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July 31 - August 11, 2022
“If you want to get to the top, there’s always the risk that it will isolate you from other people.”
You must think beyond your first strike to execute an effective strategy.
The only thing separating us from greatness is a vision and a plan for achieving greatness.
In other words, I realized that for IBM to become a great company it would have to act like a great company long before it ever became one.
When you study the most important person (you), you will begin to learn how to conquer the most important person who is holding you back (you).
Remember that not making a move is also a move. Losing time on the clock will come back to haunt you, whether you’re playing chess or the game of business.
Most entrepreneurs don’t fail because of a flawed business model or an investor who backs out. They fail because they refuse to abandon their preconceived notions about work and life. They refuse to solve (and learn from) any and all kinds of problems as they arise.
If you’re going to lose, don’t lose the lesson.
Every master, both in chess and in business, learns more from studying the moves that led to defeat than the ones that led to victory.
Great processors want to handle the situation and move on. If someone else has a better idea, great. Ego doesn’t become an obstacle to making the right decision. 3. They don’t make excuses.
Burning platforms: Hot problems that you have to deal with immediately Golden gates: Bright opportunities that you need to enter quickly
Staying curious means always looking to improve and tweaking your projections.
The less your business depends on you, the more valuable it is. The more your business depends on you, the less valuable it is. There’s no exit opportunity if the business relies on your personality.
At the time, Microsoft was trading at $23 a share, putting its market cap at $176 billion. In other words, the value of Microsoft has increased by more than a trillion dollars since Gates left! Still think organizations can’t create a culture that is more powerful than a visionary leader?
Entrepreneurs need to play a continuous replacement game, replacing parts of themselves. At the beginning of the business, you did all the paperwork; now you can hire someone to take over that task.
“Keep figuring out how to replace yourself because your time is most valuable in this process.
We need friction in all areas of our lives. It’s healthy, and it stimulates growth, creativity, and learning.
Don’t leave friction to chance. Create a culture in which you spread good words about people.
Reliability is the key to trust. After a while, people establish a track record.
The five love languages are the ways in which we give and receive love. They are: Quality Time, Words of Affirmation, Gifts, Acts of Service, and Physical Touch. In the above example, the man spoke the language of gifts when, all along, his wife had been telling him that she preferred quality time. In relationships, forget about the Golden Rule. Replace “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you” with “Do unto others the way they want to be treated.” It’s applicable to business, family, and friends.
When you give people a reputation to live up to, they often do just that.
Great leaders are always selling the future of where the team is going and what things are going to happen. They talk about what’s next. Great leaders say things such as “Our greatest days are ahead of us.”
But venture capitalists want to do just that. They want to work with nimble entrepreneurs who are open to suggestions about their business. Do you view this as guidance or meddling?
If they are falling short of their goals, I ask why and shut up. I’ve found that getting them to self-reflect is much more powerful than telling them what to do.
Keep the pressure constant by asking questions that create accountability, and you’ll see how people will raise their game.
Rapid growth can cause chaos, but you can control the chaos to some extent by following this simple rule: If you have the capital, lease office space based on what you’ll need eighteen months from now. For many companies, if is a rather important word.
We use the term “Fortune 500” so often that we may have forgotten its origin. In 1955, Edgar P. Smith, an editor at Fortune magazine, published a list of the five hundred largest US corporations by total annual revenue. Today, the list includes both public companies and private ones (if their revenues are publicly available).
The difference between being smart and being wise is that a smart person thinks he knows all the answers while a wise person is comfortable knowing he doesn’t. Wisdom is especially valuable during chaotic times.
Those who possess all three characteristics—theory, witness, and application—are called “trifectas.”
“I am powerful because the time my family needed me to come through for them, I stepped up and handled the situation.”
Mobsters are masters at recruiting because they know how to sell the dream of the benefits of joining their team.
Selling is about believing in yourself, believing in your business, and believing in the value you can offer to the other person, whether a potential customer, a key vendor, or a major industry figure.
If you can step outside your ego, you’ll realize that you often win by letting others also win. It also pays, at times, to let others think that your great ideas are actually theirs.
The person who really has the leverage is the person who needs the deal the least. Options give you power. If you can walk away from a deal, you’re in the best position to negotiate the best terms.
whenever possible, cultivate multiple options.
If 30 percent or more of your revenue comes from one place, you’re in trouble.
Again, what will determine your success is if it matters to you.
The start-up graveyard is filled with companies run by well-intentioned, talented people who just weren’t prepared to handle the chaos of building a business.
