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Underrated predictor of success: willingness to be low-status | Hacker News

news.ycombinator.com · 10,357 words · saved by 1 readers

As a bootstrapped founder when I was younger, even dating was awkward. People considered me to be quasi-unemployed, despite working 80 hours a week. It's really hard to do if you're thirsty for status. The issue with the bankers is that they’re trapped in a local maximum. A successful entrepreneur is probably the highest status role possible in modern society (think Zuckerberg, Bezos, Gates) maybe even rivaling POTUS. I don’t buy that entrepreneurs are not interested in status, they’re just making a longer term status play (and taking on more financial risk to do so). Look at “30 under 30” lists, accounts on Twitter and their bios, there’s massive amounts of status seeking there. I suspect the successful low status people are actually the standard devs/IT employees, not founders. An annoying part of this game is that it’s also high status to pretend you’re low status or that you don’t care about status (hence all the “I’m humbled to accept <high status achievement>”) Dating is always a

Folks in the status professions (banking, law,..) often tell me they want to become an entrepreneur. I always tell them, you wont do it. They attended the right school, joined the right firm, attained that corner office. As a founder they would give up all that, and their family and friends will tell them that they've made a massive mistake, for years, while it appears that nothing is happening. Then they sheepishly admit that this is true. As a bootstrapped founder when I was younger, even dating was awkward. People considered me to be quasi-unemployed, despite working 80 hours a week.…

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