Shoes outside! Silicon Valley startups adopt desi habit

A viral photo from San Francisco has set social media abuzz — and no, it’s not AI generated. The image shows multiple pairs of shoes neatly lined up outside an office door. The location? Cursor, the AI startup founded in 2022 by four MIT alumni — Aman Sanger, Michael Truell, Sualeh Asif and Arvid Lunnemark.

Yes, you read that right. Employees are being asked to leave their shoes outside before entering the office. And Cursor isn’t alone.

Startups such as Replo, Spur, Speak, Flowhub and Composite are also encouraging staff to ditch their Vans and Uggs at the door. What sounds like a page out of an Indian household rulebook — “chappals bahar rakho” — is quietly becoming a trend in America’s tech capital.

According to an NYT report, workers at Spur, which uses AI to check websites for bugs, are given slides to wear inside their office in Manhattan, and guests are asked to do the same. Sneha Sivakumar, a co-founder and the chief executive, told NYT the no-shoes policy “makes it feel like a second home” for her 10 employees and “disarms you in a positive way”.

Growing up in an Indian family in Singapore, she often removed shoes in homes and temples to “show respect for a space.” That slippered employees don’t drag in dirt and mud from the street is a “plus point,” she said.

Nick Bloom, a Stanford economist who studies work culture, said the shoes-off trend was partly “the pajama economy in action”.

That is, now that people who worked from home during the pandemic are back in the office, they are bringing their home habits with them. Here’s the irony: while removing footwear is customary in Indian homes and temples, it’s rare — almost unheard of — in corporate offices.

Even in Bengaluru’s startup corridors, no one expects you to park your sneakers outside the glass door.