Advice
Decide and Do
The best things in life happened to me when I invested in myself, backed myself and stepped into the mystery without procrastinating. If you are going to do something, and it feels right then do it quickly.
Use the four cardinal virtues to think through a decision: Prudence is the base, followed by justice, fortitude, and temperance. THEN GO!
Cheap and Expensive
Don’t go cheap if you buy these things.
Cheap gets expensive really fast:
- Mattresses
- Shoes
- Teapot
- Wifi / Mobile data
- Tax advice
- Used cars
- Car tires
- Vaccines
- Frying pans
- Sushi
- Airline tickets with multiple connections
- Airport hotel rooms
It’s not a zero sum game
It’s so much more energizing rooting for someone to succeed than hoping they fail.
Win and help others win is a simple and joyful way to go through life.
Spending time on the wrong stuff
I’ve worked at small, fast-growing companies, large, slowly dying companies, and monolithic ones so big that no one person knows anything.
At dying companies, you spend a lot of time trying to figure out why something ISN’T working.
- Why is the revenue going down
- Why are customers complaining
- Why are employees leaving for other jobs
- Why aren’t we growing
You run experiment after experiment, and nothing moves the needle. Then you spend the next four weeks optimizing the same failed experiment. Small, insignificant wins are celebrated and then, two weeks later, forgotten. Instead of working on new things, most of the time is spent protecting the status quo. All this busy work is like rearranging the deck chairs on the titanic.
At fast growing companies, the bulk of your “data analysis” is spent trying to figure out why new features worked SO WELL.
- Why did customer numbers double again
- Why is revenue up again
- Why are all the metrics up this month when it was flat this time last year
- Why did we beat the budget again
At fast growing companies customers are your secret sales team as they refer your product to their friends. Happy customers also offer up great product ideas and they use your product in ways you never intended. It’s fun, exciting and fluid.
Take a breath, and ask yourself. Where are you spending your time at work? Is it busy work or are you holding on for dear life as the product grows.
Trust me; it doesn’t have to be that hard. I’ve seen a lot of brilliant people grind themselves down in slow-growth companies , while mediocre folks have found a winning growth company, buckled up, and been successful.
Zombies in boom town
The next few years will be a time of massive growth for the economies around the world. My lesson after the 2008 recession was to make sure I was in the right company to ride out the boom times. Hard work, persistence and integrity are table stakes. 99% of your success over the next 5 years will depend on the company you choose.
It’s mostly about being in the right place at the right time, but you gotta make your luck and get yourself well positioned to partake.
Some companies will thrive as business travel springs back, tech hubs emerge because of remote work, and new software is built to support changes in the way we work and play.
Geopolitics won’t be the same in 2022 as businesses and consumers shift away from China as a consequence of COVID.
Weaker companies will die as they get eaten up by the faster-growing new competition.
Other companies will limp along like zombies, the equivalent of the walking dead. These zombie companies will trudge and decay over time as all the good people leave to start their own things or get poached. It’s a slow death, and a lot of loyal employees will rot in the carcass.
Choose wisely over the next 6 months. Hitch your wagon to a thriving company that’s attracting smart and motivated people riding the new growth wave.
There will be a massive opportunity cost if you consciously or unconsciously decide to ride out the boom in a zombie company. It’s probably better to be in a business that implodes quickly because it’ll force you to make a move.
There is a tide in the affairs of men
Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune;
Omitted, all the voyage of their life
Is bound in shallows and in miseries.
On such a full sea are we now afloat,
And we must take the current when it serves,
Or lose our ventures.
Shakespeare
More waves are on the way
I went surfing with a buddy on Saturday afternoon. Weekend sessions are always packed with all sorts, from weekend warriors to seasoned surf dogs, so I had low expectations when it came to catching many waves on a crowded beach break. I intended to surf with a friend, get wet, and maybe catch a few waves.
I noticed another surfer picking up a lot of waves. He was relaxed and chatting with his friends in between sets. He was chill and always in the right place for a quick little wave, which meant his wave count was much higher. I ended up paddling next to him as a bigger set wave took shape in front of us. We both looked at each other, and then he smiled at me and told me to go for it. Based on where I was sitting in the lineup, it was my wave, but it was still a cool and casual gesture from someone confident enough to know that more waves were on the way. His bucket was full.
Make a point of hanging out with people who have a full bucket. They are the people who know when enough is enough and aren’t desperately trying to hold onto things and constantly taking.
Companies can be a bit like this as well. In a tight job market, watch out for companies that will do anything to make you stay. Work with people who are quietly confident and happy to help, whether it’s working together or getting you set up for your next move. The top performers at the most exciting companies know there are more waves on the way.
No points for difficulty
“The interesting thing about business, it’s not like the Olympics. You don’t get any extra points for the fact that something’s very hard to do. So you might as well just step over one-foot bars, instead of trying to jump over seven-foot bars.”
Warren Buffett
I wish I’d heard and taken this advice earlier in my start-up career. Hanging around too long and slogging through a company that’s going nowhere has a massive cost. It’s like running up a big sand dune – the faster you run, the more energy you burn with no progress.
The one upside of working on a difficult problem is the friendships and lifelong bonds you made with your team. I know friendships and connections can’t be measured monetarily, but a strong network of comrades who have built together and fought to keep a company afloat is priceless and endures. Applying that grit and experience to a fast-growing company, later on, can yield amazing results.
the dog stars
The book is set in beautiful Colorado amidst a brutal post apocalyptic America. It was written in 2012 but the themes are familiar. A flu similar to Covid-19 has decimated the population to the verge of an extinction event. It’s like the rapture has occurred and now it’s about surviving amongst the survivors.
Places like Erie, Boulder, the Flatirons, Grand Junction and Denver all have guest appearances.
It’s a blend of Stephen King’s The Road, Jack Krakauer’s Into The Wild and David Thoreau’s Life in the Woods.
The upside down world
Why do maps always show the north as up? Here’s a change of perspective 🙂
Source: https://www.flickr.com/photos/takapprs_flickr/4759921794
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