<story><title>If You Want to Go Broke, Listen to a Billionaire</title><url>https://sideprojectplaybook.com/if-you-want-to-go-broke-listen-to-a-billionaire/</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>mdorazio</author><text>I think it&amp;#x27;s worth discussing things that &lt;i&gt;actually&lt;/i&gt; lead to positive outcomes in business settings rather than looking at outliers who mostly got lucky.  People I know in the &amp;quot;successful entrepreneurs despite never getting lucky&amp;quot; category generally have some combination of attributes that the whole VC industry (including wishful founders) often downplays:&lt;p&gt;- Actual domain expertise (a summer internship or talking to a few people doesn&amp;#x27;t count)&lt;p&gt;- A solid grasp on business fundamentals and managing teams effectively&lt;p&gt;- A strong network of people who serve as potential employees, partners, customers, mentors, etc. due to being outgoing and generally spending time on developing relationships&lt;p&gt;- An uncanny ability to recognize niche business problems that are underserved by existing options&lt;p&gt;- A willingness to laugh at concepts like &amp;quot;work-life balance&amp;quot;, &amp;quot;happy marriage&amp;quot;, and &amp;quot;spend more time with your kids&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;- The ability to build a strong team from nothing and keep it strong by firing people who suck and rewarding people who are good&lt;p&gt;- Recognition of what you are and are not good at, and then finding good people to do the latter for you&lt;p&gt;- The ability to sell things effectively (no, if you build it they probably won&amp;#x27;t just come)&lt;p&gt;I&amp;#x27;m sure others on HN have their own lists.</text></comment>
<story><title>If You Want to Go Broke, Listen to a Billionaire</title><url>https://sideprojectplaybook.com/if-you-want-to-go-broke-listen-to-a-billionaire/</url></story><parent_chain></parent_chain><comment><author>zelon88</author><text>Great read! Lots of potent talking points for your next financial meeting at work.&lt;p&gt;I saw a company advisor get all bent because so many people were taking out 401k loans. So we had to listen to him (a millionaire) and the CEO (also a millionaire) talk about how &amp;quot;cheap&amp;quot; money is at the moment and how they&amp;#x27;re both taking out mortgages and investing the money because their mortgage rates are so low. Then my boss said, verbatim, &amp;quot;I know, for a fact, with what you&amp;#x27;re making that any of you could get a loan at a credit union right now.&amp;quot;&lt;p&gt;There&amp;#x27;s a lot of older people in my industry who take an executives word for gospel. It was heartbreaking to see this man gaslight everybody with his unwitting ignorance to how real people get by.</text></comment>