Rio Richardson

“Technology alone is not enough—it’s technology married with liberal arts, married with the humanities, that yields us the results that make our heart sing.”

Think of all the things you do on a daily basis. Anything done more than once has potential for a product or service to improve the process. For me, one of those products was a mirror I could hang in the shower. It saves me tons of time while shaving, and now I don’t know how I ever lived without it.

Be cognizant of products you use and frequently... See more

Many of the simple market opportunities, the easy and obvious things, are either dominated by pseudo-monopolies, like Google, or are blood baths filled with thousands of minnows (see SaaS)

There are two modes of information discovery: foraging and hunting. Foraging is passive. You don’t have a clear goal; you just wander and scroll until something catches your interest. Hunting is active and purposeful. You know what you’re looking for and are consciously searching for it. A good information diet needs both

Here are some ways to put second-order thinking into practice today.

1. Always ask yourself, “And then what?”


2. Think across time — What do the consequences look like in 10 minutes? 10 months? 10 Years?


3. Create templates like the second image above with 1st, 2nd, and 3rd order consequences. Identify your decision, think it through, and write down the

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Step 2: Find $1,000,000 worth of customers.

Now that you’ve found an idea that people are willing to spend money on, it’s time to assess whether there’s a big enough pool of prospective buyers.

In this step, you’ll also want to ensure your market isn’t shrinking, and that it fares well compared to similar markets.

I use Google Trends, Google Keyword... See more

The frameworks that got us here, of jobs-to-be-done or product-market fit, will be insufficient going forward. For founders to have extraordinary outcomes, they will have to find alpha in markets that aren’t easily understood.

Which is to say, technology alone won’t be enough. The other essential ingredient will be taste. Technology without taste... See more