Career Advice for People Who Feel Lost | Kata 7

99% of people working in companies or in general in life are very confused. And

the minute you have clarity, you will beat everybody else. But it's hard to get clarity because so many exciting things in the world. No decisions to be made without experiment. Somebody else

making $3,000 outside unless you have made it and you have taken that life risk, that's not something you're committed to. You're triing it. In big

committed to. You're triing it. In big

companies, confusion happens on purpose cuz no one wants to own the call. Cuz if

I own the call and that decision was wrong, many times you either lose your job or it's like your reputation falls down. What is the one thing I can do

down. What is the one thing I can do such that by doing it everything in my life becomes easier or unnecessary. The

minute you're in your third job for most people that's their career because beyond the third job experimenting in more fields is not going to change who you are. Always look at is this startup

you are. Always look at is this startup growing exponentially. If you are

growing exponentially. If you are sitting on an exponential train you are the stupidest person to leave.

All right, we spoke about attribution in the last kata. This kata we're going to talk

kata. This kata we're going to talk about confusion. If there's a defining

about confusion. If there's a defining hallmark of early 20s, not just for everybody here, but also for me and for everybody else watching between 20 and

27, 28, some people it takes till 30 also. I think the hallmark is confusion.

also. I think the hallmark is confusion.

And I read this beautiful article, okay?

And I fully empathize with this. I'll

tell you why. The article was about hyper gambling.

It's like look, if you're making a certain amount of salary and that's a standard salary, but at the same time, house prices are completely shooting up. You do the calculation on

shooting up. You do the calculation on SIP investment, whatever you're doing, right? All those investments. I'm not a

right? All those investments. I'm not a personal finance guy, but I'm sure there's some mathematics around this.

You know that in 30 years, you'll be able to afford a house and you'll be retired. But you're like 30 years is a

retired. But you're like 30 years is a very long time. I don't want to be somewhat rich and somewhat successful at 50. I want to be that at 20. So you know

50. I want to be that at 20. So you know what people do for the next 5 years of their life? They do what is called hyper

their life? They do what is called hyper gambling. They take these massive

gambling. They take these massive longshot risks hoping one of them works.

And I'll be honest, there's some kinds of hyper gambling that's good, which is go start your own startup and try a very ambitious like Y cominator will or a lot of these VCs will now fund very young people who are swinging big who are trying to build a very big business. One

out of 100 times it works for a VC it works for an investor it works cuz they are funding 100 startups but for you hyper gambling might not be the you know ideal thing. Some other people hyper

ideal thing. Some other people hyper gamble by going the buying the latest, you know, some penny stock and hoping yeah 100x. But I empathize with them

yeah 100x. But I empathize with them because it's so hard, right? It's like

the world is filled with opportunities and every day you're hearing about somebody who invested in something and it went 100x or somebody else who got this new type of job and suddenly it goes 10x. There's so much FOMO in the

goes 10x. There's so much FOMO in the world, right? And at 20 to 25 in our

world, right? And at 20 to 25 in our Instagram, YouTube, social media world, it is very hard to not have seen hundreds of opportunities at the same

time and therefore be confused.

And my opinion is that we live in a world whose job is to confuse you, right? It's it's actually not their job.

right? It's it's actually not their job.

It's a side effect of what they're doing because everyone's vying for your attention and they're all spending on advertising and content to get your attention and some of this advertising and content is at odds with each other.

So, everyone has their own narrative.

There are thousands of this. So, there

was this one skit I'd seen a long time ago where a guy goes into a room and the room is called Instagram and inside the room you know there's a guy doing budon, there's a guy do you know clapping, there's another guy doing selling soap,

there's whatever. It's just really funny

there's whatever. It's just really funny the video and I think your job is to avoid being affected by this as

hard as as hard as that sounds. So today

I want to talk about something that every 20 to 25 year old is in the state of how to avoid it and how to do better for yourself. Cool. Let's go. Like I

for yourself. Cool. Let's go. Like I

said, I think the greatest problem facing youngsters today is confusion.

Five options are good. This other

company is good, that other company is good. Either orance

good. Either orance whatever there's 100,000 things that you can do. You can invest all your money in

can do. You can invest all your money in some token this that what there's 100 things you can do. the difference

between confusion and diversification because some of you get confused between what is conf what five options are there I need to get into all versus diversification which is if this falls I need to have

another option you get confused between it a little bit I'm going to run you through what that confusion is and how to cure this problem we'll attribute it correctly we'll try to find in the many things you're

looking at what actually works next slide Peter the frames the world in four quadrants quadrants only one of of them builds anything. Okay, there is a

builds anything. Okay, there is a definite optimist.

The view of the future is future can be better. Okay, do they have a plan? Yes,

better. Okay, do they have a plan? Yes,

they have a plan. Result you get railroads iPhones SpaceX whatever.

Then there's a indefinite optimist which is a lot of us are like this. All is well.

They don't have a plan.

It'll happen. World will align, manifest.

And then I think a lot of them get into something called credential collection, which is they kind of they're trying to get lucky, which is a but let me get a

degree, let me get, you know, this credential, let me get Facebook on my resume, this that, whatever, so that I'm ready for that luck when that luck comes. It's one way of looking at

comes. It's one way of looking at things. It's useful. Then there's a

things. It's useful. Then there's a definite pessimist whose future is bleak.

Do they have a plan? Yes.

And they build survival bunkers.

They're fully scared. So they're like and in the in India you'll find this as people who have, you know, invested in FDS and all that. They've just like invested all their money. This they're

living like absolute scrges. Okay. And

many of them die very rich.

They they'll die at 70, but they have lots of money that they saved up. But

they're saving all that money hoping a worst case happens and the worst case actually doesn't happen. The last one is an indefinite pessimist which is future is bad. Ga no plan

is bad. Ga no plan doom scroll. And I'll tell you something

doom scroll. And I'll tell you something a lot of people tell me that I am a definite pessimist that I believe the future is bleak. Actually I do not believe the future is bleak. I believe

the future is bleak only for jobs.

But I think communities will exist.

Humans will find other ways to entertain themselves. Humans like trading among

themselves. Humans like trading among each other. they will trade other stuff.

each other. they will trade other stuff.

You know, if you look at Counter-Strike, the Counter-Strike economy is so big, there's no real job there, right? But

it's like people are trading assets between each other and some multi-, you know, this thing economy, multi-billion dollar economy. Even finance,

dollar economy. Even finance, technically, there's not, it's you're speculating on where something will go tomorrow, right? It's not a real job per

tomorrow, right? It's not a real job per se. So, I I believe I'm in the definite

se. So, I I believe I'm in the definite optimist camp about everything. And that

means none of us might need to have jobs 10 years from now, 20 years from now because the AI will get better enough to take care of us. And trust me, this might actually happen. But what matters is are you around other people who can take care of if there's a short period

where things are hard, are you around other people who can take care of you?

Are there adults in the room where if you know something happens, all of our business gets automated, do you trust me and the people around us to fix it, to build a new line of revenue if needed,

whatever it is, right? So I put myself in a definite optimist category. I think

the future will be better with AI, right? And a lot of people hate doing

right? And a lot of people hate doing jobs and you'll only have to do the things that are interesting and fun in the, you know, long run. I that's the world I believe we're entering and I

have a plan. Yes. Next slide.

How many of you believe in maximum optionality option?

This is something I know you're all lying about because I know, you know, it's very hard to describe, but sometimes I'll be sitting, somebody will be trying to have an appraisal conversation with me. I'm like, this

person is just keeping all their doors open.

I want to do this, maybe I want to do that, maybe I want to do this, maybe I want to do that.

But I think you make the least amount of impact like this, right? And you know, I don't blame you because I bet at 2122 I was the same, right? I mean jobs spire I sort of I was in the middle of building

a startup but the only difference is I would do one thing at once today I'm doing multiple things but today it's not because of optionality it's because of diversification and I'll explain the exact difference to you

there's a reason I made this deck next slide okay there's something called Greg Mcnown's essentialism okay and he calls indecision which is

not the ability to not make a decision the undisciplined pursuit of more the reason you are not making a decision is because you're a greedy.

Just kidding. But that's his opinion.

And the cure is systematic elimination.

If a task isn't a 9 out of 10, hell yes, it's a no. The minute you set a criteria, okay, I'm not going to do this unless I'm damn sure about it. Unless

it's a 9 out of 10, hell yes, I won't do it.

The minute you set this criteria, lot of things in your life go away.

or you want to do some you know degree in something or you want to travel somewhere whatever like any decision you want to make in life the minute you set this criteria you'll only do the things you love

right because you have to essentially love something to have a 9 or 10 you'll only do the things you're passionate about every tiny option every option you have every extra option is actually a

tax on your willpower you don't see it having another option it reduces Let's say you're doing a primary thing and you have five other options. The

more options you have directly proportional to how much your impact here is. So your impact actually here

here is. So your impact actually here goes down the minute you have 20 options, 30 options. And you'll see this in everything, right? Like you'll see it in marriages or let's say how many of you have

girlfriends or boyfriends? Okay, few

hands went up. Um the minute you have a girlfriend or a boyfriend but then outside you have five other options. Do

you think your commitment to this first one is going to be the same?

No. Right. Pretty obvious. It'll drop.

It looks safe, but optionality is the po is a type of poison.

Next slide. There's something called Gary Keller's the one thing, right?

Okay. And I'll tell you how to think about this. It it weaponizes the idea of

about this. It it weaponizes the idea of optionality. It uses optionality as a

optionality. It uses optionality as a type of weapon.

And it does this right it it does optionality by collapsing things. The

better question to ask is what is the one thing I can do such that by doing it everything in my life becomes easier or unnecessary.

So I'm saying don't give up on the five things you want to do but what is the one thing you can do right now that makes all those things possible. This is

a better way to look at it. And by the way is built on this principle. At some

point we like, hey, we don't have video editors. We're struggling to hire video

editors. We're struggling to hire video editors. What is the one thing we can do

editors. What is the one thing we can do right now that'll make this easier?

And so on and so forth. Everything we

have built is just something we needed.

It's never been, oh, that's an attractive idea. We'll go after that.

attractive idea. We'll go after that.

We've just never been that. It's like,

we need this right now. What is the one thing we can do right now that makes our life easier?

Next slide. And I want to tell you quickly the difference between confusion and diversification.

Confusion is you have five things that are interesting to you but no impact or no scale or no P&L on any of the five things.

None of those things are working.

Diversification is one thing is working very well and by trying to do the second thing this is not going to fall. This

may fall later because of market reasons this or that and and you'll see this with freelance. Okay, a lot of

with freelance. Okay, a lot of freelancers do this. They think I'm going to freelance and I make a lot of money this that whatever. I'll tell you the it's called the freelancer's trap and I wrote a book about freelancing in 2017 right and it's something we didn't

write in the book called the freelancer's trap which is a project make good money but I'll tell you one thing freelance comes with inherent risk what I mean by that is in a job you

don't absorb that much risk you have a stable standard salary you don't know how rare that is but in freelancing and I'll tell you something about our company that you need to know very well

which is that all our clients don't pay their invoic on time. It's our job to push the client to pay the invoices on time and every month by the way the outflow of the company because we have

like 500 plus employees spending a huge amount of money. So all those invoices need to come in a specific time and more importantly just in case those invoices don't come on time we need to have

reserve.

We make sure there's enough money sitting in the bank so that if clients are lazy and late and whatn not we are still able to pay these salaries. You

are buffered from that risk because you don't see it. But the minute you freelance, that risk is on you. I'll

tell you what happens. People say,

"Okay, I picked up this project. Okay,

$2,000, whatever, $3,000, big money."

But finishing that one contract, a the client asks you for more and more changes. And when it's time to pay the

changes. And when it's time to pay the invoice, the client now delays next month, next month, next month. So three months have passed, you've actually not made any money. You're not made real money. And

money. You're not made real money. And

sometimes the clients run away as well.

And that's the problem. The smaller you are as a freelancer, the less of a brand you have, the worse clients you get. The

bigger companies like us get really big clients. And like for example, we work

clients. And like for example, we work with like some of the biggest clients you can think of and they pay their invoices on time because their reputation matters. When we work with

reputation matters. When we work with vendors because we care about a reputation, we pay we pay our like if some invoice comes to us, we pay it on time or not too late because we want to be good people, right? We don't want to

have that bad reputation. But with small freelancers, small clients, everything is bad reputation world. So not only is there a risk that they'll pay you late, there's a risk that they don't pay you at all. So you're absorbing that risk

at all. So you're absorbing that risk and the way you and by the way it still happens to us also. Sometimes there'll

be clients who don't pay us, very rare, but and if you take legal action, it'll take 2, three years for it to, you know, materialize, but luckily we're diversified, which means we have three other clients, four other clients who if

this person hits, we're still okay. If

this person falls or doesn't pay, we still have enough. So as a freelancer, you actually need at least three or four projects to make sure you have a consistent revenue stream, which because these freelance projects are 3 months,

four months, requires you to do sales.

It requires you to do sales.

So you learn that as a freelancer, you become more like an entrepreneur and more like a salesperson than whatever it is. Let's say you're freelancing in

is. Let's say you're freelancing in graphic design, okay? You learn over time as a graphic design freelancer business. Your job is to constantly keep

business. Your job is to constantly keep getting deal flow. So you stop doing graphic design. You're half the time

graphic design. You're half the time spending time at events or like meeting people or like building relationships which is a totally different job than you signed up for. It's not free and

easy money. It's a lot of effort and

easy money. It's a lot of effort and then sometimes not being paid at the end of the day. And when you're doing this full-time, you realize, this is just taking too much energy and I can't work and get new clients at the same

time. And by the time I'm finishing the

time. And by the time I'm finishing the project, the guy has shut down the project. So I need to look for another

project. So I need to look for another client. So there'll be periods where you

client. So there'll be periods where you don't get paid because you are you've been so engrossed in finishing the work that you don't have a new client available. So you realize I have to get

available. So you realize I have to get another person to actually do the you know the actual work let me do the sales and you'll do that but when you're a small team that person will be like

you're paying me a salary freelance and the cycle repeats which is why all freelancers believe it or not either they end up building large

businesses where they have hundreds of people doing this or they end up with just one client struggling and sometimes zero clients. Okay. So

what is confusion versus what is diversification? Diversification is is

diversification? Diversification is is there a way you can make additional revenue without losing your core job and quitting your job and doing this without taking an all-in risk.

That is diversification.

And I'll tell you some good ways to diversify. Invest your money.

diversify. Invest your money.

If you take your salary from here and invest some portion in, you know, some good blue chip stocks, that is diversification. Why are you losing the

diversification. Why are you losing the first thing because of this thing? No.

Right?

And that's the question to ask. By doing

the second thing, am I losing the first thing?

And there are plenty of opportunities in the world where without losing the first thing, you can do the second thing.

I ask the AOS way, right? Like we don't drop the ball on on and some old project that we did just because we're doing a new project. We're like only once this

new project. We're like only once this is stable, we take up new things. We

have bandwidth to do more things.

Okay, next slide. Anyway, there's a book called the unac unaccountability machine and he he says this thing about large organizations, right? Over time,

organizations, right? Over time, decisions get handed off to process. No

one has to own a call and entropy wins.

I'm randomly some big companies sometimes they randomly take process.

Over time, you'll realize why an agency matters. Why do companies outsource to

matters. Why do companies outsource to agencies? Why can't they do things

agencies? Why can't they do things inhouse? Have you ever thought about

inhouse? Have you ever thought about this?

The best founders I know, young founders who I've been friends with for four or five years have now come to the realization because in a big company, there's so many things going on that you

want someone's focus on something. It's

better to go external because that external person cares a lot, right?

Because they know if you they don't deliver in 3 months, you're going to shut down their project. Whereas in a company, it's like you expect, oh, salaried employee, I'm going to be here forever. Confusion is not accidental and

forever. Confusion is not accidental and in many companies is baked in to avoid blame. In big companies, believe it or

blame. In big companies, believe it or not, confusion happens on purpose.

You might think, "What? What are you saying, Vun? You're saying companies,

saying, Vun? You're saying companies, you know, intentionally confuse people."

Yes, cuz no one wants to own the call.

Cuz if I own the call and I say, "Yes, I'm making the decision do this." And

that decision was wrong. Many times you either lose your job or it's like your reputation falls down. So there are big companies, believe it or not, where we call them frogs. some executives in big

companies where they just don't make a decision. They're too slow and they're

decision. They're too slow and they're like to make this decision I need all 15 people in my team to agree. The best

companies, one person will be like, I'm going to spearhead this project. I'm

going to do this. The initiative takers.

That's why founder-driven companies do better because founders know they can't blame anyone else.

Ultimately, if we make a bad decision, it's the founders's fault. Founders

understand this. Next slide.

Companies run on high clarity low confusion superstar. The minute you have

confusion superstar. The minute you have confusion in you which is without establishing one thing I'm thinking about freelance I'm doing this

company trust you less not just here any company is less likely to give you more impactful roles and I'll tell you one thing AOS is not the only company does that does this a lot of companies do

like take the example of DIN right went all in on doing a very specific Unreal cinematics role and then he just did such a good job at it he got any whatever he asked for because like we

can bet on we can count on you now whereas a lot of other people will be like first you give me that then I'll drop everything else world doesn't work like that world works the other way around unless you're in a position you

have the leverage if you have the leverage then you can say hey listen bro give me all these things then I will drop everything else if you have leverage you are some superstar you have good brand

etc whatever it is but usually it's you have to prove it first you have to go all first and then you'll get what you want and AOS is no different to this

actually every company does this okay and I think these hard calls right are best the the rule we have here is ask for forgiveness not permission

make a mistake it's okay and later on ask for permission forgiveness say sorry you know I did this it didn't work out sorry dude nobody I'm telling you like nobody cares that much about failure

something that took me a long time to understand people care that at some point you were eventually right and you took the hard calls you took the risk and you're not confused about it and I'm

telling you most 99% of people working in companies or in general in life are very confused and the minute you have clarity you'll beat everybody else but it's hard to get clarity because so many exciting things in the world no which

are the one things do you randomly go down the path on tough next slide and I think your edge versus everyone else is precisely ly that

you can solve that confusion. who can be like meonga call and I think in aos like I've mentioned you have to prove this first and then receive you'll receive free reign like

some of the people in the company but in general like for from a life perspective as well I think it's important to understand that 99% of people are confused and the minute you are no

longer confused I'll be random out of the five things you want to do maybe you've picked I'll do the IT networking for the It would be very random. But the minute

you decide to become all in world expert at it and only care about that, trust me, all opportunities will come your way. It's so strange.

way. It's so strange.

It's so strange.

And once you do that and become very established as the IT expert, whatever, you'll have 10 other, you know, things you can do because now people trust you as that expert. You have enough clientele. You have enough money. You

clientele. You have enough money. You

have enough free cash flow. And then you use that to do your next five projects.

Next slide. And I think I'm I just want to tell you how much of a problem this is this confusion thing. And it's very simple to me sitting here because I've

been there and I you know we have so many employees in the company and we interview so many thousands of people that it's just like these patterns are so common and I'm just telling you might

think this is silly or stupid or whatever but it's like so common. I

thought maybe it's useful to just tell you what is happening. You got to find a path of career guidance. There'll be a 25 year old paralyzed by infinite career branches. No action taken. Should I do

branches. No action taken. Should I do this or this? Like the most common question I get is should I do is BCOM the right degree or B blah blah blah the right degree? And honestly, no one

right degree? And honestly, no one knows. The best BCOM guy will beat the

knows. The best BCOM guy will beat the average B tech guy. Okay, the best no degree guy at specific thing if they really care about it will will beat an IIT as well.

This is obvious. This is true. You all

know this. But I think everyone is paralyzed by should I do this or should I do something else? Should I do video editing or should I do finance? Some

people had this confusion. Should I do video editing or should I do something else? Should I be a software engineer or

else? Should I be a software engineer or should I be something else? And

honestly, all the world wants from you is to decide and anything whether it be video editing, whether it be dancing, if you're Shamak, if you're a dancer

Shamak, you'll make roses. If you're

prauas, whatever his name is, Prabhu deva, you'll make a ridiculous amount of money, right? If you're a good dancer. So,

right? If you're a good dancer. So,

whatever it is, you might think, oh, dance, of course, the average dancer will make zero.

But whatever it is, if you decide and you're sure and you're going down that path, you'll do very well.

And trust me, believe it or not, even if you want to do five things, the better, and something I learned myself, even if you want to do five things, the best is to do one thing really well and then you can do the next four

things. You diversify.

things. You diversify.

But without that one thing working, you're in confusion land.

You'll see 27 year old stuck between partner, grad school, remote. should I

do remote relationship and get into this school or should I, you know, do this job? But they're not doing anything

job? But they're not doing anything about it. They're just confused. And I'm

about it. They're just confused. And I'm

trying to tell you that clarity is fake.

You just have to decide. Nobody knows

what the right answer is. You, you know, you make a call, but ultimately the minute you make that call, you are above 99% of the population.

I I just want to tell you it's very very very simple to do this.

You just decide.

Next slide. Why is everybody so confused?

Okay. And I think there are lots of people to blame but ultimately you can't blame the world that you're in. I think

number one is that I think there are status games masquerading as choice.

Right? Lot of people do multiple internships. Like you all have a CV, a

internships. Like you all have a CV, a resume. If your CV said Facebook and

resume. If your CV said Facebook and then Google and then I don't know sorry Meta and Google and then Nvidia it'll be cool right if you

got internships in all three right it's complete waste one is enough and you really have to go there to gain experience

someone wants to do like a cool degree so that people see me in a certain way whereas we all know that your degrees have not been valuable for everything

the second thing is I think risk illiteracy right I think people overwway the downside of making a choice

choice like which is let's say I decide to continue to work at AOS versus this freelance opportunity this or that risk right

you've heard these stories and my opinion of these stories is it's a can that person prove that they have consistently made that money for 12 months I'll be very surprised or even if

12 months 2 years I'll be very surprised second thing is I also believe in any growing company salary brands rapidly increase

like we don't know we pay talent maybe two or three times what we used to pay when we started maybe even more than that and that's only going to increase right especially if you're one of the early loyal people in the

And I think you believe that there's too much down you overweigh the downside of that one pick and if it's freelancing then it's freelancing right even in freelancing if you are going all in on that maybe the downsides are not as bad

right I'm just batting for the other side for a second maybe that's the right option for you but you got to decide and I think you underway compounding upside

all success is compounding not just financial you know putting money in stock market and compounding but also the relationship ships that you have, the skills that you learn, the team that you're working with, it all compounds.

Suddenly you wake up and you're like, wait, I have like, you know, I'm in this position of power and I have 20 new deals. Whereas earlier they, you know, I

deals. Whereas earlier they, you know, I would get one new deal. Compounding is

crazy, dude. And compounding is all about brand and brand can happen internally as well. Internally, you're

known for this. Okay, fine. You get all these opportunities.

Next thing is of course infinite scroll brain which is Tik Tok I think Instagram Tik Tok brain which is that the minute you start scrolling

course there are thousand options right and it's like sometimes I know this is rubbish because some someone will come speak to me like I really want to be this and it's a job role like like you

have there's no relationship between you and the job role the person like no I really want to do this I'm like you've never tried it before no I really want to do this It's all like, where is this information coming from? Like, have you

ever thought about doing a job that you've never heard of? No. Right?

You'll always see something on Instagram and be like, I want to do I want to be a wildlife photographer.

Right? It's just random stuff.

And I think you're doing it because you want to be different from everybody else. But I'll tell you the secret to

else. But I'll tell you the secret to being different from everybody else is to just commit to one thing. That's it.

And I think last one is blind leading the blind. Please don't take advice from

the blind. Please don't take advice from Reddit. I've never met a successful

Reddit. I've never met a successful people who's currently using 10 years ago. All the successful people used to

ago. All the successful people used to use Reddit.

My Reddit account has like crazy karma from 10 years ago, right? But I don't use it anymore because now it's mostly become people who are complaining.

You're getting advice from like people who have lost which is not, you know, it's you don't want their confusion coming on you. Next slide.

Let's do an anti-confusion playbook.

I want you all to have clarity and you know if that clarity is something else that's also okay you know best you know yourself best I'm not the right person to give you prescriptive advice on I

also don't know you know better you know yourself better first thing let's put all our decisions in are these oneway doors or two-way doors Jeff Bezos has a

very good article he writes these shareholder letters he wrote something about decisions and he said there's a difference between something called oneway doors and two-way two way doors.

A two-way door means if I make this decision, is it reversible?

Can I come back?

If I decide to, I don't know, tell this person, shut up, can I come back from it? Can I apologize and get back? There

it? Can I apologize and get back? There

are other things that are two-way door.

There are one way doors. If I make the decision, it's an irreversible decision, right? tomorrow if I do this specific

right? tomorrow if I do this specific thing, if I let this if I fire this person, let's say, and the relationships become bad, it's a one-way door. I'm never going to

be able to turn back the clock and do this again. Like aging is a one-way decision, right?

If you can reverse it later, decide in minutes. If you feel something is a

minutes. If you feel something is a two-way door, okay, I can undo this quickly, decide within 5 minutes. If

it's a one-way door, take weeks, take months.

One way doors are very hard and that's why one of the things that we've been very careful about and something that we've been thinking about is if someone leaves us we want to make sure it's a oneway door it's okay to

leave us that's fair but it needs to be a well thoughtout decision right if you can just go out go to another company come back you know freelance for 2 months come back I mean we you're losing so much context of business here right

you're losing so much of that context we're losing good talent and it starts becoming a habit like it start becoming a behavior for everybody So, we've been thinking about changing the two-way door to a oneway door cuz right now people make that decision

sometime in minutes, right? And then

they regret it 2 months or 3 months later. The next one is personal OKRs but

later. The next one is personal OKRs but just one which is one objective and three key results. If you're making a decision, if you're let's say deciding

to go freelance, what is the one objective you have number to get to and what are the three key results?

Right? The next thing is time boxed curiosity sprints.

I understand that we live in a world where you can't know everything about an industry, right? You don't know if the

industry, right? You don't know if the other if the grass is greener on the other side. You don't know if that other

other side. You don't know if that other industry is better or you don't know if that other field is better. You don't

know if freelancing is better. You don't

know if you don't know. Nobody knows.

But unfortunately, these are oneway doors. You have to stop doing this and

doors. You have to stop doing this and go do that your entire time. Right? So,

I think the best way to do this is to give yourself 60 days to explore a field.

Play around with the field, you know, side it because see, every field is exciting when you do it for the first two weeks, right? Right? When you've

done it for years, you see all the hard parts. Right?

parts. Right?

Spend 60 days to explore a field, then commit or reject.

The next thing is default to build, ship, and feedback loop. If you have working code, if you're a software engineer or if you have a working video, if you're if you're doing freelancing, if you have a working client, if you

have a product, it clarifies faster than any whiteboard. Whiteboard, we get stuck

any whiteboard. Whiteboard, we get stuck on analysis paralysis.

No decisions to be made without experiment. Somebody else making $3,000

experiment. Somebody else making $3,000 outside. Unless you have made it and you

outside. Unless you have made it and you have taken that life risk, that's not something you're committed to. You're

triing it.

Last is marriage and career rule of three.

Date three serious partners or ship three serious projects.

Then decide.

More sampling rarely improves improves clarity and increases opportunity cost.

How many of you this is your third job?

Okay.

The minute you're in your third job for most people that's their career because beyond the third job experimenting in more fields is not going to change who you are.

That it's extra sampling that doesn't it's not needed. After three of something let's say you've done three you know projects here or three videos here. you kind of know what to expect,

here. you kind of know what to expect, right? In the first one, you you know,

right? In the first one, you you know, there might still be a big difference in the second one. There must still be a big difference in the third one. But

three is a good number, right? After

three, more sampling rarely helps. And

actually, it increases opportunity cost.

Now, you're like losing on the effects of compounding. If you're constantly

of compounding. If you're constantly switching after three jobs, I think everyone's allowed to rapidly switch to three jobs to find what they want to do.

But in those three jobs, maybe if the second one is good, stick. It's very

rare. I'm telling you, especially in the world today where you know there's hundreds of people out on the street who are who don't have a job, if you find something that works and you kind of enjoy it, you won't you'll never 100% enjoy anything. You can enjoy it

enjoy anything. You can enjoy it reasonably enough, do it. And the minute you decide now, you're ahead of 99% of the trust me on this. Next slide.

When making choices, I'll help you make this choice also. When making choices, look for growth rate versus absolute scale. Sure, you can go work at a very

scale. Sure, you can go work at a very very large company that's at the peak of their scale or you can look at some of these early stage startups, right? Like for example, I've been

right? Like for example, I've been watching Emergent grow, right? And we've

been helping them. They're a client of ours. I've watched them grow like a

ours. I've watched them grow like a rocket ship from zero to like $50 million in like a very short period of time. That's clearly a rocket. Maybe

time. That's clearly a rocket. Maybe

they might crash and burn. Maybe they

might end up becoming a really successful company. But the point is

successful company. But the point is there you have a chance to go wherever it is very quickly. up or down you'll know very quickly instead of wasting like 10 years of your life at a company that's already hit its like top right

there might be a company making thousands of crores selling nut and bolt in India there are so many of those companies steel pipes this that they're making ridiculous amount of money but if you work there growth rate is small so

always look at is this startup growing exponentially if you are sitting on an exponential train you are the stupidest person to leave trust me on this if a company is rapidly scaling you get

opportunities there's excess money there is just so much responsibility to go around that you can just put your hand and take it and be like me responsibility you can do that but if it's slow growth

no there are there's bureaucracy government is a good example right it's not going to rapidly grow so the people there have already put their hands like in big companies you'll see they're making thousand crores it's not growing

very much all the bureaucrats like people like you but 10 years later who are like so they don't let new talent come in they're like no no no this is mine this a problem but with startups no because there's so much new opportunity.

You have the ability to put your hands around some gold. Awesome.

I just want to leave this with one thing, right? The minute you make a

thing, right? The minute you make a choice, you're ahead of everybody else.

In my own case, like I feel like when I was very young, I was also a youngster.

I grew up with the internet. Like some

of you guys got the internet after mobile phone era, but I spent my young my youth on a computer. I feel like it's very hard to make a choice. But in my

30s, I learned that the minute you make a choice, you're ahead of everybody else cuz they will always do sub impact of what you end up doing. And once you've made that choice and you have one thing

that works, it's very easy to do five or 10 other things. There's a story of every successful celebrity or superstar or whatever. Ranir Singh now is doing

or whatever. Ranir Singh now is doing superu the the whatever the wafer brand and whatnot, the protein bar brand and whatnot. So once that one thing works,

whatnot. So once that one thing works, everything else ends up working. You

just need to find that one thing and this is a good framework to do it.

That's it for me. Hope you like this.

Bye.