Worst Advice Ever

Overview of the Video’s Absurd Anecdote

The video tells an absurd anecdote (as described by the creator) about a CEO presenting to ~50 employees. Supposedly, the CEO’s slide deck contained only four words:

• “remember to not smile.”

The presenter sets up the scenario like a motivating business update, but instead the CEO orders employees to suppress smiles. An employee then asks what it means, and the creator frames the whole story as ridiculous—especially because the CEO is allegedly representing a docs/self-hosted documentation company, where the mission and culture don’t seem to match such a grim directive.

The Creator’s Core Argument: “Don’t Smile” Is Misguided

The creator argues that the premise of “don’t smile” as a productivity/work-hardness strategy is misguided—particularly for employees rather than owners.

While the creator acknowledges that hard work and sacrifice (even staying late—like “until 4:00 a.m.”) can be necessary to ship great products, they claim that long-term sustainability requires joy, connection, camaraderie, and morale. Expecting employees to be relentlessly grim and discouraged, they say, undermines motivation instead of building a healthy, winning culture.

“Playing Not to Lose” vs. “Playing to Win”

The video critiques the mindset as “playing not to lose” rather than “playing to win.” The creator claims that focusing on avoiding negative outcomes—or suppressing positive emotion—creates a defensive, fear-driven approach. In contrast, true drive comes from:

• fun
• ambition
• enthusiasm

They reinforce this personally by describing years of intense work across roles (including content creation and a prior job), saying they only endured it through fatigue by staying positive and smiling.

Kipchoge as a Smiling Under Pressure Example

To support the claim that smiling correlates with harder work, the video references marathon runner Eliud Kipchoge, portrayed as running with a smile—even through extreme pain. The creator adds that training programs have modeled themselves on Kipchoge and found benefits, concluding that:

• joy is a “secret weapon”
• being told not to smile is harmful

Closing Takeaway: “Remember to Smile”

The segment ends with a more motivational message: the creator reiterates that people should remember to smile, framing it as valuable for the modern ability to build complex things faster (with less technical friction). The creator jokingly calls it “smile-ogen.”

Presenters or Contributors Mentioned

• The video narrator / speaker (creator; name not given in the subtitles)
• Travis Kalanick (referenced as the source of a marathon-running metaphor on a podcast)
• Eliud Kipchoge (referenced as the marathon runner who smiles while running)
• Josh (mentioned by name; context unclear)
• Tij (mentioned as appearing in a photo during a sponsored segment; context unclear)
• Elliot (referenced in the subtitles; exact role unclear due to auto-generation)
• Tij / Josh / Elliot / Jason?: The subtitles reference Elliot and Josh, but the exact roles are ambiguous due to auto-generated captions.