"Clean Code" is killing (pre-revenue) startups

> Every hour you spend polishing your CI/CD pipeline or refactoring a component is an hour your users don’t see value.

The "value-add" perspective is really important for the technology people to accept at some point. This was the core lesson I got out of semiconductor manufacturing. You can evade the realities of the business for a period of time, but the bullshit bubble will always pop. It doesn't matter how many layers of management are between you and the customer. The shockwave will reach you eventually.

At the end of the day, much of the suffering in a tech startup boils down to ego trips overpowering any sense of boring business rationale. Being a technical co-founder does not excuse you from caring about the non-technical aspects of the business. Often, you need to care even more than the CEO about things that they are otherwise responsible for. Done right, you will probably find you don't have as much time or desire to play around with shiny new technology on the clock.

I know it sounds crazy, but giving the customer what they actually need can be far more rewarding than rewriting that LOB application for the 5th time. In a startup, every technology person should be working directly with the customer. F100 org charts aren't much different, but it's easy to trick yourself into thinking you have no power in a place that big.