Ask Questions, Allocate Resources, Keep One Voice

Editing is more than deleting. Editors clarify by asking questions, and Rabois insists on consistency: ask the same questions of the same kinds of work no matter who brings it to you. People compare notes. If your bar moves depending on who's in the room, you don't have a bar.

Editors also allocate resources. A newspaper editor moving journalists from the sports desk to a breaking story is doing the same thing a founder does by shifting engineers from a pet feature to the funnel that's leaking. Where people sit is the strategy, whatever the slide deck says.

Finally, the company should read like it was written by one voice. Not because the founder wrote everything, but because the standards are so internalized that anyone's memo, launch, or decision sounds like the company. That's editing succeeding.