First In, Last Out

Cockroach. That’s what my professional mascot would be if I had one.

Being the first-in and last-out at work these days isn’t nearly as cool as it used to be. Whether you work in an office, at home, or at your local pet shop, there’s a Cal Ripken, Jr., in your organization.

Is it you?

My grandparents referred to this characteristic as work ethic. For my parents, it was a non-negotiable. “If you don’t work, you don’t eat,” was the edict that ruled our home when I was growing up.

I’ve had a job-job since I was a kid. From household and gardening chores to putting food on the table, I was expected to be a contributor from the git-go.

Bussing tables, washing dishes, mowing lawns, cleaning windows … it was normal and expected that if you were able, you worked. 

This isn’t the case today. Not where I live.

I know poor kids by name that have $600 smart phones and $150 sneakers. Some of these kids have spent more time at professional sporting events and concerts than cleaning their room.

I would say most kids think Manual Labor is the relief pitcher the Yankees just traded for … but then again, most kids don’t watch baseball so what the hell do I know.

Honestly, my parents, teachers, coaches and professors will tell you I was thick. Nothing — and I mean nothing — came easy for me. I wasn’t trying to be difficult. My brain simply processed information differently and not nearly as efficiently as those around me.

But it didn’t matter. I kept at it. I studied longer. I read and re-read. I got up earlier and stayed up later just to scrape by with a C. But boy, I’m glad I did. Without even knowing it, I was learning to outwork, out hustle, and outlast the competition. And this quality has stayed with me my entire career.

So here’s my challenge for those who still want to do something great:

1. How much time are you committing to practice your craft? Because all the greats out-practice their opponents. All of them.
2. How much time are you putting into doing really great work? It’s awfully tough to produce something amazing between 9–12 a.m., and 1–5 p.m.
3. How much thought and preparation are you putting into your meetings and calls? What are you doing to get better when you’re off the clock?

If you’re tripping over the fact that you’re not where you want to be at this stage in your career, or like many, believe you’re not earning what you’re worth, I hate to break it to, but here’s the gospel truth:

We design and build our own realities. And unless you’re the guy born on Third Base who thought he hit a triple, if you want a great life, you are going to have to earn it.

Step One: Be the first one in and last one out. Work you ass off in-between.

Step Two: Accept the fact your financial future is completely up to you.

Step Three: Don’t expect to get paid until you create serious value for others.

Outhustle. Outserve. Outperform. First in, last out.

Get the Hell Out! (Don't Quit)

I'm an idiot. This was a terrible mistake. It’s over. Three lies that slip past the ears of every entrepreneur as they approach failure … and success.

If these words haven’t played in your head before, you’re not taking big enough risks. For the rest of us, all I can say is you’re not nuts. Well, maybe you are nuts but not because of the negative self-talk looping in your head.

Anyone who has striven to do something great has heard this voice. The difference is entrepreneurs that eventually succeed tend to have advocates that refuse to put up with the negative bullshit we tell ourselves.

Don’t take my word for it. Read Jonathan Haidt’s fascinating book, The Happiness Hypothesis: Finding Modern Truth in Ancient Wisdom. You’ll soon learn it’s perfectly normal to have these feelings of loss, sadness and isolation in life as you ride along on your elephant. (Read the book.)

For me, I had to learn to stop taking myself and my ideas so seriously. The world will go on without me. And if our dreams aren’t something that can be realized in months or years or even within our lifetime, we still get to choose to find happiness both within ourselves and with others.

So before you nuke your project and jump into Dante’s outermost ring of pain, take a deep breath, drink a large glass of water, and force yourself to take an eight-hour nap. When you wake up, the world will still be here. It may not be as good as the one you imagined but it’ll still be here. And guess what? It needs you. That’s right. The world needs you.

Have a little faith, friend. Yesterday wasn’t your day. Today may not be either. But trust me: in the not-too-distant future, you will get another chance to do something great if you don’t quit.

I’m just hoping the person you were born to be shows up and not the weirdo talking all of that end-of-the-world nonsense that’s wracking your brain.

You’ve got what it takes. You’ve put in your 10,000 hours. You’ve mastered your craft. Get back on your horse and get the heck out of Hades.

Giddy’up!

Angel Funding 101: How committed are you?

Stick with me. This is good stuff.

As a greying entrepreneur, I get hit up for advice and funding. (Mostly funding.) The truth is, I hit up my share of veteran entrepreneurs when I was striking out. When rookies hit me up now, I try to make myself available but with one caveat.

If you want my advice on your career or a venture you’re working on, you have to tolerate a parable first and then answer a few questions. The parable is from the gospel of Saint Matthew and it goes like this:

“The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field. When a man found it, he hid it again, and then in his joy went and sold all he had and bought that field.”

Alright. Let’s break it down.

The treasure was obviously hidden. What was this guy doing digging around on someone else’s property? The fact he chose to hide it “again” means the treasure wasn’t in plain sight.

The guy scores a few points considering he decided against stealing it.

Maybe he was honest. Maybe he knew he couldn’t keep or sell it without getting busted.

He definitely had an idea of what the treasure was worth.

And why did he hide it again? My guess: if he found it, it’s likely someone else would, too.

To me, the most valuable phrase in this parable is, “in his joy”.

Joy is a powerful word. It seems this dude had a genuine sense of satisfaction and personal fulfillment in whatever it was he found. And to top it off, he knew what his possessions were worth.

Assuming this guy may have been married, he would have had to talk the missus into selling her stuff, too.

Listen, it’s one thing to be excited about an opportunity. It’s another to persuade others to buy into your vision and mutually commit. This leaves us with two big questions:

What did the treasure consist of?

When I ask entrepreneurs this question, I get a version of one of the following answers:

“Financial independence!”

“Market share!”

“Being admired as an industry leader by my peers!”

Wrong, wrong, and wrong.

I’m skipping ahead here but here’s how I address these kinds of responses.

It’s you that is hidden in the box. YOU.

This always triggers a response like, “How can I be in the box? I found the box!”

I remind them we cannot be discovered until we first discover ourselves. If you ask anyone who has achieved success, you learn there are no big breaks. These folks believed in themselves when few others did and they refused to quit until they found their joy.

Now, if they are asking for funding, I ask them one more question: 

Are you asking me to sell my stuff to buy your field?

While they’re letting that question sink in, I kindly convey the following:

1. Discover yourself FIRST.

2. Prepared to make serious sacrifices to achieve what it is you seek.

3. Get used to putting in tons of ass-breaking work.

Only then, can we begin to understand the cost of being fully committed.

Grandma's Porn Problem

Food Porn, Travel Porn, Adventure Porn, Porn Porn: These are the drugs of choice that slowly crush our souls and steal our joy.

In the latest issue of The New Yorker, now on newsstands everywhere, they cover the state of modern pornography.

"In 2014, Pornhub alone had seventy-eight billion page views, and XVideos is the fifty-sixth most popular Web site in the world. Some porn sites get more traffic than news sites like CNN, and less only than platforms such as Google, Facebook, Amazon, and PayPal."

Whether your fingerprints are on one or more of those 78 billion page views, the truth is, we all have a serious porn problem. Even grandma.

Pornography, as defined in most dictionaries, means printed or visual material containing the explicit description or display of sexual organs or activity, intended to stimulate erotic rather than aesthetic or emotional feelings.

"Rather than aesthetic or emotional feelings." That got me thinking.

Think about how much time we waste looking at explicit displays of ... everything. Games and movies. Cooking shows. Travel magazines. Adventure catalogues. Foodie blogs and news feeds.

All of these ancillary forms of "porn" are eating up large amounts of our time and resources.

Recently, one of my heroes was ranting that Red Bull was nothing more than a seller of Snuff. A friend of mine pointed out that if that is true, and I believe it is, than this icon of mine (I'm looking at you, Yvon Chouinard), is guilty of being a purveyor of Adventure Porn. Ouch. (Let's just say my friend completely ruined my habit of reading Patagonia catalogues cover-to-cover.)

Whatever it is in the virtual world that's sucking the reality out of our lives and relationships, let's knock it off. 

Let's go outside and do something. Spend time with another living being.

Let's go somewhere we've never been. Let's talk to the people we meet along the way.

Make something. Start a new business. Start a new school. 

Trade information for experiences.

The point is this: stop fantasizing and start doing.

Who farted? When business honeymoons end.

Remember when the love of your life let it rip for the first time?

Dad was painting his house when he heard JFK had been shot.

I was waiting for the bus on a dark December morning when I learned John Lennon was gone forever.

How strange that our brains index certain memories this way.

Do you remember where you were when that special someone — that gorgeous, intelligent person that seemed too good to be true — let one rip right in front of you for the very first time?

I grew up in a conservative, religious home. In a house full of kids, including adopted kids, neighborhood kids and foreign exchange kids. We were reared (pun intended) to be respectful. Especially when it came to containing bodily noises.

I had to attend Etiquette Class as a kid. Under no circumstance were you to fart in public … or as my mom called it, “passing wind”.

I made it through High School without ever hearing a member of the opposition sex cut the cheese. Stack of Bibles. And when I departed for college, I was under the impression this just wasn’t something girls did.

And then it happened.

If you have ever truly and completely loved someone, and then, for whatever reason, they pinch one off within earshot for the first time, it can be fairly traumatic.

Whether it sounded like a mouse squeak or a violent clap of thunder, it can be quite an unsettling experience for all involved.

Where am I going with this nonsense? Well, people do this metaphorically in business every day.

We work so hard to create new customers and develop meaningful working relationships. We go to extreme measures to impress others in order to convey our profound level of commitment, dedication and professionalism. And then, when everything appears to have reached unprecedented levels of goodness, the apple of your eye does the unthinkable. Or worse, you do. And nothing will ever be the same. But that’s OK. Because it isn’t natural for us to sustain this kind of unrealistic expectations in the first place.

The truth is, everybody farts. Literally and figuratively. Get over it.

The next time you catch yourself either trying to produce completely unrealistic results in order to impress a client or colleague, or worse, the next time you embarrass yourself by nearly sharting yourself in a collaborative situation, do yourself a favor. Follow these three simple steps:

1. Offer a simple apology. Then go for a really long walk.
2. After the walk, using 100 words or less, write down what you learned from the situation and what you can do to avoid doing it again.
3. If you can’t get face-to-face, call the person and talk through the situation. Whatever you do, find a way to inject some humor.

Here’s what I’ve experienced after most post-fart standoffs:

It doesn’t take long for everyone to see the situation as a shared experience. A gift, really … a kind of unique breakthrough that can lead to new levels of honesty, mutual respect and collaboration.

Poopourri: When deals go bad

No one — and I mean nobody — enjoys fart humor more than my kids. Just ask their teachers.

Early in my career, a terribly successful entrepreneur and mentor taught me an invaluable lesson:

Everyone — and I mean everybody — poops.

The banker you’re meeting with, the investors shooting holes in your business plan, and yes, the girl of your dreams that seems so unobtainable ... they all go number two.

It was 1990-something and I had to screw my courage up and fly to New York to meet with a big shot at Dow Jones. This guy controlled a piece of software I needed. It didn’t humor him I was from west of the Hudson and was wearing cowboy boots. Short story: I earned exclusivity to that piece of software (which was valued at $2 million) for $70,000. Giddy’up.

One of the things that got me on the plane to NYC was knowing this guy wasn’t any better (or worse) than me. Sure, he was an Ivy Leaguer and made more in a week than I’d earn in a year, but we were the same. It took me a few more years to learn this ancient truth has a b-side … and it isn’t half as melodic.

In business and in life, the things we love can and will go to shit.

While some treasures are recoverable, like the tiny toy my kid ingested and, thank God, successfully “passed”, some golden nuggets are never coming back.

When this happens, even you, the most optimistic, tenacious bootstrapper on the block, must learn to accept it and move on.

But you probably won’t. Not at first.

“I can salvage this thing!”, you tell yourself.

“All I need is an expensive peace offering.”

“I’ll make them an offer they can’t refuse!”

The next thing you know, you’re that proverbial guy that stunk up the office lavatory after a long night of saki and bad sushi.

As in life, so it is in business: you cannot cover a deal gone bad with Lysol, candles or the incense your roommate uses to mask his use of Golden Goat.

Take it from an old pro … it’s time you learn to walk away with some dignity ... and make it snappy.

The next time you wake up and realize the amazing thing you had in your possession is sunk for good, dismount and walk away. Clean yourself up. Get a good night’s rest. And for goodness sake, stop talking about it.

The sun will come up and there’s a cup of coffee with your name on it somewhere. Gulp it down and open yourself up to new possibilities.

Oprah and the F Bomb

I love Oprah. I want to be her friend. I want my dog to be her dog’s friend. But she’s wrong.

Speaking to a graduating class at Harvard, Gayle King’s best friend sought to inspire a few brilliant, budding humans with these words of encouragement:

“There is no such thing as failure; failure is just life trying to move us in another direction.”

When I read this story, I was immediately reminded of the expression repeated by kind-hearted teachers, instructors and workshop facilitators everywhere: “There are no bad ideas!”

I hate to break it to you, kid, but there are tons of bad ideas. Tons. And we can’t get to a good idea until we mow through all of the shitty ones first.

So, too, it is with failure. Which leads us to today’s four-letter F-word.

At some point between the Vietnam War and Barney & Friends, American society began to disassociate itself from the idea of failure. I’m not suggesting losing was once a cardinal virtue; I just think there has been a deliberate attempt to deemphasize what it means for kids to experience failure.

As a young entrepreneur, I was fortunate to grow up in a home that not only acknowledged failure, we embraced it.

In my early days of launching and managing fledgling start-ups, I was lucky to be surrounded by older, wiser advisors who would teach me how to fail quickly and inexpensively. They would say things like, “Noah, that’s the worst idea I’ve ever heard … if you do this, you’re going to lose your ass.” Every once in a while, they would also say, “Drop everything else you’re working on and make this idea happen.”

At each company I’ve helped, I’ve tried to create a fun and safe environment where talented people have the freedom to screw up. I would create “Best Idea Wins” contests to solve simple and sometimes intractable problems.

Many times, the best ideas came from summer interns like Veronique Valcu. Vero was a sophomore at Penn. Over a six-week internship, she helped us put together an idea that would land our little upstart on the stage of TEDGlobal.

Vero later told me that she was “this” close to accepting an internship in New York where she would have been a glorified coffee girl. You know what the golden rule is for coffee girls and boys? DON’T SCREW UP. The exact opposite of what I’m talking about.

Whether you’re striking out on your own or running a billion-dollar enterprise, don’t rob yourself and your teammates by ignoring the important role failure plays in human progress and development.

I’m reminded of what FDR said while sitting fireside during the darkest days of World War II: “There’s nothing to fear but fear itself.” 

For entrepreneurs, we need to conquer our fear of looking or sounding stupid. We need to master our fear of being wrong.

One day before tomorrow

It’s safe (and a little sad) to say I’ve spent half my life living in the future.

I came by it honestly. My father is a futurist. This guy had me reading Peter Drucker, Tom Peters and Charles Handy before I could get my hands on the swimsuit edition of Sports Illustrated. Thanks to Jim Roberts, I was instilled with confidence that I had what it takes to put a dent in the universe.

Dad was a “you can watch the news or make the news” kind of guy.

He would say, “God has big plans for you!”, which used to feel more like a curse than a blessing. It wasn’t until I was a grown man that I realized God has big plans for everyone.

On my 33rd birthday, Dad reminded me Jesus saved the whole world at 33. 

“Yeah … I’m probably not going to do that this year.”

To counter-balance Dad, my mother, Saint Judy of Boise, made sure I understood I was no better — and no worse — than everybody else.

Treat the President with the same dignity and respect as the homeless man down the street,” she would say. She loved to quote Rudyard Kipling and his famous poem, “If — ”, especially the part about walking with kings yet never losing the common touch. Mom was all about that.

The sad truth is, I over-corrected like most entrepreneurs tend to do. I became so obsessed with shaping the future, I found it nearly impossible to focus on right-this-second.

Maybe it was having three kids or working 80-hour weeks for 20 years. Maybe it was all those trips to Africa. Whatever it was, I finally discovered the world will go on without me. It was here long before I arrived. It will be here long after I’m gone.

By obsessing on crazy-big, cancer-curing ideas all those years, I overlooked the magic that can only happen when you pour yourself into someone right in front of you.

Now that I’m on the tail-end of half time, both career-wise and as a parent, I feel lucky to discover what the world needs most from us is to for us to give ourselves to the small and seemingly insignificant things under our nose.

It’s tough to free yourself of the glory days and heartbreakers of the past. For me, it’s more difficult to free my mind of the future I used to visualize. For me, I have to carve out time and open my eyes to what’s around me.

Today, I am convinced my greatest contribution to this world is likely in the magical space that exists between me and the people that surround me right this moment. Which happens to be one day before tomorrow.