
Motivating posters for your startup - imdavis
http://startupvitamins.com
======
edw519
Don't mean to rain on your parade, OP. Just having a little fun...

    
    
      +-------------+  +-------------+  +-------------+ 
      |             |  |             |  |             |
      |   No room   |  |  Tear down  |  |   Posters   |
      |     for     |  | this poster |  |  & Posers   |
      |   posters   |  | and put up  |  |  differ by  |
      |   in your   |  |   another   |  |  only one   |
      |     MVP     |  | white board |  |   letter.   |
      |             |  |             |  |             |
      +-------------+  +-------------+  +-------------+
       18x24"-$26.00    18x24"-$26.00    18x24"-$26.00
    
      +-------------+  +-------------+  +-------------+ 
      |             |  |    If you   |  |   Objects   |
      | MOTIVATING. |  |  need to be |  | on posters  |
      |             |  |  motivated, |  |  are less   |
      |  POSTERS.   |  | you should  |  |  oriented   |
      |             |  | be working  |  |    than     |
      |   DON'T.    |  |  somewhere  |  |    they     |
      |             |  |    else.    |  |   appear.   |
      +-------------+  +-------------+  +-------------+
       18x24"-$26.00    18x24"-$26.00    18x24"-$26.00
    
      +-------------+  +-------------+  +-------------+ 
      |   00110010  |  |    Stop     |  |  The less   |
      |   11001011  |  |   reading   |  |  you read   |
      |   10010110  |  |   this &    |  | Hacker News |
      |   10001001  |  |    get      |  |  the more   |
      |   10010011  |  |    back     |  | likely you  |
      |   01011001  |  |     to      |  | will be on  |
      |   01011001  |  |    work.    |  | Hacker News |
      +-------------+  +-------------+  +-------------+
       18x24"-$26.00    18x24"-$26.00    18x24"-$26.00

~~~
brini

      > +-------------+
      > |   00110010  |
      > |   11001011  |
      > |   10010110  |
      > |   10001001  |
      > |   10010011  |
      > |   01011001  |
      > |   01011001  |
      > +-------------+
    

Hex: 32 cb 96 89 93 59 59

Decimal: 50 203 150 137 147 89 89

ASCII: 2 Ë [not defined]x3 Y Y

What am I missing?

~~~
XaspR8d
Vertical isn't ASCII either:

    
    
      3c  23  40  57  2b  10  74  2f
    
      <   #   @   W   +   DLE t   /
    

I think it's nothing, pointing out we shouldn't be wasting our time figuring
out useless poster puzzles that have little value to our work?

------
Thieum22
When I see those, I always remember the quote from Peopleware - DeMarco /
Lister :

"These motivational accessories, as they are called (including slogan coffee
mugs, plaques, pins, key chains, and awards), are a triumph of form over
substance. They seem to extol the importance of Quality, Leadership,
Creativity, Teamwork, Loyalty, and a host of other organizational virtues. But
they do so in such simplistic terms as to send an entirely different message:
Management here believes that these virtues can be improved with posters
rather than by hard work and managerial talent. Everyone quickly understands
that the presence of the posters is a sure sign of the absence of hard work
and talent."

~~~
swalberg
My first thought was of the more cynical
<http://www.despair.com/motivation.html>

Motivation: If a pretty poster and a cute saying are all it takes to motivate
you, you probably have a very easy job. The kind robots will be doing soon.

~~~
rjknight
I clicked in to this thread purely to post a despair.com link. You beat me to
it, and you also posted the most appropriate link!

------
dickbasedregex
I think the comments thus far have been a little harsher than is necessary.
Sure, some of them are a bit cliched but that's fine. None of them seem as
tacky as the traditional corporate motivational posters. Perhaps if I worked
anywhere near the valley I might be more critical but given that I work in a
city that is as far removed from start up culture as possible, I'm probably
not as jaded (for lack of a better word) as most HN users.

I purchased one of these posters because the quote addresses one of my biggest
repeated failings and the author, Jason Fried, is someone I have a lot of
respect for. I wouldn't mind an attractive reminder to avoid my perfectionist,
obsessive nature hanging over my desk.

Kudos on the site design and the idea. Best of luck to you. My only quibble is
that the site name could be a bit more subdued on some of those posters.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Agreed. These are more like a koan or kata. They help focus the mind in
moments of distraction. Maybe like a haiku - simple words to stimulate a
beautiful response in the mind.

------
josscrowcroft
To be perfectly honest I'd be pretty offended if a place where I was working
put these on the walls.. The Holstee Manifesto
([http://shop.holstee.com/?campaignid=446&mbsy=7pD](http://shop.holstee.com/?campaignid=446&mbsy=7pD))
I understand, because it's great. But these are just trite and tacky, form
over function kind of stuff.

I reckon I'd be far more inspired by, you know, pictures of the team. Or
lolcats.

~~~
ramayac
Or some Dilbert giant comics poster.

------
FuzzyDunlop
I think your company should form its own culture, not try to synthesise one by
propping up posters of vacuous bullshit that basically tries to tell you how
to do your job.

~~~
famousactress
I think I agree.. but your own culture can be useful in this form. I dig the
"Go fast and break things" posters hanging around the facebook office (dunno
if they're still there). It makes sense to me that if your team finds some
core values it might be good to commit them to paper and toss them up and a
way to remind everyone, especially new folks that it's a hard-won tenant the
team believes in.

But I think the idea of importing those values in the form of posters picked
off of a website somewhere makes it easy to skip the important part of doing
the hard work to figure out what your team collectively believes in.

------
Zigurd
I can picture the scene:

CEO seated at fusty mahogany desk says "Eagles, jet fighters, and crew shells
aren't selling to these 'millenials.' Hire some hipster models and get some
'edgy' copy!"

------
Strshps1MoreTim
Do not buy. These are from the evil LeadLander guys:
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4891637>

~~~
monochromatic
Ok... is there any evidence of that, or are we just going with bald assertion?

edit: Nevermind. Their website says they're part of Draugiem Group, which does
seem to own Relead.

------
antidoh
CONSUME

MARRY AND REPRODUCE

OBEY

~~~
stcredzero
<http://maggotfilms.com/2010/12/08/they-live/>

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/They_Live>

------
three14
Anyone but me read "Experiment. Fail. Learn. Repeat." as "... Repeat failed
experiment, even while knowing better?"

------
malaporte
So I'm going to buy a "Don't compromise" and put it right in front of a "Done
is better than perfect".

~~~
damienkatz
Yeah, that's why motivational posters are usually a dumb idea. The words are
almost always true, but very context dependent. Stuck on a wall like that they
lose context and start to seem absurd, things start to feel like a Dilbert
cartoon.

------
jt2190
I suppose it's possible that these posters can motivate a team, but only if
everyone on the team knows and understands, on a deep level, what the slogans
stand for. Unfortunately, it's very tempting to skip the part where you have a
set of long, hard, emotionally draining conversations with the team, where the
team puts measurements in place that help them see when they're not holding to
their stated goals, where they get frustrated but keep trying to improve
things anyway. Why go through all of that when you can just put up a poster!

(edit: My point is that these posters seem like they should be earned, not
just purchased.)

------
MrAlmostWrong
I think what's getting people upset is that they are called 'motivating'
posters. I would hang these up in my office for two reason:

1) They look nice and nothing wrong with having a nice looking off space. 2)
They serve as reminders. Sure we all 'know' these sayings and try to apply
them in everything that we do, but that doesn't mean we forget sometimes and
stray off the beaten path. Just like saying we could all have someone tell us
"do unto others..." every once in a while.

------
abcd_f
I just had a torn out page from a magazine with Audi RS4 on it framed and hung
on the wall at the eye level. As dumb as it was, it did miracles during the
crunch times.

------
pastylegs
This sort of stuff makes me cringe

------
JoeAltmaier
[http://dd.dynamicdiagrams.com/2009/03/visualization-a-la-
dil...](http://dd.dynamicdiagrams.com/2009/03/visualization-a-la-dilbert/)

------
MiguelHudnandez
Can you make one that says "Is this good for the company?"

~~~
rmoriz
try the Office Space kit by thinkgeek:
<http://www.thinkgeek.com/product/8e6c/>

------
wwkeyboard
Houston, we've jumped the shark.

------
famousactress
I like some of these, but for some reason they all remind me of the Portal 2
propaganda and I hear them in my head read in the Cave Johnson voice.

------
stcredzero
All you need are the regular motivational posters with an additional caption:
Do you want to work somewhere management thinks this is a good idea?

------
anotherevan
Oh wow! New product idea! Print these 'motivational' posters on toilet paper!
Now all I need is a technical co-founder...

------
rjknight
There are 14 posters here, but the five I can see above the "fold" on my
1440-pixel high monitor are definitely the worst five. The last five posters
are awesome because they say something that it's possible to disagree with,
and is therefore worth saying. The top five are trite and cheesy.

------
grantph
Except it's wrong. It should be... Experiment. Learn. Repeat.

There's too much emphasis on failure. If you keep focusing on failure, you
keep thinking about failure. I prefer to think of learning experiences. Learn.
Learn. Learn. Eventually you find a combination that works!

------
ansgri
They all are but the different formulations of ARBEIT MACHT FREI.

------
tferris
As nice as they are these posters won't motivate anybody.

I best advice I got years ago (from HN): burn the boats, put pressure on
yourself and you don't need motivational poster anymore.

------
fudged71
I love the designs, and I think it's a great way to make money. Wish I'd
thought of it first :) I can see companies paying a bit more to motivate their
employees.

------
Typhon
If I ever found a company, the only posters on the office walls will have a
white background and black letters, for example the word "OBEY".

The dresscode will be sunglasses.

~~~
biscarch
You could probably have Shepard Fairey do that. heh. Of course, you'd have to
be ok with Andre staring you in the face all day.

------
zeynalov
26$ + 50$ + 20$ (or something like that) shipping, 96$, isn't it too much for
a framed print? I would like to buy one but it looks expensive to me.

------
bjxrn
I think they missed a good one by Samuet Beckett: Ever Tried. Ever Failed. No
Matter. Try Again. Fail Again. Fail Better.

------
kyberias
But... that's Visual Studio's logo right there.

~~~
abcd_f
... which in itself represents an infinite VS crash-restart cycle that ensues
if you ever to mess with a project resource file by hand :)

------
derwildemomo
Just ordered some. Let's hope that international delivery doesn't take weeks.

~~~
creativityhurts
I bet it would take at least 2 weeks so find alternative ways to stay
motivated.

------
milang
I liked this idea better when it was called Busy Building Things.

------
overworkedasian
these are kinda pricey for what they are. fab.com has awesome prints likes
these on sale every now and then for half the price and now free shipping.
just saying.

------
danielweber
Every one of those made me feel depressed.

------
johnnyjustice
sweet idea, i hope it catches on

