MacInnis: Silicon Valley's 'never quit' ethos is bullshit designed to serve VCs
Matt McGinnis · “I deliberately understaff every project” | Leadership lessons from Rippling’s $16B journey · Dec 28, 2025 · at 44:29
Matt McGinnis, CPO of Rippling and former founder of Inkling, discusses startup failure and venture capital alignment with Lenny Rachitsky.
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“We talk in Silicon Valley about never quit, but that is complete absolute venture capital bullshit. The incentive of venture capitalist is to put money into your company and milk you dry. They never get their money back. There is no way for them to take that investment back. And so the only logical desire that they would have is for you to keep trying. Against all odds, because there is the occasional example where someone pivoted from A to X and it was wildly different and it worked.”
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“And so that's the way we work at Rippling. Everyone is constantly asking for more resources. And of course, where we can afford to and where it's appropriate, new resources arrive. But it is really important to me that we feel that we've deliberately understaf…”