Ethan Evans

Burnout is less, it turns out, about hard work.

It's more about losing your vision.

You no longer know where you're going.

I'm just going to keep my head down and work hard.

I call this work hard and hope to be noticed.

Hope is not a very good strategy.

He often said, we need to be strategically patient, but tactically impatient.

So it's feeling this urgency of how have I moved my business forward as far as I possibly can today, and yet realizing that building something of real value might take 10 years.

Know what you want, know where you're going, and...

Boy, I think the thing I wish I had known most about what's been called corporate politics is it's just other people trying to get ahead.

They're just starting with what do they need and what do they want.

And sometimes if you're in their way, it's not personal.

They don't even notice.

It's just your accidental roadkill.

Sometimes it's intentional.

So one thing I wish I had known is just figure out what other people's motives are.

And that doesn't mean they have a hidden or deep or dark motive.

Just sometimes their motives don't align with yours.

The other thing you said is you called it a corporate ladder, and that's what it's always been called.

I've heard a new analogy I like better, which is the corporate climbing wall, because it's wider.