People lie a lot. We lie so much that there’s even a term for good lies - we call them white lies while scientists call them prosocial lies.
You can read more about prosocial lies in this article entitled “What’s Good About Lying?”
Prosocial lies are “falsehoods told for someone else’s benefit, as opposed to ‘antisocial lies’ that are told strictly for your own personal gain.” Empathy and compassion are necessary for telling prosocial lies. You identity suffering (through empathy) in others and try to reduce or lessen that suffering (through compassion).
In every day life, I think lying to make someone feel better is fine. Our words have consequences so it is a good thing to be careful with what we say. Memory is a key component to telling white lies. We recall what happened when we said something a certain way before and it caused someone to get upset or hurt. So, we make some adjustments when a similar situation comes up.
In startup life, these kinds of prosocial lies are very destructive. It is not immediately noticeable as the lies seem innocent and seemingly not too consequential.
But, the white lies add up and eventually form into a mode of operating. White lies actually become desirable after it is accepted. Everything starts to get modified.
Magnitude and severity get increasingly difficult to measure. Urgency is harder to detect. Things get really blurred. How someone will feel takes priority over facts, root issues, and raw truths.
Things take longer to communicate. Misunderstandings are the norm. And, major problems take a long time to get resolved - but people are happier. Being happy has never saved a startup from closing shop.
For a startup, white lies are no different than cooked truths. Just as cooked books are bad (and illegal), cooked truths are almost always bad.
The main problem with prosocial lies is that once it becomes the accepted norm it lays the foundation for other types of lies to gradually spread.
People will lie about nearly everything. The CEO is told that a deal was lost because of shoddy follow up but the VP of Sales mentions that the buyer had a prior relationship with the sales head from a competitor.
A marketing manager will tell his boss that the contact database was already made current when the task has not even been started, yet. The VP of Marketing will review a draft of a newly written white paper and think that it is barely average but tell the technical writer or product marketing manager that it is “pretty good.”
The HR person is told to reach out to five people but only calls four of them for whatever reason but says, “I got in touch with everyone on the list.”
People lie on expense reports. They lie on performance reviews. They lie on activity updates. The lies just keep spreading. Eventually, people get very good at explaining the lies. It gets hard to even point out the lies.
A big company can withstand white lies. In fact, I would argue that it is almost a necessary trait for people who work at big companies.
Being polite is the default mode of communicating in large organizations. They call the delivery of bad or negative news, advice, or messages as a “shit sandwich” for that reason.
The packaging is almost as important as the content inside the package. Startups do not have time for all of this bullshit.
Large companies can afford to move slow and expend a great deal of resources on communications. That is why they hold so many meetings, write so many internal memos, and have a process for everything - including how to tell good lies.
They have ways to tell people that they are being terminated in a polite way. They have ways to tell entire teams that their performance is woefully inadequate in a polite way. They prioritize not demotivating people (ie, hurt feelings) over relaying facts and truths.
A startup has three main strengths when competing against larger competitors. First, the startup makes decisions faster. And, second, the startup is able to concentrate its limited resources into a small surface area through intense focus. Third, the startup is highly flexible and can pivot or make quick modifications in-flight.
All three of these advantages depend heavily on not wasting time on things such as being polite, ambiguous, or compassionate.
Problems take an extremely long time to fix when white lies exist at a startup. This is highly under-appreciated by first time founders or CEOs.
A startup moves a lot faster than big companies. A month that passes at a startup is the equivalent of two or three months for a large company that is generating operating income. This is due to burned time killing a startup but helping a large company.
The feedback loop must be a lot faster to take advantage of speed. And, the loops can be shorter when it is not weighed down by lies - whether it is a white one or not. All lies just create more communication roundtrips which, in turn, makes diagnostics take longer to complete.
A startup that is not fast is a startup that is doomed. White lies slow down a startup more than lazy people. And, white lies have no benefit at a startup. Big companies are slow and methodical so it actually benefits from politeness or polite lies.
Anyone who does not conform to politeness will stick out like a sore thumb. They will get hammered down. People get promoted for being “a pleasure to work with” because they are always “understanding, professional, and supportive.”
A startup is virtually fighting for life or death. All those empathetic and compassionate people can go tell each other white lies at the startup’s alumni picnic. Guess what? Failed startups do not have alumni groups much less picnics.
It is rare to hear a startup veteran say, “you know, our startup failed miserably but people were so nice and caring of one another. I’d love to work with them for another eight years at another new startup.”
More likely, they will think back and wished that “we did not lie to ourselves as much as we did or for as long as we did because we waited too long to make the necessary changes that could have made a difference.”
The best way to avoid people who tell white lies is to be upfront about it during the hiring process. Make it very clear to candidates that your startup values candor above all else.
Explain to everyone why your startup treats candor with such care. And, why candor must be protected by everyone at all times.
To exercise candor, the environment needs to be grounded in mutual trust, openness, and sincerity. Here is an example of how I would convey this message to a new hire:
We expect everyone to exercise candor. It means that we do not have patience for people who try hard to be polite or tell white lies to let hard truths, facts, or opinions land softly.
Candor is a competitive advantage for us because it protects speed and focus - the two main traits a startup relies upon to effectively compete against larger companies.
Candor is not just a product of trust and sincerity but trust and sincerity strengthen when candor is expected at all times.
Candor thrives when everyone trusts once another and speaks with sincerity. If trust and sincerity lacks, candor turns into a blunt force and loses its value. Thus, the CEO and executive team needs to set the example for others to follow.
No matter what people think there will be a low level of trust in the beginning. This is why so many founders hire people they have worked with in a prior company. Real trust forms over a long period of time through a high frequency of interactions (ie, proofs).
Therefore, one powerful way a startup can shorten this trust building process is to imbue its environment (when small) with a very high degree of candor. To do so, every member of the startup has to be open to everyone else. Openness is a critical requirement to making candor infectious.
If a person in IT does not feel comfortable providing input to a web marketing manager, he will either keep his mouth shut or walk on egg shells and wrap the input with so many disclaimers or apologies that the input is either hard to understand or gets misunderstood. It may even make others who expect directness get suspicious or defensive.
Here are three ways to get the same message across (approaches are labelled in parenthesis):
Bad: “I know it’s not my area but I have some experience with building web sites and I was wondering if you’d welcome my feedback on the recent micro site you guys just launched. I think the site looks amazing but there may be some additional ways I think you could make the site just a little bit easier to navigate.” (Polite)
Also Bad: “The navigation on the micro site is really clunky. It forces the visitors to figure out too many things on their own. We should really fix this problem.” (Blunt and Impolite)
Good: “I found the micro site to be more difficult to navigate than I anticipated. I have an idea on a couple modifications that can make navigation easier. Can I give you a quick call later today or tomorrow?” (Candid, Efficient, and Direct).
Which of the above methods of communicating is the most efficient and productive if speed and focus are your competitive advantages? Clearly, it is the last one.
You can get everyone to be direct without being insensitive. To do so, get everyone to understand why and how not exercising candor will weigh down everyone. And, do it upfront because a lot of people have to unlearn being polite over bring truthful.
This is especially true if you recruit someone with many years of experience working at a big company. Pay attention to how they talk during the job interview.
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