Lenny Rachitsky: uncertainty

Transcript context

…I don't think personality types matter as much. I've seen very quiet people, very extroverted people. You name it. I've seen all sorts of personality types. So for me personally, I don't think there's a personality type that people should copy and be like, "I need to be like this person. I need to be Steve Jobs. I need to be Elon." I don't really believe in that because there's just so much variation. Tony from DoorDash is so different than a lot of folks, and Rujul is so different and Grant from Whatnot. These are all very, very different people. Patrick is a different kind of person. Ryan from Flexport. These are just very different personality types. But the thing that I would argue folks that build really big companies have in common is they just really want it and they really believe in themselves and they really believe they can make it work. And that they're somehow deep in their internal psyche, there's something that's like, "I'm the one and I won't accept this not working." And even though objectively there's all this data coming in, this isn't working, this is bad. My employees want to quit, my executives want to quit. Whatever it is. Somewhere deep down in there, they're like, "Oh yeah, I'm going to make this work. This company is going to be big." And they just believe. And it's almost like that internal gravitational force inside of them is so large, it warps the world to bend to that will. And people start to believe it because they believe it so much and they convince their employees to believe in and they convince everyone around them that this is going to happen for them. And so again, this is not a personality trait. I'm arguing this is a core belief. So interesting. And it connects so much to what we've been talking about. Just don't die. Don't lose hope in what you're working on. A founder hearing this might feel like, "Man, I don't know if I'm so convinced this is going to work. " In your experience, how much of this is internally, they're so certain and convinced versus externally, they need to show this confidence? Well, I think it's internally they're convinced. Yeah, I'm not sure it's external. But, and this is the big but, no one has this at the early stages when they don't have a good idea and they don't have customers and it's objectively not working. And so again, I know a lot of founders are like, "Well, I don't feel that way. Oh no, maybe I'm an imposter and I shouldn't do a startup." Well, of course you don't feel that way if you haven't talked to any customers and haven't built a product. But what usually happens is you pivot to a good idea where you start with a good idea that you care about and customers you care about and you launch it. And the better the product does, the more obsessed you get with your own company. I think in the case of Stripe, I don't want to tell Patrick's story for him, but I recall him saying at some point he wasn't as sure that Stripe was going to work until they were a year or two in. And then once it started working and then they really believed in it. But it wasn't like he woke up one day and like, "Stripe is the thing. It's going to work." I think you build conviction and you have this network effect virtual cycle where you get work conviction. The more customers reflect back to you and data reflects back to you that you're on the right track.…

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