The Soul of Startups

CHAPTER 2The Type A

The experiences I'm sharing here are memories I sometimes wish I could erase. But there's no denying that they have shaped me into the person I am today. It's what I'm known for, both the good and the bad.

You may have seen headlines like the following;

Applet Becomes the Youngest Startup to Enter the Unicorn Club in 18 Months!

Or

Pics Becomes a Unicorn After a Rocky Slow Start

Or

UK Startup Becomes Renewal Energy Giant After Closing Funding with Top Tier VCs

When the media describes the success of a startup, they rarely discuss the sacrifice employees had to make to reach the point of victory. Why? Because that's not what sells newspapers. Plus, nobody wants to get into libel suits, especially when the limelight is already on them.

Many people have asked me what it was like working for such an exciting rising startup. Back in the day, I would reply like a broken record, “It is a great company! We're still young, but we're very ambitious, and the most important part, we hire super‐smart people. We've had a lot of fun building this together.”

If you have followed the recent hiring trends sufficiently, you've likely seen journalists discuss the lack of diversity in companies. This absence of diversification is especially evident in tech startups where the industry already suffers from a scarcity of suitable candidates.

A lack of diversity can unintentionally create unsafe and toxic working environments, which subsequently contribute regularly to high turnover. ...