I'd like to hear the story from your partner's point of view. Could you please send me his name, email address, phone number, coding background and resume?
I don't see why you think it's unethical for them to try to poach your partner. It's not like he's some helpless pawn in this game, especially if he's as smart as you say he is. If I thought I had a chance at getting one of my competitor's best people to come work for me instead, I'd jump on it in an instant.
Yeah, the way this is written it sounds like "your hacker" is Dustin Hoffman in Rainman, and you are his caretaker or something.
On a side note: I had no idea YC teams were this competitive with each other. I still had the image of one big Nerd Summer Camp that happened to spit out companies and connections. This makes it sound more like the Skull and Bones guys competing to meet the President at Secret Meeting X.
"I had no idea YC teams were this competitive with each other."
As far as I've seen, they are not (and, neither of these teams is a YC team...they are YC applicants, along with 400+ other teams). The teams tend to be very well-equipped coming into the game and don't really feel the need to break up other teams before they've had a run at it. When a couple of companies fizzled out after the program, I suspect there was a bit of competition for who would get some of the folks from those no longer existent companies, but I'm sure it was friendly (at least I can't imagine any way it could have been otherwise...everybody is still friendly at the events). Others started working on new ideas of their own rather than joining an existing YC company.
Haha, I'm curious who this is about since I know the OP.
Anyway, I think it's a poorly executed attempt at being unethical. If you had a friendship with the person who tried to poach, that person should have realized that he was going to dagger your relationship by trying to steal your partner without even pitching an idea.
Given that your partner is very tight with you (and apparently barely knows the poacher), obviously the incident was going to get back to you . . . one would have expected that the poacher would have tried to partner with you guys or, at the very least, have made a damn compelling argument for why your partner would ditch you.
If you're gonna be shady, you've gotta be strategic about it at least. LOL
"I don't see why you think it's unethical for them to try to poach your partner."
This is Arthur Anderson thinking, not Y Combinator thinking.
If you jumped on one of my best people "in an instant", then you better be prepared to set aside resources to deal with me. Are you sure you really want to do that?
If Arthur Andersen thinking is defined as "don't take petty crap like this personally, and focus your brain cycles on MSPW", then I have to side with Arthur Andersen. But I suspect that this is a matter on which Paul Graham and David Duncan would be in agreement.
"It's not personal, Sonny. It's strictly business."
And it certainly isn't petty. I don't care how much technical talent you have, if you're not prepared to compete in business, whatever the threat, you're toast. Poaching my people is crossing the line.
And I don't care what Paul Graham, David Duncan, or anyone else thinks. On this issue, you shouldn't either. Ethics is non-negotiable.
This isn't a question of ethics. This is a question of whether you and the company you're building is worth the talent you have put together to build it. If, particularly at this early stage (the article says the silly words "this late in the game", as though applying to YC is the finish line) your partner were to come to the conclusion that another company were a better opportunity, then your problem is with your business or with your partner. It has nothing to do with other possible businesses that might want your partners talents on their side.
If you're not prepared to deal with the problem of getting and keeping good developers in a highly competitive market, then you're not equipped to deal with running a business in the tech industry. You will be astounded by how hard it is to recruit the very best talent. Middle tier and lesser developers are abundant...it's the cream of the crop, the people who deliver solid, reliable, working code day in and day out, that are difficult to find and to keep.
Welcome to the real world of business, where you have to worry about things like that.
Why is it, whenever there's an ethical issue on this forum, inevitably, someone steps up and says, "This isn't a question of ethics."
Maybe I'm the one in the wrong place. I certainly hope not. I like it here.
(FWIW: I've been in the "real world of business" since 1979, starting and selling 2 successful start-ups, working on #3. In all that time, nothing has concerned me more than ethical issues. I'd like to think I've been burnt every way possible, but thanks to some of the responses in this forum, now I wonder.)
> Why is it, whenever there's an ethical issue on this forum, inevitably, someone steps up and says, "This isn't a question of ethics."
Because, in this case, it isn't. The article is about a human being, one with free will or some impressive approximation thereof, who received a business proposition.
Another human being is pissed off at the person making the proposition...but the proposition is not his problem. The business he is building and his relationship with his teammate is his problem. The person receiving the proposition may have had some ethics questions to address, like, "What is my responsibility to my teammate and the business we are building?"
The person making the offer was perhaps a bit rude (though his description of the proposition makes it entirely within the bounds of good taste), but not particularly unethical. Nearly every hire you make in the real world is hiring someone away from an existing job. Is it unethical to give someone a better offer? Is it unethical to give someone (who you know to be an employee at IBM or Google or whatever) your business card when you meet them at events and say, "let's have lunch sometime"? Of course not.
Anyway, it's all like a damned soap opera, and the OP made a mistake to post it at all. This isn't college, and nobody cheated on a test.
> Maybe I'm the one in the wrong place. I certainly hope not. I like it here.
A not so subtle way of suggesting that perhaps I'm poisoning the waters with my unethical advice? You'll be fine, as I can't reach through the wires and choke you or anything sinister like that. Unless perhaps you've got a weak heart and respond reflexively to nasty comments like mine, in which case, perhaps a nice hot bath would be more your speed.
By the way, I haven't failed to notice that everyone except me is getting voted up in this "little debate". Kinda scary. I'm adamant on this issue, not because of emotion, but because I think it's that important. I really don't care what technology you use, but I do care how you treat other people. I've seen what happens too many times when people don't play "by the rules" (whatever that means to you).
FWIW, I don't think either party in this "dispute" emerges smelling very good. We should all just get back to hacking. Get beat in the marketplace fair and square? Try something else. That's the beauty here. Everyone can win.
> By the way, I haven't failed to notice that everyone except me is getting voted up in this "little debate".
I'm not among the ones voting you down. I prefer to respond.
> I've seen what happens too many times when people don't play "by the rules" (whatever that means to you).
Sure, and I agree...where we disagree is on what those rules are. My position is that offering someone a job is not a breach of ethics, unless there is a non-compete or non-association agreement in place. The folks in this story are unrelated parties. They have no contractual relationship, and seemingly no friendship to uphold. While it would be rude to "poach" (note that I don't care for this word in this context--it puts the person being offered a position in the role of animal with no ability to think for or look out for his/her own interests) someone from a friends company, it is not a breach of any reasonable code of business ethics.
Good old boys, in the bad old days, might have had gentleman's agreements in place to keep folks from moving between jobs for higher pay and better treatment. But those days and those boys are, for the most part, gone in the technology industry. Employment is at will, and the best talent goes to the highest bidder (by some definition of highest, where Google redefines it to not be raw salary). That is how it is, and how it should be. What you're suggesting is, I believe, the unethical position. When taken to its logical conclusion, you're suggesting that an engineer is the lifetime servant of the company he works for, and has no right to entertain other offers and no one has the right to make other offers.
In a previous thread, you've threatened murder in similar circumstances. I believe we're at odds on this position, as well. ;-)
> I don't think either party in this "dispute" emerges smelling very good.
"One of us isn't leaving the room alive," is a figure of speech, one of many, I learned from my mentor. Helped me learn there's a whole lot more to business than being good at the technical aspects. Turned me from a wimp coder into a competitive business person.
Of course we're not indentured servants and have free will. It's just that this episode smelled real fishy to me. Still does.
Enjoyed the repartee today. Looking forward to the next time. Now, for my bath...
I don't think your comments were nasty and don't accuse anyone of poisoning anything. And I don't feel like I'm responding emotionally on this issue (although it may appear that way.) I just wonder sometimes why 2 intelligent people will look at the same data and have responses 180 degrees apart.
As a born nerd, I spent the first half of my life in a world I didn't belong in, being dumped on every step of the way. The world has finally changed for people like me (and you, I presume). Now I LOVE the thrill of competing! When it's fair and right, by offering better value. So when pussies who can't compete fairly resort to underhanded tactics, I take exception and fire right back. Between the eyes.
That's how I interpreted this incident. Can't code? Get a coder. Steal mine right out from under me (if you can), and deal with me. Period. I understand that you don't see it that way, but don't understand why. I'll just leave it at that.
And yes, I think I will have that nice hot bath tonight. Thank you.
"If you're not prepared to compete in business, whatever the threat, you're toast."
"Poaching my people is crossing the line."
Those two statements look juxtaposed to me. It sounds to me like you're the one who isn't prepared to compete if you aren't willing to pose such a threat to your competitors, or to contend with it when you're on the receiving end.
I'm prepared to compete and have to scars to show for it. I compete by doing the right thing and offering better value to my customers, not by a slime-ball back-door gimmicks, like commandeering others' IP, slamming my competitors, and yes, poaching co-founders in a bar.
Fine, it's not unethical, but it's stupid. Did they think they had a shot after one run-in at a bar? Would you join another team after running into them at a bar with no knowledge of their idea?
What are you saying is stupid? Wanting him, or thinking they could get him? If you all went to undergrad together, then it's possible they know more about his talent than either of you realize. I certainly have classmates who didn't know me very well, who, while I wouldn't take them as the other half of a two-man team, I would take them as a third or fourth man give that I already had one committed partner. And while their chances at success may have been slim, it's not like the attempt required much of an investment.
It was stupid that they thought they could get him. Of course, he's good. They should have wanted him, but he also barely knew my partner during undergrad. And we were actually pretty good friends before this incident.
"...I don't want to bury anyone else's reputation..."
That's not for you to decide. If what they did was unethical, then you have a responsibility to share. If it wasn't, then anything you say won't matter anyway.
I place ethics more important than anything else when considering partners. WAY more important that skill, work ethic, or connections. Take it from someone who has been burned more than once by lying, cheating, stealing, and backroom deals that my partners thought were "no big deal". F*ck 'em. They'll never get a second chance with me. Never.
You're probably tempted to say nothing so you don't offend. Don't. Spare the rest of the community the same potential headache and tell the whole story.
(Personally, if someone tried to poach my partner, only one of us would leave the room alive. This isn't a game anymore.)
I'll concede that my question over simplifies the issue: Burning bridges is bad, you can definitely be stupid about how you try to recruit talent ...
But whenever someone comes to work with/for you they're likely precluded for working for/with someone else. Sure there could be reasons not to try and poach someone, but in general I don't think you are responsible for the person/company left behind.
seeing the words "unethical", "poaching", and "boneheaded" in ahsonwardak's post; it's interesting to note that ahsonwardak is currently living in Washington DC...
I think you just saved yourself from what could have eventually been a huge headache.
I'm assuming since you are applying for funding from YC that you are looking to start a company (YC acceptance or not). If that is the case, you should be glad that you weeded out someone weak while it is easy and not later on down the road. This could be a valuable lesson: Choose who you work with and trust very carefully!
If this guy can get up and jet on you this easily, think what would have happened after you actually started and financial and emotional stress enters the equation?
My advice is go find someone who you can really trust as a co-founder. Someone you know you can depend on when the going gets tough.
If I had known that this would devolve into a public shouting match, I would not have posted this in a public forum. As far as I am concerned, I only intended to vent on my blog and this forum about something that upset me. I am disappointed that we didn't raise the level of discourse, instead it ended up being a free-for-all. I'm over it. It's a dead issue.
