Embrace Accountability to Get Leverage

So why don't we jump into accountability, which I thought was pretty interesting, and I think you have your own unique take on it. The first tweet on accountability was, "Embrace accountability and take business risks under your own name. Society will reward you with responsibility, equity, and leverage."

Yeah, so to get rich, you know you're gonna need leverage. And leverage comes in labor, it comes in capital, or it can come through code or media. But most of these, like labor and capital, people have to give to you. For labor, somebody has to follow you; for capital, someone has to give you money or assets to manage or machines. So to get these things, you have to build up credibility, and you have to do those under your own name as much as possible, which is risky.

So accountability is a double-edged thing. It allows you to take credit when things go well and to bear the brunt of the failure when things go badly. So in that sense, you know, people who are stamping their names on things aren't foolish; they're just confident. It may turn out to be foolish in the end, but if you look at a Kanye, or an Oprah, or a Trump, or an Elon, or anyone like that, these people can get rich just off their name because their name is such powerful branding. You know, regardless of what you think of Trump, you have to realize that the guy was among the best in the world at just branding his name.

Why would you go to Trump casino? Used to because Trump. Why would you go to Trump Tower? Because of Trump. When it came time to vote, I think that a lot of voters just went and said "Trump." They recognized the name, so the name recognition paid off. Same thing with Oprah; she puts her brand on something, her name on something, and it flies off the shelves. It's like instant validator. But these people also take risks for putting their name out there. Obviously, Trump is now probably hated by half or more than half of the country and by a big chunk of the world. But he sticks his name out there.

By putting your name out there, you become a celebrity, and fame has many, many downsides. It's better to be anonymous and rich than to be poor and famous. But even famous and rich has a lot of downsides associated with it; you're always in the public eye. So accountability is quite important when you're working to build a product, or you're working on a team, or you're working in a business.

We are constantly drummed into our heads how important it is to be part of a team, and I absolutely agree with that. A lot of our training socially is telling us to not stick our necks out. The crowd, this is a saying that I hear from Australian friends, "The tall poppy gets cut." Right? Don't stick your neck out. But I would say that actually a really, really well-functioning team is small and has clear accountability for each two different portions.

Like, so you can say, "Okay, this person is responsible for building the product; this person is responsible for the messaging; this person is responsible for raising money; this person is responsible for the pricing strategy; and then maybe their online advertising." So if somebody screws up, you know exactly who's responsible. At the same time, if something goes really well, you also know exactly who's responsible. So if you have a small team and you have clearly delineated responsibilities, then you can still keep a very high level of accountability.

And accountability is really important because when something succeeds or fails, if it fails, everybody points fingers at each other, and if it succeeds, everybody steps forward to take credit. We've all had that experience when we were in school and we got a group assignment to do. There were probably a few people in there who did a lot of the work, and then there were a few people who just did a lot of grandstanding or positioning to do the work. So we're all familiar with this from a childhood sense, but it is sort of uncomfortable to talk about.

But clear accountability is important. Without accountability, you don't have incentives. Without accountability, you can't build credibility. But you take risks; you take risks of failure. You take risks...