Tech culture glorified round-the-clock execution over clever ideas.

Evidence

Nowhere was the grind mindset more celebrated than in the tech world. Yahoo! CEO Marissa Mayer famously attributed Google’s success to its early employees’ grueling 130-hour workweeks. There were no weekends or holidays in the grind; tireless execution trumped clever ideas. Upon visiting a coworking space run by her husband, Mayer said, “If you go in on a Saturday afternoon, I can tell you which startups will succeed, without even knowing what they do.” Silicon Valley became a cult of self-improvement, with engineers trading their schlubby 1980s archetype for slim physiques, North Face vests, and a constant search for “hacks” to improve their lives. The stakes were enormous: Where Wall Street promised six-figure bonuses for twenty-hour workdays, Silicon Valley dangled the prospect of billions through IPOs or acquihires. — W. David Marx, Blank Space, 316

Categorization

• ADDENDUM: Relevant to ‘On Sacrifice’ only loosely — but the grind culture critique here connects to the class/status signaling dynamics in ‘Complaints About Immodesty Go Way Back’ as a form of status display through self-denial.