Founders

What I learned from rereading Walt Disney: The Triumph of the American Imagination by Neal Gabler. 

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You can read, reread, and search all my notes and highlights from every book I've ever read for the podcast. 

You can also ask SAGE any question and SAGE will read all my notes, highlights, and every transcript from every episode for you.

 A few questions I've asked SAGE recently: 

What are the most important leadership lessons from history's greatest entrepreneurs?

Can you give me a summary of Warren Buffett's best ideas? (Substitute any founder covered on the podcast and you'll get a comprehensive and easy to read summary of their ideas) 

How did Edwin Land find new employees to hire? Any unusual sources to find talent?

What are some strategies that Cornelius Vanderbilt used against his competitors?

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(2:00) Disney’s key traits were raw ingenuity combined with sadistic determination.

(3:00) I had spent a lifetime with a frustrated, and often unemployed man, who hated anybody who was successful. 

— Francis Ford Coppola: A Filmmaker's Life by Michael Schumacher. (Founders #242)

(6:00) Disney put excelence before any other consideration.

(11:00) Maybe the most important thing anyone ever said to him: You’re crazy to be a professor she told Ted. What you really want to do is draw. Ted’s notebooks were always filled with these fabulous animals. So I set to work diverting him. Here was a man who could draw such pictures. He should earn a living doing that. 

— Becoming Dr. Seuss: Theodor Geisel and the Making of an American Imagination by Brian Jay Jones. (Founders #161)

(14:00) A quote about Edwin Land that would apply to Walt Disney too:

Land had learned early on that total engrossment was the best way for him to work. He strongly believed that this kind of concentrated focus could also produce extraordinary results for others. Late in his career, Land recalled that his “whole life has been spent trying to teach people that intense concentration for hour after hour can bring out in people resources they didn’t know they had.”  A Triumph of Genius: Edwin Land, Polaroid, and the Kodak Patent War by Ronald Fierstein. (Founders #134)

(15:00) My parents objected strenuously, but I finally talked them into letting me join up as a Red Cross ambulance driver. I had to lie about my age, of course. 

In my company was another fellow who had lied about his age to get in. He was regarded as a strange duck, because whenever we had time off and went out on the town to chase girls, he stayed in camp drawing pictures.

His name was Walt Disney.

Grinding It Out: The Making of McDonald's by Ray Kroc. (Founders #293)

(20:00) Walt Disney had big dreams. He had outsized aspirations.

(22:00) A quote from Edwin Land that would apply to Walt Disney too: My motto is very personal and may not fit anyone else or any other company. It is: Don't do anything that someone else can do.

(24:00) Walt Disney seldom dabbled. Everyone who knew him remarked on his intensity; when something intrigued him, he focused himself entirely as if it were the only thing that mattered.

(29:00) He had the drive and ambition of 10 million men.

(29:00) I'm going to sit tight. I have the greatest opportunity I've ever had, and I'm in it for everything.

(31:00) He seemed confident beyond any logical reason for him to be so. It appeared that nothing discouraged him.

(31:00) You have to take the hard knocks with the good breaks in life.

(32:00) Nothing wrong with my aim, just gotta change the target. — Jay Z

(35:00) He sincerely wanted to be counted among the best in his craft.

(43:00) He didn't want to just be another animation producer. He wanted to be the king of animation. Disney believed that quality was his only real advantage.

(47:00) Walt Disney wanted domination. Domination that would make his position unassailable.

(49:00) Disney was always trying to make something he could be proud of.

(50:00) We have a habit of divine discontent with our performance. It is an antidote to smugness.

— Eternal Pursuit of Unhappiness: Being Very Good Is No Good,You Have to Be Very, Very, Very, Very, Very Good by David Ogilvy and Ogivly & Mather.  (Founders #343)

(53:00) While it is easy, of course, for me to celebrate my doggedness now and say that it is all you need to succeed, the truth is that it demoralized me terribly. I would crawl into the house every night covered in dust after a long day, exhausted and depressed because that day's cyclone had not worked. There were times when I thought it would never work, that I would keep on making cyclone after cyclone, never going forwards, never going backwards, until I died.

— Against the Odds: An Autobiography by James Dyson (Founders #300)

(56:00) He doesn't place a premium on collecting friends or socializing: "I don't believe in 50 friends. I believe in a smaller number. Nor do I care about society events. It's the most senseless use of time. When I do go out, from time to time, it's just to convince myself again that I'm not missing a lot."

— The Red Bull Story by Wolfgang Fürweger (Founders #333)

(1:02:00) Steve was at the center of all the circles.

He made all the important product decisions.

From my standpoint, as an individual programmer, demoing to Steve was like visiting the Oracle of Delphi.

The demo was my question. Steve's response was the answer.

While the pronouncements from the Greek Oracle often came in the form of confusing riddles, that wasn't true with Steve.

He was always easy to understand.

He would either approve a demo, or he would request to see something different next time.

Whenever Steve reviewed a demo, he would say, often with highly detailed specificity, what he wanted to happen next.

He was always trying to ensure the products were as intuitive and straightforward as possible, and he was willing to invest his own time, effort, and influence to see that they were.

Through looking at demos, asking for specific changes, then reviewing the changed work again later on and giving a final approval before we could ship, Steve could make a product turn out like he wanted.

Much like the Greek Oracle, Steve foretold the future.

— Creative Selection: Inside Apple's Design Process During the Golden Age of Steve Jobs by Ken Kocienda. (Founders #281)

(1:07:00) He griped that when he hired veteran animators he had to “put up with their Goddamn poor working habits from doing cheap pictures.” He believed it was easier to start from scratch with young art students and indoctrinate them in the Disney system.

(1:15:00) I don’t want to be relagated to the cartoon medium. We have worlds to conquer here.

(1:17:00) Advice Henry Ford gave Walt Disney about selling his company: If you sell any of it you should sell all of it.

(1:23:00) He kept a slogan pasted inside of his hat: You can’t top pigs with pigs. (A reminder that we have to keep blazing new trails.)

(1:25:00) Disney’s Land: Walt Disney and the Invention of the Amusement Park That Changed the World by Richard Snow.

(1:33:00) It is the detail. If we lose the detail, we lose it all.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from rereading George Lucas: A Life by Brian Jay Jones.

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Get access to the World’s Most Valuable Notebook for Founders

You can read, reread, and search all my notes and highlights from every book I've ever read for the podcast. 

You can also ask SAGE any question and SAGE will read all my notes, highlights, and every transcript from every episode for you.

 A few questions I've asked SAGE recently: 

What are the most important leadership lessons from history's greatest entrepreneurs?

Can you give me a summary of Warren Buffett's best ideas? (Substitute any founder covered on the podcast and you'll get a comprehensive and easy to read summary of their ideas) 

How did Edwin Land find new employees to hire? Any unusual sources to find talent?

What are some strategies that Cornelius Vanderbilt used against his competitors?

Get access to Founders Notes here. 

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Join this email list if you want early access to any Founders live events and conferences

Join my personal email list if you want me to email you my top ten highlights from every book I read

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(0:01) George Lucas unapologetically invested in what he believed in the most: himself.

(1:00) George Lucas is the Thomas Edison of the modern film industry.

(1:30) A list of biographies written by Brian Jay Jones

(6:00) Elon Musk interviewed by Kevin Rose

(10:15) How many people think the solution to gaining quality control, improving fiscal responsibility, and stimulating technological innovation is to start their own special-effects company? But that’s what he did.

(17:00) When I finally discovered film, I really fell madly in love with it. I ate it. I slept it. 24 hours a day. There was no going back.

(18:00) Those on the margins often come to control the center. (Game of Thrones)

(21:00) As soon as I made my first film, I thought, Hey, I’m good at this. I know how to do this. From then on, I’ve never questioned it.

(23:00) He was becoming increasingly cranky about the idea of working with others and preferred doing everything himself.

(34:00) Francis Ford Coppola: A Filmmaker's Life by Michael Schumacher. (Founders #242)

(42:00) The film Easy Rider was made for $350,000. It grossed over $60 million at the box office.

(45:00) The Founders: The Story of PayPal and the Entrepreneurs Who Shaped Silicon Valley by Jimmy Soni. (Founders #233)

A Mind at Play: How Claude Shannon Invented the Information Age by Jimmy Soni and Rob Goodman (Founders #95)

Steve Jobs & The NeXT Big Thing by Randall Stross. (Founders #77)

(47:00) What we’re striving for is total freedom, where we can finance our pictures, make them our way, release them where we want them released, and be completely free. That’s very hard to do in the world of business. You have to have the money in order to have the power to be free.

(49:00) You should reject the status quo and pursue freedom.

(49:00) People would give anything to quit their jobs. All they have to do is do it. They’re people in cages with open doors.

(51:00) Stay small. Be the best. Don’t lose any money.

(59:00) That was a very dark period for me. We were in dire financial strait. I turned that down [directing someone else’s movie] at my bleakest point, when I was in debt to my parents, in debt to Francis Coppola, in debt to my agent; I was so far in debt I thought I’d never get out. It took years to get from my first film to my second film, banging on doors, trying to get people to give me a chance. Writing, struggling, with no money in the bank… getting little jobs, eking out a living. Trying to stay alive, and pushing a script that nobody wanted.

(1:02:00) “Opening this new restaurant might be the worst mistake I've ever made."

Stanley [Stanley Marcus of Neiman Marcus] set his martini down, looked me in the eye, and said, "So you made a mistake. You need to understand something important. And listen to me carefully: The road to success is paved with mistakes well handled."

His words remained with me through the night. I repeated them over and over to myself, and it led to a turning point in the way I approached business.

Stanley's lesson reminded me of something my grandfather Irving Harris had always told me:

“The definition of business is problems."

His philosophy came down to a simple fact of business life: success lies not in the elimination of problems but in the art of creative, profitable problem solving. The best companies are those that distinguish themselves by solving problems most effectively.

Setting the Table: The Transforming Power of Hospitality in Business by Danny Meyer. 

(1:05:00) My thing about art is that I don’t like the word art because it means pretension and bullshit, and I equate those two directly. I don’t think of myself as an artist. I’m a craftsman. I don’t make a work of art; I make a movie.

(1:06:00) I know how good I am. American Graffiti is successful because it came entirely from my head. It was my concept. And that’s the only way I can work.

(1:09:00) Creative Selection: Inside Apple's Design Process During the Golden Age of Steve Jobs by Ken Kocienda. (Founders #281)

(1:21:00) The budget for Star Wars was $11 million. In brought in $775 million at the box office alone!

(1:25:00) Steven Spielberg made over $40 million from the original Star Wars. Spielberg gave Lucas 2.5% of Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Lucas gave Spielberg 2.5% of Star Wars. That to 2.5% would earn Spielberg more than $40 million over the next four decades.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading Steven Spielberg: A Biography by Joseph McBride. 

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Get access to the World’s Most Valuable Notebook for Founders

You can read, reread, and search all my notes and highlights from every book I've ever read for the podcast. 

You can also ask SAGE any question and SAGE will read all my notes, highlights, and every transcript from every episode for you.

 A few questions I've asked SAGE recently: 

What are the most important leadership lessons from history's greatest entrepreneurs?

Can you give me a summary of Warren Buffett's best ideas? (Substitute any founder covered on the podcast and you'll get a comprehensive and easy to read summary of their ideas) 

How did Edwin Land find new employees to hire? Any unusual sources to find talent?

What are some strategies that Cornelius Vanderbilt used against his competitors?

Get access to Founders Notes here. 

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Episode Outline: 

Whatever is there, he makes it work.

Spielberg once defined his approach to filmmaking by declaring, "I am the audience."

"He said, 'I want to be a director.' And I said, 'Well, if you want to be a director, you've gotta start at the bottom, you gotta be a gofer and work your way up.' He said, 'No, Dad. The first picture I do, I'm going to be a director.' And he was. That blew my mind. That takes guts."

One of his boyhood friends recalls Spielberg saying "he could envision himself going to the Academy Awards and accepting an Oscar and thanking the Academy.” He was twelve.

He was disappointed in the world, so he built one of his own.

Spielberg remained essentially an autodidact. Spielberg followed his own eccentric path to a professional directing career. Universal Studios, in effect, was Spielberg's film school. Giving him an education that, paradoxically, was both more personal and more conventional than he would have received in an academic environment. Spielberg devised what amounted to his own private tutorial program at Universal, immersing himself in the aspects of filmmaking he found most crucial to his development.

At the time he came to Hollywood, generations of nepotism had made the studios terminally inbred and unwelcoming to newcomers. The studio system, long under siege from television, falling box-office receipts, and skyrocketing costs, was in a state of impending collapse.

When Steven was very discouraged trying to sell a script and break in, he always had a positive, forward motion, whatever he may have been suffering inside.

In the two decades since Star Wars and Close Encounters were released, science-fiction films have accounted for half of the top twenty box-office hits. But before George Lucas and Spielberg revived the genre there was no real appetite at the studios for science fiction. The conventional wisdom was science-fiction films never make money.

Your children love you. They want to play with you. How long do you think that lasts? We have a few special years with our children, when they're the ones who want us around. So fast, it’s a few years, then it's over. You are not being careful. And you are missing it.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading Cinema Speculation by Quentin Tarantino. 

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Some questions other subscribers asked SAGE: 

I need some unique ideas on how to find new customers. What advice do you have for me?

What are some strategies that Cornelius Vanderbilt used against his competitors?

How did Edwin Land find new employees to hire? Any unusual sources to find talent?

What are the most important leadership lessons from history's greatest entrepreneurs?

Can you give me more ideas about how to avoid competition from Peter Thiel?

Have any of history's greatest founders regretted selling their company?

What is the best way to fire a bad employee?

How did Andrew Carnegie know what to focus on?

Why was Jay Gould so smart?

What was the biggest unlock for Henry Ford?

Can you give me a summary of Warren Buffetts best ideas?

If Charlie Munger had a top 10 rules for life what do you think those rules would be?

What did Charlie Munger say about building durable companies that last?

Tell me about Cornelius Vanderbilt. How did he make his money?

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(9:00) Tarantino is possibly the most joyously infectious movie lover alive.

(14:00) On the ride home, even if I didn't have questions, my parents would talk about the movie we had just seen. These are some of my fondest memories.

(14:00) He has a comprehensive database of the history of movies in his head.

(17:00) The Futurist: The Life and Films of James Cameron by Rebecca Keegan and The Return of James Cameron, Box Office King by Zach Baron (Founders #311)

(25:00) Robert Rodriguez interviews Quentin Tarantino in the Director’s Chair

(26:00) Like most men who never knew their father, Bill collected father figures. (Kill Bill 2)

(27:00) When people ask me if I went to film school, I tell them, No, I went to films.

(29:00) Invest Like the Best #348 Patrick and John Collision 

(31:00) Tarantino made his own Founders Notes [Comparinig himself and another director] Nor did he keep scrapbooks, make notes, and keep files on index cards of all the movies he saw growing up like I did.

(32:00) Napoleon and Modern War by Napoleon and Col. Lanza. (Founders #337)

(41:00) On Spielberg and greatness: Steven Spielberg's Jaws is one of the greatest movies ever made, because one of the most talented filmmakers who ever lived, when he was young, got his hands on the right material, knew what he had, and killed himself to deliver the best version of that movie he could.

(46:00) I've always approached my cinema with a fearlessness of the eventual outcome. A fearlessness that comes to me naturally.

(51:00) The Big Score: Robert Friedland and The Voisey’s Bay Hustle by Jacquie McNish (Founders #131)

(51:00)

Tarantino's top 8 movies have cost around $400 million to make and made about $1.9 billion in box office sales

Pulp Fiction
$8 million
$213 million

Jackie Brown
$12 million
$74 million

Kill Bill 1
$30 million
$180 million

Kill Bill 2
$30 million
$152 million

Inglorious Basterds
$70 million
$321 million

Django Unchained
$100 million
$426 million

The Hateful 8
$60 million
$156 million

Once Upon A Time In Hollywood
$90 million
$377 million

(58:00) What made Kevin Thomas so unique in the world of seventies and eighties film criticism, he seemed like one of the only few practitioners who truly enjoyed their job, and consequently, their life. I loved reading him growing up and practically considered him a friend.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading Eternal Pursuit of Unhappiness: Being Very Good Is No Good,You Have to Be Very, Very, Very, Very, Very Good by David Ogilvy and Ogivly & Mather. 

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Get access to the World’s Most Valuable Notebook for Founders at Founders Notes

Some questions other subscribers asked SAGE: 

I need some unique ideas on how to find new customers. What advice do you have for me?

What are some strategies that Cornelius Vanderbilt used against his competitors?

How did Edwin Land find new employees to hire? Any unusual sources to find talent?

What are the most important leadership lessons from history's greatest entrepreneurs?

Can you give me more ideas about how to avoid competition from Peter Thiel?

Have any of history's greatest founders regretted selling their company?

What is the best way to fire a bad employee?

How did Andrew Carnegie know what to focus on?

Why was Jay Gould so smart?

What was the biggest unlock for Henry Ford?

Can you give me a summary of Warren Buffetts best ideas?

If Charlie Munger had a top 10 rules for life what do you think those rules would be?

What did Charlie Munger say about building durable companies that last?

Tell me about Cornelius Vanderbilt. How did he make his money?

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(0:01) But what did David actually mean by divine discontent? Here's an interpretation:

DON'T BOW YOUR HEAD.

DON'T KNOW YOUR PLACE.

DEFY THE GODS.

DON'T SIT BACK.

DON'T GIVE IN.

DON'T GIVE UP.

DON'T WIN SILVERS.

DON'T BE SO EASILY HAPPY WITH YOURSELF.

DON'T BE SPINELESS.

DON'T BE GUTLESS.

DON'T BE TOADIES.

DON'T GO GENTLE INTO THAT GOOD NIGHT.

AND DON'T EVER, EVER ALLOW A SINGLE SCRAP OF RUBBISH OUT OF THE AGENCY

(5:00) We have to work equally hard to replace the old patterns of self-defeating behaviors. An old Latin proverb tells us how: a nail is driven out by a nail, habit is overcome by habit.

(7:00) Brilliant thinking is rare, but courage is in even shorter supply than genius. — Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future by Peter Thiel. (Founders #278)

(7:00) Fear is a demon that devours the soul of a company: it diminishes the quality of our imagination, it dulls our appetite for adventure, it sucks away our youth. Fear leads to self-doubt, which is the worst enemy of creativity.

(10:00) Trust is one of the greatest economic forces on earth. —  The NEW Poor Charlie's Almanack: The Wit and Wisdom of Charlie Munger. (Founders #329)

(13:00) How great we become depends on the size of our dreams. Let's dream humongous dreams, put on our overalls, go out there and build them.

(14:00) If you asked an oracle the secret to doing great work and the oracle replied with a single word my bet would be on “curiosity” — How To Do Great Work by Paul Graham. (Founders #314)

(17:00) Only dead fish go with the flow.

(18:00) If I have to choose between agreement and conflict, I’ll take conflict every time. It always yields a better result. — Jeff Bezos

(20:00) It's the cracked ones that let light into the world.

(20:00)

Rule #1. There are no rules.
Rule #2. Never forget rule #1.

(21:00) Bureaucracy has no place in an ideas company.

(23:00) You see, those who live by their wits go to work on roller coasters. The ride is exhilarating, but one has to have a stomach of titanium. For starters, you're never a hundred per cent certain you'll ever get there. If you (even) get to your destination, you sometimes wonder why you've ever bothered.

Other times the scenery pleasantly surprises you.

(24:00) Discovery consists of seeing what everyone has seen and thinking what nobody has thought.

(25:00) God is with those who persevere.

(25:00) Dogged determination is often the only trait that separates a moderately creative person from a highly creative one.

That's because great work is never done by temperamental geniuses, but by obstinate donkey-men.

(26:00) Against the Odds: An Autobiography by James Dyson (Founders #300)

(26:00) We are what we repeatedly do. Our character is a composite of our habits. Habits constantly, daily, express who we really are.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading The Lessons of History by Will and Ariel Durant. 

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(1:00) This is a 100 page biography of the human species

(1:00) The Story of Civilization by Will and Ariel Durant (Full Set) 

(2:30) Generations of men establish a growing mastery over the earth, but they are destined to become fossils in its soil.

(4:00) Ruthlessly prioritize how you spend your time.

(4:00) The influence of geographic factors diminishes as technology grows.

(4:30) ALL OF THE NAPOLEON EPISODES:

Napoleon: A Concise Biography by David Bell. (Founders #294) 

The Mind of Napoleon: A Selection of His Written and Spoken Wordsedited by J. Christopher Herold. (Founders #302)

Napoleon and Modern War by Napoleon and Col. Lanza. (Founders #337) 

(8:00) Our job is to make our companies and ourselves better equipped to meet the test of survival.

(11:30) Economic development specializes functions, differentiates abilities, and makes men unequally valuable to their group.

(12:30) The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness by Naval Ravikant and Eric Jorgenson. (Founders #191)

(14:30) In the end, superior ability has its way.

(16:30) Nothing is clearer in history than the adoption by successful rebels of the methods they were accustomed to condemn in the forces they deposed.

(19:00) The imitative majority follows the innovating minority and this follows the originative individual, in adapting new responses to the demands of environment or survival.

(20:00) If you can identify an enduring human need you can build a business around that.

(21:00) In every age men have been dishonest and governments have been corrupt.

(25:00) Survival at all costs: Nature and history do not agree with our conceptions of good and bad; they define good as that which survives, and bad as that which goes under.

(25:00) Victory in our industry is spelled survival. — Steve Jobs

(25:00) All that matters is to survive. The rest is just words. — Charles de Gaulle by Julian Jackson. (Founders #224)

(26:00) By being so cautious in respect to leverage and having loads of liquidity, we will be equipped both financially and emotionally to play offense while others scramble for survival. — The Essays of Warren Buffett by Warren Buffett and Lawrence Cunningham (Founders #227)

(27:00) History reports that the men who can manage men manage the men who can manage only things, and the men who can manage money manage all.

(31:00) The Iron Law of Oligarchy

(32:00) Every advance in the complexity of the economy puts an added premium upon superior ability.

(33:00) The General and the Genius: Groves and Oppenheimer—The Unlikely Partnership that Built the Atom Bomb by James Kunetka. (Founders #215)

(34:00) Freedom's Forge: How American Business Produced Victory in World War II by Arthur Herman 

(37:00) All technological advances will have to be written off as merely new means of achieving old ends

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from rereading Tycoon's War: How Cornelius Vanderbilt Invaded a Country to Overthrow America's Most Famous Military Adventurer by Stephen Dando-Collins. 

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(0:01) Vanderbilt was only interested in two things: making money and winning

(3:00) Cornelius Vanderbilt, the descendant of poor Dutch immigrants, would die in 1877 possessing more money than was held by the United States treasury.
(3:00) The First Tycoon: The Epic Life of Cornelius Vanderbilt by T.J. Stiles

(5:00) The NEW Poor Charlie's Almanack: The Wit and Wisdom of Charlie Munger. (Founders #329) 

(6:00) “If I had learned education. I would not have had time to learn anything else.”

(7:00) Vanderbilt wrote nothing down, keeping every detail of his business dealings in his head, and at any given time he knew his income and expenditures down to the last cent.

(10:00) From Founders Notes. I asked the chat feature:

Tell me about Cornelius Vanderbilt. How did he make his money?

One trait it identified in Vanderbilt was this:

Vanderbilt's approach to business was often marked by a sly concealment of his intentions, keeping information close while simultaneously gathering intelligence on competitors. This strategic obfuscation allowed him to make moves that others often couldn't predict or comprehend until it was too late

(This feature will be available to Founders Notes subscribers very soon!)

(15:00) The Invisible Billionaire: Daniel Ludwig by Jerry Shields (Founders #292)

(24:00) The Founders: The Story of PayPal and the Entrepreneurs Who Shaped Silicon Valley by Jimmy Soni. (Founders #233) 

(26:00) Gentlemen, you have undertaken to cheat me. I won’t sue you, for the law is too slow. I’ll ruin you. Yours truly, Cornelius Vanderbilt.

(37:00) He's turning everyone against Walker by appealing to their interests. He’s not saying do this for me to get my ships back. He appeals to their interests and aligns their interests with his own.

(40:00) Vanderbilt had more money than all the Central American governments combined.

(41:00) As far as my nature is concerned, I do not meet competition, I destroy competitors.

— The 38 Letters from J.D. Rockefeller to His Son by John D. Rockefeller. (Founders #324)

(41:00) Vanderbilt said why don’t you pay me to not compete with you?

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

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What I learned from reading Relentless: From Good to Great to Unstoppable by Tim Grover and Winning: The Unforgiving Race to Greatness by Tim Grover. 

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(3:00) What I am giving you is insight into the mentality of those who have found unparalleled success by trusting their own instincts.

(3:00) Mozart: A Life by Paul Johnson. (Founders #240)

(6:00) Michael was the best because he was relentless about winning. No matter how many times he won he always wanted more and he was always willing to do whatever it took to get it.

(6:00) Michael never cared about achieving mere greatness. He cared about being the best ever.

(7:00) These are the most driven individuals you'll ever know, with an unmatched genius for what they do: they don't just perform a job, they reinvent it.

(8:00) Alex Rodriguez interviews Kobe Bryant 

(11:00) The most important thing, the one thing that defines and separates him from any other competitor: He's addicted to the exquisite rush of success and he'll alter his entire life to get it.

(11:00) The mind will play tricks on you. The mind was telling you that you couldn't go any further. The mind was telling you how much it hurt. The mind was telling you these things to keep you from reaching your goal. But you have to see past that, turn it all off if you are going to get where you want to be. —

—Driven From Within by Michael Jordan and Mark Vancil. (Founders #213)

(12:30) If one thing separated Michael from every other player, it was his stunning ability to block out everything and everyone else. He was able to shut out everything except his mission.

(14:00) At some point you made something simple into something complicated.

(16:00) Being at the extreme in your craft is very important in the age of leverage. The best person in the world at anything gets to do it for everyone.

(20:00) A 600 page biography of Kobe Bryant: The Life of Kobe Bryant by Roland Lazenby. (Founders #272)

(21:00) This could be an ad for FOUNDERS NOTES 

The greats never stop learning.

All the hours of work have created an unstoppable internal resource you can draw on in any situation.

(22:00) Mostly he tested himself. It seemed that he discovered the secret quite early in his competitive life: the more pressure he heaped on himself the greater his ability to rise to the occasion.

— Michael Jordan: The Life by Roland Lazenby. (Founders #212)

(23:00) Kobe and Ahmad Rashad interview

(23:00) Be indifferent to the opinions of other people. Michael does not care what you think. Kobe does not care what you think. There is no one that can hold them to a higher standard than themselves.

(34:00) How Kobe Bryant knew he was going to win a lot of championships:

It was easy to size other players up in the NBA. I found that a lot of guys played for financial stability. Once they got that financial stability the passion, the work ethic, and the obsessiveness was gone. Once I saw that I thought, “This is going to be like taking candy from a baby. No wonder Michael Jordan wins all these fucking championships.”

(35:00) Michael Jordan worked on consistency, relentlessly.

(49:00) A good competitor always evaluates his oppenent. And you understand him for what he really is. You never try to give him confidence you try to take it at all times. — Michael Jordan video

(53:00) Everyone wanted to be like Mike. Mike did not want to be like anyone else.

(1:07:00) Creative Selection: Inside Apple's Design Process During the Golden Age of Steve Jobs by Ken Kocienda. (Founders #281)

(1:07:00) Stop adding. Start deleting. Winning demands total focus.

(1:11:00)  It started with hope.

It started with hope.

We went from a shitty team to one of the all time greatest dynasties.

All you needed was one little match to start that whole fire.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading Decoded by Jay Z. 

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(1:39) I would practice from the time I woke in the morning until I went to sleep

(2:10) Even back then I though I was the best.

(2:57) Bourdain: The Definitive Oral Biography  (Founders #219)

(4:32) Belief becomes before ability.

(5:06) Michael Jordan: The Life (Founders #212)

(5:46) The public praises people for what they practice in private.

(7:28)  Lock yourself in a room doing five beats a day for three summers.

(7:50) Sam Walton: Made In America  (Founders #234)

(9:50) He was disappointed in the world, so he built one of his own — from Steven Spielberg: A Biography (Founders #209)

(12:47) The Pmarca Blog Archive Ebook by Marc Andreessen (Founders #50)

(13:35) I'm not gonna say that I thought I could get rich from rap, but I could clearly see that it was gonna get bigger before it went away. Way bigger.

(21:10) Over 20 years into his career and dude ain’t changed. He’s got his own vibe. You gotta love him for that. (Rick Rubin)

(21:41) Against The Odds: An Autobiography by James Dyson (Founders #200)

(25:27) I believe you can speak things into existence.

(27:20) Picking the right market is essential.

(29:29) All companies that go out of business do so for the same reason – they run out of money. —Don Valentine 

(29:42) There are two things in business that matter, and you can learn this in two minutes- you don’t have to go to business school for two years: high gross margins and cash flow. The other financial metrics you can forget. —Don Valentine 

(31:54) I went on the road with Big Daddy Kane for a while. I got an invaluable education watching him perform.

(33:12) Everything I do I learned from the guys who came before me. —Kobe

(34:15) I truly hate having discussions about who would win one on one or fans saying you’d beat Michael. I feel like Yo (puts his hands up like stop. Chill.) What you get from me is from him. I don’t get 5 championships without him because he guided me so much and gave me so much great advice.

(34:50) Steve Jobs: The Exclusive Biography (Founders #214)

(37:20) This is a classic piece of OG advice. It's amazing how few people actually stick to it.

(38:04) Nuts!: Southwest Airlines' Crazy Recipe for Business and Personal Success(Founders #56)

(39:04) The key to staying on top of things is to treat everything like it's your first project.

(41:10) The Founders: The Story of Paypal and the Entrepreneurs Who Shaped Silicon Valley (Founders #233)

(44:46) We (Jay Z, Bono, Quincy Jones) ended up trading stories about the pressure we felt even at this point in our lives.

(45:22) Competition pushes you to become your best self. Jordan said the same thing about Larry Bird and Magic Johnson.

[46:43] If you got the heart and the brains you can move up quickly. There's no way to quantify all of this on a spreadsheet, but it's the dream of being the exception.

(52:26) He (Russell Simmons) changed the business style of a whole generation. The whole vibe of startup companies in Silicon Valley with 25 year old CEOs wearing shell toes is Russell's Def Jam style filtered through different industries.

(54:17) Jay Z’s approach is I'm going to find the smartest people that that know more than I do, and I'm gonna learn everything I can from them.

(54:49) He (Russell Simmons) knew that the key to success was believing in the quality of your own product enough to make people do business with you on your terms. He knew that great product was the ultimate advantage in competition.

(55:08) In the end it came down to having a great product and the hustle to move it.

(56:37) Learn how to build and sell and you will be unstoppable. The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness (Founders #191)

(58:30) We gave those brands a narrative which is one of the reasons anyone buys anything. To own not just a product, but to become part of a story.

(59:30) The best thing for me to do is to ignore and outperform.

(1:01:16) Poor Charlie's Almanack: The Wit and Wisdom of Charles T. Munger. (Founders #90)

(1:06:01) Tao of Charlie Munger: A Compilation of Quotes from Berkshire Hathaway's Vice Chairman on Life, Business, and the Pursuit of Wealth With Commentary  (Founders #78)

(1:08:42) Jony Ive: The Genius Behind Apple's Greatest Products(Founders #178)

(1:11:46) Long term success is the ultimate goal.

(1:12:58) Runnin' Down a Dream: How to Succeed and Thrive in a Career You Love - Bill Gurley

(1:15:11) I have always used visualization the way athletes do, to conjure reality.

(1:18:14) The thing that distinguished Jordan wasn't just his talent, but his discipline, his laser-like commitment to excellence.

(1:19:42) The gift that Jordan had wasn't just that he was willing to do the work, but he loved doing it because he could feel himself getting stronger and ready for anything. That is the kind of consistency that you can get only by adding dead serious discipline of whatever talent you have.

(1:21:37) when you step outside of school and you have to teach yourself about life, you develop a different relationship to information. I've never been a purely linear thinker. You can see it to my rhymes. My mind is always jumping around restless, making connections, mixing, and matching ideas rather than marching in a straight line,

(1:27:41) Samuel Bronfman: The Life and Times of Seagram’s Mr. Sam (Founders #116)

(1:34:15) The real bullshit is when you act like you don't have contradictions inside you. That you're so dull and unimaginative that your mind never changes or wanders into strange, unexpected places.

(1:36:25) There are extreme levels of drive and pain tolerance in the history of entrepreneurship.

(1:38:45) Hit Men: Power Brokers and Fast Money Inside the Music Business

(1:42:24)  I love sharp people. Nothing makes me like someone more than intelligence.

(1:44:17) They call it the game, but it's not. You can want success all you want but to get it you can't falter. You can't slip. You can't sleep— one eye open for real and forever.

(1:51:49) The thought that this cannot be life is one that all of us have felt at some point or another. When a bad decision and bad luck and bad situations feel like too much to bear those times. When we think this, this cannot be my story, but facing up to that kind of feeling can be a powerful motivation to change.

(1:54:18) Technology is making it easier to connect to other people, but maybe harder to keep connected to yourself.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading The Days of Duveen by S.N. Behrman. 

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Patrick and I are looking for partners. If you are building B2B products get in touch here. 

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(0:01) Duveen noticed that Europe had plenty of art and America had plenty of money, and his entire astonishing career was the product of that simple observation.

(2:30) The great American millionaires of the Duveen Era were slow-speaking and slow-thinking, cautious, secretive, and maddeningly deliberate.

(3:30) How Larry Gagosian Reshaped The Art World by Patrick Radden Keefe. (Founders #325)

(4:30) Invest Like The Best #342 Will England: A Primer on Multi-Strategy Hedge Funds

(6:00) There is an old two-part rule that often works wonders in business, science, and elsewhere: 

1. Take a simple, basic idea and 

2. Take it very seriously. — the NEW Poor Charlie's Almanack: The Wit and Wisdom of Charlie Munger. (Founders #329)

(10:00) The art dealer Joseph Duveen insisted on making the paintings he sold as scarce and rare as possible. To keep their prices elevated and their status high, he bought up whole collections and stored them in his basement. The paintings that he sold became more than just paintings—they were fetish objects, their value increased by their rarity.  — The 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene. 

(14:00) Duveen had enormous respect for the prices he set on the objects he bought and sold. Often his clients tried, in various ways, to maneuver him into a position where he might relax his high standards, but he nearly always managed to keep them.

(16:00) Wildcatters: A Story of Texans, Oil, and Money by Sally Helgesen. (Founders #338)

(18:00) You don’t need many customers if the few customers you do have are the riches people in the world.

(22:00) His enthusiasm was irrepressible.

(26:00) Duveen felt that his educational mission was two fold —to teach millionaire American collectors what the great works of art were, and to teach them that they could get those works of art only through him.

(27:00) When you pay high for the priceless, you're getting it cheap.

(31:00) He was interested in practically nothing except his business.

(31:00) Certain men are endowed with the faculty of concentrating on their own affairs to the exclusion of what's going on elsewhere in the cosmos. Duveen was that kind of man.

(32:00) Monopoly was his method.

(38:00) Duveen would pay the servants of staff that worked in the homes of his clients. This was the result: They developed a feeling that it was only fair to transmit to Duveen any information that might interest him.

(41:00) The art dealer Joseph Duveen was once confronted with a terrible problem.

The millionaires who had paid so dearly for Duveen’s paintings were running out of wall space, and with inheritance taxes getting ever higher, it seemed unlikely that they would keep buying.

The solution was the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., which Duveen helped create in 1937 by getting Andrew Mellon to donate his collection to it. The National Gallery was the perfect front for Duveen.

In one gesture, his clients avoided taxes, cleared wall space for new purchases, and reduced the number of paintings on the market, maintaining the upward pressure on their prices. All this while the donors created the appearance of being public benefactors.

— The 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene. 

(48:00) His clients felt better when they paid a lot. It gave them the assurance of acquiring rarity.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading Wildcatters: A Story of Texans, Oil, and Money by Sally Helgesen.

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Vesto shows you all of your company's finances in one view. Schedule a demo with Vesto's founder Ben and tell him David from Founders sent you. 

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(0:01) Family and business were the same thing to him.

(1:00) We're one-hundred percent family owned, unincorporated, and independent, and we intend to stay that way.

(1:00) He possessed the directness and the utter simplicity of the old and the truly great.

(2:00) His unquestioning confidence in the worthiness of his enterprise made him seem impervious to doubts.

(5:00) The Morgans always believed in absolute monarchy. While Junius Morgan lived, he ruled the family and the business. Until Junius died his massive shadow dominated his son’s life. — The House of Morgan: An American Banking Dynasty and the Rise of Modern Finance by Ron Chernow. (Founders #139)

(8:00) Everywhere they looked, they saw opportunity without limits. The land itself was empty, and so these men built cities upon it and founded dynasties. They left behind them a world made in their own image.

(9:00) The old wildcatters had neither the time nor the inclination to question their own purposes, or to agonize about what the future consequences of their efforts might be. They just went out and did whatever was there to be done.

(10:00) The trouble with this business is that everybody expects to find oil on the surface. If it was up near the top, it wouldn't be any trick to it. You've got to drill deep for oil. — The Big Rich: The Rise and Fall of the Greatest Texas Oil Fortunes by Bryan Burrough (Founders #149)

(14:00) Charlie’s surfing model. One thing I learned from having dinner with Charlie was the importance of getting into a great business and STAYING in it. There’s a tendency in human nature to mess up a good thing because of an inability to sit still:

"There are huge advantages for the early birds. When you're an early bird, there's a model that I call surfing—when a surfer gets up and catches the wave and just stays there, he can go a long, long time.

But if he gets off the wave, he becomes mired in shallows. But people get long runs when they're right on the edge of the wave, whether it's Microsoft or Intel or all kinds of people."

—  the NEW Poor Charlie's Almanack: The Wit and Wisdom of Charlie Munger. (Founders #329)

(18:00)  Ted Turner's Autobiography (Founders #327)

(19:00) All the stories seem to be about the same prickly individual. They are giants, successful predators, acute and astute, tamers of the untamable and defenders of vast treasure.

(26:00) There are times when certain cards sit unclaimed in the common pile, when certain properties become available that will never be available again. A good businessman feels these moments like a fall in the barometric pressure. A great businessman is dumb enough to act on them even when he cannot afford to. — The Fish That Ate the Whale: The Life and Times of America's Banana King by Rich Cohen. (Founders #255)

(29:00) Delusional optimism: Go from one setback to another setback without any loss of enthusiasm.

(31:00) There's no what if. There's only what happened.

(33:00) Rainmakers Podcast

(34:00) I’d rather be lucky than smart, because a lot of smart guys go hungry.

(36:00) Optimism is the personal quality that nurtures luck.

(36:00) Chaos and defiance ruled the day, and those who led the way made little secret of their refusal to be controlled.

(44:00) Anybody who's got an idea of his own has to be a little bit crazy. Being crazy is something big companies just don't understand.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading Roots of Strategy by Thomas R. Phillips and Napoleon and Modern War by Napoleon and Col. Lanza. 

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(0:01) Napoleon fought more battles than Alexander, Hannibal, and Caesar combined.

(5:00) The Mind of Napoleon: A Selection of His Written and Spoken Words edited by J. Christopher Herold. (Founders #302)

(7:00) Insull: The Rise and Fall of A Billionaire Utility Tycoon by Forrest McDonald. (Founders #336)

(8:00) No one should believe more in your business than you do. If this is not the case you are in the wrong business.

(11:00) If you do everything you will win.

(13:00) Napoleon episodes: 

Napoleon: A Concise Biography by David Bell. (Founders #294) 

The Mind of Napoleon: A Selection of His Written and Spoken Words edited by J. Christopher Herold. (Founders #302) 

(14:00) What is the bigger number, five or one? One. One army, a real army, united behind one leader, with one purpose. A fist instead of 5 fingers. — Robert Baratheon in Game of Thrones (YouTube)

(17:00) Keep your forces united. Be vulnerable at no point. Bear down with rapidity upon important points. These are the principles which insure victory.

(17:00) Read over and over again the campaigns of Alexander, Hannibal, Caesar, Gustavus, Turenne, Eugene and Frederic. Make them your models. This is the only way to become a great general and to master the secrets of the art of war. With your own genius enlightened by this study, you will reject all maxims opposed to those of these great commanders. [If Napoleon was alive you know he’d listen to Founders podcast]

(20:00) The Tao of Charlie Munger by Charlie Munger and David Clark (Founders #295)

(20:00) Advance orders tend to stifle initiative. A commander should be left free to adapt himself to circumstances as they occur.

(23:00) The art of war consists in a well organized and conservative defense, coupled with an audacious and rapid offensive.

(26:00) Ten people who yell make more noise than ten thousand who keep silent.

(29:00) Long orders, which require much time to prepare, to read and to understand are the enemies of speed. Napoleon could issue orders of few sentences which clearly expressed his intentions and required little time to issue and to understand.

(31:00) A great leader will resort to audacity.

(32:00) “Alexander the Great thought, decided, and above all, moved swiftly. He appreciated the importance of speed and the terrifying surprises speed made possible. His enemies were always stunned and shocked by his arrival. He invented the blitzkrieg.”  — Heroes: From Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar to Churchill and de Gaulle by Paul Johnson. (Episode #226)

(34:00) It is no harm to be too strong; it may be fatal to be too weak.

(41:00) Napoleon on single threaded leadership: Once a campaign has been decided upon there should be no hesitation in appointing one commander to assure its success. When authority is divided, opinions and actions differ, and confusion and delay arises. A single chief proceeds with vigor; he is not delayed by necessity to confer.

(42:00) Posess obstinate will.

(43:00) Experience must be supplemented by study. No man's personal experience can be so inclusive as to warrant his disregarding the experiences of others. (This is a great reason why you should invest in a subscription to Founders Notes ) 

(44:00) It is profitable to study the campaigns of the great masters.

(47:00) Skill consists in converging a mass of fire upon a single point. He that has the skill to bring a sudden, unexpected concentration of artillery to bear upon a selected point is sure to capture it. (A lesson from Peter Thiel: Don’t divide your attention: focusing on one thing yields increasing returns for each unit of effort.)

(49:00) All great captains have been diligent students [of history].

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading Insull: The Rise and Fall of A Billionaire Utility Tycoon by Forrest McDonald. 

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(0:01) Insull had been in the electric business as long as there had been an electric business.

(4:00) He awoke early, abruptly, completely, bursting with energy; yet he gained momentum as the day wore on, and long into the night. Sam had near-demonic energy.

(5:00) Sam's most obvious attribute was a capacity for racing through large quantities of reading material, effortlessly perceiving its important assumptions and generalizations, and thoroughly assimilating its salient details.

(7:00) He eagerly embraced platitudes:

• Idle hands are the devil's workshop

• Time is money

• Things are simply "done" or "not done"

• One reveres one's family

• Only that which is useful is good

• Survival of the fittest

(8:00) Opportunity handled well leads to more opportunity.

(12:00) He developed an ability to concentrate on a single subject and to completely shut out everything else, no matter how pressing.

(13:00) A theme from the robber baron era: How do we turn a luxury product into a necessity?

(18:00) If you do everything you will win.  — Working by Robert Caro. (Founders #305) and The Mind of Napoleon: A Selection of His Written and Spoken Words edited by J. Christopher Herold. (Founders #302)

(19:00) Insull reread every one of Edison's European contracts, and he took it upon himself to write weekly letters to Johnson, summarizing the fluctuations in the telephone situation and outlining Edison's shifting interests in connection with it. These letters proved to be the best selling points Johnson could have in recommending Insull to Edison.

(20:00) One of his most deep-rooted traits was that he was absolutely unable to imagine the possibility of his own failure; he entirely lacked the sense of caution of those who doubt themselves.

(21:00) Caution, like relaxation, was unnatural to him.

(21:00) We will make electric lights so cheap that only the rich will be able to burn candles.

(27:00) Edison had an almost pathological hostility to any form of system, order, or discipline imposed from without.

(33:00) Warren Buffett on leverage:

Unquestionably, some people have become very rich through the use of borrowed money. However, that's also been a way to get very poor. When leverage works, it magnifies your gains. Your spouse thinks you're clever, and your neighbors get envious. But leverage is addictive. Once having profited from its wonders, very few people retreat to more conservative practices.

And [to repeat] as we all learned in third grade-and some relearned in 2008–any series of positive numbers, however impressive the numbers may be, evaporates when multiplied by a single zero. History tells us that leverage all too often produces zeroes, even when it is employed by very smart people.

Leverage, of course, can be lethal to businesses as well. Companies with large debts often assume that these obligations can be refinanced as they mature. That assumption is usually valid. Occasionally, though, either because of company-specific problems or a worldwide shortage of credit, maturities must actually be met by payment. For that, only cash will do the job.

— The Essays of Warren Buffett by Warren Buffett and Lawrence Cunningham. (Founders #227)

(35:00) Smart men go broke three ways: liquor, ladies and leverage. — Charlie Munger

(42:00) To make electricity as cheap as possible we need the largest base of customers. The way to get the largest base of customers is through monopoly.

(45:00) He understood the potential of his industry in a way others did not.

(45:00) We are only going to do things that other people can not do.

(47:00) While money may not buy friends it will keep many a man from becoming an enemy.

(50:00) The moment of applause was the moment for action.

(1:00:00) You need to tell your customers what goes into making your product. It may be normal to you because it is your everyday thing. It is not normal to them. And if you explain and you educate your customers they will find it fascinating. And as a result it will make the service and the product you provide more valuable in their eyes.

(1:00:00) Sam Insull made electric power so abundant and cheap in the United States that people who had never expected to use it, found it as natural and as necessary as breathing.

(1:06:00) He took his leverage too high and the structure of the leverage was a problem. —  Ted Turner's Autobiography.(Founders #327)

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading How To Make A Few Billion Dollars by Brad Jacobs. 

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(0:01) I'm what's called a moneymaker. I've started five companies from scratch—seven if you include two spin-offs and turned them all into billion dollar or multibillion-dollar enterprises.

(2:00) I love working with outrageously talented people to deliver outsized returns for shareholders in public stock markets.

(5:00) All of the successful people I know have rearranged their brains to prevail at achieving big goals in turbulent environments where conventional thinking often fails.

(5:00) The single most powerful pattern I have noticed is that successful people find value in unexpected places and they do this by thinking about business from first principles. —  Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future by Peter Thiel (Founders #335)

(7:00) So much of success in business comes from keeping your head in a good place.

(8:00) I'm an ambitious person by nature and a dealmaker by inclination.

(9:00) Episode #295: I Had Dinner With Charlie Munger

(13:00) Listen to Think Big and Move Fast: Brad Jacobs on Invest Like the Best 

(14:00) Setting the Table: The Transforming Power of Hospitality in Business by Danny Meyer. (Founders #20)

(15:00) If you want to make money in the business world, you need to get used to problems, because that's what business is.

(20:00) I am not surprised when things don’t go perfectly. That is the nature of the universe.

(21:00) Listen to this incredible conversation between Charlie Munger and John Collison on Invest Like The Best. 

(28:00) Invest in technology. The savings compound, it gives you an advantage over a slower moving competitor, and can be the difference between a profit and a loss. (Lesson from Andrew Carnegie)

(31:00) How Larry Gagosian Reshaped The Art World by Patrick Radden Keefe. (Founders #325)

(36:00) While the rental industry overall was slow to computerize, the larger regional players were more tech-savvy. By 1997, nearly all of them were running on software developed by a company called Wynne Systems.

I bought Wynne.

Owning Wynne accomplished two things.

We had an industry-best platform that we could continue to develop internally for our own use, and the acquisition gave us access to aggregated, anonymized data on macro-trends across the industry.

This gave us a high-level view of emerging market trends, such as equipment gluts or shortages in the making. We could proactively adjust our pricing and asset management, while the rest of the industry was being reactive.

(40:00) The deals I've avoided have contributed more to my success than the deals I've done.

(42:00) I love these questions for a business and a family:

“What's your single best idea to improve our company?"

and

"What's the stupidest thing we're doing as a company?"

(47:00) There are few mistakes costlier than hiring the wrong person.  An empty seat is less damaging than a poor fit.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading the transcripts of Young Oprah on Her Life and Career and Oprah on Career, Life and Leadership. 

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(1:00) Oprah fired her agent and replaced him with a Chicago lawyer named Jeffrey Jacobs. "I heard Jeff is a piranha. I like that. Piranha is good."

(3:00) I will just create. And if it works, it works. And if it doesn’t, I’ll create something else. I don’t have any limitations on what I think I could do or be.

(4:30) Dr. Julie Gurner’s Ultra Successful newsletter 

Dr Julie Gurner's Website 

(7:00) Imitation precedes creation.  — Stephen King On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft by Stephen King. (Founders #210)

(9:00) On getting demoted from anchor to talk show host: I was embarrassed by the whole thing because I had never failed before. It was that “failure” that led to the talk show. (Opportunity is a strange beast. It frequently appears after a loss.)

(9:00) The talk show immediately felt right to her: This is what I should have been doing because it was like breathing to me. It was like breathing. I knew it was the right thing to do.

(10:00) Oprah has an intense, powerful belief in herself. And she has had that since she was 4.

(11:00) I truly believe that thoughts are the greatest vehicle to change power and success in the world. Everything begins with thoughts.

(12:00) If you actually have to choose between the most experienced person, or the most educated person, or the person who actually wants it the most, you always pick the person who wants it the most. — Josh Kushner on the Invest Like the Best podcast 

(14:00) Visualize.

If in your mind's eye you see a successful venture, a deal made, a profit accomplished, it has a superb chance of actually happening. Projecting your mind into a successful situation is the most powerful means to achieve goals.

If you spend time with pictures of failure in your mind, you will orchestrate failure.

Countless times, before the event, I have pictured a heroic sale to a large department store every step of the  way and the picture in my mind became a reality. I've visualized success, then created the reality from the image.

Great athletes, business people, inventors, and achievers from all walks of life seem to know this secret.

— Estée Lauder: A Success Story by Estée Lauder. (Founders #217)

(17:00) I am going to have what I deserve.

(19:00) I was watching my grandmother boiling clothes (they had no indoor plumbing) and I was four years old and I remember thinking: My life won’t be like this. My life won’t be like this. It will be better.

(22:00) I thank whatever God there is for my unconquerable soul.

(22:00) And whatever you do, if you do a lot of it, you get good at it. And that is how this broadcasting career started for me. I’ve been an orator for a long time. I’ve been an orator all of my life.

(27:00) I feel that my show is a ministry.

(27:00) I loved books so much as a child. They were my outlet to the world.

(29:00) I had a very strict father. I remember my father saying you can not bring C’s in this house because you are not a C student. You’re an A student. It was just so matter of fact.

(31:00) Paul Graham on how to make yourself a big target for luck:

“When you read biographies of people who've done great work, it's remarkable how much luck is involved.They discover what to work on as a result of a chance meeting, or by reading a book they happen to pick up.So you need to make yourself a big target for luck, and the way to do that is to be curious.Try lots of things, meet lots of people, read lots of books, ask lots of questions.”

— How To Do Great Work by Paul Graham. (Founders #314)

(33:00) Her schedule in college was intense: I’d do all my classes from 8am to 1pm. Then I worked at the tv station from 2pm to 10pm. Then I’d study until 1am and then do the routine all over again the next day.

(34:00) I demand only the best for myself.

(35:00) Oprah on the parasocial relationship with her audience: It’s not like other celebrities. I see people react to other people and it’s not like it is to me.

(37:00) Asking for help is a superpower no one uses.

(39:00) The ability to read at an early age saved my life. I knew there was a better way. I knew there was a way out because I had read about it.

(41:00) I sign every check. It is tedious. It gets to be a lot. I have piles of checks. The idea of having money and not being responsible and knowing how much money you have and keeping control of it is not something that I personally can accept. I watch it very carefully.

(42:00) Henry Singleton pays all the bills and signs all the checks, calling it "a form of discipline. Through doing the signing it's amazing how much you learn about the business. There's a reminder of each event or action behind each check. — Distant Force: A Memoir of the Teledyne Corporation and the Man Who Created It by Dr. George Roberts. (Founders #110)

(42:00) How do you learn to be a founder? You do it the same way you do anything else: 14, 15 hour days. I feel most comfortable working.

(43:00) For me, work just meant discovery and fun. If I heard somebody complaining, “Oh, I work so hard, I put in ten- and twelve-hour days,” I would crucify him. “What the fuck are you talking about when the day is twenty-four hours? What else did you do?”  —Total Recall: My Unbelievably True Life Story by Arnold Schwarzenegger. (Founders #141)

(43:00) It doesn’t feel like work.

(46:00) Intuition is a very powerful thing. More powerful than intellect in my opinion. That’s had a big impact on my work. — Steve Jobs

(48:00) I am only a little dress-maker, trying to make women young and pretty. These other designers that do the pretty little sketches, the boys, they don't understand women, they don't know how they live. Their idea is to make them weird, freaks. — Coco Chanel: The Legend and the Life by Justine Picardie. (Founders #199)

(51:00) I live from the inside out.

(54:00) Acquired’s podcast episode on Oprah and Harpo 

(54:00)

Self belief

Ownership

Do the same thing for 25 years

Stay within your circle of competence

(55:00) Find what feeds your passion. Your real job is to find out why you are really here and then get about the business of doing that.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading The Red Bull Story by Wolfgang Fürweger and Red Bull's Billionaire Maniac by Duff McDonald. 

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(1:30) "In literal financial terms, our sports teams are not yet profitable, but in value terms, they are," he says. "The total editorial media value plus the media assets created around the teams are superior to pure advertising expenditures."

(2:30) "It is a must to believe in one's product. If this were just a marketing gimmick, it would never work."

(5:00) He doesn't place a premium on collecting friends or socializing: "I don't believe in 50 friends. I believe in a smaller number. Nor do I care about society events. It's the most senseless use of time. When I do go out, from time to time, it's just to convince myself again that I'm not missing a lot."

(7:30) The most dangerous thing for a branded product is low interest. (Edwin Land: The test of an invention is the power of an inventor to push it through in the face of the staunch-not opposition, but indifference-in society. (Indifference is your enemy)

(9:00) Nike, Adidas and Vans episodes:

Shoe Dog: A Memoir by the Creator of Nike by Phil Knight. (Founders #186)

Sneaker Wars: The Enemy Brothers Who Founded Adidas and Puma and The Family Feud That Forever Changed The Business of Sports by Barbara Smit. (Founders #109)

Authentic: A Memoir by the Founder of Vans by Paul Van Doren. (Founders #216)

(11:00) The lines between Red Bull, Red Bull athletes, and Red Bull events are blurry on purpose. To Mateschitz, it's just one big image campaign with many manifestations.

(12:00) He has no plans to sell or take Red Bull public. "It's not a question of money. It's a question of fun. Can you imagine me in a shareholders' meeting?”

(13:00) Red Bull’s Billionaire Maniac https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2011-05-19/red-bulls-billionaire-maniac

(16:00) He is universally described as a person with great charisma.

(16:30) The Invisible Billionaire: Daniel Ludwig by Jerry Shields. (Founders 292)

(17:00) He has a fierce desire for privacy. He buys a society magazine to make sure he never appears in it.

(22:00) There is no market for Red Bull. We will create one.

(24:00) Estée Lauder: A Success Story by Estée Lauder.  (Founders #217)

(30:00) the NEW Poor Charlie's Almanack: The Wit and Wisdom of Charlie Munger. (Founders #329)

(31:00) Gossip and malicious rumors are worth more than the most expensive publicity campaign in the world.” — Dior by Dior: The Autobiography of Christian Dior (Founders #331)

(36:00) Control your costs and maintain financial discipline even when making record profits.

(38:00) Cult brands have their own laws, otherwise they would not be cultish.

(38:00) Red Bull is Dietrich Mateschitz and Dietrich Mateschitz is Red Bull.

(38:00) Many companies outsource their marketing and advertising activity. Red Bull consistently took the opposite route: It outsourced production and distribution and takes care of sales and advertising itself.

(40:00) Charlie Munger and John Collison on Invest Like The Best #355 

Rolex: Timeless Excellence on Invest Like The Best 

(41:00) If you are making a physical product make it look different from its competitors from the start.

(43:00) Everything is marketing.

(45:00) Never do anything that compromises your survival.

(46:00) He keeps his empire constantly in motion

(46:00) All corporate projects like Formula 1, football, Air Race, and media serve the core business: the sale of the energy drink.

(47:00) This is a battle for attention.

(49:00) Red Bull owns their events. They never relinquish media rights to any event. They invest in making the content and then they give their content to other media distributors for free. A very clever way to multiply their advertising and marketing spend.

(52:00) The Bugatti Story by L’Ebe Bugatti. (Founders #316)

The Dream of Solomeo: My Life and the Idea of Humanistic Capitalism by Brunello Cucinelli. (Founders #289)

(54:00) Why he moved Red Bull’s headquarters to a little village on a lake: The aim was to create a more pleasant working atmosphere.

(54:00) On why fitness is so important to him: “Everything that gives me pleasure in life is connected with a certain physical fitness and physical well-being. I like going to the mountain, I like skiing, I like sailing, I like riding a motorbike, I like fooling around - and everything is connected with a minimum of physical agility, motor skills, dexterity, strength, stamina. In order to enjoy it outdoors, I need the indoor program.”

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading Jesus: A Biography from a Believer by Paul Johnson. 

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(3:00) 

Churchill by Paul Johnson. (Founders #225) 

Socrates: A Man for Our Times by Paul Johnson. (Founders #252)

Mozart: A Life by Paul Johnson. (Founders #240)

Heroes: From Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar to Churchill and de Gaulle by Paul Johnson. (Founders #226) 

(10:00) Jesus was:

-observant

-detail oriented

-maintained intense eye contact

-confident

-decisive

-charismatic

-gifted communicator

(11:00) The most important step when starting anything new is recruiting the people who are going to help you on your mission.

(12:00) No prophet is acceptable in his hometown.

(16:00) Jesus emphasized the importance of humility, gentleness, non aggression. The importance of the pursuit of justice and righteousness. He encourages acts of compassion and forgiveness towards others.  He focuses on inner purity, sincerity, and a genuine heart. He commends those who work towards reconciliation, harmony, and peace.

(17:00) Some of Jesus’s maxims:

Love your enemies.

If someone slaps you on one cheek, turn to them the other also.

Judge not and you will not be judged.

Forgive and you will be forgiven.

(18:00) A summary of Jesus’s teaching in two words: Be kind.

(18:00) He turned compassion, which all of us feel from time to time for a particular person, into a huge overarching gospel of love. He taught the love of mankind as a whole.

(26:00) Jesus taught to change and improve yourself. He led by example and encouraged imitation. Those that changed themselves, changed the world.

(27:00) Jesus’s new 10 commandments:

1. Each of us must develop a true personality. Each of us is unique. Develop your character.

2. Abide by universality. See the human race as a whole.

3. Give equal consideration to all.

4. Use love in all your human relationships, at all times, and in every situation.

5. Show mercy.

6. Balance. Keep your head even when others are losing theirs.

7. Cultivate an open mind.

8. Pursue truth.

9. Judiciously use your power.

10. Show courage.

(34:00) Join my personal email list to get updates about the new Founders conference

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading Dior by Dior: The Autobiography of Christian Dior and Creators by Paul Johnson. 

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(4:00) The Taste of Luxury: Bernard Arnault and the Moet-Hennessy Louis Vuitton Story by Nadege Forestier and Nazanine Ravai. (Founders #296)

(5:00) Opportunity is a strange beast. It frequently appears after a loss.

(6:00) Dior was a nobody in his forties, with nothing in his design career to suggest genius.

(6:00) When you read biographies of people who've done great work, it's remarkable how much luck is involved. They discover what to work on as a result of a chance meeting, or by reading a book they happen to pick up. So you need to make yourself a big target for luck, and the way to do that is to be curious. Try lots of things, meet lots of people, read lots of books, ask lots of questions.

— How To Do Great Work by Paul Graham. (Founders #314)

(7:00) Dior told him: “I am not interested in managing a clothing factory. What you need, and I would like to run, is a craftsman’s workshop, in which we would recruit the very best people in the trade, to reestablish in Paris a salon for the greatest luxury and the highest standards of workmanship. It will cost a great deal of money and entail much risk.”

(8:00) He spat in the face of postwar egalitarian democracy and said, in so many words, “I want to make the rich feel rich again.” His first collection turned out to be the most successful in fashion history.

(18:00) I envisioned my fashion house as a craftsman’s workshop rather than a clothing factory.

(19:00) A fortune teller tells Dior he must do found his fashion house in spite of his fears and doubts: She ordered me sternly to accept the Boussac offer at once. You must create the house of Christian Dior, whatever the conditions, she told me. Nothing anyone will offer you later will compare with the chance which is open to you now.

(22:00) Dior said Balenciaga was "the master of us all" — Balenciaga (Founders #315)

(26:00) Gossip and malicious rumors are worth more than the most expensive publicity campaign in the world.

(29:00) The most passionate adventures of my life have been with my clothes. I am obsessed with them.

(30:00) When asked what was the best asset a man could have, Albert Lasker replied, ‘Humility in the presence of a good idea.’ It is horribly difficult to recognize a good idea. I shudder to think how many I have rejected. Research can’t help you much, because it cannot predict the cumulative value of an idea. — Ogilvy on Advertising by David Ogilvy.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from rereading Les Schwab Pride In Performance: Keep It Going! by Les Schwab. 

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(8:00) I didn't know how to ride a bike. We never had one. All the other young kids delivered newspapers on a bike. 

He's got no money. He doesn't have a bike. So he ran his routes for two months in order to get enough money to buy his first bike. He’d run nine or 10 miles a day. 

(8:00) I was too proud to complain.

(10:00) For a poor boy, money was much more important than pride.

(10:00) Am I Being Too Subtle?: Straight Talk From a Business Rebel by Sam Zell. (Founders #269)

(13:00) I was young. I was cocky. But the same cockiness helped me a lot in going through life.

(15:00) The very first sentence describing his very first day in business is mind blowing: I had never fixed a flat tire in my life.

(15:00) the NEW Poor Charlie's Almanack: The Wit and Wisdom of Charlie Munger (Founders #329)

(29:00) Sam Walton: The Inside Story of America's Richest Man by Vance H. Trimble (Founders #150)

(35:00) I always knew that if we fixed all the flat tires in town, we'd have all the tire business in town.

(40:00) If we become complacent, then brother, it's all over with.

(52:00) Grinding It Out: The Making of McDonald's by Ray Kroc (Founders #293)

(56:00) If you’re not serving the customer, or supporting the folks who do, we don’t need you. —Sam Walton

(1:00:00) The company paid low wages and had a lower overhead. The flaw was they didn’t get —with the low pay— near the quality of employees we had.

(1:01:00) Life is hard for the man who thinks he can take a shortcut.

(1:06:00) Decision making should always be made at the lowest possible level.

(1:08:00) Whatever you do, you must do it with gusto, you must do it in volume. It is a case of repeat, repeat, repeat.

(1:08:00) Charlie Munger analyzes why Les Schwab was successful.

(1:11:00) Extreme success is likely to be caused by some combination of the following factors:

1 Extreme maximization or minimization of one or two variables. Think Costco.

2 Adding success factors so that a bigger combination drives success, often in nonlinear fashion, as one is reminded by the concept of breakpoint and the concept of critical mass in physics. Often, results are not linear. You get a little bit more mass and you get a lollapalooza result. And, of course, I've been searching for lollapalooza results all my life, so I'm very interested in models that explain their occurrence.

3 An extreme of good performance over many factors. Example, Toyota or Les Schwab.

4 Catching and riding some sort of big wave. Example, Oracle.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading the NEW Poor Charlie's Almanack: The Wit and Wisdom of Charlie Munger. 

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Listen to this incredible conversation between Charlie Munger and John Collison on Invest Like The Best. 

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(2:00) The practical wisdom of Poor Charlie's Almanack, this ode to curiosity, generosity, and virtue will similarly compound at successive generations of entrepreneurial readers extend his lessons to their own circumstances.

(12:00) Education is the process whereby the ability to lead a good life is acquired.  — Socrates: A Man for Our Times by Paul Johnson. (Founders #252)

(22:00) Trust is one of the greatest economic forces on earth.

(29:00) Charlie is content to trust his own judgment when it runs counter to the wisdom of the herd.

(31:00) Animated: Charlie Munger: The Psychology of Human Misjudgement

(31:30) Aim for durability. Durability has always been a first rate virtue in Charlie’s eyes.

(32:00) Charlie only focuses on great businesses and great businesses have moats.

(33:00) Johnny Carson by Henry Bushkin. (Founders #183)

(42:00) You can flourish in a niche: People who specialize in the business world —and get very good because they specialize— frequently find good economics that they wouldn't get any other way.

(45:00) Being so well known has advantages of scale. This is what you might call an informational advantage. It increases social proof.

(46:30) Business Breakdowns episode on Coca Cola 

(49:00) Occasionally scaling down and intensifying gives you a big advantage. (You can find great profit margins this way)

(50:00) Sam Walton: Made In America by Sam Walton. (Founders #234)

(51:00) Scale and fanaticism combined is very powerful. (Think Sam Walton)

(57:00) I also believed then, as I do now after more than fifty years as a money manager, that the surest way to get rich is to play only those games or make those investments where I have an edge. — A Man for All Markets: From Las Vegas to Wall Street, How I Beat the Dealer and the Market by Ed Thorp. (Founders #222)

(1:08:00) The best thing a human being can do is help another human being know more.

(1:14:00) Optimism is a moral duty. — Edwin Land

(1:17:00) You want to maximize the playing time of your top players.

(1:17:00) The game of competitive life often requires maximizing the experience of the people who have the most aptitude and the most determination as learning machines.

(1:22:00) The most important rule in management is get the incentives right.

(1:25:00) Never, ever think about something else when you should be thinking about the power of incentives.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

Reflections from my dinner with Charlie Munger.

Order the new updated version of Poor Charlie’s Almanack: The Essential Wit and Wisdom of Charles T. Munger

Charlie Munger episodes:

#295 I had dinner with Charlie Munger

#286 Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger All I Want To Know Is Where I'm Going To Die So I'll Never Go There: Buffett & Munger – A Study in Simplicity and Uncommon, Common Sense by Peter Bevelin. 

#221 Charlie Munger Damn Right: Behind the Scenes with Berkshire Hathaway Billionaire Charlie Munger by Janet Lowe.

#90 Charlie Munger Poor Charlie’s Almanack: The Essential Wit and Wisdom of Charles T. Munger

#79 Charlie Munger Charlie Munger: The Complete Investor by Tren Griffin

#78 Charlie Munger Tao of Charlie Munger: A Compilation of Quotes from Berkshire Hathaway's Vice Chairman on Life, Business, and the Pursuit of Wealth With Commentary by David Clark

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What I learned from reading The Outsiders: Eight Unconventional CEOs and Their Radically Rational Blueprint for Success by William Thorndike. 

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I use EightSleep to get the best sleep of my life. Find out why EightSleep is loved by founders everywhere and get $500 off at eightsleep.com/founders/

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(5:00) Tom Murphy] gave me one of the best pieces of advice I've ever received. He said, 'Warren, you can always tell someone to go to hell tomorrow'...You haven't missed the opportunity. Just forget about if for a day. If you feel the same way tomorrow, tell them then-but don't spout off in a moment of anger." All I Want To Know Is Where I'm Going To Die So I'll Never Go There: Buffett & Munger – A Study in Simplicity and Uncommon, Common Sense by Peter Bevelin. (Founders #286)

(5:15) Thirty years ago Tom Murphy, then CEO of Cap Cities, drove this point home to me with a hypothetical tale about an employee who asked his boss for permission to hire an assistant.

The employee assumed that adding $20,000 to the annual payroll would be inconsequential.

But his boss told him the proposal should be evaluated as a $3 million decision, given that an additional person would probably cost at least that amount over his lifetime, factoring in raises, benefits and other expenses (more people, more toilet paper).

And unless the company fell on very hard times, the employee added would be unlikely to be dismissed, however marginal his contribution to the business.

— A Few Lessons for Investors and Managers From Warren Buffett by Warren Buffett and Peter Bevelin. (Founders #202)

(7:30) The autobiography of the founder of CBS: As It Happened A Memoir by Bill Paley 

(9:00) The goal is not to have the longest train, but to arrive at the station first, using the least fuel.

(10:00) Tom Murphy’s simple formula:

1. Focus on industries with attractive economic characteristics.

2. Selectively use leverage to buy occasional large properties.

3. Improve operations.

4. Pay down debt.

5. Repeat.

(13:00) The business of business is a lot of little decisions every day, mixed up with a few big decisions.

(16:00) He quickly indoctrinated Burke into the company's lean, decentralized operating philosophy.

(17:00) I had an appetite for and a willingness to do things that Murphy was not interested in doing. Burke believed his job was to create the free cashflow and Murphy's job was to spend it.

(19:30) Stay in the game long enough to get lucky. The most important thing that he does happens 30 years into his career.

(21:30)

Q: Is this a case of leading by example?

Murphy: Is there any other way?

(23:30) Decentralization is the cornerstone of our philosophy. Our goal is to hire the best people we can and give them the responsibility and authority. They need to perform their jobs. We expect our managers to be forever cost conscious.

(24:00) Repeated by Murphy: Hire the best people and leave them alone.

(24:00) An extreme decentralized approach keeps both costs and rancor down.

(25:00) Murphy delegates to the point of anarchy.

(26:00) The best defense against the revenue lumpiness inherent in advertising supported businesses was a constant vigilance on costs.

(30:00) Why Capital Cities had low turnover: The system in place corrupts you with so much autonomy and authority that you can't imagine leaving.

(35:00) To learn more about a Capital Cities like company listen to The 50X Podcast.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

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What I learned from reading Ted Turner's Autobiography.

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(9:00) My net worth dropped by about 67 million per week, or nearly 10 million per day, every day for two and a half years.

(10:00) Once to drive home a point about the difficulties of attracting good loyal employees he told me: Jesus only had to pick 12 disciples and even one of those didn't turn out well.

(10:00) Early to bed, early to rise, work like hell, and advertise .

(11:00) Total Recall: My Unbelievably True Life Story by Arnold Schwarzenegger. (Founders #141)

(13:30) The problem isn't getting rich, it's staying sane. — Charlie Munger

(17:00) I learned a lesson that would stick with me throughout my career. When the chips are down in the pressure's on it's amazing to how creative people can be.

(20:00) My father always maintained many of the different billboard businesses as separate legal entities. (He didn’t want to dilute ownership of his main company and separate entities allowed for periodic reorganization to offset capital gains liabilities.

(20:30) When you own an asset your job is to maximize its value.

(23:00) He combines the assets he has in a way his competitors can not.

(24:00) The more I learned about TV stations the more I realized that ours was a disaster. Of the 35 people who were on the payroll when we took over only two were still there a year later —the custodian and the receptionist.

(25:00) Ted Turner believed in the power of television more than almost anybody else.

(30:30) My dad taught me early on that longterm relationships with your customers and partners are very important. You never know how the guy who you're friendly with today might be able to help you tomorrow.

(31:00) Cable Cowboy: John Malone and the Rise of the Modern Cable Business by Mark Robichaux. (Founders #268)

(32:00) What other people in his industry sees as a threat, Ted sees as an opportunity.

(37:00) These issues were all unchartered territory. All of us, the regulators, the broadcasters, the program suppliers and the leagues were sorting things out on the fly. I was working as hard as I could. I'd go all out during the day, working on sales, distribution, regulatory issues, whatever the battle happened to be, and I'd worked right up until it was time to fall asleep. I had a pull down Murphy bed in my office and I would literally work until the point of total exhaustion. Then I'd put my head on the pillow at night worried about problems. Then I'd wake up and spend the entire next day trying to solve them.

(44:00) One of the most important ideas in the book is the power of Belief: Clearly the company for whom the economics of 24 hour news would have made the most sense with a big three broadcasters. They already had most of what was needed: studios, bureaus, reporters, anchors. They had everything but a belief in cable.

(45:00) I'm going to be a billionaire. And here's why. I'm going to put this station up on a satellite and I'm going to get a news thing going. Sports, movies and news, 24 hours a day, all over the world. He said this in 1976.

(46:00) Henry Ford didn't need focus groups to tell him that people would prefer inexpensive, dependable automobiles over horses. Alexander Graham Bell never stopped to worry about whether people would prefer speaking to each other on a phone.

(49:00) I'm always convinced that one of the reasons that I've been successful is that I've almost always competed against people who were bigger and stronger, but who had less commitment and desire than I did. For Turner Broadcasting this dispute meant everything. We had to win.

(52:00) Ted’s Superstation idea is printing money: $177 million in revenue and $66 million in profit. This is in the 1980s!

(53:00) It would be 13 years before we faced another 24 hour news channel.

(57:00) He has a keen understanding of how to combine assets to create an advantage that no one else has.

(58:00) The Gambler: How Penniless Dropout Kirk Kerkorian Became the Greatest Deal Maker in Capitalist History by William C. Rempel. (Founders #65)

(58:00) Genius has the fewest moving parts. Never get into deals that are too complicated.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading Anna: The Biography by Amy Odell. 

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1. If you need tax prep and bookkeeping check out betterbookkeeping.com/founders. It's like having a full time CFO and super cheap grandpa sitting on your shoulder. 

2. Vesto makes it easy for you to invest your businesses idle cash. Schedule a demo with Vesto's founder Ben and tell him David from Founders sent you. 

Here's the legal disclosures to make the lawyers happy:

Vesto Advisors, LLC (“Vesto”) is an SEC registered investment adviser. Registration with the SEC does not imply a certain level of skill or training. More information about Vesto and our partnership can be found here

We are entitled to compensation for promoting Vesto Advisors, LLC. Accordingly, we have an incentive to endorse Vesto and its team and services. We are not current advisory clients of the Vesto.

3. I went to Notre Dame and spoke to the Art of Investing class. You can listen to the full conversation here. 

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(8:00) She knows the ecosystem in which she operates better than anyone.

(8:30) If Anna had a personal tag line it would be: I just have to make sure things are done right.

(16:00) He had a desk with nothing on it except a buzzer underneath, so that when he was done with you, which was in about five minutes, his assistant could come in and whisk you away.

(17:00) What is the number one thing you hope people learn from you? To be decisive and clear.

(19:00) The Vogue 100 is a private club whose members pay $100,000 a year just for access to Anna.

(29:00) She did not second guess herself.

(30:00) She was meticulous about everything.

(32:00) Her focus was singular. She was very clear minded about wanting to do work that she thought was the best.

(38:00) She knew that killing stories was necessary to let people know that you had standards.

(41:00) Creative Selection: Inside Apple's Design Process During the Golden Age of Steve Jobs by Ken Kocienda. (Founders #281)

(44:00) Anna ran the magazine with iron fisted discipline.

(48:00) With Anna you get two minutes. The second minute is a courtesy.

(49:00) It is slothful not to compress your thoughts. — Winston Churchill

(52:00) Anna intentionally builds relationships with the most powerful people in her industry.

(52:00) Anna saw the potential for the industry and how she can expand the power and the influence that her individually, and Vogue as a brand, by just combining all these people that are already in the ecosystem and then intentionally putting them together. When they work together it becomes stronger. And as a result of what she created, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.

(53:30) The power she has cannot be understated. The way in which she accumulated the power was fascinating. She aligned everybody's interest, with her at the center.

(1:05:00) She's not just building up a personal brand. She's not just building up Vogue. She's building up the entire industry.

(1:06:00) Relationships last longer than money.

(1:06:00) Resist any cheapening of the brand, however popular and lucrative it might be in the short term.

(1:08:00) Anna told him don't spend any time and money building out the perfect store in New York. Just roll racks into the unfinished space and start selling clothes. (He ignored this advice and went out of business)

(1:11:00) More resources:

Front Row: Anna Wintour: The Cool Life and Hot Times of Vogue's Editor in Chief by Jerry Oppenheimer 

The September Issue (Documentary)

The Devil Wears Prada (Movie)

73 Questions with Anna Wintour

73 More Questions with Anna Wintour 

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading How Larry Gagosian Reshaped The Art World by Patrick Radden Keefe. 

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(4:00) The dealer has been so successful selling art to masters of the universe that he has become one of them.

(5:45) We think of genius as being complicated, but geniuses have the fewest moving parts. Gagosian is simple. He's basically a shark, a feeding machine.

(6:00) A novice is easily spotted because they do too much. Too many ingredients, too many movements. Too much explanation. A master uses the fewest motions required to fulfill their intention.

(10:00) His own publicist described him as “A Real Killer”

(12:00) The Invisible Billionaire: Daniel Ludwig by Jerry Shields. (Founders #292)

(17:30) There is always a blueprint. Joseph Duveen was the art dealer to the Robber Barons. 

Biographies of Duveen:

Duveen: A Life in Art

Secrets Of An Art Dealer

Duveen

The Artful Partners: The Secret Association of Bernard Berenson and Joseph Duveen

(18:00) Numerous friends of Gagosian caution me not to mistake this merry-go-round of parties and galas and super yacht cruises for a life of leisure. This guy is always working. This motherfucker works 24/7. The parties are marketing showcases in disguise.

(19:00) The Taste of Luxury: Bernard Arnault and the Moet-Hennessy Louis Vuitton Story by Nadege Forestier and Nazanine Ravai. (Founders #296)

(19:30) The best way to raise the price of something is to say that you would never sell it.

(23:00) If Gagosian possesses one secret weapon that has equipped him for success it might be his disinhibition.

(33:00) The niche Gagosian pursued was seen —at the time —as low status. The secondary business was perceived as a backwater by dealers. It was considered a bit distasteful.

(42:00) He disdains formal meetings. He finds bureaucracy and protocol dull. There is no hierarchy. There is Larry and then everyone else.

(44:00) Gagosian reaps huge profits from asymmetries of information.

(51:00) Art is just money on the walls.

(54:00) David Geffen is still as liquid as the day is long.

(56:00) The competitive drive of self-made billionaires does not go into remission once they’ve made their fortune.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading The 38 Letters from J.D. Rockefeller to His Son by John D. Rockefeller. 

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(5:00) My Influence had been extended to all corners of the oil industry.  If I say that I have the power of life and death over oil producers and oil refiners, that is not a lie. I can make them wealthy or I can make them worthless.

(7:25) I never thought I would lose. As far as my nature is concerned, I do not meet competition. I destroy competitors.

(8:30) Retreat means surrender. Retreat will turn you into a slave. The war is inevitable. Let it come.

(9:00) Bring a steel like determination to face all kinds of challenges.

(13:45) I firmly believe that our destiny is determined by our actions and not by our origins.

(15:45) Alexander the Great: The Brief Life and Towering Exploits of History's Greatest Conqueror--As Told By His Original Biographers by Arrian, Plutarch, and Quintus Curtius Rufus. (Founders #232)

(21:00) The glory and success of the family cannot guarantee the future of a children and grandchildren.

(22:30) People of poor backgrounds will actively develop their abilities while also seizing various opportunities because they urgently need to rescue themselves.

(26:00) Luck is the remnant of design luck is the remnant of design. — Cyrus McCormick

(27:30) Rockefeller explains to his son, in writing, exactly what he was: A conqueror.

(28:00) Everyone is a designer and architect of his own destiny.

(29:00) If you do everything you will win: All great events hang by a single thread. The clever man takes advantage of everything, neglects nothing that may give him some added opportunity; the less clever man, by neglecting one thing, sometimes misses everything. — The Mind of Napoleon: A Selection of His Written and Spoken Words edited by J. Christopher Herold. (Founders #302)

(32:00) Visionary businessmen are always good at finding opportunities in every disaster. And that is how I did it.

(36:00) Anything can happen in this world.

(38:30) People who climb up in any industry are fully committed to what they are doing. They sincerely love the work that they do. If you sincerely love the work that you do you will naturally succeed.

(41:00) Do it now. Opportunity comes from opportunity.

(42:00) Action solves everything.

(42:00) Always more audacity. — Hero of the Empire: The Boer War, a Daring Escape, and the Making of Winston Churchill by Candice Millard. (Founders #319)

(43:00) So at this time we’d better push it. We’d better push it.

(43:00) Smart people make things happen.

(46:00) Life is an opportunity at a time.

(48:00) Get rid of the habit of being distracted.

(54:00) No one in the world leads a smooth life.

(58:00) Too many people overestimate what they lack and underestimate what they have.

(58:00) You cannot sharpen your razor on velvet. — Abraham Lincoln

(59:00) When I was a poor boy I was confident that I would become the richest person in the world. Strong self confidence inspired me.

(59:00) I never believed that failure is the mother of success. I believe that faith is the father of success. Victory is a habit.

(59:00) Believing that there will be great results is the driving force behind all great careers.

(1:06:00) A story about Rockefeller’s ruthless competitive drive.

(1:07:00) My nature never wears off. What I like is the good feeling of victory.

(1:09:00) The people who can get ahead in the world are those who know how to find their ideal environment. If they cannot find it, they will create it themselves.

(1:16:00) Enthusiasm is a force multiplier to everything.

(1:16:00) The outcome of things is often proportional to our enthusiasm.

(1:18:00) I think carefully prepared plans and actions are called luck. I never succumb to luck, I believe in cause and effect.

(1:18:00) Ask yourself: Am I using my mind to create history?

(1:18:00) I never succumb to luck, I believe in cause and effect.

(1:18:00) In the process for pursuing career success the most important step is to prevent yourself from making excuses.

(1:19:00) The important thing is that you firmly believe that you are your greatest capital.

(1:19:00) Faith [in yourself] is the force that must drive you forward.

(1:20:00) No American has completely changed the American way of life like Henry Ford did. He has turned the car from a luxury into a necessity that everyone can afford.

(1:23:00) I told myself, I warned myself. You must hold onto this tightly. It can bring you to the realm of your dreams.

(1:26:00) Of course I paid a high price, but what I won was freedom and a glorious future. I became my own master.

(1:32:00) The end is just the beginning. — Andrew Carnegie

(1:33:00) Look at those who fail, and you will find that most people fail not because they make mistakes, but because they are not fully committed. The same goes for companies.

(1:35:00) The person who can create value the most is the person who devotes himself completely to his favorite activities.

(1:36:00) Match people by their enthusiasm.

(1:38:00) THE ROCKEFELLER EPISODES: 

#307 The World's Great Family Dynasties 

#254 John D. Rockefeller: The Founding Father of the Rockefellers

#248 John D Rockefeller (Titan) 

#247 Henry Flagler (Rockefeller's partner) 

#148 John D. Rockefeller's Autobiography 

#16 John D. Rockefeller (Titan) 

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading Bloomberg by Michael Bloomberg. 

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[2:08] Answering to no one is the ultimate situation.

[3:02] Twitter thread on Michael Bloomberg by Neckar.Substack.com

[5:28] We never made the error that so many others have: mistaking their product for the device that delivers it.

[6:27] We knew our core product was data and analytics.

[7:01] We were motivated by an idea that we could build something new that just might make a difference.

[9:04] Total Recall: My Unbelievably True Life Story by Arnold Schwarzenegger

[10:05] I was willing to do anything that they wanted. I would have never left voluntarily.

[16:00] Street smarts and common sense were better predictors of career achievements.

[17:40] Almost all occupations have a big selling component: selling your firm, your ideas and yourself.

[18:20] It is the doers, the lean and hungry ones, those with ambition in their eyes and fire in their bellies, who go the furthest and achieve the most.

[21:36] Comparing John to Bill on leadership, I always thought John was more egalitarian, but less effective.

[22:55] It was a lowly start. We slaved in our underwear and an un-air conditioned, a bank vault.

[23:57] The General and the Genius: Groves and Oppenheimer - The Unlikely Partnership that Built the Atom Bomb

[24:22] Amp It Up: Leading for Hypergrowth by Raising Expectations, Increasing Urgency, and Elevating Intensity by Frank Slootman

[27:20] David Geffen biography: The Operator: David Geffen Builds, Buys, and Sells the New Hollywood

[30:07] It's said that 80 percent of life is just showing up. I believe that. You can never have complete mastery over your existence. You can't choose the advantages you start out with, and you certainly can't pick your genetic intelligence level. But you can control how hard you work. 

[31:20] Life, I've found, works the following way: Daily, you're presented with many small and surprising opportunities. Sometimes you seize one that takes you to the top. Most, though, if valuable at all, take you only a little way. To succeed, you must string together many small incremental advances-rather than count on hitting the lottery jackpot once. Trusting to great luck is a strategy not likely to work for most people. As a practical matter, constantly enhance your skills, put in as many hours as possible, and make tactical plans for the next few steps. Then, based on what actually occurs, look one more move ahead and adjust the plan. Take lots of chances, and make lots of individual, spur-of-the-moment decisions.

[32:12] Don't devise a Five-Year Plan or a Great Leap Forward. Central planning didn't work for Stalin or Mao, and it won't work for an entrepreneur either.

[34:16] I truly pity people who don't like their jobs. They struggle at work, so unhappily, for ultimately so much less success, and thus develop even more reason to hate their occupations. There's too much delightful stuff to do in this short lifetime not to love getting up on a weekday morning.

[38:48] Did I want to risk an embarrassing and costly failure? Absolutely. Happiness for me has always been the thrill of the unknown, trying something that everyone says can't be done, feeling that gnawing pit in my stomach that says danger ahead. I want action.

[40:28] Let My People Go Surfing: The Education of a Reluctant Businessman

[41:37] I rented a one room temporary office. It was about a hundred square feet of space with a view of an alley, a far cry from my previous place of employment. I deposited  $300,000 of my Salomon Brothers windfall into a corporate checking account. And fifteen years later, I had a billion-dollar business.

[45:25] By endurance we conquer.

[46:50] Zero to One by Peter Thiel

[47:14] Made In Japan: Akio Morita and Sony by Akio Morita

[51:19] The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness

[54:35] Sid Meier's Memoir!: A Life in Computer Games

[58:30] Each news story is a product demo. More demos lead to more revenue. More revenue leads to more stories and then even more revenue.

[1:03:24] He's got a lot of these like roundabout ways to get in front of potential customers. He’s repurposing the information that his unique business collects.

[1:15:53] When it comes to competition, being one of the best is not good enough. Do you really want to plan for a future in which you might have to fight with somebody who is just as good as you are? I wouldn't. —Jeff Bezos

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading Jimmy Buffett: A Good Life All the Way by Ryan White and A Pirate Looks at Fifty by Jimmy Buffett.

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Vesto makes it easy for you to invest your businesses idle cash. Schedule a demo with Vesto's founder Ben and tell him David from Founders sent you. 

Here's the legal disclosures to make the lawyers happy:

Vesto Advisors, LLC (“Vesto”) is an SEC registered investment adviser. Registration with the SEC does not imply a certain level of skill or training. More information about Vesto and our partnership can be found here

We are entitled to compensation for promoting Vesto Advisors, LLC. Accordingly, we have an incentive to endorse Vesto and its team and services. We are not current advisory clients of the Vesto.

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(8:00) Q: What are you going to do with your life? A: Live a pretty interesting one.

(10:00) A lesson that his grandfather taught him: The only thing standing between Jimmy and the world would be a lack of imagination an an over abundance of caution. All he had to do was leap and the world would be his.

(13:00) There is a lot of Mark Twain in Jimmy Buffett. Lighting Out for the Territory: How Samuel Clemens Headed West and Became Mark Twain by Roy Morris Jr. (Founders #312) 

(13:30) There was nothing normal about me. My drive was not normal. My vision of where I wanted to go in life was not normal. The whole idea of a conventional existence was like Kryptonite to me. — Total Recall: My Unbelievably True Life Story by Arnold Schwarzenegger. (Founders #141)

(15:00) Jimmy Buffett and Warren Buffett: Their lives are illustrations of the power of compounding.

(16:30) A hit song was nice. But owning the publishing on a hit song was even better.

(17:30) Decoded by Jay Z. (Founders #238)

(19:30) You can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something. — Steve Jobs

(24:00) If you want to create and capture lasting value, don’t build an undifferentiated commodity business. — Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Futureby Peter Thiel (Founders #278)

(28:00) It is ironic that I was never categorizable and now I’m a category. — Jimmy Buffett

(28:00) Billy asked me who I saw myself like in today's music scene. I told him, nobody. I really didn't see myself like anybody. What really set me apart in these days was my repertoire. It was more formidable than the rest of the players. There were a lot of better musicians around but there wasn't anybody close in nature to what I was doing. — Chronicles: Volume One by Bob Dylan. (Founders #259)

(29:00) No one is ever eager to fix a cash machine that isn't broken.

(29:00) You can’t sell a bagless vacuum cleaner to people that make $500 million a year selling vacuum bags. — Against the Odds: An Autobiography by James Dyson(Founders #300)

(31:00) Something that grows exponentially can become so valuable that it's worth making an extraordinary effort to get it started. — Paul Graham How to Do Great Work (Founders #314)

(36:00) My description of Jimmy Buffett:

-Blue collar work ethic

-Learning machine

-Loves it

-Won’t quit

(37:00) The Business of Phish

(42:00) What Jimmy Buffett and Kanye West have in common

Some say he arrogant. Can y'all blame him?

It was straight embarrassing how y'all played him

Last year shoppin' my demo, I was tryna shine

Every motherfucker told me that I couldn't rhyme

Now I could let these dream killers kill my self-esteem

Or use my arrogance as the steam to power my dreams

(46:00) Jimmy kept the main thing the main thing:  “I don't give a shit what happens 22 and a half hours of the day. The only thing that matters is the 90 minutes that we're on stage.”

(1:04:00) That's what's wrong with the world these days. Nobody wants to put in the time it takes to be legendary. Mythology is not fast food.

(1:05:00) Margaritaville Holdings intuitively adopted the asset-light model, where it licenses its intellectual property to owners and operators via franchise agreements

(1:09:00) There is nobody who understands who Jimmy Buffett is and what Jimmy Buffett does better than Jimmy Buffett. 

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading Nuts!: Southwest Airlines' Crazy Recipe for Business and Personal Success by Kevin and Jackie Freiberg and  Herb’s Heroes by David Sanders. 

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Vesto makes it easy for you to invest your businesses idle cash. Schedule a demo with Vesto's founder Ben and tell him David from Founders sent you. 

Here's the legal disclosures to make the lawyers happy:

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We are entitled to compensation for promoting Vesto Advisors, LLC. Accordingly, we have an incentive to endorse Vesto and its team and services. We are not current advisory clients of the Vesto.

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(2:30) Reality is chaotic; planning is ordered and logical. The two don’t square with one another.

(5:30) You undergo a lot of stress all the time. How do you handle it? I don’t handle it. I like it.

(7:30) He smoked 5 packs of cigarettes a day. He drank Wild Turkey Bourbon daily. He said “Wild Turkey and Phillip Morris cigarettes are essential to the maintenance of human life.”

(8:00) He built the most successful airline in history. Southwest was profitable for 47 straight years.

(9:30) All that matters is to survive. The rest is just words. — Charles de Gaulle

(18:00) Kelleher didn’t mince any words: “I told Lamar, you roll right over the son of a bitch and leave our tire tracks on his uniform if you have to.”

(27:30) No carrier knows its niche as well as Southwest.

(28:30) While other carriers have been lured by the temptation to step outside their niche, Southwest has maintained the discipline to stay focused on its fundamental reason for being.

(29:00) Herb on why he was conservative with debt: When there are bad times you aren't threatened by debt payments and debt payments are what put other airlines in and out of bankruptcy forever.

(30:00) Southwest is obsessed with keeping costs low to maximize profitability instead of being concerned with increasing market share.

(30:15) Southwest is willing to forgo revenue generating opportunities in markets that would disproportionately increase its costs.

(35:00) Keller has said on many occasions that a company is never more vulnerable to complacency than when it's at the height of its success. The number one threat is us he would say.

(38:30) When we look back at the last 20 years it is obvious that a number of large companies were so set in their ways that they did not adapt properly and lost out as a result. 20 years from now, we'll look back and we'll see the same pattern. — Bill Gates

(39:00) Herb Kelleher illustrates the speed with which Southwest moves by telling a story about Don Valentine, former VP of marketing.

Valentine had just joined from Dr. Pepper when the marketing group met in January to discuss a new television campaign.

Valentine was ready with his timeline for producing the spots:

-script in March

-script approval in April

-casting in June

-shoot in September

When Valentine finished, Kelleher said, “Don, I hate to tell you, but we’re talking about next Wednesday.”

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

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What I learned from reading Working Backwards: Insights, Stories, and Secrets from Inside Amazon by Colin Bryar and Bill Carr.

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(8:00) Principles Jeff Bezos would repeat: customer obsession, innovation, frugality, personal ownership, bias for action, high standards.

(10:30) Single threaded leadership: For each project, there is a single leader whose focus is that project and that project alone, and that leader oversees teams of people whose attention is focused on that one project.

(11:00) The best thing I did as a manager at PayPal was to make every person in the company responsible for doing just one thing. Every employee’s one thing was unique, and everyone knew I would evaluate him only on that one thing. I had started doing this just to simplify the task of managing people. But then I noticed a deeper result: defining roles reduced conflict. — Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Futureby Peter Thiel. (Founders #278)  

(12:30) Jeff said many times: We need to eliminate communication, not encourage it. Communication is a sign of dysfunction.

(14:30) Jeff is insisted that instead of finding new and better ways to manage our dependencies, we figure out how to remove them.

(15:30) Jeff on decision making speed: “Most decisions should probably be made with somewhere around 70% of the information you wish you had. If you wait for 90%, in most cases, you're probably being slow. Plus, either way, you need to be good at quickly recognizing and correcting bad decisions. If you're good at course correcting, being wrong may be less costly than you think, whereas being slow is going to be expensive for sure."

(16:30) The best way to fail at inventing something is by making it somebody's part-time job.

(21:00) Even though you cannot hear it, with a well-written narrative there is a massive amount of useful information that is being transferred in those 20 minutes.

(23:00) A simple tip on how to produce unique insights:

Jeff has an uncanny ability to read a narrative and consistently arrive at insights that no one else did, even though we were all reading the same narrative. After one meeting, I asked him how he was able to do that. He responded with a simple and useful tip that I have not forgotten: he assumes each sentence he reads is wrong until he can prove otherwise. He's challenging the content of the sentence, not the motive of the writer. Jeff was usually among the last to finish reading.

(26:30) Jeff wanted to know exactly what we were going to build and how it would be better for customers. To Jeff a half-baked mockup was evidence of half-baked thinking.

(27:00) Founders force the issue.

(28:00) Writing required us to be thorough and precise. We had to describe features, pricing, how the service would work, why customers would want it. Half baked thinking was harder to disguise on the written page than in PowerPoint slides.

(34:30) Failure and invention are inseparable twins.

(35:30) Working backwards exposes skill sets that your company needs but does not yet have.

(36:30) Differentiation with customers is often one of the key reasons to invent.

(44:00) To read Bezos’ shareholder letters is to get a crash course in running a high-growth internet business from someone who mastered it before any of the playbooks were written.

(46:00) The idea that Amazon, a pure e-commerce distributor of retail products made by others, would become a hardware company and make and sell its own reader device was controversial.

(46:00) If you outsource then your company doesn’t acquire those skills. Amazon wants the skills.

(54:00) Jeff wanted to build a moat around his best customers.

(58:00) We had acquired a core competency only a few other companies could match.

List of Jeff Bezos episodes to learn more:

#282 Jeff Bezos shareholder letters

#180 Jeff Bezos (Invention of a Global Empire)

#179 Jeff Bezos (Everything Store)

#155 Jeff Bezos (Invent and Wander)

#71 Jeff Bezos Shareholder Letters

#38 Space Barons

#17 Jeff Bezos (Everything Store)

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

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What I learned from reading Young Titan: The Making of Winston Churchill by Michael Shelden. 

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We are entitled to compensation for promoting Vesto Advisors, LLC. Accordingly, we have an incentive to endorse Vesto and its team and services. We are not current advisory clients of the Vesto.

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Listen to Invest Like The Best #343 David Senra 

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(5:00) It was better for the world that he had known failure and suffered moments of self doubt.

(6:00) There was something in Churchill's character that simply wouldn't allow him to give up. He was a dangerous optimist.

(8:00) History likes winners.

(9:30) The adventures and ordeals of those early years were essential to the making of a man who triumphed in the second world war.

(10:00) At 40 he was largely written off as a man whose best days were behind him. (Churchill shares a lot of parallels with Steve Jobs)

(10:30) He fashioned his career as a grand experiment to prove that he could work his will on his times. Persevering in that approach, despite repeated setbacks and often harsh ridicule of those who didn't share his high opinion of himself.

(13:00) At the heart of this story is an irrepressible spirit.

(17:30) Little men let events take their course. I like things to happen. And if they don't happen, I like to make them happen.

(15:00) In every age there are great men. Why not us? And why not now?

(19:30) Churchill mobilized the English language and sent it into battle.

(22:00) While other politicians were content to get their information from a scattering of newspapers, Churchill devoured whole shelves.

(23:00) Winston Churchill wanted to be the dominant political figure of his time.

(23:30) Robert Caro's books on Lyndon Johnson

(26:30) Listen to Invest Like The Best #343 David Senra 

(30:00) If a man is sure of himself it only sharpens him and makes him more effective.

(35:00) Another thing Steve Jobs and Winston Churchill had in common: High Energy. This story about Steve Jobs in incredible. 

(36:00) The Splendid and the Vile: A Saga of Churchill, Family, and Defiance During the Blitz by Erik Larson. (Founders #196) 

(44:00) Churchill to his son: “Your idle and lazy life is very offensive to me. You appear to be leading a perfectly useless existence."  — The Splendid and the Vile: A Saga of Churchill, Family, and Defiance During the Blitz by Erik Larson. (Founders #196) 

(48:00) Larry Ellison: I know that most people think trying to build a hard wing of this size is crazy. But that’s the beauty of the idea. The other side isn’t trying to build one. So we’ll have a wing, and they won’t. — The Billionaire and The Mechanic(Founders #126) 

(50:30) Winston's opponents never tired of saying that he was unreasonable.

(58:00) All of the Winston Churchill episodes: 

The Splendid and the Vile: A Saga of Churchill, Family, and Defiance During the Blitz by Erik Larson. (Founders #196) 

Churchill by Paul Johnson. (Founders #225) 

Hero of the Empire: The Boer War, a Daring Escape, and the Making of Winston Churchill by Candice Millard. (Founders #319)

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

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What I learned from rereading The Fish That Ate the Whale: The Life and Times of America's Banana King by Rich Cohen.

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[4:47] This story can shock and infuriate us, and it does. But I found it invigorating, too. It told me that the life of the nation was written not only by speech-making grandees in funny hats but also by street-corner boys, immigrant strivers, crazed and driven, some with one good idea, some with thousands, willing to go to the ends of the earth to make their vision real.

[8:56] Tycoon's War: How Cornelius Vanderbilt Invaded a Country to Overthrow America's Most Famous Military Adventurer by Stephen Dando-Collins (Founders #55)

[10:00] Unlike Vanderbilt's other adversaries William Walker was not afraid of Cornelius when he should have been.

[12:21] The immigrants of that era could not afford to be children.

[12:42] The Adventures of Herbie Cohen: World's Greatest Negotiator by Rich Cohen

[12:54] He was driven by the same raw energy that has always attracted the most ambitious to America, then pushed them to the head of the crowd. Grasper, climber-nasty ways of describing this kid, who wants what you take for granted. From his first months in America, he was scheming, looking for a way to get ahead. You did not need to be a Rockefeller to know the basics of the dream: Start at the bottom, fight your way to the top.

[14:01] There is no problem you can't solve if you understand your business from A to Z.

[17:08]  Sam spotted an opportunity where others saw nothing.

[18:17] As far as he was concerned, ripes were considered trash only because Boston Fruit and similar firms were too slow-footed to cover ground. It was a calculation based on arrogance. I can be fast where others have been slow. I can hustle where others have been satisfied with the easy pickings of the trade.

[18:42] The kid on the streets is getting a shot at a dream. He sees the guy who gets rich and thinks, yep, that'll be me. He ignores the other stories going around.  // There's no way to quantify all that on a spreadsheet, but it's that dream of being the exception, the one who gets rich and gets out before he gets got that's the key to a hustler's motivation. —Decoded by Jay Z. (Founders #238)

[26:36] He was pure hustle.

[28:15] Preston later spoke of Zemurray with admiration. He said the kid from Russia was closer in spirit to the banana pioneers than anyone else working. "He's a risk taker," Preston explained, “he's a thinker, and he's a doer.”

[30:33] They don't write books about people that stopped there.

[32:48] Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefeller by Ron Chernow (Founders #248) and John D: The Founding Father of the Rockefellers by David Freeman Hawke. (#254)

[34:22] He seemed to strive for the sake of striving.

[34:44] If you're on a mans side you stay on that mans side or you're no better than a goddamn animal.

[35:11] The world is a mere succession of fortunes made and lost, lessons learned and forgotten and learned again.

[39:41] A man whose commitment could not be questioned, who fed his own brothers to the jungle.

[40:00] The Forgotten Highlander: An Incredible WWII Story of Survival in the Pacificby Alistair Urquhart.

[41:02] Why the Founders of United Fruit were the Rockefellers of bananas.

[47:23] He kept quiet because talking only drives up the price.

[48:19] There are times when certain cards sit unclaimed in the common pile, when certain properties become available that will never be available again. A good businessman feels these moments like a fall in the barometric pressure. A great businessman is dumb enough to act on them even when he cannot afford to.

[53:30] He believed in the transcendent power of physical labor—that a man can free his soul only by exhausting his body.

[1:02:04] He disdained bureaucracy and hated paperwork. So seldom did he dictate a letter that he requires no full-time secretary.

[1:04:01] He was respected because he understood the trade. By the time he was 40 he had served in every position. There was not a job he could not do nor a task he could not accomplish. He considered it a secret of his success.

[1:05:02] Rick Rubin: In the Studio by Jake Brown. (Founders #245)

[1:08:00] Zemurray was the founder, forever on the attack, at work, in progress, growing by trial and error.

[1:10:44] Here was a self-made man, filled with the most dangerous kind of confidence: he had done it before and believed he could do it again. This gave him the air of a berserker, who says, If you're going to fight me, you better kill me. If you’ve ever known such a person, you will recognize the type at once. If he does not say much, it's because he considers small talk a weakness. Wars are not won by running your mouth. I'm describing a once essential American type that has largely vanished. Men who channeled all their love and fear into the business, the factory, the plantation, the shop.

[1:11:44] Founder Mentality vs Big Company Mentality: When this mess of deeds came to light, United Fruit did what big bureaucracy-heavy companies always do: hired lawyers and investigators to search every file for the identity of the true owner. This took months. In the meantime, Zemurray, meeting separately with each claimant, simply bought the land from them both. He bought it twice paid a little more, yes, but if you factor in the cost of all those lawyers, probably still spent less than United Fruit and came away with the prize.

[1:13:04] His philosophy: Get up first, work harder, get your hands in the dirt and blood in your eyes.

[1:17:02] For every move there is a counter move. For every disaster there is a recovery. He never lost faith in his own agency.

[1:17:57] A man focused on the near horizon of costs can sometimes lose sight of the far horizon of potential windfall.

[1:20:22] You gentlemen have been fucking up this business long enough. I'm going to straighten it out.

[1:23:03] In a time of crisis the mere evidence of activity can be enough to get things moving.

[1:23:42] Zemurray was never heard to bitch or justify. He was a member of a generation that lived by the maxim: Never complain, never explain.

[1:27:08] The Father of Spin: Edward L. Bernays and the Birth of Public Relationsby Larry Tye

[1:28:14] He should link his private interest to a public cause.

[1:29:32] In almost every act of our daily lives, whether in the sphere of politics or business, in our social conduct or our ethical thinking, we are dominated by the relatively small number of persons who understand the mental processes and social patterns of the masses, who harness old social forces and contrive new ways to bind and guide the world.

[1:32:28] Sam's defining characteristic was his belief in his own agency, his refusal to despair. No story is without the possibility of redemption; with cleverness and hustle, the worst can be overcome. I can't help but feel that we would do well by emulating Sam Zemurray–not the brutality or the conquest, but the righteous anger that sent the striver into the boardroom of laughing elites, waving his proxies, shouting, "You gentlemen have been fucking up this business long enough. I'm going to straighten it out.

—

“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers. ”

— Gareth

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What I learned from reading Hero of the Empire: The Boer War, a Daring Escape, and the Making of Winston Churchill by Candice Millard. 

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(2:30) He was meant not just to fight for his country, but one day to lead it. Although he believed this without question, he still had to convince everyone else.

(3:30) He didn't even have a plan. Just the unshakeable conviction that he was destined for greatness.

(4:00) Churchill by Paul Johnson. (Founders #225)

(4:30) Young Titan: The Making of Winston Churchill by Michael Shelden

(5:00) The River of Doubt: Theodore Roosevelt's Darkest Journey by Candice Millard. (Founders #175)

(8:00) In his open pursuit of fame and popular favor, Churchill seemed far less Victorian than Rooseveltian.

(8:30) Winston advertises himself as simply and as unconsciously as he breathes. Churchill was widely criticized for being a self advertiser.

(9:30) “I am certainly not one of those who need to be prodded. In fact, if anything, I am a prod."

(9:30) Churchill did not need encouragement. He only needed a chance.

(11:00) "I have faith in my star. That I am intended to do something in the world."

(12:30) "I do not believe the Gods would create so potent a being as myself for so prosaic an ending."

(13:30) The Mind of Napoleon: A Selection of His Written and Spoken Words edited by J. Christopher Herold. (Founders #302)

(17:30) Winston had spent the best years of his life composing his impromptu speeches.

(18:00) He had no one who believed in him quite as much as he believed in himself.

(20:30) He was defiantly determined to decide for himself where he would go and what he would do.

(27:00) From studying the outcome of past expeditions, he believed that those that burdened themselves with equipment to meet every contingency had fared much worse than those that had sacrificed total preparedness for speed. — Endurance: Shackleton's Incredible Voyage by Alfred Lansing. (Founders #144)

(31:00) Nothing but being shot at will ever teach men the art of using cover.

(32:00) The greater the obstacle, the greater the triumph.

(34:00) He had hated his captivity with an intensity that surprised even him. He could not bear the thought of being in another man's control.

(35:00) Who shall say what is possible or impossible, in these spheres of action one cannot tell without a trial.

(36:00) Always more audacity.

(43:30) He read for four or five hours every day.

(45:00) He would be obliged to rely on someone else's intelligence and cunning. This state of affairs was far less appealing to him than the dangerous he would face if he were on his own.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

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What I learned from the first 6 years of making Founders.

I recorded a new episode with Patrick. It should be out soon. Follow Invest Like the Best in your favorite podcast app so you don't miss it. 

What I learned from reading The Forgotten Highlander: An Incredible WWII Story of Survival in the Pacific by Alistair Urquhart.

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(4:00) I hope that this book will be inspirational and offer hope to those who suffer adversity in their daily lives.

(10:00) You might as well send a cow in pursuit of a rabbit. The Indians were accustomed to these woods. — Franklin & Washington: The Founding Partnership by Edward Larson. (Founders #251)

(13:30) When you reach a large goal or finally get to the top, the distractions and new assumptions can be dizzying. First comes heightened confidence, followed quickly by overconfidence, arrogance, and a sense that “we’ve mastered it; we’ve figured it out; we’re golden.” But the gold can tarnish quickly. Mastery requires endless remastery. In fact, I don’t believe there is ever true mastery. It is a process, not a destination. — The Score Takes Care of Itself: My Philosophy of Leadership by Bill Walsh. (Founders #106)

(15:30) Invaders are always organized.

(23:00) Stay at the front and do not look back.

(29:00) Every morning I would tell myself over and over: Survive this day. Survive this day. Survive this day.

(32:00) On countless occasions I've seen two men with the same symptoms and same physical state and one will die and one will make it. I can only put that down to sheer willpower.

(35:00) Shantaram: A Novel by Gregory David Roberts 

(41:00) Dan Carlin's Nightmares of Indianapolis podcast episode

(48:00) Alistair Urquhart was conscripted into the British military to fight during World War II. He was 19 years old.

He was sent to Singapore. The Japanese invaded and he was taken hostage.

He survived 750 days in the jungle working as a slave on The Death Railway and the bridge on the River Kwai.

Most of the time he worked completely naked.

He contracted dysentery, malaria, and tropical ulcers. A lot.

He was transferred to a Japanese hellship.

The ship was torpedoed.

Almost everyone on the ship died. He survived.

He spent 5 days adrift at sea until he was picked up by a Japanese whaling ship.

He was sent to Nagasaki and forced to work in a mine.

Two months later he was struck by the blast from the Atomic bomb.

He was freed by the US Marines shortly thereafter.

He returns home to Scotland and finds out his best friend died in the war and the girl he loved got married and moved to Canada.

At 90 years of age he wrote the book to inspire others to persevere when they are faced with hardships in their life.

I think it is a great book for entrepreneurs.

The story demonstrates the adaptability of humans, our fierce desire to survive, and puts the stress of building companies into the proper perspective.

The entire story only takes 3 hours and 14 minutes

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from rereading Creativity, Inc.: Overcoming the Unseen Forces That Stand in the Way of True Inspiration by Ed Catmull. 

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(7:00) Walt Disney created a made-up world, used cutting-edge technology to enable it, and then told us how he’d done it.

(7:30) Einstein: His Life and Universe by Walter Isaacson. (Founders #187)

(7:30) Both Einstein and Disney inspired me, but Disney affected me more because of his weekly visits to my family's living room.

(7:45) Every time some technological breakthrough occurred, Walt Disney incorporated it.

(9:30) His dad was the son of an Idaho dirt farmer. His dad was one of 14 kids. 5 of his dad's siblings died as infants. His dad was the first person in his family ever to go to college. He had to work while he was going to college and pay his own way. His dad built the family house with his own hands.

(10:30) When you read biographies of people who've done great work, it's remarkable how much luck is involved. They discover what to work on as a result of a chance meeting, or by reading a book they happen to pick up. So you need to make yourself a big target for luck, and the way to do that is to be curious. Try lots of things, meet lots of people, read lots of books, ask lots of questions. — How To Do Great Work by Paul Graham. (Founders #314)

(12:30) The New New Thing: A Silicon Valley Story by Michael Lewis (Founders #274)

(14:00) George Lucas: A Life by Brian Jay Jones (Founders #35)

(15:00) We [Ed Catmull and George Lucas] worked with a blinders on intensity. George had relentless practicality. He wasn't some hobbyist trying to bring technology into filmmaking for the heck of it. His interest in computers began and ended with their potential to add value to his filmmaking process.

(19:00) George Lucas believed in the future and his ability to shape it.

(20:30) The storyteller is the most powerful person in the world. — Steve Jobs

(20:30) The art of storytelling is critically important. Most of the entrepreneurs who come talk to us can't tell a story. Learning to tell a story is incredibly important because that's how the money works. The money flows as a function of the stories — Don Valentine

(22:30) Steve used the phrase insanely great products to explain what he believed in.

(26:30) This guy told me that the way to establish his authority in the room was to arrive last. His thinking was this would establish him as the most powerful player in the room since he could afford to keep everyone else waiting. All it ended up establishing was that he had never met anyone like Steve jobs.

(38:30) If you give a good idea to a mediocre team, they will screw it up. If you give a mediocre idea to a brilliant team, they will either fix it or throw it away and come up with something better.

(42:00) Everything associated with our name needed to be good. Quality is the best business plan.

(42:30) Steve understood that every interaction a customer had with Apple could increase or decrease his or her respect for the company. As he put it, a corporation "could accumulate or withdraw credits" from its reputation, which is why he worked so hard to ensure that every single interaction a customer might have with Apple-from using a Mac to calling customer support to buying a single from the iTunes store and then getting billed for it-was excellent. — Becoming Steve Jobs: The Evolution of a Reckless Upstart into a Visionary Leader by Brent Schlender and Rick Tetzeli (Founders #265)

(48:30) Invent and Wander: The Collected Writings of Jeff Bezos (Founders #282)

(52:30) People discover and realize their visions over time and through dedicated, protracted struggle.

(53:30) If you’re sailing across the ocean and your goal is to avoid weather and waves, then why the hell are you sailing? You have to embrace that sailing means that you can’t control the elements and that there will be good days and bad days and that, whatever comes, you will deal with it because your goal is to eventually get to the other side. You will not be able to control exactly how you get across. That’s the game you’ve decided to be in. If your goal is to make it easier and simpler, then don’t get in the boat.

(59:00) It is difficult to understand people who deviate so radically from the norm like Steve did.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

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What I learned from reading The Bugatti Story by L’Ebe Bugatti.

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(2:01) If there was a prototype operation for what Enzo Ferrari envisioned it had to be what the legendary Ettore Bugatti built in Molsheim. — Enzo Ferrari: The Man and the Machine by Brock Yates. (Founders #220)

(7:00) Go Like Hell: Ford, Ferrari, and Their Battle for Speed and Glory at Le Mans by A. J. Baime. (Founders #97)

(14:30) I determined to build a car of my own. I had realized by then that I was completely taken by mechanics. My ideas gave me no rest.

(16:00) The two inventors described to each other a singular experience: Each had imagined a perfect new product, whole, already manufactured and sitting before him, and then spent years prodding executives, engineers, and factories to create it with as few compromises as possible. — Instant: The Story of Polaroid by Christopher Bonanos. (Founders #264)

(22:00) Faster progress would be made in all fields if conceit did not cause us to forget or disdain the work done by others before us. There is a tendency to believe that nothing worthy of note has been done in the past, and this has an unfortunate bearing on our judgment; thus the present trend toward mediocrity.

(23:45) I was hypnotized, drawn more and more to the mechanics of motors. These exciting problems had me completely under their sway, and so began for me the hard uphill task, the thankless labor of constructing and destroying and beginning again, without a break or rest,  and for days, months, years even, until success finally rewarded all my efforts.

(27:00) Bugatti made no attempt to compete with the low price models already on the market. The price of the Bugatti was higher than any other car of equal horsepower.

(37:00) Bugatti is the personification of Paul Graham’s essay How To Do Great Work(Founders #314)

-Work on what you have a natural aptitude for and a deep curiosity about.

-Make a commitment to be the best in the world at what you do.

-Care deeply about making truly great work.

(42:00) All the finest trophies were won easily by engaging in every important race without pause.

(44:00) Nothing is too good. Nothing is too dear. You've got to win whatever the cost. You work day and night if necessary.

(44:30) There was a factory. However Molsheim was more than that. It was a house and a family. It was a little world where the attitude to things and the relations between people were out of the ordinary.

(45:30) The personality of its founder continued to show in even the smallest details and unexpected ways.

(46:00) You get the feeling of being suddenly confronted with something unusual and beyond classification.

(49:30) His starting point was always to create the most extraordinary things.

(50:30) Against the Odds: An Autobiography by James Dyson (Founders #300)

(52:00) The root principle was to do things your way. It didn't matter how other people did it. As long as it works and it is exciting people will follow you.

(58:30) A human life, by its very nature, has to be devoted to something or other, to a glorious or humble enterprise, an illustrious or obscure destiny. This is a strange but inexorable condition of things. — The Revolt of the Masses by Jose Ortega y Gasset

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

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What I learned from reading Creators: From Chaucer and Durer to Picasso and Disney by Paul Johnson. 

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(2:20) Among the masters of Parisian fashion, Balenciaga was the greatest.

(3:00) Christian Dior called Balenciaga “the master of us all" and Coco Chanel said that Balenciaga was "the only couturier in the truest sense of the word. The others are simply fashion designers".

(3:30) Jay Gould episodes #258 and #285 

(5:00) For the next seventy-four years Balenciaga did a piece of sewing every day of his life.

(5:20) Being prolific is underrated. — Paul Graham (Founders #314)

(8:45) From the age of three to his mid-twenties he learned thoroughly every aspect of his trade.

(17:00) Bernard Arnault (Founders #296)

(23:00) What Dior told Boussac: What you need, and I would like to run, is a craftsman’s workshop, in which we would recruit the very best people in the trade, to reestablish in Paris a salon for the greatest luxury and the highest standards of workmanship. It will cost a great deal of money and entail much risk.”

(26:00) Balenciaga never commented on other designers.

(28:00) Balenciaga had a religious like devotion to his craft: Balenciaga regarded making dresses as a vocation, like the priesthood, and an act of worship. He felt that he served God by suitably adorning the female form, which God had made beautiful.

(29:00) Customers were called patrons.

(30:00) His remoteness was not a pose but part of his dedication to his art. He worked fanatically hard.

(31:00) His fundamental principles as a dressmaker:

Make women happy. Make dresses the customer never wants to take off.

Permanence. You should bequeath your dress to your daughter. And her to her daughter.

Best material from the best textile creators.

(33:00) You don’t wear a Balenciaga dress, you present it. (Make up your own terms!)

(35:00) The essence of his creations was the work of human hands, bringing into existence the images projected on paper from his powerful and inventive brain. The archives of his firm survive intact, and they reveal the extent to which everything was done by hand:

(37:00) Cut against the bias.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading How To Do Great Work by Paul Graham.

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(2:00) All you need to do is find something you have an aptitude for and great interest in.

(2:10) Doing great work means doing something important so well that you expand people's ideas of what's possible.

(4:15) How many even discover something they love to work on? A few hundred thousand, perhaps, out of billions.  —How to Do What You Love by Paul Graham

(5:10) Always preserve excitingness. (Let what you are excited about guide you)

(8:15) If you're excited about some possibility that everyone else ignores, and you have enough expertise to say precisely what they're all overlooking, that's as good a bet as you'll find.

(9:15) How To Work Hard by Paul Graham

(10:05) When you follow what you are intensely interested in this strange convergence happens where you're working all the time and it feels like you're never working.

(10:20) You can't tell what most kinds of work are like except by doing them. You may have to work at something for years before you know how much you like it or how good you are at it.

(13:00) When it comes to figuring out what to work on, you're on your own.

(14:00) Lighting Out for the Territory: How Samuel Clemens Headed West and Became Mark Twain by Roy Morris Jr. (Founders #312)

(17:15) One sign that you're suited for some kind of work is when you like even the parts that other people find tedious or frightening.

(17:50) Make what you are most excited about.

(19:00) If you're interested, you're not astray.

(19:30) Against the Odds: An Autobiography by James Dyson (Founders #300)

(20:15) At each stage do whatever seems most interesting and gives you the best options for the future. I call this approach "staying upwind." This is how most people who've done great work seem to have done it.

(22:50) In many projects a lot of the best work happens in what was meant to be the final stage.

(25:00) A Mathematician’s Apology by G.H. Hardy

(26:00) Great work usually entails spending what would seem to most people an unreasonable amount of time on a problem.

(26:30) The reason we're surprised is that we underestimate the cumulative effect of work. Writing a page a day doesn't sound like much, but if you do it every day you'll write a book a year. That's the key: consistency. People who do great things don't get a lot done every day. They get something done, rather than nothing.

(27:10) Something that grows exponentially can become so valuable that it's worth making an extraordinary effort to get it started.

(27:30) Taylor Swift (Acquired’s Version)

(30:00) If you don't try to be the best, you won't even be good. This observation has been made by so many people in so many different fields that it might be worth thinking about why it's true.

(36:00) Originality isn't a process, but a habit of mind. Original thinkers throw off new ideas about whatever they focus on.

(38:00) Change breaks the brittle.

(43:45) What might seem to be merely the initial step — deciding what to work on — is in a sense the key to the whole game.

(45:00) Being prolific is underrated. + Examples of outlandishly prolific people

(48:30) Just focus on the really important things and ignore everything else.

(50:30) One of the most powerful kinds of copying is to copy something from one field into another. History is so full of chance discoveries of this type that it's probably worth giving chance a hand by deliberately learning about other kinds of work. You can take ideas from quite distant fields if you let them be metaphors.

(51:30) Seek out the best colleagues.

(54:30) Solving hard problems will always involve some backtracking.

(56:30) Don't marry someone who doesn't understand that you need to work, or sees your work as competition for your attention. If you're ambitious, you need to work; it's almost like a medical condition; so someone who won't let you work either doesn't understand you, or does and doesn't care.

(57:50) The prestige of a type of work is at best a trailing indicator and sometimes completely mistaken. If you do anything well enough, you'll make it prestigious.

(58:00) Curiosity is the best guide. Your curiosity never lies, and it knows more than you do about what's worth paying attention to.

If you asked an oracle the secret to doing great work and the oracle replied with a single word, my bet would be on "curiosity."

The whole process is a kind of dance with curiosity.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

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What I learned from reading The Nolan Variations: The Movies, Mysteries, and Marvels of Christopher Nolan by Tom Shone.

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(7:00) The only way I know how to work is to sort of burrow in on one project very obsessively.

(7:25) People will say to me, "There are people online who are obsessed with Inception or obsessed with Memento.”

They're asking me to comment on that, as if I thought it were weird or something, and I'm like, Well, I was obsessed with it for years. Genuinely obsessed with it. So it doesn't strike me as weird. . . I feel like I have managed to wrap them the up in it way I try to wrap myself up.

(8:30) The Futurist: The Life and Films of James Cameron by Rebecca Keegan and The Return of James Cameron, Box Office King by Zach Baron. (Founders #311)

(11:00) I don’t think of myself as an artist. I’m a craftsman. I don’t make a work of art; I make a movie. — George Lucas: A Life by Brian Jay Jones. 

(15:30) Steven Spielberg: A Biography by Joseph McBride. (Founders #209)

(22:45) Nolan is relentlessly resourceful. He wants to spend as as little money as possible so he can maintain as much control over the project as possible.

(23:30) He makes his first movie on the weekends while he working a full-time job!

(29:30) The efficiency of filmmaking is for me a way of keeping control. The pressure of time, the pressure of money. Even though they feel like restrictions at the time, and you chafe against them, they're helping you make decisions. They really are. If I know that deadline is there, then my creative process ramps up exponentially.

(34:00) The result of making a billion dollar blockbuster: Suddenly his position at Warner Brothers went from solid to unassailable.

(37:00) Stories can add to your own thinking but you need your own foundation to add them to first.

(38:00) I know it's more fun when we're all together and we can do the thing together. That's why we keep it as a family business.

(39:00) Rolls-Royce: The Magic of a Name: The First Forty Years of Britain s Most Prestigious Company by Peter Pugh. (Founders #287)

(43:30) Every time a new feature or product was proposed, he decreed that the narrative should take the shape of a mock press release. The goal was to get employees to distill a pitch into its purest essence, to start from something the customer might see—the public announcement—and work backward. Bezos didn’t believe anyone could make a good decision about a feature or a product without knowing precisely how it would be communicated to the world. — The Everything Store: Jeff Bezos and the Age of Amazon by Brad Stone. (Founders #179)

(45:30) Once your children are born, you can never look at yourself through your own eyes anymore; you always look at yourself through their eyes.

(49:30) I often have terrible luck with the weather, but my philosophy is to shoot no matter what the weather is, always shooting no matter what weather, just keeping going, keeping going. Letting everybody on the crew and cast know we're really serious about doing that, no matter what the conditions are, so they're not looking out the window first thing and going, Oh, we will or won't shoot today.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading Lighting Out for the Territory: How Samuel Clemens Headed West and Became Mark Twain by Roy Morris Jr.

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One of the best podcasts I've heard this year: Listen to Invest Like The Best #336 Jeremy Giffon Special Situations in Private Markets 

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(7:20) A great way to think about power law people: Their absence leaves of void that no one else can fill.

(8:00) His death would not have lengthened the life of the Confederacy or the Union, by a single day. It would, however, have reduced the literary inheritance of the United States by an incalculable amount.

(11:20) Opportunity is a strange beast. It frequently appears after a loss.

(13:00) In another life Mark Twain would be a cocaine dealer.

(17:30) I knew more about retreating than the man that invented retreating.

(21:15) The ad itself became legendary: “Wanted: Young, skinny, wiry fellows not over eighteen. Must be expert riders, willing to risk death daily. Orphans preferred.” Hundreds of adventure-seeking young men quickly responded.

(24:30) Blood and Thunder: The Epic Story of Kit Carson and the Conquest of the American West by Hampton Sides

(27:45) The purest veins were usually the deepest.

(28:00) The trouble with this business is that everybody expects to find oil on the surface. If it was up near the top, it wouldn't be any trick to it. You've got to drill deep for oil. — The Big Rich (Founders #149)

(32:30) Get the facts first, then you can distort them as much as you like.

(33:30) People are attracted to confidence and repelled from nuance.

(37:00) The whole point of the performance was not so much what was being said, as how it was being said.

(47:30) Ambassador Burlingame gave the author a well-meaning piece of advice. “You have great ability; I believe you have genius,” Burlingame said. “What you need now is refinement of association. Seek companionship among men of superior intellect and character. Refine yourself and your work. Never affiliate with inferiors; always climb.”

It was an admonishment Twain would take to heart and follow, virtually to the letter, for the next forty-four years.

(53:00) When you have something that you know is true, even over the long term, you can afford to put a lot of energy into it. — Jeff Bezos

(57:30) Mark Twain produced a remarkable stream of novels, short stories, essays, and travel pieces that today stands as one of the great bodies of work in English literature.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading The Futurist: The Life and Films of James Cameron by Rebecca Keegan and The Return of James Cameron, Box Office King by Zach Baron.

(4:00) I watched Titanic at the Titanic. And he actually replied: Yeah, but I madeTitanic at the Titanic.

(7:10) I like difficult. I’m attracted by difficult. Difficult is a fucking magnet for me. I go straight to difficult. And I think it probably goes back to this idea that there are lots of smart, really gifted, really talented filmmakers out there that just can’t do the difficult stuff. So that gives me a tactical edge to do something nobody else has ever seen, because the really gifted people don’t fucking want to do it.

(7:20) At 68 years old, Cameron wakes up at 4:45 AM and often kick boxes in the morning.

(7:45) Self doubt is not something Cameron has a lot of experience with. His confidence preceded his achievements.

(9:00) I was going through this stuff, chapter and verse, and making my own notes and all that. I basically gave myself a college education in visual effects and cinematography while I was driving a truck.

(16:00) Every idea is a work in progress.

(17:30) He's been on a planet of his own making ever since.

(18:00) The Return of James Cameron, Box Office King by Zach Baron

(22:00) Cameron's career has been built on questioning accepted wisdom and believing in the power of the individual.  His outlook is that we can take fate in our own hands.

(27:00) All creative individuals build on the works of their predecessors. No one creates an a vacuum. — Walt Disney and Picasso (Founders #310)

(31:00) Cameron would go to the library at the University of Southern California, photocopying graduate student theses on esoteric filmmaking subjects.

He filled two fat binders with technical papers.

For the cost of a couple hundred dollars in photocopying, he essentially put himself through a graduate course in visual effects at the top film school in the country without ever meeting a single professor.

(34:00) Cameron had only been at Corman's for a matter of days, but he was already taking charge. He seems constitutionally incapable of doing otherwise. (What a line!)

He had a very commanding presence.

(35:30) Your mediocrity is my opportunity.

(37:40) Cameron finds writing torture. He does it anyway.

(43:00) Cameron is willing to let ideas marinate for decades.

(43:45) "I like doing things I know others can’t.” That's part of what attracts him to shooting movies in water.  "Nobody likes shooting in water. It's physically taxing, frustrating, and dangerous. But when you have a small team of people as crazy as you are, that are good at it, there is deep satisfaction in both the process of doing it and the resulting footage."

(49:15)  I was stunned by Jim's allegiance to the project and the extent of his physical abilities. Jim was there for every minute of it. It was beyond belief, his commitment to what we were doing.

(55:30) I'd just made T2 for Carolco and I admired how they rolled, being their own bosses, mavericks, entrepreneurs. I’d been fed up with the studio system. So I figured I could set up a structure which would allow me to call the shots myself.

(57:30) Mute the world. Build your own world.

(1:04:50) Opportunity is a strange beast. It commonly appears after a loss.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading Creators: From Chaucer and Durer to Picasso and Disney by Paul Johnson. 

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(3:30) Disney made use of the new technologies throughout his creative life.

(4:45) Lists of Paul Johnson books and episodes: 

Churchill by Paul Johnson. (Founders #225) 

Heroes: From Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar to Churchill and de Gaulle by Paul Johnson.(Founders #226)

Mozart: A Life by Paul Johnson. (Founders #240) 

Socrates: A Man for Our Times by Paul Johnson. (Founders #252) 

(5:55) Picasso was essentially self-taught, self-directed, self-promoted, emotionally educated in the teeming brothels of the city, a small but powerfully built monster of assured egoism.

(7:30) Most good copywriters fall into two categories. Poets. And killers. Poets see an ad as an end. Killers as a means to an end. If you are both killer and poet, you get rich. — Confessions of an Advertising Man by David Ogilvy. (Founders #306)

(10:00) Whatever you do, you must do it with gusto, you must do it in volume. It is a case of repeat, repeat, repeat. — Les Schwab Pride In Performance: Keep It Going! by Les Schwab. (Founders #105)

(11:30) Picasso averaged one new piece of artwork every day of his life from age 20 until his death at age 91. He created something new every day for 71 years.

(15:30) Power doesn't always corrupt. But what power always does is reveal. — Working by Robert Caro (Founders #305)

(17:30) Many people find it hard to accept that a great writer, painter, or musician can be evil. But the historical evidence shows, again and again, that evil and creative genius can exist side by side in the same person. In my judgment his monumental selfishness and malignity were inextricably linked to his achievement.

He was all-powerful as an originator and aesthetic entrepreneur precisely because he was so passionately devoted to what he was doing, to the exclusion of any other feelings whatever.

He had no sense of duty except to himself, and this gave him his overwhelming self-promoting energy. Equally, his egoism enabled him to turn away from nature and into himself with a concentration which is awe-inspiring.

(21:30) It shows painfully how even vast creative achievement and unparalleled worldly success can fail to bring happiness.

(24:00) Walt Disney (at age 18) wanted to run his own business and be his own master. He had the American entrepreneurial spirit to an unusual degree.

(27:00) Recurring theme: Knowing what you want to do but not knowing how to do it—yet.

(26:20) All creative individuals build on the works of their predecessors. No one creates in vacuum.

(28:30) Why Walt Disney moved to Hollywood: The early 1920s, full of hope and daring, were a classic period for American free enterprise, and for anyone interested in the arts—Hollywood was a rapidly expanding focus of innovation.

(28:00) Filmaker episodes: 

Francis Ford Coppola: A Filmmaker's Life by Michael Schumacher. (Founders #242)

Steven Spielberg: A Biography by Joseph McBride. (Founders #209)

George Lucas: A Life by Brian Jay Jones. (Founders #35) 

(30:10) The relentless resourcefulness of a young Walt Disney!

(34:30) This is wild: It is significant that Mickey Mouse, in the year of his greatest popularity, 1933, received over 800,000 fan letters, the largest ever recorded in show business, at any time in any century.

(36:00) Something that Disney does his entire career —he has this in common with other great filmmakers— he is always jumping on the new technology of his day.

(37:00) Lack of resources is actually a feature. It’s the benefit. — Kevin Kelly on Invest Like the Best #334

(38:45) Imagination rules the world. — The Mind of Napoleon: A Selection of His Written and Spoken Words edited by J. Christopher Herold. (Founders #302)

(41:15) Disney put excellence before any other consideration.

(41:45) Disney hired the best artists he could get and gave them tasks to the limits of their capacities.

(47:45) Disney’s Land: Walt Disney and the Invention of the Amusement Park That Changed the World by Richard Snow. (Founders #158)

(49:30) I Had Lunch With Sam Zell (Founders #298)

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading Michael Jordan: The Life by Roland Lazenby.

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(5:07) His competence was exceeded only by his confidence.

(5:58) He worked at the game, and if he wasn't good at something, he had the motivation to be the best at it.

(6:33) It seemed that he discovered the secret quite early in his competitive life: the more pressure he heaped on himself, the greater his ability to rise to the occasion.

(14:06) At each step along his path, others would express amazement at how hard he competed. At every level, he was driven as if he were pursuing something that others couldn't see.

(16:10) Whenever I was working out and got tired and figured I ought to stop, I'd close my eyes and see that list in the locker room without my name on it, and that got me going again.

(19:29) Jordan could sense immediately that he had something the others didn't.

(59:53) The Jordan Rules succeeded against the Bulls so well that they became textbook for guarding athletic scorers. The scheme helped Detroit win two NBA championships, but it also helped in the long run, by forcing Jordan to find an answer. "I think that 'Jordan Rules' defense, as much as anything else, played a part in the making of Michael Jordan," Tex Winter said.

(1:16:35) Jordan had been surprised to learn how lazy many of his Olympic teammates were about practice, how they were deceiving themselves about what the game required.

(1:19:56) I have always liked practice and I hate to miss it. When you miss that one day, you feel like you missed a lot. You take extra work to make up for that one day. I've always been a practice player. I believe in it.

(1:29:47) Jordan presented a singleness of purpose that was hard to dent.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

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What I learned from reading Arnold and Me: In the Shadow of the Austrian Oak by Barbara Outland Baker.

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(6:30) He forced his sons to eat with silverware at perfect right angles. They had to keep their elbows to their waists. If the boys did not obey, the back of his hand was quick to strike their cheeks.

(7:30) His life began to flourish through the art and science of bodybuilding.

Arnold ate it, slept it, worked it, imagined it, thought it, believed it, and trusted it.

Bodybuilding became his existence.

(8:10) He had no time to waste on naysayers. He aligned only with those who shared his passion. 

(8:15) He knew that to succeed according to his manic standards he needed to master an individual sport.

(8:30) His intelligence did not show on his report cards yet he mastered his goals like a wizard. (If you do everything you will win)

(8:50) His singular concentration provided a rock solid belief in his potential.

(9:30) Not even his peers could understand the enormity of his lifetime dreams.

(11:00) Arnold: The Education of a Bodybuilder by Arnold Schwarzenegger (Founders #193)

(11:15) Gradually a conflict grew up in our relationship. She was a well-balanced woman who wanted an ordinary, solid life, and I was not a well-balanced man and hated the very idea of ordinary life. She had thought I would settle down, that I would reach the top in my field and level off.

But that's a concept that has no place in my thinking.

For me, life is continuously being hungry.

The meaning of life is not simply to exist, to survive, but to move ahead, to go up, to achieve, to conquer.

(13:40) If you do everything you will win.

(13:45) And I then saw very clearly what I could achieve, and that gave me a tremendous amount of motivation.

(13:55) Instead of training two hours a day like most kids did, I would train twice a day, two hours.

Totally abnormal.

Sometimes three times a day and sometimes four times a day. I would go home during my lunch time, and then do, for an hour straight, just sit-ups to get that extra hour that no one else has gotten in, just to be ahead of everyone else.

(16:20) Arnold was not a man of many surprises. He was clear in his focus, firm in his decisions, and egocentric at all costs.

(17:55) Champions behave like champions before they’re champions; they have a winning standard of performance before they are winners. — The Score Takes Care of Itself: My Philosophy of Leadership by Bill Walsh. (Founders #106)

(21:20) He made it clear that his world was huge and I must learn to accept that other people and activities demanded his attention.

(23:30) His family foundation was instrumental in setting up his intense motivation to succeed.

This negative motivation pushes him to achieve the maximum potential in every activity.

(27:30) No one could restrain his mutinous energy.

(27:55) Arnold always felt self-confident, no matter the disparity in sophistication, income or status.

(29:30) Francis could sell ice to the Eskimos, Lucas said later. He has charisma beyond logic. I can see now what kind of men the great Caesars of history were, their magnetism. — George Lucas: A Life by Brian Jay Jones. (Founders #35)

(31:30) I’m not so dominant that I can’t listen to creative ideas coming from other people. Successful people listen. Those who don’t listen, don’t survive long. — Driven From Within by Michael Jordan  (Founders #213)

(22:40) Problems are just opportunities in work clothes. — Henry J. Kaiser: Builder in the Modern American West by Mark Foster. (Founders #66)

(33:10) Optimism is a moral duty. — Edwin Land A Triumph of Genius: Edwin Land, Polaroid, and the Kodak Patent War by Ronald Fierstein. (Founders #134)

(33:50) A sunny disposition is worth more than fortune.  — The Autobiography of Andrew Carnegie by Andrew Carnegie. (Founders #283)

(35:30) Stay public. You gotta promote, promote, promote, or it all dies. You just gotta be out there all the time. — Bourdain: The Definitive Oral Biography by Laurie Woolever. (Founders #219)

(37:00) He maintained his rigorous training schedule.

(38:30) He craved the interaction with each new expert and remembered every tip.

Arnold already recognized that he had the ability to learn any content he chose.

(38:45) The best jobs are neither decreed nor degreed. They are creative expressions of continuous learners in free markets. — The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness by Naval Ravikant and Eric Jorgenson. (Founders #191)

(39:15) Imitation precedes creation. — Stephen King On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft by Stephen King. (Founders #210)

(44:35) Total Recall: My Unbelievably True Life Story by Arnold Schwarzenegger. (Founders #141)

Arnold: The Education of a Bodybuilder by Arnold Schwarzenegger. (Founders #193)

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

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What I learned from reading Glock: The Rise of America's Gun by Paul Barrett. 

Listen to Invest Like the Best #292 David Senra: Passion and Pain. 

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(5:22) What struck me is how his inexperience was a great advantage. He didn't assume anything about how to design a handgun because he's never designed one before. Consequently he designed the best one ever. He didn't know what was out of bounds.

(8:20) Gaston Glock himself put it in an interview: "That I knew nothing was my advantage.”

(8:55) He began disassembling the guns, putting them back together, and noted the contrasting methods used to make them.

(9:00) More on Glock’s initial research process: I started intensive studies in such a manner that I visited the Austrian patent offices for weeks examining generations of handgun in innovation.

(9:10) Learning from history of a form of leverage.

(10:25) Crucially, the gun should have no more than 40 parts. This is one of the most important ideas in the book. He designed a product —and a company— based on limiting the amount of moving parts.

(12:00) My intention was to learn as much as possible as fast as possible.

(12:30) Move fast: I worked for two years, day and night, to bring the sample to the Army on time.

(12:45) Difference for the sake of it and retention of total control. — Against the Odds: An Autobiography by James Dyson (Founders #300)

(15:00) The important thing that gave him his big price advantage was that he designed the pistol for complete production on computer controlled tools.

(15:20) The book is all simplicity, focus, and differentiation.

(15:30) Glock produced the simplest handgun with only 34 components.

(18:30) He's got all these very unique and unusual forms of distribution.

(18:35) How did a pistol produced by an obscure engineer in Vienna, a man who barely spoke English and had no familiarity with America, become in the space of a few years, an American icon?

The answer to that question is distribution.

(20:20) There's a lot of money to be made if we could convert U.S police departments from revolvers to pistols.

(22:50) The only conventional thing about the Glock was the method of operation he adopted for his handgun. Glock borrowed his basic mechanics from John Moses Browning, the greatest gun designer of the late 19th century.

(24:08) He objected to the Pentagon's insistence that the rights to manufacture the winning gun design would be open to competitive bidding. Glock intended to collect all profit from the production of his gun himself.

(24:35) Quality will always bring you more money.

(25:50) Glock's gross margins exceeded 65%. The Glock's simpler design and the computerized manufacturing methods allowed for larger profits.

(27:45) Working by Robert Caro. (Founders #305)

(30:40) David Ogilvy said the word FREE is magical to customers.

(31:00) Glock began putting some of the country's most admired shooting instructors on contract to spread the word about the Austrian pistol.

(32:00) Cut the prices, scoop the market, watch the costs, and the profits will take care of themselves. + The deals worked financially because of the company's startingly low manufacturing costs.

(32:30) Glock is just running Sam Colt’s playbook — just doing it 140 years later. — Revolver: Sam Colt and the Six-Shooter That Changed America by Jim Rasenberger. (Founders #147)

(33:00) Sam Colt relentlessly pursued public contracts, regardless of the profit margin. “Government patronage, Sam Colt once said, is an advertisement, if nothing else.”  Gaston Glock became the Sam Colt of the 20th century.

(34:30) Glock was able to focus. They put all of their effort and resources behind a single product: American handgun makers offered many diverse models in the fashion of the Detroit car companies. Glock saw that as competing with himself and resisted the temptation.

(36:20) He evolved from a provincial manager of a radiator factory to a world traveling industrialist.

(41:45) That was Glock's theme. I did it my way.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

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What I learned from reading Dynasties: Fortunes and Misfortunes of the World's Great Family Businesses by David Landes.

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Listen to Invest Like the Best #292 David Senra: Passion and Pain. 

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(4:25) Success causes failure. As the family develops power and prestige, the heirs find many interesting and amusing things to do rather than run their business.

(6:00) Those on the margins often come to control the center.

(9:00) Great industrial leaders are always fanatically committed to their jobs. They are not lazy, or amateurs. — Confessions of an Advertising Man by David Ogilvy. (Founders #306)

(9:50) For many of the great founders “Appetite comes with eating.”

(11:00)

Rothschild episodes:

Founder: A Portrait of the First Rothschild by Amos Elon. (Founders #197)

The House of Rothschild: Money's Prophets by Niall Ferguson. (Founders #198)

JP Morgan episodes:

The House of Morgan: An American Banking Dynasty and the Rise of Modern Finance by Ron Chernow. (Founders #139)

The Hour of Fate: Theodore Roosevelt, J.P. Morgan, and the Battle to Transform American Capitalism by Susan Berfield. (Founders #142)

Rockefeller episodes:

Random Reminiscences of Men and Events by John D. Rockefeller. (Founders #148)

Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefeller by Ron Chernow. (Founders #248)

John D: The Founding Father of the Rockefellers by David Freeman Hawke. (Founders #254)

(13:30) Mayer Rothschild thought that long term relationships were more valuable than immediate profit.

(15:45) Nathan Rothschild has extreme levels of self belief: When his prospective father-in-law asked for proof of his prospects, Nathan told him that if he was concerned about having his daughters provided for, he might just as well give them all to Nathan, and be done with it.

(19:00) The Rothschilds developed the technique of absolute direction to perfection.

(21:15) Wal-Mart stock is staying right where it is. We don’t need the money. We don’t need to buy a yacht. And thank goodness we never thought we had to go out and buy anything like an island. We just don’t have those lands of needs or ambitions, which wreck a lot of companies when they get along in years. Some families sell their stock off a little at a time to live high, and then—boom—somebody takes them over, and it all goes down the drain. One of the real reasons I’m writing this book is so my grandchildren and great-grandchildren will read it years from now and know this: If you start any of that foolishness, I’ll come back and haunt you. So don’t even think about it. — Sam Walton: Made In America by Sam Walton. (Founders #234)

(26:00) If you want to build a family dynasty you need to have a bunch of kids. This is the number one factor for increasing the chance that your family dynasty outlives you.

(29:45) Larry Ellison didn’t have the methodical relentlessness that made Bill Gates so formidable and feared. By his own admission, Ellison was not an obsessive grinder like Gates: “I am a sprinter. I rest, I sprint, I rest, I sprint again.” Ellison had a reputation for being easily bored by the process of running a business and often took time off, leaving the shop to senior colleagues. — Softwar: An Intimate Portrait of Larry Ellison and Oracle by Matthew Symonds. (Founders #124)

(36:13) A man always has two reasons for the things he does, a good one, and the real one. — J.P. Morgan

(38:00) Andrew Carnegie celebrated too quickly. He later admitted to Morgan that he had sold out too cheap, by $100 million. Morgan replied, “Very likely, Andrew.” — The Hour of Fate: Theodore Roosevelt, J.P. Morgan, and the Battle to Transform American Capitalism by Susan Berfield. (Founders #142)

(38:35) Henry Villard had come to Morgan for help in taking over Edison's company. This was a mistake. Morgan was not by nature, a helper. He was a driver. He arranged a counter coup.

(41:45) Properly understood, any new and better way of doing things is technology. — Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future by Peter Thiel. (Founders #278)

(43:30) “It is impossible to create an innovative product unless you do it yourself, pay attention to every detail, and then test it exhaustively. Never entrust the creation of a product to others, for that will inevitably lead to failure and cause you deep regret.”

—Sakichi Toyada

(45:00) You should make an effort to make something that will benefit society.

(45:30) Sol Price: Retail Revolutionary by Robert Price. (Founders #304)

(48:50) Mailman is a Gmail plugin that allows you to control when and what emails should land in your inbox. https://www.mailmanhq.com

(58:30)  Rockefeller believed that he would be rich and he believed that this was because God wanted him to be.

(58:45) Rockefeller’s competitors and associates were amateurs by comparison, and he saw them for what they were.

(1:01:00) Published railway tariffs were for the small man. They were not for major shippers who could play one railroad against another while promising steady cargo. (Rockefeller’s initial edge)

(1:03:15) His clincher was to offer the victim a look at the books of Standard. A potential seller was dumbfounded to learn that standard was able to sell at less than his own cost of production. They could kill him whenever they pleased.

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What I learned from reading Confessions of an Advertising Man by David Ogilvy. 

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(4:15) When Fortune published an article about me and titled it: "Is David Ogilvy a Genius?," I asked my lawyer to sue the editor for the question mark.

(4:45) The people who built the companies for which America is famous, all worked obsessively to create strong cultures within their organizations. Companies that have cultivated their individual identities by shaping values, making heroes, spelling out rites and rituals, and acknowledging the cultural network, have an edge

(5:30) We prefer the discipline of knowledge to the anarchy of ignorance. We pursue knowledge the way a pig pursues truffles. A blind pig can sometimes find truffles, but it helps to know that they grow in oak forests.

(5:48) We hire gentlemen with brains.

(6:16) Only First Class business, and that in a First Class way.

(6:25) Search all the parks in all your cities; you'll find no statues of committees.

(9:45) Buy Ogilvy on Advertising

(10:45) One decent editorial counts for a thousand advertisements. + You simply cannot mix your messages when selling something new. A consumer can barely handle one great new idea, let alone two, or even several. — Against the Odds: An Autobiography by James Dyson (Founders #300)

(15:22) It was inspiring to work for a supreme master. M. Pitard did not tolerate incompetence. He knew that it is demoralising for professionals to work alongside incompetent amateurs.

(16:66) You have to be ruthless if you want to build a team of A players. It's too easy, as a team grows, to put up with a few B players, and they then attract a few more B players, and soon you will even have some C players. The Macintosh experience taught me that A players like to work only with other A players, which means you can't indulge B players.

(18:12) In the best companies, promises are always kept, whatever it may cost in agony and overtime.

(18:33) I have come to the conclusion that the top man has one principal responsibility: to provide an atmosphere in which creative mavericks can do useful work.

(19:38) I admire people who work hard, who bite the bullet.

(19:58) I admire people with first class brains.

(20:23) I admire people who work with gusto. If you don't enjoy what you are doing, I beg you to find another job. Remember the Scottish proverb, "Be happy while you're living, for you're a long time dead."

(20:50) I admire self-confident professionals, the craftsmen  who do their jobs with superlative excellence.

(21:40) The best way to keep the peace is to be candid.

(23:18) That’s been the most important lesson I’ve learned in business: that the dynamic range of people dramatically exceeds things you encounter in the rest of our normal lives—and to try to find those really great people who really love what they do.  —  Make Something Wonderful: Steve Jobs in his own words. (Founders #299)

(24:39) The Man Who Sold America: The Amazing (but True!) Story of Albert D. Lasker and the Creation of the Advertising Century by Jeffrey L. Cruikshank and Arthur W. Schultz. (Founders #206)

(25:09) Claude Hopkins episodes:

My Life in Advertising by Claude Hopkins. (Founders #170)

Scientific Advertising by Claude Hopkins. (Founders #207)

(25:47) Talent is most likely to be found among nonconformists, dissenters, and rebels.

(26:49) The majority of business men are incapable of original thinking because they are unable to escape from the tyranny of reason. Their imaginations are blocked.

(28:21) This podcast studies formidable individuals.

(31:40) Samuel Bronfman: The Life and Times of Seagram’s Mr. Sam by Michael R. Marrus. (Founders #116)

(37:47) I doubt whether there is a single agency (or company) of any consequence which is not the lengthened shadow of one man.

(39:51) Don't bunt. Aim out of the park. Aim for the company of immortals.

(40:13) Most big corporations behave as if profit were not a function of time.

When Jerry Lambert scored his first breakthrough with Listerine, he speeded up the whole process of marketing by dividing time into months. Instead of locking himself into annual plans, Lambert reviewed his advertising and his profits every month.

The result was that he made $25,000,000 in eight years, where it takes most people twelve times as long. In Jerry Lambert's day, the Lambert Pharmaceutical Company lived by the month, instead of by the year.

(41:30) The Mind of Napoleon: A Selection of His Written and Spoken Words edited by J. Christopher Herold. (Founders #302)

(41:36) I am an inveterate brain picker, and the most rewarding brains I have picked are the brains of my predecessors and my competitors.

(43:27) We make advertisements that people want to read. You can't save souls in an empty church.

(44:05) You aren't advertising to a standing army; you are advertising to a moving parade.

(45:13) The headline is the most important element in advertisements.

(47:47) Runnin' Down a Dream: How to Succeed and Thrive in a Career You Love by Bill Gurley

(48:15) Set yourself to becoming the best-informed man in the agency on the account to which you are assigned.

If, for example, it is a gasoline account, read text books on the chemistry, geology and distribution of petroleum products. Read all the trade journals in the field. Read all the research reports and marketing plans that your agency has ever written on the product. Spend Saturday mornings in service stations, pumping gasoline and talking to motorists. Visit your client's refineries and research  laboratories. Study the advertising of his competitors. At the end of your second year, you will know more about gasoline than your boss.

Most of the young men in agencies are too lazy to do this kind of homework. They remain permanently superficial.

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What I learned from reading Working by Robert Caro. 

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Listen to one of my favorite podcasts: Invest Like the Best: Sam Hinkie: Find Your People 

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[3:40] You can't get very deep into Johnson's life without realizing that the central fact of his life was his relationship with his father.

[8:00] It was the hill country and his father's failures that taught him how terrible could be the consequences of a single mistake.

[8:45] Lyndon Johnson wouldn't understand. He would refuse to understand. He would threaten you, would cajole you, bribe you or charm you. He would do whatever he had to do, but he would get that vote.

[9:00] What mattered to him was winning because he knew what losing could be. What its consequences could be.

[9:50] Robert Caro books I've read: 

The Power Broker 

The Path to Power

Means of Ascent

Master of The Senate (currently reading) 

[11:00] About what I wanted to do with my life and my books (which are my life)

[11:40] I am a reflection of what I do. — Steve Jobs

[23:20] There are certain moments in your life when you suddenly understand something about yourself. I loved going through those files, making them yield up their secrets to me.

[24:10] Turn every page. Never assume anything. Turn every goddamn page.

[27:50] Robert Caro snaps: No, that's not why highways get built where they get built. They get built there because Robert Moses wants them there.

[28:15] Robert Moses had power that no one understood. Power that nobody else was even thinking about.

[29:50] There are sentences that are said to you in your life that are chiseled into your memory.

[34:00] Three of the editors took me to some fancy restaurant and told me they could make me a star. Bob Gottlieb said, Well, I don't go out for lunch but we can have a sandwich at my desk and talk about your book. So of course I picked him.

[37:15] Robert Moses was a ruthless genius with savage energy.

[38:30] Ambitious people are rare, so if everyone is mixed together randomly, as they tend to be early in people's lives, then the ambitious ones won't have many ambitious peers. When you take people like this and put them together with other ambitious people, they bloom like dying plants given water. Probably most ambitious people are starved for the sort of encouragement they'd get from ambitious peers, whatever their age.

— Paul Graham’s essays. (Founders #275-277)

[42:30] in a couple of sentences these two men —idols of mine — had wiped away five years of doubt.

[42:50] There is not a more mysterious craft than entrepreneurship.

[48:15] I now had a picture of Lyndon Johnson's youth, that terrible youth, that character hardening youth.

[54:00] I wasn't fully understanding what these people were telling me about the depth of Lyndon Johnson's determination, about the frantic urgency, the desperation, to get ahead, and to get ahead fast.

As if the passions, the ambitions that he brought to Washington, strong though they were, were somehow intensified by the fact that he was finally there, in the place where he had always wanted to be.

I wanted to show the contrast between what he was coming from the poverty, the insecurity —and what he was trying for.

[55:15] I wanted to make the reader see the contrast between what he was coming from and what he was trying for. Something on the way to work had excited him and thrilled him so much that he'd break into a run every morning.

[56:15] And as Lyndon Johnson came up Capitol Hill in the morning, he would be running.

Well, of course he was running—from the land of poverty to this. Everything he had ever wanted, everything he had ever hoped for, was there.

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What I learned from reading Sol Price: Retail Revolutionary by Robert Price. 

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[6:50] He believed in developing strong operating efficiencies, and he continually emphasized passing on savings to customers.

[8:48] It's pretty incredible to think about that Sol's ideas have created trillions of dollars of value.

[11:18] You can always understand the son by the story of his father. The story of the father is embedded in the son. —Francis Ford Coppola: A Filmmaker's Life by Michael Schumacher. (Founders #242)

[14:00] Stephen King on the belief and support he received from his wife: “Having someone who believes in you makes a lot of difference”— Stephen King On Writing: A Memoir of the Craftby Stephen King. (Founders #210)

[16:00] True education is gained through the discipline of life. —Henry Ford

[19:45] Sol kept a small sign in his office: “Do it now.”

[24:00] Sol finds an idea future generations of entrepreneurs will use: A membership retail store targeted to a specific niche.

[24:45] When you have people driving far distances to save money that is a very good sign. — Sam Walton: Made In America by Sam Walton. (Founders #234)

[26:45] Daniel Ek interview on the Acquired podcast. 

[39:10] If you’re not spending 90% of your time teaching, you’re not doing your job. —Jim Sinegal.

[39:45] You train an animal, you teach a person.

[40:00] He was not a fan of training manuals because he believed that manuals were a substitute for thinking.

[43:00] What does limited selection have to do with efficiency? Because payroll and benefits represent 80% of a retailer’s cost of operations, pricing advantage follows labor productivity. Fewer items result in reduced labor hours throughout all of the product supply channels. Put simply, the cost to deal with 4,500 items is a lot less than the cost to deal with 50,000 items.

[50:21] The operating efficiencies of the warehouse concept and the direct delivery of products from the suppliers to Price Club made it possible to sell merchandise for less.

[55:00] Costco and Sam's were expanding aggressively while Price Club remained tentative.

[1:03:30] Sol was a poster child for the American dream. His immigrant parents were born in a small Russian village. Sol was the first in his family to graduate college. He earned a law degree. He became an exceptionally successful businessman and philanthropist, celebrated 70 years of marriage, was a good father who instilled high values in his sons, and he never walked away from responsibility. It doesn’t get much better than that.

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What I learned from reading The Women of Berkshire Hathaway: Lessons from Warren Buffett's Female CEOs and Directors by Karen Linder. 

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Episode outline:

Mr. Buffett, we're going to put our competitors through a meat grinder. — Buffett: The Making of an American Capitalist by Roger Lowenstein. (Founders #182)

There are several "Going Out of Business" advertisements from competitors' stores framed and hanging on the wall.

As a general rule, bet on the quality of the business, not on the quality of the management-unless, of course, you've got a Mrs. B. in your hand. If that is the case, go all in. She was a business genius. —  The Tao of Charlie Munger (Founders #295)

Retirement is fatal. — David Ogilvy (Founders #189)

Business like raising a child, you want a good one. A child needs a mother and a business needs a boss.

What is your favorite thing to do on a nice evening? Drive around to check the competition and plan my next attack.

He was 52 and famous. I was 33 and a junior account executive. Early on, he wrote a letter to one of my clients. After listing eight reasons why some ads prepared by the company’s design department would not be effective, he delivered his ultimate argument: The only thing that can be said in favor of the layouts is that they are “different.” You could make a cow look different by removing the udder. But that cow would not produce results. So began my “David” file. Almost everyone who worked at the agency kept one. — The King of Madison Avenue: David Ogilvy and the Making of Modern Advertising by Kenneth Roman. (Founders #169)

Buffet said: If she ran a popcorn stand I’d wanna be in business with her. She's just plain smart. She's a fierce competitor and she's a tireless worker.

Buffett “on how Mrs. B ran her business: One question I always ask myself in appraising a business is how I would like, assuming I had ample capital and skilled personnel, to compete with it. I'd rather wrestle grizzlies than compete with Mrs. B. They buy brilliantly, they operate at expense ratios on to t competitors don't even dream about, and they then pass on to their customers much of the savings. It's the ideal business—one built upon exceptional value to the customer that in turn translates into exceptional economics for its owners."

She hired a chauffeur who drove her around Omaha each day. The driver took her to other stores. She looked in the windows and checked to see how many cars were in their parking lots. It didn't take long for her to plan her revenge.

There was no looking back. She just swung.

Aspiring business managers should look hard at the plain, but rare, attributes that produced Mrs. B’s incredible success. Students from 40 universities visit me every year, and I have them start the day with a visit to NFM. If they absorb Mrs. B’s lessons, they need none from me.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

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What I learned from reading The Mind of Napoleon: A Selection of His Written and Spoken Words edited by J. Christopher Herold. 

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(3:45) A man who combined energy of thought and energy of action to an exceptional degree.

(4:45) He knows that men have always been the same, that nothing can change their nature. It is from the past that he will draw his lessons in order to shape the present.

(5:15) Destiny must be fulfilled. That is my chief doctrine.

(6:05) Napoleon: A Concise Biography by David Bell (Founders #294)

(9:25) To aim at world empire seemed to Napoleon a most natural thing.

(10:00) To have lived without glory, without leaving a trace of one's existence, is not to have lived at all.

(10:55) The greatest improvisation of the human mind is that which gives existence to the nonexistent.

(11:45) The best way to understand a person is to listen to that person directly. —  Make Something Wonderful: Steve Jobs in his own words (Founders #299)

(12:55) The great majority of men attend to what is necessary only when they feel a need for it—the precise time when it is too late.

(16:10) The worst way to live according to Napoleon:

When on rising from sleep a man does not know what to do with himself and drags his tedious existence from place to place; when, scanning his future, he sees nothing but dreadful monotony, one day resembling the next; when he asks himself, "Why do I exist?”—then, in my opinion, he is the most wretched of all.

(17:45) Instead his (Steve Jobs) ego needs and personal drives led him to seek fulfillment by creating a legacy that would awe people. A dual legacy, actually: building innovative products and building a lasting company. He wanted to be in the pantheon with, indeed a notch above, people like Edwin Land, Bill Hewlett, and David Packard. — Steve Jobs: The Exclusive Biography by Walter Isaacson. (Founders #214)

(19:15) He must know himself. Until then, all endeavors are in vain, all schemes collapse.

(20:15) Napoleon on George Washington: Britain refused to acknowledge either him or the independence of his country; but his success obliged them to change their minds and acknowledge both. It is success which makes the great man.

(21:15) Washington saw the conflict as a struggle for power in which the colonists, if victorious, destroyed British pretentions of superiority and won control over half of a continent. — Franklin & Washington: The Founding Partnershipby Edward Larson. (Founders #251)

(23:15) If you do everything you will win: All great events hang by a single thread. The clever man takes advantage of everything, neglects nothing that may give him some added opportunity; the less clever man, by neglecting one thing, sometimes misses everything.

(23:45) Warren Buffett: We are individually opportunity driven. — All I Want To Know Is Where I'm Going To Die So I'll Never Go There: Buffett & Munger – A Study in Simplicity and Uncommon, Common Sense by Peter Bevelin. (Founders #286)

(24:15) Imagination rules the world.

(25:00) Ambition is a violent and unthinking fever that ceases only when life ceases.

(34:52) The corpse of an enemy always smells sweet.

(35:30) Roots of Strategy: Book 1

(38:45) Robert Caro profiled two men who seeds were not high (in a tournament) they were without many advantages. And to get all the way to the top you probably had to sacrifice everything to the effort. The meta lesson is if you are not willing to pay that price presume someone else will.

If you want something like the presidency (or being a billionaire) you should presume there is someone out there who will devote all their time, money, relationships, sense of ethics, everything in sacrifice of that one goal. Of course that person would win that race.  — Invest Like The Best Sam Hinkie Find Your People 

(40:45) I do not want be roadkill on the modern-day Napoleon's path to glory.

(43:15) The ancients had a great advantage over us in that their armies were not trailed by a second army of pen pushers.

(44:05) A wasted life should be your greatest fear.

(46:30) Make use of every possible opportunity of increasing your chances of victory.

(48:55) Paul Graham on Be Hard to Kill:

The way to make a startup recession-proof is to do exactly what you should do anyway: run it as cheaply as possible.

For years I've been telling founders that the surest route to success is to be the cockroaches of the corporate world. The immediate cause of death in a startup is always running out of money. So the cheaper your company is to operate, the harder it is to kill. —  Paul Graham’s essays (Founders #275)

(51:30) Winning is the main thing. Keep the main thing, the main thing.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

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What I learned from reading Tiger Woods by Jeff Benedict and Armen Keteyian.

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[3:00] He was someone no one had ever seen or will ever see again.

[5:20] You can always understand the son by the story of his father. The story of the father is embedded in the son. — Francis Ford Coppola: A Filmmaker's Life by Michael Schumacher. (Founders #242)

[7:15] His output was enormous, much greater than that of nine tenths of other composers. He was a mature artist in most forms at the age of twelve. There was never a month, often scarcely a week, when he did not produce a substantial score. — Mozart: A Life by Paul Johnson. (Founders #240)

[7:50] Tiger's opponents were never people; it was always history.

[14:05] I've always been a practice player. I believe in it. — Michael Jordan: The Lifeby Roland Lazenby. (Founders #212)

[17:00] Grinding It Out: The Making of McDonald's by Ray Kroc. (Founders #293)

[18:30] Tiger was filling his mind with words that were intended to make him great. He wrote some of the messages from the self-help cassettes on a sheet of paper that he taped to his bedroom wall:

I believe in me

I will own my own destiny

I smile at obstacles

I am first in my resolve

I fulfill my resolutions powerfully

My strength is great

I stick to it, easily, naturally 

My will moves mountains

I focus and give it my all

My decisions are strong

I do it with all my heart

Tiger listened to those tapes so often that he wore them out.

[31:50] People would ask him how did you get so good Tiger? And he would answer, practice, practice, practice.

[32:10] The world is a very malleable place. If you know what you want, and you go for it with maximum energy and drive and passion, the world will often reconfigure itself around you much more quickly and easily than you would think.  —The Pmarca Blog Archive Ebook by Marc Andreessen.

[36:45] The Score Takes Care of Itself: My Philosophy of Leadership by Bill Walsh. (Founders #106)

[40:15] That’s all training is. Stress. Recover. Improve. You’d think any damn fool could do it. But you don’t. You work too hard and rest too little and get hurt. — Bowerman and the Men of Oregon: The Story of Oregon's Legendary Coach and Nike's Cofounder by Kenny Moore. (Founders #153)

[46:15] Money didn't motivate him. Nor did fame. He played for the hardware. He played for the win.

[53:45] Robert Caro’s Books

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What I learned from reading Against the Odds: An Autobiography by James Dyson for the 4th time. You can also find the book on Book Finder. 

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Episode Outline: 

[4:30] Invention: A Life by James Dyson (Founders #205)

[2:41] I am a creator of products, a builder of things, and my name appears on them. That is how I make a living and they are what have made my name at least familiar in a million homes.

[11:00] Isambard Kingdom Brunel: The Definitive Biography of The Engineer, Visionary, and Great Briton by L.T.C. Rolt. (Founders #201)

[13:10] After the idea there is plenty of time to learn the technology. My first cyclonic vacuum cleaner was built out of cereal packets and masking tape long before I understood how it worked.

[14:15] Difference for the sake of it. In everything. Because it must be better. From the moment the idea strikes, to the running of the business. Difference, and retention of total control.

[18:00] I would not be dragged into something I didn't want to do.

[22:40] They were all running round and round the track like a herd of sheep and not getting any quicker. Difference itself was making me come in first.

[23:34] As I grew more and more neurotic about being caught from behind I trained harder to stay in front. To this day it is the fear of failure, more than anything else, which makes me keep working at success.

Isambard Kingdom Brunel was unable to think small, and nothing was a barrier to him. The mere fact that something had never been one before presented, to Brunel, no suggestion that the doing of it was impossible. He was fired by an inner strength and self-belief almost impossible to imagine in this feckless age.  While I could never lay claim to the genius of a man like that —I have tried to be as confident in my vision as he was.  And at times in my life when I have encountered difficulty and self-doubt I have looked to his example to fire me on.

[30:33] The vision of a single man pursued with dogged determination that was nothing less than obsession.

[36:30] The root principle was to do things your way. It didn't matter how other people did it.

[41:38] You simply cannot mix your messages when selling something new. A consumer can barely handle one great new idea, let alone two, or even several.

[49:30] A direct relationship with the customer is the holy grail. Do not abandon it.

[52:00] One of the strains of this book is about control. If you have the intimate knowledge of a product that comes with dreaming it up and then designing it, I have been trying to say, then you will be the better able to sell it and then, reciprocally, to go back to it and improve it. From there you are in the best possible position to convince others of its greatness and to inspire others to give their very best efforts to developing it, and to remain true to it, and to see it through all the way to its optimum point. To total fruition, if you like.

[1:02:20] Before I went into production with the dual cyclone I had built 5,127 prototypes.

[1:02:30] There is no such thing as a quantum leap. There is only dogged persistence – and in the end you make it look like a quantum leap.

[1:03:30] While it is easy, of course, for me to celebrate my doggedness now and say that it is all you need to succeed, the truth is that it demoralized me terribly. I would crawl into the house every night covered in dust after a long day, exhausted and depressed because that day's cyclone had not worked. There were times when I thought it would never work, that I would keep on making cyclone after cyclone, never going forwards, never going backwards, until I died.

[1:06:20] I was broke, hungry and depressed. The outlook was very dreary. My doggedness and self-belief in the absence of any real evidence that they were justified was beginning to look more and more like insanity.

[1:10:30] Persistent trial and error allows them to wake up one morning after many, many mornings with a world beating product.

[1:13:15] I began to consider forgetting the whole thing and doing something else with my life.

[1:16:00] The poor buggers were so wrong, to think that designers knew nothing about business, or about marketing, or is about selling. It is the people who make the things that understand them, and understand what the public wants.

[1:21:30] Go further. There is nothing wrong with making the consumer laugh. Conventional looks do not make a product more marketable.

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What I learned from reading Make Something Wonderful: Steve Jobs in his own words.

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How did Edwin Land find new employees to hire? Any unusual sources to find talent?

What are some strategies that Cornelius Vanderbilt used against his competitors?

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(3:48) He gave an extraordinary amount of thought to how best to use our fleeting time.

(4:24) He imagined what reality lacked and set out to remedy it.

(7:27) Steve Jobs: The Lost Interview Video and My Notes.

(10:02) Edwin Land episodes:

Instant: The Story of Polaroid by Christopher Bonanos. (Founders #264)

Land's Polaroid: A Company and the Man Who Invented It by Peter C. Wensberg (Founders #263)

A Triumph of Genius: Edwin Land, Polaroid, and the Kodak Patent War by Ronald Fierstein (Founders #134)

Land's Polaroid: A Company and the Man Who Invented It by Peter C. Wensberg (Founders #133)

The Instant Image: Edwin Land and the Polaroid Experienceby Mark Olshaker (Founders #132)

Insisting On The Impossible: The Life of Edwin Land and Instant: The Story of Polaroid(Founders #40)

(13:23) Think of your life as a rainbow arcing across the horizon of this world. You appear, have a chance to blaze in the sky, then you disappear.

(14:10) One from Many: VISA and the Rise of Chaordic Organization by Dee Hock. (Founders #260)

(15:42) Read Jeff Bezos's shareholder letters in book form: Invent and Wander: The Collected Writings of Jeff Bezos or for free online: Amazon Investor Relations(Founders #282)

(19:45) If you want to understand the entrepreneur, study the juvenile delinquent. — Let My People Go Surfing: The Education of a Reluctant Businessman by Yvon Chouinard. (Founders #297)

(30:47) How important product is based on how much time you spend with it: People are going to be spending two, three hours a day interacting with these machines—longer than they spend in the car.

(39:02) Return to the Little Kingdom: Steve Jobs and the Creation of Appleby Michael Moritz. (Founders #76)

(40:32) The real big thing is: if you’re going to make something, it doesn’t take any more energy—and rarely does it take more money—to make it really great. All it takes is a little more time. And a willingness to do so, a willingness to persevere until it’s really great.

(45:07) Creativity, Inc.: Overcoming the Unseen Forces That Stand in the Way of True Inspiration by Ed Catmull 

(45:31) Steve’s enthusiasm kept him writing check after check to Pixar, ultimately investing some $60 million.

(47:47) It is better to have fewer people even if it means doing less. Let's build our company slowly and carefully.

(53:36) I’m not so dominant that I can’t listen to creative ideas coming from other people. Successful people listen. Those who don’t listen, don’t survive long. — Driven From Within by Michael Jordan (Founders #213)

(54:40) You never achieve what you want without falling on your face a few times in the process of getting there.

(1:00:11) There wasn’t a hierarchy of ideas that mapped onto the hierarchy of the organization.

(1:03:33) Don’t be a career. The enemy of most dreams and intuitions, and one of the most dangerous and stifling concepts ever invented by humans, is the “Career.” A career is a concept for how one is supposed to progress through stages during the training for and practicing of your working life. There are some big problems here. First and foremost is the notion that your work is different and separate from the rest of your life. If you are passionate about your life and your work, this can’t be so. They will become more or less one. This is a much better way to live one’s life.

(1:05:11) Make your avocation your vocation. Make what you love your work.

(1:05:58) Think of your life as a rainbow arcing across the horizon of this world. You appear, have a chance to blaze in the sky, then you disappear.

(1:09:27) In the Company of Giants: Candid Conversations With the Visionaries of the Digital World by Rama Dev Jager and Rafael Ortiz. (Founders #208)

(1:10:52) Much of it is also drive and passion—hard work makes up for a lot.

(1:13:28) A risk-taking creative environment on the product side required a fiscally conservative environment on the business side.

(1:13:57) You've got to choose what you put your love into really carefully.

(1:14:38) A remarkably consistent set of values that Steve held dear: Life is short; don’t waste it. Tell the truth. Technology should enhance human creativity. Process matters. Beauty matters. Details matter. The world we know is a human creation—and we can push it forward.

(1:19:24) Steve Jobs speaking to Apple employees (Video) 

(1:29:48) Apple is the world’s premier bridge builder between mere mortals and the exploding world of high technology.

(1:30:14) Steve’s favorite quote: We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit. – Aristotle

(1:32:29) The Man Behind the Microchip: Robert Noyce and the Invention of Silicon Valley by Leslie Berlin. (Founders #166)

(1:42:27) That’s been the most important lesson I’ve learned in business: that the dynamic range of people dramatically exceeds things you encounter in the rest of our normal lives—and to try to find those really great people who really love what they do. 

(1:43:00) Jony Ive: The Genius Behind Apple's Greatest Productsby Leander Kahney. (Founders #178)

(1:47:27) It’s a circus world, and you never know what’s around the next corner.

(1:53:40) Bourdain: The Definitive Oral Biography by Laurie Woolever. (Founders #219)

(2:01:00) All glory is fleeting.

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What I learned from having lunch with Sam Zell and reading Zeckendorf: The Autobiography of The man Who Played a Real-Life Game of Monopoly and Won the Largest Real Estate Empire in History by William Zeckendorf. 

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 A few questions I've asked SAGE recently: 

What are the most important leadership lessons from history's greatest entrepreneurs?

Can you give me a summary of Warren Buffett's best ideas? (Substitute any founder covered on the podcast and you'll get a comprehensive and easy to read summary of their ideas) 

How did Edwin Land find new employees to hire? Any unusual sources to find talent?

What are some strategies that Cornelius Vanderbilt used against his competitors?

Get access to Founders Notes here. 

Episode Outline: 

[27:31] Start of episode on Zeckendorf’s autobiography

[27:44] 26 years of work was now moving down the chute.

[28:36] The secret of any great project is to keep it moving, keep it from losing momentum.

[34:55] If you want to understand the entrepreneur, study the juvenile delinquent. — Let My People Go Surfing: The Education of a Reluctant Businessman by Yvon Chouinard. (Founders #297)

[36:21] Zeckendorf: Revisiting the legacy of a master builder

[45:08] This ruthless industry has created far more bankruptcies than it has billionaires. — Risk Game: Self Portrait of an Entrepreneur by Francis Greenburger. (Founders #243)

[48:49] If you want to know whether you are destined to be a success or a failure in life, you can easily find out. The test is simple and it is infallible: Are you able to save money? If not, drop out. You will lose. You may think not, but you will lose as sure as you live. The seed of success is not in you. — James J. Hill: Empire Builder of the Northwest by Michael P. Malone.

[53:20] I brought energy and drive. I became the chief enthusiast.

[1:08:42] I was also deeply in debt. Never, except for rare moments, have I ever had my head very far above the financial water and never have I Iet this trouble me.

[1:10:51] The importance to me of being on the heights was that in an hour I could achieve what previously would've taken a year or more of effort to perform.

[1:11:13] One way to succeed is by aiding and supporting the position of others through new or ingenious ideas or projects. This usefulness to others is in large part the reason for my own success.

[1:14:44] Am I Being Too Subtle?: Straight Talk From a Business Rebel by Sam Zell. (Founders #269)

[1:15:04] The Invisible Billionaire: Daniel Ludwig by Jerry Shields. (Founders #292)

[1:21:28] The Patriarch: The Remarkable Life and Turbulent Times of Joseph P. Kennedy by David Nasaw 

[1:25:52] More businesses die from indigestion than starvation. — The HP Way: How Bill Hewlett and I Built Our Company by David Packard. (Founders #291)

[1:29:23] Wisdom is prevention. –Charlie Munger + Be hard to kill. —Paul Graham (Founders #275)

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What I learned from rereading Let My People Go Surfing: The Education of a Reluctant Businessman by Yvon Chouinard.

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[3:45] One of my favorite sayings about entrepreneurship is: If you want to understand the entrepreneur, study the juvenile delinquent. The delinquent is saying with his actions, “This sucks. I’m going to do my own thing.”

[4:32] The original intent for writing Let My People Go Surfing was for it to be a philosophical manual for the employees of Patagonia. We have always considered Patagonia an experiment in doing business in unconventional ways.

[7:48] MeatEater Podcast #188 Yvon Chouinard on Belonging to Nature

[7:55] The first part of our mission statement, “Make the best product,” is the cornerstone of our business philosophy. “Make the best” is a difficult goal. It doesn’t mean “among the best” or the “best at a particular price point.” It means “make the best,” period.

[9:58] When I die and go to hell, the devil is going to make me the marketing director for a cola company. I’ll be in charge of trying to sell a product that no one needs, is identical to its competition, and can’t be sold on its merits. I’d be competing head-on in the cola wars, on price, distribution, advertising, and promotion, which would indeed be hell for me. I’d much rather design and sell products so good and unique that they have no competition.

[14:32] We were like a wild species living on the edge of an ecosystem: adaptable, resilient, and tough.

[14:49] I believe the way towards mastery of any endeavor is to work towards simplicity. The more you know, the less you need.

[15:49] The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

[17:59] Complexity is often a sure sign that the functional needs have not been solved. Take the difference between the Ferrari and the Cadillac of the 1960s. The Ferrari’s clean lines suites its high-performance aims. The Cadillac really didn’t have any functional aims. It didn’t have steering, suspension, aerodynamics, or brakes appropriate to its immense horsepower. All it had to do was convey the idea of power, creature comfort, of a living room floating down the highway to the golf course. So, to a basically ugly shape were added all manner of useless chrome: fins at the back, breasts at the front. Once you lose the discipline of functionality as a design guidepost, the imagination runs amok. Once you design a monster, it tends to look like one too.

[21:29] Shoe Dog: A Memoir by the Creator of Nike by Phil Knight. (Founders #186)

[28:02] Becoming Trader Joe: How I Did Business My Way and Still Beat the Big Guys by Joe Coulombe. (Founders #188)

[28:55] There are different ways to address a new idea or project. If you take the conservative scientific route, you study the problem in your head or on paper until you are sure there is no chance of failure. However, you have taken so long that the competition has already beaten you to market. The entrepreneurial way is to immediately take a forward step and if that feels good, take another, if not, step back. Learn by doing, it is a faster process.

[31:33] Can a company that wants to make the best-quality outdoor clothing in the world be the size of Nike? Can a ten-table, three-star French restaurant retain its third star when it adds fifty tables? The question haunted me throughout the 1980s as Patagonia evolved.

[35:47] I was still wondering why I was really in business.

[38:17] We had to begin to make all of our decisions as though we would be in business for a hundred years.

[39:02] Made in Japan: Akio Morita and Sony by Akio Morita. (Founders #102)

[39:13] Jeff Bezos on what he learned from Akio Morita and how it influenced the building of Amazon:

"Right after World War II, Akio Morita, the guy who founded Sony, made the mission for Sony that they were going to make Japan known for quality.

And you have to remember, this was a time when Japan was known for cheap, copycat products. And Morita didn’t say we’re going to make Sony known for quality. He said we’re going to make Japan known for quality. He chose a mission for Sony that was bigger than Sony.

And when we talk about earth’s most customer-centric company, we have a similar idea in mind. We want other companies to look at Amazon and see us as a standard-bearer for obsessive focus on the customer as opposed to obsessive focus on the competitor."

[42:13] Keep your company in Yarak: Super alert, hungry but not weak, and ready to hunt.

[42:45] Against The Odds: An Autobiography by James Dyson (Founders #200)

[44:02] Jay Z: What am I here for? To be second best? I don’t think so.

[44:13] The more you know, the less you need.

[51:33] Teach, inform, and inspire. Do so relentlessly and the sales will follow.

[53:04] I was taught by some wise people that if you manage the top line of your company-your customers, your products, your strategy-then the bottom line will follow. But if you manage the bottom line of the company and forget about the rest, you’ll eventually hit the wall because you'll take your eyes off the prize. — Steve Jobs

In the Company of Giants: Candid Conversations With the Visionaries of the Digital World by Rama Dev Jager and Rafael Ortiz. (Founders #208)

[56:03] Quality, not price, has the highest correlation with business success. Whenever we are faced with a serious business decision, the answer almost always is to increase quality.

[56:59] Huberman Lab Podcast

[57:19]  I cannot imagine any company that wants to make the best product of its kind being staffed by people who do not care passionately about the product.

[57:39] One of my all time favorite quotes:

A master in the art of living draws no sharp distinction between his work and his play; his labor and his leisure; his mind and his body; his education and his recreation. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues his vision of excellence through whatever he is doing, and leaves others to determine whether he is working or playing. To himself, he always appears to be doing both.

[58:56] You should not see change as a threat, rather as an opportunity to grow and evolve to a higher level.

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David Rosenthal and Ben Gilbert — of the Acquired podcast — invited me to San Francisco for a discussion on our mutual obsession: spending every waking hour studying the history of entrepreneurship and sharing those lessons on our podcasts. 

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This episode is brought to you by: Tiny: Tiny is the easiest way to sell your business. Tiny provides quick and straightforward exits for Founders. Get in touch with Tiny by emailing [email protected]. 

[3:00] David’s time with Charlie Munger

[5:30] Henry Flagler after Standard Oil

[8:30] What makes a great biography, and how to capture all sides of complex characters?

[11:00] Studying history is a form of leverage to achieve success

[13:00] How do we figure out what the true story is for an episode we're doing?

[20:30] Silicon Valley should focus more on durability than growth

[21:30] How David got into reading biographies and podcasting

[25:40] What were each of their influences before starting Acquired and Founders?

[35:30] How to suck less over time

[37:30] What motivates, Ben, David, and David to get better?

[45:00] Dead ends: business model changes, paid podcasts, changing the name to “Adapting”, and Senra's “Autotelic”

[51:30] “You’re not advertising to a standing army, you’re advertising to a moving parade”

[56:00] Comparison of podcasting business models

[1:00:10] Senra’s insane Readwise "healthy twitter" habit

[1:04:30] Is it possible for the ultra-wealthy not to mess up their kids?

[1:14:30] The fleeting moments you get to spend with your kids

[1:17:00] The value of building relationships with best-in-class peers

[1:19:30] How the book publishing industry works

[1:28:45] How to differentiate yourself as an investor in 2023?

[1:38:30] The greatest historical examples as content marketing

[2:02:00] The best businesses are cults (and Senra starts one on the episode)

[2:07:00] Senra gives feedback to Ben and David on Acquired episode format

[2:15:30] Steve Jobs’ 1997 product matrix

[2:17:00] The moral imperative to market products that help people

[2:23:00] Ray Kroc and Steve Jobs: deeply flawed founders

[2:23:30] The founders we idolize are world-builders

[2:28:00] When yachts and jets are underpriced assets

[2:32:00] How to compete when money is cheap vs. when there are real interest rates

[2:39:30] When Ben and David have fixed broken episodes in post-production

[2:44:30] Why masters of craft are so interesting to study

[2:45:30] Should you listen to advice?

[2:51:00] David’s first job detailing cars

[2:52:30] The Cuban experience immigrating to Miami

[3:01:00] College entrepreneurship programs

[3:04:00] Ben’s experience learning UNIX as a kid

[3:08:30] David remembers Tim Ferriss guest lecturing in college

If you have scrolled this far and still haven't followed Acquired in your podcast player please do so here! 

What I learned from reading The Taste of Luxury: Bernard Arnault and the Moet-Hennessy Louis Vuitton Story by Nadege Forestier and Nazanine Ravai.

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[1:16] I am the boss. I shall be here on Monday morning and I shall be running the company in person.

[4:30] The Taste of Luxury: Bernard Arnault and the Moet-Hennessy Louis Vuitton Story by Nadege Forestier and Nazanine Ravai

[5:01] I highly recommend listening to Acquired’s episode on LVMH. It is excellent.

[5:16] Business Breakdowns episode LVMH: The Wolf in Cashmere’s Conglomerate

[6:16] Napoleon: A Concise Biography by David Bell. (Founders #294)

[6:18] Mind of Napoleon: A Selection of His Written and Spoken Words by Napoleon and J. Christopher Herold.

[7:20] I’m not so dominant that I can’t listen to creative ideas coming from other people. Successful people listen. Those who don’t listen, don’t survive long. — Driven From Within by Michael Jordan (Founders #213)

[9:00] “I am very competitive. I always want to win.” —Bernard Arnault

[10:39] What I'm interested is in doing.

[11:43] He believed in extreme discretion.

[11:56] I Had Dinner With Charlie Munger (Founders #295)

[16:17] Beneath his civilized appearance there lurked the spirit of an adventurer. He wanted more.

[17:45] He wanted to go far. He had an iron will. At a laboriously won tennis match he said “I may lose once but I never lose twice.” —Bernard Arnault

[19:45] Problems are just opportunities in work clothes.

[23:30] Arnault remained inflexible. He wanted control. There was no question of his becoming the Willots’ partner.

[24:15] Far from discouraging him, this consensus of opinion (that this would lead to failure) acted as a stimulus.

[24:25] “I remember people telling me, it does not make sense to put together so many brands. And it was a success, it was a recognized success, and for the last 10 years now, every competitor is trying to imitate. I think they are not successful, but they try.” —Bernard Arnault

[30:43] “In business, I think the most important thing is to position yourself for long-term and not be too impatient, which I am by nature, and I have to control myself.” —Bernard Arnault

[33:35] He had such an appetite for victory and such a capacity for work that he was bound to succeed.

[35:26] “People think of politicians having true power, but that’s less and less true. After all, they are often constrained or being edged into a corner by a whole series of contingencies ... I’m lucky in that I can say, ‘I want my group to be in such and such a situation in 10 or 20 years’ time’ and then formulate a plan to make that happen.” –Bernard Arnault

[42:37] Those on the margins often come to control the center.

[43:10] Invest Like the Best episode Doug Leone —Lessons From A Titan

[48:31] Difference for the sake of it. In everything. Because it must be better. From the moment the idea strikes, to the running of the business. Difference, and retention of total control. — Against The Odds: An Autobiography by James Dyson (Founders #200)

[1:01:20] My relationship to luxury goods is really very rational. It is the only area in which it is possible to make luxury profit margins.

[1:02:45] Arnault wants to take power everywhere and immediately.

[1:07:40] Arnault is an iron fist in an iron glove.

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What I learned from having dinner with Charlie Munger and rereading The Tao of Charlie Munger.

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(5:45) The blueprint he gave me was simple: Forget what you know about buying fair businesses at wonderful prices; instead, buy wonderful businesses at fair prices.

(8:48) He has never forgotten the importance of having friends in high places.

(9:04) Most people systematically undervalue their time. — Peter Thiel

(11:08) Franklin & Washington: The Founding Partnership by Edward Larson. Founders #251)

(12:23) Meet You in Hell: Andrew Carnegie, Henry Clay Frick, and the Bitter Partnership That Changed America by Les Standiford. (Founders #284)

(15:02) Charlie took the excess capital out of Blue Chip Stamp and invested it in profitable businesses.

(16:56) Charlie started seeing the advantages of investing in better businesses that didn't have big capital requirements and did have lots of free cash that could be reinvested in expanding operations or buying new businesses.

(17:38) Go for great.

(21:33) In everything I’ve done it really pays to go after the best people in the world. —Steve Jobs

(27:15) If you're in a good business just know that it's human nature to mess it up. Don't mess it up. Just stay there and let time do its work.

(27:34) One truly great business will make your unborn grandchildren wealthy.

(28:08) All I Want To Know Is Where I'm Going To Die So I'll Never Go There: Buffett & Munger – A Study in Simplicity and Uncommon, Common Sense by Peter Bevelin. (Founders #286)

(34:39) I did not succeed in life by intelligence. I succeeded because I have a long attention span.

(34:54) Charlie Munger on how he made $400 or $500 million by reading Barron’s for 50 years.

(35:11) One of the reasons Charlie and Warren have never worried about anyone mimicking their investment style is because no other institution or individual has the discipline are the patience to wait as long as they can. 

(35:47) Wisdom is prevention.

(36:50) Only play games where you have an edge. — A Man for All Markets: From Las Vegas to Wall Street, How I Beat the Dealer and the Market by Ed Thorp. (Founders #222)

(38:31) Wise people step on big and growing troubles early.

(44:51) I am continually amazed at the number of people who are presented with an opportunity and pass. There’s your basic dividing line between the people who shoot up in their careers like a rocket ship, and those who don’t — right there. — Marc Andreessen's Blog Archive (Founders #50)

(46:28) The most inspiring biography I’ve read so far: Born of This Land: My Life Story by Chung Ju-yung. (Founders #117)

(47:11) Invest Like The Best #204 Sam Hinkie Find Your People

(42:42) Rober Caro’s Books:

The Power Broker

The Path to Power: The Years of Lyndon Johnson I

Means of Ascent: The Years of Lyndon Johnson II

Master of the Senate: The Years of Lyndon Johnson III

The Passage of Power: The Years of Lyndon Johnson IV

(48:46) We just got after it and we stayed after it. — Sam Walton: Made In America by Sam Walton. (Founders #234)

(52:39) Some brand names own a piece of consumer's minds and they do not have any direct competition.

(55:30) We are individual opportunity driven.

(57:08) Size and market domination can create their own kind of durable competitive advantage.

(56:15) Jony Ive: The Genius Behind Apple's Greatest Products by Leander Kahney. (Founders #178)

(1:01:57) Extreme specialization is the way to succeed. Most people are way better off specializing than trying to understand the world.

(1:04:44) Wise people want to avoid other people who are just total rat poison and there are a lot of them.

(1:05:35) Charlie and I have seen so much of the ordinary in business that we can truly appreciate a virtuoso performance.

(1:09:00) Am I Being Too Subtle?: Straight Talk From a Business Rebel by Sam Zell. (Founders #269)

(1:10:15) Charlie looks at nearly everything through the lens of history. You aren't changing human nature. Things will just keep repeating forever.

(1:13:13) There should be more willingness to take the blows of life as they fall. That's what manhood is, taking life as it falls. Not whining all the time and trying to fix it by whining.

(1:14:40) Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire by James Wallace and Jim Erickson. (Founders #290)

(1:17:00) Arnold Schwarzenegger autobiographies and episodes:

Total Recall: My Unbelievably True Life Story by Arnold Schwarzenegger. (Founders #141)

Arnold: The Education of a Bodybuilder by Arnold Schwarzenegger. (Founders #193)

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What I learned from reading Napoleon: A Concise Biography by David Bell.

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[3:00] He could think quicker and along more individual and original lines than any of them.

[4:00] John D: The Founding Father of the Rockefellers by David Freeman Hawke. (Founders #254)

[4:14] Miami meetup with Shane Parrish

[7:31] His life was enormously important, endlessly fascinating, and connected to some of the most controversial and constantly reinterpreted events in the world history.

[8:37] Paul Johnson’s books:

Churchill by Paul Johnson. (Founders #225)

Mozart: A Life by Paul Johnson. (Founders #240)

Socrates: A Man for Our Times by Paul Johnson. (Founders #252) 

[10:54] Heroes: From Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar to Churchill and de Gaulle by Paul Johnson. (Founders #226)

[12:20] He knew the importance of actively crafting his image in all available media.

[15:08] Napoleon found comfort and companionship in books

[17:02] The revolution was overturning age old hierarchies and giving worldwide prominence to previously obscure figures.

[17:24] Napoleon was ruthless.

[18:36] Only after that battle did I believe myself to be a superior man. And did the ambition come to me of executing the great things, which so far had been occupying my thoughts only as a fantastic dream.

[20:00] Many are the historical opportunities that have been lost for lack of talent or vision. In Napoleon's case, the man met his hour.

[20:13] He could see in a moment how to maneuver everything for maximum effect.

[21:03] Napoleon was a man of stone and iron.

[26:27] Napoleon was something new and the keenest observers understood it.

[29:06] I wanted to rule the world, who wouldn't have in my place?

[29:26] If papa could see us now.

[29:45] Franklin & Washington: The Founding Partnership by Edward Larson. (Founders #251)

[32:15] You might as well send a cow in pursuit of a rabbit. The Indians were accustomed to these woods.

[35:30] The Empire was increasingly coming to resemble a skyscraper built in haste without a proper foundation.

[35:58] Driven: An Autobiography by Larry Miller. (Founders #168)

[39:24] The key to victory was to plan and pursue a war exactly contrary to what the enemy wants.

[39:49] Hardcore History Ghosts of the Ostfront series

[41:08] The distracted do not beat the focused.

[42:36] Success is never permanent. The same person that built the empire, destroyed it.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

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What I learned from rereading Grinding It Out: The Making of McDonald's by Ray Kroc.

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[2:00] I have always believed that each man makes his own happiness and is responsible for his own problems.

[4:00] I was fascinated by the simplicity and effectiveness of the system they described that night.Each step in producing the limited menu was stripped down to its essence and accomplished with a minimum of effort.

[5:00] When I flew back to Chicago that fateful day in 1954, I had a freshly signed contract with the McDonald brothers in my briefcase. I was a battle-scarred veteran of the business wars, but I was still eager to go into action. I was 52 years old. I had diabetes and incipient arthritis. I had lost my gall bladder and most of my thyroid gland in earlier campaigns. But I was convinced that the best was ahead of me.

[6:00] It’s not what you do it’s how you do it:

Ralph Lauren: The Man Behind the Mystique by Jeffrey Trachtenberg. (Founders #288)

Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire by James Wallace and Jim Erickson. (Founders #290)

The Invisible Billionaire: Daniel Ludwig by Jerry Shields. (Founders #292)

[8:00] I never considered my dreams wasted energy. They were invariably linked to some form of action.

[10:00] For me, work was play.

[13:00] I vowed that this was going to be my only job. I was going to make my living at it and to hell with moonlighting of any kind. I intended to devote every ounce of my energy to selling, and that's exactly what I did.

[14:00] Francis Ford Coppola: A Filmmaker's Life by Michael Schumacher. (Founders #242)

[20:00] This was the first phase of grinding it out—building my personal monument to capitalism. I paid tribute, in the feudal sense, for many years before I was able to rise with McDonald's on the foundation I had laid.

[21:00] Make every detail perfect and limit the number of details to perfect.

[26:00] I was putting every cent I had and all I could borrow into this project.

[28:00] Perfection is very difficult to achieve and perfection was what I wanted in McDonald's. Everything else was secondary.

[29:00] If my competitor was drowning, I'd put a hose in his mouth.

[44:00] Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefeller by Ron Chernow. (Founders #248)

John D: The Founding Father of the Rockefellers by David Freeman Hawke. (Founders #254)

[47:00] The advertising campaign we put together was a smash hit. It turned Californians into our parking lots as though blindfolds had been removed from their eyes.

[48:00] Authority should go with the job.

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What I learned from rereading The Invisible Billionaire: Daniel Ludwig by Jerry Shields. 

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[2:00] Obsessed with privacy, Ludwig pays a major public relations firm fat fees to keep his name out of the papers.

[4:00]  An associate speaks of his unlimited ingenuity in dreaming up new ways of doing things.

[5:00] Ludwig’s most notable characteristic, besides his imagination and pertinacity, is a lifelong penchant for keeping his mouth shut.

[5:00] I'm in this business because I like it. I have no other hobbies.

[6:00] Holding strongly to an opinion, purpose, or course of action, stubbornly or annoyingly persistent.

[8:00] Risk Game: Self Portrait of an Entrepreneur by Francis Greenburger (Founders #243)

[10:00] At his peak, he owned more than 200 companies in 50 countries.

[23:00] War makes the demand for Ludwig's products and services skyrocket.

[25:00] Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire by James Wallace and Jim Erickson. (Founders #290)

[28:00] He did not mellow as he grew richer and older.

[28:00] Some years later, the captain of a Ludwig ship made the extravagant mistake of mailing in a report of several pages held together by a paper clip. He received a sharp rebuke for his prodigality: "We do not pay to send ironmongery by air mail!"

[29:00] Ludwig’s tightfistedness, however, persisted after the Depression, putting him in sharp contrast to such free spenders as Onassis and Niarchos. It also was largely responsible for many of his innovations in the shipbuilding industry.

[29:00] Onassis: An Extravagant Life by Frank Brady. (Founders #211)

[30:00] Ludwig’s ridding his ships of any feature that did not contribute to profits pleased his own obsessive sense of economy and kept him a step ahead of the competition. When someone asked why he didn't put a grand piano aboard his ships, as Stavros Niarchos did, Ludwig snapped, "You can't carry oil in a grand piano."

[31:00] Stay in the game long enough to get lucky.

[32:00] The world is a very malleable place. If you know what you want, and you go for it with maximum energy and drive and passion, the world will often reconfigure itself around you much more quickly and easily than you would think.  The Pmarca Blog Archive Ebook by Marc Andreessen (Founders #50)

[37:00] The yacht was as much a business craft as any of his tankers and probably earned him more money than any of them.

[40:00] Like the Rockefeller organization, Ludwig had mastered the practice of keeping his money by transferring it from one pocket, one company to another, while appearing to spend it.

[42:00] He had learned something by now. Opportunities exist on the frontiers where most men dare not venture, and it is often the case that the farther the frontier, the greater the opportunity.

[43:00] The way to escape competition is to either do something no one else is doing or do it where no one else is doing it.

[43:00] Much of Ludwig's success was due to his willingness to venture where more timid entrepreneurs dared not go.

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What I learned from reading The HP Way: How Bill Hewlett and I Built Our Company by David Packard.

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Do our products offer something unique?

Customer satisfaction second to none is the only acceptable goal.

What I learned from rereading Jeff Bezos' Shareholder Letters for the 3rd time (Founders #282)

In Silicon Valley, the ultimate career standard was set by David Packard: start a company in a garage, grow it into the leading innovator in its field, then take it public, then take it into the Fortune 500 (or better yet, the Fortune 50), then become the spokesman for the industry, then go to Washington, and then become an historic global figure. Only Packard had accomplished all of this; he had set the bar, and the Valley had honored his achievement by making him the unofficial "mayor" of Silicon Valley.

—The Intel Trinity: How Robert Noyce, Gordon Moore, and Andy Grove Built the World's Most Important Company by Michael Malone 

Steve Jobs: The Exclusive Biography by Walter Isaacson. (Founders #214)

Gates read the encyclopedia from beginning to end when he was only seven or eight years old. — Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire by James Wallace and Jim Erickson. (Founders #290)

My father wouldn't let me quit.

Given equally good players and good teamwork, the team with the strongest will to win will prevail.

Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future by Peter Thiel. (Founders #278)

That was a very important lesson for me —that personal communication was often necessary to back up written instructions.

Insisting On The Impossible: The Life Of Edwin Land by Victor McElheny 

More businesses die from indigestion than starvation.

I found, after much trial and error, that applying steady, gentle pressure from the worked best.

Bill and I knew we didn't want to be a “me too” company merely copying products already on the market.

Netbooks accounted for 20% of the laptop market. But Apple never seriously considered making one. “Netbooks aren’t better than anything,” Steve Jobs said at the time. “They’re just cheap laptops.” Jony proposed that the tablets in his lab could be Apple’s answer to the netbook.

—— Jony Ive: The Genius Behind Apple's Greatest Products by Leander Kahney. (Founders #178)

Gains in quality come from meticulous attention to detail, and every step in the manufacturing process must be done as carefully as possible, not as quickly as possible.

Exponential growth is based on the principle that the state of change is proportional to the level of effort expended.

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What I learned from rereading Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire by James Wallace and Jim Erickson.

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Gates read the encyclopedia from beginning to end when he was only seven or eight years old.

Gates had an obsessive personality and a compulsive need to be the best.

Everything Bill did, he did to the max. What he did always went well, well beyond everyone else.

You want to maneuver yourself into doing something in which you have an intense interest. —  Poor Charlie's Almanack: The Wit and Wisdom of Charles T. Munger.

Gates devoured everything he could get his hands on concerning computers and how to communicate with them, often teaching himself as he went.

A young man with no money and tons of enthusiasm. — The Dream of Solomeo: My Life and the Idea of Humanistic Capitalism by Brunello Cucinelli. (Founders #289)

He consumed biographies to understand how the great figures of history thought.

The idea that some people were super successful was interesting. What did they know? What did they do? What drove those kinds of successes?

Idea Man: A Memoir by the Cofounder of Microsoft by Paul Allen. (Founders #44)

“I’m going to make my first million by the time I'm 25.” It was not said as a boast, or even a prediction. He talked about the future as if his success was predestined.

Gates and Allen were convinced the computer industry was about to reach critical mass, and when it exploded it would usher in a technological revolution of astounding magnitude. They were on the threshold of one of those moments when history held its breath... and jumped, as it had done with the development of the car and the airplane. They could either lead the revolution or be swept along by it.

Bill had a monomaniacal quality. He would focus on something and really stick with it. He had a determination to master whatever it was he was doing. Bill was deciding where he was going to put his energy and to hell with what anyone else thought.

Don’t do anything that someone else can do. — Edwin Land

You've got to remember that in those days, the idea that you could own a computer, your own computer, was about as wild as the idea today of owning your own nuclear submarine. It was beyond comprehension.

There would be no unnecessary overhead or extravagant spending habits with Microsoft.

“Pertec kept telling me I was being unreasonable and they could deal with this guy [Gates]. It was like Roosevelt telling Churchill that he could deal with Stalin.

Four years in and Microsoft had only 11 employees.

Gates sustained Microsoft through tireless salesmanship. For several years he alone made the cold calls and haggled, cajoled, browbeat, and harangued the hardware makers of the emerging personal computer industry, convincing them to buy Microsoft's services and products. He was the best kind of salesman there is: he knew the product, and he believed in it. Moreover, he approached every client with the zealotry of a true believer.

When we got up to 30 employees, it was still just me, a secretary, and 28 programmers. I wrote all the checks, answered the mail, took the phone calls.

This might be Bill’s most important decision ever: IBM had talked to Gates about a fixed price for an unlimited number of copies of the software Microsoft licensed to IBM. The longer Gates thought about this proposal the more he became convinced it was bad business. Gates had decided to insist on a royalty arrangement with IBM.

You have to be uncompromised in your level of commitment to whatever you are doing, or it can disappear as fast as it appeared. 

Look around, just about any person or entity achieving at a high level has the same focus. The morning after Tiger Woods rallied to beat Phil Mickelson at the Ford Championship in 2005, he was in the gym by 6:30 to work out. No lights. No cameras. No glitz or glamour. Uncompromised. 

— Driven From Within by Michael Jordan and Mark Vancil. (Founders #213)

Overdrive: Bill Gates and the Race to Control Cyberspace by James Wallace. (Founders #174)

You can drive great people by making the speed of decision making really slow. Why would great people stay in an organization where they can't get things done? They look around after a while, and they're, like, "Look, I love the mission, but I can't get my job done because our speed of decision making is too slow."

—Invent and Wander: The Collected Writings of Jeff Bezos (Founders #155)

Alexander the Great: The Brief Life and Towering Exploits of History's Greatest Conqueror--As Told By His Original Biographers by Arrian, Plutarch, and Quintus Curtius Rufus. (Founders #232)

Gates was intolerant of distractions.

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What I learned from reading The Dream of Solomeo: My Life and the Idea of Humanistic Capitalism by Brunello Cucinelli.

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[4:00] I am reminded of Machiavelli: during his exile, he too spent his afternoons playing board games and drinking wine, while at night, in the austere silence of his studio, he engaged in solitary, literary conversations with the ancient scholars.

[6:00] The true meaning of my life seems to be a spontaneous drive and energy.

[7:00] I am driven by an immense desire: that my life, when it reaches its end, will not have been useless.

[7:00] Brunello Cucinelli by Om Malik 

[8:00] God assigns to all of us a mission to fulfill. Our task is first to discover the nature of our summons, then to follow it.

[11:00] We schedule time to think. Most people schedule themselves like a dentist. It's so easy to get so busy that you no longer have time to think- and you pay a huge price for that. —— All I Want To Know Is Where I'm Going To Die So I'll Never Go There: Buffett & Munger – A Study in Simplicity and Uncommon, Common Sense by Peter Bevelin. (Founders #286)

[14:00] Try to be your son's teacher until he's ten years old; his father, until he's twenty; and his friend, for the rest of his life.

[14:00] The problem is not getting rich, it's staying sane. —Charlie Munger

[18:00] What an astonishing thing a book is. It's a flat object made from a tree with flexible parts on which are imprinted lots of funny dark squiggles. But one glance at it and you're inside the mind of another person, maybe somebody dead for thousands of years. Across the millennia, an author is speaking clearly and silently inside your head, directly to you. Writing is perhaps the greatest of human inventions, binding together people who never knew each other, citizens of distant epochs. Books break the shackles of time. A book is proof that humans are capable of working magic. —Carl Sagan

[23:00] Postponing the reward increases the appreciation, a fact that has been forgotten in the current culture of impatience.

[29:00] I could see the humiliation in my father's eyes. His teary eyes were the source of inspiration for my life.

[33:00] I have always been firmly convinced that in order to successfully stand out you need to focus on one single project representing the dream of your life.

[36:00] A young man with no money and tons of enthusiasm.

[41:00] Ralph Lauren: The Man Behind the Mystique by Jeffrey Trachtenberg. (Founders #288) 

[43:00] One thing I never did—which I’m really proud of—was to push any of my kids too hard. I knew I was a fairly overactive fellow, and I didn’t expect them to try to be just like me. — Sam Walton: Made In America by Sam Walton. (Founders #234)

[48:00] Invention: A Life by James Dyson. (Founders #205)

[49:00] The greatest minds can convey deep and complex thoughts with words that are understandable to everyone.

[50:00] Enthusiastically build an extraordinary reality day after day.

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What I learned from reading Ralph Lauren: The Man Behind the Mystique by Jeffrey Trachtenberg.

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[2:01] When I lumped him together with a handful of other designers during casual conversation, he snapped: “Don't put me with those designers. My business is not compared to anybody else's."

[3:00] In practice Ralph Lauren is a tough, intensely ambitious businessman.

[3:00] Ralph has always possessed immense self-confidence; it is central to his character, an asset as valuable as his sense of color, fabric, style.

[4:00] Coco Chanel: The Legend and the Life by Justine Picardie. (Founders #199)

[7:00] Few outsiders understood fully how lucrative the licensing business had become. Ralph would have been a successful designer in his own right. However, he would never have qualified as one of the world's richest men without licensees willing to pay him 5 to 7 percent of sales.

[7:00] His privately held fashion empire was on the brink of bankruptcy. Geffen surmised that the company should be transformed from a manufacturing firm to a design, marketing, and licensing company. "You guys stink at manufacturing," he said. "You need to get out of that business." Instead, Geffen continued, the company needed to focus on what it really knew: how to design and market the Calvin Klein brand name. — The Operator: David Geffen Builds, Buys, and Sells The New Hollywood by Tom King

[14:00] When my customers come to me, they like to cross the threshold of some magic place; they feel a satisfaction that is perhaps a trace vulgar but that delights them: they are privileged characters who are incorporated into our legend. For them this is a far greater pleasure than ordering another suit.” —Coco Chanel, 1935

[16:00] What he lacked in experience he compensated it for an energy and enthusiasm.

[17:00] Differentiation is survival. — Jeff Bezos Jeff Bezos' Shareholder Letters (Founders #282)

[19:00] Mediocrity is always invisible until passion shows up and exposes it.

[22:00] From the beginning I've been aware of the need to sell everybody. — Becoming Trader Joe: How I Did Business My Way and Still Beat the Big Guys by Joe Coulombe. (Founders #188)

[26:00] Difference for the sake of it. In everything. Because it must be better. From the moment the idea strikes, to the running of the business. Difference, and retention of total control. — Against The Odds: An Autobiography by James Dyson (Founders #200)

[28:00] Made in Japan: Akio Morita and Sony by Akio Morita. (Founders #102)

[32:00] Intransigence is my only weapon. — Charles de Gaulle by Julian Jackson. (Founders #224)

[41:00] It's torture being a partner to somebody you don't want to be a partner with.

[45:00] On a Thursday night he wins an award for best men’s wear designer. The next day he could not meet his payroll.

[49:00] When bills come due, only cash is legal tender. Don't leave home without it. — The Essays of Warren Buffett by Warren Buffett and Lawrence Cunningham. (Founders #227)

[54:00] You can make a lot of different mistakes and still recover if you run an efficient operation. Or you can be brilliant and still go out of business if you’re too inefficient. — Sam Walton: Made In America by Sam Walton.

[55:00] The thing that set Ralph apart was his single-mindedness of purpose. Everybody else moved from place to place, from trend to trend. He wasn't trendy. He stayed with it. It's the single most important thing about him. To this day there are people walking around saying Ralph Lauren isn't that special, I could have done it. It's the weirdest thing. They couldn't be more wrong. Ralph is the most special guy in the apparel business.

[55:00] Graham Duncan on the Tim Ferriss Show

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What I learned from rereading Rolls-Royce: The Magic of a Name: The First Forty Years of Britain s Most Prestigious Company by Peter Pugh.

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[2:31] Henry Royce had known poverty and hardship all his life. The only university he had graduated from was the one of hard knocks.

[3:00] Rolls on Royce: I was fortunate enough to make the acquaintance of Mr. Royce and in him I found the man I had been looking for for years.

[5:00] A great product has to be better than it has to be. Relentlessness wins because, in the aggregate, unseen details become visible. All those unseen details combine to produce something that's just stunning, like a thousand barely audible voices all singing in tune. — Hackers and Painters by Paul Graham (Founders #277)

[6:00] You can always understand the son by the story of his father. The story of the father is embedded in the son. — Francis Ford Coppola: A Filmmaker's Life by Michael Schumacher. (Founders #242)

[9:00] This ability to observe, think about and then improve on existing machines (products) was to be a consistent theme throughout Royce’s life.

[10:00] Many times our position was so precarious that it seemed hopeless to continue.

[12:00] Against The Odds: An Autobiography by James Dyson (Founders #287)

[12:00] Some have tried to give the impression that it was almost by chance that Royce became involved in designing a motor car. Royce was not a man to rely on chance. He saw that the motor car had a great future and that it would be an ideal product for his business.

[12:00] This part is excellent: There was nothing revolutionary about Royce’s car. He had taken the best of current automobile design and improved on every aspect of it. I do not think that Royce did anything of a revolutionary nature in his work on motor cars. He did, however, do much important development and a considerable amount of redesigning of existing devices so that his motor cars were far and away better than anyone else’s motor cars. He paid great attention to the smallest detail and the result of his personal consideration to every little thing resulted in the whole assembly being of a very high standard of perfection. It is rather to Royce’s thoroughness and attention to even the smallest detail than to any revolutionary invention that his products have the superlative qualities that we all know so well.

[13:00] Henry Royce ruled the lives of the people around him, claimed their body and soul, even when they were asleep.

[14:00] They didn't understand how important this was to me. —Coco Chanel: The Legend and the Life by Justine Picardie. (Founders #199)

[16:00] He's made-and remade-Apple in his own image. Apple is Steve Jobs with ten thousand lives. — Inside Steve’s Brain by Leander Kahney. (Founders #204)

[21:00] Thomas Edison on how overregulation crippled the British car industry: The motor car ought to have been British. You first invented it in the 1830s. You have roads only second to those of France. You have hundreds of thousands of skilled mechanics in your midst, but you have lost your trade by stupid legislation and prejudice.

[27:00] This is a first: A company so focused on quality that they risked going to prison. Claude Johnson took the bold stand that he would tear up every drawing and go to prison rather than agree to risk inferior skills of other companies. Johnson said that the plan of using other manufacturers was futile and would yield nothing but mountains of scrap.

[28:00] Royce admitted it: I prefer to be absolute boss over my own department (even if it was extremely small) rather than to be associated with a much larger technical department over which I had only joint control.

[31:00] They worked in monastic seclusion in an office situated in the middle of the village about a quarter of a mile from Royce’s house. To ensure a minimum of distraction the office was for a number of years forbidden the luxury of a telephone. This was the team responsible for the design of every car and all their components from 1919 until Royce died in 1933. In matters concerning the actual model which eventually went into production, Royce’s decision was final.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading All I Want To Know Is Where I'm Going To Die So I'll Never Go There: Buffett & Munger – A Study in Simplicity and Uncommon, Common Sense by Peter Bevelin. 

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Follow one of my favorite podcasts Invest Like The Best and listen to episode Mitch Lasky—The Business of Gaming

Follow the podcast Gamecraft to learn more about the history of the video game industry. 

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[2:01] Buffett and Munger have a remarkable ability to eliminate folly, simplify things, boil down issues to their essence, get right to the point, and focus on simple and timeless truths.

[3:00] The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness by Naval Ravikant and Eric Jorgenson.  (Founders #191)

[4:00] Warren Buffet or Charlie Munger are the very wise grandfather figure that I never had.

[5:00] To try to live your life totally free of mistakes is a life of inaction. —Warren Buffett

[5:00] The sign above the players' entrance to the field at Notre Dame reads ´Play Like a Champion Today.' I sometimes joke that the sign at Nebraska reads 'Remember Your Helmet.' Charlie and I are 'Remember Your Helmet' kind of guys.' We like to keep it simple. (You must structure your life and business to be able to survive the inevitable bad decisions you’re going to make.)

[5:00] Wisdom is prevention. —Charlie Munger

[6:00] We make actual decisions very rapidly, but that's because we've spent so much time preparing ourselves by quietly sitting and reading and thinking. —Charlie Munger

[7:00] If you get into the mental habit of relating what you're reading to the basic underlying ideas being demonstrated, you gradually accumulate some wisdom. —Charlie Munger

[7:00] At Berkshire, we don't have any meetings or committees, and I can think of no better way to become more intelligent than sit down and read. I hate meetings, frankly. I have created something that I enjoy: I happen to enjoy reading a lot, and I happen to enjoy thinking about things. —Warren Buffett

[7:00] We both hate to have too many forward commitments in our schedules. We both insist on a lot of time being available to just sit and think. —Charlie Munger

[8:00] I need eight hours of sleep. I think better. I have more energy. My mood is better. And think about it: As a senior executive, what do you really get paid to do? You get paid to make a small number of high-quality decisions. — Invent and Wander: The Collected Writings of Jeff Bezos, With an Introduction by Walter Isaacson. (Founders #155)

[9:00] I think people that multitask pay a huge price. When you multitask so much, you don't have time to think about anything deeply. You're giving the world an advantage you shouldn't do. Practically everybody is drifting into that mistake. I did not succeed in life by intelligence. I succeeded because I have a long attention span. —Charlie Munger

[9:00] Jony Ive on Steve Jobs: Steve was the most remarkably focused person I’ve ever met. (Video)

[11:00] It is just that simple. We've had enough good sense when something was working well, keep doing it. The fundamental algorithm of life: repeat what works. —Charlie Munger

[13:00] ALL THE BUFFETT AND MUNGER EPISODES:

Berkshire Hathaway Letters to Shareholders 1965-2018 by Warren Buffett. (Founders #88) 

The Snowball: Warren Buffett and the Business of Life by Alice Schroeder. (Founders #100)

The Tao of Warren Buffett by Mary Buffett & David Clark. (Founders #101) 

Buffett: The Making of an American Capitalist by Roger Lowenstein. (Founders #182) 

A Few Lessons for Investors and Managers From Warren Buffett by Warren Buffett and Peter Bevelin. (Founders #202) 

The Essays of Warren Buffett by Warren Buffett and Lawrence Cunningham. (Founders #227) 
 

Tao of Charlie Munger by David Clark (Founders #78) 

Charlie Munger: The Complete Investor by Tren Griffin. (Founders #79) 

Poor Charlie's Almanack: The Wit and Wisdom of Charles T. Munger. (Founders #90) 

Damn Right: Behind the Scenes with Berkshire Hathaway Billionaire Charlie Munger by Janet Lowe. (Founders #221) 

[14:00] Buffett: It's an inversion process. Start out with failure, and then engineer its removal.

[15:00] Munger: I figure out what I don't like instead of figuring out what I like in order to get what I like.

[15:00] Repetition is the mother of learning.

[17:00] Munger: You can see the results of not learning from others' mistakes by simply looking about you. How little originality there is in the common disasters of mankind. (Business failures through repetition of obvious mistakes made by predecessors and so on.)

[18:00] Munger: History allows you to keep things in perspective.

[18:00] Everything that needs to be said has already been said. But since no one was listening, everything must be said again.

[19:00] Berkshire was a small business at one time. It just takes time. It is the nature of compound interest. You cannot build it in one day or one week.

[20:00] Pretend that every single person you meet has a sign around his or her neck that says, “Make me feel important.”

[22:00] Buffett: In almost 60 years of investing we found it practically useless to give advice to anyone.

[23:00] Munger: One of my favorite stories is about the little boy in Texas. The teacher asked the class, If there are nine sheep in the pen and one jumps out, how many are left? And everybody got the answer right except this little boy, who said, None of them are left. And the teacher said, You don't understand arithmetic. And he said No, teacher. You don't understand sheep.

[25:00] Quite often Henry simply talked about his philosophy of running a corporation and the various financial strategies that he came up with as he sat in his corner office each day, often working at his Apple computer. He was a brilliant business strategist, just as he was a brilliant chess strategist and he came up with many creative ideas, ideas that were sometimes contrary to the currently accepted methods of managing a large corporation that prevailed in those days.

“He always tries to work out the best moves," Shannon said, "and maybe he doesn't like to talk too much, because when you are playing a game you don't tell anyone else what your strategy is." — Distant Force: A Memoir of the Teledyne Corporation and the Man Who Created It by Dr. George Roberts. (Founders #110)

[28:00] Buffett: The difference between successful people and very successful people is that very successful people say no to almost everything.

[29:00] If you want to know whether you are destined to be a success or a failure in life, you can easily find out. The test is simple and it is infallible: Are you able to save money? If not, drop out. You will lose. You may think not, but you will lose as sure as you live. The seed of success is not in you. — James J. Hill: Empire Builder of the Northwest by Michael P. Malone. (Founders #96)

[31:00] Buffett: Life tends to snap you at your weakest link.

[35:00] Sol Price: Retail Revolutionary & Social Innovator by Robert E. Price (Founders #107)

[38:00] Paul Graham’s essays (Founders #275-277)

[39:00] I'm very suspect of the person who is very good at one business, who starts thinking they should tell the world how to behave on everything. —Warren Buffett

[42:00] The Essays of Warren Buffett by Warren Buffett and Lawrence Cunningham. (Founders #227)

[44:00] This life isn't a greenroom for something else. He went for it. —Bourdain: The Definitive Oral Biography by Laurie Woolever.

[44:00] Buffett: We're here on the earth only one time so you ought to be doing something that you enjoy as you go along and you can be enthusiastic about.

[48:00] Personal History by Katherine Graham. (Founders #152)

[49:00] The problem is not getting rich, it is staying sane. —Charlie Munger

[54:00] Learning is not memorizing information. Learning is changing your behavior. Most people can’t learn from the experiences of other people: Charlie and I don't expect to win you over to our way of thinking—we've observed enough human behavior to know the futility of that, but we do want you to be aware of our personal calculus.

[57:00] We are individual opportunity driven. Our acquisition technique at Berkshire is simplicity itself: We answer the phone.

[1:00:00] A brand is a promise. —Warren Buffett

[1:01:00] Obsess over customers. Buffett said this about Amazon in 2012: Amazon could affect a lot of businesses who don't think they will be affected. For Amazon, it is very hard to find unhappy customers. A business that has millions and millions of happy customers can introduce them to new items, it will be a powerhouse and could affect a lot of businesses.

[1:03:00] Munger: We should make a list of everything that irritates a customer, and then we should eliminate those defects one by one.

[1:04:00] Most companies, when they get rich, get sloppy.

[1:05:00] Munger: One of the models in my head is the 'Northern Pike Model. You have a lake full of trout. But if you throw in a few northern pike, pretty soon there aren't many trout left but a lot of northern pike. Wal-Mart in its early days was the northern pike. It figured out how the customer could be better served and just galloped through the world like Genghis Kahn.

[1:09:00] Practice! Michael Jordan: The Life by Roland Lazenby. (Founders #212)

[1:10:00] Market forecasters will fill your ear, but they will never fill your wallet.

[1:11:00] We don't have any new tricks. We just know the old tricks better.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading American Rascal: How Jay Gould Built Wall Street's Biggest Fortune by Greg Steinmetz.

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[0:01] A series of spectacular financial triumphs had made Gould fabulously rich. At age thirty-six, he was the most notorious businessman in the country.

[1:00] Vanderbilt told a newspaper that Gould was "the smartest man in America." Rockefeller, when asked who he thought had the best head for business, answered "Jay Gould" without pausing to think.

They  recognized Gould as a master of his craft. No one disputed that he was an extraordinary problem solver, an unparalleled negotiator, an expert communicator, a lightning-fast thinker, and a masterful tactician with a staggering memory.

[2:00] Railroads changed America in the nineteenth century much as automobiles changed the country in the twentieth century and the internet has changed the twenty first century.

[5:00] American Rascal shows the complex and quirky character of the nineteenth century's greatest robber baron. He was at once praised for his brilliance by Rockefeller and Vanderbilt and condemned for forever destroying American business values by Mark Twain. He lived a colorful life, trading jokes with Thomas Edison, figuring in Thomas Nast's best sketches, paying Boss Tweed's bail, and commuting to work in a 200-foot yacht.

[6:00] I consider this part two in a two part series on Jay Gould. Make sure you listen to part 1: Dark Genius of Wall Street: The Misunderstood Life of Jay Gould, King of the Robber Barons by Edward J. Renehan Jr. (Founders #258)

[9:00] He read whatever he could get his hands on. Jay was often nowhere to be found. He was off hiding somewhere with his books.

[10:00] He would wake up at three to study by firelight.

[10:00] My Life and Work by Henry Ford. (Founders #266)

[12:35] “As you know. I’m not in the habit of backing out of what I undertake, and I shall write night and day until it is completed.”

[13:00] Relentless and self-confident: Gould toyed with the idea of college. He visited Rutgers, Yale, Harvard, and Brown. He concluded college was an expensive indulgence. Why bother with college when he could teach himself from books?

[13:00] I am determined to use all my best energies to accomplish this life's highest possibilities.

[22:00] The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness by Naval Ravikant and Eric Jorgenson. (Founders #191)

[22:00] All I Want To Know Is Where I'm Going To Die So I'll Never Go There: Buffett & Munger – A Study in Simplicity and Uncommon, Common Sense by Peter Bevelin

[26:00] Conspiracy: Peter Thiel, Hulk Hogan, Gawker, and the Anatomy of Intrigue by Ryan Holiday. (Founders #31)

[30:00] The good ones know more. — Ogilvy on Advertising by David Ogilvy (Founders #82)

[37:00] The story of how Gould seized Erie shows his brilliance as a financial strategist, his deep understanding of law, a surprising grasp of human nature, and a mastery of political reality.

[41:00] Tycoon's War: How Cornelius Vanderbilt Invaded a Country to Overthrow America's Most Famous Military Adventurer by Stephen Dando-Collins (Founders #55)

[42:00] There isn't any secret. I avoid bad luck by being patient. Whenever I'm obliged to get into a fight, I always wait and let the other fellow get tired first.

[44:00] James J. Hill: Empire Builder of the Northwest by Michael P. Malone. (Founders #96)

[52:00] Edison and Gould shared some traits. Both were born into poverty. Both thought about little beside their obsessions —inventions for Edison, money for Gould. Both worked all the time. Both had spent their childhoods reading anything that came their way.

[53:00] Edison: A Biography by Matthew Josephson. (Founders #267)

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from rereading Meet You in Hell: Andrew Carnegie, Henry Clay Frick, and the Bitter Partnership That Changed America by Les Standiford.

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Follow one of my favorite podcasts Invest Like The Best  and check out these great episodes: 

#137 Bill Gurley: All Things Business and Investing
#88 Sam Hinkie: Data, Decisions, and Basketball
#204 Sam Hinkie: Find Your People

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[0:01] Frick had been the man Carnegie trusted above all others to manage the affairs of Carnegie Steel.

[2:00] Carnegie had delegated the job of holding the line on wages and other demands to Frick—a Patton to Carnegie's FDR.

[3:00] The Autobiography of Andrew Carnegie by Andrew Carnegie.  (Founders #283)

[5:00] Here's a starter pack of essentials  for Day 1 defense: customer obsession, a skeptical view of proxies, the eager adoption of external trends, and high-velocity decision making. —Jeff Bezos’s Shareholder Letters (Founders #282)

[7:00] In less than half a century the United States had been transformed―from a largely agrarian and underdeveloped federation of competing interests, to a relatively cohesive economic juggernaut. The age of the Founding Fathers was over. The Age of the Titans had begun.

[12:00] By 1863 Carnegie was earning more than $45,000 a year from this and all his other investments, compared with a mere $2,400 from his railroad salary. Yet he understood that it was the contacts he made and the information he derived from his association with the railroad that made everything else possible.

[13:00] More control. Less costs. More profit.

[15:00] Technology is just a better way to do something: As a result of the process for transforming iron to steel that bore his name (Bessemer), a quantity of steel that might formerly have taken as long as two weeks to produce could now be made in fifteen minutes.

[17:00] Carnegie starts his company during a financial panic. The best time to expand is when no one else dares to take the risk.

[20:00] Already the best but still wants to do better: Even his key employees were not spared Carnegie's heavy-handed management style. To almost every positive report Carnegie's response was "Good, but let us do better."

[21:00] Cut the prices, scoop the market, watch the costs, and the profits will take care of themselves.

[21:00] Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire by James Wallace and Jim Erickson (Founders #140)

[22:00] He could make steel more efficiently than any of them.

[24:00] Henry Clay Frick: The Life of the Perfect Capitalist by Quentin Skrabec Jr. (Founders #75)

[24:00] Like Rockefeller, Henry Clay Frick used a lot of borrowed money to get his start in the coke business. There was a line in one of Rockefeller’s biographies where it said “he was the greatest borrower I’ve ever seen.”

[26:00] Frick knew his business down to the ground.

[26:00] LIke Carnegie, Frick expands his business during an economic panic. Frick, who would later recall this as one of the most grueling times in his life, proved as undaunted in the face of adversity as Carnegie had been.

[34:00] Carneige was accustomed to obedience from his subordinates, but if he expected unquestioned subservience from Henry Frick, he had gravely miscalculated.

[36:00] Frick was no puppet, but rather a man willing to take considerable risks in defense of his principles.

[37:00] Frick had ambition, a singleness of purpose, and a lack of self—doubt that even Carneige envied.

[38:00] Carnegie would repeat the mantra time and again: profits and prices were cyclical, subject to any number of transient forces of the marketplace. Costs, however, could be strictly controlled, and in Carnegie’s view, any savings achieved in the costs of goods were permanent.

[39:00] On this issue the two men were of one mind. Frick had made his way in coke by the same reckoning that Carnegie had in rail and steel: if you knew your costs down to the penny, you were always on firm ground.

[39:00] Frick had always understood how essential new technologies were in driving costs down. Cost control became nearly an obsession.

[47:00] [Frick was shot] Only after he was finished with his day’s work did Frick permit himself to be carried from the office to an ambulance.

[49:00] You must not allow anything to discourage you in the least. Even if things do not go well for some time to come, or even if they should get much worse. Just keep at it, doing the best you can. Do not allow the fact that you are not getting along as well as you would like to lead you to put yourself in a compromising position.

[1:03:00] Empires of Light: Edison, Tesla, Westinghouse, and the Race to Electrify the World by Jill Jonnes. (Founders #83)

[1:04:00] J.P. Morgan understood the folly of a long-term battle with the Carnegie Company, a firm that controlled its own sources of raw materials, transport, and manufacture, and that was far more deeply capitalized than his or any other of the upstarts. They might stay in the game for a while, and they might put a dent in Carnegie's armor, but in the end, Carnegie would run them into the ground, every one.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from rereading The Autobiography of Andrew Carnegie by Andrew Carnegie. 

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(1:01) 3 part series on Andrew Carnegie and Henry Clay Frick:

Meet You In Hell: Andrew Carnegie Henry Clay Frick, and the Bitter Partnership That Transformed America by Les Standiford. (Founders #73) 

The Autobiography of Andrew Carnegie by Andrew Carnegie (Founders #74) 

Henry Clay Frick: The Life of the Perfect Capitalist by Quentin Skrabec Jr. (Founders #75) 

(2:00) What these guys all had in common is they were hell bent on knowing their business down to the last cent. They were obsessed with having the lowest cost structure in their industry.

(2:00) Highlights from Meet You in Hell: Andrew Carnegie, Henry Clay Frick, and the Bitter Partnership That Changed America:

—Cut the prices, scoop the market, watch the costs, and the profits will take care of themselves.

—Frick knows his business down to the ground.

—Frick’s rise from humble beginnings was obviously intriguing to him. It signaled to Carnegie that Frick was another of the fellow “fittest,” and those were the individuals with whom Carnegie sought to align himself.

—Carnegie would repeat the mantra time and again: profits and prices were cyclical, subject to any number of transient forces of the marketplace. Costs, however, could be strictly controlled, and in Carnegie’s view, any savings achieved in the costs of goods were permanent.

—On this issue the two men were of one mind. Frick had made his way in coke by the same reckoning that Carnegie had in rail and steel: if you knew your costs down to the penny, you were always on firm ground.

(6:00) Benjamin Franklin: An American Life by Walter Isaacson. (Founders #115)

(7:00) A sunny disposition is worth more than a fortune. Young people should know that it can be cultivated; that the mind like the body can be moved from the shade into sunshine.

(7:00) The Snowball: Warren Buffett and the Business of Life by Alice Schroeder. (Founders #100)

(8:00) The most important judge of your life story is yourself.

(9:00) You can always understand the son by the story of his father. The story of the father is embedded in the son. —Francis Ford Coppola: A Filmmaker's Life by Michael Schumacher. (Founders #242)

(10:00) Invest in technology, the savings compound, it gives you an advantage over slower moving competitors, and can be the difference between a profit and a loss.

(17:00) He is working from sunrise to sunset for $1.20 a week and he is ecstatic about being able to help his family avoid poverty. 

(18:00) Andrew Carnegie had manic levels of optimism.

(20:00) Do not delay. Do it now. It is a great mistake not to seize the opportunity. Having got myself in, I proposed to stay there if I could.

(21:00) I felt that my foot was upon the ladder and that I was about to climb.

(21:00) Lesson from Andrew Carnegie’s early life: Focus on whatever job is in front of you at this very moment and do the best you can. You can never know what opportunities that will unlock in the future.

(24:00) On the miracle of reading and having free access to a 400 volume personal library: In this way the windows were opened in the walls of my dungeon through which the light of knowledge streamed in. Every day's toil and even the long hours of night service were lightened by the book which I carried about with me and read in the intervals that could be snatched from duty. And the future was made bright by the thought that when Saturday came a new volume could be obtained.

(26:00) To Colonel James Anderson, Founder of Free Libraries in Western Pennsylvania:

He opened his Library to working boys and upon Saturday afternoons acted as librarian, thus dedicating not only his books but himself to the noble work. This monument is erected in grateful remembrance by Andrew Carnegie, one of the "working boys" to whom were thus opened the precious treasures of knowledge and imagination through which youth may ascend.

(28:00) Running Down A Dream: How to Succeed and Thrive in a Career You Love by Bill Gurley

(36:00) Dark Genius of Wall Street: The Misunderstood Life of Jay Gould, King of the Robber Barons by Edward J. Renehan Jr. (Founders #258)

(43:00) This policy is a true secret of success: Uphill work it will be.

(46:00) Put all your eggs in one basket and watch that basket.

(46:00) The most expensive way to pay for anything is with time.

(48:00) The men who have succeeded are men who have chosen one line and stuck to it. It is surprising how few men appreciate the enormous dividends derivable from investment in their own business.

(48:00) My advice to young men would be not only to concentrate their whole time and attention on the one business in life in which they engage, but to put every dollar of their capital into it.

(51:00) The House of Morgan: An American Banking Dynasty and the Rise of Modern Finance by Ron Chernow. (Founders #139)

(52:00) Last Train to Paradise: Henry Flagler and the Spectacular Rise and Fall of the Railroad that Crossed an Ocean by Les Standiford. (Founders #247)

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from rereading Jeff Bezos' Shareholder Letters (for the 3rd time!) 

Read Jeff's letters in book form: Invent and Wander: The Collected Writings of Jeff Bezos or for free online: Amazon Investor Relations

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[2:30] Amazon hopes to create an enduring franchise

[3:00] Because of our emphasis on the long term, we may make decisions and weigh trade-offs differently than some companies.

[4:00] We will continue to focus relentlessly on our customers.

[4:00] We will work hard to spend wisely and maintain our lean culture. We understand the importance of continually reinforcing a cost-conscious culture.

[4:00] We set out to offer customers something they simply could not get any other way.

[5:00] Word of mouth remains the most powerful customer acquisition tool that we have.

[5:00] We are working to build something important, something that matters to our customers, something that we can all tell our grandchildren about. Such things aren't meant to be easy.

[6:00] "To read Bezos’ shareholder letters is to get a crash course in running a high-growth internet business from someone who mastered it before any of the playbooks were written." — From CB Insights

[7:00] Common themes repeated in Jeff’s letters:

More innovation is ahead of us.

It is still early. The opportunity —if we execute well — is enormous.

We will move quickly.

We will endure. Amazon will be a durable, long-lasting company.

We will focus on cash flow.

Once in a lifetime opportunities will be risky. Jeff gave himself a 30% chance of success— at best.

Customer obsession is our North Star. It is what we will bet the company on.

We will be BOLD.

We will have a frugal, lean culture that Sam Walton would approve of.

This will be hard. All valuable things are.

We will have to learn along the way.

[8:00] Sam Walton: Made In America by Sam Walton. (Founders #234)

[11:00] I would love to ask Jeff the question, “If you could only have one word to describe you on your tombstone, what would it be?” My guess is he would pick “relentless.”

[16:00] We believe we have reached a "tipping  point," where this platform allows us to launch new ecommerce businesses faster, with a higher quality of customer experience, a lower incremental cost, a higher chance of success, and a faster path to scale and profitability than any other company. (A company that builds companies)

[17:00] Made in Japan: Akio Morita and Sony by Akio Morita. (Founders #102)

[19:00] We will continue to invest heavily in introductions to new customers. Though it's sometimes hard to imagine with all that has happened in the last five years, this remains Day 1 for ecommerce, and these are the early days of category formation where many customers are forming relationships for the first time. We must work hard to grow the number of customers who shop with us. (He was right about this — what is the lifetime value of an Amazon customer over 17 years?)

[21:00] To us, operational excellence implies two things: delivering continuous improvement in customer experience and driving productivity, margin, efficiency, and asset velocity across all our businesses.

Often, the best way to drive one of these is to deliver the other.

For instance, more efficient distribution yields faster delivery times, which in turn lowers contacts per order and customer service costs. These, in turn, improve customer experience and build brand, which in turn decreases customer acquisition and retention costs.

[22:00] Creative Selection: Inside Apple's Design Process During the Golden Age of Steve Jobs by Ken Kocienda (Founders #281)

[24:00] Jeff Bezos on The Electricity Metaphor for the Web's Future

[27:00] Repeat this loop: Focus on cost improvement makes it possible for us to afford to lower prices, which drives growth. Growth spreads fixed costs across more sales, reducing cost per unit, which makes possible more price reductions. Customers like this, and it's good for shareholders. Please expect us to repeat this loop.

[29:00] The Everything Store: Jeff Bezos and the Age of Amazon by Brad Stone. (Founders #179)

[35:00] My Life and Work by Henry Ford. (Founders #266)

[40:00] Jeff Bezos is unapologetically extreme. He is already the best and still wants to be better.

[41:00] This part is incredible— on the need for good judgement and why data may lead you to make the wrong decision:

Our quantitative understanding of elasticity is short-term. We can estimate what a price reduction will do this week and this quarter. But we cannot numerically estimate the effect that consistently lowering prices will have on our business over five years or ten years or more. Our judgment is that relentlessly returning efficiency improvements and scale economies to customers in the form of lower prices creates a virtuous cycle that leads over the long term to a much larger dollar amount of free cash flow, and thereby to a much more valuable Amazon.

[43:00] Don’t build an undifferentiated commodity business. — Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future by Peter Thiel. (Founders #278)

[44:00] Differentiation is survival.

[49:00] Missionaries build better products.

[50:00] Long-term thinking levers our existing abilities and lets us do new things we couldn't otherwise contemplate. It supports the failure and iteration required for invention, and it frees us to pioneer in unexplored spaces. Seek instant gratification-or the elusive promise of it-and chances are you'll find a crowd there ahead of you. Long-term orientation interacts well with customer obsession. If we can identify a customer need and if we can further develop conviction that that need is meaningful and durable, our approach permits us to work patiently for multiple years to deliver a solution.

[52:00] Problems are just opportunities in work clothes.

[53:00] Similar idea said two different ways:

Jeff Bezos: The financial results for 2009 reflect the cumulative efforts of 15 years of customer experience improvements.

Peter Thiel: If you focus on near-term growth above all else, you miss the most important question you should be asking: will this business still be around a decade from now?

[55:00] The most radical and transformative of inventions are often those that empower others to unleash their creativity—to pursue their dreams.

[57:00] A dreamy business offering has at least four characteristics.

—Customers love it

—It can grow to very large size

—It has strong returns on capital

—It's durable in time-with the potential to endure for decades.

When you find one of these get married.

[1:03:00] Be a yardstick of quality. Some people aren't used to an environment where excellence is expected. — Inside Steve’s Brain by Leander Kahney. (Founders #204)

[1:03:00] I believe high standards are teachable. High standards are contagious.  —Jeff Bezos

[1:04:00] Leaders have relentlessly high standards. Many people may think these standards are unreasonably high.

[1:07:00] The key point here is that you can improve results through the simple act of teaching scope-that a great memo probably should take a week or more.

[1:10:00] Differentiation is Survival and the Universe Wants You to be Typical

In what ways does the world pull at you in an attempt to make you normal?

How much work does it take to maintain your distinctiveness?

To keep alive the thing or things that make you special?

We all know that distinctiveness – originality – is valuable.

What I’m asking you to do is to embrace how much energy it takes to maintain that distinctiveness.

The world wants you to be typical – in a thousand ways, it pulls at you.

Don’t let it happen.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from rereading Creative Selection: Inside Apple's Design Process During the Golden Age of Steve Jobs by Ken Kocienda.

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Follow one of my favorite podcasts Invest Like The Best  

[2:01] We're going to relentlessly chase perfection, knowing full well we will not catch it, because perfection is not attainable. But we are going to relentlessly chase it because, in the process, we will catch excellence.

[2:01] I'm not remotely interested in being just good.

[3:00] Gentlemen, this is the most important play we have. It's the play we must make go. It's the play that we will make go. It's the play that we will run again, and again, and again.

[4:00] In any complex effort, communicating a well-articulated vision for what you're trying to do is the starting point for figuring out how to do it.

[4:00] A significant part of attaining excellence in any field is closing the gap between the accidental and intentional, to achieve not just a something, or even an everything, but a specific and well-chosen thing.

[6:00] Every day at Apple was like going to school, a design-focused, high-tech, product-creation university.

[8:00] A story about Steve’s clarity of thought.

[9:00] Although Steve's opinions and moods could be hard to anticipate, he was utterly predictable when it came to his passion for products. He wanted Apple products to be great.

[11:00] The decisiveness of Steve Jobs.

[16:00] Steve wasn't merely interested in paying lip service to this goal. He demanded action. Steve found the time to attend a demo review so he could see it. His involvement kept the progress and momentum going.

[17:00] Put yourself in your customer’s shoes. Hack away the unessential.

[17:00] People do not care about your product as much as you do. You have to make it simple and easy to use right from the start.

[18:00] Steve Jobs believed that stripping away nonessential features made products easier for people to learn from the start and easier to use over time.

[19:00] Insanely Simple: The Obsession That Drives Apple's Success by Ken Segall

[22:00] Don’t rest on your laurels. Steve said: “I think if you do something and it turns out pretty good, then you should go do something else wonderful, not dwell on it for too long. Just figure out what's next.”

[24:00] The sooner we started making creative decisions the more time there was to refine and improve those decisions. (The sooner you start the more time you will have to get it right.)

[26:00] The simple transaction of buying a song, and of handing over a credit card number to Apple in order to so, became part of what Steve had begun calling “the Apple experience." As a great marketer, Steve understood that every interaction a customer had with Apple could increase or decrease his or her respect for the company. As he put it, a corporation "could accumulate or withdraw credits" from its reputation, which is why he worked so hard to ensure that every single interaction a customer might have with Apple-from using a Mac to calling customer support to buying a single from the iTunes store and then getting billed for it-was excellent. —— Becoming Steve Jobs: The Evolution of a Reckless Upstart into a Visionary Leader by Brent Schlender and Rick Tetzeli (Founders #265)

[29:00] Studying great work from the past provides the means of comparison and contrast and lets us tap into the collective creativity of previous generations. The past is a source of the timeless and enduring.

[29:00] Design is how it works. —Steve Jobs

[31:00] Hackers and Painters by Paul Graham (Founders #275, 276, 277)

[34:00] Jony Ive: The Genius Behind Apple's Greatest Products by Leander Kahney. (Founders #178)

[37:00] Our clarity of purpose kept us on track.

[38:00] Concentrating keenly on what to do helped us block out what not to do.

[40:00] Steve Jobs on the importance of working at the intersection of liberal arts and technology:

“The reason that Apple is able to create products like the iPad is because we've always tried to be at the intersection of technology and liberal arts, to be able to get the best of both, to make extremely advanced products from a technology point of view, but also have them be intuitive, easy to use, fun to use, so that they really fit the users. The users don't have to come to them, they come to the user.”

[42:00] Steve Jobs provided his single-minded focus on making great products, and his vision motivated me.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading Copy This!: How I turned Dyslexia, ADHD, and 100 square feet into a company called Kinkos by Paul Orfalea.

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Follow Invest Like The Best in your favorite podcast player here

Two episodes I recommend: 

Paul Orfalea - It's About the Money episode 299

David Senra - Passion & Pain episode 292 

[5:23] I've never met a more circular, out-of-the-box thinker. It's often exhausting trying to keep up with him.

[6:21] I graduated from high school eighth from the bottom of my class of 1,200. Frankly, I still have no idea how those seven kids managed to do worse than I did.

[9:29] I also have no mechanical ability to speak of. There isn't a machine at Kinko's I can operate. I could barely run the first copier we leased back in 1970. It didn't matter. All I knew was that was I could sell what came out of it.

[11:24] Building an entirely new sort of business from a single Xerox copy machine gave me the life the world seemed determined to deny me when I was younger.

[14:04] The A students work for the B students, the C students run the companies, and the D students dedicate the buildings.

[24:02] I learned to turn a lot of busywork over to other people. That's an important skill. If you don't develop it, you'll be so busy, busy, busy that you can't get a free hour, not to mention a free week or month, to sit back and think creatively about where you want to be heading and how you are going to get there.

[25:07] There's no better way to stay "on" your business than to think creatively and constantly about your marketing: how you are marketing, who you are marketing to, and, always, how you could be doing a better job at it. You'd be amazed what kind of business you can generate by a seemingly simple thing like handing out flyers.

[27:18] The phone rang. It was one of our store managers calling to ask me how to handle a bounced check. I held the receiver away from my face and looked at it, flabbergasted. If every store manager needed my help to deal with a bounced check, then we really had problems.

[40:55] I never walked in the back door used by coworkers. I walked in the front door so I could see things from the customer's perspective.

[49:06] You had to remember he'd been picking up the best ideas from all around the country.

[55:14] I believe in getting out of as much work as I possibly can.

[55:45] By now, you’d have to be as bad a reader as I am not to figure out that I have a dark side. You rarely hear people talk about their dark sides, especially business leaders, which is a shame because successful businesses aren't usually started by laid-back personalities. I don't hide the fact that I have a problem with anger.

[1:04:37] I'll give you an example of a corporate view of money. We used to sell passport photos at Kinko's and we advertised the service in the local Yellow Pages. It would cost us 75 cents to make a passport photo. I calculated that price jumped by $1 to $1.75 when you added in the cost of the Yellow Pages ads. We'd sell those photos for $13 a piece. You think this is a nice business? Shortly after we sold a controlling stake in Kinko's, the new budget people came in and, to make their numbers, they got rid of the Yellow Pages ads. They saw it as an advertising expense and didn't take into account how it affected the rest of our business. I used to go to the office and think, "Are they deliberately trying to be idiots?" These straight-A types drove me nuts. Then, like a self-fulfilling prophecy, we abandoned our passport business. That is corporate dyslexia. There is a lot of corporate dyslexia going on out there.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested, so my poor wallet suffers.” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading Starting At Zero: His Own Story by Jimi Hendrix. 

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[0:01] He was also a compulsive writer, using hotel stationery, scraps of paper, cigarette cartons, napkins—anything that came to hand.

[0:01] Decoded by Jay Z. (Founders #238)

[1:00] He always claimed that for him life and music were inseparable.

[5:00] I liked to be different.

[5:00] The Autobiography of Bob Dylan Chronicles: Volume One by Bob Dylan. (Founders #259)

[6:00] Bob Dylan: 

Billy asked me who I saw myself like in today's music scene.

I told him, nobody. I really didn't see myself like anybody.

What really set me apart in these days was my repertoire.

It was more formidable than the rest of the players. 

There were a lot of better musicians around but there wasn't anybody close in nature to what I was doing.

[7:00] Anthony Bourdain on Jimi Hendrix: I often compare the experience of going to Japan for the first time, going to Tokyo for the first time, to what Eric Clapton and Pete Townsend must have gone through, the reigning guitar gods of England, what they must have gone through the week that Jimi Hendrix came to town. 

You hear about it, you go see it.A whole window opens up into a whole new thing.And you think what does this mean? What do I have left to say? What do I do now?

[12:00] The first guitarist I was aware of was Muddy Waters. I heard one of his records when I was a little boy, and it scared me to death.  Wow! What was all that about?

[15:00] I loved my music, man. You see, I wasn't ever interested in any other things, just the music. I was trying to play like Chuck Berry and Muddy Waters. Trying to learn everything and anything.

[16:00] My first gig was at an armory, a National Guard place, and we earned thirty-five cents apiece and three hamburgers.

[16:00] It was so hard for me at first. I knew about three songs, and when it was time for us to play onstage I was all shaky, so I had to play behind the curtains. I just couldn't get up in front.

And then you get so very discouraged. You hear different bands playing around you, and the guitar player always seems like he's so much better than you are.

Most people give up at this point, but it's best not to. Just keep on; just keep on. Sometimes you are going to be so frustrated you'll hate the guitar, but all of this is just a part of learning. If you stick with it you're going to be rewarded. If you're very stubborn you can make it.

[18:00] I had very strange feelings that I was here for something and I was going to get a chance to be heard. I got the guitar together because that was all I had. Oh Daddy, one of these days I'm gonna be big and famous. I'm gonna make it, man!

[20:00] It was pretty tough at first. I lived in very miserable circumstances. I slept where I could and when I needed to eat, I had to steal it.

[24:00] I lived in very miserable circumstances. Sleeping among the garbage cans between them tall tenements was hell.

Rats runnin' all across your chest, cockroaches stealin' your last candy bar from your very pockets.

I even tried to eat orange peel and tomato paste.

People would say, "If you don't get a job you'll just starve to death."

But I didn't want to take a job outside music.

[27:00] I don't wanna play backup on somebody else's team. I have my own ideas that I have to bring to life, and I'm willing to sacrifice my comfort to do so.

[31:00] Obsess over customers.

[33:00] I don't give a damn so long as I have enough to eat and to play what I want to play. That's enough for me. I consider ourselves to be some of the luckiest cats alive, because we're playing just what we want to play and people seem to like that.

[37:00] A lesson from Charlie Munger: Look at the behavior of people you dislike, or you don't respect, and do the opposite.

[39:00] Once you've made a name for yourself you are all the more determined to keep it up.

[44:00] James Dyson’s 2nd autobiography: Invention: A Life by James Dyson. (Founders #205)

[49:00] We call our music Electric Church Music because it's like a religion to us.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading What I Learned Before I Sold to Warren Buffett: An Entrepreneur's Guide to Developing a Highly Successful Company by Barnett Helzberg Jr.

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[5:00]  Then, right there on the sidewalk I told one of the most astute businessmen in America why he ought to consider buying our family's 79-year-old jewelry business.

"I believe that our company matches your criteria for investment, I said. To which he replied, simply, "Send me the information. It will be confidential.”

My conversation with Buffett lasted no more than half a minute.

[8:00] My dream buyer for the family business all along was Warren Buffet.

[11:00] "This can be the fastest deal in history," Buffett said.

"But what about due diligence?" I asked, surprised at how fast the negotiations were moving.

Most suitors demand to see every scrap of paper you've ever generated and to interview every top manager.

That wasn't Buffett's way. "I can smell these things, Buffett said. "This one smells good.”

[12:00] First A Dream by Jim Clayton. (Founders #91)

[13:00] Buffett on his management technique: “Managers run their own shows.

They don't have to report to central management. When we get somebody who is a .400 hitter we don't start telling them how to swing.”

[14:00] I was always taught that many, many people were out there developing ideas I could use. I have found that to be true throughout my life. These thoughts and ideas have all been borrowed or stolen from many wise people.

Think of the world as your garden of marvelous people and ideas with unlimited picking rights for you.

[17:00] Cable Cowboy: John Malone and the Rise of the Modern Cable Business by Mark Robichaux. (Founders #268)

[23:00] Despite missteps, entrepreneurs are a special breed who do not give up on the larger goals.

[24:00] It's not hard to express the quality we're looking for in metaphors. The best is probably a running back. A good running back is not merely determined, but flexible as well. They want to get downfield, but they adapt their plans on the fly. — Relentlessly Resourceful by Paul Graham

[25:00] Entrepreneurs are driven to succeed. They possess an almost naive belief that nothing can stand in their way, they are mentally deaf to those who belittle their chances, they love to compete, and they have the skills of broken field runners who take the bumps and bruises along the way, change course when necessary, and stay focused on the goal.

If this is not you, don't try to fool yourself. It's not worth it.

Thinking you can start your own business or wanting to be your own boss, just because you hate your job, when you really have no desire or stamina to go it on your own, is courting disaster. Where there is no real will, there is no way.

Some people are more  enamored by the concept than the reality. They would rather contemplate the beauty of the mountain from the base.

The entrepreneur wants to climb the mountain first, briefly appreciate the gorgeous vistas from the summit, and then find the next mountain. If you possess this obsession of seeing your own creative notions succeed and are willing to pay the price, then you have no choice but to pursue the life of an entrepreneur.

[29:00] He taught us to concern ourselves only with those things over which we have control.

I thought he was unique in this until I realized this is one of the key common traits of highly successful people.

Those folks are never victims; they take what comes and handle the situation. The rest is a waste of time.

[30:00] Upgrade the herd annually: "You make more money closing bad stores than opening new ones.”

His philosophy made sense. We decided we would rather spend time and effort on a $4.5 million store that could ultimately achieve annual sales of $6 million than on a lower-volume store with less potential.

[32:00] Focus is your lever to success.

Do not underestimate the incredible amount of mental discipline it takes to focus yourself and your teammates. Wonderful alternatives and seductive opportunities abound and temptations to go in multiple directions are unlimited.

Commit yourself to be the best, define what that means, and focus on the head of that pin like no one in your industry.

[32:00] Estee Lauder was a master at doing things don’t scale. — Estée Lauder: A Success Storyby Estée Lauder. (Founders #217)

[33:00] To be successful, have your heart in your business, and your business in your heart. —Thomas Watson The Maverick and His Machine: Thomas Watson Sr. and The Making of IBM by Kevin Maney (Founders #87)

[38:00] Only a fool tests the depth of the water with both feet. —African Proverb

[40:00] Some of our partners created an inhospitable climate for customers. Some posted negative signs.

At one store a manager hung a sign in red warning customers that they would be charged a steep fee if they bounced a  check. It said, "The bank doesn't make copies and we don't cash checks." That really got me boiling.

I jumped up on the counter and ripped it down as customers and coworkers looked on, amazed. That may sound extreme, but I needed to make the point in a memorable way. I didn't want signs like that staring our customers in the face.

I told our coworkers that the occasional hit we took for a bounced check cost far less than what we lost-and couldn't quantify-by creating a subtly hostile atmosphere. —

Copy This!: How I turned Dyslexia, ADHD, and 100 square feet into a company called Kinkos by Paul Orfalea.

[42:00] Nearly any action or communication means far more when done urgently.

Trust only movement.

[42:00] One person with a belief is equal to a force of ninety-nine who have only interests. —John Stuart Mill

[43:00] None of this works if you can’t trust your own judgement.

[46:00] This reservoir of knowledge and human experience creates tremendous opportunities and advantages for you as an entrepreneur. You are heir to the discoveries of many entrepreneurs who skinned their shins trying something new. It is likely other  entrepreneurs before you have experienced the same challenges and problems, and found ways to surmount them.

[47:00] You have the experiences of thousands of experts and mentors at your fingertips.

[47:00] The incredible, wonderful, and unavoidable truth is that seeking the help of others can put you light years ahead of other people who beat their heads against the wall trying to reinvent the wheel

[48:00] I’ve never found anybody that didn’t want to help me if I asked them for help. I called up Bill Hewlett when I was 12 years old. He answered the phone himself. I told him I wanted to build a frequency counter. I asked if he had any spare parts I could have. He laughed. He gave me the parts. And he gave me a summer job at HP working on the assembly line putting together frequency counters. I have never found anyone who said no, or hung up the phone. I just ask. Most people never pick up the phone and call. And that is what separates the people who do things, versus the people who just dream about them. You have to act. —Steve Jobs

[53:00] "Max kept repeating, 'As hire As. Bs hire Cs. So the first B you hire takes the whole company down." — The Founders: The Story of Paypal and the Entrepreneurs Who Shaped Silicon Valley by Jimmy Soni.

[54:00] “The greatest thing you can do for your competition—hiring poorly.” —Bill Gates

[59:00] I wish that I had known sooner that if you miss a child's play or performance or sporting event, you will have forgotten a year later the work emergency that caused you to miss it. But the child won't have forgotten that you weren't there.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from rereading Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future by Peter Thiel.

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[4:01] Jobs's return to Apple 12 years later shows how the most important task in business-the creation of new valuecannot be reduced to a formula and applied by professionals.

[5:00] A really important sentence to understand one of the main points in Peter’s book: Apple's value crucially depended on the singular vision of a particular person.

[5:00] A unique founder can make authoritative decisions, inspire strong personal loyalty, and plan ahead for decades.

[6:00] Conspiracy: Peter Thiel, Hulk Hogan, Gawker, and the Anatomy of Intrigue and Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future (Founders #31)

[7:00] Properly understood, any new and better way of doing things is technology.

[8:00] By creating new technologies we rewrite the plan of the world.

[9:00] The paradox of teaching entrepreneurship is that such a formula necessarily cannot exist; because every innovation is new and unique, no authority can prescribe in concrete terms how to be innovative.

The single most powerful pattern I have noticed is that successful people find value in unexpected places, and they do this by thinking about business from first principles instead of formulas.

[10:00] The minute that you understand that you can poke life and actually something will pop out the other side, that you can change it, you can mold it. That's maybe the most important thing. It's to shake off this erroneous notion that life is there and you're just gonna live in it, versus embrace it, change it, improve it, make your mark upon it. —Steve Jobs

[11:00] Brilliant thinking is rare, but courage is in even shorter supply than genius.

[13:00] A startup is the largest group of people you can convince of a plan to build a different future. A new company's most important strength is new thinking.

[14:00] What follows is not a manual or a record of knowledge but an exercise in thinking. Because that is what a startup has to do: question received ideas and rethink business from scratch.

[14:00] The Founders: The Story of Paypal and the Entrepreneurs Who Shaped Silicon Valley by Jimmy Soni. (Founders #233)

[17:00] Their casual way of conducting affairs did not appeal to me. — Random Reminiscences of Men and Events by John D. Rockefeller (Founders #148)

[18:00] My number one repeated learning in life: There Are No Adults. Everyone's making it up as they go along. Figure it out yourself, and do it. —Naval Ravikant

[19:00] Bill Gurley’s answer to the question For people who were there, does this feel like dot-com bust level unwiding yet? Yes.  Link to tweet

[21:00] Peter’s 4 principles for founders:

1. It is better to risk boldness than triviality.

2. A bad plan is better than no plan.

3. Competitive markets destroy profits.

4. Sales matters just as much as product.

[22:00] The most contrarian thing of all is not to oppose the crowd but to think for yourself.

[22:00] By “monopoly,” we mean the kind of company that’s so good at what it does that no other firm can offer a close substitute.

[24:00] Every business is successful exactly to the extent that it does something others cannot.

[25:00] Durability has always been a first rate virtue in Charlie’s eyes. — Poor Charlie's Almanack: The Wit and Wisdom of Charles T. Munger. (Founders #90)

[27:00] If you focus on near-term growth above all else, you miss the most important question you should be asking: will this business still be around a decade from now?

[27:00] There is no shortcut to monopoly

[28:00] A substantive advantage makes your product difficult or impossible to replicate.

[30:00] The perfect target market for a startup is a small group of particular people concentrated together and served by few or no competitors.

[32:00] Shallow men believe in luck. Strong men believe in cause and effect.

[32:00] Victory awaits him who has everything in order.

[33:00] My heroes are people who took epic journeys into the unknown often at substantial personal risk. I am simply following the path that they carved into history. —Explore/Create My Life in Pursuit of New Frontiers, Hidden Worlds, and the Creative Spark by Richard Garriott.

[35:00] Instead of pursuing many-sided mediocrity and calling it "wellroundedness," a definite person determines the one best thing to do and then does it. She strives to be great at something substantive— to be a monopoly of one.

[36:00] Long-term planning is often undervalued by our indefinite short-term world.

[39:00] Monopoly businesses capture more value than millions of undifferentiated competitors.

[40:00] Most startups fail and most venture funds fail with them.

[43:00]  You cannot trust a world that denies the power law to accurately frame your decisions for you, so what's most important is rarely obvious. It might even be a secret.

[44:00] I also believed then, as I do now after more than fifty years as a money manager, that the surest way to get rich is to play only those games or make those investments where I have an edge. — A Man for All Markets: From Las Vegas to Wall Street, How I Beat the Dealer and the Market by Ed Thorp. (Founders #222)

[45:00] Schlep Blindness by Paul Graham  

[46:00] Great companies can be built on open but unsuspected secrets about how the world works.

[47:00] Conspiracy: A True Story of Power, Sex, and a Billionaire's Secret Plot to Destroy a Media Empire by Peter Thielby Ryan Holiday

[48:00] The best entrepreneurs know this: every great business is built around a secret that's hidden from the outside.

[51:00] Keith Rabois on Peter Theil insisting on focus

[54:00] Superior sales and distribution by itself can create a monopoly, even with no product differentiation. The converse is not true.

[56:00] Advertising doesn’t exist to make you buy a product right away; it exists to embed subtle impressions that will drive sales later. Anyone who cannot acknowledge its likely effect on himself is doubly deceived.

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What I learned from reading Hackers and Painters: Big Ideas From The Computer Age by Paul Graham 

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[4:00] How To Make Wealth by Paul Graham 

[4:01] Wealth is stuff we want: food, clothes, houses, cars, gadgets, travel to interesting places, and so on. You can have wealth without having money. If you had a magic machine that could on command make you a car or cook you dinner or do your laundry, or do anything else you wanted, you wouldn't need money. Whereas if you were in the middle of Antarctica, where there is nothing to buy, it wouldn't matter how much money you had.

[6:00] All a company is is a group of people working together to do something people want.

[7:00] It turns out, though, that there are economies of scale in how much of your life you devote to your work. In the right kind of business, someone who really devoted himself to work could generate ten or even a hundred times as much wealth as an average employee.

[8:00] And the people you work with had better be good, because it's their work that yours is going to be averaged with.

[9:00] In the Company of Giants: Candid Conversations With the Visionaries of the Digital World by Rama Dev Jager and Rafael Ortiz.  (Founders #208)

[10:00] A very able person who does care about money will ordinarily do better to go off and work with a small group of peers.

[10:00] Paul Graham’s Essays (Founders #275)

[11:00] What is technology? It's technique. It's the way we all do things.

[12:00] Sam Walton got rich not by being a retailer, but by designing a new kind of store.

[12:00] Sam Walton epiosdes

#150 Sam Walton: The Inside Story of America's Richest Man by Vance H. Trimble.

#234 Sam Walton: Made In America by Sam Walton.

[13:00] Use difficulty as a guide not just in selecting the overall aim of your company, but also at decision points along the way. At Viaweb one of our rules of thumb was run upstairs. Suppose you are a little, nimble guy being chased by a big, fat, bully. You open a door and find yourself in a staircase. Do you go up or down? I say up. The bully can probably run downstairs as fast as you can. Going upstairs his bulk will be more of a disadvantage. Running upstairs is hard for you but even harder for him.

[14:00] So few businesses really pay attention to making customers happy.

[15:00] What people will give you money for depends on them, not you.

[16:00] Hackers and Painters by Paul Graham

[20:00] The other way makers learn is from examples. For a painter, a museum is a reference library of techniques. For hundreds of years it has been part of the traditional education of painters to copy the works of the great masters, because copying forces you to look closely at the way a painting is made.

[21:00] Relentelssness wins. A great product has to be better than it has to be.

[21:00] Relentlessness Wins: Many painters might have thought, this is just something to put in the background to frame her head. No one will look that closely at it.

Not Leonardo. How hard he worked on part of a painting didn't depend at all on how closely he expected anyone to look at it. He was like Michael Jordan. Relentless.

Relentlessness wins because, in the aggregate, unseen details become visible.

[22:00] All those unseen details combine to produce something that's just stunning, like a thousand barely audible voices all singing in tune.

[24:00] The right way to collaborate, I think, is to divide projects into sharply defined modules, each with a definite owner, and with interfaces between them that are as carefully designed and, if possible, as articulated as programming languages.

[25:00] It turns out that looking at things from other people's point of view is practically the secret of success.

[25:00] You only get one life. You might as well spend it working on something great.

[26:00] The Other Road Ahead by Paul Graham 

[26:00] Subscribe to listen to Founders Daily (my new daily podcast)

[29:00] Use your product yourself all the time.

[29:00] Mind The Gap by Paul Graham

[29:00] When people care enough about something to do it well, those who do it best tend to be far better than everyone else. There's a huge gap between Leonardo da Vinci and second-rate contemporaries.

[32:00] Technology will certainly increase the gap between the productive and the unproductive.

[33:00] So we should expect to see ever-increasing variation in individual productivity as time goes on.

[34:00] Paul Graham’s answer to how big of a difference can a single developer or a small team make?

The answer is increasingly much. Increasingly much.

Achrimedes said if he had a lever long enough he could move the world.

Well nowawadys from your bedroom —thanks to all the infrastucture that exists — a combination of open source and services like AWS — the lever is enourmoulsy long.

You could be sitting in your bedroom programming … a single person … and if you make something that people like and is novel it can really have a huge effect.

That is very exiciting. You guys may take this for granted but anybody who is as old as me realizes how that was not the case 20 years ago.

It will be interesting to see how far it goes because it is certainly not over yet.

(How far can it go?)

Always further than people expect.

[37:00] Beating The Averages by Paul Graham 

[37:00] Paul Graham on Econtalk: I found that the interesting parts of programming you can’t make scientific. [Startups are the same.] What makes a programmer good at programming is more like what makes a painter good at painting. It is something a little less organized. It is taste. A sense of design. A certain knack.

[40:00] In business, there is nothing more valuable than a technical advantage your competitors don't understand.

[40:00] A startup should give its competitors as little information as possible.

[41:00] Taste For Makers by Paul Graham

[42:00] Whatever job people do, they naturally want to do better.

[43:00] It's surprising how much different fields' ideas of beauty have in common. The same principles of good design crop up again and again.

[44:00] If something is ugly, it can't be the best solution.

[46:00] In most fields the appearance of ease seems to come with practice. Perhaps what practice does is train your unconscious mind to handle tasks that used to require conscious thought.

[48:00] "It is my opinion," Ferrari once wrote, "that there are innate gifts that are a peculiarity of certain regions and that, transferred into industry, these propensities may at times acquire an exceptional importance... In Modena, where I was born and set up my own works, there is a species of psychosis for racing cars." — Go Like Hell: Ford, Ferrari, and Their Battle for Speed and Glory at Le Mans by A.J. Baime. (Founders #97)

[50:00] The recipe for great work is: very exacting taste, plus the ability to gratify it.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

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What I learned from reading Paul Graham’s essays.

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[4:01] You don't want to start a startup to do something that everyone agrees is a good idea, or there will already be other companies doing it. You have but that you know isn't to do something that sounds to most other people like a bad idea.

[5:20] The independent-minded are often unaware how different their ideas are from conventional ones, at least till they state them publicly.

[6:20] Founders find themselves able to speak more freely with founders of other companies than with their own employees.

[7:40] There are intellectual fashions too, and you definitely don't want to participate in those. Because unfashionable ideas are disproportionately likely to lead somewhere interesting. The best place to find undiscovered ideas is where no one else is looking.

[8:30] How much does the work you're currently doing engage your curiosity? If the answer is "not much," maybe you should change something.

[9:00] How To Think For Yourself by Paul Graham

[9:00] How To Work Hard by Paul Graham

[10:00] Hackers and Painters by Paul Graham

[11:00] Paul on Twitter: "Maybe better founders could have..." Presumably Patrick knows what he means by that, but in case it's not clear, he's describing the empty set. If Patrick and John Collison had to work long hours to build something great, you will too. Link to tweet

[13:00] Less is more but you have to do more to get to less. — Rick Rubin: In the Studio by Jake Brown. (Founders #245)

[13:00] If great talent and great drive are both rare, then people with both are rare squared.

[14:30] Can’t Hurt Me by David Goggins

[15:30] Aliens, Jedis, & Cults

[16:30] How To Do What You Love by Paul Graham

[19:00] Fear's a powerful thing. I mean it's got a lot of firepower. If you can figure out a way to wrestle that fear to push you from behind rather than to stand in front of you, that's very powerful. I always felt that I had to work harder than the next guy, just to do as well as the next guy. And to do better than the next guy, I had to just kill.

And you know, to a certain extent, that's still with me in how I work, you know, I just go in. —Jimmy Iovine

[20:00] Many problems have a hard core at the center, surrounded by easier stuff at the edges. Working hard means aiming toward the center to the extent you can. Some days you may not be able to; some days you'll only be able to work on the easier, peripheral stuff. But you should always be aiming as close to the center as you can without stalling.

[22:00] Find work that feels like play. —The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness by Naval Ravikant and Eric Jorgenson. (Founders #191)

[23:00] A deep interest in a topic makes people work harder than any amount of discipline can.

[23:00] Mozart: A Life by Paul Johnson. (Founders #240)

[25:00] Working hard is not just a dial you turn up to 11. It's a complicated, dynamic system that has to be tuned just right at each point. You have to understand the shape of real work, see clearly what kind you're best suited for, aim as close to the true core of it as you can, accurately judge at each moment both what you're capable of and how you're doing, and put in as many hours each day as you can without harming the quality of the result. This network is too complicated to trick. But if you're consistently honest and clearsighted, it will automatically assume an optimal shape, and you'll be productive in a way few people are.

[26:00] How to Lose Time and Money by Paul Graham

[30:00] Schlep Blindness by Paul Graham

[31:00] A company is defined by the schleps it will undertake. And schleps should be dealt with the same way you'd deal with a cold swimming pool: just jump in. Which is not to say you should seek out unpleasant work per se, but that you should never shrink from it if it's on the path to something great.

[33:00] What I’ve Learned From Users by Paul Graham

[34:00] The first thing that came to mind was that most startups have the same problems. No two have exactly the same problems, but it's surprising how much the problems remain the same, regardless of what they're making. Once you've advised 100 startups all doing different things, you rarely encounter problems you haven't seen before.

[34:00] Today I talked to a startup doing so well that they had no current problems that needed solving. Profitable, growing ~20x a year (not a typo), only 9 employees. This is so rare that I didn't know what to do. We ended up talking about problems they might have in the future.

I advised them never to raise another round, so to get equity you're going to have to get hired there. So learn to program. Link to tweet

[35:00] But knowing (nearly) all the problems startups can encounter doesn't mean that advising them can be automated, or reduced to a formula.

[37:00] It's not about pop culture, and it's not about fooling people, and it's not about convincing people that they want something they don't. We figure out what we want.

And I think we're pretty good at having the right discipline to think through whether a lot of other people are going to want it, too. —Steve Jobs

[39:00] That was another big surprise: how often founders don't listen to us.

[39:00] Damn Right: Behind the Scenes with Berkshire Hathaway Billionaire Charlie Munger by Janet Lowe. (Founders #221)

[40:00] The reason startups are so counterintuitive is that they're so different from most people's other experiences. No one knows what it's like except those who've done it.

[42:00] Speed defines startups. Focus enables speed. YC improves focus.

[42:00] Alexander combined an excessive tolerance of fatigue with an intolerence for slowness. Alexander the Great: The Brief Life and Towering Exploits of History's Greatest Conqueror--As Told By His Original Biographers (Founders #232)

[43:00] However good you are, good colleagues make you better. Indeed, very ambitious people probably need colleagues more than anyone else, because they're so starved for them in everyday life.

[45:00] Leading By Design: The Ikea Story (Founders #104)

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading Paul Graham’s essays.

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[4:52] My father told me I could be whatever I wanted when I grew up, so long as I enjoyed it.

[5:49] Do what you love doesn't mean, do what you would like to do most this second.

[7:41] To be happy I think you have to be doing something you not only enjoy, but admire. You have to be able to say, at the end, wow, that's pretty cool.

[8:00] You should not worry about prestige. This is easy advice to give. It’s hard to follow.

[10:22] You have to make a conscious effort to keep your ideas about what you want from being contaminated by what seems possible.

[12:18] Whichever route you take, expect a struggle. Finding work you love is very difficult. Most people fail.

[16:46] How To Do What You Love by Paul Graham 

[16:34] What Doesn’t Seem Like Work by Paul Graham 

[17:16] If something that seems like work to other people doesn't seem like work to you, that's something you're well suited for.

[17:42] Michael Jordan said what looked like hard work to others was play to him. Michael Jordan: The Life by Roland Lazenby. (Founders #212) and Driven From Within by Michael Jordan and Mark Vancil. (Founders #213)

[20:53] How Not to Die by Paul Graham 

[23:00] All that matters is to survive. The rest is just words. — Charles de Gaulle by Julian Jackson (Founders #224)

[24:49] You have to assume that running a startup can be demoralizing. That is certainly true. I've been there, and that's why I've never done another startup.

[27:31] If a startup succeeds, you get millions of dollars, and you don't get that kind of money just by asking for it. You have to assume it takes some amount of pain.

[28:17] So I'll tell you now: bad shit is coming. It always is in a startup. The odds of getting from launch to liquidity without some kind of disaster happening are one in a thousand.

So don't get demoralized. When the disaster strikes, just say to yourself, ok, this was what Paul was talking about. What did he say to do? Oh, yeah. Don't give up.

[28:45] Why to Start a Startup in a Bad Economy by Paul Graham 

[30:23] If we've learned one thing from funding so many startups, it's that they succeed or fail based on the qualities of the founders.

[31:15] If you're worried about threats to the survival of your company, don't look for them in the news. Look in the mirror.

[34:10] The cheaper your company is to operate, the harder it is to kill.

[35:43] Relentlessly Resourceful by Paul Graham 

[35:43] I finally got being a good startup founder down to two words: relentlessly resourceful.

[37:20] If I were running a startup, this would be the phrase I'd tape to the mirror. "Make something people want" is the destination, but "Be relentlessly resourceful" is how you get there.

[37:40] The Anatomy of Determination by Paul Graham 

[37:45] David’s Notes: A Conversation with Paul Graham

[39:50] After a while determination starts to look like talent.

[42:12] Ambitious people are rare, so if everyone is mixed together randomly, as they tend to be early in people's lives, then the ambitious ones won't have many ambitious peers. When you take people like this and put them together with other ambitious people, they bloom like dying plants given water. Probably most ambitious people are starved for the sort of encouragement they'd get from ambitious peers, whatever their age.

[43:21] One of the best ways to help a society generally is to create events and institutions that bring ambitious people together. (Founders Podcast Conference?)

[45:21] What Startups Are Really Like by Paul Graham 

[49:00] The Entire History of Silicon Valley by John Coogan

[49:50] Meet You In Hell: Andrew Carnegie Henry Clay Frick, and the Bitter Partnership That Transformed America by Les Standiford. (Founders #73)

[55:08] You need persistence because everything takes longer than you expect. A lot of people (founders) were surprised by that.

[57:18] Estee Lauder was a master at doing things that don’t scale. Estée Lauder: A Success Storyby Estée Lauder. (Founders #217)

[58:45] What makes companies fail most of the time is poor execution by the founders. A lot of times founders are worried about competition. YC has founded 1900+ companies. 1 was killed by competitors. You have the same protection against competitors that light aircraft have against crashing into other light aircraft. Do you know what the protection is? Space is large.

[1:01:00] Paul on what he would do if he was strating a company today: 

If I were a 22 year starting a startup I would certainly apply to YC. Which is not that surprising, since it was designed to be what I wish I'd had when I did start one. But (assuming I got in) I would not get sucked into raising a huge amount on Demo Day.

I would raise maybe $500k, keep the company small for the first year, work closely with users to make something amazing, and otherwise stay off SV's radar.

Ideally I'd get to profitability on that initial $500k. Later I could raise more, if I felt like it. Or not. But it would be on my terms.

At every point in the company's growth, I'd keep the company as small as I could. I'd always want people to be surprised how few employees we had. Fewer employees = lower costs, and less need to turn into a manager.

When I say small, I mean small in employees, not revenues.

[1:05:07] Against The Odds: An Autobiography by James Dyson (Founders #200)

[1:07:00] A Word To The Resourceful by Paul Graham 

[1:08:07] We found the startups that did best were the ones with the sort of founders about whom we'd say "they can take care of themselves." The startups that do best are fire-and-forget in the sense that all you have to do is give them a lead, and they'll close it, whatever type of lead it is.

[1:09:00] Understanding all the implications of what someone tells you is a subset of resourcefulness. It's conversational resourcefulness.

[1:11:00] Do Things That Don’t Scale by Paul Graham 

[1:11:00] Startups take off because the founders make them take off.

[1:16:00] The question to ask about an early stage startup is not "is this company taking over the world?" but "how big could this company get if the founders did the right things?" And the right things often seem both laborious and inconsequential at the time.

[1:16:00] Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire by James Wallace and Jim Erickson (Founders #140)

[1:21:00] The world is complicated. It is noisy. We are not going to get a chance to get people to remember much about us. No company is. So we have to be really clear about what we want them to know about us. —Steve Jobs

[1:22:00] Any strategy that omits the effort is suspect.

[1:23:00] The need to do something unscalably laborious to get started is so nearly universal that it might be a good idea to stop thinking of startup ideas as scalars. Instead we should try thinking of them as pairs of what you're going to build, plus the unscalable thing(s) you're going to do initially to get the company going.

Now that there are two components you can try to be imaginative about the second as well as the first. Founders need to work hard in two dimensions.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from rereading The New New Thing: A Silicon Valley Story by Michael Lewis

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[1:23] Maybe somewhere in a footnote, it would be mentioned that he came from nothing, grew up poor, dropped out of high school, and made himself three or four billion dollars.

[7:41] She explained that the shares in Netscape that Clark had given them had made them rich.

"And you have to understand," she said, “that when this happened, we were poor. I was ready to cook the cat."

I assumed this was a joke, and laughed. I assumed wrong.

[12:48] He was expelled from school and left town.  One time he came home talking about nothing but computers. No one in Plainview had even seen a computer except in the movies.

[13:21] I remember him telling me when he came back from the Navy, ‘Mama, I’m going to show Plainview.’

[14:42] In under eight years this person, considered unfit to graduate from high school, had earned himself a Ph.D. in Computer Science.

[15:05] I grew up in black and white. I thought the whole world was shit, and I was sitting in the middle of it.

[17:17] If you want to understand the entrepreneur, study the juvenile delinquent. The delinquent is saying with his actions, “This sucks. I’m going to do my own thing. — Yvon Chouinard

[17:56] The most powerful paragraph in the book: One day I was sitting at home and, I remember having the thought ‘You can did this hole as deep as you want to dig it.’ I remember thinking ‘My God, I’m going to spend the rest of my life in this fucking hole.’ You can reach these points in life when you say, ‘Fuck, I’ve reached some sort of dead-end here. And you descend into chaos. All those years you thought you were achieving something. And you achieved nothing. I was thirty-eight years old. I’d just been fired. My second wife had just left me. I had somehow fucked up. I developed this maniacal passion for wanting to achieve something.

[19:00] Two part series on Vannevar Bush

Pieces of the Action by Vannevar Bush. (Founders #270) and Endless Frontier: Vannevar Bush, Engineer of the American Century by G. Pascal Zachary. (Founders #271) 

[21:38] New Growth Theory argued that wealth came from the human imagination. Wealth wasn’t chiefly having more of old things; it was having entirely new things.

[22:54] On creating new wealth/companies: A certain tolerance for nonconformism is really critical to the process.

[24:31] The internet has massively broadened the possible space of careers, and most people haven't figured this out yet. —The Almanack of Naval Ravikant: A Guide to Wealth and Happiness by Naval Ravikant and Eric Jorgenson. (Founders #191)

[25:06] A master in the art of living draws no sharp distinction between his work and his play; his labor and his leisure; his mind and his body; his education and his recreation. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues his vision of excellence through whatever he is doing, and leaves others to determine whether he is working or playing. To himself, he always appears to be doing both.

[27:36] George Lucas: A Life by Brian Jay Jones. (Founders #35) and Steven Spielberg: A Biography by Joseph McBride. (Founders #209)

[33:10] The independence and the control is worth a lot more than the money.

[33:32] These people could never build the machines of the future, but they could sell the machines of the present.

[35:02] Clark on how to avoid being disrupted: For a technology company to succeed, he argued, it needed always to be looking to destroy itself. If it didn’t, someone else would. “It’s the hardest thing in business to do,” he would say. “Even creating a lower-cost product runs against the grain, because the low-cost products undercut the high-cost, more profitable products.” Everyone in a successful company, from the CEO on down, has a stake in whatever the company is currently selling. It does not naturally occur to anyone to find a way to undermine that product.

[40:41] The young were forever eating the old. In this drama technology played a very clear role. It was the murder weapon.

[40:55] The art of storytelling is critically important. Most of the entrepreneurs who come to us can't tell a story. Learning to tell a story is incredibly important because that's how the money works. The money flows as a function of the stories. —Don Valentine

[42:53] The Pmarca Blog Archive Ebook by Marc Andreessen (Founders #50)

[45:48] What is the role I want to play in my company? I need to make sure to design my environment so I am always playing that role. Make sure you design the job you want. What is the point of being an entreprenuer if you don’t do that?

[47:45] John Doerr had cleared $500 million in 18 months. 30 times his original investment.

[49:13] You must find extraordinary people.

I noticed that the dynamic range between what an average person could accomplish and what the best person could accomplish was 50 or 100 to 1.

Given that, you're well advised to go after the cream of the cream. That's what we've done.

A small team of A+ players can run  circles around a giant team of B and C players.

— In the Company of Giants: Candid Conversations With the Visionaries of the Digital World by Rama Dev Jager and Rafael Ortiz. (Founders #208)

[52:03] Clark liked to say that human beings when they took risks, fell into one of two types, pigs or chickens. “The difference between these two kinds of people is the difference between the pig and the chicken in the ham-and-eggs breakfast. The chicken is interested, the pig is committed. If you are going to do anything worth doing, you need a lot of pigs.”

[53:14] In our 10 days at sea the value of his holdings had nearly tripled. This is fantasy land he said.

[53:54] There are vastly more conceivable possibilities than realized outcomes.

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“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — Gareth

Be like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from rereading The Mamba Mentality: How I Play by Kobe Bryant. 

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Episode outline: 

If you really want to be great at something, you have to truly care about it. If you want to be great in a particular area, you have to obsess over it. A lot of people say they want to be great, but they're not willing to make the sacrifices necessary to achieve greatness. They have other concerns and they spread themselves out. That's totally fine. After all, greatness is not for everybody. Greatness isn't easy to achieve. It requires a lot of time.

You can't achieve greatness by walking a straight line.

Respect to those who do achieve greatness and respect to those who are chasing that elusive feeling.

May you find the power in understanding the journey of others to help create your own.

He dedicates a lot of time in this book to the importance of learning from and studying the great people that came before you.

Showboat: The Life of Kobe Bryant by Roland Lazenby (Founders #272)

His dissection of the game was at another level. In my entire career, I’ve never seen a player as dedicated to being the best. His determination is unparalleled. He unquestionably worked harder than anyone else I have ever played with.

Kobe knew that to be the best you need a different approach from everyone else.

If I wanted to implement something new into my game, I'd see it and try incorporating it immediately. I wasn't scared of looking bad or being embarrassed.

I had a constant craving, a yearning, to improve and be the best. I never needed any external forces to motivate me.

If something has worked for other greats before you, and if something is working for you, why change it up and embrace some new fad? Stick with what works, even if it's unpopular.