{8} Memos, Bets & Focus

Knowledge from Evy Lyons, Daniel Vassallo, and Greg Brockman

Dane Lyons

Jan 12, 2023

Chat #1: Evy Lyons

Builder of brands, teams & muscles. CMO @Traackr.

Evy Lyons:
The world would be a better place if more people wrote and read and took action on memos.

Dane Lyons:
How can people who prefer verbal communication incorporate memos into their workflow?

Evy Lyons:
They have to practice writing memos. It helps to have a basic structure.

The Context: What is happening or not happening that presents an opportunity?
The Concept: What is your idea?
The Impact: What will happen if you do it?
The Path: What are the next steps to advance it?

Dane Lyons:
I like that structure because it forces people to think about expected outcomes resulting from their actions. It discourages reactive busy work and encourages impactful action.

How do you inspire a group to fundamentally change how they communicate with each other?

Evy Lyons:
I’m a fan of the rip off the bandaid approach. It’s abrupt but getting stuck in the transition is a more painful process.

As an example, outlaw standing meetings. Make information flow asynchronous only. Get on calls when it makes sense.

To be transparent, I haven’t tried that example. But it’s something I dream about…

Dane Lyons:
Here is a potential solution if the bandaid rip doesn't work. 😉

Andrew Gazdecki @agazdecki

Billion dollar startup idea: calendar app that would automatically shut down a persons computer anytime they went to schedule a meeting.

Conclusion:
It’s easy to get into workflows with too many meetings accomplishing little more than sapping the life out of everyone involved. Memos force us to be more intentional about what we’re building, why, and how.

I often worry about new communication systems being overly rigid. Sometimes rigidity can be a good thing. Evy mentioned ripping off the bandaid to help the team embrace a new system. But once the team settles into creating memos, it may be good to encourage memos rather than requiring them.

Chat #2: Daniel Vassallo

Creator of the Gumroad course Small Bets.

Daniel Vassallo:
"You should never put links in your tweets!" 🤡

Dane Lyons:
Wow. Are those yearly or all-time numbers?

Daniel Vassallo:
All-time, since Dec 2019.

Dane Lyons:
Really impressive that you're driving almost 5x more sales through Twitter than Google.

Daniel Vassallo:
I'm surprised there's any from Google actually. I think it's mostly people looking me up directly because they don't remember the URL, etc.

Dane Lyons:
The Small Bets course looks interesting. Is it at all related to or inspired by Thinking in Bets? (great book by @AnnieDuke)

Daniel Vassallo:
I actually never read it, but from what I heard about the book there are many similarities.

Dane Lyons:
Nice. It is very useful to think about your work in terms of bets. I'm a fan of small bets with a lowish probability of a positive outcome, but with a high upside.

Daniel Vassallo:
I'm a fan of the other kind: high probability of a small win :)

Conclusion:
It’s a misconception that you can’t do great things with a slow but steady approach. Entrepreneurship is often about having the discipline to accomplish small tasks that add marginal value.

I also like to sprinkle in high-upside, low-risk tasks. For example, as I’m growing my newsletter, I could choose to initiate conversations with makers who have a modest following. The probability that they’ll reciprocate is high, and the resulting conversation is unquestionably valuable. But I could also spend time talking to people who are out of my league. If they ignore me, it’s a small time investment. If my ping results in a conversation, it could result in a nice boost.

This isn’t to say my growth strategy is to fish for influencers and treat growth as a game of catching Pokemon. Being inauthentic isn’t good for anyone. But if you have something worth saying, don’t be afraid to say it.

#protip by Greg Brockman

President & Co-Founder OpenAI.

Greg Brockman @gdb

Classic software wisdom is to focus on one problem at a time. However, I often find it more productive to focus on many interrelated problems. When you get stuck on one, you can do something productive on another one — and often unstick the original by noticing the connections.

Many people might not like this take, but I strongly agree. Focus is great as long as you have a vision of getting from A to B. When you get stuck along the way, it’s not always helpful to force yourself to “do what you said you would do”. It is often better to work on an adjacent problem, gain context, then come back later.

I feel so strongly about this that I’ve previously considered adopting a personal workflow that embraces the concept. I’ve considered buying a used gym locker or another physical storage system with many small compartments.

Each compartment would contain a single project storing all my notes, prototypes, images, etc. As I get coffee every morning, I’d look at the projects and decide what I’d like to work on for the day. Then I’d take out the project files and focus on making progress while all the other distractions remain locked away.