Great post, as always Benn. To your point - "It is a reminder that there are no rules". Steve Jobs has also been quoted as saying "....we hire smart people so they can tell us what to do". So maybe we are reading too much into the Apple retreats or trying to build a formula where none can exist!
Thanks, and yeah, I feel like half this conversation has been examples and then counterexamples and then counterexamples to those counterexamples, and we're probably just going to do that forever.
The whole thing about "Founder Mode" makes me almost infinitely weary. The problem with Founder Mode at scale in an organisation is it's all well and good to have a "decider" founder who is in the weeds and decides a bunch of stuff for themselves, but that they teach these behaviors to the people who work for them, who in turn do the same for their reports, and so on. And so you get a whole bunch of managers who think it's cool to throw their weight around and not take advice from their team, and treat their peers as competition rather than colleagues. Sound familiar? :-)
I was talking with someone else about it recently, and it seems close to a decent idea to me, if it wasn't framed as "founders are always right." I do think there's something to "make a decision and move on." And it's *almost* that. But that sort of thing isn't exclusive to founders, nor does it require some exec to come in and steamroll everyone.
> Either explicitly or through the blinders we put on ourselves, we develop fences for ourselves—our shoulds and shouldn’ts, our cans and won’ts; the identities that are us, and the ones that we can’t pull off.
Love this line. We're primates in cages with the doors unlocked but having seen the bars for so long is the fear that prevents us from stepping out.
This was one of the things that really struck me out that NBA book I talked about a while back. Countries where basketball is popular produce way more NBA players than places where it isn't, which 1) makes sense, but 2) really says a lot about how we basically look to do the things that are available to us. If people who are potential matches for the NBA can't find there way there - it's very obvious who is a tall athletic man! - what hope do the rest of us have, when our skills and stuff are way less apparent?
I think the number one problem here is thinking you are getting away with it when you aren't. I can't tell you the number of times I have heard, 'Well, Steve Jobs did this' or 'Elon Musk does this...' And of course, these conversations are typically excusing vices - that weren't things that made these or other successful founders successful. They were successful in spite of the behavior and would probably EVEN admit their behavior was far from ideal.
I think it's natural to see common characteristics between founders and decide that the characteristic (for example, at least a little narcissism) was part of the reason for their success.
But I think we also have to consider that their positive characteristics - let's say insane confidence - might just commonly ride along with their negative ones (narcissism). The 'getting away with it' part is when the positives outweigh the negatives for a large enough group of people to do something great together - for a long enough period of time to make an impact.
Finally - you won't find all of the good with none of the bad. I can't find the exact quote, but I remember reading something along the lines of 'Fathers want their sons to have all of their virtues and none of their vices.' I think the same is true with founders - the good comes with the bad, and you have to decide what you're willing to deal with personally.
Yeah, I very much agree with the first part. This was part of that post about Away and Steph Korey that didn't make it into the original:
---
The problem, however, is that Korey's treatment of her employees is, generously, an effect of that devotion, not a cause. Her passion for "getting more out of every trip"—Away’s mission—is ostensibly both the essential ingredient for building a successful luggage company and what drove her to lash out at her employees when Away’s bags didn’t deliver on that promise. That passion is an invisible confounding variable, causing both Away's success and the Jobsian outbursts we can observe.
Those who excuse this behavior often point to tech icons who acted similarly—Steve Jobs and Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos and Larry Ellison and Andy Grove and Travis Kalanick were all notoriously demanding. But to assume that's what made them good—or worse, to mimic it, like Theranos’ Elizabeth Holmes—is like trying to be a better tennis player by copying John McEnroe’s tantrums. These leaders were generational talents who likely succeeded despite their tempers, not because of it. For every Steve Jobs, there are thousands of us with less talent whose tempers don’t make us great leaders—they just make us cruel.
" It may well be that we spectators, who are not divinely gifted as athletes, are the only ones able truly to see, articulate, and animate the experience of the gift we are denied. And that those who receive and act out the gift of athletic genius must, perforce, be blind and dumb about it — and not because blindness and dumbness are the price of the gift, but because they are its essence.” I would say this can be often true but not necessarily exclusively true... in that I also believe there is a path for some that become founders who decide to practice things counter to their nature over many years to be "better version of themselves" and therefore can be aware of the shortcomings and improve on them. But I also don't think this is common.
Yeah, I think that's true in two respects: That there are smaller or specific skills that are very much intentionally refined in both sports and at work; and that non-sports fields are probably more trainable than sports fields. But, I do think there's something very real to point that you can't take some of those "negative" things out of people who have the positive stuff. Great artists aren't gonna be stable people, because stable people don't make great art.
A great post Ben. Following one of the ideas you presented, I'd like to recommend the readers the book "The hard things about hard things". I loved it because it didn't attempt to create a recipe for someone, like "do these things and everything will be fine". Instead, it says "in this messed up situation, this worked for me and this didn't. Go figure yourself what to do".
I find it so odd how many people crave for external advice that tells them exactly what (not) to do, instead of asking for feedback and to be challenged...
Thanks! And I agree, I think that book's better than most, at least insofar as it feels more real. Most books like that feel like they're trying to make everything fit into some Grand Framework, and that one doesn't try to do that nearly as much.
Great post, as always Benn. To your point - "It is a reminder that there are no rules". Steve Jobs has also been quoted as saying "....we hire smart people so they can tell us what to do". So maybe we are reading too much into the Apple retreats or trying to build a formula where none can exist!
Thanks, and yeah, I feel like half this conversation has been examples and then counterexamples and then counterexamples to those counterexamples, and we're probably just going to do that forever.
The whole thing about "Founder Mode" makes me almost infinitely weary. The problem with Founder Mode at scale in an organisation is it's all well and good to have a "decider" founder who is in the weeds and decides a bunch of stuff for themselves, but that they teach these behaviors to the people who work for them, who in turn do the same for their reports, and so on. And so you get a whole bunch of managers who think it's cool to throw their weight around and not take advice from their team, and treat their peers as competition rather than colleagues. Sound familiar? :-)
I was talking with someone else about it recently, and it seems close to a decent idea to me, if it wasn't framed as "founders are always right." I do think there's something to "make a decision and move on." And it's *almost* that. But that sort of thing isn't exclusive to founders, nor does it require some exec to come in and steamroll everyone.
> Either explicitly or through the blinders we put on ourselves, we develop fences for ourselves—our shoulds and shouldn’ts, our cans and won’ts; the identities that are us, and the ones that we can’t pull off.
Love this line. We're primates in cages with the doors unlocked but having seen the bars for so long is the fear that prevents us from stepping out.
This was one of the things that really struck me out that NBA book I talked about a while back. Countries where basketball is popular produce way more NBA players than places where it isn't, which 1) makes sense, but 2) really says a lot about how we basically look to do the things that are available to us. If people who are potential matches for the NBA can't find there way there - it's very obvious who is a tall athletic man! - what hope do the rest of us have, when our skills and stuff are way less apparent?
Your writing is so good it makes me angry
Thank David, I appreciate that (but also, don't be, I am very bad at many other things).
I think the number one problem here is thinking you are getting away with it when you aren't. I can't tell you the number of times I have heard, 'Well, Steve Jobs did this' or 'Elon Musk does this...' And of course, these conversations are typically excusing vices - that weren't things that made these or other successful founders successful. They were successful in spite of the behavior and would probably EVEN admit their behavior was far from ideal.
I think it's natural to see common characteristics between founders and decide that the characteristic (for example, at least a little narcissism) was part of the reason for their success.
But I think we also have to consider that their positive characteristics - let's say insane confidence - might just commonly ride along with their negative ones (narcissism). The 'getting away with it' part is when the positives outweigh the negatives for a large enough group of people to do something great together - for a long enough period of time to make an impact.
Finally - you won't find all of the good with none of the bad. I can't find the exact quote, but I remember reading something along the lines of 'Fathers want their sons to have all of their virtues and none of their vices.' I think the same is true with founders - the good comes with the bad, and you have to decide what you're willing to deal with personally.
Yeah, I very much agree with the first part. This was part of that post about Away and Steph Korey that didn't make it into the original:
---
The problem, however, is that Korey's treatment of her employees is, generously, an effect of that devotion, not a cause. Her passion for "getting more out of every trip"—Away’s mission—is ostensibly both the essential ingredient for building a successful luggage company and what drove her to lash out at her employees when Away’s bags didn’t deliver on that promise. That passion is an invisible confounding variable, causing both Away's success and the Jobsian outbursts we can observe.
Those who excuse this behavior often point to tech icons who acted similarly—Steve Jobs and Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos and Larry Ellison and Andy Grove and Travis Kalanick were all notoriously demanding. But to assume that's what made them good—or worse, to mimic it, like Theranos’ Elizabeth Holmes—is like trying to be a better tennis player by copying John McEnroe’s tantrums. These leaders were generational talents who likely succeeded despite their tempers, not because of it. For every Steve Jobs, there are thousands of us with less talent whose tempers don’t make us great leaders—they just make us cruel.
---
I've maybe softened on that a little bit though around your last point. I won't attempt to summarize it because I'll butcher it, but this essay (one of my favorites) makes a very similar point about sports stars at the end, and I find it very compelling. https://bpb-us-e1.wpmucdn.com/sites.psu.edu/dist/7/59784/files/2016/08/DFW-How-Tracy-Austin-Broke-My-Heart-1994-1lctx91.pdf
" It may well be that we spectators, who are not divinely gifted as athletes, are the only ones able truly to see, articulate, and animate the experience of the gift we are denied. And that those who receive and act out the gift of athletic genius must, perforce, be blind and dumb about it — and not because blindness and dumbness are the price of the gift, but because they are its essence.” I would say this can be often true but not necessarily exclusively true... in that I also believe there is a path for some that become founders who decide to practice things counter to their nature over many years to be "better version of themselves" and therefore can be aware of the shortcomings and improve on them. But I also don't think this is common.
Yeah, I think that's true in two respects: That there are smaller or specific skills that are very much intentionally refined in both sports and at work; and that non-sports fields are probably more trainable than sports fields. But, I do think there's something very real to point that you can't take some of those "negative" things out of people who have the positive stuff. Great artists aren't gonna be stable people, because stable people don't make great art.
Yup. Disruptive startups run by conformist people… doesn’t work.
A great post Ben. Following one of the ideas you presented, I'd like to recommend the readers the book "The hard things about hard things". I loved it because it didn't attempt to create a recipe for someone, like "do these things and everything will be fine". Instead, it says "in this messed up situation, this worked for me and this didn't. Go figure yourself what to do".
I find it so odd how many people crave for external advice that tells them exactly what (not) to do, instead of asking for feedback and to be challenged...
Thanks! And I agree, I think that book's better than most, at least insofar as it feels more real. Most books like that feel like they're trying to make everything fit into some Grand Framework, and that one doesn't try to do that nearly as much.
This is the first good piece I’ve seen about the concept. Well done.
Thanks, and glad to hear it! (but also, given how most of this conversation has gone, that's a low bar)
Loved it, as always! Great take on founder mode.
Thanks! And hope you've been doing well!