Friday Fuel - September 25th, 2020
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Hi friends,
Here’s your weekly shot of Friday Fuel, a collection of things that I’ve been learning from or enjoying recently.
📕What I’ve Been Reading - On Sunday, golfer Bryson DeChambeau shot six under par to win his first major, the U.S. Open. Dubbed “The Mad Scientist of Golf,” Bryson is known for his untraditional approach to the game, utilizing a rare combination of deep analytics and gut instinct.
This article breaks down Bryson’s methods behind the madness, illustrating how and why Bryson is making a name for himself as one of the most innovative athletes in the world. Many of these attitudes and processes can be directly applied to a wide range of industries, especially business.
If you have a goal of being the best you can be in your respective field (or you just like reading interesting things), I’d highly recommend giving this article a look.
🎧What I’ve Been Listening To - Harry Stebbings is wise beyond his years. At age 18, he launched The Twenty Minute VC podcast in order to help pay for his mother’s medical bills. Fast forward five years later and Twenty Minute VC is the world’s largest independently run venture capital podcast with hundreds of thousands of listeners per episode.
In this episode he sits down with Austen Allred, the founder and CEO of Lambda School, the startup that (now remotely) trains people to become web developers or data scientists at no cost. Once the students land a job, a fraction of their salary goes towards their tuition. This is called an Income Share Agreement (ISA).
Over the course of thirty minutes, they cover a wide variety of topics including how to assess your attitude towards risk, Lambda School’s growing pains, and the effect of COVID on the serendipity of the Bay Area.
If you want to read more about how Harry built himself up as one of the youngest forces in venture capital, check out this feature in TechCrunch.
🤯What’s Blown My Mind -
A few weeks back, I shared an exchange between early Airbnb investor Paul Graham and co-founder Brian Chesky. Now, I’m showing you the email that started it all.
To think that this one half-seriously written email could morph into a company valued at $26 billion is wild. Talk about a eureka moment…
🧵A Thread that Inspired Me -
If you’re an NBA fan, you’ve probably taken notice of how dominant Jimmy Butler has been in these playoffs. A notoriously fierce competitor, Jimmy’s now one game away from his first ever NBA finals. To say it’s unlikely that he’d ever be in this position is an understatement. It wasn’t until reading this thread that I realized how much adversity and pain he endured to turn his dreams into reality. Even if you’ve never watched a quarter of basketball in your life, you should read this thread.
Against all odds, very few things can beat hard work and ruthless determination. Truly amazing.
🧠An Idea I Enjoyed -
The best business ideas are ones that solve common problems. Thanks to the internet, it’s never been easier to identify a problem, communicate with target users, and start building a business. Social media and other tech platforms are the most valuable market research tools we have at our disposal.
This illustration depicts this perfectly.
First identify a common problem, next use technology to speak with potential customers who share the same issue. If you find they are willing to pay to resolve it, then you know that you’re onto something. From there, you build.
That’s all he wrote. If you’re new here and want to catch up on some old editions, here are a couple of my favorites: An Epic Showdown and Fast and Curious.
Like what you’ve been reading? I’d love if you shared this with someone special who you think would enjoy it.
You can also follow me on Twitter or check out my website randymginsburg.com for more content.
Thanks for reading,
Randy