Why Wanting to Do Everything is a Red Flag for Startup Partners

In early startup days, have you ever been told:

This sounds like praise, but the myth behind it is treating "versatility" as "efficiency."

In early startups, the most expensive thing isn't not knowing how to do something, but cutting limited attention into fragments,

finally everyone's super busy, busy for nothing, but no one's pushing the most critical milestones.

Today's story is about how Instagram initially wanted to do everything, and no one paid attention.

When someone always wants to learn and take on others' work too, this isn't necessarily ambition—often it's a warning sign in management and collaboration.

You Think They're Filling Gaps, Actually Creating Execution Debt

Startups' scarcest resource isn't manpower, but "high-quality decisions" and "continuous delivery rhythm."

If everyone in a team wants to be capable of everything, they usually step into three pitfalls.

First pitfall: Attention gets fragmented, critical path has no owner. Early products' biggest fear isn't being slow, it's being chaotic.

When everyone crosses over to do others' work, a very typical phenomenon appears:

Everyone's moving, but critical tasks' owners are unclear, finally becoming "looks very hardworking" but "delivery is erratic."

Second pitfall: Division of labor gets eroded, trust costs explode.

Division of labor's value isn't saving time, it's reducing communication friction.

When someone frequently intervenes in modules they're not responsible for, original processes start showing hidden costs:

Alignment, rework, passive waiting, version conflicts. Most terrifying is, finally no one dares to let go,

because you're never sure if what you hand over will be changed beyond recognition by others.

Third pitfall: Unclear authority and responsibility, finally becomes a political problem.

"I want to do it too" looks like learning on the surface, actually often a power probe.

Because in startups, people who can decide direction are often those holding core modules. When someone keeps trying to take others' plates, conflict is almost inevitable.

So, wanting to do everything isn't passion, it's a very expensive way to collaborate.

Instagram's Key Lesson: Not Adding Things, But Deleting Things

A more classic "Less is more" case is Instagram's predecessor Burbn.

Burbn initially was a Foursquare-style location check-in app, lots of features, check-ins, plan meetups, various social mechanisms, could also share photos. The problem was, more features, less users wanted to use it, product became very cluttered. (The Atlantic)

Kevin Systrom later said very directly in interviews, they arrived at Instagram's answer, not by "making it more complex," but by "removing features." They said they deleted features from Burbn until only the core remained, then found Instagram's direction. (Tim Ferriss)

Some reports even described them cutting almost all other Burbn features, only keeping photos, comments, likes and other core interactions, plus filters, and using extremely simplified operations to make sharing very smooth. The most practical insight for entrepreneurs from this story isn't "you need to know how to pivot," but: Your real growth often isn't maxing out the skill tree, but daring to cut unnecessary things, making the entire system controllable, replicable, scalable.

In other words, Burbn became Instagram not because the team suddenly became more versatile, but because they focused on one thing: what do users care about most, where should the team put resources.

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So Where Exactly is "Wanting to Do Everything" a Red Flag?

Putting Burbn's lesson back into partner collaboration, you'll see the same structural problem:

When someone wants to do everything, it usually means they haven't made real trade-offs.

Startups need "bet more accurately," not "learn more." Especially early on, every non-critical task you do is weakening your mainline speed, and also increasing communication friction, finally producing a bunch of what you think is effort, actually debt—Execution Debt.

I'm not against learning, I even strongly support entrepreneurs consciously filling ability gaps. The problem is the method.

You can fill gaps, but don't use "taking others' work" to fill them.

You can cross domains, but use "clear boundaries" to cross.

You can learn fast, but don't use "disrupting team rhythm" to prove you're strong.

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For People Looking for Startup Partners: Do / Don't

Do

• Do clearly define owner and deliverables: who makes decisions, who delivers, who reviews. This isn't process obsession, it's speed.
• Do prove ability with "deliverables": want to learn frontend is fine, but prove it with side projects, weekend demos, or clearly separated small modules, not directly meddling in others' mainline.
• Do guard your own front first, then talk expansion: people who can make their responsible area into stable output are the team's real accelerators.

Don't

• Don't treat "I want to do it too" as collaboration chemistry: passion without boundaries always becomes others' burden.
• Don't use learning as reason to interfere with others' processes: you're learning, they're delivering. Both matter, but rhythms should be separate.
• Don't believe in versatility: early stage's strongest aren't people who can do everything, but people who know what they should and shouldn't do.

True Maturity is Daring to Give the Stage to the Most Suitable Person

The Analects say: "The superior man is devoted to fundamentals. When the foundation is established, the Way will grow."

Put in startup management context: first stabilize the most critical core business, other abilities will grow, and grow in the right places.

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