Asking For Competitors Quotes

So Haymitch, what do you think of the games have one hundred percent more competitors than usual?” asks Caesar. Haymitch shrugs. “I don’t see that it makes that much difference. They’ll still be one hundred percent as stupid as usual, so I figure my odds will be roughly the same.

Men write more books. Men give more lectures. Men ask more questions after lectures. Men post more e-mail to Internet discussion groups. To say this is due to patriarchy is to beg the question of the behavior's origin. If men control society, why don't they just shut up and enjoy their supposed prerogatives? The answer is obvious when you consider sexual competition: men can't be quiet because that would give other men a chance to show off verbally. Men often bully women into silence, but this is usually to make room for their own verbal display. If men were dominating public language just to maintain patriarchy, that would qualify as a puzzling example of evolutionary altruism—a costly, risky individual act that helps all of one's sexual competitors (other males) as much as oneself. The ocean of male language that confronts modern women in bookstores, television, newspapers, classrooms, parliaments, and businesses does not necessarily come from a male conspiracy to deny women their voice. It may come from an evolutionary history of sexual selection in which the male motivation to talk was vital to their reproduction.

There was also the time that competitors were asked to submit a paragraph of a Graham Greene parody: Greene himself entered under a pseudonym and placed third.

story, I interviewed more than a hundred friends, relatives, competitors, adversaries, and colleagues. His wife also did not request any restrictions or control, nor did she ask to see in advance what I would publish. In fact she strongly encouraged

It is far better to ask what your competitors will likely do before you proceed than to simply wait and see what happens. Only strategies that provide a sustainable advantage—or a significant lead in developing future advantages—are worth investing in.

look at what your competitors do, and ask yourself a series of questions: “Are their strategy and goals the same as mine?” If their strategy and beliefs are different, and you still have conviction in your own, then you shouldn’t be distracted. Stay the course.

3 STEPS FOR APPLYING DISTINCT VALUE Step 1: Understand what matters to your buyers. Step 2: Identify something about your company, product, or service that competitors cannot match. Step 3: Convey steps 1 and 2 to buyers and ask for their buy-in to the value you have presented.

At a nearby table, two men in suits were discussing the gymnastics final in booming voices. “She never would have won if the Russians hadn’t boycotted,” the man insisted. “It’s not a victory if the best players aren’t there.” Sam asked his mother whether she thought the man with the loud voice was right. “Hmm.” Anna sipped her iced tea and then she rested her chin in her hands, which Sam had learned to recognize as her philosophizing gesture. Anna was a great talker, and it was one of the most profound pleasures of young Sam’s life to discuss the world and its mysteries with his mother. No one took him, and his queries, more seriously than she did. “Even if what he says is true, I think it’s still a victory,” she said. “Because she won on this day, with this particular set of people. We can never know what else might have happened had other competitors been there. The Russian girls could have won, or they could have gotten jet-lagged and choked.” Anna shrugged. “And this is the truth of any game—it can only exist at the moment that it is being played. It’s the same with being an actor. In the end, all we can ever know is the game that was played, in the only world that we know.

What the field needed, he argued, was what he called inverse reinforcement learning. Rather than asking, as regular reinforcement learning does, “Given a reward signal, what behavior will optimize it?,” inverse reinforcement learning (or “IRL”) asks the reverse: “Given the observed behaviour, what reward signal, if any, is being optimized?”15 This is, of course, in more informal terms, one of the foundational questions of human life. What exactly do they think they’re doing? We spend a good fraction of our life’s brainpower answering questions like this. We watch the behavior of others around us—friend and foe, superior and subordinate, collaborator and competitor—and try to read through their visible actions to their invisible intentions and goals. It is in some ways the cornerstone of human cognition. It also turns out to be one of the seminal and critical projects in twenty-first-century AI.

Always ask yourself how someone could preempt your products or service. How can they put you out of business? Is it price? Is it service? Is it ease of use? No product is perfect and if there are good competitors in your market, they will figure out how to abuse you. It’s always better if you are honest with yourself and anticipate where the problems will co​me from.

So, Haymitch, what do you think of the Games having one hundred percent more competitors than usual?” asks Caesar. Haymitch shrugs. “I don’t see that it makes much difference. They’ll still be one hundred percent as stupid as usual, so I figure my odds will be roughly the same.” The audience bursts out laughing and Haymitch gives them a half smile. Snarky. Arrogant. Indifferent.

The first is about problem solving generally. Kobayashi redefined the problem he was trying to solve. What question were his competitors asking? It was essentially: How do I eat more hot dogs? Kobayashi asked a different question: How do I make hot dogs easier to eat? This question led him to experiment and gather the feedback that changed the game. Only by redefining the problem was he able to discover a new set of solutions.

When the Game Boy was released, Yokoi’s colleague came to him “with a grim expression on his face,” Yokoi recalled, and reported that a competitor handheld had hit the market. Yokoi asked him if it had a color screen. The man said that it did. “Then we’re fine,” Yokoi replied. Yokoi’s strategy of finding novel uses for technology, after others had moved on, smacks of exactly what a well-known psychological creativity exercise asks for.

We started with weekly learnings sessions for our top sixty leaders: two hours every week together as one team, with the premise that we would no longer judge outcomes as good or bad, we would just read the outcomes as outcomes, learn from them, and quickly improve. The goal was to outlearn our competitors. We would stop the shaming and blaming and the judging of outcomes as good or bad, and instead continuously ask ourselves, “What did we set out to do, what happened, what did we learn, and how fast can we improve on it?

At least she was good at archaeology, she mused, even if she was a dismal failure as a woman in Tate’s eyes. “She’s been broody ever since we got here,” Leta said with pursed lips as she glanced from Tate to Cecily. “You two had a blowup, huh?” she asked, pretending innocence. Tate drew in a short breath. “She poured crab bisque on me in front of television cameras.” Cecily drew herself up to her full height. “Pity it wasn’t flaming shish kebab!” she returned fiercely. Leta moved between them. “The Sioux wars are over,” she announced. “That’s what you think,” Cecily muttered, glaring around her at the tall man. Tate’s dark eyes began to twinkle. He’d missed her in his life. Even in a temper, she was refreshing, invigorating. She averted her eyes to the large grass circle outlined by thick corded string. All around it were make-shift shelters on poles, some with canvas tops, with bales of hay to make seats for spectators. The first competition of the day was over and the winners were being announced. A woman-only dance came next, and Leta grimaced as she glanced from one warring face to the other. If she left, there was no telling what might happen. “That’s me,” she said reluctantly, adjusting the number on her back. “Got to run. Wish me luck.” “You know I do,” Cecily said, smiling at her. “Don’t disgrace us,” Tate added with laughter in his eyes. Leta made a face at him, but smiled. “No fighting,” she said, shaking a finger at them as she went to join the other competitors. Tate’s granitelike face had softened as he watched his mother. Whatever his faults, he was a good son.

Toyota wasn’t really worried that it would give away its “secret sauce.” Toyota’s competitive advantage rested firmly in its proprietary, complex, and often unspoken processes. In hindsight, Ernie Schaefer, a longtime GM manager who toured the Toyota plant, told NPR’s This American Life that he realized that there were no special secrets to see on the manufacturing floors. “You know, they never prohibited us from walking through the plant, understanding, even asking questions of some of their key people,” Schaefer said. “I’ve often puzzled over that, why they did that. And I think they recognized we were asking the wrong questions. We didn’t understand this bigger picture.” It’s no surprise, really. Processes are often hard to see—they’re a combination of both formal, defined, and documented steps and expectations and informal, habitual routines or ways of working that have evolved over time. But they matter profoundly. As MIT’s Edgar Schein has explored and discussed, processes are a critical part of the unspoken culture of an organization. 1 They enforce “this is what matters most to us.” Processes are intangible; they belong to the company. They emerge from hundreds and hundreds of small decisions about how to solve a problem. They’re critical to strategy, but they also can’t easily be copied. Pixar Animation Studios, too, has openly shared its creative process with the world. Pixar’s longtime president Ed Catmull has literally written the book on how the digital film company fosters collective creativity2—there are fixed processes about how a movie idea is generated, critiqued, improved, and perfected. Yet Pixar’s competitors have yet to equal Pixar’s successes. Like Toyota, Southern New Hampshire University has been open with would-be competitors, regularly offering tours and visits to other educational institutions. As President Paul LeBlanc sees it, competition is always possible from well-financed organizations with more powerful brand recognition. But those assets alone aren’t enough to give them a leg up. SNHU has taken years to craft and integrate the right experiences and processes for its students and they would be exceedingly difficult for a would-be competitor to copy. SNHU did not invent all its tactics for recruiting and serving its online students. It borrowed from some of the best practices of the for-profit educational sector. But what it’s done with laser focus is to ensure that all its processes—hundreds and hundreds of individual “this is how we do it” processes—focus specifically on how to best respond to the job students are hiring it for. “We think we have advantages by ‘owning’ these processes internally,” LeBlanc says, “and some of that is tied to our culture and passion for students.

THE 12 COMMANDMENTS OF BOSSES’ DIRTY WORK How to Implement Tough Decisions in Effective and Humane Ways Do not delay painful decisions and actions; hoping the problem will go away or that someone else will do your dirty work rarely is an effective path. Assume that you are clueless, or at least have only a dim understanding, of how people judge you and the dirty work that you do. Implement tough decisions as well as you can – even if they strike you as wrong or misguided. Or get out of the way and let someone else do it. Do everything possible to communicate to all who will be affected how distressing events will unfold, so they can predict when bad things will (and will not) happen to them. Explain early and often why the dirty work is necessary. Look for ways to give employees influence over how painful changes happen to them, even when it is impossible to change what will happen to them. Never humiliate, belittle, or bad-mouth people who are the targets of your dirty work. Ask yourself and fellow bosses to seriously consider if the dirty work is really necessary before implementing it. Just because all your competitors do it, or you have always done it in the past, does not mean it is wise right now. Do not bullshit or lie to employees, as doing so can destroy their loyalty and confidence, along with your reputation. Keep your big mouth shut. Divulging sensitive or confidential information can harm employees, your organization, and you, too. Refrain from doing mean-spirited things to exact personal revenge against employees who resist or object to your dirty work. Do not attempt dirty work if you lack the power to do it right, no matter how necessary it may seem.

If the global pie stayed the same size, there was no margin for credit. Credit is the difference between today’s pie and tomorrow’s pie. If the pie stays the same, why extend credit? It would be an unacceptable risk unless you believed that the baker or king asking for your money might be able to steal a slice from a competitor. So it was hard to get a loan in the premodern world, and when you got one it was usually small, short-term, and subject to high interest rates. Upstart entrepreneurs thus found it difficult to open new bakeries and great kings who wanted to build palaces or wage wars had no choice but to raise the necessary funds through high taxes and tariffs. That was fine for kings (as long as their subjects remained docile), but a scullery maid who had a great idea for a bakery and wanted to move up in the world generally could only dream of wealth while scrubbing down the royal kitchen’s floors. The Magic Circle of the Modern Economy It was lose-lose. Because credit was limited, people had trouble financing new businesses. Because there were few new businesses, the economy did not grow. Because it did not grow, people assumed it never would, and those who had capital were wary of extending credit. The expectation of stagnation fulfilled itself.

The evidence for the cognitive interpretation of the above-average effect is that when people are asked about a task they find difficult (for many of us this could be “Are you better than average in starting conversations with strangers?”), they readily rate themselves as below average. The upshot is that people tend to be overly optimistic about their relative standing on any activity in which they do moderately well. I have had several occasions to ask founders and participants in innovative start-ups a question: To what extent will the outcome of your effort depend on what you do in your firm? This is evidently an easy question; the answer comes quickly and in my small sample it has never been less than 80%. Even when they are not sure they will succeed, these bold people think their fate is almost entirely in their own hands. They are surely wrong: the outcome of a start-up depends as much on the achievements of its competitors and on changes in the market as on its own efforts. However, WYSIATI plays its part, and entrepreneurs naturally focus on what they know best—their plans and actions and the most immediate threats and opportunities, such as the availability of funding. They know less about their competitors and therefore find it natural to imagine a future in which the competition plays little part.

We have a system we follow every time we get asked to create a product logo. Clients like the work we produce and we’re able to charge a good dollar because clients know a product logo is something they will use for a long time. Once we create one product logo, we have our foot in the door and clients often come back as they launch new products.” Ted considered Alex’s conclusion. “Tell me about the system you follow for creating logos.” “It’s nothing too formal, but we always start off by asking the client to describe their vision for their product and how they differentiate themselves from their competitors.” Ted began to make notes. “That sounds like a good first step. Let’s call it Visioning.” Step 1: Visioning “What’s the next step?” asked Ted. “After we establish the client’s goals, we go through an exercise where we ask the client to personify their product. For example, we’ll ask questions like, ‘If your product was a famous actor, who would it be?’ and ‘If your product was a rock star, who would it be?’ One of our favorite questions is a little goofy: ‘If your product was a cookie, what kind of cookie would it be?’ These questions force the client to think about the personality they want to come through in their logo.” “That sounds unique, Alex. Let’s call that step two and give it a name like Personification.” Step 2: Personification “What’s your next step in designing a logo?” “We then go back to the office and use a pencil and paper to freehand sketch

One way Dan demonstrates to his students the concept of sunk cost is through a game in which participants bid to purchase a $100 bill. Rule #1: Bidding starts at $5. Rule #2: Bids can only increase by $5 at a time. Rule #3: The winner pays the amount of his or her final bid and gets the $100. The last rule is that the second-highest bidder also pays what he or she has bid, but gets nothing. As the game progresses, the bids rise to $50 and $55, at which point Dan will have made money. (The $55 bidder will pay $55 to get $100 and the second bidder will pay $50 and get nothing.) At some point, someone bids $85 and a competitor bids $90. At that point, Dan stops them and reminds them that the first person will win $10 ($100 minus $90) and the second person will lose $85. He asks the $85 bidder whether they want to continue to $95. Inevitably, they say yes. Then he asks the first person the same question, and he happily agrees to go to $100. But it doesn’t stop there at $100. Next, Dan asks the person who’s bid $95 if they want to go to $105. As before, if they say no, they’ll lose their previous bid: $95. But at this point, when the bidding is over $100, if they say yes, that means they are now actively bidding knowing that they will lose money. This time it’s $5 ($105 bid minus $100 winnings), but the loss will only increase from there. Inevitably, both participants keep bidding higher and higher until at some point one person realizes how crazy this is and they stop (and the person stopping ends up losing $95 more).

March 4 Could This Be True of Me? But none of these things move me, neither count I my life dear unto myself. Acts 20:24 It is easier to serve God without a vision, easier to work for God without a call, because then you are not bothered by what God requires; common sense is your guide, veneered over with Christian sentiment. You will be more prosperous and successful, more leisure-hearted, if you never realise the call of God. But if once you receive a commission from Jesus Christ, the memory of what God wants will always come like a goad; you will no longer be able to work for Him on the commonsense basis. What do I really count dear? If I have not been gripped by Jesus Christ, I will count service dear, time given to God dear, my life dear unto myself. Paul says he counted his life dear only in order that he might fulfil the ministry he had received; he refused to use his energy for any other thing. Acts 20:24 states Paul’s almost sublime annoyance at being asked to consider himself; he was absolutely indifferent to any consideration other than that of fulfilling the ministry he had received. Practical work may be a competitor against abandonment to God, because practical work is based on this argument—“Remember how useful you are here,” or—“Think how much value you would be in that particular type of work.” That attitude does not put Jesus Christ as the Guide as to where we should go, but our judgement as to where we are of most use. Never consider whether you are of use; but ever consider that you are not your own but His.

History favors the bold. Compensation favors the meek. As a Fortune 500 company CEO, you’re better off taking the path often traveled and staying the course. Big companies may have more assets to innovate with, but they rarely take big risks or innovate at the cost of cannibalizing a current business. Neither would they chance alienating suppliers or investors. They play not to lose, and shareholders reward them for it—until those shareholders walk and buy Amazon stock. Most boards ask management: “How can we build the greatest advantage for the least amount of capital/investment?” Amazon reverses the question: “What can we do that gives us an advantage that’s hugely expensive, and that no one else can afford?” Why? Because Amazon has access to capital with lower return expectations than peers. Reducing shipping times from two days to one day? That will require billions. Amazon will have to build smart warehouses near cities, where real estate and labor are expensive. By any conventional measure, it would be a huge investment for a marginal return. But for Amazon, it’s all kinds of perfect. Why? Because Macy’s, Sears, and Walmart can’t afford to spend billions getting the delivery times of their relatively small online businesses down from two days to one. Consumers love it, and competitors stand flaccid on the sidelines. In 2015, Amazon spent $7 billion on shipping fees, a net shipping loss of $5 billion, and overall profits of $2.4 billion. Crazy, no? No. Amazon is going underwater with the world’s largest oxygen tank, forcing other retailers to follow it, match its prices, and deal with changed customer delivery expectations. The difference is other retailers have just the air in their lungs and are drowning. Amazon will surface and have the ocean of retail largely to itself.

a young Goldman Sachs banker named Joseph Park was sitting in his apartment, frustrated at the effort required to get access to entertainment. Why should he trek all the way to Blockbuster to rent a movie? He should just be able to open a website, pick out a movie, and have it delivered to his door. Despite raising around $250 million, Kozmo, the company Park founded, went bankrupt in 2001. His biggest mistake was making a brash promise for one-hour delivery of virtually anything, and investing in building national operations to support growth that never happened. One study of over three thousand startups indicates that roughly three out of every four fail because of premature scaling—making investments that the market isn’t yet ready to support. Had Park proceeded more slowly, he might have noticed that with the current technology available, one-hour delivery was an impractical and low-margin business. There was, however, a tremendous demand for online movie rentals. Netflix was just then getting off the ground, and Kozmo might have been able to compete in the area of mail-order rentals and then online movie streaming. Later, he might have been able to capitalize on technological changes that made it possible for Instacart to build a logistics operation that made one-hour grocery delivery scalable and profitable. Since the market is more defined when settlers enter, they can focus on providing superior quality instead of deliberating about what to offer in the first place. “Wouldn’t you rather be second or third and see how the guy in first did, and then . . . improve it?” Malcolm Gladwell asked in an interview. “When ideas get really complicated, and when the world gets complicated, it’s foolish to think the person who’s first can work it all out,” Gladwell remarked. “Most good things, it takes a long time to figure them out.”* Second, there’s reason to believe that the kinds of people who choose to be late movers may be better suited to succeed. Risk seekers are drawn to being first, and they’re prone to making impulsive decisions. Meanwhile, more risk-averse entrepreneurs watch from the sidelines, waiting for the right opportunity and balancing their risk portfolios before entering. In a study of software startups, strategy researchers Elizabeth Pontikes and William Barnett find that when entrepreneurs rush to follow the crowd into hyped markets, their startups are less likely to survive and grow. When entrepreneurs wait for the market to cool down, they have higher odds of success: “Nonconformists . . . that buck the trend are most likely to stay in the market, receive funding, and ultimately go public.” Third, along with being less recklessly ambitious, settlers can improve upon competitors’ technology to make products better. When you’re the first to market, you have to make all the mistakes yourself. Meanwhile, settlers can watch and learn from your errors. “Moving first is a tactic, not a goal,” Peter Thiel writes in Zero to One; “being the first mover doesn’t do you any good if someone else comes along and unseats you.” Fourth, whereas pioneers tend to get stuck in their early offerings, settlers can observe market changes and shifting consumer tastes and adjust accordingly. In a study of the U.S. automobile industry over nearly a century, pioneers had lower survival rates because they struggled to establish legitimacy, developed routines that didn’t fit the market, and became obsolete as consumer needs clarified. Settlers also have the luxury of waiting for the market to be ready. When Warby Parker launched, e-commerce companies had been thriving for more than a decade, though other companies had tried selling glasses online with little success. “There’s no way it would have worked before,” Neil Blumenthal tells me. “We had to wait for Amazon, Zappos, and Blue Nile to get people comfortable buying products they typically wouldn’t order online.

Was this luck, or was it more than that? Proving skill is difficult in venture investing because, as we have seen, it hinges on subjective judgment calls rather than objective or quantifiable metrics. If a distressed-debt hedge fund hires analysts and lawyers to scrutinize a bankrupt firm, it can learn precisely which bond is backed by which piece of collateral, and it can foresee how the bankruptcy judge is likely to rule; its profits are not lucky. Likewise, if an algorithmic hedge fund hires astrophysicists to look for patterns in markets, it may discover statistical signals that are reliably profitable. But when Perkins backed Tandem and Genentech, or when Valentine backed Atari, they could not muster the same certainty. They were investing in human founders with human combinations of brilliance and weakness. They were dealing with products and manufacturing processes that were untested and complex; they faced competitors whose behaviors could not be forecast; they were investing over long horizons. In consequence, quantifiable risks were multiplied by unquantifiable uncertainties; there were known unknowns and unknown unknowns; the bracing unpredictability of life could not be masked by neat financial models. Of course, in this environment, luck played its part. Kleiner Perkins lost money on six of the fourteen investments in its first fund. Its methods were not as fail-safe as Tandem’s computers. But Perkins and Valentine were not merely lucky. Just as Arthur Rock embraced methods and attitudes that put him ahead of ARD and the Small Business Investment Companies in the 1960s, so the leading figures of the 1970s had an edge over their competitors. Perkins and Valentine had been managers at leading Valley companies; they knew how to be hands-on; and their contributions to the success of their portfolio companies were obvious. It was Perkins who brought in the early consultants to eliminate the white-hot risks at Tandem, and Perkins who pressed Swanson to contract Genentech’s research out to existing laboratories. Similarly, it was Valentine who drove Atari to focus on Home Pong and to ally itself with Sears, and Valentine who arranged for Warner Communications to buy the company. Early risk elimination plus stage-by-stage financing worked wonders for all three companies. Skeptical observers have sometimes asked whether venture capitalists create innovation or whether they merely show up for it. In the case of Don Valentine and Tom Perkins, there was not much passive showing up. By force of character and intellect, they stamped their will on their portfolio companies.

But there were problems. After the movie came out I couldn’t go to a tournament without being surrounded by fans asking for autographs. Instead of focusing on chess positions, I was pulled into the image of myself as a celebrity. Since childhood I had treasured the sublime study of chess, the swim through ever-deepening layers of complexity. I could spend hours at a chessboard and stand up from the experience on fire with insight about chess, basketball, the ocean, psychology, love, art. The game was exhilarating and also spiritually calming. It centered me. Chess was my friend. Then, suddenly, the game became alien and disquieting. I recall one tournament in Las Vegas: I was a young International Master in a field of a thousand competitors including twenty-six strong Grandmasters from around the world. As an up-and-coming player, I had huge respect for the great sages around me. I had studied their masterpieces for hundreds of hours and was awed by the artistry of these men. Before first-round play began I was seated at my board, deep in thought about my opening preparation, when the public address system announced that the subject of Searching for Bobby Fischer was at the event. A tournament director placed a poster of the movie next to my table, and immediately a sea of fans surged around the ropes separating the top boards from the audience. As the games progressed, when I rose to clear my mind young girls gave me their phone numbers and asked me to autograph their stomachs or legs. This might sound like a dream for a seventeen-year-old boy, and I won’t deny enjoying the attention, but professionally it was a nightmare. My game began to unravel. I caught myself thinking about how I looked thinking instead of losing myself in thought. The Grandmasters, my elders, were ignored and scowled at me. Some of them treated me like a pariah. I had won eight national championships and had more fans, public support and recognition than I could dream of, but none of this was helping my search for excellence, let alone for happiness. At a young age I came to know that there is something profoundly hollow about the nature of fame. I had spent my life devoted to artistic growth and was used to the sweaty-palmed sense of contentment one gets after many hours of intense reflection. This peaceful feeling had nothing to do with external adulation, and I yearned for a return to that innocent, fertile time. I missed just being a student of the game, but there was no escaping the spotlight. I found myself dreading chess, miserable before leaving for tournaments. I played without inspiration and was invited to appear on television shows. I smiled.

Mrs. Latham, president of the Victorian Oaks Preservation Society, hadn't said much about the nature of this meeting when she'd called a week ago. And Hayley hadn't even thought to ask, she'd been so overjoyed that the proposal from her tiny restoration firm had made the short list. Even with the size of the project-nine separate houses to fully restore-she knew she could do it. She wouldn't be alone. In the projects she'd tackled so far, Hayley had found a reliable group of subcontractors that didn't mind working for an untried woman, young enough to be a daughter to some of them. What she lacked in experience, she hoped she made up for in passion for the work and an ardent commitment to historical accuracy. But what did Mrs. Latham hope to accomplish in meeting with both her and her only competitor together? For an instant, Hayley wished she'd bought herself a briefcase. Still, with her delicate features and flyaway straight, looking businesslike was just a dream. The door opened, revealing an immaculately uniformed maid.

With the lens of Jobs to Be Done, the Medtronic team and Innosight (including my coauthor David Duncan) started research afresh in India. The team visited hospitals and care facilities, interviewing more than a hundred physicians, nurses, hospital administrators, and patients across the country. The research turned up four key barriers preventing patients from receiving much-needed cardiac care: Lack of patient awareness of health and medical needs Lack of proper diagnostics Inability of patients to navigate the care pathway Affordability While there were competitors making some progress in India, the biggest competition was nonconsumption because of the challenges the Medtronic team identified. From a traditional perspective, Medtronic might have doubled down on doctors, asking them about priorities and tradeoffs in the product. What features would they value more, or less? Asking patients what they wanted would not have been top of the list of considerations from a marketing perspective. But when Medtronic revisited the problem through the lens of Jobs to Be Done, Monson says, the team realized that the picture was far more complex—and not one that Medtronic executives could have figured out from pouring over statistics of Indian heart disease or asking cardiologists how to make the pacemaker better. Medtronic has missed a critical component of the Job to Be Done.

Rather than asking customers explicitly about feature X, Y or Z, one approach to defining the MVP is to ask, “What is the smallest or least complicated problem that the customer will pay us to solve?” This approach runs counter to the typical cry for more features, which is often based on what the competitors have or what the last customer visited had to say. The MVP is the inverse of what most sales and marketing groups ask of their development teams.

As the story goes, the manuscript that formed the outlines of Wiener’s contributions to information theory was nearly lost to humanity. Wiener had entrusted the manuscript to Walter Pitts, a graduate student, who had checked it as baggage for a trip from New York’s Grand Central Terminal to Boston. Pitts forgot to retrieve the baggage. Realizing his mistake, he asked two friends to pick up the bag. They either ignored or forgot the request. Only five months later was the manuscript finally tracked down; it had been labeled “unclaimed property” and cast aside in a coatroom. Wiener was, understandably, blind with rage. “Under these circumstances please consider me as completely dissociated from your future career,” he wrote to Pitts. He complained to one administrator of the “total irresponsibleness of the boys” and to another faculty member that the missing parcel meant that he had “lost priority on some important work.” “One of my competitors, Shannon of the Bell Telephone Company, is coming out with a paper before mine,” he fumed. Wiener wasn’t being needlessly paranoid: Shannon had, by that point, previewed his still-unpublished work at 1947 conferences at Harvard and Columbia. In April 1947, Wiener and Shannon shared the same stage, and both had the opportunity to present early versions of their thoughts. Wiener, in a moment of excessive self-regard, would write to a colleague, “The Bell people are fully accepting my thesis concerning statistics and communications engineering.

Google was in the water when the waves of Internet traffic came because it was tinkering with new ideas under the umbrella of Google’s famous “20% Time.” “20% Time” is not Google indigenous. It was borrowed from a company formerly known as Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing, aka 3M, which allowed its employees to spend 15 percent of their work hours experimenting with new ideas, no questions asked. 3M’s “15% Time” brought us, among other things, Post-it Notes. Behind this concept (which is meticulously outlined in an excellent book by Ryan Tate called The 20% Doctrine) is the idea of constantly tinkering with potential trends—having a toe in interesting waters in case waves form. This kind of budgeted experimentation helps businesses avoid being disrupted, by helping them harness waves on which younger competitors might otherwise use to ride past them. It’s helped companies like Google, 3M, Flickr, Condé Nast, and NPR remain innovative even as peer companies plateaued. In contrast, companies that are too focused on defending their current business practice and too fearful to experiment often get overtaken. For example, lack of experimentation in digital media has cost photo brand Kodak nearly $ 30 billion in market capitalization since the digital photography wave overwhelmed it in the late ’90s. The best way to be in the water when the wave comes is to budget time for swimming.

In medicine, prescription before diagnosis is malpractice. Asking the right questions will help you discover a person’s needs and concerns so that you can respond intelligently and appropriately. Yet salespeople, consultants, or managers often try to push their solutions on you before they even know what your needs are. This is a fast way to alienate people and push you toward their competitor, isn’t it?

The 4Q refers to the four questions that we suggest leaders ask customers in person (not on a survey): 1. How are you doing? 2. What’s going on in your industry/neighborhood? 3. What do you hear about our competitors? 4. How are we doing?

you can’t be better than your competitors if you are exactly like them. To be better, you have to first be different.

Why did Connex for QuickBooks Online succeed? Here are the reasons: I received free app store listings on Intuit’s website. My app was even on the first page of their store briefly. This drove large amounts of traffic to my site. I received free listings on many other sites before they started asking for a commission. I later pulled those listings, since the cost to advertise exceeded the revenue they brought to the company. These stores failed to show how many installs and conversions they generated. I had many positive and real reviews on my app store listings. I noticed competitors had hundreds of five-star reviews that mostly looked fake. QuickBooks Online had few integrations at the time. I was one of the first companies to get listed. For QuickBooks Canada and QuickBooks U.K., my app was one of the first system integrators. I had almost no competitors who serviced QuickBooks outside of the U.S. Shopify, BigCommerce, ShipStation and other companies had no native integration. Mine was one of the first. I recorded videos and added landing pages that ranked high on Google with minimal effort. Since I had a shoestring marketing budget, this was very important. The issue I had with other products was that they didn’t offer free promotion. Since my company was one of the first, we had ample time to add features and fix problems. We have a solution that is light years ahead of competitors. Why would someone want to compete with us? In the words of one of my partner companies, “We could build one, but yours would be a lot better.” My app required no desktop apps or website plugins to install. Since my audience was small business owners, the easier the install the better. Most business users have a limited understanding of websites. Asking them to change a bunch of settings or configure something on their own is daunting. We set up Connex for qualified users. Many competitors just let users go through a self-guided trial. We received feedback from many customers that they would purchase if they could make Connex work. I added a talk-to-sales component, and our conversion ratio increased. Connex was successful because I added a personal touch in a world where SaaS owners expect users to just “figure it out” on their own. Software that requires no support and maintenance is a pipe dream.

Similar to the rebates we discussed earlier, pre-payment creates a strong barrier dissuading a customer from switching to a competitor. I do not think that you will get prepayment 100% of the time, but I think you can successfully obtain this 25–35% of the time if you ask for it all of the time. When you ask, I would encourage you to make it a first concession issue rather than a first offer issue. I will offer a price that I know the other side will react to by saying it is “too high.” In response, I concede to lower my price if they pay me in advance.

Similar to the rebates we discussed earlier, pre-payment creates a strong barrier dissuading a customer from switching to a competitor. I do not think that you will get prepayment 100% of the time, but I think you can successfully obtain this 25–35% of the time if you ask for it all of the time.

Jeff Bezos asks his team each week is what competitors have entered their market in the last seven days!

Heads of companies often inadvertently contribute to this confusion. Some time ago a business reporter told me of an encounter with the head of a major Japanese corporation. The reporter was working on a profile of the company. When he asked questions that tried to clarify the strategy of the corporation, the other man angrily retorted, “Why would I tell you our strategy? So I could help our competitors?” I think this man wouldn’t talk about his strategy not because he was afraid of helping his competitors but because he didn’t have one: this company’s public statements have always struck me as extraordinarily ambiguous.

Our core competencies did not extend to either end of the value chain. Steve did not let this get in the way. In one of our meetings, he said that a typical company that wanted to grow would take stock of its existing capabilities and ask, “What can we do next with our skill set?” He emphasized that Amazon’s approach was always to start from the customer and work backwards. We would figure out what the customers’ needs were and then ask ourselves, “Do we have the skills necessary to build something that meets those needs? If not, how can we build or acquire them?” Once we determined what was necessary to create value for our customers and to differentiate ourselves from our competitors, we didn’t let our lack of ability deter us from achieving this important end result—our own device.

Written sales call objective. Needs-analysis questions to ask. Something to show. Anticipated customer concerns and objections. Points of difference vis-à-vis competitors. Meaningful benefits to customers. Dollarization approach; investment return analysis. Strategies to handle objections and eliminate customer concerns. Closing strategies.

The people at Away understood that there’s a real difference between a product idea and a brand,” says David Sebens, the luggage industry consultant, when asked why this company succeeded but its competitors failed. “Brands survive. Product ideas come and go. Those two women [Away’s founders] are really, really smart.

God is like the sky, like the empty sky. It has no boundaries so it cannot be defined. You cannot say where it begins and where it ends. It is eternal, it is infinite -- yet it is right in this place, just in front of you. If you are relaxed it is there; if you become tense it disappears. Life cannot be possessed because life is God. Existence cannot be possessed because existence is God. YOU CANNOT TAKE HOLD OF IT. -- remember -- BUT YOU CANNOT LOSE IT. Yes, you cannot possess it, but there is no way to lose it either. It is there. It is always there. You have to drop your rush, your hurry, your ideas to go somewhere, to reach, to become, to be this and that. You have to stop becoming. And it is there; you cannot lose it. There is no competition, there is nobody blocking your way, there are no competitors. You need not be in a hurry. You need not make any effort to grab. There is nobody competing with you and there is nobody standing in front of you -- only God, only God. You can relax. You need not be afraid that you will miss it. You cannot miss it in the very nature of things. You cannot lose him. You relax. There is no hurry because God is not something in time -- relax. There is nowhere to go because God is not distant in some star -- relax. You cannot miss in the very nature of things -- relax. relax. Don't seek, don't search, don't ask, don't knock, don't demand -- relax. If you relax, it comes. If you relax, it is there. If you relax, you start vibrating with it. God is so big, so huge, so enormous. It is the totality of existence -- who can exhaust it? There is no struggle, no competition. And there is eternal time available. Don't be in a hurry and don't be serious.

Do you think I should buy some crystals?” “Crystals?” Father Barry asked. “What kind?” “You know,” she said. “The kinds they have in the New Age store. For the…auras and things. To protect us against the demons.” “Sherry,” he said. “I’m a priest.” “Oh, right,” she said. “You can’t recommend anything that comes from the competitors.

So what are we doing with this ability? I asked. Are we blackmailing governments or companies? Give us money or we blast your satellites into smithereens. Trying to blackmail the US or China would be a really good way to have St Genevieve turned into a smoking crater. A stupid villain threatens, Charlie. A smarter villain offers a service. ..So we offer satellite blasting services? We have a select clientele who, for an annual retainer fee, have the option to use our ability to enact logistical challenges to their competitors. In space. So that's a yes.

Unlike its competitors who sell preassembled merchandise, IKEA puts its customers to work. It turns out there’s a hidden benefit to making users invest physical effort in assembling the product—by asking customers to assemble their own furniture, Ariely believes they adopt an irrational love of the furniture they built, just like the test subjects did in the origami experiments.

To start asking for more, build your credibility first with strategic testimonials and a solid portfolio.

Why are you doing this? Ever find yourself working on something without knowing exactly why? Someone just told you to do it. It’s pretty common, actually. That’s why it’s important to ask why you’re working on____. What is this for? Who benefits? What’s the motivation behind it? Knowing the answers to these questions will help you better understand the work itself. What problem are you solving? What’s the problem? Are customers confused? Are you confused? Is something not clear enough? Was something not possible before that should be possible now? Sometimes when you ask these questions, you’ll find you’re solving an imaginary problem. That’s when it’s time to stop and reevaluate what the hell you’re doing. Is this actually useful? Are you making something useful or just making something? It’s easy to confuse enthusiasm with usefulness. Sometimes it’s fine to play a bit and build something cool. But eventually you’ve got to stop and ask yourself if it’s useful, too. Cool wears off. Useful never does. Are you adding value? Adding something is easy; adding value is hard. Is this thing you’re working on actually making your product more valuable for customers? Can they get more out of it than they did before? Sometimes things you think are adding value actually subtract from it. Too much ketchup can ruin the fries. Value is about balance. Will this change behavior? Is what you’re working on really going to change anything? Don’t add something unless it has a real impact on how people use your product. Is there an easier way? Whenever you’re working on something, ask, “Is there an easier way?” You’ll often find this easy way is more than good enough for now. Problems are usually pretty simple. We just imagine that they require hard solutions. What could you be doing instead? What can’t you do because you’re doing this? This is especially important for small teams with constrained resources. That’s when prioritization is even more important. If you work on A, can you still do B and C before April? If not, would you rather have B and C instead of A? If you’re stuck on something for a long period of time, that means there are other things you’re not getting done. Is it really worth it? Is what you’re doing really worth it? Is this meeting worth pulling six people off their work for an hour? Is it worth pulling an all-nighter tonight, or could you just finish it up tomorrow? Is it worth getting all stressed out over a press release from a competitor? Is it worth spending your money on advertising? Determine the real value of what you’re about to do before taking the plunge.

Oddly, Orkut became a sensation in Brazil. “In Brazil, Orkut is the Internet and Google is search,” wrote one local journalist, who added that using Orkut was “like putting sugar in your coffee, watching Globo telenovelas, or heading to the beach from Christmas to Carnival.” On a trip to Brazil in 2006, Sergey Brin was asked why, and he responded, “We don’t know—what do you think?” When pressed, Googlers would refer to stereotypes of Carioca sociability, but that didn’t sufficiently explain why Orkut became the social networking choice of this country over other competitors—or why Orkut was so badly left behind in the rest of the world. Marissa Mayer’s personal analysis was based on the Google yardstick of speed. Brazilians, she says, were used to lousy Internet service and thus more tolerant of the delays. “They would just keep sitting there and waiting,” she says. Orkut was also dominant in India, where it was the number one Google service—ahead of search and Gmail. “There is no second product in India—Orkut is dominant,” said Manu Rekhi, the Orkut India product manager, in 2007. “I’ve seen beggar kids who use their money to get on Orkut.” Mayer also attributed that success to its quick response compared to other services. “Do you know why Orkut took off in India?” she would ask. “Opposite time zone, and no load on the servers at night. Speed matters.” (Why Orkut ruled in Brazil, however, was a mystery never solved.)

These groups were a new kind of vehicle: a hive or colony of close genetic relatives, which functioned as a unit (e.g., in foraging and fighting) and reproduced as a unit. These are the motorboating sisters in my example, taking advantage of technological innovations and mechanical engineering that had never before existed. It was another transition. Another kind of group began to function as though it were a single organism, and the genes that got to ride around in colonies crushed the genes that couldn’t “get it together” and rode around in the bodies of more selfish and solitary insects. The colonial insects represent just 2 percent of all insect species, but in a short period of time they claimed the best feeding and breeding sites for themselves, pushed their competitors to marginal grounds, and changed most of the Earth’s terrestrial ecosystems (for example, by enabling the evolution of flowering plants, which need pollinators).43 Now they’re the majority, by weight, of all insects on Earth. What about human beings? Since ancient times, people have likened human societies to beehives. But is this just a loose analogy? If you map the queen of the hive onto the queen or king of a city-state, then yes, it’s loose. A hive or colony has no ruler, no boss. The queen is just the ovary. But if we simply ask whether humans went through the same evolutionary process as bees—a major transition from selfish individualism to groupish hives that prosper when they find a way to suppress free riding—then the analogy gets much tighter. Many animals are social: they live in groups, flocks, or herds. But only a few animals have crossed the threshold and become ultrasocial, which means that they live in very large groups that have some internal structure, enabling them to reap the benefits of the division of labor.44 Beehives and ant nests, with their separate castes of soldiers, scouts, and nursery attendants, are examples of ultrasociality, and so are human societies. One of the key features that has helped all the nonhuman ultra-socials to cross over appears to be the need to defend a shared nest. The biologists Bert Hölldobler and E. O. Wilson summarize the recent finding that ultrasociality (also called “eusociality”)45 is found among a few species of shrimp, aphids, thrips, and beetles, as well as among wasps, bees, ants, and termites: In all the known [species that] display the earliest stages of eusociality, their behavior protects a persistent, defensible resource from predators, parasites, or competitors. The resource is invariably a nest plus dependable food within foraging range of the nest inhabitants.46 Hölldobler and Wilson give supporting roles to two other factors: the need to feed offspring over an extended period (which gives an advantage to species that can recruit siblings or males to help out Mom) and intergroup conflict. All three of these factors applied to those first early wasps camped out together in defensible naturally occurring nests (such as holes in trees). From that point on, the most cooperative groups got to keep the best nesting sites, which they then modified in increasingly elaborate ways to make themselves even more productive and more protected. Their descendants include the honeybees we know today, whose hives have been described as “a factory inside a fortress.”47

Figure 2-3: Correlation Between CXi Scores and Loyalty Metrics Here’s how we know this for a fact. When we field the CXi survey, we ask consumers to tell us three things: How willing they are to make another purchase from each company, how likely they are to switch business to a competitor, and how likely they are to recommend each company to a friend. Their answers let us calculate the relationships between customer experience and three of the most common loyalty metrics used in business today: purchase intent, churn, and word of mouth. The relationships

If a market has X number of Google searches every single month, and there are Y number of competitors, and the click prices on Google AdWords are in the reasonable range, then it’s a contender.

Another thing you need to understand is what we now call the “core competencies” of your organization. What are we really good at? What do our customers pay us for? Why do they buy from us? In a competitive, nonmonopolistic market—and that is what the world has become—there is absolutely no reason why a customer should buy from you rather from your competitor. None. He pays you because you give him something that is of value to him. What is it that we get paid for? You may think this is a simple question. It is not. I have been working with some of the world’s biggest manufacturers, producers, and distributors of packaged consumer goods. All of you use their products, even in Slovenia. They have two kinds of customers. One, of course, is the retailer. The other is the housewife. What do they pay for? I have been asking this question for a year now. I do not know how many companies in the world make soap, but there are a great many. And I can’t tell the difference between one kind of soap or the other. And why does the buyer have a preference—and a strong one, by the way? What does it do for her? Why is she willing to buy from one manufacturer when on the same shelves in the United States or in Japan or in Germany they are soaps from other companies? She usually does not even look at them. She reaches out for that one soap. Why? What does she see? What does she want? Try to work on this. Incidentally, the best way to find out is to ask customers not by questionnaire but by sitting down with them and finding out. The most successful retailer I know in the world is not one of the big retail chains. It is somebody in Ireland, a small country about the size of Slovenia. This particular company is next door to Great Britain with its very powerful supermarkets, and all of them are also in Ireland. And yet this little company has maybe 60 percent of the sandwich market. What do they do? Well, the answer is that the boss spends two days each week in one of his stores serving customers, from the meat counter to the checkout counter, and is the one who puts stuff into bags and carries it out to the shoppers’ automobiles. He knows what the customers pay for. But let me go back to the beginning: The place to start managing is not in the plant, and it is not in the office. You start with managing yourself by finding out your own strengths, by placing yourself where your strengths can produce results and making sure that you set the right example (which is basically what ethics is all about), and by placing your people where their strengths can produce results.

For a king among people is one whom no-one rules but God the most high, and who does not need anything except God-great and glorious. And with that he rules his kingdom insofar as his soldiers and his subjects obey him. Yet the kingdom proper to him is his own heart and soul, where his soldiers are his appetites, his anger, and his affections; while his subjects are his tongue, his eyes, his hands, and the rest of his organs. If he rules them and they do not rule him, and if they obey him and he does not obey them, he will attain the level of a king in this world. And if that be coupled with the fact that he is independent of all people, yet all people are in need of him for their life now and in the future, he will be an earthly king. This is the level of the prophets-may God's blessings be upon all of them. For they have no need of direction to the next life from anyone except God-great and glorious-while everyone needs it from them. They are followed in this kingship by religious scholars, who 'inherit the legacy of the prophets', Their kingship, however, is proportional to their ability to guide the people, and to their lack of need for asking for guidance. By means of these attributes man comes close to the angels in qualities, and by means of them approaches God the most high. This kingship is a gift to man from the true king whose sovereignty has no competitor.

An in-depth, introspective analysis is required. It needs to be objective, candid, and thorough. Good questions, like the following, can help. They may not produce perfectly clear answers, but they are a starting point. (Note that they are from an external perspective to give you some distance from internal biases.) What would our competitors say we do exceptionally well? Where are we dominant in the marketplace? Where do we have high market share? Where have others attempted to compete with us and failed? If we asked members to play “word association” with us, when we say the “XYZ Association” what word or phrase would come immediately to mind? If we asked members to identify the one thing that we do that helps them most, what would they say? What are we not doing that we should be doing that expands on existing strength? Don’t allow your association to operate on “pseudo strength.” Make sure your strength is real.

In reviewing a business model, the key question executives should ask is this: Do the choices we have made about the company’s structure reflect our choice of primary customer? If the answer is no, competitors whose business models are consistent with their chosen primary customer will almost certainly be outplaying you.

A tofu birthday cake dosn't wreak a marriage; but if you cut the tofu into lewd shapes, you are probably asking for trouble. Looking back, I think we stopped being kind to each other. And we became competitors.... Love cannot be sustained under these conditions, any more that yeast will proof in cold water.

February 2 The Constraint of the Call Woe is unto me, if I preach not the gospel! 1 Corinthians 9:16 Beware of stopping your ears to the call of God. Everyone who is saved is called to testify to the fact; but that is not the call to preach, it is merely an illustration in preaching. Paul is referring to the pangs produced in him by the constraint to preach the Gospel. Never apply what Paul says in this connection to souls coming in contact with God for salvation. There is nothing easier than getting saved because it is God’s sovereign work—“Come unto Me and I will save you.” Our Lord never lays down the conditions of discipleship as the conditions of salvation. We are condemned to salvation through the Cross of Jesus Christ. Discipleship has an option with it—“IF any man . . .” Paul’s words have to do with being made a servant of Jesus Christ, and our permission is never asked as to what we will do or where we will go. God makes us broken bread and poured-out wine to please Himself. To be “separated unto the gospel” means to hear the call of God; and when a man begins to overhear that call, then begins agony that is worthy of the name. Every ambition is nipped in the bud, every desire of life quenched, every outlook completely extinguished and blotted out, saving one thing only—“separated unto the gospel.” Woe be to the soul who tries to put his foot in any other direction when once that call has come to him. This College exists to see whether God has any man or woman here who cares about proclaiming His Gospel; to see whether God grips you. And beware of competitors when God does grip you.

The more concentrated the competition, the more you have to worry about it. If you don’t realize when a case involves high competitor concentration, you could easily make a strategic recommendation that’s flat-out wrong. The easiest way to assess competitor concentration is to ask the following questions: How many competitors are there? How big are they (in terms of sales or market share)?

If your client isn’t winning in the marketplace, ask, “What is the competitor doing that we aren’t?

Candidate: I sense we’re just missing something critical. Something is causing this to happen. Either customers have changed in a way that has benefited our competitors but not our client, or competitors have changed in a way that attracts new business but we haven’t. (Note how I framed the issue in concrete terms: Either competitors or customers have changed. Laying out an issue in this structured way makes it easier for the interviewer to follow your logic. I could just as easily have said, “I think we need to look into the customers themselves,” or I could have started asking questions about customers. The problem with diving in this way is that it doesn’t give the interviewer any insight into the organization of your thought process. Are you asking questions like a reporter would, or are you asking questions for a specific purpose?

Here are the types of questions I consider asking during product analysis: What is the nature of the product? (What are its benefits? Why would someone buy it?) Is it a commodity good or a unique good? (Could the company increase differentiation?) Are there any complementary goods? (Can the company piggyback off growth in complements or near complements?) Are there any substitutes? (Is the company vulnerable to indirect competitors, namely substitutes?) What is the product’s life cycle? (Is it new or almost obsolete?) How is it packaged? (This is an optional question. Is anything bundled or included with the product—for example, just a razor versus a razor with replacement blades, or just a product versus a product with a service contract? Would a change in the product’s packaging make the product more likely to meet specific consumer segments’ needs?) If you selectively ask questions about these product-related topics, you can uncover insights that will help you refine your hypotheses and ultimately serve your client more effectively.

If I do any company analysis at all, I almost always ask two specific questions related to this topic: What does this company do well? What does this company do differently than its competitors?

You think what you do to ruin competitors is bad. Well, the twins fuck up anyone who so much as looks at them the wrong way. I once walked in on both of them covered in blood, ‘playing’ with a man while he was hanging from the ceiling by his hands. And let’s just say, he survived. Because they are that good. They know where to cut and how to cut to draw the pain out. And if you’re on their radar, then you’re in serious shit.” “I think I want to marry her,” I tell him in awe. “Have you met her?” he asks in disbelief. “You really want more than what she gave you?” “I fucking want it all,” I insist. “Well, we can’t say you haven’t been warned,” Dawson adds, shaking his head as if I’m the crazy one. “You know me, Dawson. Do you really think for a second I couldn’t handle her?” “River, I get that you run a very successful business because people know not to fuck with you, but she will never be that person. She will fuck with you. Take every cent you have and let you bleed out but won’t kill you just so you know who took it.” “I plan to marry her,” I tell him. “She can bleed me dry.” “You really don’t know what she’s capable of, then,” he chastises. “I’m certainly keen to find out. She’ll be mine within the month,” I tell him confidently.

There are many ways to ask customers why they churn. At Drip, any customer that canceled their account received an automated email within ten minutes of canceling. It said, “Hello, I’m one of the founders of Drip, and I’d love to hear why you decided to cancel your account.” We got a wide range of responses. Some people would tell us they were shutting their business down—which isn’t something we could fix. Others would say they switched to a cheaper tool because they didn’t need our more powerful product. Others switched to a competitor because they needed a feature we didn’t have. The key to getting useful data points out of an exit survey is to keep it short and direct, create a connection (“I’m the founder, and your feedback would help me build a better product!”), and ask for a reply—even if it’s just four or five words. This can give you a glimpse into what potential customers want, which helps guide product decisions. More often than not, you can get a quick win with churn using tactics like an email welcome sequence and in-app onboarding tools to make sure new users see value early. However, pushing churn below 2% or 3% is a long road that unfolds slowly as you refine your marketing and sales language, learn more about your ideal customer, and add more features those customers love (we covered that in the Market chapter).

Take as many as you want,” Ebenezer said. “Consider it a gift from one farmer to another.” “Are you sure?” Drake asked. “We’re competitors, after all.” “Nonsense.” The old man stood from his chair. “We grow food that people enjoy. There’s no competition there, just collaboration. Farming is an act of love — of both the people around us and the earth itself.

What, you might ask, has happened to Schumpeter's powerful forces of creative destruction? Barriers to entry-whether regulatory barriers, the cost of investment, or anticompetitive behavior by the corporations themselves-allow monopolistic firms to retain their power by preventing new firms from entering the industry. In big tech, large incumbents police the so-called kill zone in their marketplace by "hoovering up or squashing any potential competitors." Google, Amazon, and Microsoft have, between them, "collectively bought over 436 companies and startups in the past 10 years and regulators have not challenged any of them.

was spinning his own version of reality both to me and to himself. To check and flesh out his story, I interviewed more than a hundred friends, relatives, competitors, adversaries, and colleagues. His wife also did not request any restrictions or control, nor did she ask to see in advance what I would publish. In fact she strongly encouraged me to be honest about his failings as well as his strengths. She is one of the

Consistent actions build respect, not words. I worked to develop my mass—that sense of who you are—into something that pulled others in. Since I was attracted to those who were tough and real, my roommates were Terry Brands, one of the more ferocious competitors in NCAA history, and Travis Fisher, a hard-nosed, small town Iowa boy. They asked me to room with them, and I jumped at the opportunity. I based every decision on principles that would lead me to greatness on the mat. Terry and Travis were blessings to live with as both had jumped the gap from believing to committing. I’ve learned Elite people have a bias toward action.

The three rules for speaking with the media: Answer the question you want to be asked. If someone asks a very difficult or challenging question, reframe it into one that you’re comfortable answering. Don’t accept a question’s implicit framing, but instead take the opportunity to frame it yourself. Don’t Think of An Elephant by George Lakoff 32 is a phenomenal, compact guide to framing issues. Stay positive. Negative stories can be very compelling. They are quite risky, too! As an interviewee, find a positive framing and stick to it. This is especially true when it comes to competitors and controversy. Speak in threes. Narrow your message down to three concise points, make them your refrain, and continue to refer back to your three speaking points.

A number of cryptoasset-based projects focus on social networks, such as Steemit4 and Yours,5 the latter of which uses litecoin. While we admire these projects, we also ask: Will these networks and their associated assets gain traction with competitors like Reddit and Facebook?

OPEC-Plus had also helped generate a geopolitical reordering—the new relationship between Moscow and Riyadh. Once, in the early 1990s, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, Naimi was asked what he thought of Russia. “I think of it as a competitor,” he said. But now oil, which had been a source of rivalry, had brought them together.

Schmidt started 2012 with new, modern packaging for the deodorant, which was designed to set it apart from the competition. She looked beyond the direct-to-consumer sales channels and the natural and wellness retailers that her competitors used almost exclusively; in 2015, she expanded into traditional grocery stores and pharmacies, which allowed her to reach more customers and to enable greater access to healthy natural products. Her creativity, innovation, and hard work paid off. Schmidt earned appearances on Fox News and The Today Show; mentions on social media from celebrities and influencers; articles in national publications; and distribution on the shelves of Target and Walmart. Though it was bittersweet, Jaime realized that a larger company with more resources could bring her vision and mission to an even wider customer base, and she signed the deal with Unilever right before Christmas 2017. Reflecting on her journey, she says, “When I’m asked about what made Schmidt’s so successful, I often say that my customers were my business plan. It started when I listened to those at the farmer’s market, and it continued through each step of growth. Staying hyper-tuned-in to my customers always guided and served me.” Not sales. Not marketing. Customers, educating, and being educated.

When you choose to see everyone around you as a competitor. Everything as a competition. It will be difficult for you to ask for help or to get help when you need it. It will be difficult to get where you want to be In life, because no man is an Island. We always need each other, to archive great things. We must choose to set our differences aside and learn on how to work together.

2. MIGRATE YOUR PRODUCT LEK had to move away from ‘standard’ strategy towards analysis of competitors. This led to ‘relative cost position’ and ‘acquisition analysis’. Your task is to find a unique product or service, one not offered in that form by anyone else. Your raw material is, of course, what you and the rest of your industry do already. Tweak it in ways that could generate an attractive new product. The ideal product is: ★ close to something you already do very well, or could do very well; ★ something customers are already groping towards or you know they will like; ★ capable of being ‘automated’ or otherwise done at low cost, by using a new process (cutting out costly steps, such as self-service), a new channel (the phone or Internet), new lower-cost employees (LEK’s ‘kids’, highly educated people in India), new raw materials (cheap resins, free data from the Internet), excess capacity from a related industry (especially manufacturing capacity), new technology or simply new ideas; ★ able to be ‘orchestrated’ by your firm while you yourself are doing as little as possible; ★ really valuable or appealing to a clearly defined customer group - therefore commanding fatter margins; ★ difficult for any rival to provide as well or as cheaply - ideally something they cannot or would not want to do. Because you are already in business, you can experiment with new products in a way that someone thinking of starting a venture cannot do. Sometimes the answer is breathtakingly simple. The Filofax system didn’t start to take off until David Collischon provided ‘filled organisers’ - a wallet with a standard set of papers installed. What could you do that is simple, costs you little or nothing and yet is hugely attractive to customers? Ask customers if they would like something different. Mock up a prototype; show it around. Brainstorm new ideas. Evolution needs false starts. If an idea isn’t working, don’t push it uphill. If a possible new product resonates at all, keep tweaking it until you have a winner. At the same time . . .

In the eighties, the fast-food chain Wendy’s effectively asked America, “Where’s the beef?” The implication was that their competitors weren’t using enough meat. So what’s at stake for choosing another brand over Wendy’s? We might get stuck with a wimpy sandwich. Likewise, Whole Foods has built an enormous industry helping customers avoid the consequences of overly processed foods, and more recently Trader Joe’s has come along to help customers avoid the consequences of Whole Foods’ prices. Brands that help customers avoid some kind of negativity in life (and let their customers know what that negativity is) engage customers for the same reason good stories captivate an audience: they define what’s at stake.

Step 6: When Filofax grew enormously in the 1980s as an expensive, aspirational product, the absence of a generic niche description became a problem for the leader. People began to use ‘filofax’ to describe the category, which meant that every competitor could describe their product as a filofax (note the lower case f ). In 1986 David Collischon wisely coined the term ‘personal organiser’ to describe the category and encouraged everyone to use the term. Marketing experts are adamant that it is easier for us to think first about a category generally, and then about the brand. ‘I need a personal organiser to keep all my bits of paper.What brand should I ask for in the shop? Well, Filofax is the best known.’ This is an easier and more natural way of thinking than, ‘I need a Filofax.’ The clear benefit of a personal organiser was that it helped people be better organised . If the term ‘personal organiser’ had not gained widespread currency the benefit of the new category would have been much less clear, and Filofax’s brand name would have become devalued. Contrast the confusion caused in the electronic-organiser niche. When this developed in the 1990s, the leading brand was PalmPilot. But what was the category name? As Al and Laura Ries comment, ‘Some people call the Palm an electronic organiser. Others call the Palm a handheld computer. And still others, a PDA (personal digital assistant). All of these names are too long and complicated. They lack the clarity and simplicity a good category name should possess. If . . . a personal computer that fits on your lap is called a laptop computer, then the logical name for a computer that fits in the palm of your hand is a palm computer . . . Of course, Palm Computer pre-empted Palm as a brand name, leaving a nascent industry struggling to find an appropriate generic name . . . Palm Computer should have been just as concerned with choosing an appropriate generic name as it was in choosing an appropriate brand name.’9

What will happen to that vast body of Christians who were told Christianity is a matter of personal wellness, a competitor in the market for Self-therapy, when these shaky foundations no longer hold? Joel Olsteen says heaven has a warehouse full of blessings with my name on them. The only reason I don't have them is because I don't believe hard enough. What will happen when I finally determine I'm not cut out for this Christianity thing because my faith just doesn't pass muster? If Ken Ham is to be believed, it's already too late. The next generation is "already gone" (see supra, page 114). These are the Millennials who have actuated in their twenties what was in their hearts when they were twelve, that is, Christianity was something best grown out of and left behind. They've made their choice, answered the questions. And of those who remain, one wonders what it portends that 44% of younger evangelicals support gay marriage. It shouldn't be too much of a stretch to observe this position has more to do with cultural trends than with serious Scriptural contemplation, or contemplation on any serious theological thought, but try telling them that. Not only would that require transcending the latest slogans, but it would require considering an authority above the dictates of one's Self, and that is heresy in the religion of Gnosticism. But nature has a way of being what it is despite people's attempts to deny or reject it, to say nothing of nature's God. Nature, for example, will have the final vote on the gay marriage issue. No matter how hard two men try, they will never ever make a baby. Nature won't allow that. And eventually people will begin asking what the point of marriage was in the first place. Oh yeah, because two certain types of people – biology calls them male and female – make babies. Or again, human nature will have the final vote on the progressive experiment in collectivist action, say, in health care, and if history is a guide, that vote won't end well for progressives. We truly are individuals, not the Borg. Finally, the law of economic gravity will soon kick in on our national debt as well, reminding us that what can't go on forever won't. Then the fun begins. History teaches that days of leisurely indulgence, the sort which has always begotten Gnosticism, are numbered. It's one thing to shake your fist at the world when living a comfortable existence. Boutique rebellion against Yaltabaoth's systems of control is always fun. It's another thing to be hungry and need a damn bite to eat, or to be cold, because "the system" was finally broken beyond repair. Right around then we hear a galloping sound in the distance. That's the four horsemen coming to do what they are appointed to do. Marantha. S. D. G.

Now, Porter explains in his book: “To identify a new value chain, a firm must examine everything it does, as well as its competitors' value chains, in search of creative options to do things differently. A firm should ask questions including ‘How can the activity be performed differently or even eliminated?

THE MOTOR YACHT AUTHORITY. TRUSTED EXPERTS & TRIED AND TRUE SALES TACTICS. The team of expert brokers at 26 North Yachts has an excellent track record - selling yachts 23% faster than our competitors and for a higher percentage of the asking price. This saves owners money on operational costs and depreciation when it’s time to sell. Our team focuses on leveraging both tried-and-true sales tactics as well as modern digital strategies to quickly get your yacht in front of qualified buyers.

Finding the Competitive Levers When there’s a battle between two networks, there are competitive levers that shift users from one into the other—what are they? The best place to focus in the rideshare market was the hard side of the network: drivers. More drivers meant that prices would be lower, attracting valuable high-frequency riders that often comparison shop for fares. Attract more riders, and it more efficiently fills the time of drivers, and vice versa. There was a double benefit to moving drivers from a competitor’s network to yours—it would push their network into surging prices while yours would lower in price. Uber’s competitive levers would combine financial incentives—paying up for more sign-ups, more hours—with product improvements to improve Acquisition, Engagement, and Economic forces. Drawing in more drivers through product improvements is straightforward—the better the experience of picking up riders and routing the car to their destination, the more the app would be used. Building a better product is one of the classic levers in the tech industry, but Uber focused much of its effort on targeted bonuses for drivers. Why bonuses? Because for drivers, that was their primary motivation for using the app, and improving their earnings would make them sticky. But these bonuses weren’t just any bonuses—they were targeted at quickly flipping over the most valuable drivers in the networks of Uber’s rivals, targeting so-called dual apping drivers that were active on multiple networks. They were given large, special bonuses that compelled them to stick to Uber, and every hour they drove was an hour that the other networks couldn’t utilize. There was a sophisticated effort to tag drivers as dual appers. Some of these efforts were just manual—Uber employees who took trips would just ask if the drivers drove for other services, and they could mark them manually in a special UI within the app. There were also behavioral signals when drivers were running two apps—they would often pause their Uber session for a few minutes while they drove for another company, then unpause it. On Android, there were direct APIs that could tell if someone was running Uber and Lyft at the same time. Eventually a large number of these signals were fed into a machine learning model where each driver would receive a score based on how likely they were to be a dual apper. It didn’t have to be perfect, just good enough to aid the targeting.

Define the Profitable Core In our experience, business definition is one of the most frustrating activities for senior executives. Although business leaders know that they should have a clear answer to the question, “What is our core business?” it is difficult to arrive at a fully satisfying statement. Part of the problem arises from blurring several distinct but related topics that need to be considered one at a time and then integrated in a consistent manner or within a single framework. In working toward a useful business definition, executives need to ask themselves the following questions: What are the boundaries of the business in which I participate, and are those boundaries “natural” economic boundaries defined by customer needs and basic economics? What products, customers, channels, and competitors do these boundaries encompass? What are the core skills and assets needed to compete effectively within that competitive arena? What is my own core business as defined by those customers, products, technologies, and channels through which I can earn a return today and can compete effectively with my current resources? What is the key differentiating factor that makes me unique to my core customers? What are the adjacent areas around my core, and are the definitions of my business and my industry likely to shift, changing the competitive and customer landscape?

Yeah, but Marcus, aren’t you afraid you’ve now introduced them to the competition?” If you’re thinking this, let’s be clear about something: If someone wants to know who your competitors are, roughly, how long will it take them to figure it out? Seconds, if they’re slow! The reality is this: Consumer ignorance is no longer a viable sales and marketing strategy.

Waze’s triumph and Navteq’s decline should be the model for every budding ExO. Ask yourself, “Which of my products or services can I digitize and dematerialize?” and “How can I use the Six Ds to leapfrog my biggest linear competitors? How can I use them to demonetize and democratize my products and/or services?

When I was a certified small business and startup mentor for several Non-Profit Organizations (NPOs), after several months I came to realize that most business owners saw websites as "one and done" items rather than as company portals through which valuable and important processes could go through -while concurrently promoting their business online 24/7 through multiple online channels. Set your goals higher and ask yourself "how can we automate what takes up so much of our time and energy" and "how can we learn from and mirror the strategies of larger, more profitable competitors?

Lincoln, unlike many executives, had no fear of surrounding himself with strong-willed subordinates who might overshadow him. When advised not to appoint Salmon P. Chase to a cabinet post because the Ohioan regarded himself as “a great deal bigger” than the president-elect, Lincoln asked: “Well, do you know of any other men who think they are bigger than I am? I want to put them all in my cabinet.”5 He included every major competitor at the Chicago Convention in his cabinet, a decision that required unusual self-confidence, a quality misunderstood by some, including his assistant personal secretary, John Hay. Deeming modesty “the most fatal and most unsympathetic of vices” and the “bane of genius, the chain-and-ball of enterprise,” Hay argued that it was “absurd to call him a modest man.”6 But Hay was projecting onto his boss his own immodesty. Lincoln was, in fact, both remarkably modest and self-confident, and he had no need to surround himself with sycophants dependent on him for political preferment. Instead he chose men with strong personalities, large egos, and politically significant followings whose support was necessary for the administration’s success.

A marketing professor asked his students, “If you were going to open a hotdog stand, and you could only have one advantage over your competitors . . . which would it be . . . ?” “Location! ….Quality! …. Low prices! ….Best taste!” The students kept going until eventually they had run out of answers. They looked at each other waiting for the professor to speak. The room finally fell quiet. The professor smiled and replied, “A starving crowd.

Thus, contrary to the folklore, entrepreneurs don't much like risk either. They use these six mindsets to mitigate it. Or manage it. Or off‐load it onto others. “Isn't your idea risky?” they will be asked. Of course, it's risky! There's market risk: Will customers buy (They bought from the outset at Budgetplaces.com; but not so fast at Nespresso.)? There's technology risk: Will the new‐fangled product actually work (Would Elon Musk figure out how to build electric vehicles with enough range?)? There's execution risk: Will the team be able to deliver what it sets out to deliver (Simon Cohen's 2 a.m. wake‐ups stole a day on his competitors.)? And more. Working counter‐conventionally, they all put one or more of the six mindsets into action.

Both started at the same time from the left corner of Goebbels’ mouth. But, when the faster fly arrived at the right corner, his slower competitor was already there. “How in the world did you get here ahead of me?” asked the astonished fly, who had been sure of victory. “That was easy—I took the short cut around the back of Goebbels’ head!

In absorbing competitors, Rockefeller was equally secretive and asked them to continue operating under their original names and not divulge their Standard Oil ownership.

first is about problem solving generally. Kobayashi redefined the problem he was trying to solve. What question were his competitors asking? It was essentially: How do I eat more hot dogs? Kobayashi asked a different question: How do I make hot dogs easier

What’s a LAN?” Viona asked. Darryl scoffed. Patiently, Owen explained to the novice, “It’s a gaming meet thing. Competitors link up on a ‘local area network’ together.” “So there’s no lag,” Darryl chimed in. Viona felt too silly to ask what a LAG was.

When you craft a position statement, you want to answer these four questions: Who is your customer? Question to ask: Who will buy your product or service? Why is your startup the most/best/only . . . ? Questions to ask: What are you? How do you solve the problem? What key benefits does it provide? Questions to ask: Why would a customer choose you versus your competitors? What is your special focus or superpower? How does it realize an ultimate benefit that is important, meaningful, and transcends you as a person? Question to ask: Why are you spending your precious life doing this?

Bezos’s “it” factor was picking the perfect product to sell at the start. He avoided inventory risk (he could return books), expanded the product list beyond what could be sold in stores, and offered a price advantage that could not be matched by the large store-based competitors due to their fixed costs. Then he reinforced his product advantage with an infrastructure edge and expanded his list of products beyond books. Important to note: He sold his infrastructure services to others, including his key competitors, such as Target. To protect itself, another competitor, Walmart, has recently asked some of its suppliers to avoid using web infrastructure services offered by Amazon.com

Once a year, in the frog kingdom, a race was organized. Every year there was a different goal. This particular year, they had to get to the top of an old tower. All the frogs from the pond gathered to watch the event. The starting gun was fired. When they saw how high the tower was, the frogs in the crowd thought the competitors would never be able to reach the summit. They started saying things like: “‘Impossible! They’ll never make it.’ “‘Frogs can’t climb up something like that!’ “‘They’ll dehydrate before they get up there.’ “The competitors could hear them, and one after another they began to feel discouraged. Only a few went on climbing. The onlookers kept insisting: ‘It’s not worth it! None of them can make it. Look, they’ve nearly all given up!’ “The few remaining frogs admitted defeat, all except one, who simply went on climbing despite everything. And, alone, after a supreme effort, the frog reached the top of the tower. “Stupefied, the others wanted to know how he had done it. One went over to ask what his secret was, only to discover that the winner . . . was deaf!

If your digital supply chain is better than your competitors’, you’ll be in a much stronger position to succeed.

Questions to ask when analyzing a business Business - How does the company make money? - Does it seem like it should be a good business? Is it competitive? Do suppliers have too much power? Do customers value the product? Are there substitutes? - Without looking at financials, how does the company seem like it has done against competitors in its industry in terms of executing on its vision? - What reputation does the management team have? Do they seem honest? Straightforward? Valuation - What is the company's P/E multiple? Is it high or low for its industry? For the overall market right now? Why might the stock be trading at this valuation? - What is the company's free-cash flow yield? Is this a relevant metric given the stage the company is in? How does it compare to similar companies? - Is the company growing faster or more slowly than other companies with similar multiples? - Based on the number alone, does the company seem to have a rich valuation or a cheap valuation? Why might this be the case? Financials - What has been the trajectory of revenue growth over the past ten years? Why? What is it expected to do in the future? - How has the company's industry been growing? Is the company gaining or losing share in its industry? - What is the company’s level of profit margins? How does it compare to other companies in its industry? - How have margins varied over the past ten years? Why? - What percentage  of the company's costs are fixed costs versus variable costs? - What is the company's historical return on capital? Why is it high/low? What does this say about the quality of the business? - What is the trend in returns on capital? Why? What does this say about the returns the company will have to make on its future investments? - What is the company's dividend policy? Why? If they are paying no dividend or a small dividend, is there a danger that the company's management will waste shareholder's money? Technical - How have the company's shares performed against the overall market and its industry over the past twelve months? - What seems to be driving this under/over performance? - What key news events are likely to impact the stock in the future? - Do mutual funds and other large institutional investors seem to be buying or selling the shares? Sentiment and Expectations - What are the consensus earnings estimates for the next quarter and year? Do they seem aggressive or conservative? - Does consensus opinion seem overly bullish or bearish about the company's future prospects? - What insight do you have that the market might be missing that will cause the shares to appreciate?

Me: “Why does competitor X have five times your revenue?” Entrepreneur: “We are using partners and OEMs, because we can’t build a direct channel like competitor X.” Me: “Why not? If you have the better product, why not knuckle up and go to war?” Entrepreneur: “Ummm.” Me: “Stop looking for the silver bullet.” There comes a time in every company’s life where it must fight for its life. If you find yourself running when you should be fighting, you need to ask yourself, “If our company isn’t good enough to win, then do we need to exist at all?

In Ignatian spirituality nothing is hidden away; everything can be opened up as a way of finding God. “God must be found in everything,” as Nadal noted, summarizing Ignatius. When you’re in a job you enjoy, that’s easy. The work itself becomes a way to find God: the emotional, mental, and sometimes physical satisfaction that comes with the labor is a way of experiencing God’s joy and God’s desire to create alongside you. One of the main characters in the 1981 movie Chariots of Fire, about competitors in the 1924 Olympics, is a Scots minister who is also a runner. When asked why he runs, he says, “When I run, I feel [God’s] pleasure.” That’s as good a description as any about living out a vocation. The work itself is pleasurable.

I constantly challenge my athletes with workouts that take them to the upper edge of their ability. Like Brett's, my philosophy is that your biggest competitor is yourself. I will never ask the impossible. But I will come close. Those who answer with courage and self-belief instead of fear and doubt are the ones who realize their dreams.