As an industry we're also pretty terrible at recruiting - people who've figured out how to network effectively and come through the side doors do pretty well, but the bulk of the industry still pursues the model of "see job ad, send resume through front door, quietly wait for call back". This adds to the frustration of job hunting.
Many people also find interviews extremely stressful - our industry makes this worse by sticking them through exhausting full-day marathons full of seemingly pointless trivia.
Not so long ago I was stuck in a horrible job with truly abusive managers. Everyone hated it and commiserated copiously after work (we drank a lot back then), and everyone talked about leaving. Out of the 20-odd people only 4 actually ended up leaving (including me).
When I asked people about it it was nearly universally about anxiety and fear. People loathe interviewing, applying, and all that, to a point where they're willing to put up with a lot of pain just to avoid it.
I just imagine how much BETTER those companies could be with more positive leadership though. It's a waste.
If Nest is this way under a tyrant, imagine how it really COULD be, and how many more interesting things they could create.
http://www.amazon.com/Why-Does-He-That-Controlling/dp/042519...
It's by a guy who was a counselor for abusive men, often ones attending therapy as part of a court order. It is the single most astute book I have read. He spent more than a decade listening to people's bullshit, and in this book he breaks it down brilliantly. Particularly relevant to you are the sections on how abusive relationships benefit abusers and why the abused stay so long.
Many people will allow themselves to be abused at work without doing anything about it. They'll commiserate with their coworkers, or vent on Glassdoor, or fantasize about leaving, but without ever following through.
So some good ones leave, and the rest get ridden hard and work on weekends and stay late to make their managers happy and rich.
Cribbing from that "book"- Destroy their sense of self-confidence & self-worth. Pick 'em young- they are easier to fool. Give them brief moments of sunshine to make them hope it'll get better. Promises. Threats. General megalomania.
The reason why Jobs and Fadell could be assholes and still succeed is because they were/are Jobs/Fadell. That doesn't mean you or I can act like assholes and still succeed. Perhaps we could be assholes after we succeed, but that's a highly unlikely hypothetical.
You can demand greatness without being an asshole.
You can tell someone the work they did isn't good enough without being an asshole.
You can also truthfully review someone's bad code without being an asshole, for what it's worth.
Being an asshole != "telling it like it is" though most people confuse the two.
This reminds me of an old quote.
"People who are brutally honest generally enjoy the brutality more than the honesty."
You tell someone something they don't want to hear, but need to hear, and you are now known as an asshole.
... but usually they're saying something that they want to hear themselves say.
I’ve seen it time and time again.. and then pushed out on social media to make the person that said it look like the bad guy...and since it’s usually one person against another, it’s impossible to defend.
This is why when the technology gets cheap enough, I will have a secret body cam on me at all times.
It’s already been proven many times that privacy no longer matters. Hell, a guy got an entire basketball team taken away from him based on private conversations.
Here's some advice, since you think you can take it. When striving to correct others: (a) Make sure you're actually correct (b) make sure you're doing it to reach a common goal, rather than to uplift yourself and (c) understand that a defensive reaction is not a weakness, it's an entirely normal human reaction, and try to empathize with the person as you deliver the hard news.
A lot of people think that others don't want to hear the truth, but it's not that. Most people want to know what's going on. What most people don't want to endure is the embarrassment of being wrong in front of someone -- which is an entirely different thing.
People get corrected on stuff all the time and take it in stride. It's when there is a blow to their ego or you're actually wrong that they get upset. So, you need to either make it clear it's not about them in particular (it usually isn't, hence the "common goal"), and even if it is, you need to make sure they know it's about making them better, not tearing them down. And, you have to be willing to consider counter-arguments -- that is, not pretend you are the sole arbiter of truth.
Bluntly stating an uncomfortable truth (or opinion!) with no quarter is not what people who seek the truth do, it is what people who want to be in control do.
So rather than develop the interpersonal skills that would allow you to say those kinds of things without sounding like an asshole, you're just going to secretly record everyone you run into (which is something that will solidify you as an asshole), and have this video record of you being an asshole to people.
"...you are now known as an asshole."
My personal opinion is that the answer lies in the more primitive parts of the brain. Investors, acquirers, and customers are all human beings, and as human beings they all respond to primate social dominance cues. Investors fund, acquirers acquire, employees perform for, and customers buy from aggressive dominant alpha males because... well... that's what the alpha wants you to do and your brain stem is telling you to obey them. They are pushing ancient buttons that way pre-date the neocortex.
Again, not universal, but there's a part two:
Some investors invest in these types not because they themselves are taken in, but because they know on average others will be. Could a more quiet, reserved, polite personality -- even a more intelligent one -- have managed to sell a simple cloud-connected thermostat for $3.2 billion dollars? Maybe, but statistically probably not.
This will remain true until we find a way to remove legacy code.
Lawrence Joseph Ellison has a reputation like that, and his company seems to have done OK.
Many successful companies are founded/led by sociopaths.
I've read supposed accounts where he sounded worse than Nest's management.