Archives for 2022

It’s often discussed that investors are more willing to invest in an entrepreneur who has failed before, rather than one who is starting a business for the first time.

This is because the entrepreneur who has failed has felt pain. They’re battled hardened. They know what mistakes to avoid. These things—in theory—make them more likely to succeed, and increase the probability investors make money on their investment.

I was surprised today though to read about WeWork Founder Adam Neumann’s recent fundraise from a16z, the most prestigious venture capital firm in the world.

Neumann failed. Big time. Under his leadership, WeWork raised $21 billion, and its current market capitalisation is $4 billion.

Yet a16z was willing to write their biggest cheque ever, at $350 million, to fund Neumann’s new residential real estate company focused on rentals. Neumann’s new company is now valued at over $1 billion, and it hasn’t even commenced operations yet.

I don’t get it. At all.

This is one of those posts where I publish, and will likely return to in a year or two.

Let’s see how things shake out.

I’m in the midst of a prolonged sprint towards an important deadline at work.

It’s been all consuming in a tools-feel-light kind of way.

I realised though that when I sit down to write my daily post, a lot of the same lessons are floating around in my head.

Many of them are just different flavours of: do the basics well, avoid unforced errors, begin drawing, everything is a trade-off, taking things bird-by-bird, and always be the note taker.

This period is an opportunity to steep myself in these lessons, and to methodically practise them so I can get better.

Have you experienced something similar?

We don’t have foxes in New Zealand. I read about them in stories, but I’d never seen one in real life until I moved to London.

Maru and I stayed in a few AirBnbs before we found our first London flat, and one of those looked out onto a garden with a shed. Each day a fox would curl up on the roof of the shed and nap quietly in the afternoon sun. I used to enjoy watching it out the window whilst I was preparing for job interviews. It felt like a furry companion that was helping me settle into a new city.

We now see foxes slinking around our neighbourhood, and are sometimes woken up by their screeches in the middle of the night. Each time I see them, I’m reminded simultaneously that I’m far from home, and that I’ve chosen to make a home in a new place.

Red Fox reminder.

With a bowling ball in hand, everyone goes for the strike.

It’s the best result, right? So why wouldn’t you go for it?

But there are many things that come before a strike.

Finding a ball that’s the right size and weight. Having the right shoes. Practising your run up to the lane. Looking where you want the ball to go. Avoiding the gutter.

Focusing only on the strike risks mistakes, and there are many points on the table for reliable players who get the basics right.

The logic applies for ten pin bowling, and many other sports, projects, and objectives.

We can wait for news, or hunt down the information we need.

We can wait for someone to suggest an improvement, or introduce the change now.

We can wait for the emergency, or run a drill so folks are prepared.

We can always wait.

But there’s always another, often better, option.

The London Underground is an impressive beast.

More than 1 billion journeys take place on it each year. The longest journey you can take without changing trains is 54 kilometres. Waterloo station alone has over 23 escalators and sees over 100 million passengers per year.

With that in mind, what do you think of when you see this sign?

Sometimes the product, the service, the challenge is so large, complex, and difficult, that just keeping the train on the tracks and moving forward is a feat to be celebrated.

Obvious to who?

The person with more experience? 

The person who “just gets this stuff”.

The person who attended the training?

Much of the world and its complexities are non-obvious.

Dropping the use of the word “obvious” can help people feel safer and more included within a team.

Andrew shared a fascinating thread about how to have a friend group in your 30s and beyond, and I really liked it.

As people get older, life experiences diverge, kids take up a lot of time, and jobs take people to far off places.

It’s really hard to have and maintain a friend group with all this other stuff happening.

However, there are two things that make having a friend group easier: 1) a gathering place, and 2) a shared activity.

The best gathering place is someone’s home. Restaurants and cafes are too public, and it’s hard to do anything other than talk and eat in them.

A shared activity could be anything from eating good food, to playing sport, to watching a favourite TV series. As long as it is something the group enjoys doing.

Friend groups also shouldn’t be exclusive. Let’s leave that stuff back in high school. We should proactively invite new people. Don’t worry about them liking or not liking the shared activity; just invite them and then let them decide.

It’s inspired me to take stock and think about how I can be a bit more deliberate in this area of my life.

There are rarely easy answers.

Everything is a trade-off.

Most information is imperfect.

The “optimal” option may just be the “least bad” one.

People will get upset.

And yet, when we acknowledge the above, it’s easier to lift our chin, push our shoulders back, and approach the problem with a calm, clear-eyed perspective.

Can be caused by under thinking and over thinking.

By both impulsiveness and inertia.

By overconfidence and a lack thereof.

A bit of balance goes a long way.

If you plan like:

• There will be more traffic,
• You’ll take a wrong turn,
• Someone will need a bathroom break,
• You’ll run out of gas, or
• Someone will get car sick

You’ll bake in buffer time for the journey.

It works for both road trips and other large undertakings.

Our worries can fall into one of two categories:

1. Worries that will matter in the long run

2. Worries that won’t

This simple categorisation should lead to lighter shoulders.

I’ve been reflecting on this Picasso quote: “To know what you are going to draw, you have to begin drawing.”

A plan with perfect grammar is fine.

But it alone won’t get us where we need to go.

We need to start, and figure it out as we go along.

I wrote years ago about ‘Bird by Bird’ by Anne Lamott, one of my favourite books.

The short story is always worth a read:

“Thirty years ago my older brother, who was ten years old at the time, was trying to get a report on birds written that he’d had three months to write. It was due the next day. We were out at our family cabin in Bolinas, and he was at the kitchen table close to tears, surrounded by binder paper and pencils and unopened books on birds, immobilized by the hugeness of the task ahead. Then my father sat down beside him, put his arm around my brother’s shoulder, and said, ‘Bird by bird, buddy. Just take it bird by bird.’”

Today was a bird by bird kind of day.

All the little things piled up.

But I was ready. I’ve conditioned myself to recognise these kinds of days.

They’re ones where you aren’t going to hit a home run, but you swing anyway and do your best to make some—or any—forward progress.

On these days, the inches matter.

This topic is niche. It’s specifically for folks who create and use metrics on a regular basis to make decisions.

There are 4 elements to a simple, clear, and useful metric.

1. Unit of measurement (e.g., number, average)
2. Subject (e.g., sales, returns, complaints)
3. Verb (e.g., completed, failed, delayed)
4. Time period (e.g., per day, week, month)

If you have these four things, generally in this order, you should be able to create a metrics that works in 90% of situations.