Why Winners Say No | Ep 988
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
So I made my first million when I was 26. A decade later, my portfolio company has generated last year over $250 million in aggregate revenue. And I'm 36 now. And so in this video, I'm going to give you the real-world advice that I wish someone had told me much earlier. Stop networking. All right, now this is a really, really important point. Now, it's not that I even have some big problem with networking overall. That's actually not my point. It's more that there are seasons of life, right? In the beginning, you're in exploration. I grabbed this from Naval and I really love it.
When should entrepreneurs stop networking and focus on exploitation?
Later on, you get into exploitation, which is where you go all in, right? And so the thing is, is that in the beginning, you're tasting lots of stuff. You're trying to figure out what you are good at or have some proclivity towards. When you have that proclivity, then it becomes very clear. Now is the time to cut everything else so that we can focus and go deep, right? So you go broad in the beginning so that you can figure out what you need to go deep on. The broad period that you're in is never the period where you're going to make money. This is the part you have to get. I'd say from the beginning of when I started until I really graduated from it was about five years. It's less of a binary and more of a continuum.
In the beginning, you taste lots of stuff. Because in the beginning, you have to say yes to things.
How does the exploration-to-exploitation framework explain early business growth?
You have to say yes because you're so bad. You're so scared. You never want to say yes. But you learn to say yes a little bit. And then you say yes more. And then you say yes more. And then very quickly, you learn to say yes and get overwhelmed. And so the only way out of this yes trap is you have to start practicing to say no. And if you're like, wait a second, that means that I have to change what I do. Welcome to entrepreneurship. Like you have to learn, you have to evolve, you have to grow. So let me give you a very tactical example. So if you're debating between going to a networking event, right? Or like a lunch with some dude who's like, Hey, we should collaborate. We should synergize. We should maybe trade ideas.
Let me pick your brain, whatever. Right. And if you're picking between any of those things and working, choose the work because when the work works out, the people will still be there to take your call. But if you never do the work, no amount of networking ever, We'll get the work done for you. And the bonus or negative bonus here is that if you don't get the work done, they're not going to take your call in the future. And so they're willing to take the call today with whatever small amount of success that you have. But if you lose that success because you get distracted, they're not going to take the call in the future. That door will be open. I promise. And not only will that door be open, a hundred other doors will open for you.
If you win during the season, losers congregate, winners isolate. If everyone was supposed to win, they would have made podiums bigger. The top of the mountain isn't supposed to fit a lot of people. It's normal. The air is harder to breathe. And the thing is, if all of this seems antithetical or different than what you've heard or what other people around you are experiencing, ask yourself, do those people have the lives you want? A great way to make a mistake is to ask someone else's idea about your idea who has no idea. When you make this transition from going from the exploration period to the exploitation phase, you go from many looser connections to a very few tight ones. I tend to be very transactional as a person, but I think we all are.
And some people are just open about it. Everybody on some level does some sort of math in their head of like the person, this person in my life, I get more benefits than I have costs. But the thing is, is that if you want to raise the standard of your life, you have to raise the standard of the people who you surround yourself with. Because the fastest way to change your life is to change who you're friends with.
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Chapters
5 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:00–0:27
2
When should entrepreneurs stop networking and focus on exploitation?
0:27–1:06
3
How does the exploration-to-exploitation framework explain early business growth?
1:06–3:13
4
Why do founders get trapped by saying yes and how do they learn to say no?
3:13–4:54
5
Should you choose working on core projects over attending networking lunches?
4:54–8:20