Hacker News Reader

Comment by lvl102 | Hacker News Reader

Does Tobi even work these days? Sometimes I think he prioritizes playing video games over running a multibillion dollar company. It’s frustrating because Shopify could have been much bigger as a result of the pandemic if they had someone with a bit more ambition.

View on HN

This seems odd to me, given that he looks (from the outside at least) to be one of the most ambitious CEO's around. E.g. Building a fulfilment network to compete with Amazon.

From the inside, he has an ego like Elon and focus like Dorsey. Several of his executives are very good at managing him, but he lives in and broadcasts from a white void detached from reality.

Can I ask what your source for this is? Perhaps you're an ex-employee?

I never worked under Tobi directly (or even close), but I was almost always thoroughly impressed with his communication and direction. I think I have a totally different take than the one you stated. The only axis I could see Elon & Tobi both sitting on is being members of the tres comas club.

Externally he has a personal writer whose whole job it is to make him seem smart. He's the darling of the Canadian tech industry, which badly needed a win since the implosion of Nortel, so he has a ton of advantages. In SV he would be a mediocre wannabe founder but in Ottawa he's hot shit.

That seems disingenuous at best—the man helped create Ruby on Rails & founded a mutli-billion dollar tech startup that has been wildly successful. Is there really any ground to question his intelligence, or rather, whether or not he's smart?

Tobi still actively works on project within Shopify.

I've worked on projects within the last year that had (pretty heavy) direct involvement from Tobi.

Tobi is cool as fuck.

Your experience reminds me of the saying, sometimes "the best people to work WITH are the worst people to work FOR".

This reminds me of SNL's Undercover Boss Starkiller Base ~ Kylo Ren

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FaOSCASqLsE

Kylo Ren as Matt: "He said Kylo Ren has an 8-pack. That Kylo Ren is shredded."

Are you saying this based on speculation, or based on having worked with or for him at Shopify?

Not OP, but I worked for Tobi when I was at Shopify. He is indeed cool as fuck.

Paging @xal

Reply on news.ycombinator.com