Both are true

Many concepts that sound good on paper are infeasible to implement, or simply don’t produce the expected results. It’s frustrating when that happens, of course, but the pace of experimentation and learning at a startup is unparalleled. I think this is an especially important form of rigor for theorycels like me. Building product forces a different ... See more

The hardest part to strike then, I think, is that you can’t be too careful, but you also can’t be too confident. Somewhere in between the two there’s this specific type of curiosity that we’re after, the key ingredient of which is humility. The kind that arrives at a new place, or a new problem and is willing to assume “I don't know" — but let’s fi... See more

What I Wish Someone Had Told Me

1. Optimism, obsession, self-belief, raw horsepower and personal connections are how things get started.


2. Cohesive teams, the right combination of calmness and urgency, and unreasonable commitment are how things get finished. Long-term orientation is in short supply; try not to worry about what people think in the short t

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Looking back at the financial crisis, the people who came out relatively unharmed weren't the ones who saw the collapse coming. They were the ones who knew all along that nothing was certain, things change, people act irrationally, markets fail, information is incomplete, and above all, you have to be prepared for the unexpected. The biggest irony

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