I can't know what's correct there, but I don't need to. Ultimately it comes down to was it a success or not, for a company this basically means does it exist and is it profitable. In the alternate universe where things are done differently it could be better or worse. My main point is that whether it's the right or wrong stubborn depends on your point of view. Now Paul Graham has been very successful in business, but even there you might have different businesses. People took different approaches and were still successful. And business is just a narrow part of life. So what's bothering me here is that there are broad generalizations that in most cases come down to your point of view. This could ironically be interpreted as the wrong kind of stubborn.
My experience, is that folks can't deal with "it depends." We have to have "hard and fast" rules, to be applied in all contexts.
Determining "it depends" almost always requires scars and contusions. Less-experienced folks often have a much more difficult time, making these decisions, than folks that have been around the track a few times.
The folks that decided to cancel that project were very highly-placed executives. It wasn't an easy decision. However, one of my mistakes, was underestimating just how obstinate and change-averse, the QA people could be, and how much real power they wielded. If I had accepted this, I maybe could have saved the project. It was a hard lesson, but one I learned well.
That corporation made some serious mistakes, mainly from being so risk-averse, that they allowed their competitors to eat their lunch, and suffered a pretty big implosion. I suspect that they will do OK, in the long run, but they took a real beating. Ironically, the reason they survived that drubbing, was because of their fiscal conservatism.
"Good judgment comes from experience. Experience comes from bad judgment."
