Life is like skiing. Just like skiing, the goal is not to get to the bottom of the hill. It's to have a bunch of good runs before the sun sets.

Fire the committee. No great website in history has been conceived of by more than three people. Not one. This is a deal breaker.

I think it's fascinating to note that some of the most successful organizations of our time got there by focusing obsessively on service, viewing compensation as an afterthought or a side effect. As marketing gets more and more expensive, it turns out that caring for people is a useful shortcut to trust, which leads to all the other things that a growing organization seeks.

Treat different people differently. Anything else is a compromise.

Our cultural instinct is to wait to get pickedNo one is going to pick you. Pick yourself.

A well-defined backup plan is sabotage waiting to happen. Why push through the dip, why take the risk, why blow it all when there's the comfortable alternative instead? The people who break through usually have nothing to lose, and they almost never have a backup plan.

Saying 'no' or even 'stop' is the hallmark of the professional you want on your team.