Why Grow?

Explicit content warning

10/05/21 • 27 min

2 Listeners

Basecamp has always prided itself on staying small and lean. But, with two major products, we're going to change that. The question when looking to grow, however, is "why?"

Show Notes

03:08 - Highrise
03:09 - Campfire
03:10 - Backpack
07:18 - Software as a service (SaaS)
09:41 - Slack: Getting Past Burnout, Busywork, and the Myth of Total Efficiency - Tom DeMarco
13:33 - Hill Charts
14:23 - Ryan Singer
17:52 - Citizen Kane
18:15 - "Growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell." - Edward Abbey

Basecamp has always prided itself on staying small and lean. But, with two major products, we're going to change that. The question when looking to grow, however, is "why?"

Show Notes

03:08 - Highrise
03:09 - Campfire
03:10 - Backpack
07:18 - Software as a service (SaaS)
09:41 - Slack: Getting Past Burnout, Busywork, and the Myth of Total Efficiency - Tom DeMarco
13:33 - Hill Charts
14:23 - Ryan Singer
17:52 - Citizen Kane
18:15 - "Growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell." - Edward Abbey

Previous Episode

Planning is Guessing (Season 2)

People put too much stock in making long-term plans, but let's call them what they really are: guesses. On this episode we discuss deadlines, business plans, world domination, and Dungeons & Dragons.

Show Notes

01:06 - Dungeons & Dragons
01:20 - Mind Flayer
02:00 - Six-week cycles (Shape Up)
05:54 - The meaning of a bet (Shape Up)
07:23 - Shape Up
08:32 - Setting the appetite (Shape Up)
09:57 - "Plans are useless, but planning is indispensable." - Dwight D. Eisenhower
12:29 - Carlos Segura - Segura, Inc.
12:43 - S Corporations
15:24 - The deal Jeff Bezos got on Basecamp (Signal v. Noise)
16:51 - Blue Origin
19:04 - “The reason that most of us are unhappy most of the time is that we set our goals—not for the person we’re going to be when we reach them—we set our goals for the person we are when we set them.” - Jim Coudal quoting Dan Gilbert (Creative Mornings Chicago)
19:12 - Coudal Partners
19:12 - Field Notes
20:59 - Key Performance Indicator (KPI)
21:01 - Objectives and Key Results (OKR)

Next Episode

Workaholism

Working long hours, putting in overtime, logging on on the weekends, have become badges of honor, but there's a big difference between work and getting stuff done. This week Jason and David push back against this idea of workaholism.

Show Notes

01:37 - Six-week cycles (Shape Up)
02:46 - On Apple's monopoly power to destroy HEY (Signal v. Noise)
09:10 - Oura Ring
10:47 - Test-driven development (Wikipedia)
12:50 - An Inside Look at Google's Best Employee Perks (Inc.)
17:12 - Paid Time Off (Basecamp Employee Handbook)
24:19 - Summer Hours (Basecamp Employee Handbook)

REWORK - Why Grow?

Transcript

[00:00:00] Broken By Design by Clipart plays.
Shaun: [00:00:02] Welcome to Rework, a podcast by Basecamp about the better way to work and run your business. I'm your host, Shaun Hildner. We're continuing our Rework book club this week with a look at the chapter, “Why Grow?”
[00:00:13] You know, since its inception, Basecamp has been a relatively small, lean company. At the time Rework was written, there were only 16 employees and it's always been a point of pride around here that we've