Find people who've been there

Ali on spotting talent before it's obvious“It's mostly about being intentional with the pattern matching you already have from a lifetime of interacting with people, rather than suspending judgment the way polite society trains us to do.”

Jim on learning faster and remembering more“Before you decide you’re bad at learning, look at how you’re learning. Give yourself a method, remove distractions, and practice recalling what matters.”

Lorraine on getting noticed for your work“Doing great work doesn’t guarantee recognition. Make your impact easy to explain so people can advocate for you when you’re not in the room.”

Moses on making it to the top when you started with nothing“I had love for the game, parents who kept me grounded, and a city that taught me how to compete. What kept me going was consistency and curiosity. You control what you can control, stack good days, and let the game reward you when it's time.”

Pedro on where machine learning is headed“The same basic paradigms have been used since the 1950s. At the end of the day, we’re going to need some new ideas.”

Jason on when to keep fighting and when to wind down“I’ve seen this movie too many times: four months of runway with flat sales usually means the founder never found a repeatable motion, not that the market said no.”

Matthew on finding the right partner“You want to be happy enough that the right thing doesn’t become your everything.”

Kirsten on how AI changes what consumers buyTime 100 Most Influential People and dollar Shave Club sold for $1B.

Soleio on designing products people love“Good design starts with knowing what matters. If your team can’t agree on the problem, polishing the interface won’t fix it.”

Julian on using a system to curb phone distractions“I don't try to restart at full speed; I drop back to the mínimo viable version of each habit until the momentum returns, because a 20-minute workout and one focused block on the side project beats another day of zero.”

Niraj on using breathwork to change your physical state“Breathing is the only autonomic function you can consciously control. It's a direct line to your nervous system. When you exhale, your parasympathetic system engages and your heart rate comes down. A few minutes of rhythmic breathing is enough to pull yourself out of stress and back into your center.”

Alastair on handling a teammate who undermines you in meetings“I would name the pattern in private first: I noticed you agreed in the room, then raised concerns afterwards. If you disagree, raise it in the meeting so we can deal with it straight away.”

Jim on enjoying competition when teammates are more intense“I stopped enjoying baseball when I was chasing what everyone else valued, and I found my game again only when I started competing to raise my own level, not to beat theirs.”

Stanley on turning a scrappy experiment into a public company“We saw a macaroon shop in Palo Alto with orders they couldn't fulfill, so we built a static HTML site with a phone number and took orders by hand. The scrappy part isn't a phase you graduate from; it's a discipline. You automate after you understand the problem deeply, not before. Change everything except the mission if the data says so.”

Vanessa on sexual expectations couples never say out loud“I don't believe in a universal normal for any stage, but I do think it's completely natural for that early honeymoon frequency to taper off after about a year.”

Andrej on how far we are from AGICo-founded OpenAI and designed Stanford's first deep learning class.

Spenser on turning user behavior into growth“Users tell you what they want, but their behavior shows you what matters. Understand the difference before deciding what to build...”

Tiago on turning knowledge into action“Saving information isn’t the goal. Organize it around what you’re trying to accomplish, so the ideas you collect become things you actually create.”

Jeffrey on why treating symptoms is the wrong place to start“Symptoms are late signals, not first causes. In chronic illness the biology starts drifting years before a diagnosis. If you start at the symptom, you are downstream. You may mute the alarm without finding the fire. The body is a network, so ask what shifted in the person's story and physiology that made the symptom possible, then address that.”

Laurie on making a strong start in the first ninety days“Listen, the first 90 days is where careers get made or stalled, and most people waste it being polite and waiting to be told what to do.”