28. Jason Fried, Co-founder/CEO of 37signals

This week, we were lucky to talk to Jason Fried, co-founder and CEO of 37signals (the company behind Basecamp and HEY) and a co-author of Rework, Remote and a few other books.

👉 Full show notes with links: https://www.metacastpodcast.com/p/028-jason-fried 👉 Our book about starting a podcast: https://bit.ly/metacast-book 👉 Metacast merch: https://merch.metacastpodcast.com

Segments

• [02:07] Introduction of Jason and 37signals 
• [04:28] Founder role vs. CEO role 
• [07:27] Working with the same co-founder for 20 years 
• [10:00] Disagreements between founders 
• [12:21] Disagree and commit principle 
• [14:04] The business side of things (numbers, accounting, etc.) 
• [17:07] On costs and profitability 
• [19:51] Intentionally keeping the company small 
• [22:51] Managing risk 
• [25:01] Jeff Bezos’ investment 
• [31:24] Working on several products at the same time 
• [32:21] Six-week cycles vs. long-term projects 
• [37:40] Evolution of 37signals 
• [43:35] Keeping products until the end of the Internet 
• [46:18] Calm companies 
• [47:28] Listening to customer feedback 
• [53:15] Jason's email is public. Is this a good idea? 
• [56:57] Employee performance reviews and fixed salaries 
• [58:35] Can the "calm company" mindset work in big companies? 
• [01:04:41] How does one find a calm company to work for? 
• [01:06:36] Publishing books 
• [01:09:28] On being contrarian and no politics at work 

We’re always happy to hear back from our listeners, so don’t hesitate to drop us a note at hello@metacastpodcast.com. Subscribe to our newsletter where we announce new episodes, publish key takeaways, and ramble about interesting stuff at https://www.metacastpodcast.com.