Random Chat, Thoughts, Posts, and/or Rants Thread

[monnffffiiiiiii]

Lots of people want to be rich because they want status, not time. Since starting as an entrepreneur is super low status, they fail - or simply fail to quit their job.

These are the people "too cool" to be entrepreneurs. They would never dare make a cold call or work a few months as a waiter to pay the bill.

These are the people who write stuff but would never post it online.

Being ok with looking dumb will take you a long way. It certainly helped me.

PS: I saw that on Twitter, not coming from me directly.

 

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[Andy Black]

Too many employees simply do not care how long tasks or projects take and are perfectly content with endless revisions, details, and refinement.

Being an entrepreneur is all about results and effectiveness. You gotta ship the damn thing.

It depends what we're paid/rewarded for.

If you're just paid to show up 9-5 then that's what you do.

If you're just paid to deliver a result then that's what you do.

 

[mikecarlooch]

Great quote I heard today

“You’ll be surprised to discover that success is less in the extraordinary and more in the repeated execution of the ordinary”

 

[MJ DeMarco]

Our pool cover didn't survive the winter and has tears in it.

We contacted the company that installed it and they said they will charge $200 just to come look at it.

They gave us the date (which was May 17) and said they would arrive anytime during the day.

We stayed at the house ALL DAY waiting for these fckers, and they never showed. Not even a courtesy "sorry, we can't make it."

Multiple texts and emails during the day, never answered. They stood to make $200 just to show up for 20 minutes.

This aholes tried to show up yesterday unannounced, told 'em to take a hike.

 

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[thechosen1]

It depends what we're paid/rewarded for.

If you're just paid to show up 9-5 then that's what you do.

If you're just paid to deliver a result then that's what you do.

Very true. Need to come up with better ways to motivate full time employees to meet deadlines… the thing is, as a business owner that operates by the project, you need full time employees once you hit a certain size. But the drawback to that is that you get this inevitable lethargy. Contractors who are paid by the job will do everything in their power to go fast - full time employees will not. But contractors are more expensive. It is a catch-22, always something you balance in construction or project based work.

Of course there are businesses that are considered contractors but the businesses themselves have FT employees so they might not be perceived as fast… speaking from experience

 

[MJ DeMarco]

Team Sky is an excellent example of a 1% gains across every conceivable little gain possible. They re-defined how cycling teams won Tour de France.

Turn the clock back to 2010 and Britain had never produced a Tour De France winning rider.

The team was founded with the primary goal of producing the first British winner of the Tour De France. To accomplish this, it was decided that the core of the squad should be comprised of relatively young British riders, supplemented with several established foreign names. The first roster of Sky riders reflected this, including the likes of; Thomas, Froome, Wiggins and Stannard, alongside Simon Gerrans, Edvald Boasson Hagen and Thomas Löfkvist..

Marginal gains yield major rewards​

The long list of triumphs enjoyed by Team Sky since their inception can be largely attributed to what is known as the ‘aggregation of marginal gains‘.

This philosophy was implemented by Dave Brailsford following his appointment as general manager of the team. In his own words, the basis of the theory is that “if you break down everything you could think of, that goes into riding a bike, and then improve it by 1%, you will get a significant increase when you put them all together. They’re tiny things, but if you clump them together it can be the difference between winning and losing.”

Their search for efficiency has included countless innovative tweaks, some of which may seem to the untrained eye to be tenuously linked to performance on a bike. Such changes include; travelling with their own mattresses and pillows to ensure riders sleep and recover as best as possible, colour coding water bottles to differentiate between water and energy drinks saving time on the road, and travelling on their state of the art team bus known as ‘The Death Star’, decked out with reclining padded seats, a shower, a treatment room, and a built in sound system.

Result? The British based outfit have produced the race winner 7 in a row.


Apply this to business - ANY business, and success is 10x more likely.

This post is now automatically linked whenever someone types "1% better" or "1% improvement".

 

[monnffffiiiiiii]

FYI!!!

 

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[RicardoGrande]

View attachment 48919
FYI!!!

I know it's been too long in this post-c0vid hysteria because I misread this as "afford more vaccinations!"

 

[Jon822]

 

[Matt Sun]

 

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[Dwight Schrute]

 

[mikecarlooch]

Team Sky is an excellent example of a 1% gains across every conceivable little gain possible. They re-defined how cycling teams won Tour de France.

Turn the clock back to 2010 and Britain had never produced a Tour De France winning rider.

The team was founded with the primary goal of producing the first British winner of the Tour De France. To accomplish this, it was decided that the core of the squad should be comprised of relatively young British riders, supplemented with several established foreign names. The first roster of Sky riders reflected this, including the likes of; Thomas, Froome, Wiggins and Stannard, alongside Simon Gerrans, Edvald Boasson Hagen and Thomas Löfkvist..

Marginal gains yield major rewards​

The long list of triumphs enjoyed by Team Sky since their inception can be largely attributed to what is known as the ‘aggregation of marginal gains‘.

This philosophy was implemented by Dave Brailsford following his appointment as general manager of the team. In his own words, the basis of the theory is that “if you break down everything you could think of, that goes into riding a bike, and then improve it by 1%, you will get a significant increase when you put them all together. They’re tiny things, but if you clump them together it can be the difference between winning and losing.”

Their search for efficiency has included countless innovative tweaks, some of which may seem to the untrained eye to be tenuously linked to performance on a bike. Such changes include; travelling with their own mattresses and pillows to ensure riders sleep and recover as best as possible, colour coding water bottles to differentiate between water and energy drinks saving time on the road, and travelling on their state of the art team bus known as ‘The Death Star’, decked out with reclining padded seats, a shower, a treatment room, and a built in sound system.

Result? The British based outfit have produced the race winner 7 in a row.


Apply this to business - ANY business, and success is 10x more likely.

Thanks @Antifragile for bringing up this concept.

One thing does pique my curiosity - how would you utilize this concept practically without spending too much time on small details rather than larger things that matter?

My immediate thinking was in a combination of Gary Keller's One Thing book and the aggregation of marginal gains.

The one thing(s) come first, small details and 1% improvements second.

How do you think about this?

-

This concept added a new variable to my productivity equation -

Deep Work + The ONE Thing + Repetition Of The Ordinary + Aggregation Of Marginal Gains

 

[monnffffiiiiiii]

The 1% improvement thing only works only as long as you have the basics right.

Applied to e-commerce for example, optimizing your landing page won't move the needle if you don't have the right products.

1% improvement is interesting only as long as the basics have been established aka don't start with that.

If my memory is correct, the British cycling team story was taken from Atomic Habits, one of the most overrated (and at times false) self-help books of all time.

Side note: anyone into road cycling will tell you about their suspicions that the British team (Froome et al.) was as doped as Lance was, but naturally, that's another story...

 

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[Isaac Odongo]

Now in my country people are in fright because hundreds of the courses many graduated from have been declared expired. People are wondering what on this earth is going to happen.

 

[Jon822]

The 1% improvement thing only works only as long as you have the basics right.

Applied to e-commerce for example, optimizing your landing page won't move the needle if you don't have the right products.

1% improvement is interesting only as long as the basics have been established aka don't start with that.

If my memory is correct, the British cycling team story was taken from Atomic Habits, one of the most overrated (and at times false) self-help books of all time.

Side note: anyone into road cycling will tell you about their suspicions that the British team (Froome et al.) was as doped as Lance was, but naturally, that's another story...

This is a good point. To add to this: by definition of relative increases, the base amount matters since this is the amount the increase depends on. It's analogous to the base amount you invest compared to the annualized returns you see. If someone was able to create a consistent annualized return of say 50%, but his base amount invested was $1000, it's essentially worthless. Maximizing the annualized return only starts to matter after you can input a large enough of a base amount (for example, $1,000,000+). Now, when you start maximizing the "aggregation of marginal gains", it's resulting magnitude matters. This is also precisely why the Slowlane fails before it even gets onto the road: it tries to leverage relative increases on amounts that are basically zero. "Hurry up and get that $1000 you have invested into the stock market so you don't miss out on your $80 (assuming 8% return) for the year!"

Going back to the cycling example, worrying about the marginal gains of optimized sleep and color-coded water bottles is irrelevant if you don't notice your bike has a flat tire. Another really good example was mentioned by someone in this forum about high-sub YouTube channels and how they maximize every marginal gain they can get from thumbnail, title, tags, etc. At the top, this stuff is what separates winners from losers. But for someone with a new-ish channel whose content sucks, this will be a waste of time.

All of this might sound obvious but I've definitely struggled with "analysis paralysis" where I tried optimizing marginal gains way too early. Essentially, I invested $500 then tried to maximize my annual returns. Make an excellent base (product, investment, etc), then worry about the marginal gains.

Side note - I recognize that not all improvements function as relative increases but the above examples still provide a high level overview of how to maximize output per time investment. Additionally, it can help someone see why large, absolute increases are needed before relative improvements.

 

[monnffffiiiiiii]

This is a good point. To add to this: by definition of percentages, the base amount matters since this is the amount the increase depends on. It's analogous to the base amount you invest compared to the annualized returns you see. If someone was able to create a consistent annualized return of say 50%, but his base amount invested was $1000, it's essentially worthless. Maximizing the annualized return only starts to matter after you can input a large enough of a base amount (for example, $1,000,000+). Now, when you start maximizing the "aggregation of marginal gains", it's resulting magnitude matters.

Going back to the cycling example, worrying about the marginal gains of optimized sleep and color-coded water bottles is irrelevant if you don't notice your bike has a flat tire. Another really good example was mentioned by someone in this forum about high-sub YouTube channels and how they maximize every marginal gain they can get from thumbnail, title, tags, etc. At the top, this stuff is what separates winners from losers. But for someone with a new-ish channel whose content sucks, this will be a waste of time.

All of this might sound obvious but I've definitely struggled with "analysis paralysis" where I tried optimizing marginal gains way too early. Essentially, I invested $500 then tried to maximize my annual returns. Make an excellent base (product, investment, etc), then worry about the marginal gains.

Side note - I recognize that not all improvements function as relative increases but the above examples still provide a high level overview of how to maximized output per time investment. Additionally, it can help someone see why large, absolute increases are needed before relative improvements.

It's like the gym in the beginning: you don't need perfect shoes, you need compound exercise.

Ofc 99% of people focus on the shoes.

 

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[Jon822]

It's like the gym in the beginning: you don't need perfect shoes, you need compound exercise.

Ofc 99% of people focus on the shoes.

Don't forget the name brand water bottle and gym bag.

My dad bought $2000 worth of scuba-diving gear before he even realized he doesn't actually like scuba-diving.

 

[Awakened2022]

Now in my country people are in fright because hundreds of the courses many graduated from have been declared expired. People are wondering what on this earth is going to happen.

Luckily for you and me, we are pursuing the only course that amounts to something: hands-on entrepreneurship. It only gets more relevant the more times you execute the right action.

 

[monnffffiiiiiii]

Another way to find good products to sell online isn't to look for the product itself, but for the badly advertised ones.

 

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[loop101]

Is it a big deal if the US defaults? I assume they will raise the "limit" like they always do, and print more money, like they always do. I'd rather go broke earlier, rather than later, if it is really inevitable. This perky lady says they have 0 days left to make a deal, because of the various procedures they follow.

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a1xc73ETupc

 

[Isaac Odongo]

It's like the gym in the beginning: you don't need perfect shoes, you need compound exercise.

Ofc 99% of people focus on the shoes.

And I have been focused on certain kind of shoes.

 

[Subsonic]

This is a good point. To add to this: by definition of relative increases, the base amount matters since this is the amount the increase depends on. It's analogous to the base amount you invest compared to the annualized returns you see. If someone was able to create a consistent annualized return of say 50%, but his base amount invested was $1000, it's essentially worthless. Maximizing the annualized return only starts to matter after you can input a large enough of a base amount (for example, $1,000,000+). Now, when you start maximizing the "aggregation of marginal gains", it's resulting magnitude matters. This is also precisely why the Slowlane fails before it even gets onto the road: it tries to leverage relative increases on amounts that are basically zero. "Hurry up and get that $1000 you have invested into the stock market so you don't miss out on your $80 (assuming 8% return) for the year!"

Going back to the cycling example, worrying about the marginal gains of optimized sleep and color-coded water bottles is irrelevant if you don't notice your bike has a flat tire. Another really good example was mentioned by someone in this forum about high-sub YouTube channels and how they maximize every marginal gain they can get from thumbnail, title, tags, etc. At the top, this stuff is what separates winners from losers. But for someone with a new-ish channel whose content sucks, this will be a waste of time.

All of this might sound obvious but I've definitely struggled with "analysis paralysis" where I tried optimizing marginal gains way too early. Essentially, I invested $500 then tried to maximize my annual returns. Make an excellent base (product, investment, etc), then worry about the marginal gains.

Side note - I recognize that not all improvements function as relative increases but the above examples still provide a high level overview of how to maximize output per time investment. Additionally, it can help someone see why large, absolute increases are needed before relative improvements.

I actually think that these 1% gains can even be great when one is at 0.
You just have to up the frequency. 1% a day means that your a totally different person after 1 year.

The mistake people make is that they try to do too much at once instead of something for a long time. A aspiring youtuber will grow best by aggregating small gains across all aspects.

Imo you can combine this with the 80/20 principle and see where these small gains have the largest magnitude.

 

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[Antifragile]

Thanks @Antifragile for bringing up this concept.

One thing does pique my curiosity - how would you utilize this concept practically without spending too much time on small details rather than larger things that matter?

My immediate thinking was in a combination of Gary Keller's One Thing book and the aggregation of marginal gains.

The one thing(s) come first, small details and 1% improvements second.

How do you think about this?

-

This concept added a new variable to my productivity equation -

Deep Work + The ONE Thing + Repetition Of The Ordinary + Aggregation Of Marginal Gains

Mike,
Good question. On the surface looks like they are conceptually opposite.

Yet, I think they are identical!

If “The One Thing” is about removing any kind of multitasking, then we will be faster at hitting 1% gains across the board over and over again. Why? Because - no distractions. There is plenty of science on this. The whole book (in my mind & oversimplifying it big time) can be summarized by “don’t multitask”. But it doesn’t mean we shouldn’t know all the things we should do. Have a list of things to try, experiment, tinker etc.

 

[rjdgreat]

Courage plays a huge role when you have to deliver relative value. Always remember that context matters and execution is always the answer. If you're hesitant to give relative-value to someone, remember that if the needs of the target is unmet, you have to deliver that need without hesitation because you are the only who can give the target needs at the moment and nobody matters to the target except the value you give.

 

[socaldude]

Is it a big deal if the US defaults? I assume they will raise the "limit" like they always do, and print more money, like they always do. I'd rather go broke earlier, rather than later, if it is really inevitable.

They'll raise the debt ceiling. It's just a political pry bar hostage negotiation. A default on US debt will mean goodbye to reserve currency status and a dollar crash. Inflation will sky rocket and imports will be more expensive. This could go on well into the year.

"Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's"- Mathew 22:21. In other words Caesar can take his fake money and taxes and stick it where the sun don't shine.

 

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[BizyDad]

The 1% improvement thing only works only as long as you have the basics right.

Applied to e-commerce for example, optimizing your landing page won't move the needle if you don't have the right products.

1% improvement is interesting only as long as the basics have been established aka don't start with that.

If my memory is correct, the British cycling team story was taken from Atomic Habits, one of the most overrated (and at times false) self-help books of all time.

Side note: anyone into road cycling will tell you about their suspicions that the British team (Froome et al.) was as doped as Lance was, but naturally, that's another story...

Wow. Could you be any more of a wet blanket? It's "interesting"?

It is so interesting how "from memory" you throw aspertions, attack and under cut what is actually a great point and applicable in so many situations.

You're a writer, and a marketer, so it's clear that your word choice of "suspicious" and "overrated" and "at times false" lay bare your thoughts on this subject. I'm starting to understand why you weren't well received when you got home. Contrarians usually aren't.

I'll give you two 1% stories.

Going into the 1988 season, Pat Riley's Lakers had won NBA championship this season before. He was concerned about complacency. How do you get a team of champions and future Hall of famers to improve when they believed they just needed to maintain?

He challenged them all to look at what each of them did, and go 1% better. The rebounders, just get 1% more rebounders. The shot makers, just hit 1% more shots.

The Result? The 1988 Lakers were one of the all-time greatest single season teams, arguably the greatest Lakers team ever, and cemented themselves as a dynasty.

Having never read atomic habits or heard of the British cycling team, I still had heard of Pat Riley and his 1% rule.

At the beginning of last year I faced a problem.

I was in the process of purchasing a client's business with a partner. My partner was the lead salesperson in an e-commerce store. But just three years prior, he had been working in newspapers. He didn't see himself as a salesperson. He didn't see himself as a business person.

He had been working in his dad's business for 3 years, and now he and I were about to buy it.

When I took a look at the books I identified one big problem. We were giving too much away in discounts. 8.4 discount rate the year prior to purchase.

After 3 years of his dad preaching that this is what we have to do to make sales, I knew I wasn't going to convince him overnight. I floated the idea to him of lowering the discount rate and met with a lot of resistance. I needed to give him a task that was believable and achievable.

So I asked him to lower our discounts by 1%. I showed him how much it was impacting profit and how much more profit would make for each 1% reduction in our discount. So if he would normally quote 10% off, make 9. Make 5 4 instead. You get the idea.

This was something he could do. And he took to it very quickly. By the end of first quarter last year, our discount rate had dropped to 4.4%, almost cut in half. But our sales were 20% greater then the prior year.

This year we had almost the same result. First quarter, our sales are up 18%, and our discount rate at dropped to 2.8%.

And it all happened through slow steady incremental improvements that sounded believable and achievable.

Now of course your original point is valid that if you don't have a real business, one percent improvement doesn't matter.

Of course someone should have a real business before they focus on improving the business. Your point was so self-evident, I don't know why you felt the need to argue against a good point.

It's like the gym in the beginning: you don't need perfect shoes, you need compound exercise.

Ofc 99% of people focus on the shoes.

Funny thing about this stat. It is similar over-hype self-help drivel that is flat out false. Ofc.

I wouldn't normally care, except that you took exception with 2 people who are more successful than you and you literally did that same exact thing that you called them out for with your very next comment.

 

[Kevin88660]

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Warning by developer: Please do not start if you have low self-esteem or confidence issues.

 

[biophase]

The 1% improvement thing only works only as long as you have the basics right.

Applied to e-commerce for example, optimizing your landing page won't move the needle if you don't have the right products.

Well actually a 1% improvement does move the needle by definition. However it may be too small to notice.

Optimizing your landing page is still better than not doing it, even if your product is shitty.

1% improvement is interesting only as long as the basics have been established aka don't start with that.

I think what you’re trying to say is that you have to look at the work it takes to get 1% better.

If you have to put in a weeks worth of work to get 1% better, then maybe you should see if there’s something else that takes 2 days to get 10% better.

But if changing my add to cart button from black to orange gives me a .1% improvement and takes me 5 minutes. I’m definitely knocking that task out immediately.

 

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[thechosen1]

They'll raise the debt ceiling. It's just a political pry bar hostage negotiation. A default on US debt will mean goodbye to reserve currency status and a dollar crash. Inflation will sky rocket and imports will be more expensive. This could go on well into the year.

"Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's"- Mathew 22:21. In other words Caesar can take his fake money and taxes and stick it where the sun don't shine.

This is very true. However, this is assuming the people in power have the right intentions and American leaders care about America.

I am beginning to wonder if that is the case. It is an outside question (I'm not saying I BELIEVE they don't care about America), it's more of a chilling, nagging question, a sort of "what if they don't actually care if we lose reserve status?" Or worse, "what if stronger forces WANT us to lose it?"

But I'm 99% sure it's the same old crony stuff and it will get raised.

 

[MJ DeMarco]

Looks like the "1% better" commentary needs an extraction into its own thread, history says those don't go well so I'm hesitant.