Several months prior, a tech blog had published an article announcing the analytics startup’s first major fund-raising round of ten million dollars. When asked how he would spend the new funding, the CEO made his priorities clear: he would pay the first hundred employees far above market, he said, and spoil current employees to retain them. This was the language of customer acquisition, but I didn’t know. I didn’t think at all about the stratification, either; how the hundred-and-first employee might feel. I’d never worked anywhere with a hundred people—I’d never worked anywhere with twenty. I’d certainly never worked anywhere that wanted to spoil its employees and had the means to do it. Generous, I thought. I found the tenacity winning.