Seth Godin says that we should worry about coincidence .
Which is exactly what happened to me. Almost as a continuation of my previous post about the differing risk tolerances of startups and large companies - and a related post by my friend Jason Drohn at JDs blog, that carried the ball forward (thanks, Jason!) - I happened to read this short essay "Learning from Founders " by the inimitable Paul Graham [well, anyone who is a regular reader of Paul's will agree that it is short by his standards]. Written as a foreword to Jessica Livingston's book "Founders at Work", Paul gives us, in his classic "no-bullshit" style, an under-the-covers look at how work really gets done in a small startup. Here's a brief snippet of the essay:
In fact, programming didn't get done by well-dressed people at clean desks during office hours. It got done by badly dressed people (I was notorious for programmming wearing just a towel) in offices strewn with junk at 2 in the morning. But no visitor would understand that. Not even investors, who are supposed to be able to recognize real productivity when they see it.
I highly recommend reading this piece - like all Paul Graham essays, this one is deceptively simple to read and yet offers some deep insights into the world of programming and startups. As for the book, I haven't read it yet - if someone has, I would love to get your opinion in the comments!
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