This hits close to home, but unfortunately Occam’s Razor will get applied.
It’s an unfortunate reality that engineers (not their managers) are responsible for knowing how to handle themselves in the worst of situations so they don’t become the scapegoat at the cost of their health and security. Trust me, I’ve been through this situation and have been burned out by the [apparent] low standards and [apparent] double standards.
The prodigal charismatic leader can save the day but become a crutch too much relied on. And I get it, with all the shit we deal with in life, things ought to work out that way. But eventually that leader won’t be there for you (or even in the picture at all) and you’ll be in big trouble, especially if you spent many years relying on them for help.
Working remote for a high pressure early stage startup is a good recipe for this kind disaster if you aren’t great at managing stress or conflicts at work.
I'm going through this at the moment at a startup...
I thought I could count on the charismatic leader to save my bacon by only calling on them for help when when things are visibly on fire and my own minor charisma hasn't been enough. In the end the leader didn't show up and now I've got a HR complaint against me for following up consistently when the fire didn't get put out. The whole thing has been fairly stressful because I'm struggling to understand the particular social dynamics, my best guess is it's just power protecting power, but I am naive/delusional enough to want to believe there is more to it. Now I'm taking a month off from work to try and unwind a bit.
All of that was just a long way of saying that you never know when you'll need to call on your stress/conflict managing skills, so best to keep them sharp at all times. I thought my skills were already good, but that was quickly revealed as false when challenged by tougher opponents :).
It’s an unfortunate reality that engineers (not their managers) are responsible for knowing how to handle themselves in the worst of situations so they don’t become the scapegoat at the cost of their health and security. Trust me, I’ve been through this situation and have been burned out by the [apparent] low standards and [apparent] double standards.
The prodigal charismatic leader can save the day but become a crutch too much relied on. And I get it, with all the shit we deal with in life, things ought to work out that way. But eventually that leader won’t be there for you (or even in the picture at all) and you’ll be in big trouble, especially if you spent many years relying on them for help.
Working remote for a high pressure early stage startup is a good recipe for this kind disaster if you aren’t great at managing stress or conflicts at work.