Forget Creating Jobs; Create Entrepreneurs
The focus on jobs during the election [https://www.fredperrotta.com/remote-work-small-towns/] was woefully misguided. The discussion reflected an industrial-era mindset, which isn't surprising since both Democratic finalists and the Republican nominee were all over 65. Talking about creating jobs as a goal is wrong. Jobs are an
You Lit Your Own Hair on Fire
Startups love to run around with their hair on fire. They love urgent urgent urgent emergencies and, of course, hustle. The problem is that this is not a healthy or productive way to work. You may get a lot of stuff done, but you'll never have time to
Why Silicon Valley Hates Remote Work
Yahoo was the first big name to go against the remote work trend [http://www.businessinsider.com/marissa-mayer-defends-her-work-from-home-ban-2013-4] and bring employees back to the office in 2013. Earlier this year, IBM, formerly a leader in telecommuting, announced that their 2,600-person marketing team would be "co-located" in a
Incomplete Information
> Most decisions should probably be made with somewhere around 70% of the information you wish you had. -Jeff Bezos [http://www.businessinsider.com/jeff-bezos-explains-the-perfect-way-to-make-risky-business-decisions-2017-4] I love that line. As an entrepreneur, I'm always making decisions without certainty. Making a decision and moving forward can be valuable. If
The Fred User Manual
> Inspired by this confusingly-titled LinkedIn post [https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/how-you-revolutionize-way-your-team-works-together-all-david-politis] , I wrote the personal User Manual below for our team. The User Manual is meant to instruct people on "how to work with me." Read the original post for more context. > The User Manual
Meet Them Where They Are
> What's your California Roll? Nir Eyal's People Don’t Want Something Truly New, They Want the Familiar Done Differently [https://medium.com/startup-grind/people-dont-want-something-truly-new-they-want-the-familiar-done-differently-7648f24f8fe7] highlights how the California Roll turned American sushi consumption from zero to a multi-billion dollar industry. He calls this "the
Money Isn't Leisure
In 1930, economist John Maynard Keynes predicted that his grandchildren would work fifteen-hour weeks. While that's almost 4x Tim Ferriss's four-hour weeks [https://www.amazon.com/4-Hour-Workweek-Escape-Live-Anywhere/dp/0307465357/?tag=fredperrott05-20] , it's still less than half of the average US worker's week
Tailwinds
Reading this Atlantic article on the Retail Meltdown of 2017 [https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2017/04/retail-meltdown-of-2017/522384/] reminded me of the importance of riding tailwinds in a business. The winners take advantage of societal and market trends. The losers resist the change that is obvious to everyone
Output Over Hours
> It is high time to rid ourselves of the notion that leisure for workmen is either lost time or a class privilege. -Henry Ford, 1926 Time is the wrong unit of measurement for knowledge work. Only results matter. And results are not a function of time spent. Working on
A Place to Do Epic Work
A Hacker Noon post on high performance employees [https://hackernoon.com/know-the-soul-of-the-high-performance-employee-then-we-can-build-the-10-000-things-ad753ffd9b7f#.9oyofuh00] got me thinking about what we do at Tortuga [http://www.tortugabackpacks.com] to create a place to do great work. The author, William Belk, defines high performance employees (HPEs) as: > Rather than being tasked with