I understand nepotism. I even see its value in many successful, generational businesses where the owners want to leave a lasting impact on their community and impart a value-based mission on future generations (especially in an industry like construction that is super regional and reliant on a name being on the building).
But lose all of those "pros" by moving to another industry, like software - an industry that explicitly does not care "who is your daddy and what does he do?" - and all you're left with is the paranoia, imposter syndrome, entitlement, and forced notions of "loyalty" that fester and can plague a meddling "family" company.
Make no mistake about it. Tenna was the brainchild of a mid-2010s software company mentality. Its express purpose was to grow fast and earn a substantial return at a high multiple that would diversify the family's holding company. The problem is it hasn't - and likely won't - in the near future. The TAM is too small, the market too myopic, the initial financial investment so incredibly high and mismanaged that the hot potato "find the greater fool" investment theses are all but gone from the heady days of the early 2020s and won't work to save Tenna. The ship, as they put it, has sailed. And the winners have (somewhat) been announced. Many years ago.
So the reality is that everyone rowing, and really committing themselves to the success of the business, never actually feels like they're succeeding or progressing. Because when you're spending $1 to make 75 cents how do you not feel like a bit of a failure? And this attitude pervades the company - being forced from the top down. Even those born on third and only making it halfway home still know where they're at - even if it's always somebody else's fault...
And since it's a family company - even after a decade - "everyone else" is the problem. The engineering team, the product team, the sales team - they're either not committed enough or can't be trusted to deliver against an objective. And top leadership is RIGHT to be paranoid about that. It's been a story of calamitous hires and misdealing from the jump. But where many would become contemplative and self-confident enough to say: "hey, what is the one constant that has put in this place ten years later," the obvious answer is never said aloud. They double down on their own self-confidence - they are the smartest guys in the room, they have to be, it's been proven by these other generational companies that have worked. Hell, it's their name on the wall. But the cash still bleeds, and the strategic alternatives narrow, and the pain that comes with an aging technology becomes more and more apparent.
And the micromanagement, fear, anger, and sadness grow and intoxicate the labor with filth.
And welcome new hire! You're the one who gets to deal with it. It'll show up in the normal places, the basic ego management that comes with a company that values paranoia and mistrust as its core values: the computer tracking, the "let me call you from my personal phone" asks from the sales team, the "Eye of Sauron" allegories from recent survivors of the "direct management style". But then it's also going to show up in places you least expect - the holdovers from the family's other companies having breakdowns because they're just trying to stay afloat, the nervous eye rolls from anyone that has been there more than 5 years, the accepted disrespect and talking down to that is not contextualized and just chalked up to "East Coast directness". Yet, only 25% of quota bearing reps hit target, product windows come and go without a second thought, and funny financials keep running amok.
And the holdover employees don't realize that this is NOT NORMAL. The total lack of self awareness, lack of accountability, and lack of levity from leadership is NOT NORMAL. Great leaders communicate the truth, the hard truth, and start with how they've failed. Empathetically and authentically. And acknowledge that they're part of the problem!
But they can't break the cycle because their minions have learned to reflect it - in a lot of cases it's all they know. So it must be OK because they've got followers - so the continuous feedback loop of "cruddy attitudes losing money" never ceases to stop.
So the halls of Tenna are littered with volumes of work that will never see the light of day. Operational playbooks and spreadsheets and half-brained-solutions that whole seasons and years were used to build, edit, present and go back and rewrite because that's what was expected and directed. Broken people and family members so lost in their careers they don't know how to get out and are only motivated to pull everyone down with them.
And you know what? They're not wrong. It's their business. They can do whatever they want.
But you dear reader need to remember: It's your career. And you deserve somewhere better.
