My time with Better ended just as it began: with noise and silence.
Better’s infamous “Zoom Layoffs”, where the company achieved Twitter virality for firing hundreds of team members via video call, happened six days before I started. The explosion of attention was not isolated to Twitter: my phone buzzed constantly with outreach from concerned friends. My business school professors lectured on the event. Parody videos and internet content condemning the act flooded my newsfeed and inbox alike. Everywhere I turned, there it was.
But against the wall of noise, all was quiet.
In the heat of the moment, my would-be-manager left for another opportunity. I had no boss and no team. December, a dead month for business anyway, became a month of eerie calm, filled only with soft Excel models and gentle 1-on-1’s. Unless I reached out to others, my daily Slack and email notifications were minimal. I quickly realized my position: I had joined an actively-downsizing organization, and I wasn’t clearly adding value. I wondered if my time would be cut short, and did everything I could to preempt such a situation.
As the new year arrived, I assumed the workload of a departing team member, giving me face-time with several company directors. I spent evenings sharpening my spreadsheet skills, re-investing my paychecks in online courses from General Assembly and WallStreetPrep. I volunteered for ad-hoc projects and worked to build a rapport with my more talented colleagues. I bought a copy of The Big Short1 and read daily newsletters on the real estate industry. Following this recipe, I gradually found my footing.
Shortly thereafter, I joined two others on a small-but-mighty corporate strategy and competitive intelligence team. Suddenly, I had direct access to the C-suite, presenting every other week on industry trends and competitor insights, watching them think, debate, and make decisions. Week after week, I felt myself grow: a bit more polished, a bit more crisp, a bit smarter when I chose to voice my opinion. Teammates started bringing their trickier Excel questions to me2. I began running SQL queries and building Looker dashboards. I developed a strong rapport with influential team members.
Working at Better was hard, and it was mostly hard for common reasons. Late-stage startups are amorphous, full of the quick pivots and sharp changes early-stage companies feel, but with the massive momentum of a much larger workforce. More people means more complexity, more personalities, and more potential for conflict. Add a complicated macroeconomic environment, and the situation is, well, complicated. By summertime, I was supplementing3 to stave off the stress I felt in my chest each day.
But stress and thrill are two sides of the same coin, walking arm-in-arm in lockstep. For all of its challenges, Better was thrilling. Thrilling were the days I’d wake up at 4am to catch a 6:30 flight. A quick 90 minutes in the air, and I’d flag a taxi at the Newark airport4. Thrilling was the view from the 57th floor of 3 World Trade Center, a vantage point reserved for birds and God and us alone. Thrilling were rooftop happy hours, the New York skyline forcing itself toward heaven, feeling somehow massive and infinitesimal all at once. A night on the town, a late subway ride home, and an early alarm to catch a quick Jiu-Jitsu class at Marcelo Garcia’s5. It was thrilling and it was magic.
In my final weeks with the team, we saw the direction we were heading. The company hadn’t shared progress on going public, but it was clear that it would not happen before the September 30th deadline. With no funding on the horizon and a rapidly-decelerating housing market, all signs pointed in the same direction. People would lose their jobs. Ultimately, that included me.
So my time ended as it began, but backwards. Silence, then noise.
For a full week, nothing was asked of me. Not an email, not a Slack question. All was quiet. And when my boss called me Friday morning, saying through tears that this had nothing to do with my performance, and she’d be there to help with my new job search, the noise began again. The chatter on Twitter, the expose on TechCrunch, the thoughtful text from a friend. It grew from white noise, to a roar, to an overwhelming shriek, saying all the while “you’re part of this DISASTER?!!!”
A week later, I dialed the number of a fellow Michigan Ross MBA. He worked for Facebook. My goal was to get a referral for a job posting, and I wanted to hear how his experience had been with the organization. When he answered the phone, after exchanging pleasantries, the man spoke immediately:
”You have to tell me. What was it actually like at Better?”
I gave up on the book before I finished it, the movie was enough
Hats off to WallStreetPrep for an excellent curriculum
https://www.thorne.com/products/dp/stress-bundle —> Thorne supplements are top-tier
My commute wasn’t much longer than friends who lived outside of Brooklyn. I still find that strange.
The Wayne Gretzky of Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, with a flagship gym just outside of New York’s financial district