I’m not sure why being very agenty would necessarily mean that starting your own company should be the best bet. Being an employee lets you reap the benefits of specialization and others having taken all the risks for you (most new companies fail), and can be a very comfortable if you can just find a position that lets you use your skills to the fullest. Then you can focus on doing what you actually enjoy, as opposed to having to spend large amounts of extra energy to running a company.
Yes—absolutely true. ‘Entrepreneurship’ requires a unique skill set, and like every other skill set, comparative advantage and division of labor apply. It’s entirely consistent to be a god of programming, relatively worse at entrepreneurship, and otherwise excellent at achieving your goals (agenty).
if you can just find a position that lets you use your skills to the fullest.
...
if you can just
I’m quite sure finding an ideal position somewhere in an organization that you agree with enough to stick to for the long term, and that motivates you regularly, and that lets you use your full skills, and that you actually enjoy (notice the conjunctive probabilities yet?), and that people would find you the best match, and that you can properly signal being the best match for…
...is nowhere near as simple or easy as that phrasing makes it sound like. I’d bet it actually reduces the chances of success and expected value or costs to around the same order of magnitude as starting your own business, in the current social environment and job market. Granted, some of the above usually correlates, but it’s still hard to find anywhere near a 50% match, let alone a position that one truly loves this much. Of course, I’m assuming the above is relevant and valued by the person being agenty, since they are for me. Different minds and wants might have better odds.
But I agree that being agenty doesn’t imply striking off on your own by any means. As has been repeated over and over again on LW, being rational, especially agenty-instrumentally-rational, implies winning, and if being a small member of a big group lets you achieve more both individually and as a group, clearly that’s what they would/should do.
This seems parallel to the problem E.Y. mentioned in one of the sequences about how a “rationalist” army shouldn’t run off with each person doing their own thing, and should actually be more organized than an army composed of a few smart leaders and a chain of dumb grunts. (I might be slightly misremembering the example, but most people here, especially if they’ve read the sequences, probably know what I’m talking about).
I’m not sure why being very agenty would necessarily mean that starting your own company should be the best bet. Being an employee lets you reap the benefits of specialization and others having taken all the risks for you (most new companies fail), and can be a very comfortable if you can just find a position that lets you use your skills to the fullest. Then you can focus on doing what you actually enjoy, as opposed to having to spend large amounts of extra energy to running a company.
Yes—absolutely true. ‘Entrepreneurship’ requires a unique skill set, and like every other skill set, comparative advantage and division of labor apply. It’s entirely consistent to be a god of programming, relatively worse at entrepreneurship, and otherwise excellent at achieving your goals (agenty).
...
I’m quite sure finding an ideal position somewhere in an organization that you agree with enough to stick to for the long term, and that motivates you regularly, and that lets you use your full skills, and that you actually enjoy (notice the conjunctive probabilities yet?), and that people would find you the best match, and that you can properly signal being the best match for…
...is nowhere near as simple or easy as that phrasing makes it sound like. I’d bet it actually reduces the chances of success and expected value or costs to around the same order of magnitude as starting your own business, in the current social environment and job market. Granted, some of the above usually correlates, but it’s still hard to find anywhere near a 50% match, let alone a position that one truly loves this much. Of course, I’m assuming the above is relevant and valued by the person being agenty, since they are for me. Different minds and wants might have better odds.
But I agree that being agenty doesn’t imply striking off on your own by any means. As has been repeated over and over again on LW, being rational, especially agenty-instrumentally-rational, implies winning, and if being a small member of a big group lets you achieve more both individually and as a group, clearly that’s what they would/should do.
This seems parallel to the problem E.Y. mentioned in one of the sequences about how a “rationalist” army shouldn’t run off with each person doing their own thing, and should actually be more organized than an army composed of a few smart leaders and a chain of dumb grunts. (I might be slightly misremembering the example, but most people here, especially if they’ve read the sequences, probably know what I’m talking about).