A startup is a company designed to grow fast. Being newly founded does not in itself make a company a startup. Nor is it necessary for a startup to work on technology, or take venture funding, or have some sort of "exit." The only essential thing is growth. Everything else we associate with startups follows from growth.

As a founder and CTO, I have seen my company grow from when I used to write all the code, to the point I wrote almost none.

I just finished a project.

We spent 4 months building a software system, running experiments, writing an academic paper, and submitting it to a journal for publication. So now we are done. The end. Right?

No! This is what I call stopping at 90%.

When I was an assistant professor, I felt constantly overwhelmed. I had classes to teach, relationships with new colleagues to navigate, a lab group to assemble, and an infant at home—not to mention research to conduct and papers to publish. To get ahead, I took on any opportunities that were offered, including membership on various editorial boards and professional committees. Despite working like a madman, my productivity as measured by paper output was meager. I simply could not find time in my day for undistracted writing. And when I did find the time after an extended stretch away from writing, the warm-up period to get back into the paper was often long, further slowing my progress.

What’s the best time management strategy out there? Unfortunately, anyone who tells you they have the answer to that question is lying.

This is one of the fundamental perspectives that first-time entrepreneurs, and especially people who’ve never manufactured (created) a product, get wrong.

Недавно в очередной раз в разговоре всплыла тема использования мессенджеров в противовес электронной почте и я в очередной раз признался в сильной нелюбви к мессенджерам, которые требуют синхронного общения. То есть, если вам написали в мессенджер, то ждут ответа здесь и сейчас, тем более, что в большинстве мессенджеров видно, что вы сообщение получили и прочли.

Time management is one of those issues we all face, but (ironically) feel like we don’t have the time to address. But, as Benjamin Franklin once said, time is like money. Without being managed properly, how do you know where it’s going?

What do the calendars of entrepreneurs, VIPs, and famous business people look like?

Marketing Mix, a term coined by Neil Borden, are the ingredients that combine to capture and promote a brand or product’s unique selling points, those that differentiate it from it’s competitors. The ideas behind Borden’s model were refined over the years until E. Jerome McCarthy reduced them to 4 elements called “The Four Ps.” This proposed classification has been used by marketing companies, branding agencies and web design companies throughout the world.

A business needs to be able to move at two speeds: fast and slow. So what happens when you've lost your get-up-and-go?

I still see people think "talking to customers" works when validating an idea, but people don't always know what they want. I think real validation of an idea happens with executing it and then people getting their credit card out and paying you for it.

There’s a reason why you’re stuck in the same situation day after day.

You’ve tried to change things. Everyone does. You say today will be different, but then it just ends up being the same.

If you’re like me, you’re maybe a jobbing dev taking on contracts and occasionally your own gigs (and by-and-large this works out OK) but maybe you secretly hate yourself for being terrible at estimation, and wish you were better at it.

If that sounds like you, read on!

“We want to limit the length of a review in the product to 140 characters, because we may want to use SMS at some stage. That’s a small change, right?”

Wrong.

A year ago, I started working full-time at Bloomberg. That’s when I imagined writing this post. I imagined myself to be full of ideas that I could spit out on paper when the time comes. Just one month in, I realised it won’t be that easy: I was already forgetting things I learnt. They either became so internalized that my mind tricked me into believing I always knew them, or they slipped my mind.

This is what my calendar looked like one year after we started Wistia. And this is what my calendar looked like last year, 10 years after we began.

See anything that’s changed here in the last 10 years?

Look at all those meetings. I dreamed that someday my calendar would be full of important things to do. Being busy felt like natural byproduct of success. This is what the calendar of someone who is running a 100-person company should look like, right?

You can probably count on your fingers the number of times you’ve completed 8 hours of work in an 8-hour workday. Whether it’s endless meetings, constant emails, or coworkers popping in for a “quick chat,” your productivity rarely makes it through the day.

In my lifetime I’ve tried a dozen todo apps. In the beginning they all seem different, novel and special. Slick UI, shortcuts, tags, subtasks, the list goes on and on.

But all our stories were the same: I start using the new app, then after awhile I stop using it.

You don't have to solve the majority of hard problems you encounter in either business, design, or programming. Almost all of them can be restated as an easy problem, if you dare question the assumptions, reweigh the trade-offs, and stop diving after sunk cost.

There’s a distinction I often use that keeps coming up in conversations, and then people say “that’s really good, have you written it down anywhere?” and I have to shamefacedly admit that no, no I have not. Anyway, this is me writing it down somewhere.

How much does it cost Wikipedia to have one more person read an article? How much does it cost Chanel to produce one more bottle of perfume? How about one more digital copy of a Grateful Dead concert?

When I decided to write and sell my first ebook, The Tech Resume Inside Out, I expected to learn about the writing process. How to create a high-quality publication. How to work with editors. Designing a cover and illustrations for the book. And I have, indeed, learned plenty on these topics.

It might be that you’re losing money on every sale

(Which means that each and every item you sell, every service you perform, costs you money. Bigger won’t make you better…)

“I’m just so busy.” How many times have you heard a friend or coworker say this? Perhaps in a tone of exhaustion, but with a detectable hint of proud self-martyrdom? How many times have you said it yourself?

The economic situation is apparently so grim that some experts fear we may be in for a stretch as bad as the mid seventies.
When Microsoft and Apple were founded.

Why did you choose Scrum instead of Kanban? If you can’t answer that question, you didn’t choose Scrum. Someone else chose it for you.

Many teams start their day with the infamous three questions of the daily stand-up: "what did you do yesterday?", "what are you going to do today?", and "what are you blocked by?".

At Airtree Ventures, I’ve been lucky enough to meet hundreds of companies across many different verticals, business models and stages. While questions on pricing do come up on occasion, it’s surprising how often it’s overlooked given its direct impact on the success of any business. While a huge amount of effort is poured into product and sales & marketing, there is much less focus on pricing despite the magnitude of difference it can make.

Я надеюсь, что как грамотный разрабочик, вы имеете представление о unit-тестировании и сделаете себе в голове пару мысленных отметок о том, чего надо избегать при написании тестов.

Я тут столкнулся со странной проблемой организации рабочих задач. Про себя называю эту проблему «бульдозеризмом». Рассказываю.

Софт постоянно усложняется. Стабильность и простота расширения приложения напрямую зависят от качества кода.

К сожалению, почти каждый разработчик, и я в том числе, в своей работе сталкивается с кодом плохого качества.

На сегодняшний день рынок товаров и услуг офлайн (торговые точки, магазины, ларьки) отходит на второй план, люди начинают все больше и больше доверять онлайн-магазинам, и совершать покупки именно в сети Интернет. В связи с этим, количество интернет магазинов в Украине растёт с каждым месяцем, и практически все, не исключая самые крупные и раскрученные интернет магазины, нуждаются в свежем взгляде на решение своей главной проблемы,- проблемы увеличения продаж.

Хочу рассказать, как я начинаю работу над каждым проектом.

Раньше мне казалось, что это просто: обменялись парой писем или потрындели в скайпе пять минут — и всё, пора за работу. Ну вроде ты редактор, профессионал, знаешь что делать. Чего тут обсуждать, никогда не редактировал текст что ли?

На деле всё оказывается иначе.

Календарь дел основан на простом принципе: как не планируй, в конце концов, на решение задачи придётся потратить минуты, часы и дни. Календарь дел предлагает систему прямого управления временем. Все дела, все встречи, все задачи планируются в единственном месте — в календаре. Личные задачи ничем не отличаются от рабочих, они занимают время и их надо сделать, поэтому личные задачи планируются вместе с рабочими.

Пожалуй, всем знакома ситуация, когда хочется проигнорировать будильник и поглубже завернуться в одеяло. Рано вставать не нравится никому, просто «жаворонки», в отличие от «сов», к этому привыкли. Редким счастливчикам по роду деятельности ранний подъем не обязателен, и они вполне легитимно спят до полудня. Серийный предприниматель Брэндон Тернер был одним из них, пока однажды не решил встать пораньше ради эксперимента. Забегая наперед, скажем, что с тех пор он боготворит свой будильник.

Основная причина гибели хороших интернет-сообществ — отказ от самозащиты.

Где-нибудь в необъятных недрах интернета это происходит прямо сейчас. Когда-то на этом месте был чистый ухоженный сад для интеллектуальных бесед, куда приходили образованные и заинтересованные люди, привлечённые высоким уровнем доносящихся оттуда речей. Но вот в сад прибывает глупец и уровень бесед чуточку падает — или даже не на чуточку, если глупец вмешивается в разговоры с упорством, достойным лучшего применения.

Вы бедны, потому что неамбициозны.

Перед тем, как основать Alibaba, я пригласил к себе 24 друзей, чтобы обсудить эту бизнес-возможность. Мы проговорили уже два часа, но они все еще были немного сбиты с толку — должен признать, что тогда я высказывался не вполне внятно. Вердикт: 23 из 24, находящихся тогда в комнате, сказали мне бросить эту идею по множеству причин. Например: «Ты ничего не знаешь об интернете, и что важнее, у тебя нет стартового капитала».

Считается, что продуктивность основывается на эффективном управлении временем. Казалось бы, все просто — меньше тратишь времени на ерунду, больше — на достижение своих целей. Однако, если посмотреть на опыт людей, добившихся выдающихся результатов в искусстве, политике и бизнесе, то становится понятно, что залог их успеха точно не в том, что они больше времени тратили на работу, чем остальные. Уинстон Черчилль стал выдающимся политиком, хотя работал не больше, чем его предшественники и последователи, а Элон Маск стал наиболее выдающимся современным предпринимателем, хотя тысячи других предпринимателей и стартаперов работали не меньшее количество часов над своими проектами.

Мы не раз отмечали, что управляем прибыльной компанией в сегменте, где часто прибыльность откладывают на потом. Нас все время спрашивают, почему мы выбрали для себя прибыль как главную метрику успешности компании. В этой статье я решил рассказать о причинах, по котором мы решили сделать Basecamp прибыльной как можно скорее. За 17 лет существования мы были в плюсе ровно 17 лет. Прибыльность — особенность нашей компании (и продукта).

Один из очень интересных инструментов в арсенале дизайнера - работающие паузы.

Часто бывает, что нужно усадить жопу на стул, и просто честно махать интеллектуальной киркой час: дизайн не сделает себя сам. Тут все понятно.

Проблема наступает тогда, когда морщить лоб предстоит часов десять.

Деньги ты заработаешь, людей — наймешь. Потраченное время уже не вернешь. Это невосполнимый конечный ресурс в твоей битве с конкурентами.

В году 250 рабочих дней. Это 25 шансов серьезно улучшить продукт. 25 выстрелов в твоей битве. Это мало, поэтому не трать время зря.

В этой статье я представляю модель разработки, которую использую для всех моих проектов (как рабочих, так и частных) уже в течение года, и которая показала себя с хорошей стороны. Я давно собирался написать о ней, но до сих пор не находил свободного времени. Не буду рассказывать обо всех деталях проекта, коснусь лишь стратегии ветвления и управления релизами.

Очень легко делать продукт, который никому не нужен. Без понимания, есть ли у вас PMF и на какую юнит-экономику вы можете рассчитывать, вы не будете интересны инвесторам и у вас не будет шанса стать большими.

Ваш бизнес может продержаться какое-то время, но в конечном итоге умрет.

📢: Avoid Barrels

(A barrel is a file that exports code from other files)

Barrel benefits:
✅ Shorter import paths
✅ Support importing many files via one import
✅ "Hide" modules - Only export some modules for the "public" interface

But, I avoid barrels. Here's why:
🚫 Bloats the bundle. Inhibits tree shaking.
🚫 Increases memory usage.
🚫 Slows tooling (builds, tests, linting). Barrels create more modules to parse.
🚫 Slows code navigation ("Find all references" finds the barrel instead of the actual source).
🚫 Barrels shorten import paths and group related imports. Sounds nice, but it's an outdated benefit because I don't write imports anymore - my editor reliably auto-imports.

Simply put, asynchronous communication is when you send a message without expecting an immediate response. For example, you send an email. I open and respond to the email several hours later.

If you want to understand the importance of collaboration in the workplace, just look at the tools you use. There’s Slack and other IM tools for constant communication. Email and project management tools to send updates and important information. And Google docs, Dropbox, and others for working in real-time.

1. Мир хочет, чтобы вы оставались тупыми.

Чем вы тупее, тем вам проще продать продукты и услуги. Размер диагонали телевизора обратно пропорционален коэффициенту интеллекта.

Time management can be tough. What is urgent in your life and what is important to your life are often very different things.

This is especially true with your health, where the important issues almost never seem urgent even though your life ultimately hangs in the balance.

Что делать, когда попытки приучить себя к планированию провалились? Как быть, если жизнь по графику вызывает ощущение монотонности и скуки? Существует ли противоядие от нежелания выполнять поставленные задачи?

Если вы, так же как я, бросаете планирование спустя несколько дней, значит, нам есть о чём поговорить :)

I’ve spent a lot of time in my life trying to force myself to do things. Really good things. Things that are important to me. Things like meditating, journaling, going to the gym, and so on. I set schedules over and over. (I will rise at 5. Meditate, 530-630. Journal 630-730. Breakfast 8-9, and so on.) I fail way more than I succeed, which makes me really, really upset. I get angrier and angrier at myself, curse my lack of discipline, shame myself for watching Battlestar Galactica (again) instead of writing, delve into my psychology hoping to unearth the seeds of self-sabotage. It spirals out of control until I either give in to lying on the couch or somehow manage to squeeze out a day of discipline according to schedule, whereupon I exhale a half-sigh of relief and immediately begin bullying myself to repeat this tomorrow.

Bezos on experimental vs operational failure. Simple and elegant comparison. I always point out that there are two different kinds of failure. There's experimental failurethat's the kind of failure you should be happy with. And there's operational failure. We've built hundreds of fulfillment centers at Amazon over the years, and we know how to do that. If we build a new fulfillment center and it's a disaster, that's just bad execution. That's not good failure. But when we are developing a new product or service or experimenting in some way, and it doesn't work, that's okay. That's great failure. And you need to distinguish between those two types of failure and really be seeking invention and innovation.

It’s kind of incredible how many people I know now who have a story that goes:

I was having X really bad health issue, doctors told me to take Y medicine for the rest of my life. I did some research and tried Z lifestyle change first and that fixed it.

If you’re the proud owner of a new MacBook or MacBook Pro, and if you like crisp, 1:1 mapped pixels, your display settings should be “Looks like 1280 × 800” for 13-inch models and “Looks like 1536 × 960” on the 16-inch.

a friend shared his 1998 high school yearbook entry

Your outcomes are a lagging measure of your habits. Your net worth is a lagging measure of your financial habits. Your weight is a lagging measure of your eating habits. Your knowledge is a lagging measure of your learning habits. You get what you repeat. Your energy is a lagging measure of your sleep habits. Your fitness is a lagging measure of your exercise habits. Your clutter is a lagging measure of your cleaning habits.

For programmers it can be several hours. Why start working on this hard problem when I know the afternoon is going to be broken in half by a meeting?

Is there a name for the 10-minute period before a meeting starts where you’re like, there’s no point in getting to work on X, because I have a meeting in 10 minutes

Purely passive income is a lie

• Every project requires some maintenance
• Every project requires some mental capacity
• Every project requires some research

"Should I buy more? Should I sell more? How's that project doing?"

Point: passive income pretends to be passive

How to build a $1B company:

Don't.

Extreme success is almost all attributable to randomness. And take a look at all the billionaires: do you really envy their lifestyle? Hell no.

Instead, build a lifestyle based on your true preferences. A lot cheaper & more likely to realize.

To become an expert in any field, you have to be an ambitious learner first. Every expert started out as a curious novice once.

"Compound interest is the eighth wonder of the world"

If that sounds fluffy, perhaps this will convince you: Warren Buffett made 99.7% of his money after the age of 52.

At 21, his net worth was $20,000.

$6,000 to $73B does not happen overnight.

Anything done asynchronously is a form of automation.

You're replicating your current self to be available for a task in the future, w/o the need to be there.

Examples:

1. Recording a Loom is automation
2. Using a Calendly is automation
3. Writing a handbook is automation

🧘

Что работает в стартапе: agile, waterfall, авторитарный стиль, коллаборативный стиль, планирование, отсутсвие планирования.

Что не работает в стартапе: надеяться, что придут другие люди и решат твои проблемы.

A great framework for change management by Dr. Mary Lippitt.

Take a minute each day to call or email someone to express gratitude of some type. Consider someone you haven’t spoken with in a long time. It can be a one-line text or a 5-second voice note.

Most impactful @naval quote on my life

Leverage is the secret weapon of productivity:

Automate one process, save hours every week, reinvest that time, repeat

Трохи промтів для спілкування з АІ

Message from your future self:

"Stop using a $2,000 laptop while sitting on a $20 chair. I'm now paying $2,000/yr in physiotherapy!"

You are responsible for your own happiness.

Tips I use to avoid burnout:

• Learn to say "no" more often. Know your limits. It's easy to over-commit
• Time is your biggest asset. Spend it on what matters most.
• It's OK to ask for help. This includes seeking collaboration vs. going alone
• Take short breaks to recharge

Learn to sell. Learn to build. If you can do both, you will be unstoppable.

Real wealth is not about money.

Real wealth is:
-not having to go to meetings
-not having to spend time with jerks
-not being locked into status games
-not feeling like you have to say “yes”
-not worrying about others claiming your time and energy

Real wealth is about freedom.

You think you know something, until you try writing about it.

The difference between motion and action.

Motion:
-talk to a personal trainer
-research your book idea
-explore different types of meditation

Action:
-do 10 squats
-write 1 sentence
-meditate for 1 minute

Motion feels like progress. Action is progress.

Either we agree on how to measure it, or it becomes politics.

The modern devil is cheap dopamine.

You probably couldn’t pull it off before but you probably can now if you’re WFH:

When you feel your energy wane, take an afternoon nap.

I bet you’ll get WAY more done in the day with a 20 minute break than you will trying to power through.

Don’t be discouraged: the default state of new ideas is that they won’t work. Finding something that will is going to take many more attempts.

A key to being able to get things done is to work with what you have.

I see a lot of people hold back from doing anything, because they’re waiting for the perfect thing to show up.

The perfect tool. The perfect project. The perfect idea. I call it perfection paralysis.

I am sad how well arbitrary deadlines work.

You can’t think and do product at the same time.

Try to make your code as readable as possible and less complex. When working with conditions, get rid of invalid cases first, by exiting or throwing exceptions, and do the real logic later. It's called "Early return pattern" as the functions return as soon as possible

Imagine how effective you would be if you weren’t anxious all the time.

The wrong approach and the right approach to startups

Start a company to automate your job. Your first customer can be your current employer.

To be more productive, eliminate distractions.

Do the most important thing first each day and you'll never have an unproductive day.

A better way to “network:”

Send more cold emails. Don’t ask for anything. Express gratitude for their work. Never expect something in return.

Do this for years.

Your first business doesn't need to change the world. It just needs to change yours.

Becoming a parent is probably the best motivator to try to arrange your life such that you don’t need anyone’s permission to be with your kids.

A framework to re-evaluate how you spend your most valuable resource: time.

Do I need this in my life? If no, eliminate.
If yes, ⬇️
Does this require critical thinking? If no, automate.
If yes, ⬇️
Am I the best person for this? If no, delegate.

Eliminate. Automate. Delegate. 🔁

You're not an employee, you're a business. We just changed all the names.

• Posting your resume is marketing
• Interviewing is sales
• Salary negotiation is pricing
• Your employer is your customer

You were meant to make things, but not by being a cog in the machine.

Bad sleep, bad decisions.