Lenny's Podcast: Product | Career | Growth
01:38:16 · Jason Cohen, Lenny Rachitsky
[01:38:16] S1: For writing, On Writing Well by William Zinsser. I know I'm not the only one, but that's the point. On my best day, I write like that. And then for product, I actually like Crossing the Chasm, which of course everyone's heard of, but what I find is no one's read it, so that you know the little picture, and you think you know what the chasm is, what I find is very quickly I realize, "Oh, you haven't read the book. You saw a blog post." And there's so much good stuff in there, how to define a market and really what to do with this model. It's fantastic. So I highly recommend reading the book. [01:38:51] S0: I have had Geoffrey Moore on the podcast. We dove into a lot of this stuff. One of the things that always stuck with me is when early companies are looking for someone like them to adopt the thing. That's something that really stuck with me. It's not like they're looking for an early adopter to be like, "Oh, this is awesome." They're looking for someone that feels like them to say, "This is great." And so the early adopters are just going to spread to other early adopters and there's work to do beyond that. [01:39:14] S1: Yeah. Part of that's because he defines a market and among other things as, and the people in the market respect the opinions of the other people in the market. [01:39:23] S0: Exactly. [01:39:23] S1: And that's when you realize, "Oh, so jumping to a different market, it's not impossible. It's just like case studies aren't going to work." Yeah. [01:39:30] S0: It's a new thing. [01:39:31] S1: Yeah.
01:39:31 · Jason Cohen, Lenny Rachitsky
[01:39:31] S1: Yeah. [01:39:31] S0: Okay. All right. And then On Writing Well, such a huge trend in the book. That's like the book that most helped me write. And if you summarize the book, for me, it's just cut. Cut more and more of your stuff. There's always to cut. [01:39:43] S1: I love this phrase where he's on a panel with this guy who is like an amateur writer, and his summary to that guy is, the guy told him, "I never knew writing could be hard." And Zinsser says, " I never knew writing could be easy." I think both of those summarize the turmoil of being a writer. [01:40:07] S0: Yeah. The classic, maybe Hemingway, maybe not quote, "Writing is easy. I just sit at the typewriter and bleed." [01:40:14] S1: And bleed, yeah. [01:40:16] S0: So good. Okay. Moving on. Favorite recent movie or TV show? [01:40:21] S1: ER from 1994- [01:40:22] S0: Can- [inaudible 01:40:23] [01:40:24] S1: ... 15 seasons. Why do I say that? Besides the fact I think is good, I have a 16-year-old daughter and we're now on season, I think 13, watching this whole thing. She says it holds up after 25 years. And being Gen Alpha or whatever, I don't even know what it is. And so if this is an era when shows were an hour long, and seasons were forever, and she says it's great TV, it must be great TV. [01:40:52] S0: Wow. I've not had this podcast yet. Also, The Pitt. I don't know. If you enjoy ER, you'll enjoy The Pitt, which has won all these awards- [01:40:59] S1: Yeah. Pitt's good.
01:40:59 · Jason Cohen, Lenny Rachitsky
[01:40:59] S1: Yeah. Pitt's good. [01:41:00] S0: ... on Netflix. Fun fact, my cousin was in ER, not as a recurring character, but she was a young girl patient, and actually is a fancy actress in the world. [01:41:10] S1: Oh, cool. [01:41:10] S0: That was her start. Okay. Next question. Favorite product you've recently discovered that you really love. [01:41:17] S1: This is probably not unique, but Wispr Flow for dictation. It's really good. I like the keyboard shortcuts because I just use it all the time in all the software, and anything Anker makes. They have power stations, and docs, and rechargers. [01:41:31] S0: Anker with a K. [01:41:33] S1: Yeah. A-N-K. [01:41:34] S0: Yeah. [01:41:35] S1: Right. And just all their stuff is super high quality and works really well. Everything seems to charge twice as fast when plugged into an Anker thing. So I don't know. Whatever it is, it's really good. [01:41:44] S0: I got a new Anker charger, I also love Anker, that has a display on the side when you plug in stuff, and it's got multiple ports, and it shows you the percentage it's charging and the wattage per outlet. I love it. They're just like, "How do we make this more fancy, and fun, and charge more?" [01:41:58] S1: Yeah. [01:41:59] S0: I love it. Yeah. And then Wispr Flow, quick shout out. You get a year free Wispr Flow by becoming a insider, I think even just an annual subscriber of my newsletter as part of the product pass. And so check it out, Lennyproductpass.com. You could also check it with me. [01:42:15] S1: I did not know that. I'm not a shill for them.
01:42:15 · Jason Cohen, Lenny Rachitsky
[01:42:15] S1: I did not know that. I'm not a shill for them. [01:42:17] S0: I know. I love that. [01:42:17] S1: But it's great. [01:42:18] S0: I love when people recommend products in the product pass, a whole year free. [01:42:21] S1: Because I'm subscriber for long enough that I didn't get that. [01:42:23] S0: You missed out. You missed out. [01:42:23] S1: Okay. [01:42:24] S0: There's 19 products in there right now. [01:42:25] S1: Nice. [01:42:25] S0: And by the time this comes out, there'll be even more. Okay. Two more questions. Do you have a favorite life motto that you find yourself coming back to in work or in life? [01:42:35] S1: Yes. "Be yourself, everyone else is taken." And it's attributed to Oscar Wilde, but I've tried to look into that as I tried to get all my annotations correct for the book. And there's no evidence that he said it. But there's also no evidence who said it. So let's say it's Oscar Wilde because he said lots of things like that. [01:42:53] S0: I love that. And it's such a deep point. It's easy to hear and be like, "Yeah, yeah, yeah." But it's something I've learned to be more and more true over time, especially as you see people online doing their thing and just like, "Oh, I want to be like that." And then you realize, no, you got to be yourself. [01:43:06] S1: No. And the people who love you or like what you do also want you to be yourself because that's what they love. And if you're changed, then they wouldn't love that. [01:43:14] S0: Final question, you have this fancy award behind you on your desk. I am curious what's the story there.
01:43:14 · Lenny Rachitsky, Jason Cohen
[01:43:14] S0: Final question, you have this fancy award behind you on your desk. I am curious what's the story there. [01:43:20] S1: That's the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award for- [01:43:21] S0: Whoo. [01:43:24] S1: ... 2017 for Central Texas, which I co-won with the CEO of WP Engine Heather Brunner, which is awesome because I often call Heather a late joining co-founder, because that's what ... LinkedIn, that's what Reid Hoffman called Jeff Weiner, because Jeff was four years in, but was so impactful to everything, the success of the company, the culture, the da, da, da, da, that basically is a co-founder. And that's exactly what Heather is like at WP Engine. It's now been 11 years since she became the CEO. So there's lots of data to back us up. And I used to say to people at WP Engine, like, "If I just told you that Heather was a co-founder, you'd say, 'Yeah, no kidding.'" I'm like, "Right, that's why I think of it that way because so do you, so did anyone, because that's the impact she's had." So we co-won that award, which is nice because you almost never have co-winners. In fact, I can't remember another one. I mean, I know there are others, but it's rare enough I can't think of another one. So it's really cool that we co-won that entrepreneur award. [01:44:29] S0: Jason, this was so awesome. I really appreciate you making time. I really appreciate you sharing so much wisdom with us. Two final questions, where can folks find you online, point them to your book, your website, and how can listeners be useful to you?
01:44:29 · Lenny Rachitsky, Jason Cohen
[01:44:29] S0: Jason, this was so awesome. I really appreciate you making time. I really appreciate you sharing so much wisdom with us. Two final questions, where can folks find you online, point them to your book, your website, and how can listeners be useful to you? [01:44:42] S1: Yeah. I mean, to be useful, order the book, hiddenmultipliers.com, or of course you don't have to. I have all these articles online for free. So you can go to asmartbear.com and I'm on Twitter and other stuff that's all linked off of that website. And the articles, they're free. I don't have ads, I don't sell courses, I don't sell anything. So that's very, very non-commercial. And so in fact, the one thing I've ever done with writing that costs money is the book because it's a physical book. I've got to charge something so I can ship it and everything. But I think Hidden Multipliers is certainly my best work. So I'm very proud of that, but you don't have to buy it. It's okay. It'll make me feel good. [01:45:26] S0: This is our chance to repay you for all the- [01:45:26] S1: That's right. [01:45:28] S0: ... free content you've put out over time. [01:45:30] S1: Right. [01:45:30] S0: And so I'm going to order a number of them. Jason, thank you so much for being here. [01:45:35] S1: Thank you. This is fun.