How to Spot a Terrorist in Your Startup

1. 0:00 – 0:26

   Defining “terrorists” in startups: not difficult people, but value-destroyers

   1. DCDalton Caldwell0:00

      We're not talking about the, like, don't have difficult people-

   2. MSMichael Seibel0:03

      Yeah

   3. DCDalton Caldwell0:03

      ... or don't-

   4. MSMichael Seibel0:04

      No, no, no, no.

   5. DCDalton Caldwell0:04

      We're describing folks that effectively hijack everything.

   6. MSMichael Seibel0:09

      [laughs] Yes, yes.

   7. DCDalton Caldwell0:10

      And create no value. [laughs] And like, you know who they are.

   8. MSMichael Seibel0:13

      Yes.

   9. DCDalton Caldwell0:13

      Again, if you're watching this, we're not talking about the people on the line-

   10. MSMichael Seibel0:16

       No

   11. DCDalton Caldwell0:16

       ... where you're not really sure-

   12. MSMichael Seibel0:17

       No

   13. DCDalton Caldwell0:17

       ... and they, but they've done all this really good stuff.

   14. MSMichael Seibel0:19

       We're using the word terrorist for a reason. [laughs]

   15. DCDalton Caldwell0:20

       But this is where you're like, "Oh, wow, this is a whole cloud of problems."

   16. MSMichael Seibel0:25

       Yeah. [laughs]

   17. DCDalton Caldwell0:25

       That is what we're referring to.

2. 0:26 – 2:13

   Origin story: the “terrorist customer” who was bombing the business

   1. MSMichael Seibel0:26

      Yes. Yes. Welcome to Dalton + Michael. Today we're gonna talk about terrorists and startups. [laughs]

   2. DCDalton Caldwell0:39

      [laughs]

   3. MSMichael Seibel0:39

      What the hell am I talking about, Dalton?

   4. DCDalton Caldwell0:41

      Yeah. I mean-

   5. MSMichael Seibel0:42

      [laughs]

   6. DCDalton Caldwell0:42

      ... look, this was always your thing. I remember, uh, over the years hearing this term from you and learning from you-

   7. MSMichael Seibel0:47

      Yes

   8. DCDalton Caldwell0:47

      ... where you would talk about terrorist customers for startups.

   9. MSMichael Seibel0:51

      Yes. Yes.

   10. DCDalton Caldwell0:51

       And so obviously, uh, this is some colorful language we were using.

   11. MSMichael Seibel0:55

       Yeah.

   12. DCDalton Caldwell0:56

       Yeah. Can you just define what you meant when you-

   13. MSMichael Seibel0:58

       It was interesting. I remember talking to a startup, and this startup was trying to help a customer that was almost unhelpable, to the point where the startup would have to do things that would never make them any money, things that would only apply to a tiny percentage of people. And it was almost like the startup was serving the customer out of pity versus out of, like, even, like, accomplishing their mission and goals. And I remember saying to this founder, like, "You can just fire this customer." And I, and I remember this founder had so much kind of emotional tie to this customer, and you know, when you're in office hours, sometimes you have to use kind of, like, aggressive language, right?

   14. DCDalton Caldwell1:38

       [laughs]

   15. MSMichael Seibel1:38

       It's like, how do I, how do I cut this emotional tie? And it's like, this customer is a terrorist. Like, they are actively bombing your startup. [laughs]

   16. DCDalton Caldwell1:47

       [laughs]

   17. MSMichael Seibel1:47

       You have to let them go. And I think that that word kind of, like, flipped something in their head, and they were like, "Oh, yeah, like, this customer is causing my business harm, and that's not... We're supposed to be doing this mutual exchange where we both improve. We're not supposed to be doing this exchange where I die." And so I think that's where it came from, and, and then lo and behold, we have found terrorism in other areas. It's not just terrorist customers.

3. 2:13 – 3:37

   How terrorist customers happen: leverage, hostage dynamics, and roadmap capture

   1. DCDalton Caldwell2:13

      I think in terms of customers, if someone's watching this, they're like, "Well, how do I know if I have a terrorist customer? Like, what are these guys even talking about?" Let's, let's give some of the properties.

   2. MSMichael Seibel2:21

      [laughs]

   3. DCDalton Caldwell2:22

      Um, so I think one is where they're effectively holding you hostage-

   4. MSMichael Seibel2:30

      Yes

   5. DCDalton Caldwell2:31

      ... because they might be such a large customer.

   6. MSMichael Seibel2:33

      Yes.

   7. DCDalton Caldwell2:33

      They might be the only customer. So a common setup for getting a, a terrorist customer is you're a brand-new startup, and you get some nice inbound from a really fancy, great logo.

   8. MSMichael Seibel2:43

      Yes.

   9. DCDalton Caldwell2:43

      And they're willing to pay you lots of money.

   10. MSMichael Seibel2:45

       Yes.

   11. DCDalton Caldwell2:45

       And effectively, the rest of your startup is not going well.

   12. MSMichael Seibel2:47

       Yes.

   13. DCDalton Caldwell2:48

       And so you have this one shiny-

   14. MSMichael Seibel2:49

       Bright spot. Yes

   15. DCDalton Caldwell2:50

       ... bright spot when everything else is going bad, and perhaps that customer understands that they have that leverage over you.

   16. MSMichael Seibel2:57

       Perhaps. [laughs]

   17. DCDalton Caldwell2:58

       And you effectively spend the next duration of your life as a startup founder catering to this customer.

   18. MSMichael Seibel3:06

       Yes.

   19. DCDalton Caldwell3:07

       And this might mean your entire roadmap is dictated by them.

   20. MSMichael Seibel3:12

       Yes.

   21. DCDalton Caldwell3:12

       It might mean you're losing tons of money to service them. It mi-

   22. MSMichael Seibel3:15

       Customer service at the, just craziness. Yeah.

   23. DCDalton Caldwell3:18

       Yeah.

   24. MSMichael Seibel3:18

       Yes.

   25. DCDalton Caldwell3:18

       It basically, they, they dominate-

   26. MSMichael Seibel3:20

       Yes

   27. DCDalton Caldwell3:21

       ... your existence as a startup founder.

   28. MSMichael Seibel3:23

       And this can happen to consumer companies and B2B companies-

   29. DCDalton Caldwell3:26

       [laughs]

   30. MSMichael Seibel3:26

       ... which is interesting. Yeah.
4. 3:37 – 4:27

   Sometimes you hand them leverage: desperation and the illusion of “good revenue”

   1. MSMichael Seibel3:37

      Well, I think what's interesting about this, too, is that, you know, you're framing it as like the customer has leverage over you, which is totally true. But I've also seen it where, like, you give that customer leverage.

   2. DCDalton Caldwell3:48

      Yeah.

   3. MSMichael Seibel3:48

      Like, they're not actually that good of a logo. They're not actually paying you that much. It's just that you're so desperate for anyone to be replying to your emails and getting on the phone with you that, like, you just don't want that to stop. And so you'll-

   4. DCDalton Caldwell4:01

      Totally

   5. MSMichael Seibel4:01

      ... do things that have nothing to do with your company succeeding.

   6. DCDalton Caldwell4:06

      This would come in office hours where people would be surprised how often we would be like, after someone got into YC, "Oh yeah, you should, like, not service that customer anymore."

   7. MSMichael Seibel4:15

      Yeah.

   8. DCDalton Caldwell4:15

      And they're like, "But you're, we're gonna give up all this revenue. What are you talking about?"

   9. MSMichael Seibel4:18

      "You told me to grow, Dalton." [laughs]

   10. DCDalton Caldwell4:19

       I thought... They're shocked. We're like, "Yeah, you don't wanna be in that business anymore."

   11. MSMichael Seibel4:23

       No.

   12. DCDalton Caldwell4:24

       Um, I think that's really surprising to founders sometimes.

5. 4:27 – 5:40

   Terrorist requests: when a decent customer asks for the wrong thing

   1. MSMichael Seibel4:27

      I think it really is, too. I really wish startups could reduce down to just, like, one variable, which is, like, grow revenue. Uh, it just, it's not, not actually true, and the quality of your revenue kind of matters. I think the other thing that's tricky about a terrorist customer is that I'll move this to a s- to kind of like a, let's say the customer is actually okay. They're not in and of themselves a terrorist customer, but they're asking you to do something that you shouldn't do.

   2. DCDalton Caldwell4:56

      Yeah.

   3. MSMichael Seibel4:57

      So let's call that, like, a terrorist request. So a terrorist request could be something like, "Hey, we're asking you to do some project where you're gonna lose a ton of money," right? Or asking you to do some project where it's like, "Oh, like, you did this really great software thing for us over here. Can you, like, I guess you're good at writing software. Can you just, like, write us more software over here, here, here, here?" Or one of them that's actually, like, really tricky is like, "Oh, can you build this feature for us?" Where when you really dig down, you realize that feature will not help the customer, but they're asking you to build it. But, like, you've now spent some time. You understand the customer's business, and you're like, "It will not move the numbers. It will not..." What do you do? What do you do when you have a good customer giving you a terrorist request?

6. 5:40 – 6:17

   Don’t negotiate: hold the line, because ‘yes’ invites more demands

   1. DCDalton Caldwell5:40

      Well, I think you've gotta find a way to say no. Again, this is the, the terminology of terrorist customer is like you don't negotiate with terrorists.

   2. MSMichael Seibel5:46

      No. [laughs]

   3. DCDalton Caldwell5:47

      So, so the, the point, [laughs] uh, the point is you have to find a way to not do it.

   4. MSMichael Seibel5:52

      Yes.

   5. DCDalton Caldwell5:53

      And it's up to the founder to understand the nuance of the relationship.

   6. MSMichael Seibel5:57

      Yes.

   7. DCDalton Caldwell5:57

      So I don't know if I wanna give too general advice on this video of, like, always just- Say no and go away.

   8. MSMichael Seibel6:02

      Yeah.

   9. DCDalton Caldwell6:02

      But you do need to hold your ground and not get involved. Um, because what's, what's funny about these dynamics is once you start saying yes, it's not like they stop with the problems.

   10. MSMichael Seibel6:14

       No.

   11. DCDalton Caldwell6:14

       The problems keep on coming.

   12. MSMichael Seibel6:15

       Yes, and growing.

   13. DCDalton Caldwell6:16

       Yeah.

7. 6:17 – 7:10

   Customers don’t always know what they need: synthesize, don’t follow feature lists

   1. MSMichael Seibel6:17

      One of the mistakes I see a lot of companies make is they don't understand their customer well enough to even know whether they're be giving a terrorist request or not. Their mental model is, customer tells me to do something, they pay me, I do it, we win. Instead of the mental model being, I need to do things that makes that customer's business better, or that makes that customer's life better if it's a consumer. Like, only delivering on those tasks will produce long-term victory. [laughs] Delivering on other things they ask for will not. And I think there's this embedded assumption that we've encountered a ton of times. There's like, the customer knows how to make their business better, right?

   2. DCDalton Caldwell6:57

      [laughs]

   3. MSMichael Seibel6:58

      Right? Like, the consumer knows what they want, right? Like, all I have to do is do what they ask me to do, right? Don't- [laughs]

   4. DCDalton Caldwell7:05

      I, I think-

   5. MSMichael Seibel7:05

      I'm talking to them. They said do this. You told me to talk to them. [laughs] They told me to do this. [laughs]

8. 7:10 – 9:13

   Case studies: Facebook ‘growth as a feature’ and Twitch monetization clues

   1. DCDalton Caldwell7:10

      I think we've talked about this in a video before, but it reminds me of this old thing Mark Zuckerberg talked about once when he came and spoke to the, to the batch.

   2. MSMichael Seibel7:16

      Yeah.

   3. DCDalton Caldwell7:17

      He would argue with his employees because they had talked to their customers and done user research, and there were all these features that the customers wanted them to build for Facebook.

   4. MSMichael Seibel7:26

      Yes.

   5. DCDalton Caldwell7:26

      And that the PMs were like, "Oh, we should build these features."

   6. MSMichael Seibel7:28

      Yes.

   7. DCDalton Caldwell7:29

      And Zuck would shut all that stuff down and say, "The best feature that Facebook had, like early Facebook-

   8. MSMichael Seibel7:36

      Mm-hmm

   9. DCDalton Caldwell7:36

      ... was having all of your friends on it."

   10. MSMichael Seibel7:38

       Mm.

   11. DCDalton Caldwell7:38

       "And actually, growth is a feature, and they're not articulating this to us. We'll, this will never show up in, in-

   12. MSMichael Seibel7:45

       No

   13. DCDalton Caldwell7:45

       ... user research."

   14. MSMichael Seibel7:46

       No.

   15. DCDalton Caldwell7:46

       "But we should be spending all of our cycles on growth of getting everyone onto Facebook-

   16. MSMichael Seibel7:51

       Yes

   17. DCDalton Caldwell7:51

       ... so that all the people are there."

   18. MSMichael Seibel7:52

       Yes.

   19. DCDalton Caldwell7:52

       "And that's actually the number one thing we do to increase satisfaction, as opposed to building a laundry, laundry list of features." How smart is that?

   20. MSMichael Seibel7:59

       And no one's asking for it.

   21. DCDalton Caldwell8:00

       Yeah, no one's, no one's-

   22. MSMichael Seibel8:01

       No one's asking for it

   23. DCDalton Caldwell8:02

       ... articulating that feature. So again, the advice here is blindly following feature requests, it's a, it's a leaky bucket. There's a hole in the bucket, and you will never fill it-

   24. MSMichael Seibel8:15

       No

   25. DCDalton Caldwell8:15

       ... if you're just blindly following feature requests.

   26. MSMichael Seibel8:17

       No.

   27. DCDalton Caldwell8:18

       You kinda gotta synthesize all of your information from what the customers are telling you versus taking them literally.

   28. MSMichael Seibel8:24

       Well, and this was the classic issue at, at Twitch, where streamers, when we were pivoting at Twitch, asked us for all kinds of features, and they never asked us, "Can we get paid?" Because they never thought it was possible. You don't ask your, your dad for a Ferrari when you're 16. Once again, we had to use the context clues, and it was tricky. I remember the first time we got a hint was when we learned that one of our biggest streamers, like someone who could get 50,000 people watching them at any given time, pumped gas. And we were like, "Oh. Oh, it, this is a [laughs] this is a hint. This is a hint. Like, maybe these people who are good in this area are, aren't able to monetize their skills in the normal economy. Our bar is not how do we make someone as much money as an i-banker. We might just have to make them as much money as someone who pumps gas. Like, okay.

9. 9:13 – 10:11

   Survey trap: why literal feedback (like YC food requests) misleads

   1. DCDalton Caldwell9:13

      We used to do surveys for people in the YC batches-

   2. MSMichael Seibel9:16

      Yes

   3. DCDalton Caldwell9:16

      ... about what they wanted.

   4. MSMichael Seibel9:17

      Yes.

   5. DCDalton Caldwell9:17

      And if we took that stuff really literally, we would've spent all of our-

   6. MSMichael Seibel9:20

      Better food. [laughs]

   7. DCDalton Caldwell9:20

      We would've spent all our time on food. We would've spent all our time hiring-

   8. MSMichael Seibel9:24

      Yes

   9. DCDalton Caldwell9:24

      ... increasingly extravagant chefs-

   10. MSMichael Seibel9:27

       Yes, yes, yes

   11. DCDalton Caldwell9:27

       ... if we listened to our users in the most literal way.

   12. MSMichael Seibel9:29

       Yes.

   13. DCDalton Caldwell9:29

       That was the number one piece of feedback we got.

   14. MSMichael Seibel9:31

       Also, what about my nightshade allergy?

   15. DCDalton Caldwell9:33

       [laughs]

   16. MSMichael Seibel9:33

       I had to order DoorDash at the dinner. [laughs]

   17. DCDalton Caldwell9:35

       Yeah. But seriously, that was the-

   18. MSMichael Seibel9:37

       Yes

   19. DCDalton Caldwell9:37

       ... number one recurring-

   20. MSMichael Seibel9:39

       Yes

   21. DCDalton Caldwell9:39

       ... feedback we got from YC founders about the YC program-

   22. MSMichael Seibel9:42

       Yes

   23. DCDalton Caldwell9:42

       ... was food related.

   24. MSMichael Seibel9:43

       Well, and what was really funny, I remember reading those surveys, and it was, I felt like I was hunting for clues.

   25. DCDalton Caldwell9:50

       [laughs]

   26. MSMichael Seibel9:50

       Like, some of the most interesting stuff would be, like, these offhanded, weird comments that, like, would not be reflected by the masses, but they would be like, oh, like, that would've been it better. Or, oh, wow, like you used something that we had different than everyone else.

   27. DCDalton Caldwell10:07

       Yeah.

   28. MSMichael Seibel10:07

       But it was not build a word cloud and like, like-

   29. DCDalton Caldwell10:11

       [laughs]

10. 10:11 – 13:02

    Terrorists from inside: recruits and employees who come with endless demands

    1. MSMichael Seibel10:11

       ... look at the biggest word. Like, no. Oh my God, no, no, no, no, no. So bad. Okay, so we've talked about terrorist customers. We've talked about terrorist requests. I think for the founder that's far enough along, they know that the biggest source of terrorism is from the inside.

    2. DCDalton Caldwell10:29

       Yes.

    3. MSMichael Seibel10:29

       Terrorist employees.

    4. DCDalton Caldwell10:30

       Yes. [laughs]

    5. MSMichael Seibel10:31

       [laughs] What do they say? Something's in the inside. What is it like [laughs] what is the-

    6. DCDalton Caldwell10:35

       Yeah, the call's coming from the-

    7. MSMichael Seibel10:36

       Yeah

    8. DCDalton Caldwell10:36

       ... inside the house.

    9. MSMichael Seibel10:37

       Inside the house. Yeah. [laughs] Let's talk about terrorist employees. What, any experience?

    10. DCDalton Caldwell10:42

        No. Okay, like, no, I don't know what you're talking about. Um, so let's start with folks that aren't in the company yet. And so the set-

    11. MSMichael Seibel10:49

        Terrorist recruits

    12. DCDalton Caldwell10:50

        ... recruits. The, the setup is a founder is, like, desperate to hire. It's hard to hire.

    13. MSMichael Seibel10:54

        Yes.

    14. DCDalton Caldwell10:54

        And then someone amazing comes along, and they're like, "Holy cow, they used to work at Google. They used to work here. They w- used to work there"

    15. MSMichael Seibel11:00

        They're like a top 10 in the world at this thing-

    16. DCDalton Caldwell11:02

        Yeah

    17. MSMichael Seibel11:02

        ... we need.

    18. DCDalton Caldwell11:04

        Um, and unfortunately-

    19. MSMichael Seibel11:05

        And they wanna work for our shitty startup. [laughs]

    20. DCDalton Caldwell11:06

        Yeah, can you believe it? And unfortunately, there's a really complicated laundry list of demands of what the person wants-

    21. MSMichael Seibel11:13

        Yes

    22. DCDalton Caldwell11:14

        ... around where they work, how they work, when they work. You know, just-

    23. MSMichael Seibel11:18

        Yes

    24. DCDalton Caldwell11:18

        ... a very com-

    25. MSMichael Seibel11:19

        Weird life circumstances sometimes. Weird, like, well, I can't commit to a start date or da, da, da, da, da. Like, all these, like, weird things where, like, if you were to hear your brother or sister talk about their, like, boyfriend or girlfriend and they would say these kinds of things, you'd be like, "This is not- [laughs]

    26. DCDalton Caldwell11:36

        [laughs]

    27. MSMichael Seibel11:36

        ... this is not good" But for the employee, it's like, oh, but what about the upside?

    28. DCDalton Caldwell11:41

        And so what happens is you come up with justifications to say yes to all these things-

    29. MSMichael Seibel11:47

        Yes

    30. DCDalton Caldwell11:47

        ... and ignore the clues.
11. 13:02 – 14:18

    The meta-pattern: you can’t finesse it—cut bait and accept sunk costs

    1. MSMichael Seibel13:02

       A dark cloud. Maybe the meta point, and you touched on this earlier, is that in all of these situations, it is really hard to negotiate your way out of them.

    2. DCDalton Caldwell13:15

       Can't finesse.

    3. MSMichael Seibel13:16

       There's no like-

    4. DCDalton Caldwell13:17

       Well, and once you give... Basically, usually the solution is, "I'll give them their ask."

    5. MSMichael Seibel13:21

       Yeah.

    6. DCDalton Caldwell13:21

       And that fixes the problem, right?

    7. MSMichael Seibel13:23

       Right. [laughs]

    8. DCDalton Caldwell13:23

       The problem is there's, it's an invitation to get more asks.

    9. MSMichael Seibel13:28

       Yes.

    10. DCDalton Caldwell13:28

        Over and over-

    11. MSMichael Seibel13:29

        Yes

    12. DCDalton Caldwell13:29

        ... and over again.

    13. MSMichael Seibel13:30

        This is why we use the word terrorist. Like this is the definition almost, right? And I think that, um, what's hard, especially in office hours, is that usually you and I will pick up on this pretty fast and be like, "Cut bait."

    14. DCDalton Caldwell13:43

        Yeah.

    15. MSMichael Seibel13:43

        And then we'll do the other office hour like three months later, and it'll be like, "Well, for three months we didn't cut bait and just got punched in the face, and now we've cut bait, and you were right." And it was like, you don't deserve terrorists. This is hard enough without terrorists. [laughs] Like...

    16. DCDalton Caldwell14:00

        Yeah. It's almost like it's hard to admit that it's a sunk cost. Like you-

    17. MSMichael Seibel14:05

        Yes

    18. DCDalton Caldwell14:05

        ... there's like this moment where you have to be like-

    19. MSMichael Seibel14:06

        Yes

    20. DCDalton Caldwell14:06

        ... "This is a sunk cost. I just need to-

    21. MSMichael Seibel14:09

        Shut it down

    22. DCDalton Caldwell14:09

        ... get out of the situation," versus coming up with justifications it'll get better.

    23. MSMichael Seibel14:13

        Or assume somehow that like success comes from dealing with terrorist situations.

12. 14:18 – 15:58

    Terrorist investors: time sinks and faith-destroying pessimism

    1. DCDalton Caldwell14:18

       Yeah. And maybe one other aside, um, this comes up with investors too.

    2. MSMichael Seibel14:23

       Oh, fun.

    3. DCDalton Caldwell14:23

       The, the classic terrorist investor-

    4. MSMichael Seibel14:24

       Investors can never be terrorists, Dalton. Are you kidding me?

    5. DCDalton Caldwell14:26

       I think the classic one is someone that wants to take up a lot of time of the founders.

    6. MSMichael Seibel14:32

       Yes.

    7. DCDalton Caldwell14:32

       And by the way, they may be very nice, and they may-

    8. MSMichael Seibel14:34

       Yes

    9. DCDalton Caldwell14:34

       ... not realize they're doing it.

    10. MSMichael Seibel14:35

        Yes.

    11. DCDalton Caldwell14:35

        But effectively, you get a bunch of emails or requests or questions, and so the founder spends a lot of time line by line answering the questions.

    12. MSMichael Seibel14:43

        Yes.

    13. DCDalton Caldwell14:44

        And guess what they get? More questions. [laughs] And they answer those questions, and they get more questions. And you actually end up spending like a huge percentage of your time talking to an investor, effectively managing their feelings.

    14. MSMichael Seibel14:57

        On a 15-year journey. [laughs]

    15. DCDalton Caldwell14:58

        Yeah. And like, there's no upside. You can't bury them in so much time they stop asking for your time.

    16. MSMichael Seibel15:06

        Fundamentally, their feelings are based not on the work you're producing for them, but on is your company working.

    17. DCDalton Caldwell15:12

        Yeah.

    18. MSMichael Seibel15:12

        That's the only way to change their feelings. I think there's actually an even worse type of terrorist investor, and it is a type of investor who's lost faith in the founder. I think sometimes investors don't realize, and I've probably made this mistake a couple times, where it's kind of like you can't help but be kind of a father and mother f- figure for this person in a weird way, right? And like the worst thing a parent can do is be like, "You know, it's not gonna work out for you." [laughs] Right?

    19. DCDalton Caldwell15:37

        [laughs]

    20. MSMichael Seibel15:37

        Like it's like, they were like you, it's like, it's like [laughs] That is the worst thing. And, and like, you know, your, your brother and sister might be like, "I hate my gut- your guts," but like when it's your parents, it's a problem. And I think that sometimes investors don't realize that they're just communicating pessimism.

13. 15:58 – 18:17

    Belief as leadership: giving hard feedback while still expressing faith

    1. DCDalton Caldwell15:58

       That's such a great point. I think about this a lot, where I've seen a lot of people critique our advice/my advice-

    2. MSMichael Seibel16:05

       Yes

    3. DCDalton Caldwell16:06

       ... um, over the years of like, "Don't give up."

    4. MSMichael Seibel16:07

       Too neg- Yeah, yeah. Yes.

    5. DCDalton Caldwell16:08

       And they're like, "Oh, why is he so stupid?" Like this whole don't give up thing, like blah, blah, blah. And it's not that I think they're wrong, I just like, no, I, I, I have no apologies for encouraging people to not give up.

    6. MSMichael Seibel16:19

       Yeah.

    7. DCDalton Caldwell16:19

       And encouraging people to stay, I still believe them.

    8. MSMichael Seibel16:21

       Yeah.

    9. DCDalton Caldwell16:21

       Believe in them. And even if it is going bad, I do say, "Are you having a good time?"

    10. MSMichael Seibel16:26

        Mm-hmm.

    11. DCDalton Caldwell16:26

        And as long as you're having a good time, and you, it's fulfilling the work that you're doing, don't give up, right?

    12. MSMichael Seibel16:34

        I think this has been the hardest thing for me in office hours. I think my personal KPI for office hours when I started was like, does the founder feel good at the end?

    13. DCDalton Caldwell16:43

        Yeah.

    14. MSMichael Seibel16:43

        And that produces zero value. And when people have overheard me giving office hours, they're just like, "You sound incredibly critical," or like, "You're talking about the things that are like the biggest problems in the company." And it's this weird balance to try to talk about the hardest things, but to communicate like, "I believe in you."

    15. DCDalton Caldwell17:07

        Yeah.

    16. MSMichael Seibel17:07

        It's this very weird balance, and it's like, to me, like that's what a great advice giver give. 'Cause like they're not a great advice giver if they're not talking about the most important things in the company.

    17. DCDalton Caldwell17:16

        Yep.

    18. MSMichael Seibel17:16

        And if it's a startup, those things are going wrong. [laughs] Like...

    19. DCDalton Caldwell17:20

        For sure.

    20. MSMichael Seibel17:21

        Some number of them. But they're also not a great advice giver if they're not communicating faith. And I think like PG actually did this really well. Like he would, you know, he would have these things like, "If you just figured out a couple things, you could be the next Microsoft." And he would say it, and you'd be like, "No, I can't." But then like, "Maybe." [laughs] Like...

    21. DCDalton Caldwell17:41

        Well, and you know what the secret is, knowing PG as well as we do-

    22. MSMichael Seibel17:45

        Yeah

    23. DCDalton Caldwell17:46

        ... is he actually believed it.

    24. MSMichael Seibel17:47

        Yes.

    25. DCDalton Caldwell17:47

        And so the trick-

    26. MSMichael Seibel17:49

        Yes. Yes

    27. DCDalton Caldwell17:49

        ... so again, the trick for you all-

    28. MSMichael Seibel17:50

        'Cause sometimes startups work. [laughs]

    29. DCDalton Caldwell17:51

        The trick to help people by inspiring them is to actually believe they can succeed.

    30. MSMichael Seibel17:57

        Yeah. Yeah.
14. 18:17 – 19:01

    Wrap-up: avoid the potholes—don’t give an inch, and keep building

    1. MSMichael Seibel18:17

       So we've covered customers, we've covered requests, we've covered recruits, we've covered employees, we've covered investors. That's a lot of terrorists.

    2. DCDalton Caldwell18:26

       [laughs]

    3. MSMichael Seibel18:26

       Um, dodge them. Get, get, dodge them.

    4. DCDalton Caldwell18:30

       Don't negotiate with them.

    5. MSMichael Seibel18:31

       Don't negotiate with them.

    6. DCDalton Caldwell18:31

       Don't think that if you give them an, an inch-

    7. MSMichael Seibel18:34

       Yeah

    8. DCDalton Caldwell18:34

       ... they won't take a mile.

    9. MSMichael Seibel18:35

       No.

    10. DCDalton Caldwell18:35

        They will.

    11. MSMichael Seibel18:36

        And don't think that these people will significantly impact the success of your company. Like the, these are not the folks that determine whether your company wins or loses. These are just the potholes to avoid on the road. Like steer around them, keep going. Great chat.

    12. DCDalton Caldwell18:50

        Cool. Thanks, Michael. [upbeat music]

Episode duration: 19:02