Lenny's Podcast: Product | Career | Growth
01:06:32 · G2 Patel
But when we were walking back, there's all these people and he would just start talking to them and he'd bust out in different languages. He'd talk to someone in German, talk to someone in French, someone in Spanish, someone in Hindi, someone in. And at some point in time in Mandarin. And at some point in time I stopped, "Dude, how many languages do you speak?" He's like, "Oh, I speak, I don't know, 12 or 14 or some ridiculous number. But I try to learn a new language every year." I'm like, "Oh, why is that?" And he goes, "Well, I just want to honor the people that come here and not be presumptuous that they will speak in the language that I know." I want to speak in their language. And I'm thinking to myself, I was a box at the time. I'm like, "This guy is smarter than every person on the executive team and probably just as smart as every salesperson we have, but he's making $10 a day and all of us are enjoying this amazing life, and it's because we have access to a platform and he doesn't." So when people start confusing life thinking that, "Everything that I've earned is because of my amazing abilities." I always question that, because there's a lot of luck in this thing. But when luck does present itself, be extremely prepared to capitalize on it. And make sure that you pick the platform that can actually give you that springboard. Because platforms really matter. And if we, like I had the platform and benefit of America, of education, of being in tech, of having great friends and mentors, all of those things created compounding value. But I intentionally sought out those platforms, seek out the platform, be obsessed about being extremely prepared, and don't be intellectually lazy. Laziness is not a good trait. So do the preparation that's needed. And then just make sure that during that time period that you're doing, if you build a community around you of people that are vested in your success, I think it's just, life is just a more fun way to live it, rather than being the lone wolf that's going at it by themselves. And that's why I always feel like making sure that you are expressive and communicative and don't try to carry the entire world's burden on your shoulders, but actually share it with people with you, the people that you share it with actually appreciate that you're sharing it with them. And most people in the world love to help.
01:09:11 · G2 Patel, Lenny Rachitsky
So ask for the help, but make sure that that help is not transactional. And don't just go to them when you need something. Actually try to add value first for a long enough amount of time, not because at some point you might need something from them, just hard-wire yourself into adding value to others. And then eventually that value starts showing up, and life's just a better way to live life. And I do feel like right now it's hard for kids getting into the workforce and all of that. So, don't lose hope and stay persistent and have stamina, because these things go up and down. But if you kind of stick with it, the people that have the most amount of persistence, it's very seldom that they don't end up winning. [01:10:00] S1: Something that comes to me as you share this advice. Arnold Schwarzenegger's has this book that he put out, and I feel like the title of the book is the best piece of advice, and the simplest way to describe How to be Successful in Life, which is be useful. [01:10:19] S0: That is so good. [01:10:22] S1: Jeetu, this was incredible. Is there anything that we didn't cover that you wanted to share? Anything you want to leave listeners with before we get to our very exciting lightning round? [01:10:29] S0: I think there's a framework that I use for great companies that might be worth kind of sharing with people. [01:10:29] S1: Yes. [01:10:34] S0: There's a six part framework that I have, which is in descending order of importance, and on how to build great companies. This is- [01:10:47] S1: Amazing.
01:10:48 · G2 Patel
[01:10:48] S0: You get it for free, you get what you pay for it, so take it with a grain of salt. But here's the way I think about it. The most important thing is timing. The six things you need in a company, if you don't have all these six, you don't win. But they're stack ranked in descending order of importance, but you have to have all six. Number one is timing. It's the most important. It's the thing that you control the least. And there's a lot of companies that have built amazing products, amazing services at the wrong time, in the right market and not won, right? And so timing really matters. You don't control timing, but if you don't have timing, you don't win. Number two is the market. You have to be able to go after a large enough market, a chunk at a time. And if you're not able to go out and prosecute a market a chunk at a time, but make sure that that keeps getting bigger and bigger, it's very hard to win. So market tends to be the second most important thing in my mind after timing. The third one then is team. You have to have the right team. And the team does not mean just people liking each other. Team means that it is actually well-rounded. That means the things that you suck at someone else is really good at, and you have both accepted that of each other. For example, I have a person that I never go to another job without, and she is my partner in crime. And the reason I have her is because she is so good at things that I'm not good at. And so she's able to, any job I've taken since I've been working with her, it's always, it's a combined deal. If we don't have two offers, we don't go. And so team is really important, a well-rounded team where people understand how to complement each other. And by the way, in the team, sometimes people say, "Well, isn't team more important than market?" No, if you have a great market mediocre team, the market pulls you up. If you have a shitty market and a great team, the market drags you down. The market always wins. So no, timing, market, team. Number four is product. I think product is the soul of a company. That's the place where people seek value is, what are you delivering to me? What problem are you solving to me gets manifested through the delivery of a product. So you have to make sure that you build a great product. I actually think it's unethical to have a mediocre product sold in the market.
01:13:07 · G2 Patel, Lenny Rachitsky
So timing, market team, product number five is brand. I had a mentor one time that told me, Mark Lewis, he said, "Jeetu, don't ever go to a company who's lost their brand mojo, because very hard to resurrect it back." If they have lost their product and you cannot fix the product. But do you think Sybase is coming back? No. Once you lose your brand and once you lose the trust, people don't come back to you that much. It's very hard to do. And then number six is distribution. Just because you build it, they will not come. You have to make sure that you figure out a scaled mechanism of getting that offering to many, many people. And so timing trumps market, market trumps team. Team trumps product, product trumps brand, brand trumps distribution. You don't have all six, you don't win. [01:13:54] S1: What an amazing nugget to have at the end here, just so I understand how you think about this is, do you have a template that you work through when you're thinking about a new business unit or new product to launch? Is it is timing, right? Is market, what market do we start with? How do you actually operationalize?
01:13:54 · Lenny Rachitsky, G2 Patel
[01:13:54] S1: What an amazing nugget to have at the end here, just so I understand how you think about this is, do you have a template that you work through when you're thinking about a new business unit or new product to launch? Is it is timing, right? Is market, what market do we start with? How do you actually operationalize? [01:14:09] S0: It's actually exactly like that. I will ask myself the question on, "Is this the right time for us to go out and double, triple, quadruple down?" We might still be in experimentation mode, but do I need to double down on this right now because this might not manifest for another seven years and then we're going to be too early. And by the way, you have to know the difference between a megatrend and a hype cycle. When there's a megatrend, don't fight it and don't succumb to the temptation of trying to go out and do vanity work for a hype cycle. And there's a big difference between the two. And I think having the judgment, the older you get, the better that judgment gets. It's just miles. But having that judgment is really important because you see a pattern recognition at some point. [01:15:00] S1: I imagine AI megatrend.
01:15:00 · Lenny Rachitsky, G2 Patel
[01:15:00] S1: I imagine AI megatrend. [01:15:02] S0: AI is a megatrend in my mind, and there's a bunch of hype cycles we've had where I never particularly subscribe to them. The easiest way for me to tell is, the way it's described, is it easy to understand what this could do in its ultimate form for most people, or do you need to have a PhD to understand what someone's saying? When you feel like you need a PhD to understand what someone's saying, chances are it ain't going to be a megatrend, because by definition, a megatrend is it's going to impact a large population of the world. And if the thing is too complicated, chances are it's not going to have that level of effect, outsize effect. [01:15:43] S1: That's an awesome heuristic. I imagine you're thinking Web3 as a classic example. [01:15:46] S0: Yes. Web3 was the one that I actually cite all the time. I couldn't understand what it had been. And all of these people were kind like, "Oh, Web3, Web3." I'm like, "I couldn't make a heads of tails out of a use case." But with AI, it's like you go to ChatGPT, you ask it a question, you get an answer. I get this. This is easy. [01:16:05] S1: So going back to your framework, just to kind of close the loop there, it's really interesting that timing is the first variable you look at. This could be an amazing idea. You got the right team, amazing product that works really well, but the timing may just not be right. And no matter how awesome it is, it's not going to work.