Max Levchin

It's boring to analyze success. Like, well, we did well. It's good. I'm tired. I'm going to go to sleep is kind of the natural, like your oxytocin is in your brain.

over time. The problem is that with successes, the texture of each individual decision is much harder to detect. If you look at the world as a funnel analysis, which is a really good way of thinking about a lot of things, you start over here, become aware of a thing, start thinking about it, start considering it, start deciding it, deciding succeeding or failing.

over time. The problem is that with successes, the texture of each individual decision is much harder to detect. If you look at the world as a funnel analysis, which is a really good way of thinking about a lot of things, you start over here, become aware of a thing, start thinking about it, start considering it, start deciding it, deciding succeeding or failing.

over time. The problem is that with successes, the texture of each individual decision is much harder to detect. If you look at the world as a funnel analysis, which is a really good way of thinking about a lot of things, you start over here, become aware of a thing, start thinking about it, start considering it, start deciding it, deciding succeeding or failing.

There's a real kind of a blur between the first five steps. And this is true of web apps and checkout funnels and advertising and all kinds of other things. If everything has gone pretty well, there's a lot of effort that has to go into like, all right, well, that step to this step of the funnel, the conversion rate was 95%. And the next one was 95%. Next one was 95%. Well, which one did the best?

There's a real kind of a blur between the first five steps. And this is true of web apps and checkout funnels and advertising and all kinds of other things. If everything has gone pretty well, there's a lot of effort that has to go into like, all right, well, that step to this step of the funnel, the conversion rate was 95%. And the next one was 95%. Next one was 95%. Well, which one did the best?

There's a real kind of a blur between the first five steps. And this is true of web apps and checkout funnels and advertising and all kinds of other things. If everything has gone pretty well, there's a lot of effort that has to go into like, all right, well, that step to this step of the funnel, the conversion rate was 95%. And the next one was 95%. Next one was 95%. Well, which one did the best?

I don't know. They all seem like 95%. It's pretty good. Now you should ask the question, well, could it have been 96? Like, why didn't we do better? And so you're inevitably asking the question in terms of failure. Again, you're not really saying, how were we so good and smart that 95 was, you know, that's a really high, it's really good. Should we have done 94? Would that have been enough?

I don't know. They all seem like 95%. It's pretty good. Now you should ask the question, well, could it have been 96? Like, why didn't we do better? And so you're inevitably asking the question in terms of failure. Again, you're not really saying, how were we so good and smart that 95 was, you know, that's a really high, it's really good. Should we have done 94? Would that have been enough?

I don't know. They all seem like 95%. It's pretty good. Now you should ask the question, well, could it have been 96? Like, why didn't we do better? And so you're inevitably asking the question in terms of failure. Again, you're not really saying, how were we so good and smart that 95 was, you know, that's a really high, it's really good. Should we have done 94? Would that have been enough?

Like those questions are kind of boring and pointless to ask. I really believe in asking the question in terms of what should we have done better? Even if it's the most successful thing ever, it's nice to take a victory lap and sort of high five the team. But ultimately the question has to be like, this is a, I have a friend who grew up in a

Like those questions are kind of boring and pointless to ask. I really believe in asking the question in terms of what should we have done better? Even if it's the most successful thing ever, it's nice to take a victory lap and sort of high five the team. But ultimately the question has to be like, this is a, I have a friend who grew up in a

Like those questions are kind of boring and pointless to ask. I really believe in asking the question in terms of what should we have done better? Even if it's the most successful thing ever, it's nice to take a victory lap and sort of high five the team. But ultimately the question has to be like, this is a, I have a friend who grew up in a

very managed parenting environment where his parents would ask him when he showed up home from school with a 98% result in a test, like what happened to the other 2%? And I'm not sure it's a great way to have a childhood, but it's a great way to run a company.

very managed parenting environment where his parents would ask him when he showed up home from school with a 98% result in a test, like what happened to the other 2%? And I'm not sure it's a great way to have a childhood, but it's a great way to run a company.

very managed parenting environment where his parents would ask him when he showed up home from school with a 98% result in a test, like what happened to the other 2%? And I'm not sure it's a great way to have a childhood, but it's a great way to run a company.

So for everything, create a document space. So every time we have a blip for whatever definition of in our systems or in our processes or in our models, anything, A separate conversation is carved off on Slack. A separate conversation is documented in a Google Doc or a Notion or whatever tool we're using for this topic, but it's segregated.

So for everything, create a document space. So every time we have a blip for whatever definition of in our systems or in our processes or in our models, anything, A separate conversation is carved off on Slack. A separate conversation is documented in a Google Doc or a Notion or whatever tool we're using for this topic, but it's segregated.

So for everything, create a document space. So every time we have a blip for whatever definition of in our systems or in our processes or in our models, anything, A separate conversation is carved off on Slack. A separate conversation is documented in a Google Doc or a Notion or whatever tool we're using for this topic, but it's segregated.

It's very difficult to peel away details having to do with event one if you're coming with event two. And so first sort of most important thing is make sure you have separation of data streams. Because if you get good at post-mortem culture, you will gather a lot of data and a lot of it will be irrelevant. Like people will say, well, this also happened at the same time.