Newsletter #34: Shopify's Mastery system, post-exit founder stories, and angry Wikipedians

Hi there,

I hope you're feeling good.

I just came back from Miami. This vacation was an absolute delight. I’m very grateful for this time spent with my friends discovering new places.

While I was away, I received a message from Gadget, which enquired about sponsoring my newsletter. I already wrote about this company in edition 19, when their co-founders built a Shopify app in under 4 hours, so I’m happy that they’re sponsoring this edition.

Here is their message for you:

Join us for Gadget Launch Week!

We believe development should be fun, fast and friction-free, and from March 11-15, we're taking some major steps to get us closer to that vision. We'll be releasing new features every day to give Shopify app developers a full-stack, single-stack development experience that eliminates busywork and boilerplate code.

Sign up to be the first to hear what launches: https://bit.ly/49IaT0K

In today’s edition, we’re discussing Shopify's Mastery system, post-exit founder stories, and angry Wikipedians.

Let's dive in.

Work

You know me by now: I’m always thrilled to discover Shopify’s product updates. I like experimenting with them to see how they can help merchants in the most effective way.

But what I also enjoy is learning about the changes Shopify brings to the company itself.

In 2022, Shopify introduced Flex Comp to simplify the compensation process of their employees. This new system lets employees choose exactly how they want to allocate their total reward, between salary, restricted stock units (RSUs), and stock options, and adjust their preferences over time.

In 2023, Shopify cancelled all recurring meetings involving more than 2 people, and reinstated “meeting-free” Wednesdays.

I still remember this tweet from Tobi Lütke, CEO of Shopify:

In 2024, Shopify is shaking up the traditional setup of the “corporate ladder” and introducing a new system called the Mastery system.

This is what Shopify is addressing with the Mastery system.

Every 6 months, Shopify will reevaluate their employees’ mastery, based on:

• Craft excellence: a measure of the deep skills they possess and hone.

• Net impact: a measure of how successful they were in applying their craft towards the mission of Shopify.

If employees consistently demonstrate craft excellence and net impact, their mastery will increase and they will be promoted. These mastery promotions aim at becoming the most common and celebrated way to grow at Shopify.

In essence, employees won’t need to become managers to get promoted. They will be able to focus on the craft they love.

Whilst the idea is pretty clear, I wonder how this will be implemented within the company. I’m hoping that employees will share how they approached these changes and how they felt about them.

Learn more about Shopify’s Mastery system in its official video presentation.

Inspire

If I were to guess which word appears most frequently in my newsletter (after “Shopify” of course), I would say “entrepreneurs”.

I’m truly inspired by entrepreneurship, in all its forms.

I learn a lot by reading stories about how businesses are built, scaled, and sold.

Some entrepreneurs are happy that they sold their companies, and publicly write about it.

In 2009, Jason Cohen, who sold Smart Bear in 2007, published an interesting article titled “Rich vs. King in the Real World: Why I sold my company”. Selling his company fulfilled him.

There is also Brad Redding, founder of Elevar, who sold the company in January 2024.

Brad just published an inspiring piece called “Selling Elevar -- 17 Years in the Making”. He walked us through the entirety of his entrepreneurial journey: his first failed startup and how it taught him invaluable lessons that he carefully applied later at Elevar.

Brad’s experience is different from Jason’s as Brad is still a significant shareholder in Elevar and Buxton (the acquiring company). From his own words, they have “unfinished business to deliver to their customers” so it seems that he is not leaving the ship entirely.

On the other side, I have read stories about entrepreneurs who experienced their exit differently: selling their company for a life-changing amount left them disoriented, without a purpose, struggling with happiness and pressure to start something new.

For instance, in February 2024, Rox Codes published this Twitter thread where he explained that selling his company ThumbnailTest was “one of the most emotionally difficult times”. He had attached his “entire soul and self worth to this business”, which left him “feeling worthless”.

Alex Lieberman, co-founder of Morning Brew, summed up this topic really well in this tweet:

Ben Tossell, founder of Makerpad which was acquired by Zapier in 2021, noticed the same trend (perhaps he experienced it too?). So he decided to do something about it: he just launched Acquired Founders, a private community for acquired founders who are struggling with what's next.

This space, which requires a $500 entry fee, is dedicated to founders who made between $500K and $50M in an exit.

Discover more about Acquired Founders on their website.

Explore

Today, I’d like to share a Twitter thread that made me laugh a lot.

An internet genius gathered examples of how some Wikipedians get so sick of people making the same edits over and over that they'll add angry invisible comments that pop up when you try to make a change.

For instance, these angry Wikipedians got tired of:

• People trying to add the “é” on Beyonce

• People changing the official wikipedia dog photo to a picture of their own dog

• People trying to rename the "impact" section of Lana Del Rey's page to "legacy"

Read more in this funny Twitter thread.

Enjoy.

Thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for reading this edition until the end.

I'll talk to you soon.

Take good care of yourself.

Coralie