So You’re an Elite Performer? Maybe, And Maybe Not.

[Andy Black]

I think business is a lot different than sports.

You can't accidentally become a F1 driver or the worlds best soccer player.
The rules are so defined and the competition so intense.

People train their whole lives to compete against someone else for the exact same prize, under the exact same conditions. You aren't going to have much "luck" since every small margin is already well mapped out.

But business has so many gaps. Markets and demands are always changing and new opportunities open all the time.

The first "online success" person I ever met was this dude in South America. And he was a total disaster.

He was late 20's, had a drinking problem, and would always get us kicked out of bars. If you think of elite focus and discipline... this was not it. (Still a super fun and legit dude).

But he had still succeeded. He taken a course on software ideas, had made a basic software that did animations for businesses, and had put it online for affiliates to team up with him.

And it absolutely crushed it. Did like $5-6m sales in two years.

Right product at the right time to a hungry new audience who wanted to buy.

This is why I think the analogy of the gum ball machine is so fitting. It is 50% just showing up day after day and putting in the work to make something succeed. To me that isn't "elite", it is grit.

Can a bunch of personal work help? Of course.

Is it needed to win... not at all.

I was going to say this before but forgot: Getting a world record is winner-takes-all. Getting the Olympic gold is winner-takes-all. Business mostly isn't winner-takes-all and often isn't even a zero-sum game.

 

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[Andy Black]

This is very well articulated and I think you should have posted this thread instead of me. And here you are saying I write well yet you drop a gold post like it's nothing.

You started with a story @MTF and it was very compelling.

@Fox included a story too.

You both can write but I think Rob's thinking is a bit clearer and he arrived at a neater conclusion.

I notice Rob started with "I think" and also mentioned "I think" later. That didn't make what he wrote weaker to me, but stronger. I kept reading Rob's thinking without feeling the scientist/mathematician in me rebel at absolute statements.

Just saying I still suspect the authoritative stance on writing *may* have an adverse affect on how we think.

 

[biophase]

No, learned it through my own experience, while also noticing that peak performers, or the elite, as you call it, usually have extremely dysfunctional personal lives or mental issues, from 10 divorces to estranged children that want nothing to do with them. I won't go into names as such people here tend to be worshiped.

I’ve learned that I can only do one thing well at a time. That’s why one year would be 100% concentration on growing business and a little lax on health and working out. The next year, I would concentrate on health and let the business go on cruise control.

Regarding being an elite performer, I always knew that I was not one. Me and @snowbank once talked about hiring A performers for our businesses. When we asked each other if we thought we were A performers we both gave ourselves a B-. It’s good to know where your limits or should I say the limit of our efforts are.

 

[Panos Daras]

It is weak writing If you're writing an opinion piece, there's no point writing "I think." Everyone knows it's your opinion and there's no point in unnecessarily emphasizing that.

Amazing point. Do not use "I think" (or "I believe" in that matter). We know that you "think", you are breathing and talking. State your point and why.

If you can, use data or relevant valid research. At the very least personal experience.
No one can take that away from you, and when I hear it you become more relatable.

Also, a very bad habit people have in this forum is stating quotes from famous people.

Most of the time it is a weak argument that shows you are a classroom parrot with 0 critical thinking abilities (I am being hyperbolic just to make my point):

Example:

"I think I should have sex with my cousin"
--Albert Einstein

 

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[MitchC]

Great point.

If you are early in a new market than being an elite performer isn't that important.
"A rising tide lifts all boats"

However, how can you plan for that? Often this comes down to Lück and risk. And once it's clear that the new market IS very lukrative the competiton will increase. In mature markets where the Rules are clear elite performers have an edge.

And Just because something is very complex and has many variables doesn't mean that there aren't people that align to these conditions perfectly. Think Elon Musk.

Of course you can plan for that

Of course you can pick a growing market

Or a new traffic source or opportunity

Or a market where everyone does well

Or a big enough market where you are rewarded based on how good you are

The current one is TikTok shop, there’s probably others too but TikTok shop is on my radar rn

There’s so much opportunity out there

People are over complicating this

Can you provide value to someone?

Can you provide a unique value to someone?

How many millionaires have been made in the weightloss niche, there’s probably a new one being made every day.

Some dudes are good enough that they make 1m, some make 20k. It’s a big enough market that there’s room for everyone and always will be.

Like Andy said, it’s not winner take all.

Local businesses are even better. Builders etc. Barely any real sophisticated competition and plenty of opportunity to make millions.

 

[Black_Dragon43]

This reads well with reason.

And it makes sense.

I almost feel my heart warm as I read it.

But it is all philosophical, idealistic claptrap that fails at reality.

Theory like this works in textbooks and popular self-development books that preach following passions but it doesn't work in the real world.

For every 1000 people who believe this hogwash, 1 will succeed. And the other 999 will get eaten alive by a market who doesn't give a shit about what you feel about your inner self. And then after learning the harsh truth, they join the communist party hoping they will get paid millions to drum melodies on empty Home Depot buckets.

Sorry.

Everyone should print this message out and remember it. Self-development and happiness don't lead to cash.

 

[MakeItHappen]

Of course you can plan for that

Of course you can pick a growing market

Or a new traffic source or opportunity

Or a market where everyone does well

Or a big enough market where you are rewarded based on how good you are

The current one is TikTok shop, there’s probably others too but TikTok shop is on my radar rn

There’s so much opportunity out there

People are over complicating this

Can you provide value to someone?

Can you provide a unique value to someone?

How many millionaires have been made in the weightloss niche, there’s probably a new one being made every day.

Some dudes are good enough that they make 1m, some make 20k. It’s a big enough market that there’s room for everyone and always will be.

Like Andy said, it’s not winner take all.

Local businesses are even better. Builders etc. Barely any real sophisticated competition and plenty of opportunity to make millions.

I didn't want to sound pessimistic.

I was talking more about big business opportunities (hundreds of millions or billions) just as MTF was talking about the best of the best in a particular sport. I was not talking about whether one can make a million with new traffic sources or a little weight loss business. Because in the big business opportunities you will find geniuses and true elite performers. Good luck succeeding in a highly competitive mature market with many big players if you want to become a big player too. If you want to start the next big hedge fund on Wall Street to become a billionaire good luck. Then again if you want to become a millionaire by starting a small, niche investing community online that's more likely but you will not become a billionaire this way.

Usually, risk and reward go hand in hand and for everything you do there is an opportunity cost. Yes, there are sometimes asymmetric opportunities but more often than not if something is potentially very lucrative then there are either a lot of risks (not necessarily a bad thing) a lot of competition, or a combination of both.

 

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[MitchC]

I didn't want to sound pessimistic.

I was talking more about big business opportunities (hundreds of millions or billions) just as MTF was talking about the best of the best in a particular sport. I was not talking about whether one can make a million with new traffic sources or a little weight loss business. Because in the big business opportunities you will find geniuses and true elite performers. Good luck succeeding in a highly competitive mature market with many big players if you want to become a big player too. If you want to start the next big hedge fund on Wall Street to become a billionaire good luck. Then again if you want to become a millionaire by starting a small, niche investing community online that's more likely but you will not become a billionaire this way.

Usually, risk and reward go hand in hand and for everything you do there is an opportunity cost. Yes, there are sometimes asymmetric opportunities but more often than not if something is potentially very lucrative then there are either a lot of risks (not necessarily a bad thing) a lot of competition, or a combination of both.

I just reread the op after your reply and yeah I agree, I’m not going to reread the whole thread but I think somewhere in this thread before I started replying it went from “are you an elite performer, if not pick something realistic”, to “unless you are an elite performer you can’t succeed”.

Definitely agree with the op that some people are built different and goodluck competing with Elon Musk or Bill Gates.

I’ve heard some stories about what a savage Bill Gates was with his competitors, Jeff Bezos is the same.

Not only that they were freaks from birth. You read about Jeff Bezos childhood, and Elon Musks, they are not only obsessed and ruthless but on a superhuman level of intelligence too.

I guess I just kind of know I’m not them it’s just not even on my radar to try, I wouldn’t even want to have Elon or Bill Gates lives if you offered it to me.

I think Elon was quoted as saying “Death would be a relief to me”. That kind of intelligence and obsession must be exhausting.

Seems obvious to pick a market where you have a unique interest or value or spot an opportunity rather than go against Elon.

 

[Lex DeVille]

pick a market where you have a unique interest or value or spot an opportunity rather than go against Elon.

Pick a market where you have a unique interest/value/opportunity, then team up with Elon and let him add the word "Space" to whatever you're doing.

• Space rentals
• Space knives
• Space beer
• SpaceSex

 

[The-J]

View attachment 55440
Thoughts on this @MTF?

More follow your passion feel good nonsense, or proof everyone has a unique value they can provide to the world?

It's cool in theory. I think this is what we tend to want from our lives. We all want to do fun work, that gets paid well, that we get recognition for, and that does visible good in the world.

But there are some issues with it.

1) What you can be paid for - a lot of work is actually unpaid work. That might be spending hours researching ad content and landing pages that competitors are using, reading customer reviews to see the language they use. You don't get paid for that stuff. Much of it is "wasted".

2) What you are good at - if you are learning as you go, you're going to butt up against work you're not good at, but it still needs to get done. OK, you hire someone to do it, but maybe you're not good at managing people! So then you gotta get good at that, and you only get good by sucking first.

3) What you love - sometimes, what needs to be done doesn't inspire love. There are conversations that I have to have that I don't want to have, there are things I have to do that I don't want to do.

4) What the world needs - when you start, you often start with something that very few people actually want, and then you gotta go back to the drawing board. And, sometimes in the course of doing business, you find that your offer is no longer as compelling as it was when you started, because the WORLD has changed!

Just doesn't hold up to scrutiny.

 

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[Black_Dragon43]

Regardless of what you guys think, it’s always winner takes all. Always.

If I buy a palace, you can’t buy the same palace. If I marry a woman, you can’t marry the same woman.
If I build the biggest business in the world, you can’t build the biggest business in the world.

We’re getting crushed by the elites because we’re weak, effeminate and don’t have significant resources. Therefore we have no word at the table of the powerful when they decide how to split the spoils.

You can lie to yourselves all you want that it’s not winner takes all. But when the shit hits the fan and Amazon raises its fees as they always do, and it drains all the profits from eCommerce businesses that rely on their infrastructure, I’ll laugh my a$$ off.

Because that bald F*ck Bezos wants to legally rob you of ALL your money, ideally. And why wouldn’t he? Lures you in with the carrot, feeds you every day so you get nice and fat, until one day — snaps your neck and eats you!

And to those of you that say that business is about creating wealth from nothing — that is true, of course.

But the essence of money is basically the power to control what other people do. The really powerful people, who have control over hundreads of billions of dollars — they get to decide how resources are allocated, what the rules of the game should be, and so on.

And, the power to control what other people do is limited. And it’s always shared amongst those huge whales with access to more capital than you can imagine. And that power is definitely winner takes all.

 

[Johnny boy]

We are considered elite performers in our industry because we have all of our front teeth and have a working phone number.

#whateverittakestowin
#hustle
#grind

 

[MTF]

We are considered elite performers in our industry because we have all of our front teeth and have a working phone number.

#whateverittakestowin
#hustle
#grind

And this is a perfect example of engineering your own elite-performer-free category and owning it.

 

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[Hai]

Darwin never said this as it is one of those internet misquotes that continually get repeated. Nonetheless, the statement is quite true.



This reads well with reason.

And it makes sense.

I almost feel my heart warm as I read it.

But it is all philosophical, idealistic claptrap that fails at reality.

Theory like this works in textbooks and popular self-development books that preach following passions but it doesn't work in the real world.

For every 1000 people who believe this hogwash, 1 will succeed. And the other 999 will get eaten alive by a market who doesn't give a shit about what you feel about your inner self. And then after learning the harsh truth, they join the communist party hoping they will get paid millions to drum melodies on empty Home Depot buckets.

Sorry.

I assume a similar philosophical standpoint to The Surrender Experiment.

 

[MJ DeMarco]

I assume a similar philosophical standpoint to The Surrender Experiment.

As do I.

Definitely jives with my opinion -- the world will throw a lot of opportunities at you that fall into the box of "I don't feel like it" or "That's not my passion" -- that's where real growth and happiness is found.

 

[Jon822]

but rather flexibility and adaptability. Your ability to change in response to environmental feedback.

I know this will be wildly off topic but maybe some people will find it interesting. You can actually see adaptive evolution right in front of your eyes via bacteria. When subjected to some lethal medium, some bacteria will deregulate DNA maintenance and quickly replicate. Essentially, they are intentionally randomizing their traits to make it more likely that some descendants will become immune to the medium. Then the ones that are immune continue on as normal. This is how we created drug resistant strains of bacteria such as MRSA (methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus).

Evolutionary adaption in real time.

 

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