It’s a match made, well, somewhere. I have lived it recently as an occasional writer employed by one of many startups in this technology haven.

Of our fewer-than-twenty people, a handful have salaries and accrue equity. The rest of us are gig workers. I am paid $3 for each short writing assignment. Of course, if our business takes off, the gig folks who contributed to the success will receive additional compensation. That’s obvious, right? Of course that will happen! They just haven’t worked out the details yet.

Though the pay rate per assignment is low, the hourly pay rate is sweatshop grade due to uncompensated work–online meetings, suggested readings, training exercises. The founders, all very enthusiastic and, for the most part, youngish and buckish, knew we would be Fascinated to learn more, and we would Benefit, so it’s not really Exactly uncompensated. The Upside of being an Insider is Unlimited.

At a recent meeting, we learned that the strategy for 2018 is to follow the technology-sales hybrid playbook to develop the everyday habits we need to succeed. These are best-in-class sales habits that we execute every single day.

An actual org chart appeared. Each person was directed to notice which swim lane he or she should be in, yet to realize there is no reason to be completely siloed. We will replicate the positives of best-in-class companies by being unbelievably data-driven, and the most operationally disciplined in the world. That means a laser focus on operational discipline. Hyper operational discipline.

The process presentation was a series of vague bullets indicating that each person would need to completely understand all the touch-points across any given process, when those are available. Processes are location agnostic, and create a flywheel of, well pretty much anything. Productivity? Hyper-efficiency? Bloviation?

Our goal is to be a wild success. That was good to hear. I am pretty sure no one else will think of it, or anything else we covered.

I am not omitting as much substance as you may imagine.

After the meeting, I decided to withdraw my services before the next round of uncompensated activities. If the company hits it big, it won’t be the first tech train that has bypassed me in my career. Meanwhile, my annoyance meter is significantly lower.