1. Leverage key influencers
Every day I watch "The Charlie Rose Show" and the "PBS Newshour". Charlie introduces and reintroduces me to people who I need to know. The PBS Newshour shows me not just what is happening in the world, which today I can find anywhere, but most importantly what it means. Information isn't power. Relevant actionable information is power.
The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post.... All successful people find the top information, in context, most efficiently. Both at the macro but also, essentially, at the micro level as well.
2. Curators are the new black
Poorly filtered information, regardless of its quality, leads to information overload. Effective curation allows one to see the forest from the trees. Curation paired with insight and effective strategic and management systems insures that you are wandering around in the correct forest(s).
3. The Network Effect 2.0
If you want to know how successful you will be in the future, the quickest and most accurate way to do that is to look at the power of your network.
Networks, like money, flow to value. If you want to increase the strength of your network you must increase the strength of your value.
When you have plenty to give you will attract takers, which you can think of as customers, and will attract the attention of high level individuals and systems.
4. Be Open
If "the only constant is change" and one must "evolve or die" then openness is the lifeblood of success. Be open in your thinking, be open in your schedule, be open in your relationships and be open in your time.
In this world of exponential gains, this is not your grandfather's success. We all stand, as they say, on the shoulders of giants, and it is also true, as is said, that we must understand history or be condemned to repeat it, but we live in an increasingly disruptive age such that today's success will not look like yesterday's and tomorrow's most certainly will not.
5. Connect with Disruptors
Here is my recent 7 page interview with TechStars Founder and CEO David Cohen. If "software is eating the world" then TechStars (and Y Combinator, and AngelList) are, potentially and increasingly in fact, eating the world of professional investors. Look at the growth curves, yes...
But also the mindshare.
Here is my recent 8 page interview with elite VC Brad Feld. Does it surprise you that he and David Cohen are so closely aligned?
THE TOP INDIVIDUALS FIND EACH OTHER.
You should do the same.
6. Practice Gratitude
The Universe has physical laws and also metaphysical ones. On a basic level, think about social forces. Why do you wish to help one individual over another? Why would you hire one over another? Trust one over another?
Attraction applies not only to gravity and magnets.
As Ghandi said "You must be the change that you wish to see in the world".
Or famously, "when the student is ready, the teacher will arrive".
7. Recognize "The Next Big Thing"
To be an elite investor, first, moreso than anything, you need a Ph.D. in "the next big thing".
Paul Graham has a great discussion of some of the factors involved.
What if my startup, Media 2.0, turned out to be one of those next big things? Would you even be able to recognize it?
Of course we'd never let you in.
Every day I watch "The Charlie Rose Show" and the "PBS Newshour". Charlie introduces and reintroduces me to people who I need to know. The PBS Newshour shows me not just what is happening in the world, which today I can find anywhere, but most importantly what it means. Information isn't power. Relevant actionable information is power.
The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post.... All successful people find the top information, in context, most efficiently. Both at the macro but also, essentially, at the micro level as well.
2. Curators are the new black
Poorly filtered information, regardless of its quality, leads to information overload. Effective curation allows one to see the forest from the trees. Curation paired with insight and effective strategic and management systems insures that you are wandering around in the correct forest(s).
3. The Network Effect 2.0
If you want to know how successful you will be in the future, the quickest and most accurate way to do that is to look at the power of your network.
Networks, like money, flow to value. If you want to increase the strength of your network you must increase the strength of your value.
When you have plenty to give you will attract takers, which you can think of as customers, and will attract the attention of high level individuals and systems.
4. Be Open
If "the only constant is change" and one must "evolve or die" then openness is the lifeblood of success. Be open in your thinking, be open in your schedule, be open in your relationships and be open in your time.
In this world of exponential gains, this is not your grandfather's success. We all stand, as they say, on the shoulders of giants, and it is also true, as is said, that we must understand history or be condemned to repeat it, but we live in an increasingly disruptive age such that today's success will not look like yesterday's and tomorrow's most certainly will not.
5. Connect with Disruptors
Here is my recent 7 page interview with TechStars Founder and CEO David Cohen. If "software is eating the world" then TechStars (and Y Combinator, and AngelList) are, potentially and increasingly in fact, eating the world of professional investors. Look at the growth curves, yes...
But also the mindshare.
Here is my recent 8 page interview with elite VC Brad Feld. Does it surprise you that he and David Cohen are so closely aligned?
THE TOP INDIVIDUALS FIND EACH OTHER.
You should do the same.
6. Practice Gratitude
The Universe has physical laws and also metaphysical ones. On a basic level, think about social forces. Why do you wish to help one individual over another? Why would you hire one over another? Trust one over another?
Attraction applies not only to gravity and magnets.
As Ghandi said "You must be the change that you wish to see in the world".
Or famously, "when the student is ready, the teacher will arrive".
7. Recognize "The Next Big Thing"
To be an elite investor, first, moreso than anything, you need a Ph.D. in "the next big thing".
Paul Graham has a great discussion of some of the factors involved.
What if my startup, Media 2.0, turned out to be one of those next big things? Would you even be able to recognize it?
Of course we'd never let you in.
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