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Comment by shamdasani | Hacker News Reader

The desire for more often blinds us. We all are looking for more wealth, and perhaps working for a startup like this will get us there. However, I personally think that talent is priceless. You can't just throw money for top skill.

In field like startups, you have to passionate on what you're working on to make it the best it can be. Sure, say I have "top talent". But, what we fail to realize that "top talent" may not translate into more revenue or users. I must be willing to work the extra hours and focus my mind one hundred percent of the time to utilize this talent.

And, honestly, I do not think even money would motivate me to work to such a degree if I'm working on something I don't believe in.

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Does anyone actually believe in adtech? Are people truly passionate about social media monetization?

Most signaling about passion is transparent bullshit. For a first pass: do the people you hire apply exclusively to you and your competitors? No? Then they aren't passionate about your company's mission. At least, not any more passionate than the they are about the missions of the other companies they would have worked for instead.

Motivation and performance will be driven by autonomy, quality, work environment, peers, growth opportunities, technical interestingness, choice of tools, etc. way more than what the company actually does. And how many software engineers actually work on their company's core line of business, anyway? Some of the most interesting work is at systems level. The scheduler doesn't care all that much whether its processes are doing video transcoding, HFT, or protein folding.

We're professionals, and that's okay.

Good points.

I recall a compelling RSA animate video about motivation and job satisfaction, which distilled their factors down to just three: mastery, autonomy, and purpose.

Yes, that's a really nice video. Here is the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6XAPnuFjJc (Unfortunately, the highest resolution supported is 240p. Anyone has a link to a higher resolution video?)

On an individual level, a few million in the bank funds a lot of personal passion projects.

And I'm passionate about what I'm working on. I'm passionate about my craft. I'm passionate about investing in my team and their tech stack. To some degree, the employment agreement and the salary is pointing my drive in a direction. I don't shut it off, I just move it.

It's true that all that doesn't necessarily translate to more revenue or users. But that's also true, at least in the long run, of anything a firm might invest in, including top compensation packages for sales or management. Or expensive exclusives with vendors or clients. If the competitive advantage of a firm is its tech, then investing in that tech and recruiting and retaining top talent is a bet on a particular business plan.

> I do not think even money would motivate me to work to such a degree if I'm working on something I don't believe in.

Of course not. Ad absurdum, I wouldn't work for a drug cartel moving poison. I don't think that's a controversial position.

Or are there something inherently unethical or soul-sucking about working for a large compensation package?

> you have to passionate on what you're working on to make it the best it can be

You need to be passionate about being a professional who only delivers the best they can.

You don't need any passion for the particular domain or project per se.

Who in their right mind can be passionate about "schlep" anyway?

> You can't just throw money for top skill.

There comes a point when you're offered so much money that you're not motivated by the thing that you're doing but rather by the performance bonus you're trying to earn, or by the amount you're going to increase the share price by.

Does that lead to the same outcome as having a very passionate person instead? Maybe, maybe not, but if you're peddling advertising you probably haven't got much else to offer people other than money.

true that. Top talent engineers make their companies >20X in profit, no amount of "money" could make someone do this work. They just love it.

> talent is priceless

Only when you are shopping for hallmark cards.

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