[Music]
yeah Bucharest
how y’all doing now wait a minute wait a
minute talk to me how y’all doing yeah
that’s more like it
that’s more like it um first of all
thank everybody for being here
you know it’s not it’s not every day a
whole lot of people come up to listen to
you talk I’m gonna apologize right up
front I’m from New York City everything
in New York City operates at about 200
kilometres an hour and that’s me
included right so I’m already you’re
gonna apologize up front if I start
talking too quickly all right how should
I start I should probably start with
what I’m what am I doing here I was in
Boston minding my own business a couple
weeks ago and a friend of mine who’s in
the audience here we were having an
early beer together some of you can
hopefully appreciate that and she
mentioned you know this whole idea of
common sense and I hate the term common
sense I’ve always despised the term
common sense and I’ll give you some
reasons why in just a moment but she
managed to sweet-talk me into coming up
to Bucharest I’ve never been to
Bucharest before so I want to thank all
of you for the warm welcome
that I have received so far and lord
knows if I get an opportunity I will
definitely be coming back but I want to
talk to you here about when uncommon
makes sense now I mentioned to you a
little while ago just a moment ago that
I don’t like the word common sense and
you can you can see behind me three of
the traditional dictionary definitions
of common sense right and if you look
you’ll see they all use words like
judgment and being reasonable and you
know have a look at it really quickly
I’m not going to read them to you but
the notion is the whole idea that
somehow we’re going to be sitting in
judgment on other people on a regular
basis simply because they don’t think
the way we do is not something I’m
terribly comfortable with all those
definitions are unbelievably vague if
you actually read them through and think
about it word by
you’ll see that actually they’re not
really saying a whole lot which is one
of the problems that I have with the
notion of common sense my favorite
definition of common sense is what I
believe that you guys should know right
remember when your mother or your father
would say hey that’s common sense or
even worse your boss says why did you do
it that way that’s common sense I
remember a couple years back I was in
Germany like lecturing to an executive
audience and we were talking about
managing customers I’m a marketing guy
basically we were talking about managing
customers and the guy looks and he
stands up he’s highly incensed he stands
up and he says bill this is all just
common sense
I don’t think you realize what he was
saying so I had to look at him I said
okay is it common sense I said then let
me ask you a question I said I guess you
you you and your company have common
sense he says oh absolutely I said oh
okay so I guess you’re making more money
than your competitors I asked them
silence I guess your people perform
better than your competitors silence and
so I had to ask him I said well you know
from what I’m hearing so far from you
I’m not seeing a whole lot of benefit
from this thing that you call common
sense so maybe where I dance is perhaps
more valuable than where you think you
should be dancing small words have huge
consequences you know what you call
something influences how you behave
towards it the words that you use become
the thoughts in your head or vice versa
sometimes and they in turn determine the
way you act towards other people towards
animal just just conditioning your
behavior generally there’s a great
lao-tzu expression up behind me that you
guys can read alright I’m a big believer
that words are extremely important and
are extremely powerful and I’m as you
probably gathered from my accent I’m
Swiss believe it or not I am I’m Swiss
American but you know when
comes to the United States we like to
put people in boxes you’re this you’re
that you’re this you’re that and I’ve
never been comfortable living in a box
so this this this whole notion of common
sense and behaving the way everybody
else behaves has never been my kettle of
fish one of the questions that I got
from the TEDx organizers well you know
was what is your career and I had to
rethink that on a career I thought geez
you know I’ve never had a career I just
make money you know I’m saying I mean I
don’t need anybody as you heard from our
our introduction there I don’t like
salaries
why do you here get a salary put your
hand up if you get a salary come on be
brave put your hand up you get a salary
you know what a salary is a salary is
somebody else telling you how much
you’re worth think about that a salary
is somebody else tell me how much I can
look in the mirror I know how much I’m
worth thank you very much and I bill
accordingly so be careful of these small
words cuz small words have big
consequences now I’m not here to argue
that there is no such thing as common
sense that would be idiotic right in my
little world and my little twisted mind
there’s three types of common sense you
got the personal common sense right you
stick your finger in the flame it burns
unless you’re an idiot you learn not to
do that again okay then there’s a social
common sense right
social common sense says hey I can’t
walk down the street and Victoria Street
or whatever it’s called here in
Bucharest kissing all the beautiful
women that I see because hey that’s not
common sense it could also get me a hell
of a lot of trouble too then there’s the
organizational common sense right that’s
when you work for a company that has its
own way of thinking what they what they
often refer to as company culture and
I’m sure some of you are going through
that some companies even invent their
own vocabulary they have their
ways of spelling things for example if
you work for General Motors in the u.s.
you spell employee with one e not two
E’s I’m like what’s going on with this I
got my hand spanked cuz I actually
spelled it correctly no no no bill
you’re not supposed to do that oh okay
so there’s organizational common sense
as well all of these types of kind of
common sense that I’ve mentioned all
three types of them are based upon the
known right this is common knowledge you
know it I know it you know it she knows
it he knows it and therefore we all
understand the same thing in theory okay
the other side of that which is one that
really rubs me the wrong way is it
common sense is almost doctrinaire as
you know as I mentioned to you I’m a
little bit Swiss and in Switzerland we
have an expression in France she was
just earthy back I’m sorry it’s just not
done like this so you ask the people in
the village next door who have a clock
that wakes me up every morning when the
clock chimes that maybe they could
substitute an electronic timer looks
lady looks at me like I’m out of my mind
she says but bill it’s always been like
this I’m like yes it’s 1600s yo come on
now don’t you think we can improve a
little bit don’t you think
oh but no no no no and as she’s
looking at me like I’m an idiot okay I
get it it’s just not done and I’m sure
many of you have heard that many I’m
sure many of you have even grown up with
that type of thing that’s not the right
behavior I get it I don’t agree with it
but I get it I want to give you some
examples of when that whole notion of
common sense is not common at least as
far as I’m concerned I grew up in
Senegal as you heard in Senegal when you
want to buy something you negotiate the
price okay
anything you want to buy it’s negotiable
there is no fixed price all right so you
can imagine somebody coming from the
West from the United States or from
Europe who comes to Senegal they
market they want to buy something
they’re expecting a fixed price and been
Senegal basically we look at you we look
at what you’re wearing we look at what
you got we think how much money you got
in your pocket and then we fixed the
price accordingly right I’m sure some of
you are familiar with this this is what
I’m used to but I’m sure that if I went
into a supermarket here in Bucharest
grab the bottle of water then went to
the cashier and tried to negotiate with
her how much I was gonna pay for this
bottle of water or bottle of beer
chances are I’m not going to get very
far
so maybe what’s common-sense in Senegal
is not common sense in New York City
it’s not common sense in Geneva another
quick example here some of you might
recognize this is a very famous picture
from World War two and what you’re
looking at is two terrified black men
from Senegal crouching in the snow that
they’ve never seen before because the
French realized that they didn’t have
enough soldiers so let’s go get some of
them black guys in Senegal bring him up
put him on the lines so they went and
got 200,000 people that were called tal
Senegal a who helped protect France and
valiantly fought against the Germans an
interesting anecdote to that is when the
Germans captured the Senegalese they
felt insulted that they had had to fight
against what they considered to be lower
human beings so the Senegalese were
never sent to jail they were shot
commonsense
this is a picture of a busy house inky
Street at 3 o’clock in the morning I do
a lot of work in Finland and I remember
coming out of a club in the runt asipi
hotel earlier one morning on my way back
to the place where I was staying and the
streets were empty literally no cars in
sight I come to a crossing a street
crossing there’s a stoplight what do I
see 15 people standing in the corner not
crossing the street I’m thinking to
myself at 3 o’clock in the morning
there’s not a car coming from left right
center wherever why
just standing so me I cross the street
what do I hear behind me all kinds of
mumbling I don’t speak Finnish so I
don’t know what they were saying but I
know they were talking about me and I
could also tell by the tone that it
probably wasn’t a hundred percent
complimentary but the other side of that
was I gotta cross the street before they
did now if you put that into business
context which is where I’m going with
this in a minute you’ll see where I’m
going another little anecdote as I
mentioned to you I’ve spent a lot of
time living in Switzerland we have a
supermarket chain in Switzerland it’s
called the migra and the bottom line is
one day I’m shopping and this little old
lady comes up to me it’s January little
old lady comes up to me she looks at me
she goes wow it must be cold for you
here I’m thinking to myself well I don’t
have a jacket I left my pants at home I
mean like what’s going on here and she’s
looking at me so sympathetically and I
looked and I said what do you mean she
says well no she says you know you must
come from Africa it must be so cold for
you here common sense right he’s black
he must be from Africa I’m like yo lady
I’m from Harlem in New York City okay
winter time in New York is much colder
than it is here in Geneva so you don’t
need to worry about how cold it must be
for me I mean I really appreciated it
but you know she was just way off base
another example in the United States if
you want to borrow money you have to
have a credit rating what you’re seeing
behind me are the credit scores you got
to have a credit rating otherwise it
won’t give you anything but once you
have a credit rating you can literally
walk into a car dealership sign on the
piece of paper no money down and drive
away with 30 $40,000 car which is still
a little more difficult to do here in
Europe and Switzerland I wouldn’t even
have gotten the credit and Switzerland
we have this strange idea that if you
can’t afford something you just don’t
what a strange idea actually being
financially responsible oh my god what
is the world coming to
here’s another example that’s maybe not
so funny those of you who read the press
you’ve been probably reading about the
problems that some of us black males
particularly have been having with the
police in the United States so in terms
of common sense in terms of how you
handle or behave towards a police person
if you’re a white person you might even
argue with the policeman if you’re a
black person every second word is sark
okay and you make sure that his hand is
a long way from his gun and as you can
see from the statistics we don’t share
the same ideas or attitudes towards the
police so common sense with respect to
the cops
good luck I believe that any educated
idiot
can carry out sophisticated analysis and
this is what happens in a lot of good
corporations they hire great people very
intelligent people ask them to do very
complicated analyses and then
misinterpret the results you know what I
mean it’s like trying to learn about
life by dissecting a frog by the time
you dissect that the thing is dead how
you gonna study life good luck good luck
okay yes I yes I uncommon thinking I
believe that we all have an ability to
see something bigger than what we see
today okay and then what differentiates
us from some of the million islands out
there is that ability to see a different
reality and to make it manifest here’s
one of my heroes era Steve Bucci co
Frenchman in 1852 recognized that most
women were unemployed that most women
were relying upon men for any source of
income what does he do he builds that
huge store that you see on the right of
the picture called OBO mache the world’s
first department store hires women right
first time legal employment not
prostitution not concubinage hey a real
job
also supported the suffragettes believe
it or not this guy is actually one of
the founders of the women’s liberation
movement here’s some other names you
recognize in branson musk Jove’s haji oh
I know that he’s the guy from easyJet
Zuckerberg you all know him page and
Brin alright those are the guys that
created Google you think any of this was
based on common sense here are some of
my favorite companies at the moment
arrow farms out of New York City indoor
farming pulling as much ground pulling
as much plant material from a container
as you get from one acre of land think
about that from a container a 40-foot
container
easyJet Airbnb lyft I’m sure you know
some of these guys
Hyperloop Spotify well known companies
all of these companies did something
different now what was it that they did
and this is what I want to tell you
about and the clock is tickin one they
found the gap they solved the problem
all of these guys solved a problem too
they flew what we call the OODA loop
that’s a term from the US Air Force okay
oona basically means see the observe
okay and then after you observe
objectify design and act okay we all do
this we see something we define what it
is figure out what we need to do when we
do it we do it mostly very very quickly
there are some people who have learned
to put that into a process that process
became PayPal and the people who started
PayPal then went on to create LinkedIn
YouTube Yelp slide Tesla Digg Yammer and
a whole bunch of other companies using
exactly the same technology the third
one is keep on keeping on even when
everybody else is telling you you’re
crazy because obviously you haven’t sold
anything you’re never gonna sell
anything that’s what they said to the
guys at Airbnb who’s laughing now couple
billion dollars later right pivot or
fail wisely you don’t always get it
right the first time
hey you know something that’s okay
failures good
you learn when you fail if you’re scared
to fail chances are you’re never gonna
learn anything new and you sure as hell
won’t try anything new okay so let me
back up just a minute HOT groups people
who think differently uncommon thinking
in a group they feed off of each other
you guys with me here you get what I’m
saying
they feed off each other it’s
complimentary and one plus one plus one
is bigger than three another one that
these companies have all done is what we
call gifting small goods look at Elon
Musk you all know who he is you know
what he does recently there’s been a
little problem in Puerto Rico so what
does he do he puts some of his batteries
together flies them down to Puerto Rico
plugs him into the local hospital so
that people can get operated does he
charge through this No $0 when he’s
hoping for obviously he can establish
some goodwill and they’ll come back when
they need some money
excuse me when they need more power so
on a personal level okay cuz the clock
is really ticking here what could out
what advice can I give you one go to
places you’ve never been before
yo Bucharest okay do things you’ve never
done before that’s gonna take you out of
your comfort zone do something you’ve
never done before make a habit of it ask
why why do I do this why do I drive to
school why do I take the bus why do I
Drive my car ask yourself why it’s five
times because each time you’re going to
get an answer that’s a technique created
by taiichi ohno who’s one of the
creators of the of the toyota system
amazing amazing guy think about it try
it when you go home it’s a great way to
get to the heart of anything okay flip
it man was Emma boom Kevin and as Carl
yaqoob’ once said okay and they’re
telling me my times up but I’m gonna
steal a couple of extra minutes here
because I want to tell you a story
during World War two the American
bombers that were flying in to bomb the
Germans were getting blown out of the
sky
the b15 and so they hired this guy he’s
an Austrian guy to try and figure out
how they should armour the planes and
what did the Air Force say you
put the armor where the bullet holes are
for the planes that came back you know
what he said he said wrong because the
reason the planes didn’t come back is
because that’s where they got shot down
that’s where we need to put the armor
everybody with me him he flipped it
around ok highly-successful be 15s stop
being shot down as I like to say to
people if you’re not living on the edge
you’re probably taking up too much space
the approach that I use to try and keep
myself fresh is what I call the Banzai
approach I’m a bonsai apprentice maybe
one day before I die I’ll be a bonsai
master but one of the things you have to
do with your trees is after every two or
three years you got to pull them out of
the soil and trim 2/3 of the roots now
for me that’s like cutting my children’s
fingers off then you put them back in
and then you got to pluck all those
little leaves off one by one by one the
plant goes into shock but then 4 or 5
days later you see all these green
sprouts coming up and suddenly there’s
like an explosion of growth new leaves
new life you guys with me here all right
I know it’s easier said than done but
give it a shot and finally I want to
leave you with one thought if I may cuz
I’m Way past my time one final thought
if you want something that you’ve never
had before you’re probably gonna have to
do something you’ve never done before
don’t freak out enjoy the journey thank
you [Applause]
yeah Bucharest
how y’all doing now wait a minute wait a
minute talk to me how y’all doing yeah
that’s more like it
that’s more like it um first of all
thank everybody for being here
you know it’s not it’s not every day a
whole lot of people come up to listen to
you talk I’m gonna apologize right up
front I’m from New York City everything
in New York City operates at about 200
kilometres an hour and that’s me
included right so I’m already you’re
gonna apologize up front if I start
talking too quickly all right how should
I start I should probably start with
what I’m what am I doing here I was in
Boston minding my own business a couple
weeks ago and a friend of mine who’s in
the audience here we were having an
early beer together some of you can
hopefully appreciate that and she
mentioned you know this whole idea of
common sense and I hate the term common
sense I’ve always despised the term
common sense and I’ll give you some
reasons why in just a moment but she
managed to sweet-talk me into coming up
to Bucharest I’ve never been to
Bucharest before so I want to thank all
of you for the warm welcome
that I have received so far and lord
knows if I get an opportunity I will
definitely be coming back but I want to
talk to you here about when uncommon
makes sense now I mentioned to you a
little while ago just a moment ago that
I don’t like the word common sense and
you can you can see behind me three of
the traditional dictionary definitions
of common sense right and if you look
you’ll see they all use words like
judgment and being reasonable and you
know have a look at it really quickly
I’m not going to read them to you but
the notion is the whole idea that
somehow we’re going to be sitting in
judgment on other people on a regular
basis simply because they don’t think
the way we do is not something I’m
terribly comfortable with all those
definitions are unbelievably vague if
you actually read them through and think
about it word by
you’ll see that actually they’re not
really saying a whole lot which is one
of the problems that I have with the
notion of common sense my favorite
definition of common sense is what I
believe that you guys should know right
remember when your mother or your father
would say hey that’s common sense or
even worse your boss says why did you do
it that way that’s common sense I
remember a couple years back I was in
Germany like lecturing to an executive
audience and we were talking about
managing customers I’m a marketing guy
basically we were talking about managing
customers and the guy looks and he
stands up he’s highly incensed he stands
up and he says bill this is all just
common sense
I don’t think you realize what he was
saying so I had to look at him I said
okay is it common sense I said then let
me ask you a question I said I guess you
you you and your company have common
sense he says oh absolutely I said oh
okay so I guess you’re making more money
than your competitors I asked them
silence I guess your people perform
better than your competitors silence and
so I had to ask him I said well you know
from what I’m hearing so far from you
I’m not seeing a whole lot of benefit
from this thing that you call common
sense so maybe where I dance is perhaps
more valuable than where you think you
should be dancing small words have huge
consequences you know what you call
something influences how you behave
towards it the words that you use become
the thoughts in your head or vice versa
sometimes and they in turn determine the
way you act towards other people towards
animal just just conditioning your
behavior generally there’s a great
lao-tzu expression up behind me that you
guys can read alright I’m a big believer
that words are extremely important and
are extremely powerful and I’m as you
probably gathered from my accent I’m
Swiss believe it or not I am I’m Swiss
American but you know when
comes to the United States we like to
put people in boxes you’re this you’re
that you’re this you’re that and I’ve
never been comfortable living in a box
so this this this whole notion of common
sense and behaving the way everybody
else behaves has never been my kettle of
fish one of the questions that I got
from the TEDx organizers well you know
was what is your career and I had to
rethink that on a career I thought geez
you know I’ve never had a career I just
make money you know I’m saying I mean I
don’t need anybody as you heard from our
our introduction there I don’t like
salaries
why do you here get a salary put your
hand up if you get a salary come on be
brave put your hand up you get a salary
you know what a salary is a salary is
somebody else telling you how much
you’re worth think about that a salary
is somebody else tell me how much I can
look in the mirror I know how much I’m
worth thank you very much and I bill
accordingly so be careful of these small
words cuz small words have big
consequences now I’m not here to argue
that there is no such thing as common
sense that would be idiotic right in my
little world and my little twisted mind
there’s three types of common sense you
got the personal common sense right you
stick your finger in the flame it burns
unless you’re an idiot you learn not to
do that again okay then there’s a social
common sense right
social common sense says hey I can’t
walk down the street and Victoria Street
or whatever it’s called here in
Bucharest kissing all the beautiful
women that I see because hey that’s not
common sense it could also get me a hell
of a lot of trouble too then there’s the
organizational common sense right that’s
when you work for a company that has its
own way of thinking what they what they
often refer to as company culture and
I’m sure some of you are going through
that some companies even invent their
own vocabulary they have their
ways of spelling things for example if
you work for General Motors in the u.s.
you spell employee with one e not two
E’s I’m like what’s going on with this I
got my hand spanked cuz I actually
spelled it correctly no no no bill
you’re not supposed to do that oh okay
so there’s organizational common sense
as well all of these types of kind of
common sense that I’ve mentioned all
three types of them are based upon the
known right this is common knowledge you
know it I know it you know it she knows
it he knows it and therefore we all
understand the same thing in theory okay
the other side of that which is one that
really rubs me the wrong way is it
common sense is almost doctrinaire as
you know as I mentioned to you I’m a
little bit Swiss and in Switzerland we
have an expression in France she was
just earthy back I’m sorry it’s just not
done like this so you ask the people in
the village next door who have a clock
that wakes me up every morning when the
clock chimes that maybe they could
substitute an electronic timer looks
lady looks at me like I’m out of my mind
she says but bill it’s always been like
this I’m like yes it’s 1600s yo come on
now don’t you think we can improve a
little bit don’t you think
oh but no no no no and as she’s
looking at me like I’m an idiot okay I
get it it’s just not done and I’m sure
many of you have heard that many I’m
sure many of you have even grown up with
that type of thing that’s not the right
behavior I get it I don’t agree with it
but I get it I want to give you some
examples of when that whole notion of
common sense is not common at least as
far as I’m concerned I grew up in
Senegal as you heard in Senegal when you
want to buy something you negotiate the
price okay
anything you want to buy it’s negotiable
there is no fixed price all right so you
can imagine somebody coming from the
West from the United States or from
Europe who comes to Senegal they
market they want to buy something
they’re expecting a fixed price and been
Senegal basically we look at you we look
at what you’re wearing we look at what
you got we think how much money you got
in your pocket and then we fixed the
price accordingly right I’m sure some of
you are familiar with this this is what
I’m used to but I’m sure that if I went
into a supermarket here in Bucharest
grab the bottle of water then went to
the cashier and tried to negotiate with
her how much I was gonna pay for this
bottle of water or bottle of beer
chances are I’m not going to get very
far
so maybe what’s common-sense in Senegal
is not common sense in New York City
it’s not common sense in Geneva another
quick example here some of you might
recognize this is a very famous picture
from World War two and what you’re
looking at is two terrified black men
from Senegal crouching in the snow that
they’ve never seen before because the
French realized that they didn’t have
enough soldiers so let’s go get some of
them black guys in Senegal bring him up
put him on the lines so they went and
got 200,000 people that were called tal
Senegal a who helped protect France and
valiantly fought against the Germans an
interesting anecdote to that is when the
Germans captured the Senegalese they
felt insulted that they had had to fight
against what they considered to be lower
human beings so the Senegalese were
never sent to jail they were shot
commonsense
this is a picture of a busy house inky
Street at 3 o’clock in the morning I do
a lot of work in Finland and I remember
coming out of a club in the runt asipi
hotel earlier one morning on my way back
to the place where I was staying and the
streets were empty literally no cars in
sight I come to a crossing a street
crossing there’s a stoplight what do I
see 15 people standing in the corner not
crossing the street I’m thinking to
myself at 3 o’clock in the morning
there’s not a car coming from left right
center wherever why
just standing so me I cross the street
what do I hear behind me all kinds of
mumbling I don’t speak Finnish so I
don’t know what they were saying but I
know they were talking about me and I
could also tell by the tone that it
probably wasn’t a hundred percent
complimentary but the other side of that
was I gotta cross the street before they
did now if you put that into business
context which is where I’m going with
this in a minute you’ll see where I’m
going another little anecdote as I
mentioned to you I’ve spent a lot of
time living in Switzerland we have a
supermarket chain in Switzerland it’s
called the migra and the bottom line is
one day I’m shopping and this little old
lady comes up to me it’s January little
old lady comes up to me she looks at me
she goes wow it must be cold for you
here I’m thinking to myself well I don’t
have a jacket I left my pants at home I
mean like what’s going on here and she’s
looking at me so sympathetically and I
looked and I said what do you mean she
says well no she says you know you must
come from Africa it must be so cold for
you here common sense right he’s black
he must be from Africa I’m like yo lady
I’m from Harlem in New York City okay
winter time in New York is much colder
than it is here in Geneva so you don’t
need to worry about how cold it must be
for me I mean I really appreciated it
but you know she was just way off base
another example in the United States if
you want to borrow money you have to
have a credit rating what you’re seeing
behind me are the credit scores you got
to have a credit rating otherwise it
won’t give you anything but once you
have a credit rating you can literally
walk into a car dealership sign on the
piece of paper no money down and drive
away with 30 $40,000 car which is still
a little more difficult to do here in
Europe and Switzerland I wouldn’t even
have gotten the credit and Switzerland
we have this strange idea that if you
can’t afford something you just don’t
what a strange idea actually being
financially responsible oh my god what
is the world coming to
here’s another example that’s maybe not
so funny those of you who read the press
you’ve been probably reading about the
problems that some of us black males
particularly have been having with the
police in the United States so in terms
of common sense in terms of how you
handle or behave towards a police person
if you’re a white person you might even
argue with the policeman if you’re a
black person every second word is sark
okay and you make sure that his hand is
a long way from his gun and as you can
see from the statistics we don’t share
the same ideas or attitudes towards the
police so common sense with respect to
the cops
good luck I believe that any educated
idiot
can carry out sophisticated analysis and
this is what happens in a lot of good
corporations they hire great people very
intelligent people ask them to do very
complicated analyses and then
misinterpret the results you know what I
mean it’s like trying to learn about
life by dissecting a frog by the time
you dissect that the thing is dead how
you gonna study life good luck good luck
okay yes I yes I uncommon thinking I
believe that we all have an ability to
see something bigger than what we see
today okay and then what differentiates
us from some of the million islands out
there is that ability to see a different
reality and to make it manifest here’s
one of my heroes era Steve Bucci co
Frenchman in 1852 recognized that most
women were unemployed that most women
were relying upon men for any source of
income what does he do he builds that
huge store that you see on the right of
the picture called OBO mache the world’s
first department store hires women right
first time legal employment not
prostitution not concubinage hey a real
job
also supported the suffragettes believe
it or not this guy is actually one of
the founders of the women’s liberation
movement here’s some other names you
recognize in branson musk Jove’s haji oh
I know that he’s the guy from easyJet
Zuckerberg you all know him page and
Brin alright those are the guys that
created Google you think any of this was
based on common sense here are some of
my favorite companies at the moment
arrow farms out of New York City indoor
farming pulling as much ground pulling
as much plant material from a container
as you get from one acre of land think
about that from a container a 40-foot
container
easyJet Airbnb lyft I’m sure you know
some of these guys
Hyperloop Spotify well known companies
all of these companies did something
different now what was it that they did
and this is what I want to tell you
about and the clock is tickin one they
found the gap they solved the problem
all of these guys solved a problem too
they flew what we call the OODA loop
that’s a term from the US Air Force okay
oona basically means see the observe
okay and then after you observe
objectify design and act okay we all do
this we see something we define what it
is figure out what we need to do when we
do it we do it mostly very very quickly
there are some people who have learned
to put that into a process that process
became PayPal and the people who started
PayPal then went on to create LinkedIn
YouTube Yelp slide Tesla Digg Yammer and
a whole bunch of other companies using
exactly the same technology the third
one is keep on keeping on even when
everybody else is telling you you’re
crazy because obviously you haven’t sold
anything you’re never gonna sell
anything that’s what they said to the
guys at Airbnb who’s laughing now couple
billion dollars later right pivot or
fail wisely you don’t always get it
right the first time
hey you know something that’s okay
failures good
you learn when you fail if you’re scared
to fail chances are you’re never gonna
learn anything new and you sure as hell
won’t try anything new okay so let me
back up just a minute HOT groups people
who think differently uncommon thinking
in a group they feed off of each other
you guys with me here you get what I’m
saying
they feed off each other it’s
complimentary and one plus one plus one
is bigger than three another one that
these companies have all done is what we
call gifting small goods look at Elon
Musk you all know who he is you know
what he does recently there’s been a
little problem in Puerto Rico so what
does he do he puts some of his batteries
together flies them down to Puerto Rico
plugs him into the local hospital so
that people can get operated does he
charge through this No $0 when he’s
hoping for obviously he can establish
some goodwill and they’ll come back when
they need some money
excuse me when they need more power so
on a personal level okay cuz the clock
is really ticking here what could out
what advice can I give you one go to
places you’ve never been before
yo Bucharest okay do things you’ve never
done before that’s gonna take you out of
your comfort zone do something you’ve
never done before make a habit of it ask
why why do I do this why do I drive to
school why do I take the bus why do I
Drive my car ask yourself why it’s five
times because each time you’re going to
get an answer that’s a technique created
by taiichi ohno who’s one of the
creators of the of the toyota system
amazing amazing guy think about it try
it when you go home it’s a great way to
get to the heart of anything okay flip
it man was Emma boom Kevin and as Carl
yaqoob’ once said okay and they’re
telling me my times up but I’m gonna
steal a couple of extra minutes here
because I want to tell you a story
during World War two the American
bombers that were flying in to bomb the
Germans were getting blown out of the
sky
the b15 and so they hired this guy he’s
an Austrian guy to try and figure out
how they should armour the planes and
what did the Air Force say you
put the armor where the bullet holes are
for the planes that came back you know
what he said he said wrong because the
reason the planes didn’t come back is
because that’s where they got shot down
that’s where we need to put the armor
everybody with me him he flipped it
around ok highly-successful be 15s stop
being shot down as I like to say to
people if you’re not living on the edge
you’re probably taking up too much space
the approach that I use to try and keep
myself fresh is what I call the Banzai
approach I’m a bonsai apprentice maybe
one day before I die I’ll be a bonsai
master but one of the things you have to
do with your trees is after every two or
three years you got to pull them out of
the soil and trim 2/3 of the roots now
for me that’s like cutting my children’s
fingers off then you put them back in
and then you got to pluck all those
little leaves off one by one by one the
plant goes into shock but then 4 or 5
days later you see all these green
sprouts coming up and suddenly there’s
like an explosion of growth new leaves
new life you guys with me here all right
I know it’s easier said than done but
give it a shot and finally I want to
leave you with one thought if I may cuz
I’m Way past my time one final thought
if you want something that you’ve never
had before you’re probably gonna have to
do something you’ve never done before
don’t freak out enjoy the journey thank
you [Applause]
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