I'm not a psychologist but I have observed this kind of syndrome a couple times and I think it's usually more like a performance anxiety. You take the big fish out of the little pond and all the sudden he's a small fish in a big pond and it's a culture shock.

The time lines, the compromises and the urgency are all different at a startup. You are used to being the smartest guy in the room at a mid sized or big place, you go to a small startup that got money because the founders are exceptional and they've staffed up with some exceptional people and they are all running like hell, you might look or feel kind of ordinary and that's a tough pill to swallow. It's especially difficult if you've never felt it before, all the sudden you're "failing" Combine that with a family that thinks the world of you because "you're the best" and I expect it's worse. Or at least that is how I've tried to understand it. There are clearly other issues when it results in suicide though. Again, I'm no doctor, but I try to give them an interview problem they can't solve, I think it's good if they say "I don't know how" or "I can't do that yet"

Another symptom I've observed, when someone is in that space, they often try to do more. Rather than botching one feature, maybe they'll rush and half-ass three or four to try and "make up" for earlier shortcomings. That usually creates a rift with the team that then starts to think less of them, the new guy is a bull in a China shop.

As for management, they share some of it. Uber seems like a broken place in a lot of ways. They should know it takes time to ramp up. Also success begets success, I take things off a new employee's plate when this happens. Make it small enough for them to create a little success and then build on it. In SV there is a large talent pool and a belief that the "right person" is around there somewhere so building long term success might not be as important to some companies.

I know exactly what you're talking about. I've seen it and even been that guy.

We should be clear, though, that the "small fish in a big pond" scenario isn't exactly what happened to Joseph Thomas. According to the article he had already had a successful run at LinkedIn and had an offer on the table from Apple.

Sometimes even brilliant people just aren't a match, no matter what. But a mismatch is a mutual responsibility, and shouldn't be a brutalizing experience. The fault there lies with Uber.

I'm no fan of Uber but I think this is putting too much blame on them. If you see a toxic culture, leave. I know there are other factors, psychological things that keep you from making rational decisions etc. But lets please be clear: the world is actually a pretty brutal place for most of humanity. Most humans are stuck in a poverty loop they can't ever hope to escape. And we have a story of people who can't just say: "enough! I'm outta here?".

I'm certainly not putting the blame on Joseph, he seems to have suffered a lot despite having objectively been a good engineer. But lets not forget that we're all (mostly) at-will employees, there is nothing stopping us from getting up and leaving just right now. Personal responsibility is really important. Perhaps we should be teaching some of this stuff in high school? I don't know what the solution is IMO.

I've personally been in toxic situations as well. As soon as I realized my happiness delta was negative, I immediately started looking at other positions and switched.

> If you see a toxic culture, leave.

This is easier said than done when your own self-worth and ability to see your own value is diminished due to stress, when you have a mortgage and financial obligations and a family to take care of. Not many people are financially independent enough to just quit a job the moment they feel it's become "toxic".

> This is easier said than done when your own self-worth and ability to see your own value is diminished due to stress, when you have a mortgage and financial obligations and a family to take care of. Not many people are financially independent enough to just quit a job the moment they feel it's become "toxic".

Well, I never said it was easy.

To elaborate more, it is incredibly important to have contingency plans in place, to prevent exactly this sort of situation from happening. One of the first things I did when I started working professionally was to have enough liquidity to last at least a year, which I was able to do only after 3 years of saving aggressively. Which really came in handy after I was laid off a job and had to spend 3 months looking for another one.

I really don't understand how one can get married, have kids and not have such plans in place? IMO it seems kinda irresponsible, especially if one is working in tech, where saving money is much easier than in other professions.

I also have a years' worth of living expenses saved, and it also took me about 3 years to build. It has zero impact on my stress level at work. I don't think I feel any more free to leave than if I only had a months worth saved. The idea of leaving and potentially burning through most or all of that portion of my family's savings while I look for another job is no more appealing or satisfying than just staying in the stressful job.

Perhaps I'd feel differently if I had several more years saved or if I were more stressed at work. The thing about work stress that builds up is that your mental health declines and you can begin to think very irrationally. Paranoia and depression can set in. I've seen devastating examples of this with people I know. I think it's important not to minimize it or brush it off and to understand that what seems obvious to you or I may not be obvious at all to someone who is feeling burnt out, desperate and depressed from their work situation.

> The thing about work stress that builds up is that your mental health declines and you can begin to think very irrationally. Paranoia and depression can set in. I've seen devastating examples of this with people I know. I think it's important not to minimize it or brush it off and to understand that what seems obvious to you or I may not be obvious at all to someone who is feeling burnt out, desperate and depressed from their work situation.

I'm most certainly not "brushing it off" or "minimizing it". I'm advocating for proactive measures to avoid reaching a such a mental state that can drive a person to consider suicide as a reasonable option. In your case, it seems like the measure I suggested (having monetary guarantee for at least a year) is not sufficient, so I would advise you to look for other measures, which you can likely take now when things are good.

I didn't mean to suggest that you specifically were brushing anything off; it was more of a general statement. Sorry about that.

What are other contingency plans that can be put in place?

It's more like you are the only fish is a small pond that they want to put an ocean liner into.

Startups by their nature seem to rarely have the correct amount of resources for projects/sprints/etc. Anytime you try to cram five gallons of shit into a one gallon bucket, there are going to be repercussions.

Some people thrive on that environment, others like more traditional, better staffed and funded environments. Each to their own I guess. I feel sorry for this guy and his family, no job is worth that.

Likewise. I've worked at startups at it was a rare occasion my boss could convince me to stay past 6pm. When we were working on a big release and the work wasn't getting done fast enough or his liking the solution wasn't for me to work extra hours - it was to tell him, "you need to hire another developer to work with me". There are laws to protect you from being worked into the ground and at the end of the day, if you're a developer, finding another one isn't particularly hard whether it's at a startup or a big corp. It's a job, not a lifestyle. Work 9-6 and get out of there.

I don't disagree with you, but you're overestimating the desire of most devs (at least most I ever knew) to hop between jobs.

Yes we're sought after but that doesn't mean we want to re-adjust 4 times a year.

Of course, what I meant was that if your employer is forcing you to work 60 hour weeks you shouldn't fear threatening to quit as if you have to follow through on your threat it's unlikely you will be without employment for long. Unfortunately, in a lot of industries people don't have this luxury.

I agree with this, yes and thank you. I talked about people with more specific requirements like myself (100% remote being example).

> 4 times a year.

I think if you have to switch 4 times a year, either you're exceptionally unlucky or exceptionally bad at evaluating jobs for their effect on your personal fulfillment/happiness.

For better or worse, SV is home to a lot of incredibly high-risk investments, and a large of early startups.

Startups with a lot of money on the line and no path to revenue will do crazy things that frequently lead to toxic work environments. Raise $10 million for a product that doesn't have a market fit, hire 10 people, provide them no clear vision for your business or product, tell them to make money, and watch as your business gets pulled in 20 different directions, employees fight, and people stress out. It's not likely to end well for anyone.

It's definitely going to be more common in places where riskier investments are more likely to happen. Uber, as an example, was last valued at nearly $70b and loses nearly $800m every quarter. I would imagine that kind of cash burn with no clear path to profitability is incredibly stressful on everyone. It's almost certainly the cause for many of the horrible decisions that seem to have been made there, and the same thing can apply at smaller scales to earlier businesses.

It's sample bias. People who experienced dramatic things are far more likely to comment about them. The community is large enough that even a relatively tiny sample produces many comments under this effect.

Well, there's the stigma of talking about anything related to mental illness or depression. Personally, I've never shared any of my struggles with inner demons with anyone other than my wife (and now here).

Yes, but that's a separate issue from the work environments that I think the GP was wondering about.

Thanks. I was hoping it was just this.

All of my experiences were on the East Coast. I don't think it's unique to the bay area I just think there is a larger concentration of start-ups so you'll hear about it more frequently but it can easily happen anywhere.

This isn't unique to startups, let alone SV startups. I know from personal experience that work environments like this exist in finance and advertising, too.

I'm such a person, and it's not restricted to SV. My worst experiences were in the South East. I think that many startups, regardless of region, are poorly managed, especially as they go through the transition from startup to something bigger.

Do you have kids? Imagine putting a toddler in charge of millions and millions of dollars. Now your house and paycheck and all of your life is dependent on the demands of the toddler, and shall you try and instill any reason, she throws a tantrum and threatens to replace you with anyone else who just says "yes." That's a simple, and yet so close-to-real way to look at the reason why bad apples exist.

That said, your 50% view is probably skewed. We like to read "sensational" stories, but for every bad company out there, thousands smart and caring founders build great companies every day.

You could call it the Steve Jobs problem... or at least he is a well known face of it.

Amazon apparently has similar issues as well so it is not just startups.

The worst are whisper campaigns of passive aggressiveness.