Invest Like the Best with Patrick O'Shaughnessy
· Patrick O'Shaughnessy, David Senra
And then the answer to this question that I love to ask is predominantly, "Someone bet on me." And like I told you before, the thing I love more than anything is, like, seeing the potential in somebody before everyone else and then helping the world see what I see. Like, if I can do one thing over and over and over again the rest of my life, it would be audition people to see if there's something that I see that no one else sees and then help foster that and show everyone else what I think I see in a way that can be impactful in that person's life, which is what you described with our experience together. [00:00:00] S1: I think in the probably hundreds, I don't know, thousand conversations we've had, I don't think you've ever described it in such an easy-to-understand, impactful way like you just did, where it's just like, the whole point of this whole thing is just to help other people. [00:00:00] S0: You said before you were chasing something, right? [00:00:00] S1: Yeah.
· David Senra, Patrick O'Shaughnessy
[00:00:00] S1: Yeah. [00:00:00] S0: I'm not chasing anything. I think it might be an interesting conversation today to talk about... or, you know, how we view what we're doing in slightly different ways. But I have no goals. I'm not a goals person. I've written essays about not having goals. The most read thing I ever wrote, back when I used to do a lot of writing, was about... it was called The Growth Without Goals. And so, I'm not chasing any particular thing. I don't have a big, hairy, audacious goal or something like this. I don't want to put someone on Mars like Elon might. And not to say that that's a bad thing. I think some people are goal-oriented and that's awesome. But that's not me. And I guess I've realized that if I have a goal in the abstract sense, it's just this thing, over and over and over again. There's this amazing talk that I recommend everyone watch called Inventing on Principle. Have you seen this? [00:00:00] S1: Yeah.
· David Senra, Patrick O'Shaughnessy
[00:00:00] S1: Yeah. [00:00:00] S0: It was a talk given by a computer scientist named Bret Victor, and he espouses this idea that you should find a principle that you want to... his principle was digital creators should have instant feedback with their creation. So just like if you paint something with a paintbrush, you get instant feedback. You see the paint immediately. Whereas in computer science, you'd have to code over here and compile, and then you'd eventually see your result. There was this gap. And so his principle was to collapse that gap. That was his life's mission. And I love that way of thinking about finding one's life's mission, is find a principle. Don't necessarily have a goal, but find a principle. And my principle is, like, when I see undiscovered talent, it is my obligation to do this thing, to get to know them, to learn from them, to start introducing them to people, to start... I don't need to get anything out of it. Like, what I get out of it is the thing. That's the point. [00:00:00] S1: But you're one of the few people in the world that have actually identified this organizing principle and then built a wonderful business around that. [00:00:00] S0: Yeah. [00:00:00] S1: And I could see, like... We've talked about this a million times, but the media and investing are not two separate things. If you actually know Patrick and what is important to him, like, they are the exact same thing.
· Patrick O'Shaughnessy, David Senra
[00:00:00] S0: It's taken me a long time to articulate that principle. A decade. And that's okay. Like, don't get discouraged if you don't watch Bret Victor's talk and can't name your principle an hour later. Like, it takes time. But, you know you've found your principle when it starts informing literally every decision you make every day with your time. And that's what it does for me and it becomes universal. Like, on my team, for example. We're 16 people, something like that. Now, this is how I think about my team. It's like, "Who can I find and see something in and bring them in and then make their career explode, hopefully, in an amazing way?" And so it can be investing, it can be just in friendship, it can be on your team. Like, a good principle can be applied everywhere. And that's why I think this idea is so powerful, to do the work to find your principle for invention. And I have no idea where it will take us, that's the other fun part. One of the reasons I don't like goals is I think very talented people, when they set a goal, they tend to do it. And that's why goals are interesting to lots of people, it's a great way to make progress. But I find it unexciting because the second you set some big goal, you kind of know what's going to happen because you go do it and you know the road in front of you, and you have blinders on. And I don't actually like having blinders on. I like to go-- Everything that's ever worked for me has come out of the periphery. You know, Sam Hinkie texts me about you. Like, I wasn't looking for a podcaster to promote. [00:00:00] S1: Yeah.
· David Senra, Patrick O'Shaughnessy
[00:00:00] S1: Yeah. [00:00:00] S0: You were not the result of some goal that I was seeking. You were just something that like, came out of left field. And everything interesting I've ever done came out of left field, which is why I don't keep long-term goals or short-term goals, is that opportunity just... I'm very open to opportunity along this principle, and so I'm very enamored of this idea for how to live. [00:00:00] S1: At what age did you stop having goals?
· Patrick O'Shaughnessy
[00:00:00] S0: Well, this essay that I wrote… I'm 40 now – I wrote when I was 28, because I wrote it on the train. I used to commute back and forth from New York City to Stamford, Connecticut. And I was about to have my first child, my son Pierce. And my dad, when I was 21, handed me this book of letters that he had been writing to me since I was born, and a lot of them were when I was like a baby, like the... And I've done the same thing for my son, and it's the same pattern. There's tons of letters in the first couple of years, and then it gets more spaced out, and now I do one on his birthday every year and things like this. And I'm going to give him a packet of letters as well when he turns 21. And I remember starting this process of wanting to write him a letter before he was born. And it got me wondering about, like, "What is good parenting? Like, what do I want to do as a dad?" And I believe deeply in showing, not telling. Like, I think maybe that's another reason I don't like being interviewed. I don't like telling, I'd rather just set an example. But, I was thinking, "What example do I want to show Pierce?" And then I don't remember my exact chain of thinking, but it ended up in this idea of everything I just talked about. So it was born of wondering, like, "What example do I want my son to see and emulate?" Because I'm sure you've learned this about kids as well, they don't do what you tell them. They do what you do. They just copy you. So how you behave is how you parent, and I was thinking about that at age 28 and wrote this thing. And so that's where it came from. So right around then is probably the first time I thought about it.