Capitalist Enlightenment: Silicon Valley Style Takeaways and thoughts: Marc’s mind Author Graham Peelle February 19, 2024 Join “Build 10x Scale” - Connecting managers, execs, & founders, creating the next level of Performance, Leadership, & Culture. Join "Build 10x Scale", the community helping you scale your biz 10x. Scale through people/tech/AI harmony, reducing cost, optimizing, and growing. Open now at a low introductory price for the first 20 members ($19/mo, cancel anytime). Launching 3.4.24. Capitalist Enlightenment: Silicon Valley Style Takeaways and thoughts: Marc’s mind I have wanted to read this collection of Marc Andreessen blog posts for some time, but have prioritized other reading…and it was as good as advertised. Informative and entertaining for sure. Creative Insights about building a business, with sarcasm wrapped up for your reading pleasure. Marc Andreessen has a unique style, and with his experience, it just makes an even more worthwhile read. As I often like to do, I had to go through this and pull out the overly tech or investment speak and break down my top takeaways and concepts that stood out for me. Mark Andreessen’s blog was taken down awhile ago and it was so popular and requested, A16z brought it back on their site in a pdf/ebook form. Takeaways and thoughts: Marc’s Mind Management “First, manage your executives. It’s not that uncommon to see startup founders, especially first-timers, who hire executives and are then reluctant to manage them. You can see the thought process: I just hired this really great, really experienced VP of Engineering who has way more experience running development teams than I ever did — I should just let him go do his thing! That’s a bad idea. While respecting someone’s experience and skills, you should nevertheless manage every executive as if she were a normal employee. This means weekly 1:1’s, performance reviews, written objectives, career development plans, the whole nine yards. Skimp on this and it is very easy for both your relationship with her and her effectiveness in the company to skew sideways.” “Second, give your executives the latitude to run their organizations. This is the balancing act with the previous point, but it’s equally important. Don’t micromanage. The whole point of having an executive is to have someone who can figure out how to build and run an organization so that you don’t have to. Manage her, understand what she is doing, be very clear on the results you expect, but let her do the job. Here’s the key corollary to that: if you want to give an executive full latitude, but you’re reluctant to do so because you’re not sure she can make it happen, then it’s probably time to fire her.” - Marc Andreessen, Andreessen Horowitz Manage your executives, but remember who and why you are managing them. Clear Expectations, engagement, awareness, multi-level communication and leadership, but not micromanagement Awareness and understanding, not unnecessary direction, goes along way Make no assumptions Support where necessary Situational leadership is key Promotions “This will be controversial, but I am a big fan of promoting talented people as fast as you can — promoting up and comers into executive roles, and promoting executives into bigger and broader responsibilities.” “However, life is short, startups move fast, and you have stuff to get done. You aren’t going to have the privilege of working with that many great, talented, high-potential people in your career. When you find one, promote her as fast as you can. Great for her, great for the company, and great for you.” - Marc Andreessen, Andreessen Horowitz Don’t hold people back, but elevate and broaden experience, don’t put reigns on someone unnecessarily Don’t be afraid to manage experienced team members more closely where they need it Give them interesting work they will go find it Turnaround “Money talks, hype walks — when you’re hitting your numbers, everyone thinks you’re a genius and believes everything you say, no matter how silly. When you’re not hitting your numbers, everyone thinks you’re a moron and won’t believe anything you say, no matter how true. So go dark, focus on the business, and don’t talk publicly for at least six months.” “Ninth, shake things up. Directly on Powell’s curiosity point — change the story to something new. Overhaul the organization, move people around, fire people, promote other people, cancel products, double down on other products, do some acquisitions, cut some big deals, do some spinoffs, whatever — but change the story. Reintroduce curiosity. When all else fails, do a “shake and bake” — do a big transformative deal that you’re not sure will work but which you think has a real shot. That will at the very least inject energy back into the situation.” - Marc Andreessen, Andreessen Horowitz In order to big things, you must take big confident steps, and have consistency everywhere else Big swift changes, with hard consistency driving daily work, and don’t be afraid to not be liked, be respected You must disrupt legacy comfort and pointless process, for efficiency and effectiveness Status quo doesn’t whither unless its shaken Power through hard times In contrast to going to a mediocre small or mid-sized company that’s not growing: those are great places to go if you don’t want to go anywhere yourself. If you find yourself stuck in one, either figure out how to get the company unstuck and on a fast growth path, or get yourself unstuck. There is a caveat to all this, which is as follows: Don’t just be a “summertime soldier” — don’t go someplace because it’s already successful, and then bail when things get tough. Any hiring manager for the rest of your career will be able to read that on your resume just by looking at the dates. - Marc Andreessen, Andreessen Horowitz How you perform and power through the tough times, and most importantly, your level of commitment during those times, shows your toughness Marc is right - you can feel it by talking with someone about their profile, if they threw in the towel to early or not Reputation is built through what you do to prepare and complete in the darkness Work in the shadows builds resilience for a sustainable journey “The Pmarca Guide to Personal Productivity” The techniques that follow work together as an integrated set for me, but they probably won’t for you. Maybe you’ll get one or two ideas — probably out of the ideas I stole from other people. If so, I have succeeded. “And here we go; let’s start with a bang: Don’t keep a schedule” “Keep three and only three lists: a Todo List, a Watch List, and a Later List. The more into lists you are, the more important this is. Into the Todo List goes all the stuff you “must” do — commitments, obligations, things that have to be done. A single list, possibly subcategorized by timeframe (today, this week, next week, next month). Into the Watch List goes all the stuff going on in your life that you have to follow up on, wait for someone else to get back to you on, remind yourself of in the future, or otherwise remember. Into the Later List goes everything else — everything you might want to do or will do when you have time or wish you could do. If it doesn’t go on one of those three lists, it goes away. Each night before you go to bed, prepare a 3×5 index card with a short list of 3 to 5 things that you will do the next day. And then, the next day, do those things. I sit down at my desk before I go to sleep, pull up my Todo List” “Then, throughout the rest of the day, use the back of the 3×5 card as your Anti-Todo List. This isn’t a real list. And the name is tongue firmly in cheek. What you do is this: every time you do something — anything — useful during the day, write it down in your Anti-Todo List on the card. Each time you do something, you get to write it down and you get that little rush of endorphins that the mouse gets every time he presses the button in his cage and gets a food pellet. And then at the end of the day, before you prepare tomorrow’s 3×5 card, take a look at today’s card and its Anti-Todo list and marvel at all the things you actually got done that day. Then tear it up and throw it away. Another day well spent, and productive. - Marc Andreessen, Andreessen Horowitz I really like this productivity and activity tracking system of sorts, focused on action, and breaking it into simple areas of prioritization Find a productivity system that works for you - not because Marc or anyone else does it, but review options and find the best way to drive your day and week, and get the results you want. What you don’t want is to follow or continue doing something that doesn’t work for isn’t realistic for you. Improve your chances “Louis Pasteur characterized it for all time when he said, “Chance favors the prepared mind.” “Chance II favors those who have a persistent curiosity about many things coupled with an energetic willingness to experiment and explore. Chance III favors those who have a sufficient background of sound knowledge plus special abilities in observing, remembering, recall- ing, and quickly forming signiXcant new associations. Chance IV favors those with distinctive, if not eccentric hobbies, personal lifestyles, and motor behaviors.” - Marc Andreessen, Andreessen Horowitz Increase your surface area for luck by doing the right things with consistency, increasing volume, impact and putting yourself in the arena, or in the right rooms, with the best and brightest of whatever group you need or want to be apart of to advance in the direction for your journey. Burst the bubble, say no to doom and gloom “Let’s examine the theory of a new bubble from a few different angles. First, recall that economist Paul Samuelson once quipped, “Economists have successfully predicted nine of the last five recessions.” The human psyche seems to have a powerful underlying need to predict doom and gloom.” “On Wall Street, investors who have this habit are known as “perma-bears” and generally are predicting the imminent col- lapse of the stock market. This habit keeps them from being fully invested. Sure, they’re well protected during the occasional crash of 1929 or 2000, but by and large they massively under- perform their peers who take advantage of the fact that most years, the economy grows, and the market goes up. They have disappointing careers and die unhappy and bitter." “In reality it seems very difficult to predict either a bubble or a crash. Lots of people predicted a stock market crash... in 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998, and 1999. They were correct in 2000. But as soon as the stock market recovered in 2003 and 2004, they were back at it, and there have been similar predictions from noted pundits ever since — incorrectly.” “Similarly, in the technology industry, there were people calling a bubble starting in 1995 and continuing through to 2000, with a short break for about two years, and then more bubble-calling ever since.” “If you’re going to listen to people who predict bubbles or crashes, you have to be ready to stay completely out of the market — the stock market, and the technology industry — almost every year of your life. Second, historically, bubbles are very, very rare. It’s significant that in books and papers that talk about bubbles, there are simply not that many examples over the past 500 years of capitalism. “ - Marc Andreessen, Andreessen Horowitz There are just bets, predictions, guesses, estimates, and hopes Some have a high probability, some are very low, and some you have no idea. You must go with the information, context, and analysis you trust, and review that with other information and determine your own stance Remember that negativity and dooms day talk sells, not uncertainty or even feel-good news “If you listen to the fans, you’ll be sitting up there with them”, Buddy Ryan “People laughed when Fox bought MySpace for $580 million, but that’s a business that will generate nearly $300 million in revenue in 2007, and more in 2008. As an independent asset today, MySpace would probably be valued at between $3 billion and $5 billion today — perhaps higher. Call that the deal of the decade. Similarly, Facebook is bringing in a lot more revenue than people think. And then there’s Google. These companies aren’t pulling in all that revenue via some kind of Ponzi scheme. This is money coming from real advertisers and real users for real services with real value. Which makes total sense, amid the enormous mass migration of consumer time and attention away from traditional media towards online media. These same factors apply all the way down the foodchain.” - Marc Andreessen, Andreessen Horowitz You better make your own determination on deals - it’s your money being invested The downside of blind following trends has a recipe for disaster Negativity on positive stories comes from disbelief, misleading storylines, or complete lack of understanding Don’t trust all the experts because of their expertise, experience, or their name, instead trust the evidence and logic they are presenting, and how that aligns with your knowledge and perspective and what you are seeing. Don’t assume someone knows or that their agenda sees through the clouds. Speedcurve Performance Analytics Photo by Luke Chesser on Unsplash And if you love business, investing, economics, Marc’s last few pages are priceless. It’s a great snapshot into humanity, news, popularity, group think, and the idea that 99% of predictors are as accurate as your local tv meteorologist on Channel 68 saying you’re getting a dusting of snow and you get 6 inches plus. You want to bet on something? You better bet on yourself, meaning take all the information in and bet on your synthesis of the collective facts and perspectives. And remember, past performance does not guarantee future performance. Bull statue Photo by Hans Eiskonen on Unsplash Meet me on Wall St Photo by Patrick Weissenberger on Unsplash Hopefully, this added a little value to your business or your career. Thank you for reading. Please repost or share with someone who may benefit from this edition. **Most quotes taken from the the Pmarca blog referenced below Climb Higher | Raise Your^ROI CONTENT RESOURCES Andreessen Horowitz | Software Is Eating the World Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) is a venture capital firm in Silicon Valley, California, investing in bold founders, innovators, and entrepreneurs building the future through technology. a16z.com The Pmarca Blog Archive Is Back… as an Ebook | Andreessen Horowitz Somewhere along the way Marc Andreessen went from being pmarca to @pmarca. He took down his popular blog, and years later took up tweetstorming. Which means you can keep up with his current thoughts on Twitter — and also catch up on them (in the form of tweets, podcasts, and op-eds) here. But by popular request, you can now... a16z.com/the-pmarca-blog-archive-is-back-as-an-ebook X - Marc Andreessen twitter.com/pmarca Join “Build 10x Scale” - Connecting managers, execs, & founders, creating the next level of Performance, Leadership, & Culture. Be the boss you wanted: Scale your biz 10x. Open now at a low introductory price for the first 20 members ($19/mo, cancel anytime). Launching 3.4.24. OpCo — Organizations | People | Culture | Operations If a Performance Operations Culture means something to you, and you would like to be notified for content focused on challenging the status quo in the world of work, please share or repost for others, and make sure you click the 🔔 on my LinkedIn profile page. For additional daily content, check out grahampeelle.com. You can also find additional weekly articles on Medium. Climb Higher | Raise Your^ROI LEARN: Learn | Explore | Ambition | Reform | No "Twenty years from now, you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover." - Mark Twain
