I’ve been a part of a few team growth spurts. In past lives I’ve been an early employee of a startup, an acquisition that preceded a large hiring ramp, and the birth of a new endeavor at an established company. All situations involved simultaneous development and hiring.
Every product, team, and company in existence came about because of a spark in an individual’s head. This spark offered a brief glimpse of what could be the future (or it may have been pure madness), but that spark grew into the entity seen today. The fuel that feeds a company is the technology, but what makes it grow quickly are the people.
Here in California, the worst wildfires started with a spark impacting dry fuel, but it’s the high winds carrying embers that caused them to grow exponentially over the first few days and neutralized the efficacy of fire containment units. In a growing business, the technology is the dry fuel but the employees are the wind.
The technology of a growing enterprise is often called “table stakes” for entering or creating a market. It gets you a seat at the table and a hand in the game, but it does not determine winners and losers by itself. The robustness of the product, the ability of the team to execute, and a little luck all come together to determine how well your product will be received.
It’s easy for engineers to focus on the product. That’s what we do, and in the face of indecision it’s where we retreat. A keyboard, headphones, and a text editor can be a wonderful escape from the pressures of making big decisions based on vacuous business data or dealing with hiccups in the harmony of company culture.
Focusing exclusively on the product to the detriment of the team will often result in a failed endeavor. The team will grind away in a death march towards the end, and in the end stop caring whether the product is completed or not. The company may ship the first product, but the team will be burned out and looking for the exits. As they leave for greener pastures, their knowledge leaves with them and the company finds themselves starting from scratch … again.