Is it possible to become too invested in your work? Obviously, entrepreneurs need to be passionate. But it’s equally important to avoid fixating on perfection, which can delay the start date of a new product or service. The goal should always be to make the first sale as quickly as possible. First-time entrepreneurs sometimes suffer from inertia, letting their fear […]
Build Trust Fast
This week, the chief executives of Apple, Facebook, Amazon, and Google were grilled by the US House Judiciary Committee. Members of both major American political parties have clamored for the four Big Tech firms to be investigated for violation of antitrust legislation. The four executives—Tim Cook of Apple, Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook, Jeff Bezos of Amazon, […]
Predict the Future
The famed statistician Nate Silver has his work cut out for him. 2020 has been a year of great upheaval and unrest, with uncertainty in the economy, in public health, and in the upcoming US presidential election. In The Signal and the Noise, Silver’s classic book about predictions, he offers an interesting piece of advice: don’t […]
The World’s Richest Man Just Got Richer
With Amazon’s stock up more than 50 percent this year, Jeff Bezos’s fortune has skyrocketed by more than $56 billion in 2020 alone. With a current net worth of more than $170 billion, Bezos is one of many billionaires, including Elon Musk, for whom business is thriving during the COVID-19 pandemic. To reward Amazon’s frontline […]
Power Is Fickle
Is Silicon Valley growing tired of its most iconic founders? The recent grifts of figures like Elizabeth Holmes and Adam Neumann may herald an era in which people are more skeptical of leaders with eccentric beliefs and habits. In this atmosphere (and under increasing pressure from the federal government), industry titans Jack Dorsey and Mark Zuckerberg […]
Style Your Business Like a Startup
These days, everyone’s an entrepreneur. Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, startups were still all the rage: eye-popping IPOs drew attention to the ways that startups used dense talent pools and perk-laden headquarters to attract top talent and generate big wins for venture capitalists and early employees. But now that the economic outlook has soured, VC […]
Break Your Smartphone Addiction
Is your smartphone draining your time? Let’s be real: app developers and social media experience designers have already admitted they design their products to be addictive. If you’re feeling strapped for time and emotionally drained by the technology, yet reach for your phone whenever you need a distraction—well, you’re not alone. Millions of people have […]
Are You a Team Player?
Coach Bill Campbell was one of the most valuable players in the history of Silicon Valley, working behind the scenes to create trillions of dollars of value for companies like Apple and Google. But he was content to stay out of the spotlight after retiring as a football coach for the Columbia Lions. Campbell’s selflessness […]
How the internet rewires your brain
What happens after you click a link? Something like this: a pop-up window asks if you want to join a mailing list. You accept the site’s cookies, and maybe close a second pop-up ad. Finally, you begin to read—until, somewhere on the page, a loud video starts to play. Fundamentally, the experience of using the […]
