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PG is also meeting these founders as a peer. Working in advertising, I've seen a lot of successful people who were perfectly nice to me, but terrors to underli

PG is also meeting these founders as a peer. Working in advertising, I've seen a lot of successful people who were perfectly nice to me, but terrors to underlings and people they felt were unimportant or incompetent (and much of of what was seen as incompetence was often the result of little communication from the top of the bureaucratic ladder). I would never call these people nice, but I'd say they were nice to me. Often how nice someone is depends on where you're standing and how they see you.

PhasmaFelis 12y ago
Indeed. One of the wisest pithy quotes I've ever read is from Dave Barry: "A person who is nice to you, but rude to the waiter, is not a nice person." If someone is nice to people when it's advantageous to them, all that means is that they're not an idiot. You can learn a lot about someone's character by how they treat people they don't have to be nice to.
- devonkim 12y ago
  The most accurate summation of one's behavior is to see what happens when they believe they are not being watched. Asking the children of these startup founders would offer a different perspective, surely. There's hundreds and thousands of stories of famous people that behaved completely different at home than their public and professional images would suggest. In fact, sociopaths typically doing well in business very much helps explain the motivating factors for why people can be regarded so well professionally but hated by their families. But even at home we are probably different than how we are professionally anyway regardless of personality and I'm even different from employer to employer and for the purpose of the thread, that's really all that matters, doesn't it? Just talking to people at a party or a business dinner is not enough to get any semblance of character judgment aside from some pretty stylistic ones (small cues that say more about preferences than worldview, for example). Even playing golf together can hide monstrous raging alcoholics and serial killers from us all because these people have developed almost split personalities after decades of manipulating people. It's not necessarily conscious either but almost a personality trait like being really energetic, quiet, paying attention to detail obsessively, etc. I say all this as the son of someone that's got the cult leader personality type and how he works has framed how I absolutely refuse to work. Some might argue I'm doing better but I don't think so in terms of the original article context at all. It should also be noted that pg's sample is somewhat biased against Fortune 500 companies and dysfunctional yet still-in-business organizations that employee so many but repel those like pg and perhaps those he knows as well. Furthermore, the kind off folks that are attracted to in dysfunctional orgs are similar to men that prey upon insecure women. There's similar equivalents for business folks too. So, in short I think pg has been blessed to still have this optimistic view of any flavor of meritocracy. It's nice to be able to turn away from companies where failure is constant, rampant, and extensively rewarded to these kinds of people that don't do well as leaders in start-ups and even finance. I used to hold his view but after my career I regard it as an idealistic notion.
georgemcbay 12y ago
"PG is also meeting these founders as a peer." This is what kills the whole idea the article is based on for me. Given his position in the "startup world" pg is like an extremely physically attractive female who thinks all the men around her are super nice. Maybe they are, maybe they aren't, but either way their interactions with you (and those closest to you) are probably not an accurate measure of that. What defines whether someone is mean or not to me is how they treat people who they don't want anything from, which (soft retirement aside) is a position pg will never be in with regards to startup founders.
philwelch 12y ago
He's also not relying on his own judgment of people's character: "My wife and Y Combinator cofounder Jessica is one of those rare people who have x-ray vision for character. Being married to her is like standing next to an airport baggage scanner. She came to the startup world from investment banking, she has always been struck both by how consistently successful startup founders turn out to be good people, and how consistently bad people fail as startup founders." So he's not judging the character of these founders based upon how nice they are to him, but based on Jessica's purported "x-ray vision" for character, which presumably can't be easily fooled by the usual deference seen in the founder/investor relationship. I don't know. But I think the evidence he has access to is a lot greater in extent than the evidence you or I have access to.
- modfodder 12y ago
  That may be, but his opinion of his wife's "ability" isn't exactly unbiased. And if she came to the startup world from investment banking, she was also meeting the founders as either a peer or as someone who is beneficial to the founders access to money. Of course the "nobles" would be polite to each other, the question is how they treat the under classes. And I'm sure he has access to vast more amounts of evidence about founders than I do, but that doesn't mean he knows how to correctly analyze the evidence or won't look at the evidence with partisan eyes. This country is still filled with climate change deniers, even ones that are intelligent in most other parts of their lives. Just look at history to see how wrong PG is about mean people failing. Zuckerberg by many accounts did not treat his partners fairly, that was mean of him. Gates tried to screw over Paul Allen numerous times, not a nice guy. Steve Jobs denied the paternity of his first born (one example of many negative Jobs' stories), what a lovely fella. Both Uber and Snapchat are prime examples of companies being led by less than noble morality and Github epitomized how to do it right, until they were an example of sexual harassment. Is any of this enough for PG to categorize these founders as mean? If not, how many acts of meanness make someone mean (and vice versa, how many acts of kindness makes someone kind)? Paul Graham is a very intelligent man and by all rights, seemed to have earned his success and reputation. But if PG was always right, especially since he has all this evidence about SV and startups, there wouldn't be any failed YC companies, they'd all be IPOs and massive exits. PG is not infallible. PG does make some good points, I really like the last paragraph. "So I'm really glad I stopped to think about this. Jessica and I have always worked hard to teach our kids not to be mean. We tolerate noise and mess and junk food, but not meanness. And now I have both an additional reason to crack down on it, and an additional argument to use when I do: that being mean makes you fail." I've seen a lot of mean people succeed, but that is a great lesson to teach, even if it is a bit faulty. Maybe if we all teach our children this, one day it would actually become true.

PhasmaFelis 12y ago

Indeed. One of the wisest pithy quotes I've ever read is from Dave Barry: "A person who is nice to you, but rude to the waiter, is not a nice person." If someone is nice to people when it's advantageous to them, all that means is that they're not an idiot. You can learn a lot about someone's character by how they treat people they don't have to be nice to.

devonkim 12y ago
The most accurate summation of one's behavior is to see what happens when they believe they are not being watched. Asking the children of these startup founders would offer a different perspective, surely. There's hundreds and thousands of stories of famous people that behaved completely different at home than their public and professional images would suggest. In fact, sociopaths typically doing well in business very much helps explain the motivating factors for why people can be regarded so well professionally but hated by their families. But even at home we are probably different than how we are professionally anyway regardless of personality and I'm even different from employer to employer and for the purpose of the thread, that's really all that matters, doesn't it? Just talking to people at a party or a business dinner is not enough to get any semblance of character judgment aside from some pretty stylistic ones (small cues that say more about preferences than worldview, for example). Even playing golf together can hide monstrous raging alcoholics and serial killers from us all because these people have developed almost split personalities after decades of manipulating people. It's not necessarily conscious either but almost a personality trait like being really energetic, quiet, paying attention to detail obsessively, etc. I say all this as the son of someone that's got the cult leader personality type and how he works has framed how I absolutely refuse to work. Some might argue I'm doing better but I don't think so in terms of the original article context at all. It should also be noted that pg's sample is somewhat biased against Fortune 500 companies and dysfunctional yet still-in-business organizations that employee so many but repel those like pg and perhaps those he knows as well. Furthermore, the kind off folks that are attracted to in dysfunctional orgs are similar to men that prey upon insecure women. There's similar equivalents for business folks too. So, in short I think pg has been blessed to still have this optimistic view of any flavor of meritocracy. It's nice to be able to turn away from companies where failure is constant, rampant, and extensively rewarded to these kinds of people that don't do well as leaders in start-ups and even finance. I used to hold his view but after my career I regard it as an idealistic notion.

georgemcbay 12y ago

"PG is also meeting these founders as a peer." This is what kills the whole idea the article is based on for me. Given his position in the "startup world" pg is like an extremely physically attractive female who thinks all the men around her are super nice. Maybe they are, maybe they aren't, but either way their interactions with you (and those closest to you) are probably not an accurate measure of that. What defines whether someone is mean or not to me is how they treat people who they don't want anything from, which (soft retirement aside) is a position pg will never be in with regards to startup founders.

philwelch 12y ago

He's also not relying on his own judgment of people's character: "My wife and Y Combinator cofounder Jessica is one of those rare people who have x-ray vision for character. Being married to her is like standing next to an airport baggage scanner. She came to the startup world from investment banking, she has always been struck both by how consistently successful startup founders turn out to be good people, and how consistently bad people fail as startup founders." So he's not judging the character of these founders based upon how nice they are to him, but based on Jessica's purported "x-ray vision" for character, which presumably can't be easily fooled by the usual deference seen in the founder/investor relationship. I don't know. But I think the evidence he has access to is a lot greater in extent than the evidence you or I have access to.

modfodder 12y ago
That may be, but his opinion of his wife's "ability" isn't exactly unbiased. And if she came to the startup world from investment banking, she was also meeting the founders as either a peer or as someone who is beneficial to the founders access to money. Of course the "nobles" would be polite to each other, the question is how they treat the under classes. And I'm sure he has access to vast more amounts of evidence about founders than I do, but that doesn't mean he knows how to correctly analyze the evidence or won't look at the evidence with partisan eyes. This country is still filled with climate change deniers, even ones that are intelligent in most other parts of their lives. Just look at history to see how wrong PG is about mean people failing. Zuckerberg by many accounts did not treat his partners fairly, that was mean of him. Gates tried to screw over Paul Allen numerous times, not a nice guy. Steve Jobs denied the paternity of his first born (one example of many negative Jobs' stories), what a lovely fella. Both Uber and Snapchat are prime examples of companies being led by less than noble morality and Github epitomized how to do it right, until they were an example of sexual harassment. Is any of this enough for PG to categorize these founders as mean? If not, how many acts of meanness make someone mean (and vice versa, how many acts of kindness makes someone kind)? Paul Graham is a very intelligent man and by all rights, seemed to have earned his success and reputation. But if PG was always right, especially since he has all this evidence about SV and startups, there wouldn't be any failed YC companies, they'd all be IPOs and massive exits. PG is not infallible. PG does make some good points, I really like the last paragraph. "So I'm really glad I stopped to think about this. Jessica and I have always worked hard to teach our kids not to be mean. We tolerate noise and mess and junk food, but not meanness. And now I have both an additional reason to crack down on it, and an additional argument to use when I do: that being mean makes you fail." I've seen a lot of mean people succeed, but that is a great lesson to teach, even if it is a bit faulty. Maybe if we all teach our children this, one day it would actually become true.