Doing on the Job - Akira the Don, Naval Ravikant

Business to me is bottom of the barrel

There’s no actual skill called business

It’s too generic of a thing

It’s like a skill called relating, like relating to humans, that’s not a skill,

it’s too broad

So a lot of what goes on in business is essentially just anecdotes

They call it case studies, but it just anecdotes

And they’re trying to help you pattern match by throwing lots of data points at

you, but the reality is, you will never understand them fully until you’re

actually in that position yourself

(Until you’re actually in that position yourself)

You can always learn better by doing it on the job

By doing it on the job

By doing it on the job

You can always learn better by doing it on the job

By doing it on the job

By doing it on the job

Even then you will find that basic concepts from game theory and psychology and

big mathematics, computers, and logic will serve you much, much better

I would focus on the foundations

I would focus with a science bent

I would develop a love for reading

That is a foundation for your self-education

When it comes to your learning curve, if you wanna optimize your learning curve,

one of the reasons I don’t love podcasts, even though I’m a generator of

podcasts, I like to consume my information very quickly

I can read very fast but I can only listen at a certain speed

And it’s hard to go back, it’s hard to highlight, it’s hard to pinpoint

snippets and save them in your notebook

A lot of people think they can become really skilled at something by watching

others do it, or even by reading about others doing it

You’re gonna learn a lot more by operating your own lemonade stand,

that is how you’re gonna learn, on the job

Because a lot of the subtleties don’t express themselves until you’re actually

in the business

You know, I’ve learned that tit-for-tat iterated prisoner’s dilemma is the

piece of game theory that is worth knowing the most

The best way to learn game theory is to play lots of games

I never even read game theory books, I consider myself extremely good at game

theory

I’ve never opened up a game theory book and found a result in there where I was

like, «Oh, yeah, that’s common sense.»

I just grew up playing all kinds of games and so it’s just second nature to me

You can always learn better by doing it on the job

By doing it on the job

By doing it on the job

You can always learn better by doing it on the job

By doing it on the job

By doing it on the job

You can always learn better by doing it on the job

By doing it on the job

By doing it on the job

You can always learn better by doing it on the job

By doing it on the job

By doing it on the job

But doing is a subtle thing

That word «doing» encapsulates a lot

If I start a business where I go in every day and I’m doing the same thing

Let’s say I’m running a retail store, stocking the shelves with food and liquor

every single day, I’m not gonna learn that much, I’m repeating things a lot

So I’m putting in thousands of hours, but they’re thousands of hours doing the

same thing

Thousands of iterations, that would be different

The learning curve is across iterations, if I was trying new marketing,

changing up the inventory, branding and the messaging, changing the sign

It’s the number of iterations that drives the learning curve

The more iterations, the more shots on goal, the faster you’re gonna learn

It’s not just about the hours put in

The way we’re built, the way the world presents itself, offers us very easily

the opportunity to do the same thing over and over

Really, we’d be better served if we went off and found ways to do new things

Doing something new the first time is painful, and high odds are that you will

fail

So you just have to get very, very comfortable with frequent small failures

So you just have to get very, very comfortable with frequent small failures

You can always learn better by doing it on the job

By doing it on the job

By doing it on the job

You can always learn better by doing it on the job

By doing it on the job

By doing it on the job

You can always learn better by doing it on the job

By doing it on the job

By doing it on the job

You can always learn better by doing it on the job

By doing it on the job

By doing it on the job

Nassim Taleb made his wealth by being a trader, he relied upon black swans

Losing little bits of money every day and then once in a blue moon he would

make a lot when the unthinkable happened for other people

Most people want to make little bits of money every day, in exchange they’ll

tolerate lots of blow-up risk, they’ll tolerate going completely bankrupt

We’re not evolved to bleed a little every day

If you’re out in the natural environment, and you get a cut, you will

eventually die

You have to stop that cut

We’re evolved for small victories all the time but that becomes very expensive

That’s where the crowd is, that’s where the herd is

So if you’re willing to bleed a little bit every day but in exchange you’ll win

big later, you will do better

That is, by the way, entrepreneurship

Entrepreneurs, bleed every day

They’re not making money, they’re losing money, they’re constantly stressed out,

all the responsibility is upon them, but when they win they win big

On average they’ll make more