The Startup of You: Adapt to the Future, Invest in Yourself, and Transform Your Career

by Reid Hoffman

Develop your competitive advantage in the market by combining three puzzle pieces: your assets, your aspirations, and the market realities. (Chapter 2) • Use ABZ Planning to formulate a Plan A based on your competitive advantages, and then iterate and adapt that plan based on feedback and lessons learned. (Chapter 3) • Build real, lasting relationships and deploy these relationships into a powerful professional network. (Chapter 4) • Find and create opportunities for yourself by tapping networks, being resourceful, and staying in motion. (Chapter 5) • Accurately appraise and take on intelligent risk as you pursue professional opportunities. (Chapter 6) • Tap network intelligence from the people you know for the insight that allows you to find better opportunities and make better career decisions. (Chapter

Good entrepreneurs build and brand products that are differentiated from the competition. They are able to finish the sentence, “Our customers buy from us and not that other company because …”

If you want to chart a course that differentiates you from other professionals in the marketplace, the first step is being able to complete the sentence, “A company hires me over other professionals because …” How are you first, only, faster, better, or cheaper than other people who want to do what you’re doing in the world? What are you offering that’s hard to come by? What are you offering that’s both rare and valuable?

Your competitive advantage is formed by the interplay of three different, ever-changing forces: your assets, your aspirations/values, and the market realities, i.e., the supply and demand for what you offer the marketplace relative to the competition.

value. A competitive edge emerges when you combine different skills, experiences, and connections.

Markets that don’t exist don’t care how smart you are.

Meet with three trusted connections and ask them what they see as your greatest strengths. If they had to come to you for help or advice on one topic, what would it be?

The self-made man may be a myth, but the old saw “There is no I in team” is wrong, too. There is an I in team. A team is made up of individuals with different strengths and abilities. Michael Jordan needed his team, but no one would dispute that he was more crucial to the success of the Chicago Bulls than his teammates.

Opportunities do not float like clouds. They are firmly attached to individuals. If you’re looking for an opportunity, you’re really looking for people.

The lesson is that great opportunities almost never fit your schedule.

making a decision reduces opportunities in the short run, but increases opportunities in the long run.