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10,000 Hours with Reid Hoffman: What I Learned | Ben Casnocha

16 Lessons Learned (Among Many!)
1. People are complicated and flawed. Root for their better angels.
2. The best way to get a busy person’s attention: Help them.

Most people think there’s no way to help someone as famous and wealthy as Reid or Bill Gates. Let’s run the thought experiment. How could you help Bill Gates? Donating to his favorite charity won’t help. There’s no one you could introduce him to who he can’t already meet. Buying a Microsoft product won’t make a difference in the grand scheme. But the truth is, what Gates craves, and what you might have, is information. A >>unique perspective<<. An **insight on something that’s happening in your corner of the universe**. He can’t buy that off a shelf. If you can connect information you know to something Gates needs—suppose your 10 year-old cousin is obsessed with a new app that may reveal a new trend in computing—he’ll find it valuable, and you’re more likely to be able to build a relationship with him. At the least, it’s a powerful first gesture that’s the opposite of “gimme.”

**Help first. Help first. Help first.** It’s key to building relationships – even with the ultra successful.

3. Keep it simple and move fast when conceiving strategies and making decisions.
4. Every weakness has a corresponding strength.
5. The values that actually shape a culture have both upside and downside.
6. Understand someone’s “alpha” tendencies and how that drives them.
7. >>Self-deception<< watch: even those who say they don’t need or want flattery, sometimes still need it.
8. Be clear on your specific level of engagement on a project.
9. Sketch three possible outcomes for a project: the likely upside, likely ‘regular’, and likely downside scenarios.
10. A key to making good partnerships great: Identify and emphasize any misaligned incentives.
11. Reason is the steering wheel. Emotion is the gas pedal.
12. Trade up on trust even if it means you trade down on competency.
13. Tell the truth. Don’t reflexively kiss ass to powerful people.
14. Respect the shadow power.

The point to those seeking to do business with poo bahs is to not underestimate the influence of shadow power—advisors, assistants, consultants, and most especially spouses. To be rude to them is to doom your chances at making progress with the man or woman at the center of the circle. The more powerful the person, the broader the circle, and the more the shadows loom.


15. Make people genuine partners and they’ll work harder.
16. Final: The people around you change you in myriad unconscious ways