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Most people won't

bryce.vc

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Re: Most people won't

#11

Post by Thatguise »

davidu wrote: post #8
Thatguise wrote: post #4

These stories are everywhere, is like the one about the guy who bought a porsche for spare change because the seller was the owner's ex-wife and wanted to piss her ex off. You do know that was a coincidence right? or even a miracle given how well things ended up. Has the uber guy been a little pissed or in a bad mood the results could have been drastically different, and yet your blog-worthy suggestion is to take a l…

That's actually not the point at all. The point is to take the risk. Sometimes you'll find the person in the bad mood, but sometimes, just sometimes, it works, and when it does, it works great. And you don't need to share w/ the world the 5 other people you tried it on who weren't feeling serendipitous that day. History is told by the victors, after all.

Right and when it does not which is going to be most of the time you end up ruining your reputation in the extremely tightly-knit gossipy startup community, and become ostracized for being a "bad culture fit" in short the only guy in the room who is neither high or a brown noser.

Re: Most people won't

#12

Post by DanielRibeiro »

md224 wrote: post #3

I've been kind of struggling lately with this sort of inspirational attitude. It seems like a good attitude, but it also comes with this hidden assumption: if you try hard and keep at it, there's a good chance you'll succeed. Is this actually true? I mean I want it to be true. I'd like to live in a world where it's true. But I don't actually have any hard evidence besides the testimonials of people who have found suc…

Steve Jobs started a personal story with [1]: "Most people don't get those experiences because they never ask..."

And he ends with "you gotta be willing to fail ... if you are afraid of failing, you won't get very far"

Which seems to be a surprisingly common theme among successful people:

Mark Suster has a famous mantra: "You don't ask, you don't get"[2]

Phil Libin, CEO of Evernote, told a story of how he got Steve Balmer advise him once[3]

[1] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zkTf0LmDqKI

[2] http://www.bothsidesofthetable.com/2013/05/15/the-one-word-t...

[3] http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jqm9NXug6WE

Re: Most people won't

#13

Post by hayksaakian »

md224 wrote: post #3

I've been kind of struggling lately with this sort of inspirational attitude. It seems like a good attitude, but it also comes with this hidden assumption: if you try hard and keep at it, there's a good chance you'll succeed. Is this actually true? I mean I want it to be true. I'd like to live in a world where it's true. But I don't actually have any hard evidence besides the testimonials of people who have found suc…

Trying is a way to create and execute on opportunities.

You could think about it as creating your own luck.

The only problem is that at the end of the day it's still luck.

Re: Most people won't

#14

Post by jseliger »

The statement of the Shimura-Taniyama-Weil conjecture must have sounded crazy to its creators. . . . the idea that this was true. . . must have sounded totally outrageous at the time. This was a leap of faith, in the form of a question that [Taniyama] posed at the International Symposium on Algebraic Number Theory held in Tokyo in September 1955.

I've always wondered: what did it take for him to come to believe that this wasn't crazy, but real? To have the courage to say it publicly?

We'll never know. Unfortunately, not long after his great discovery, in November 1958, Taniyama committed suicide. He was only thirty-one. To add to the tragedy, shortly afterward the woman whom he was planning to marry also took her life, leaving the following note:

We promised each other that no matter where we went, we would never be separated. Now that he is gone, I must go too in order to join him.

. . . In his thoughtful essay about Tayniyama, Shimura made this striking comment:

Though he was by no means a sloppy type, he was gifted with the special capability of making many mistakes, mostly in the right direction. I envied him for this, and tried in vain to imitate him, but found it quite difficult to make good mistakes. (94)

—Edward Frenkel, Love" rel="nofollow">http://www.amazon.com/Love-Math-Heart-Hidden-Reality/dp/0465... and Math: The Heart of Hidden Reality, which is recommended.

What mistakes have you made lately?

Re: Most people won't

#15

Post by md224 »

WalterBright wrote: post #10
md224 wrote: post #3

I've been kind of struggling lately with this sort of inspirational attitude. It seems like a good attitude, but it also comes with this hidden assumption: if you try hard and keep at it, there's a good chance you'll succeed. Is this actually true? I mean I want it to be true. I'd like to live in a world where it's true. But I don't actually have any hard evidence besides the testimonials of people who have found suc…

The failure rate for those who don't try is 100%.

But what if the failure rate for those who do try is 99%? Trying isn't always zero-risk... I wonder if ambition could be subject to a cost/benefit analysis, haha. At some point I suppose you just have to let go of the numbers.

Re: Most people won't

#16

Post by Thatguise »

WalterBright wrote: post #10
md224 wrote: post #3

I've been kind of struggling lately with this sort of inspirational attitude. It seems like a good attitude, but it also comes with this hidden assumption: if you try hard and keep at it, there's a good chance you'll succeed. Is this actually true? I mean I want it to be true. I'd like to live in a world where it's true. But I don't actually have any hard evidence besides the testimonials of people who have found suc…

The failure rate for those who don't try is 100%.

For a lot of those who try its also 100%.

The question is should you be trying this in the first place?

Did you know its actually more likely you will survive a plane crash than have a successful startup exit? Now, would you still hop in a plane you know its going to crash?

With that logic you should, chances are you will survive, maybe.

Re: Most people won't

#17

Post by spodek »

Everybody so far is commenting on the woman who approached the CEO.

Let's not forget the CEO, who committed and risked resources on a hunch or instinct or who-knows-what.

If I had to pick one of the two to ask how they had the nerve to act and to learn from, I'd pick him. (Of course I'd prefer both and not to belittle her gumption and skills to back it up).

- What did he see to suggest risking those resources? ... To create a team of outsiders to work on the core app?

- How likely did he expect things to work out?

- How did he explain the expenditure of flying the others in to the CFO or whomever?

- Or did he make a unilateral decision without asking others?

- Did he just get lucky?

- Had he done things like this before and succeeded? Failed?

- Was he worried about making waves in his organization? Did he?

Plenty more questions pop up...

Re: Most people won't

#18

Post by XEKEP »

Thatguise wrote: post #4

These stories are everywhere, is like the one about the guy who bought a porsche for spare change because the seller was the owner's ex-wife and wanted to piss her ex off. You do know that was a coincidence right? or even a miracle given how well things ended up. Has the uber guy been a little pissed or in a bad mood the results could have been drastically different, and yet your blog-worthy suggestion is to take a l…

It is not important how unlikely are the odds. What's important is to be prepared when the chance does present itself and that requires talent and years of training.

So I think you misread the narrative, it's not about striking gold.

Re: Most people won't

#19

Post by winstonian »

md224 wrote: post #15
WalterBright wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The failure rate for those who don't try is 100%.

But what if the failure rate for those who do try is 99%? Trying isn't always zero-risk... I wonder if ambition could be subject to a cost/benefit analysis, haha. At some point I suppose you just have to let go of the numbers.

I once heard the phrase, "Don't be a pussy and quit fucking around". It has become a phrase I live by.

Re: Most people won't

#20

Post by rosser »

md224 wrote: post #15
WalterBright wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The failure rate for those who don't try is 100%.

But what if the failure rate for those who do try is 99%? Trying isn't always zero-risk... I wonder if ambition could be subject to a cost/benefit analysis, haha. At some point I suppose you just have to let go of the numbers.

What's the cost/benefit breakdown of not taking the risk?
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