I don't think people do their best work when stressed out, or worried. But a little bit of fear is healthy.

I've worked in places where The Fear, as I call it, was absent. I doubt most departments at Google have The Fear today; who's their competition? They're busy arguing over what to have for lunch, where to hold the offsite, or whether building killer robots is ethical.

Whereas at some startup, some developer is working like hell to stave off an outage. They got to work at 8 this morning, worked all the way through dinner, and are back at the office; it's 10:50pm and they could really use a break. Competitors are nipping at their heels, and the next round of funding is no sure thing. The whole company might end tomorrow—pack it up, go home, WFIO.

The Fear keeps people sharp. It inspires a sense of urgency.

Key questions: (1) how much of The Fear is optimal, and, (2) how to avoid losing it, after achieving a measure of success?

In tech, complacency kills. From day 1, the dev team at Crittercism had no urgency. I realized it when my teammates would break to do the New York Times crossword mid-afternoon while I was busting ass trying to close tickets. I couldn't change it because I was a a grunt, but it still drove me nuts. Microsoft didn't have The Fear when I worked there, either.