The Essence of Success

The biggest companies, start-ups, etc. invariably sell to the public and - like google buying out YouTube - seek more (a larger percentage of) the customers routine or habits.

Reel’s and TikTok’s captured people’s time maximally. Except, they did it through the wrong motivations. They essentially created a new-age drug.

Contrarily, we have Google Search and OpenAI that obtained a big part of the customer’s time because they allowed people to boost their productivity - to gain time. Contrary to Facebook and TikTok, who took people’s time away - captured them by force of addiction - Google, OpenAI, Tesla actually aim to take on those time consuming tasks. Like friends, they work alongside you. They don’t capture you, not at all - most people still drive their Tesla’s manually, but anytime you want Tesla’s AI is there to serve you. Similarly, OpenAI and Google are there to help you learn quicker, to become better faster. To catalyse your ambitions.

That’s what a good idea is. A good idea catalyses your ambitions. While you could invest in the next-age drug and be a part of yet another genocide of the neurons, you would have to sell fast - because those type of companies don’t last that long.

Facebook is pretty dead (I know, who am I to say such thing), it was overtaken by Instagram, a Meta company. You see, they need to change image periodically because people catch up to the fact that they’re being used. It’s a dirty game, and regulators eventually catch up.

Tesla and OpenAI - Musk and Altman mainly - on the other hand, are aiming at maximising positive effect in as many lives as possible in one way or another. They have very deep, existential, and reality-challenging curious endeavours.

The law is based on fundamental right-and-wrong-doing notions. What some may call Good and Evil. If one explicitly understands the essence of right and wrong, one can understand what regulators will be going after when the engineers are developing new ideas. But looking at the ideas isn’t all that useful, because ideas die and change.

If you’re looking to invest in a company and want your money to be in good hands - look at who’s in front of the company. Who is imposing the culture? I learned from Eduardo Espinheira: The leader of a company needs, at minimum, the so-called leadership skills. If the leader is not assertive-yet-humble, clear in his or her communication, curious, versatile, courageous, he or she will not be able to impose a culture. But beyond this ‘hygene’ factor, you MUST look at the culture that’s being imposed. More explicitly, look at what the leader encourages (rewards), what he or she tolerates, and what he or she prohibits (punishes). Let’s look at some examples of succes:

Musk encourages radical candor - brutal honesty. He has a ‘carrot-and-stick’ mentality - something is either productive or destructive. Rapid, brutal testing, failure, and rebuilding. Flat hierarchies (managers must code at least 20% of the time) - no hiding behind reports. Expectation of 80 hour weeks - if you’re not willing you leave.

He prohibits any form of detachment, such as remote work. Bureaucracy is frowned upon - acronyms, middle management silos, and multi-layer decision making. Performance is looked at in brute, no interpretations - if you’re underperforming you’re out.

Tolerates high-stakes gambles and calculated risk. Insulting is fine, it’s just a side effect of full commitement. Being on the edge of the law when the law is objectively stupid is not a problem. Laying off people without consideration for their past is also tolerated.

Altman too encourages radical candor and ‘dissrespect’ - dissent is the ignition for innovation. “Fight bullshit bureaucracy every time you see it” - maximises synergy. Prioritizes one-on-ones, small group huddles, and Slack-first communication to accelerate decision-making and avoid information silos.

Prohibits detatchment by remote work. Zero tolerance for foundationless decisions and procedural drag.

Tolerates chaos for it produces good inovation. Tolerates ideological cross-fire when it comes to opinions about AI (will it kill us all or just make us better?).

More importantly, though, a good aim is necessary. In the framework of a good aim, you needn’t worry about all of this as a leader. Just reward whatever makes progress, punish that which slows you down to attaining the goal, and tolerate that which is indiferent (even if people don’t like it).