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Comment by kevindeasis | Hacker News Reader

Would you guys agree that Jack Dorsey is a good CEO? And one of his roles as a CEO is to be able to motivate the employees towards the mission and vision of the company? And one would also be able to delegate tasks accordingly?

Also, would you guys agree that working hard for more than 16 hours a day for an extended period of time (months) is not really productive? Even more, I'd even say unhealthy and almost unrealistic (Yes, there are special cases).

I am predicting that Jack Dorsey spends less effort on most tasks and his most cognitive demanding task is about making tough critical decisions. Would you guys agree on this?

Now, why is it that some writers like to make CEOs look like gods? I wish there was a platform where you can rate writers based on their work. I'm pretty sure making them look like gods is very unhealthy for the community. Like doesn't these kind of articles piss you off?

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> Would you guys agree that Jack Dorsey is a good CEO?

No, from what I've heard, Square isn't a particularly nice place to work - with very poor work-life balances throughout the company, and Dorsey micro-manages every little detail of design and product.

Twitter, on the other hand doesn't appear to be doing particularly well, as evidenced by the current share price, and the large amount of criticism from the tech community targeted at them.

Not that I have an opinion on Twitter, but

> and the large amount of criticism from the tech community

has never been a particularly good oracle (Apple and Microsoft are two prominent examples).

Apple was lauded for years by the tech world for many reasons: dominance in audio/video/image production, the switch to a bsd based os, their dev kits, etc...

Microsoft has suffered greatly from the tech world's hatred. And, one has to wonder how different the mobile world would be if MS had built a better/more open community around their brand.

The techies, developers, etc... are the early adopters. They are the ones that are needed to keep your products fresh and relevant. Once they leave, the company is left with the unwashed masses and the platform stagnates (e.g. Microsoft).

"Now, why is it that some writers like to make CEOs look like gods? I wish there was a platform where you can rate writers based on their work. I'm pretty sure making them look like gods is very unhealthy for the community. Like doesn't these kind of articles piss you off?"

Why is this a bad thing? Becoming one like Dorsey or a CEO of huge company or simply a successful founder requires a certain mindset. A "growth" mindset at least, where you want to spend more hours for your passion (in this case business) than watching netfix. I think this mindset is pretty good. Working 18 hours a day doing your passion (And this is passion and not "work" for Dorsey or Musk) is much better than wasting your time away.

So there is nothing wrong with articles like this, showing only a normal day of people who like doing what they do.

It's the Wall Street Journal, it is essentially articles written for CEOs and their staff; what do you expect?

As of 2013, the WSJ had a print circulation of 2.4 million, and 900,000 digital subscribers. Do you seriously think all of those people are CEOs and staff?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wall_Street_Journal

CEOs, their staff, and their idolators.

Where "idolators" = millions of people independent of CEOs and their staff.

Google's results for "how many companies are there in the US" bring up a bunch of credible-looking hits putting the number in the multiples of millions.

Put another way, 2.4 million + 900,000 is a bit over one percent of the US population. I've heard the phrase "one percent" before...

WSJ is sold and read worldwide tho.

On that note, I used to get it for free (as did everyone else) as a student at my European university.

I'm not sure what your point is. It's clear that WSJ has a readership in the millions, even if you dispute the precise circulation numbers. And that's what my response to the parent was about. It won't do to suggest that only CEOs and their staff read it.

My point is that the number of companies, and hence the number of CEOs, is also in the millions, even if you restrict just to the US. So it's certainly numerically possible that it's written for CEOs and their staff (and people who want to be CEOs), which is a much larger number.

If that were the case, it would apply to every large-circulation publication, though. So it's a moot point. You could just as easily say the same thing about the NYTimes, the Financial Times, or the Economist.

It doesn't all have to be CEOs and staff -- my point was that the WSJ is targeted towards those readers.

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