How to win in tech game
How many times I’ve read on LinkedIn about twenty-year-old tech entrepreneurs making fortunes in few years or VCs earning NBA money. But is this big, fat carrot of an exit really a right thing to have in mind?
Not Everyone Wins
As the saying goes, if you only hang around at the barbers long enough, you’ll eventually get a haircut. The truth I observed is opposite: a lot of people in tech don’t make much money. Fire sales, reputational exits, “founder salaries” that go on for years, quiet bankruptcies — they’re all part of the picture.
Many give more than they get. Even from purely statistic perspective, the unicorn land as painted on Insta is just not possible.
The Ceiling for Outsiders
Innovation ecosystems can be more often than not hierarchical and exclusive. Especially to get to “inner circles” might be intimidating.
Although some hobbyist billionaires always can just buy their way in, it’s actually overall a good thing because:
Reputation usually comes from real achievements — great products built, transactions.
Hard, smart work gets rewarded. No one cares about your background, your degree, or your accent. It’s a pragmatic game, and mostly fair.
Working in a great startup or VC fund helps as well. It isn’t just a résumé boost — it’s actual currency. These are intense, accelerated environments where people grow fast, and where the talent gap becomes brutally clear.
Yes, we sometimes overworship the logo: the 17th employee at GitHub or the 150th at Google often raises money faster than someone truly brilliant who just lacks brand-name backing. But overall again, it’s rather clear rules game.
The Quiet winners
It is hard to get there, it always takes time and the success is rare. But isn’t that the case with everything worth pursuing?
Many (most?) people I know in tech, work in this space out of passion. They have their goals, quiet drive, take risks and responsibility, stay accountable, reliable.They don’t make noise, they don’t chase the spotlight, but I guess they keep the system running.
The quality of their process is not necessarily always connected with the outcome, borrowing clumsily from Annie Duke.
That to me is a key to success in the tech game. To focus on how I think, decide, behave. To control what I can - discipline, attitude, values. Great financial outcome might come or might not. But it’s actually secondary.
I believe this is a secret of true winners of this game. Even if not with largest exits, than usually with pretty damn good lives.
