My writing and reading pace has slowed considerably. Perhaps because I’ve been in a slight crypto hole where everything moves 10x the speed of the natural world… so sitting down to read or write legitimately feels like a slow motion exercise.
So this will be one of those exercises you take place in to simply complete an exercise. And that will be ok. Here’s a little brain dump to force me to write.
A playlist you can listen to while you read.
On Hiring
In the past couple of weeks at Eternal, we’ve doubled the full-time team size. I consider our team to be the best “product” Eternal has ever crafted. I believe that I am an exceptional CEO, purely off of my confidence that I have one of the most exceptional teams in New York.
Few.
Running a hiring process at an early stage company is hard enough. Running that during a pandemic increases that. Running that when you can’t have the physical elements of play in the room to get a vibe for the person + they pick up a vibe from the current team… you get the picture.
Some Thots:
Every hiring process is a running ad for the company. Candidates should be able to go through the process, get denied, and still have generally positive feelings about the experience and company itself. I don’t believe this is an unachievable task.
Hiring is a full team process, yes I spend maybe 80% of the day devoted to organizing, initial chats, vetting… but it will always come down to “who are my future peers”. However, there are many ways a team can muck up a candidate’s experience.
Recently friends that are recruiting have told me stories of interviewers not having their camera on, visible lack of interest in the conversation at hand, and other unacceptable story pieces. You have to set these ground rules during the interview process, as it is a direct reflection on the culture.
You have to be ready to say “no” to friends. It sucks, but that’s part of the reality. It destroys me every time.
Transparency in the process, and decision making. From day 1, a candidate should know how many jumps it’ll take to get across the river. And if they don’t make it, they should know exactly why. Take the time to write it out, and keep it as non-personal as possible. I’ve never taken the time to send genuine feedback to someone, and them not appreciate it.
Obviously sometimes the answer is as simple as “we didn’t like them”. That’s a completely fair reason in my opinion. In early stage work, you should vibe with the folks within a sub-10 person team.
On Body & Communication
Generally, I’m a pretty heady person. It’s how I perceive a lot of what I’m experiencing. Lately, for reasons beyond me, I’ve been feeling many things through my body.
It’s clear when something doesn’t sit right. When the touch is off. If I don’t want to be somewhere, if I want to stay with someone longer. I don’t feel a need to intellectualize it.
It is, because I say it is.
And this has pushed me towards an unapologetic mode of communication… which has allowed me a new level of agency that I’ve appreciated the self-recognition of.
On Team Agency
It doesn’t make sense to hire smart people and tell them what to do. We hire smart people so they can tell us what to do.
— SJ
I think that it’s very natural, early in a startups life, for the founders to hold a death grip on many core functions. And it’s one of those weird startup-y things I feel as though doesn’t get talked about at all within the blog posts on “execution” — which is the transition into trusting your team.
It’s an odd one because you can never half trust something. You either believe the center will hold, and you walk across, or you don’t. A bridge not tested, is hardly a bridge at all.
We built the bridge together for a year. 4 months ago I walked across it. And I’ve never been happier. We’ve never been stronger.
On Drones
I really think that drones might be the perfect computing pet. It can follow me seamlessly, like a dog. It can allow cinematic levels of capture, without breaking anyone out of the “scene”. Spectacles will definitely go full AR heads-up display. But I think that, Snap being a camera company, I wouldn’t be surprised if they were working on a drone.
Drones are more vibey than we think…
On Black Sonic Environment
Something I’ve been thinking about is rap/hip hop at large roots in electronic production. And how it’s become the dominant American sound scape. How we may be already living in the start of a Black American “futurism”… today.
On Miami & Twitter
Embrace that every city is a technology city on a different timeline. It is all technology… it is all moving in every direction always.
There are plenty of things we can discuss ranging from inclusive community to the hollowing out of the middle class to personality driven capital. Those are all well and good dialogues to hold.
But at the core, Miami as a technology hub is/will be beautiful and disgusting. Like every tech hub before and after it.
The narrative arrow was shot, and the constant memefication only makes it stronger.
Separately, I had a funny weekend down there and I’m sure I’ll be back again.
On Last Night
Last night, a friend asked what I’m most religious about.
I said beauty.
I don’t do edits really, so excuse typos and things that don’t make sense.
Thanks so much for giving me your attention. I hope it was worth it, if not… unsubscribing will not hurt my feelings, and will give you back time you literally cannot have back.
Much love.
Live in the light