blocker

When you are working in a team, the first thing you have to do is to let youngsters be independent. There should not be a blocker or a god-like figure under the shadow of whom they are living.

This hierarchy and living under the shadow of someone is a big blocker for the growth of youngsters and the organization.

It should be told to the youngsters that they are part of a team and not under the shadow of anyone. They are independent to question, give their feedback.

This whole culture of designation is screwing up the independence and free-thinking for the organization.

Moonshot Game

I liked reading the moonshot game by Rahul Chandra. It is his journey, a collection of entries through his days of starting Helion Ventures to closing it.

I have my personal 5 takeaways:

  1. Decisions: A lot many decisions in the VC world are collectively taken and still work on the guts instinct.
  2. Pedigree: In getting funded, your college plays a huge role. A simple filter. That is being one reason why they passed on investing OYO.
  3. Capital: Rahul talks about why taxi4sure had to be acquired by Ola. Why letsbuy had to be sold to Flipkart. When Tiger invests in your competitor, you have to be very worried{circa 2011}
  4. Camps: In the book, Rahul talks about how early days there were a group of VC funds investing together. 
  5. Growth: There is no time for building a company if there is no growth. One reason why Redbus was sold.  

You will have to read the book for more. This book while being a personal journey of Rahul, has many learnings for us all.  

leave

Our human mind dislikes letting it go. A lot of it has to do with sunk cost. Our capital, emotional attachment to the cause, relationship et all.

I keep reading and motivational speakers and social media marketers championing: Don’t Quit. What they don’t tell you is the opportunity cost.

Our sunk cost takes over our opportunity cost. We get blinded by we can do it, it will work. Our rationality goes for the toss, we are only getting closer to death and trying to work on a product, relationship which has no future.

Smart folks know when to leave and let go things. The only permanence in our life is the very nature of impermanence.

Rituals

I was reading Daily Rituals: How Great Minds Make Time, Find Inspiration, and Get to Work.

The common pattern and learning were:

People left their brains on autopilot. 

  1. Some went for long walks.
  2. Some started day with a cup of coffee, tea or music. 
  3. Some had lots of cigars 
  4. Others like Jung built their own house in the jungle where they would do their work at peace. 

Once you develop this habit, a daily ritual the brain stops getting distracted. You get into your world where you are super productive. Cal Newport calls it Deep Work and Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi calls it Flow. 

To be productive, you have to stick to a daily routine and over some time, everything starts happening on its own. 

To make use of this precious time of your life, you need to find your ritual and stick to it for a long period aka dispose of it to Type 2 brain. 

During the time of reading the book, I created some rituals for myself. I am following some of it, while some will still take time to take on to autopilot. Our life is a continuously evolving journey. 

why

Why do we have to find a reason behind everything? Why can’t we let things rest as it is? The constant questioning is not worthy.

Why do we have to postmortem everything happening to our life: good/bad? Leaving past behind and focusing on now does better.

Why did this happen to me?
Why are they helping me?

We turn into detective instead of living in the moment, taking life as it comes.

star

I keep hearing from my founders’ friend about the star player in their team. Someone super-efficient. We become so dependent on him/her that we start defining companies process at their convenience. That is a huge mistake. This effects the overall growth of companies’ development and culture suffers.

Do not let your company or product development run in the hand of a star player. He or she can end up becoming the biggest bottleneck for the future. On top of that keep a strong code review process, that way if he/she leaves nothing remains at their mercy.

As a founder company is your baby, people will come and go. Don’t be a hostage in the hands of these star players. Treat, incentivize everyone and keep a level playing field.

commitment

People switch jobs like taxi ride finishing a trip. There is no sense of commitment. People are willing to let go of their year-long hard-earned respect and trust.

Finding people who will abide by their ethics is like searching for wise men in daylight like Diogenes.

Any kind of perk, freedom or trust is valued as peanuts when an employee finds a newer pasture. Most don’t even stick by their virtues and commitment. The willingness of ethics is for philosophers, not job-hopping employees.

My learning, if someone wants to move on: have them quit immediately. Their presence gets burdensome for the entire organization especially when you have a pizza size team.

cure

What is the cure for yours?
Your sadness, pain, and misery,
That feeling of nothingness,
Willingness to give up without putting a fight,
Vice winning Over virtue,
What is the cure?

You are the cure, life is yours.
Life is a win-win if you see it in that way.

You don’t need a healer, a partner, a mystic. You are your cure, why are u seeking outside?

Behind the cloud

Marc Benioff is a philanthropist, billionaire, and founder of Salesforce. The company which transformed IT consumption by innovating the SaaS model of software consumption for the enterprise. He was the real disrupter, moving users from old systems like Sibel to simple easy software with pay as you go model.

Marc bought a lot of his learning from the early days of his work at Oracle. He considers Larry Elison as his friend/mentor, apart from being his early investor. Larry made 200X return of his investment. 😀

In the book, Marc openly talks about his playbooks or we can say principles. As a founder, it is extremely important to have a set of principles. Ray Dalio in his book Principles has written in detail about the same. 

The lesson he shares is similar to what every other successful founder shares in hiring, raising, competing above all keeping customers in the center.

Marc attributes a lot of Salesforce success to the community and listening to customer’s feedback. He mentions Amazon for its user interface and customer delight in the book. 

Some learning:

  • Hire right, trustworthy folks who believe in the vision of your organization. 
  • Have a set of principles and abide by it. Like a playbook (V2MOM)
  • Keep customers in the center of all the product development. 
  • Create your own rule. The marketing tactics the end of Software.