" So if Jason really believes this is a terrible problem and wants to set things on the right course"
Well you know that's not going to happen especially since he made this statement below:
"We have 35 employees at 37signals. We could have hundreds of employees if we wanted to--our revenues and profits support that--but I think we’d be worse off."
So he isn't simply saying that he feels he could expand his business and have "hundreds of employees". He is saying that his "revenues and profits" would support "hundreds of employees".
Think for a second how much profit you need to support "hundreds of employees".
I'll give him the benefit of the doubt that he was misquoted on that. If not, he's simply full of shit. This is BS to challenge Donald Trump.
First, 37signals has a large (for our field) in-house customer support team, so the mean fully loaded head count cost of a 37s employee is lower than the number you're thinking.
Second, I think you are underestimating just how profitable 37signals probably is. They have scaled a few tight products with high recurring revenue to a very large number of customers with a tiny team. I've worked at companies with hundreds of employees and knew their revenue numbers and the model 37signals is executing puts those numbers well within reach.
As an aside to this discussion: If they are actually that profitable it's a good idea to fly below the radar and resist making statements about how wildly profitable they are. Doing that might entice competitors to enter the same market and regardless of whether they succeed or not that could kill the goose.
Sometimes of course things are out in the open and it can't be avoided (lines at the restaurant or with public companies, or Oracle posting their 24x7 software support rates where a guy out of his house can do the math). Sometimes you want the publicity for one reason or another. But despite the openness of the internet there are still things that you want to keep to yourself lest everybody and their uncle decides to move into your neighborhood.
Well you know that's not going to happen especially since he made this statement below:
"We have 35 employees at 37signals. We could have hundreds of employees if we wanted to--our revenues and profits support that--but I think we’d be worse off."
So he isn't simply saying that he feels he could expand his business and have "hundreds of employees". He is saying that his "revenues and profits" would support "hundreds of employees".
Think for a second how much profit you need to support "hundreds of employees".
I'll give him the benefit of the doubt that he was misquoted on that. If not, he's simply full of shit. This is BS to challenge Donald Trump.