to understand that they
aren't good at certain things. When I'm not good at something I like to ask
someone for help whose abilities in said area I respect. This is what I
believe what the founders mean by they're "guiding principle". It should be OK
to say "I know how to get shit done" and two minutes later say "except for
this shit, can you help me".

Want practice at this? When the time comes, make sure you tell everyone
unequivocally - "I'm wrong"

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rglover
I like the premise of this idea. It stands to address a lot of problems in
teams. I hate to see someone (even myself) being ostracized or belittled for
failing to understand a concept or get something right on the first try. It
makes for a crap work environment and tends to sap any energy going into the
project. While I can agree with some of the sentiments about ego being a good
thing (i.e. ego inspires pride in one's work and self improvement), I don't
think that's the point being made here. Instead, the goal is to make the work
environment as transparent and friendly as possible. Anyone should be
comfortable speaking to anyone whether it be for advice, conversation,
instruction, or otherwise. Definitely a good principle to base your business
upon.

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skarayan
Ego is very important for drive and competition. I would rather have a team of
huge egos who are calm, collected, and calculated. No ego = mental castration.

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ptbello
"No egos" is a nice take although it appears to address internal dynamics more
directly than customer relationship. It would be nice to add something more
consistent with how customers think of the company; google's "don't be evil"
would be a good example of a culture motto that reflects equally on employees
and customers.

~~~
sreitshamer
"Always take the high road" ?

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rickdale
I like it a lot. Sometimes hackers get a bad rep for their obnoxious egos. I
will say though, a lot of my inspiration to improve my programming and to get
better with emacs comes from programmers with huge egos.

