everywhere we look the world is changing
with technology with political systems
even the way we interact with each other
how do you not only survive but thrive
in a world of change what’s the secret
sauce of Silicon Valley we’re here at
the epicenter people are trying to
figure that out
so I believe the secret is to think like
an entrepreneur I had the great
privilege to interview some of the most
successful entrepreneurs people like
Elon Musk building SpaceX and Tesla the
founders of Spanx LinkedIn 23andme
companies like Airbnb I’m constantly
asked everyone comes up and says who’s
your favorite entrepreneur and the
answer might surprise you my favorite
entrepreneurs are Nadine in red this is
my almost 101 year old grandmother and
her one two hundred and six year old
boyfriend red okay so why why you know
why are they my favorite entrepreneurs
because they’re curious they’re
constantly learning they’re constantly
questioning they’re overcoming setbacks
and they really believe tomorrow will be
better than today yes my grandmother has
some aches and pains I mean she’s a
hundred she’s breaking triple digits
yes she’s retired so she had a career as
a nurse and yes she’s left the home
where she raised her four children and
yes she lost her partner her husband
after 62 years but she’s not complaining
and she’s not complacent you know she’s
challenging the status quo and looking
for something better she’s a shining
example of thinking like an entrepreneur
you know she could have thought she was
too old to venture out she could have
stayed in a retirement center watch TV
stayed with the people around there had
meals delivered to her room but instead
she ventured out she loves music and she
went to a local concert every single
Saturday she went to support local
musicians and that’s where she found
read so she got out of her comfort zone
you know here’s where the comfort zone
is and here’s where the magic happens
and they are not the same place so of
all the entrepreneurs that I interviewed
200 of them in fact what I started
learning was they got comfortable being
uncomfortable they didn’t stay in their
comfort zone they pushed forward that
pit in your stomach they thought ok this
means I’m building something important
I’m gonna put something into the world
that people really need now it’s not an
innate ability to think like an
entrepreneur people are not just born
thinking like entrepreneurs they work at
it and I’d like to share three of the
skills that come out of my research and
the important thing here is they apply
to each and every one of us we can all
think like an entrepreneur the first is
fly the OODA loop so this stands for
observe orient decide act it’s
originally a fighter pilot mantra and I
have a very good friend who’s a fighter
pilot West Hallman he told me if you
want to think like an entrepreneur you
think like a fighter pilot and here’s
why if you can get inside the loop the
decision circle you can observe orient
decide and act faster than a competitor
you can win in a dogfight right a
competitor is reacting to a landscape
that’s already changed you took a
decision you took an action there a
split-second behind that’s the same in a
really entrepreneurial world and we live
in an entrepreneurial world an example
is a fabulous one is PayPal so Max
Levchin Peter Thiel and Elon Musk come
together and they start PayPal we all
know what that is today but they go
through six different business models
right six different things they try in a
year and a half in eighteen months
they’re moving through as quick as they
can observing orienting deciding and
acting they raise money on a technology
where they could beam cash between Palm
Pilots I don’t know how many people
remember the Palm Pilot that’s gone
PayPal is still around right one of the
things they observed was that people on
eBay we’re trying to transact and they
were using this demo website you know to
support the beaming product at any rate
PayPal moved to create an online
currency then eBay bought a competitor
they had so many more resources people
money still the PayPal team moved faster
at one point Visa credit card company
tried to sue with a PayPal startup
saying now you’re in our credit card
business and what they did was convinced
Visa to just study the problem for 12
months okay never study the problem
because while visa is studying the
problem the PayPal team’s observing Oren
team deciding acting in winning in the
marketplace so they sell to eBay now the
much more interesting thing is what
happens next the original twelve to
eighteen people at PayPal they go on to
seed the entire next wave of the
internet they are the founders of
YouTube LinkedIn Yelp slide Digg Tesla
Motors they certainly start SpaceX they
founders fund 500 startups they’re the
first money invested behind Mark
Zuckerberg at Facebook
they literally seed the entire next wave
when you spend time with them I’ve spent
time with all of these founders you say
how is that possible you didn’t just do
it once but you did it
you fanned out and did it over and over
again and what they’ll say is the first
thing you think yeah that’s not it you
have to observe orient decide act you
have to keep moving so
Jeremy Stoppelman at Yelp he said you
have to look for a counterintuitive blip
of data something that doesn’t make
sense and follow it so Yelp was started
as an email referral system and they did
not think anyone would want to write a
review Jeremy did not think that would
be fun and then what he found out is
everyone wants to review the nail salon
the restaurant the dry cleaner and so
they quickly moved and said okay Yelp
will be a review site YouTube was
started for video dating this was a
video dating startup until they shot
video at a local zoo they were just
practicing uploading and shooting video
and everyone started watching the video
of an elephant okay if you’re doing a
video dating site that doesn’t make
sense but if you really quickly move to
observe that take decisions take actions
we know what YouTube is today it’s the
website where you can see all things
video all the cat videos you want to see
in the world right there there so these
are successful entrepreneurs but they
have absolutely moved through different
decision cycles it’s about thinking like
an entrepreneur and every single one of
us can do that this is an important
point so if you are going to be flying
an Oda loop you have to have a fierce
team with you you need a wingman you
need a wingwoman so there’s great
research out of Northwestern and says if
you want to solve a problem alone you
can do that a lot of people try to solve
problems alone and your success rate is
about 44% if you get other like-minded
people and many of us try to gravitate
right towards our friends then you can
solve a problem a little bit better at
about 54% of the time if you bring in an
outsider someone who thinks totally
differently your solve rate goes up
significantly and you solve
approximately 75% now here’s the
counterintuitive take away from this
here’s the surprise it’s not because of
the person who’s diverse who comes from
the outside it’s because each single
person raises their game when we think
we’re going to be challenged
by someone who disagrees with us who
gets out of the comfort zone who
challenges the status quo we do our
homework we show up prepared we’re more
focused on the problem we’re more
willing to articulate a point of view so
having an outsider come in actually
raises our own performance it’s
something really important to think
about it’s uncomfortable but it makes us
stand a little taller and do a little
bit better all right not just flying the
Ute aloof but failing wisely is
important so if you think like an
entrepreneur it doesn’t mean that you’re
never going to fail in fact the
entrepreneurs that I interviewed in this
research project they are failing all
the time but they’re failing wisely so
what does that mean it means they’re
setting a ratio right one in five things
I try won’t work that’s what I’m going
for
or one in ten things and different
people will set different failure ratios
the idea is that you don’t want a zero
ratio a zero ratio means a perfect
record and that means you haven’t tried
something new you haven’t actually
pushed into the innovation curve so this
is Jessica Heron she’s found her Stellan
dot previously the founder of wedding
channel comm and what she says is one in
three that’s four ratio one in three
things she tries won’t work and that’s
what she’s going for at Stella and I’d
she’s got a workforce of stylist it’s a
woman’s direct selling company and she
just tells the stylist you know give me
the feedback as fast as possible love it
or lose it love this product lose it out
of our inventory and they will lose one
third and that’s success for Jess at
Google Eric Schmidt instituted a
70-20-10 ratio right 70 percent of your
time on core business 20% of your time
on side business-related 10% on total
moonshots that 10% is most likely
failure but it also may produce just
spectacularly wonderful results now
we’ve talked a little bit about
incremental failure but what if you
absolutely run into a catastrophic
failure
what if you’re the captain of the
Titanic you hit an iceberg that is a
really big problem the Titanic had 2,200
people on board they had 16 lifeboats
okay what are you gonna do we all know
what happened in this story right in two
hours and 40 minutes the Titanic sank
only 705 people survived less than a
third of the people survived but what if
you could think like an entrepreneur
what if you could be resourceful even in
that terribly desperate moment what if
you could think to yourself hmm what do
I have on this boat that will keep
people alive there were tables wooden
tables lots of them those would stay
afloat you could use deck chairs as
paddles you could use the car tires
there were cars and trucks aboard as
floating inner tubes what if you could
even use the iceberg as an island the
iceberg was known to be about 400 feet
long and it was not going to sink what
if you could use your life boats as
ferry boats and ferry passengers over to
stand on the ice Island there would have
been ways to save lives if you could
think in a different way you know I used
this example a couple weeks ago I was
teaching at Stanford we were teaching
executive education to Hispanic
entrepreneurs and this is a case the
Harvard Business Review has recently put
forward we were talking about it how can
you be resourceful how can you fail
wisely and one of the Hispanic
entrepreneurs came up to me so excited
at the end of the day and said I run a
company out of Chicago I ran a legacy
construction business and we are
struggling and now I think I could fail
wisely I could repurpose some parts of
my company I could repurpose some of the
resources that I own I can also go back
to Chicago and I can think like an
entrepreneur
that is really exciting and that’s what
gets me you know so thrilled with this
dataset and with the skills every single
person can hopefully take them and
improve the kind of work that they’re
doing now it’s not only flying a noodle
loop and failing wisely but another
skill that I really think is important
is what I’m calling gift small goods so
what’s a small good right it’s a small
kindness it’s something of value that
you can do for someone else it’s a
five-minute favor right so what does
that look like you could write a few
lines of code you could critique a
proposal you could forward a resume you
could make an introduction little things
that we can do creates huge opportunity
for other people now why is it important
to do well it’s always been sort of
morally right to help out your
colleagues but we’ve had a saying nice
guys finish last
okay here’s the really interesting thing
about technology now nice guys finish
first and the reason is your reputation
will be known it will be transparent if
you are gifting small goods you will be
helping those around you and other
people will hear about it information
will come to you people will want to
work with you
talent will come your way deal flow will
come your way that actually makes you a
lot more productive the opposite is also
true if you are hoarding resources if
you’re cheating people if you’re
harassing people we will know about that
and this is changing just in the last
few years the speed of communication and
the transparency of our reputation means
that we will know so it’s in your
self-interest to be gifting small goods
and generously helping and assisting
those around you now the person that I
know who does this best especially in
all of the 200 interviews I did is a man
named Bob Langer and when people ask me
who would you like to be most like in
all of those interviews that you did I
say I would like to be like Bob Langer
and here’s the reason why he has a
reputation for integrity and he creates
tremendous opportunity for everyone
around him now I’m never gonna be a
chemical engineer he’s a scientist
he runs a the world’s largest bio
technology engineering lab it’s at MIT
he has co-founded 40 companies that have
scaled up he has 350 different licenses
with pharmaceutical companies you know
close to a hundred thousand three
hundred papers that are published he is
putting into the world some of the
greatest technologies to stop human
suffering
that’s what Bob’s trying to do and as he
does it he brings along so many other
people when you ask him what he’s most
proud of he says my students you know
they’re kind of like my kids
I’m so proud as they succeed in the
world now bob has succeeded himself we
don’t necessarily know his name but all
of the things that he’s done we do know
about he’s the pioneer of human tissue
engineering he’s the pioneer of many of
the cancer delivery drugs most all of
them in fact he’s even making synthetic
vocal cords so that Julie Andrews of the
sound of music might sing again there
are so many wonderful things that he’s
bringing into the world he says that
it’s important to some gift small goods
and support other people because in his
own career he had a rocky start he had a
PhD from MIT and Chemical Engineering
but he wanted to teach high school and
he sent out 40 letters and he got 40
rejections and then he thought okay
maybe I could be an engineer in the
medical space and he started sending
resumes and calling absolutely no one
responded until one person did a man
named Judah Folkman and he was a Boston
Children’s Hospital and Folkman gave Bob
Langer a first opportunity and supported
him Folkman was a cancer surgeon and
that’s where most of
Bob Langer’s work has been applied so
Bob Langer has said you know so many
opportunities were created by this one
person from him it said him on his whole
path to doing what he’s doing so the
question for all of us is who are we
helping you know who who are we bringing
along who are we pushing forward in the
world if we want to create things the
world hasn’t seen it’s difficult to do
and I believe life is a search for
allies we have to go out and help each
other that brings me back to all of the
people who’ve helped me there have been
many along this path starting with my
grandmother you know I really do think
she’s an embodiment of what Eleanor
Roosevelt said which is the future
belongs to those who believe in the
beauty of their dreams Nadine has
definitely lived that for many years now
I believe that the future belongs to
those not only who believe in the beauty
of their dreams but those who will take
action and those who will make their
dreams a reality
so may you go into the world and think
like an entrepreneur and may you use
that ability to benefit the world thank
you
[Applause]
with technology with political systems
even the way we interact with each other
how do you not only survive but thrive
in a world of change what’s the secret
sauce of Silicon Valley we’re here at
the epicenter people are trying to
figure that out
so I believe the secret is to think like
an entrepreneur I had the great
privilege to interview some of the most
successful entrepreneurs people like
Elon Musk building SpaceX and Tesla the
founders of Spanx LinkedIn 23andme
companies like Airbnb I’m constantly
asked everyone comes up and says who’s
your favorite entrepreneur and the
answer might surprise you my favorite
entrepreneurs are Nadine in red this is
my almost 101 year old grandmother and
her one two hundred and six year old
boyfriend red okay so why why you know
why are they my favorite entrepreneurs
because they’re curious they’re
constantly learning they’re constantly
questioning they’re overcoming setbacks
and they really believe tomorrow will be
better than today yes my grandmother has
some aches and pains I mean she’s a
hundred she’s breaking triple digits
yes she’s retired so she had a career as
a nurse and yes she’s left the home
where she raised her four children and
yes she lost her partner her husband
after 62 years but she’s not complaining
and she’s not complacent you know she’s
challenging the status quo and looking
for something better she’s a shining
example of thinking like an entrepreneur
you know she could have thought she was
too old to venture out she could have
stayed in a retirement center watch TV
stayed with the people around there had
meals delivered to her room but instead
she ventured out she loves music and she
went to a local concert every single
Saturday she went to support local
musicians and that’s where she found
read so she got out of her comfort zone
you know here’s where the comfort zone
is and here’s where the magic happens
and they are not the same place so of
all the entrepreneurs that I interviewed
200 of them in fact what I started
learning was they got comfortable being
uncomfortable they didn’t stay in their
comfort zone they pushed forward that
pit in your stomach they thought ok this
means I’m building something important
I’m gonna put something into the world
that people really need now it’s not an
innate ability to think like an
entrepreneur people are not just born
thinking like entrepreneurs they work at
it and I’d like to share three of the
skills that come out of my research and
the important thing here is they apply
to each and every one of us we can all
think like an entrepreneur the first is
fly the OODA loop so this stands for
observe orient decide act it’s
originally a fighter pilot mantra and I
have a very good friend who’s a fighter
pilot West Hallman he told me if you
want to think like an entrepreneur you
think like a fighter pilot and here’s
why if you can get inside the loop the
decision circle you can observe orient
decide and act faster than a competitor
you can win in a dogfight right a
competitor is reacting to a landscape
that’s already changed you took a
decision you took an action there a
split-second behind that’s the same in a
really entrepreneurial world and we live
in an entrepreneurial world an example
is a fabulous one is PayPal so Max
Levchin Peter Thiel and Elon Musk come
together and they start PayPal we all
know what that is today but they go
through six different business models
right six different things they try in a
year and a half in eighteen months
they’re moving through as quick as they
can observing orienting deciding and
acting they raise money on a technology
where they could beam cash between Palm
Pilots I don’t know how many people
remember the Palm Pilot that’s gone
PayPal is still around right one of the
things they observed was that people on
eBay we’re trying to transact and they
were using this demo website you know to
support the beaming product at any rate
PayPal moved to create an online
currency then eBay bought a competitor
they had so many more resources people
money still the PayPal team moved faster
at one point Visa credit card company
tried to sue with a PayPal startup
saying now you’re in our credit card
business and what they did was convinced
Visa to just study the problem for 12
months okay never study the problem
because while visa is studying the
problem the PayPal team’s observing Oren
team deciding acting in winning in the
marketplace so they sell to eBay now the
much more interesting thing is what
happens next the original twelve to
eighteen people at PayPal they go on to
seed the entire next wave of the
internet they are the founders of
YouTube LinkedIn Yelp slide Digg Tesla
Motors they certainly start SpaceX they
founders fund 500 startups they’re the
first money invested behind Mark
Zuckerberg at Facebook
they literally seed the entire next wave
when you spend time with them I’ve spent
time with all of these founders you say
how is that possible you didn’t just do
it once but you did it
you fanned out and did it over and over
again and what they’ll say is the first
thing you think yeah that’s not it you
have to observe orient decide act you
have to keep moving so
Jeremy Stoppelman at Yelp he said you
have to look for a counterintuitive blip
of data something that doesn’t make
sense and follow it so Yelp was started
as an email referral system and they did
not think anyone would want to write a
review Jeremy did not think that would
be fun and then what he found out is
everyone wants to review the nail salon
the restaurant the dry cleaner and so
they quickly moved and said okay Yelp
will be a review site YouTube was
started for video dating this was a
video dating startup until they shot
video at a local zoo they were just
practicing uploading and shooting video
and everyone started watching the video
of an elephant okay if you’re doing a
video dating site that doesn’t make
sense but if you really quickly move to
observe that take decisions take actions
we know what YouTube is today it’s the
website where you can see all things
video all the cat videos you want to see
in the world right there there so these
are successful entrepreneurs but they
have absolutely moved through different
decision cycles it’s about thinking like
an entrepreneur and every single one of
us can do that this is an important
point so if you are going to be flying
an Oda loop you have to have a fierce
team with you you need a wingman you
need a wingwoman so there’s great
research out of Northwestern and says if
you want to solve a problem alone you
can do that a lot of people try to solve
problems alone and your success rate is
about 44% if you get other like-minded
people and many of us try to gravitate
right towards our friends then you can
solve a problem a little bit better at
about 54% of the time if you bring in an
outsider someone who thinks totally
differently your solve rate goes up
significantly and you solve
approximately 75% now here’s the
counterintuitive take away from this
here’s the surprise it’s not because of
the person who’s diverse who comes from
the outside it’s because each single
person raises their game when we think
we’re going to be challenged
by someone who disagrees with us who
gets out of the comfort zone who
challenges the status quo we do our
homework we show up prepared we’re more
focused on the problem we’re more
willing to articulate a point of view so
having an outsider come in actually
raises our own performance it’s
something really important to think
about it’s uncomfortable but it makes us
stand a little taller and do a little
bit better all right not just flying the
Ute aloof but failing wisely is
important so if you think like an
entrepreneur it doesn’t mean that you’re
never going to fail in fact the
entrepreneurs that I interviewed in this
research project they are failing all
the time but they’re failing wisely so
what does that mean it means they’re
setting a ratio right one in five things
I try won’t work that’s what I’m going
for
or one in ten things and different
people will set different failure ratios
the idea is that you don’t want a zero
ratio a zero ratio means a perfect
record and that means you haven’t tried
something new you haven’t actually
pushed into the innovation curve so this
is Jessica Heron she’s found her Stellan
dot previously the founder of wedding
channel comm and what she says is one in
three that’s four ratio one in three
things she tries won’t work and that’s
what she’s going for at Stella and I’d
she’s got a workforce of stylist it’s a
woman’s direct selling company and she
just tells the stylist you know give me
the feedback as fast as possible love it
or lose it love this product lose it out
of our inventory and they will lose one
third and that’s success for Jess at
Google Eric Schmidt instituted a
70-20-10 ratio right 70 percent of your
time on core business 20% of your time
on side business-related 10% on total
moonshots that 10% is most likely
failure but it also may produce just
spectacularly wonderful results now
we’ve talked a little bit about
incremental failure but what if you
absolutely run into a catastrophic
failure
what if you’re the captain of the
Titanic you hit an iceberg that is a
really big problem the Titanic had 2,200
people on board they had 16 lifeboats
okay what are you gonna do we all know
what happened in this story right in two
hours and 40 minutes the Titanic sank
only 705 people survived less than a
third of the people survived but what if
you could think like an entrepreneur
what if you could be resourceful even in
that terribly desperate moment what if
you could think to yourself hmm what do
I have on this boat that will keep
people alive there were tables wooden
tables lots of them those would stay
afloat you could use deck chairs as
paddles you could use the car tires
there were cars and trucks aboard as
floating inner tubes what if you could
even use the iceberg as an island the
iceberg was known to be about 400 feet
long and it was not going to sink what
if you could use your life boats as
ferry boats and ferry passengers over to
stand on the ice Island there would have
been ways to save lives if you could
think in a different way you know I used
this example a couple weeks ago I was
teaching at Stanford we were teaching
executive education to Hispanic
entrepreneurs and this is a case the
Harvard Business Review has recently put
forward we were talking about it how can
you be resourceful how can you fail
wisely and one of the Hispanic
entrepreneurs came up to me so excited
at the end of the day and said I run a
company out of Chicago I ran a legacy
construction business and we are
struggling and now I think I could fail
wisely I could repurpose some parts of
my company I could repurpose some of the
resources that I own I can also go back
to Chicago and I can think like an
entrepreneur
that is really exciting and that’s what
gets me you know so thrilled with this
dataset and with the skills every single
person can hopefully take them and
improve the kind of work that they’re
doing now it’s not only flying a noodle
loop and failing wisely but another
skill that I really think is important
is what I’m calling gift small goods so
what’s a small good right it’s a small
kindness it’s something of value that
you can do for someone else it’s a
five-minute favor right so what does
that look like you could write a few
lines of code you could critique a
proposal you could forward a resume you
could make an introduction little things
that we can do creates huge opportunity
for other people now why is it important
to do well it’s always been sort of
morally right to help out your
colleagues but we’ve had a saying nice
guys finish last
okay here’s the really interesting thing
about technology now nice guys finish
first and the reason is your reputation
will be known it will be transparent if
you are gifting small goods you will be
helping those around you and other
people will hear about it information
will come to you people will want to
work with you
talent will come your way deal flow will
come your way that actually makes you a
lot more productive the opposite is also
true if you are hoarding resources if
you’re cheating people if you’re
harassing people we will know about that
and this is changing just in the last
few years the speed of communication and
the transparency of our reputation means
that we will know so it’s in your
self-interest to be gifting small goods
and generously helping and assisting
those around you now the person that I
know who does this best especially in
all of the 200 interviews I did is a man
named Bob Langer and when people ask me
who would you like to be most like in
all of those interviews that you did I
say I would like to be like Bob Langer
and here’s the reason why he has a
reputation for integrity and he creates
tremendous opportunity for everyone
around him now I’m never gonna be a
chemical engineer he’s a scientist
he runs a the world’s largest bio
technology engineering lab it’s at MIT
he has co-founded 40 companies that have
scaled up he has 350 different licenses
with pharmaceutical companies you know
close to a hundred thousand three
hundred papers that are published he is
putting into the world some of the
greatest technologies to stop human
suffering
that’s what Bob’s trying to do and as he
does it he brings along so many other
people when you ask him what he’s most
proud of he says my students you know
they’re kind of like my kids
I’m so proud as they succeed in the
world now bob has succeeded himself we
don’t necessarily know his name but all
of the things that he’s done we do know
about he’s the pioneer of human tissue
engineering he’s the pioneer of many of
the cancer delivery drugs most all of
them in fact he’s even making synthetic
vocal cords so that Julie Andrews of the
sound of music might sing again there
are so many wonderful things that he’s
bringing into the world he says that
it’s important to some gift small goods
and support other people because in his
own career he had a rocky start he had a
PhD from MIT and Chemical Engineering
but he wanted to teach high school and
he sent out 40 letters and he got 40
rejections and then he thought okay
maybe I could be an engineer in the
medical space and he started sending
resumes and calling absolutely no one
responded until one person did a man
named Judah Folkman and he was a Boston
Children’s Hospital and Folkman gave Bob
Langer a first opportunity and supported
him Folkman was a cancer surgeon and
that’s where most of
Bob Langer’s work has been applied so
Bob Langer has said you know so many
opportunities were created by this one
person from him it said him on his whole
path to doing what he’s doing so the
question for all of us is who are we
helping you know who who are we bringing
along who are we pushing forward in the
world if we want to create things the
world hasn’t seen it’s difficult to do
and I believe life is a search for
allies we have to go out and help each
other that brings me back to all of the
people who’ve helped me there have been
many along this path starting with my
grandmother you know I really do think
she’s an embodiment of what Eleanor
Roosevelt said which is the future
belongs to those who believe in the
beauty of their dreams Nadine has
definitely lived that for many years now
I believe that the future belongs to
those not only who believe in the beauty
of their dreams but those who will take
action and those who will make their
dreams a reality
so may you go into the world and think
like an entrepreneur and may you use
that ability to benefit the world thank
you
[Applause]
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