Sam Altman on the #1 mistake great founders make

August 10, 2023

“The #1 mistake that great founders make is waiting too long to fire bad people.”

In the clip below, Sam explains that he doesn’t believe this is a learnable lesson—”you’re just going to have to make the mistake and learn it.” But it is the universal biggest mistake that otherwise great founders make.

Firing people is the worst part of running a company. You made a hiring mistake and now you have to really negatively impact someone’s life because of that.

A lot of great founders will think they can fix the situation by devoting more time to it, but as Sam points out:

“You actually hurt the employee more by keeping them in the position for longer.”