Hollywood Gives Us The Worst Face Of Silicon Valley
It's the early 2000s, and Elizabeth is obsessed with the success of her idol, Steve Jobs. She doesn't hide it: she also wants to become a billionaire and change the world by inventing things.
Doped up on personal development and firmly convinced that she will accomplish her wildest dreams, the young woman is ready to do anything to succeed. The Dropout, Theranos' drama, takes on the scam and tech culture. Everything was absolutely perfect, until that day in October 2015 when a Wall Street Journal article questioned the reliability of her technology, nothing will ever be the same for Elizabeth Holmes. She wanted to disrupt science by using a single drop of blood for blood testing, she will end up convicted of fraud.
What is real and what is fictional? When does fake-it-until-you-make-it become simply fraud? And when this fraud is sold as a fairy tale where the promoters of a hopeful mission become complicit in the suffering of people?
Seven years after the revelations of the Franco-American journalist John Carreyrou, himself hounded by private detectives during his investigation, Holmes awaits her sentence. Today, she remains a free woman on $500,000 bail, with her sentencing scheduled for September of this year.
The Dropout is not the only series chronicling con artists these days. Hulu, Disney+ and AppleTV+ are all on the case. In addition to Theranos, 2 other major scandals are the subject of event series - WeCrashed, starring Jared Leto and Anne Hathaway as the founders of WeWork; Super Pumped, starring Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Uber's Travis Kalanick. Easy money, shaky business model, unstoppable bosses, the recipe is always the same.
Nothing to do with tech, but if you haven't done so yet, check out the "White Hot" series on Netflix... We discover from the inside how Abercrombie relied on the ideal of a white, athletic and V-cut American youth. At first, the models recruited to promote the brand were all the rage. But behind the scenes, the anger rumbles...
We wish these scandals had never existed, but now we can at least analyze them. And draw some lessons from them...
Speak up 📣 What’s It Like Being A Startup Founder Over 40?
Y Combinator cofounder Paul Graham once quipped that when it comes to first-time startup founders, “the cutoff [age] in investors’ heads is 32”. He was only partly joking: a perception endures that the best founders will be 19-year-old wunderkinds like Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg, or in their early 30s at the latest.
Research suggests this attitude may be misguided. A 2020 report found that the most successful US startups — those in the top 0.1% in growth in their first five years — were launched by founders with an average age of 45. A 50-year-old entrepreneur is almost twice as likely to create a high-growth startup than a 30-year-old rival, researchers found.
Midlife founders have decades of experience. They have an idea of who to bring in as CTO, and have faced down challenges before. Over-40s founders also report having a self-confidence and level of self-knowledge they just didn’t possess in their earlier years — assets many believe have helped them make better decisions as founders. Read this recent sifted article 👈
News 🗞️ Musk's Defense Of Free Speech Seems To Apply Primarily To His Own Speech
Elon Musk, who is in the process of buying Twitter has for years presented himself as a defender of the First Amendment and free speech. For example, he defended himself in a defamation suit after calling a critic a "pedophile."
But when it comes to his employees' freedom of speech, Musk shows little tolerance. Under his leadership, when Tesla fired employees, it required them to sign severance agreements that included a strong non-denigration clause with no deadline. No one knows yet what Musk - otherwise a genius - will do with Twitter. It's a safe bet that he'll take it private, Trump will be reinstated on the network, and employees will massively flee... Musk will hire at below-market salaries. As he already does in Germany with the Tesla Gigafactory (20% below the competition according to the IG Mettal trade union). The advantage of recruiting fans...
Under Musk's leadership, dozens of Tesla US workers have reported racist, gender-based and other harassment, discrimination and unsafe working conditions. Many have also claimed to have suffered retaliation after blowing the whistle.
The libertarian movement is anything but new in the US.. Because the foundation of the movement is free speech and the refusal to align with any particular banner, it is difficult to see any real unity. This may explain why libertarians have a hard time making a real impact, especially in politics. They have never obtained more than 3.3% of the vote in presidential elections...
Data 📊 the 4-day week, good or bad idea?
A Qualtrics survey showed that 92% of US employees would want their employer to shorten the work week to 4 days. Iceland, Sweden and New-Zealand have been paving the way in large scale experimentation, and other countries may follow suit.
But what does research have to say about shorter work weeks?
➡️ Shorter work weeks answer a structural work force issue
A lot of jobs in developed countries are at risk of automation. In parallel, increasing criticism is laid upon the ‘productivity ideology’ (see Laetitia Vitaud’s new book, and translated excerpts in her newsletter here)
➡️ Shorter work weeks do not seem to involve less output
Microsoft Japan implemented a four day workweek policy in the summer of 2019, keeping salaries equal. They said that shorter work weeks accounted for a 40% increase in overall efficiency.
➡️ And although having a job is essential to mental health, as little as 8 hours a week is enough to feel okay
Rarely is the optimal amount of work per person considered from ... the person’s point of view. A 2019 study on over 70,000 people set out to tackle the topic. The results?
Working as little as 8 hours a week is enough to boost mental health! Over 8 hours and up to 50, it doesn’t change anything. Enough to question the 5 days a week paradigm? What do you think of shorter work weeks? Enter the discussion under Sarah Jallot’s post here (all sources are listed in the comments).
Trend 🌊 Skills shortage, what to do ???
The expression " great resignation " is on everyone's lips, as the Covid-19 crisis comes to an end. Faced with a shortage of skills, companies would gain by building loyalty, says management Professor Jérôme Barthélemy from Essec Business School.
Several levers can be used: 💡
- Compensation. With a period of inflation looming, companies will likely be forced to increase salaries;
- Working conditions. More and more employees are looking for a hybrid work mode that alternates face-to-face and remote work;
- Management model. Most employees need autonomy. The "command and control" model is totally out of fashion;
- Meaning. Employees increasingly need to understand why they work.
Another way to win the "war for talent" is totally counter-intuitive: increasing employability...builds employee loyalty. After taking into account elements such as company size, seniority and managerial level, a surprising phenomenon was observed: the more a company provides the means to increase employability, the more engaged people are and the less likely they are to leave. Read Jerome Barthelemy's opinion in Les Echos (in French)
The Nugget 🍪 GOJEK Does Not Forget Its Drivers
The gig economy is favored by many investors, but it also has many drawbacks that we will not list here. Some opponents go so far as to talk about AI colonialism, the idea that artificial intelligence is creating a new colonial world order. This is particularly true of the ride-sharing giants.
But when they take good initiatives, we must also know how to welcome them. The latest example is GoTo (Gojek), based in Indonesia, which decided to allocate shares to 600,000 drivers. While the giveaway represents a token amount, GoTo becomes the first major sharing-economy giant in South-east Asia to include part-time gig workers in its own IPO windfall 👏
To remind you
"ppl first" is committed and benevolent for employees, managers, and founders!
What is ppl first? It's a company that puts the employee at the heart of the strategy, considering that a fulfilled worker will make a healthy and sustainable business.
Why ppl first? Everything is accelerating and for years customer is too often the top priority, the employee is sometimes an adjustment variable. Less considered, he/she's also less committed.
How ppl first? There are many ways to achieve this (or to stay this way) but there is a common base. When a staff member would not recommend to his friends to work with him/her, when the management does not have clear values to defend etc. Staff is at risk and the company with it. To have or maintain a people first culture you need to care about your employees as individuals.