A Billionaire's Guide To Going From $4/hour to $1 Billion Net Worth - Dharmesh Shah
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You've had a good quarter. Have spot stock. I think that male time high, you saw the domain to OpenAI. You came on the pod.

I do O K, I do O K. Thank you.

right? It's my first million. How do we use the hour so that it's your first million?

If all you do is spend one hundred percent of your time converting your labor into value and do not increase your leverage.

you're not going to anywhere OK. So what were the things you indeed that had that maybe the highest return for you that did actually make .

you more high leverage? Never in my mind has have been easier to get to that first million that right now there was no good way to squeezes. And but I can not.

Much the first .

is hidden agenda and my unhidden agenda, the picture of diagram. I love diagrams cle. Number one, I want to talk about things that I think I have useful things to say in some expertise, uh, will definitely talk about an agents of things like that.

But the other circle is things that I think our berline guarantee to increase the possibility of view the audience, making your first million. The number two is that in order to do that, uh, you know, we have that helps. We have a culture of a humility that the core five valleys that have spot and I said this particular line, uh, to employees, that helps.

But I don't think i've ever said outside of a pot, but i'm going to a solve for utility over humility. So if there's a way to say something that's going to be more useful as a result of and but in order to do that, i'm going to have to say something that's not on humble. I'm going to go instead, ed, even those don humble because they increased the utility of IT. And there will be a couple of moments that are completely non utility and now on humble as well. So that's a couple of days in there.

okay. So we have to to start with this, which is you're coming on as a guest, but you're coming on as the most prepared guest we've ever had. We did a precor.

We've discuss a bunch of things. Then you, then I send you some notes, and I tried to make IT light. I just maybe one, two things to think about before the episode.

S I never know how much work somebody wants to put in you then send back a whole another dog that's like, hey, here's a bunch of stories, ideas. I have some opening reMarks. You have a whole bunch of stuff there.

You went back and you watch your old episodes, which some of those popular episodes we ve had. You read all the comments, you incorporate the feedback. Is this just how you do everything?

Not not everything um confession on this particular in this particular case, not only did I watch my pye episodes read to the comments, but in the process of that, I saw a leader board on the my first million youtube channel and i'm number five and you don't know this about me yet but you will is like I ve never met a leader board I didn't want to get on the top of what happened here but .

that's what when we I was like so you coming on what do you want talk about A I that I you know a lot about and he was like, yes but through the frame of all, it's my first million. That's the end of the park guess how do we use the hour so that you it's it's your first millions. So if you're listening to this that I like, I can guarantee you're going to do IT, but I can increase whatever that probability was. Can I in one hour tell you things that will increase your probability .

that a promise so good? Like someone in the youtube comments at the recent episode had someone on, and should I boat SAT like this for, like eight minutes and so I was like, dude shot at they are just for, they're just stared that all I have a feeling we're gona get a lot.

a lot of these yes.

right? So when I ran my company, the hustle, I think we had something like two million subscribers, and we made money through advertising. We didn't actually make that much money per person reading the newsletter because advertising in general is kind of a crappy business model.

And so remember sitting down and i'm like, what are all the different ways that I can make money off the hostel that aren't advertising? And so to make sure that you don't make this mistake, shown me in the husband team, we went and looked at a bunch of different ways to monetize your business. And we put IT all together in a really cool document, where we layed all out along with our research, and we call IT very appropriately.

We call IT the business of monotonous playback. Go to the description of this episode and you're going to see a link to that, a business monza playbook, completely free. You just click the link and you .

can see IT back to the episode.

So where should we start image?

So let's and i'm not going give you auto bii from to do so is i'm going to take us back in time of little bit because in order going to understand some of the lessons I thought now in the hindside was the most valuable for me. I didn't know this at the time. I was living IT because we often can't pick that up. But I think we'll be useful. I want to go back to my first in read the U I was in my early twice um and I was here just on a visit, took my parents who are living there I was in inDiana and applied for a job at pizza, had rejected, applied for a job at big lots, rejected, applied for a job and red roof in and because I was indian and my parents actually running like the automatic assume that I like I I know things I only been in the country for like because .

they are are famous, not hotel ears, but like motel ers. Yes, motly, and not exactly .

had we had a motel like, yes and IT was that even like a franchise motel was one of those anyway um and so this was for the night shift, right? That might be partly why I got IT so was like a love in P M to seven am and that's the only thing that would work for me because I was taking classes during the day. And uh so couple things out of that uh particular experience and this I think will really for a lot of folks.

So in the early parts of most people's career, um you're working we tell you're working some sort of job um and you have you what I call your currency and your currency is what's the kind of time value of your time like hope you are making three hours fifty five cents now, which is what I was making the kind of early early period um and you're taking that kind of curse the value multiplying IT by how much time you are as labor you expend, how much time you spend doing, whatever is that people are paying money for. And that's pretty much to production, but that's how you create you create some money in the in those early years. So mathematically, and that particular equation is only two ways to make more money.

One is work more hours and the other one is to raise the currency, raise the Price that people are willing to pay for your time. Okay, great. And that time I was looking for all the hours I could get. I want to work more hours and if someone cancels someone like it'll be there, just give me the hours like put me in company.

I made a sports reference um I don't do sports ball but I went um IT worked so so here's sort of the kind of the lessons like you start there and you're going to end up spending a large part of the early part of your life, also called the first half converting time into my in various shapes and flavors. That's effectively what you're going to be doing and then you have to spend the latter half of your life proximately just really trying to convert money back into time. That's that's what happened ah that's that's life um and so we go back to the yoga converting time into mud, expanding the currency.

There is going to be um this automatic increase that happens in your currency simply as a result of tenure. As IT turns out, companies pay more for experience and they were so you can hear the same job doing rough to the same thing. You're gonna get some marginal increase, not much, but it's going to go up.

My argument here is that in order to really kind of break in, like you're gna start to have to kind of the crew money, if you dead, to get out of that first, but you didn't need to get some sort of leverage. Leverage is okay. What can I not leveraged? And the leverage verage give me a lever long enough and a full crime to wh, to place IT.

And I will move the world, or I shall move the world. And IT was interesting about that, that quote particularly, and that's a physics thing. I love math physics things. Is that okay? So that full krim is actually very, very necessary.

You need to point on which the the lever is going to give IT um and the degree of an appliance ation you get for your force, that's what leverage creates, is how far you are from the fokus. m. So the kind of the lesson is as you're spending your time, if all you do is spend one hundred percent your time converting your labor into value and do not increase your leverage, you're not going to anywhere.

So what you have to do is you have to allocate some percentage your time to say, even though someone is that paying for this particular time, i'm going to go read a book, i'm going to go do this. I'm going to do A I, I going to meet whatever that happens to be. You have to kind of make that investment. You have to carve IT out. Otherwise you never get the leverage necessary in order to make IT that first million.

That's like the number one less than and the thing that I did that was, uh very, very useful that I still Carried this day is that you sort of have to carve out literally some amount of uh, dollars for yourself and time and money are equal to me back back then is like I mean, by that is like i'm going to take ten percent of all the money that's coming in right now. I'm going to spend IT on books on things. So whatever that's going to kind of improve my way, it's funny because even in my first shot will talk about this a little bit is like they wouldn't get me like a fast of computer, won't get a come like I don't care.

I'm not looking for approval from anyone or whatever was. Like if someone is in the way that I think we'll improve, like who I am IT increase my currency, I will spend that money. I will expensive.

I I don't care what were the things you you invest that had maybe the highest return for you that did actually bake you more more high leverage that debate you more valuable, increase your rate with the top investments you made.

Books were the highest kally um and I read with so there was there was a often called harvey ci who wrote some very kind of pedestrian business books now by today's standards not sophisticated all but realized like a bad age for me is like this is brilliant that makes so much sense the book was tittles how to uh, swim with charge without being in the alive. I think .

that was one of that being eating.

There was another one. I was less about business, but still like everything I need to know. I learned in kindergarten. And these are like basic very, very like basic, basic things.

But it's one of those that it's like if you're an alien from another planet, which is what I felt like a large part of my life is like also this is how the world works kind of thing is like, you know, that seems shockingly obviously, knowledge wasn't shockingly obvious to me at the time, right? So that's kind. Lesson number one, you need to go to to get leverage.

Lesson number two. So after my bedroom of instant, where I was a nice shift thing, they had a computer there, which was one of nice things to do, their accounting and add closed the books that was part of my jobs that was so early exposure to computers but that I was able to get a job at U. S.

steel. No he fool. That was .

first real programming as an actually developer school working on my undergrad. Um and IT was great. I loved you.

Love the work. The thousand inDiana the U S. Deal plan that I was working at was in gary, inDiana. And I don't know things may have change now.

I don't know the gary in inDiana work at the like top of the list of people want to live, right? Like that was like the like the place you did not want to be. As IT turns out, inDiana overall was in a fine state.

But it's like very north sh uh and very cold that I just come over from india. And so I did a very new thing to do, which was I, okay, well, I D have a job of U. S.

deal. IT doesn't really matter. Talking to a main frame and writing my coder, whatever do they have other places like it's a big company, as IT turns out, U.

S. D. Has a plant in birmingham, alabama. Did not know where I was never been to alama, but one thing I didn't know was like, oh, it's more south than here, number one.

And number two is like it's not gary, inDiana. So the mathematical odds of IT being a worst place because i'd looked this up is like our slim to us. So birmingham, alabama, still not necessarily at I um best places to be but i'm like what I requested to transfer, say, hey, i'm working as often.

I know I knew, but I I see that you have a plant down in burning obama. Can I go work down there and they said, sure, like yourself self. So I get down to obama working for U. S. deal.

And i'm impatient person but I was like work like OK well and IT was making, uh, I think was like around twenty seven thousand dollars a year, which was a lot Better than I used to be making a red roof in. And IT was a full time job like this. I didn't have to like crowds for hours, anything like that. He was an actual salary, which was awesome.

The thing I learned though is like, okay, so how do I like progress? Like how do I get to grow? And I think I figured out um and this was said to me by kind of my manager and almost in in these kind of words, which is directly if you're not making steel, shipping steel, transporting steel, moving steel or selling steel here overhead.

And like that the like, the time that the pipi like sort of hit me is like, well, I don't want to be overhead I D I find what to do that. And so then like this is, once I get on, a very, very simplistic guy is like, okay, well, my thing is for development, where do I need to work or i'm not overhead, right? And so then the kind extradition is, oh, well, I need to work at a company or software, the actual product, just like still as the actual product for U.

S. You will like to get closer to kind of what the actual value is. So I open the sunday paper, which is what we did back then.

This is free internet days. And i'm like, look for jobs. A company is that are software company.

And so I applied for a job at a software company that happened to have a job bad in the people. Brampton m, and please call some idea systems. There was a divide soft company.

I, for a job there, uh, got that job, which is awesome. And that was life changing. In of itself is like, okay, software companies money comes to software developers are much Better treating developers than non software companies, as IT turns out as a rule. So like this is awesome and kind of the file away lesson here would be um your value is kind inversions proportional to the distance from the actual value creation.

Whatever happens to be to hear that in there, find a way to get there and and not saying you have to be soft development, but like the guy like my manager who had said you have to be making steel, selling steel or shipping steel, whatever everything else to sort of meta and is overhead and was again this was a ninety is right. Um I think people have a more nuance approach to uh how value is created. But if you have a chance to get closer to the actual customer calls to the actual product, uh, you should take that, that will can increase your leverages, increase your currency.

So i'm working at some other as a software developer. Um this is a good score or else i'll share. There's a uh, high utility in the stories.

So i'm working there and I I am making my figure around forty thousand hours a year um at that time, which this is ninety early nineties give take and burning a mama aps that was actually pretty good money so they paid me and the thing I was doing um is that uh some guards sf product was like a main frame products. So have the character mode turmoils that you guys seeing the movies now? Uh, still mainframes out there.

But most neural people don't have interact with them. But anyway but they were the process of trying to build a graphical user interface, which is the the latest thing back then that interact with the their main frame they wanted offer, like a windows gonna google on top of the the remain frame. So my job was that they take this character mode screen and create using this uh, drag rob tool, a gooey equivalent of that particular screen.

There were hundreds of screens in the product, was a multimillion product. And like, well, this is stupidity. We had consultants on there because they were trying to connect late, the development and the consult.

Ah I remember this vividly was making a hundred twenty five dollars an hour to do this uh, what I thought I was being relatively wrote work, right? I like two months and to the job I go to my boss and like, you know, we're paying these guys one hundred and twenty five dollars an hour. And all that really doing is dragon dropping based on this character, more screen or whatever.

This is not offered well, but in my way, this is so trivial. My brother, who has not graduate high school yet, he works at the pig week, which is a grocery chain h down the self. Even he could do this like in a day.

That's how to wire repaying these people hundred and twenty five dollars hour doesn't make any sense. And so my bus said, bring him in so I brought my brother in, is seventeen, uh, still has a graduate, a high school. Show him what we're doing like, okay, look at the screen over here.

Do this over here. You drag and drop in the here. Now all review your work. At the other day, we didn't know what to pay him, uh, so we paid him five hours hour.

Some brother starts working there and there and we're going along kind of building this new product. Uh, I hire all my classmates s uh, from undergrad. That team is growing. We're try doing this new product and at some guard and I continually kind of get in impatient.

I'm like, okay, well, now I met a software company now I know the value that i'm creating is like, okay, like what is and i'm so them, but constantly kind of going back to them is like, I won't. I have to do. I am still individual, contribute, by the way, don't not managing anybody, but unlike I get the way the stuff is working.

And so they were likely super, super nice and generous. And so they kind of me and kept bumping me. And IT was only therefore like my thick was like fourteen months or something like that. And so eventually we were paying me like a quarter million dollars a year in birmingham, obama in the early nineties. And i've only been there a year in half because I really able to connect the dots of the value being created.

And then I sort of got tired of because I think IT was just kind of wrong with me to cause I go back to them because they were paying me like, really well, right? Like, okay, well, a guy for to hit my ceiling of, what's the reasonable? Now for me to ask of this software company, uh, to pay me like OK, what do I have to do is, like, well, I have to get closer the value creation.

What I like, I start my own self compare. That was the kind of and no product idea that I know. This is the thing I need to do like like I thought that went into my head is like, oh, in order for me to like Better and kind of get more leverage on my time, i'm going to now have to leave some guard and go do my own thing and figure out like soft to building to do this.

And the one thing I do know like how to do is make developers happy is like her, uh, here are all my friends. I D like, I know what makes a developer click. That was the had genesis of my first startup and and the lesson here is that I would have to share this this one one story regret this because I in this year is is a good story. Um so in one of those guy discussions was my major what i'm going back is like, okay like what else I have to do didn't have .

any three number twenty seven eight point twenty six to five uh.

yeah roughly yeah roughly twenty seven somewhere my yeah twenty five thirty um and so after a plate was started to get ridiculous so he came back like, do you really think you're going to find that many companies are going to pay you x amount of two hundred thousand dollars of whatever IT was take in that conversation and this kind of came to me in the moment um in the line I came back with was well as IT turns out this is a very kind of mathematical side.

Me is like I really don't need to find that many companies that will pay me two hundred thousand dollars here. I just need to find one and I think there's what out there at all IT wasn't not a threat. IT was a very just a very measured, like logical, like a stock like response, right?

Like that's not the functional real, not for you know what is the local maximum in terms of how many companies are out there that will pay? You know what's the standard distribution? Not of that matters. Like I don't meet to find like a hundred of them and like i'm mobile, i'm willing to go anywhere like i'm going to bed money that if I looked, I could fight .

one right like that do to do with .

them in a way he's like, you think you find hundred companies out here that I want to pay you this? Like, no. But the good news is I need one hundred.

I need one. And I believe that there's one out there. And that applies to dating. That applies to being successful at one bit. You making one business work will do enough to change your life.

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And and so that there's two lessons to draw from that a one is the power of negotiation um which is one of my other one favorite books most recommended books is um uh getting to yes which from the harvard a negotiation project and that's one book I think i've read like four times now. H I reread IT um like every few years .

give you a quick insights for anybody who hasn't read the book like me. Um what an insight from there that would make me a Better negotiator.

Most people when they think of negotiation, they think about this kind adversity. It's me as the zero some game. This is what's happening. And if IT turns out most negotiations uh both in life and in business um are actually not like that.

And and that first order thinking in terms of I go my objectives to get the lowest Price and their objectives to get the highest Price for the thing i'm trying to buy for them with there is a house, whatever. And that's not the way to think about. The way to think about IT is to identify what your actual needs are.

What's truly the thing are if if you're selling for Price, fine, but recognize that and do your best identify what the other parties needs are because there is often very, very often a path that actually will optimize for both of you, and that's actually a Better path. And just try divide the pine fighting over Price of whatever the good might be, something else that actually more important, right? And and so this applies to something different situations that we like.

I'll give you like A A tangible example of that. I think, uh, a mistake companies make building their Operating system in terms of how they run something that uh is always taken to heart, is that we automatically ally think that people are solving for is like compensation number one, autonomy and direction and cope good like and those are all important as IT turns out, the number one on the feature list of what people want is actually flexibility. And they would trade a lot of other things in exchange for flexibility, right?

If you can just get the boat of that, if you understand that, then you can sort treat off other things that might actually have a higher Price to use. Flexibility is like, okay, like we can do that. Yeah, there's a cost to IT, but the cost of not provide a flexibility is actually much hired because the talent density is going to be lower, going up to pay more, all things equal. Um anyway that the the the big lesson from uh uh getting to yes, there is a bunch of all the ones that is an easy read to, by the way, not a particularly like dance. Have you read uh you if you're not a business, if you're just in life, uh, is a book worth reading?

When Jerry giving came on the pocket, he said that he said, the same idea, different. If he goes, we ask them, what do you learn about negotiating from criss balling? who? Who is that guys? A tiny, he said, I used to think negotiators like this, two people sitting across each other tables of, I want this, no, I want this, the adversary thing, guys, Christian told me. Imagine you're both sitting on the same side, the table, and you're looking at the other side of the table and there's the problem and you're both are looking at the problem and saying, oh, okay, so the problem is that you're looking for this and i'm looking for this and then there's the other thing we haven't discussed IT. How we how can we together figure out this problem and fundamental just taking a different taking that lens will allow you be more successfully negotiation.

let's say your negotiating something that I think is a uh, what I would call a non commoditized is hard to figure out the Price that unique property could be. Uh, how somewhere where there's not a hundred house on the streets that just something that unique heart to find comparable on whether will doesn't matter what IT is, the temptation is to go in as a buyer and say, well, no, it's got this wrong with IT. This is wrong with IT.

That's wrong with that. I'm not have to fix that. And it's like it's and to try to up, can I drive the buyers expectations down? That's actually not the update approach in in this situation, these kinds of situations.

And the reason is the via reaction most people have they're sitting on a unique property like that is oh like he does not actually understand the value he's poking IT holds all but he doesn't get the fact that this this, this and the other thing what I need to do is find someone that actually appreciate the value of this thing and then all do Better on the Price, right? And there's objective value because there's no compromises like no one really knows what the actual fair value now foot has had. Let's say, when the same property, this places fantastic.

I love IT. Let me tell you the things I love about IT. Let me tell you why I I am like all in love with this thing that you're selling right now and you go through that and he has the authentic husb genuine i'm not making this up um and and then I put my Price out there like you here's what IT is now the the sellar has to say, okay well and I really going to find like I don't know the Prices this person seems right to be good for.

He loves this place and I going to find someone else that loves IT more than dimensions loves IT. Probably not like he told he gets this thing, however. So maybe this Price is only what the fair Price should be, right? Like that.

You seem like a reasonable guy, so that, say, IT takes people's guards out. This only works, by the way, when you have what this kind of rare is hard to find come to whatever the Price is not really objectively no, it's hard to kind of trying lead to like a quote code through Price. Um anyway, that's my that's great. I want to go shing tip of the day. So okay.

great. And so you um you told me something when we were talking before about this first company and you said, OK, I did this company and actually maybe there's more. In the first, everybody told me something great that I want to bring up, which is then you did the second company and this is one that I don't know. It's on your link. Then you're like, this is my embarrassing company.

It's my things didn't go well and the story he told us, he was like I did the first company when I just didn't know I didn't know anything about anything some clues bubble law, which was making up as go super crappy and and IT kind of worked IT worked um then is like i'm to the second one but now I was smarter. Now I actually don't want to do have some experience. I'm going to things the right way this time.

I am going to go raise money. I'm to hire Better people. I am going to get a Better off and want to do this.

I'm going to do proper. And then I guess that that business, you can tell the story here, but I didn't work. But you said some great line, you go just because you just because I was ignorant doesn't mean I was wrong.

Meaning that first time I did that first business, I was ignorant. I didn't know anything, but I doesn't mean I was wrong. Can you can you impact that idea?

Let's say there's an objective truth function. I says, okay, this was in this particular situation the right decision to make and whatever situation you're in right now, that objective truth function, if we had run against all the decisions I made in that first start up, I think my hit rate was actually pretty high.

And the hit rate of lots of founders, because our natural instincts in that situation actually turned out to be good instincts like being like resourceful and not spending to cool or whatever, taking your time doing all the things that kind of came as natural instinct. And I was not a natural born entrepreneurs probably um likely why I have the insecurity. But in something like like a starter entrepreneurship, there's a bunch of decision you're going to make.

A lot of them made mayor may not be optimal, but what was definitely the optimal in was second guessing myself on the second ones. Like i'm going to do the opposite of what I did my first one because I like I got a champ. I was back then um so i'm going to go i'm going to speed run, i'm going to a cr, i'm going to to five hundred thousand dollars checked myself on day one, fund the thing whatever. Like like who has time? We don't have time to go through those kind of styles .

or whatever really quick. I I remember red a time in high school. I had this like hilbrun y friend that had like a huge chest because he was like so strong at bench pressing. And we went to like an exercise class.

And the teachers like the best way to get strong in your chest is to do incline bench press and a thirty degree angle, thirty degree angle, some other than a forty five degree, and something than a ten degree. In my red neck friend who didn't know anything, he just would go down in lively. He was like, I must have been doing about thirty degrees because I have strong a shit.

Like at the same thing, I do not matter. Like if you know what you're doing, you're not always in result. What was your? What was the second company? I had no idea that you had a failure on your bell.

Yeah, I love. Yeah, yes. Um I had. So IT was a kind of facebook before.

Facebook for small business. IT was effectively A C. R M. I've been working to C. R. M over a long, long time built for small businesses.

And this was right in like the two thousand time frame, so right as the bubble was bursting in. The first company was not an internet company. This was there was a web base uh information management tool for small business uh around customer.

I was .

called captiva A C A P T I V.

How much and how long did the last for you shared?

IT. So once again, because I was gonna things differently this time, I wrote the first five hundred thousand dollars check, and I kept writing checks. And like.

I have money. Why would I not like just one of myself and say, can you say how how how much you how much you have? How much of that did you put into the second one? Can you say that?

Um I think i've probably put in about two million. I say give a take.

I found A I google captiva dimension, and I found A P, D, F that has a lot of handwriting on IT and IT looks like it's a case study for slow and you're trying to make a point. And he said, in ninety ninety, I found of my second start up called captiva. This is what IT was.

I was in many aspects similar to salesforce com, and about two years in the product development, over a million dollars of capital invested, mostly of my own capture, could still not gain any significant traction. And ultimately, IT was solved the pro and I didn't work out. And so this is like the only thing that I can find about captiva on the internet is a case study that you help to write.

by the way. And it's like we sort of take you for granted currently, why? And it's not like not trying to hide things. Uh but the year that wasn't as a big a deal back then. So yeah I wasn't blog and was blogging so was like, okay, well, why would you just say things like where you going to say them to um but so what the kind of interesting things as far as kind of closing up that particular chapter, what ended up happening make my third sport sport reference. And this was a golf one has IT was a long cook to par.

Uh, what happened was I took that company, captiva, merged IT, into my first start up, which I had that sodium I was doing to um you start the same time, which is not something one should do um and then ended up selling the kind of merge entity. So I did not making my money back for intense of the purposes. I don't really lose anything but IT was a uh very, very long but to part I just um so the big idea .

so far were yeah um at the beginning you're going to trade time for money and then at some point in your life you're going to despite start trying to trade money back for time that's life I think that's that's a golden dog. The second one is cool. You can either get more hours or increase the the value of per hour.

And that's where you started taking budget and investing in books and training and seminar, whatever whatever you try to do to increase your own value. You get the job at U. S.

deal. That's where you realize you're either an asset or a liability to this company. You're either overhead or you're the one actually creating value.

If you want to be higher leverage, you've got ta be closer toward the actual value is created. So then you switch, you do a software company, you would do that of the lesson around negotiations. So go back and ask for more. And this would be not just ask for more, but what would you take for me to be making more is more, more like the question you ask .

your bosses that right the actual lesson um I I drew from that is the the power of being able to reduce frame something in a very simple like inarguable way right like the fact that he was so punchy, right? Like IT was just one sense. I don't need to find a bunch of companies.

I just need to find one. And I think I can, right? Had that been like a five minute long conversation, me going back and force or whatever, trying to make an argument, I don't think I would have work.

What made IT work was the fact. And this, I think, is a very, very, like anything else to say, developed skill. And you got, like, actually change. Are the master of this is being able to what I call like insight compression, right? And I just made that up but says, can you take some big idea and kind of boil IT down, boil IT down to like it's the essence of still captured and is just A S display lation, for lack of a Better term of that idea of that concept down to something really simple um because the simple you can make IT the more likely uh IT is to be transmissible, to be communicated to be whatever and this applies to the ity obviously apply to in a copy rating in marketing and things like that applies the venture pictures applies to so many things.

By the way, I think one good point to make in this is this isn't just a mindset you had when you were Young and broke, like you took my power writing course a few years ago, is I do this guys that you're a founder of a twenty thirty billion dollar public company.

He's sitting here in the course learning is saying, can I learn something about writing? Can I get a little bit Better at this one skill? You are still doing that now, not just when you're to twenty years old years ago. I'm beginning I get to like you start to level up IT seem like you continued doing IT a guy came on the podcast the day my positions of musical artist he talked about, yeah, had his first song go huge so he thought, oh, that's what I do.

I make songs they they blow up that's that's been I guess it's hard for the other real is not hard for me as the first song is like, you know whatever five times plant um the second song actually was still like double platform but felt like a huge failure. Third long single platform. He's like i'm going downhill and then the studio shelves them and for years they they it's too expensive for you would even produce the music.

So we're gonna keep you know you're on the shelf in the music industry as like what are you doing during that time? And I thought he would just say he was depressed eating cheetos on the couch is like A, I was depressed eating cheetos on the couch. And then I dusted off the cheater just for a minute.

Is that going? I enrolled in A A berkeley college for music and is like, I was learning to improve my singing. Is my ability to play instruments.

I couldn't play the guitar before that. So I learned to play the guitar. And is like, yeah, just figure. Okay, this period of my life, i'll just sharped up myself.

I become a Better artist and is like, I would go to these classes with a bunch of college kids. And here I am. You know, grammy award winning.

I've been on the charts. I've made millions of dollars as an artist, and there's Better singers in here than me. And he's like, IT was A A real mind fuck.

But what I took from the whole story was, and this kind of inspiring, like this guy use that time to sharpen his skills. I think a lot of adults just stop. I think they just that stuff you do when you're Young and you just don't need to invest in learning anymore after that.

Talking about the the power writing course that you have and then just cut writing in copywriting generally, is that the return on time for developing writing, I have not found the ceiling yet. H, is that IT is just so high, I cannot describe to people like if you could do nothing else that say you you had five hours to invest in the next month, or something like that, you could spend IT all learning how to write well and future, you will look back on those five hours.

And a boy, that was a great use of five hours, right? Or then out where the number is, because that's what I considered to be a just an amplifier of things, right? IT will make you a Better thinker, Better communicator, Better picture, Better sales person, Better everything we .

are talking about. Uh, being close to the action. I don't remember if you talked about this on the pod or or if you talk about just privately, but I had known that you bought chat dot com and we have known that you've been about agents.

I think last podcast we talked about vectors and things like that. I think we mentioned agents. And I think like that's like a big thing to you right now. And speaking of being closed, the action, you bought the same chat I come. I think you said on the podcast IT was something like ten million dollars or maybe said eight figures, I forget. And then IT comes out like two weeks ago that you sold the domain chat 点 com to OpenAI for around eight figures。 And I think I said I was like all we should add one thing.

we became on the pot, you had just bought IT and we were like what to do with that? You're like not super sure i'm going to try some things um but I just think it's a great omai and think it's a greater vest. And you just you had made a bet but you didn't have the it's not like you had IT all figured out and he was all the risk um I ray, that bet then now here's the update. What happened okay.

So a couple thing is just kind of so I I think the china when the pod was like within like seven two hours of when that kind of purchase that happened, so was just was just done. IT was not just told my I actually had a plan for I was going to build um a chat application on top of the GPT algorithm similar ChatGPT.

And this is and this is there have been two time actually a computer with open eye, which I don't advise anyone to ever do, is like clearly on the top of my list of people i'd ever want to compete with that is m altman just too smart and even a more rebellious capitalist than I am, actually, I mean, that most positive way. So my original thought was like, okay, they put the ChatGPT z out. There is a demo APP, right? It's like it's there to demonstrate the power of large language models and the underlying gp t algorithm.

But open the eyes is a platform company the only? And there been stories about these guys of thing, which is, oh, someone invents a cool y technology. Uh, I think, hey, people start that way.

They had some dream and transfer thing and they had an APP. This is, oh, here's our encysted technology. Demonstrate by me sending new money over a palm pilot or something like that. And then like, oh well, that in crop out, we don't care about we care about the actual .

transfer of part is he doing to companies and then something like do you just make things so show people what are working on yeah .

that's what in sam has and got on record and said that, right they had not expected IT to have goes like this is a way first kind of demonstrate the technology and can make IT accessible so people can try IT uh and so we sort to cut them off guard as well, right? Which is like this was not IT was expected to they get tens of millions IT was one hundred billion users within a couple of months.

But in the back of my head, i'm like, okay, well, that's great. But they're going to go back to being a platform company. But someone should actually create something that is that any user application that is on top of LLM like like GPT three of the time and then IT just still happens is what those are.

The verse for a configured itself and chat out outcome in a random uh event became available for self for the first time in like thirty years. I'd never been. Actually used before and i'm like, I I need to do this was like that was so that was kind of thing. Number one, I I could actually for that thing number to um kind of rationalization to myself is that I this is the cover charge to get into the I party uh that people will take me seriously like like no one really knew me in that space because I I am not from that world uh you know didn't go machine learning school is can for or something like that that sort of something I A heart to ignore that deep down inside and part market or right? I think it's this is a good story that it'll get people's attention.

Did they reach out to you the idea of acquiring IT? Or did you where you look at a conference with them in your legs? Hey, I have this thing if you want to like IT.

i'll tell you. okay. So and the draw line in terms of uh as a transaction beyond because my experience, I if I am a at library to share uh what happened post that a decision um less comfortable sharing so uh the way kind of came to be is that I was uh at a skoal event.

I think I actually talked about um this a untied and what things that sam announced at that event. A same old is there was this oh you know, uh catch GPT you guys no one. Yeah, it's awesome.

We're gonna like support um these plugins to ChatGPT because right now the limit ChatGPT you can access their party data works. They can do anything. It's got the data that it's got bason its training data um but it's like a snaps shot in time.

But these extensions will sort of amplify multiply of the capabilities of of ChatGPT and so that sorry, when the laws switch on off in my head i'm like crap oh but day I was to create the ChatGPT of ChatGPT you gonna this into the actual platform, natural and user and user APP. Is that what i'm like? Okay, if i'm not going to do something, I think that would be like unwise for me to keep that domain.

It's like, like and if I have plans to do something that I did not want, go to, I because is clear that this was going to be a big bet for them. I was trying IT about the hobby project, so I reach out the sample. I knew it's like the if you were like interested or like and there were other bitters, the do me at the time that I went for sale. And my third back of my motivation was I I had a suspicious of who some of the other players might be. I didn't want them to have to do that kind of .

competitivity to me. Did you sell IT for a process? Or it's just like like you like I think you've said on twitter, you sold that for shares of over that was IT like manal. Just give me to you for the cost in order to be able to invest in your company.

I thought that I did this, uh, cleverly, uh, what I made the an else that I had sold IT. Uh, I didn't share the details, but I, I, I provided A I GPT prompt that says, if you type this into chat PPT that says, oh, dh like to buy domain ames, but he usually does IT because he's got a project in mind. Dimension doesn't sell domain names at a loss because he didn't have to.

Darrah also isn't like profiting from his friends, and he considers, and he's known, stand for a while. So OpenAI did by tragedy. But these are the facts that you know and then it's like and then a prompt is if you had to guess, what do you think you the that doing so for because I D also disclosed I was a shareholder. Open the eye. This happened uh, a while ago.

And so like you want to a shareholder before that you weren't, yes, so but you would have loved to be an investor in an OpenAI. And this was like you said that the cover charge IT was the anti .

in order to get there. This was like even a even a Better party, right? This is the shareholder party. That's H I think .

based on all that, I think I put your prompt and I was like dh bought the domain for fifteen and half million dollars and now owns fifty and hf million dollars of OpenAIr s tock t hat t hat w as l ike t he t hat w as t he t he A I a nswer t o t hat y ou c ould l eave I T a t t hat.

yeah. Leave at that. yeah. What do do you have?

So once that I have .

to to share with you this is the a non humble utility part of IT, but there's a left in here. So there's a old us. Steve jobs closed around connecting dots. And the cook was something like, you can connect the dots looking forward. You can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to have faith, faith in something that the adults will connect at some point in your future, your stuff I trust your instincts uh and i've been a big believer in that even before um your jobs said those words which is now you sort of collect um you know what he calls dots and I really like the idea because I love graphs um those things that I love is like, okay, well, if I have made an inventory of all the dost i've collective through my life and and dogs can be people i've met, can be skills i've learned things, experienced lessons and then over time, if I had to go back and like write a history of my life and say, oh, well, this was kind of a weird dot at the time like I could never have guessed that had had been up for that dot this over here pie would never have happened, right?

Like you don't know in a parallel verse like what was actually going to take but I tell you for for a fact of the universe as IT exist right now would that have happened had that but here not not not been collected um but I had collected IT and so my big lesson here is that you have to spend a lot of your time and this is the same kind of lesson and just phrase differently around investing in those dots uh that may or may not make sense of the time that you're doing them a but they feel right. They feel like they could have something IT doesn't have to all be with the like diagonal in capitalist. Sometimes this just like I want to collect this stop because I love this. I believe that I have convict whatever IT is right it's like it's you um your time of the planet, your money, whatever is you're doing uh you should be able to collect those dots but if you can trust your instincts and so and not all that going to work out and this is the beauty uh of these kinds of things is that you don't need for all of the work. You need water to the work really well and that's IT like that's literally right.

So i'm obsessed with being transparent about money, particularly with ultra high network people. The reason being is that there is not a lot of information on this demographic. And so because I own hamp ton, which is a community for founders, I have access to thousands of Young and incredibly high network people with people worth hundreds, millions and sometimes billions of dollars inside of hampton.

And so every year we do this thing called the hamp ton wealth report, where we survey over a thousand entrepreneurs, and we asked them all types of information about their personal finances. We ask them about how they're investing their money, what their portfolio looks like. We ask them about their month spend habits.

We ask him how they've set up their estate, how much of money they're to lead a charity, how much money do they keep in cash, how much money they're paying themselves from their businesses. Basically, every question that you wanted ask a rich person. We and we do IT for you, and we do IT with hundreds and hundreds of people.

So if you want to check out, the report is called hanton welf report. Just got to join him to that com, click our menu and you're going to see a section called reports and you're going to see IT. All right, there is very easy. So again, it's called the hampton wealth report. Go to a join hampton dot com, click the menu, and then click the report button and let me know you think.

I ll use the sport to reference. In basketball, there is people who you say, have a nose for the ball. They just know where the ball is going to bounce.

They know where to be. The ball just sort, always end up in the head, end up in the right spot. You talk about your first job application was to Peter hot, you bad, you know, just moved to the country, everything.

But pretty quickly you found yourself in software development in the nineties, which is ugly, the best place to be then you, he said, in two thousand years, the web internet company, internet was the next best place to be after that. Then you create hub spot, which was a cloud SaaS company, which is arguably the next best place to be for that next decade. And now you just sold chat uh chat I com to OpenAI.

You launch a OpenAI and you are talking about A I agents. And I would say that seems like in this decade the best place to be. And so I view you as somebody who has a nose for the ball.

And what I mean by that is like the frontier that your interested seems to be, the frontier where all of the action in the value in the trillion dollar companies are going to get created, which means if the trillion dollar company ties are created, that means the tens of billions of dollar company is can be created, the billion dollar of the hundred million and the ten million dollars anties. Also, I just mean that s is the target rich environment. So I think that when you say this is the thing, are most interested in, we should pay attention. Tell us why agents of the .

thing we should pay attention bring you back to the kind of early thank you for the leading this that was great um is that you know we talk about you the audience making your first million or your next million if you're a further long in the in the journey is that is that make the first one is almost always hard subsequently and that's that's not counterintuitive at all um I will say this though is that never in my mind has been easier to get to that first million that is going to be here like as as we're living our our lives right now.

And in part of that um is what uh agents unlock. So let's talk about agents will talk about what they are, why, why such a massive opportunity and what you the audience should do about IT. okay.

So we'll take a uh, step back to last year. Last year was all about chat and like and everyone used ChatGPT. We all get IT. We type in a prom, something comes back awesome.

And that's what's A A very kind of interactive approach to the use of A I right like you type up, I goll give me a block poser to do this for you and IT comes back with the response and you may do to follow up, but it's especially this kind of back and forth interaction model um with with A I what asian saw. And as a result of that kind of interactive model that the test, the u sign A I generally more disco that is okay. Do this for me.

There's a single art of fact, produce a blog post, generate image, whatever happen to be what agents are, uh, can very simply are is A I software that can accomplish higher level goals requiring multiple tasks and be multiple steps. So it's not just a one shot. Give me a black post, comes back of the blog post.

I want you to do this thing and that thing may require ten steps. Each of those things, I, as we were just talking about earlier, you might need to functional, decompose everything in order accomplish that. Her go has to have memory, as do all these things in order dyp kind of make that possible. But that's what A A I agent is. And right now we're going to to talk about asia's as as the curtly stands.

Uh, my expectation is that agents are the new apps is is just software, right? So when mobile came along this time, there's an up for that is up like like not that far the distant future, like everything is going to be this could be hundreds of thousands, millions of agents, right? The same way that just lots of lots of apps out there.

Uh, so think about, uh, agent. If it's super to do that is like it's just an A I APP that happens to do really high order or can do higher als required mult multiple steps. So I think I think uh, without getting into a age and out A I too much, he is kind of my my view of the world in terms of how is going to shape out.

There's lots of debate going around. Uh oh in order for you to be in A I uh true A I agent has be autonomists. You can't have you know like you stop beyond the give IT a goal. I'm more pragmatic ics than that. I don't think that say, uh, a requirement in order for something to to be called in agent.

But he's important part is that so if you can pull out that thread, the way the world looks um soon is that we will have hybrid teams that consist of humans and consist of A I agents. And the easiest, simplest and therefore in my um to say this was some uh conviction because it's Better do IT that way. The easiest way to pull that off and the simplest way to describe IT is if you think of the digital agent as a digital team member, because that's the easiest way to get there from here, right? Like OK, you just stay obvious, head IT over the the ages going to create the like.

Just do all of the things get to humans. Yeah, that might happen someday, but why not gona happen as a direct job for where we are today was likely going to happen is individual task will get automated. And we will started rejecting a about having these hybrid the same way we had hybrid ves before we had out, like all full time employees go I to hire a free answer for three months to do this because we all need for for you did that is like, that's okay. They didn't work in the office that we had hybrid from a geographic perspective and that we're going to have hybrid .

d from a carbon barbon. It's like we've got guest coming over and now my wife decomposes that into, okay, we need to clean the kitchen. Um we need to clean this area and we need to get food.

Uh, we need to order food. And so he tells me low the dishwasher, I go load the dishwasher. Then I handed over to my agent, my dishwasher agent, who then will wash those dishes.

And so i'm kind of the, she's the C. D. Composes IT. I'm a human in the loop. I'm doing one step that hope ideally that we can have another robot that loads the this rover.

For now, I do that, but the dishwasher is Better to doing the dishes than I even was and will do IT well every single time. I trust that agent to do IT. That's what time the inside of companies .

is not going to look like. yes. And and might be that um I think we will have humans doing the review and approval for a vast majority of task, right? So I think the the the digital team members, for lack of a Better term, are going to be doing lower level test to start with exactly things we can trust them with this.

Like, okay, well, mistakes so much, much to lower. Like, okay, produce ten versions of this blog article is really like very important for my business. But then let me pick the one that's actually going to go out.

And then when I pick the one going to go out, I must step the process. The human do that. Then the post production maybe is all digital.

We don't know, right? Give this an example of an agent you're using that like you actually use now because on the basis of the basis actually be working.

not just simple example I have an agent that says I really like this epsom to say my first million um and I recall hearing something about x like some some words stuck into my mind um and I wanna a lincoln post based on that OK so here's but here's what I want to happen. I want to all i'm going to give IT as input the instructions kind of M P C all right. Like okay, here's what you get for me um is a youtube video.

What I want is an output is a lincoln post is going to do well by some definition of do well, uh, we have trading IT on that OK. What is going to do is going to say, okay, first. Step one, pull the transcribe from a youtube video.

Step two, figure who the players are. Step three, highlighting things are great, worthy tweet, worthy remark, worthy whatever IT was happy to be. That four, figure out what I hope the best was actually asking about.

That was a snipped in there that you made reference to. Clt that as well. Put that all into thing now you'll say, okay, like what style happens to work? Well linked m specifically. Oh, like you're write me a two hundred word prompt that describes the language in the style.

Where's the bullet points? Whether using the modus doesn't use them? Like what works? Have an agent that does that like a style creator thing, whatever, take all of that and now produce, uh, a linton post and and this .

divinity and so you do that. You have a thing .

that I have a thing that does that, by the way, the really fun part about this, it's like lego bricks, right? So I have an agent that does a youtube crisco pt rolta straight forward. But I say Better youtube transcript, the one that you would just get copy off the web because there's an L M N involves, like, I want a youtube score prank. Ript has chapter headings which not got in the transcript that's going to bold things that are actual is so ever it's GTA format IT in a way as human consumer. Wait Better transcript, the regular transcript, get out of youtube.

So like what check this out. How much have you seen this good to M F M volt dot com vote?

My my friend .

greg is built in this. And it's not it's not ready for, uh, you know, the big time. But here we are less. Let's do IT. So M F M volt, that com, you land here.

So what he built basically a site that kind of works like what you described just for specifically by first million podcasting fans. Okay, so he's like, right? He was like, I don't just want summaries.

I want is I like because got ideas, it's got frameworks, it's got stories. And those are like the big things that he really Carried about. So if I just go like first is got to take a bunch of and A I is basically extracting those from every episode.

It's like searching for frameworks, searching for stories and. But like you just show you this, I go to episodes will try this lives, see if this works and I type darmon and this is our last episode we did in twenty twenty three. So it's got the the the the overall summary would chat their titles like you said here, but checked this out.

So I go to stories, it's like chat pots of one dollar sale, uh, pandora of manual musicians. It's like the seventeen year evolution of chat. And if I click that, it'll take me to that moment.

But you also have summarized IT. There's also frameworks in here like an A I emerging week, basically. Uh, the idea here was how I dedicated a full week to just hands on experimenting with A I tools only. And so IT is extracting and categorizing and linking these ideas from the podcast this way. But to do IT, he's he's said he's strung together five agents.

There's listen for when there's a new episode says I found a new epo de pass IT to the transcriber transcriber like I scribed IT as to the summer and the extractor passes IT to those guys. There's a great turn that into clips passed into the clip guy, right? And each one of those is their own agent. And I think that that and then like you said, it's composer lego book block. So if I want to use a summarized for something else, well that once that age and exists, can semi ze anything not just .

have a yep that is the future shown so um so like a quick one sentence description, is the positioning test ted on on you guys as well? Is asian dot A I is the number one professional network or A I agents is also the only professional network for A I agent .

is linked for agents?

yes. And and so cus and the question is, is like why why do agents need their own profession network? right? That that's a uh, reasonable question ask. And the answer is, if we imagine that I happened to you, right, that we're going to have this hybrid world where we have both, uh, I teammates and carbon based life form teammates, well, how are you going to find those people, right? So we have fired for humans that we can sole, I need a logo create for whatever I I can go to up work.

I want to to hire someone for the next year, four months, to do whatever skills that are, whatever there needs to be equivalent of vat for A I agents, right? I don't know what's out there like I don't know and and the here where starts to get really kind of super cool. So imagine a professor network and IT has reading and reviews is got their experience like, oh, i'm an agent that does this.

I've been used forty thousand times. And here are the people that, like me, drama follows me. Isn't that I right? Like because humans can follow agents. Agents can follow other agents. And what's going to happen, uh, over time, is that agents will be able to hire other agents on the network because everyone knows what everyone else can do.

They can try other like o i've been given a budget of one hundred dollars to try five different ages to figure out which one is the best for my particular use case. And IT can go without human events and disco. Try as like network.

Like, look, yeah, i'll pay you this other agent. So over thirty years I built a lot of software that is what I call solo software, right? Like just like software are for me, for my public speaking cut L P M uh in the talk that kind of stuff. Um then I found that most of those things .

Better and ms, yeah minutes like IT yes.

I did not .

invent by terms stand of comedians use that that's around forever.

But yeah, I stole that from that that ny James, can I ask you a um I ask you a root question and then I ask you a thoughtful question, but I am sorry to read question. Good question is this do you a billionaire and you're super smart and you love all of this new tech? Like, why are you doing the elon thing elon's like, cool.

I did my zip too. I then I did pay pal, then I did tesla don't want space. I'm going to keep kind of building new companies, bigger battles. You've in have stuff for so long. You've been doing crm for like thirty years. I don't you feel like you want to just spread those wings, baby, and just fly and just go build your rockets and like what's your why are you do like a next grand act? Um that's my real question for you.

Yeah no it's it's not read at all and the s is actually quite simple uh and has the added value of being true is that this sort of is my next big act. So the the problem is, okay, so let's say you're playing a video game. Take a your video game of choice um and and you've kind of granit out.

You've built the things you've got the weapons you're you're there like you're now and kind of power more you can do. Now lets say out there something like that is I like my favorite ames. Um and now you can just go out expLoring and try things and do stuff because you've got all of that.

If you're gna play a new game, there's a bunch of stuff you still have even though because you have to sort of get right, you're going to have to build a team. I'd have to go find a cofounder. By the way, i've won the cofounder lottery, right, like I didn't like no one knew at the time, but that has a massive impact on your outcome.

Like there's so many things i'd have to get right just to be able to kona do the next thing. I think my odds are doing that like even something like agent that A I. My odds are hire lying that off with the infrastructure already have beneath me in the form of hub spot. And sometimes I have to skin the little in order, kind of squeak the thing and make IT fit in a hub spot shake box. And I have mechanisms for which I can do that but I don't feel like i've ever been um kept from doing the thing that would have been my big bold idea as a result of being uh A C T O IT helps but if if I have like if that we're the case yes, I would go like, you know what it's great ride uh yeah wish the company well and will continue be a as earlier .

but I don't I don't accept your .

answer but IT why don't you .

you .

well let's break IT down that he's logical guy. Let's break IT. So let's say he has has things he's excited about new technologies and new ideas, just potential potential to create goal ship in the world, right?

So there's two ways of looking at this either hub spot um how is the best place to do that, which I would just view like not nothing the infrastructure just think like the company have spot, which is a specific mission and set of customers that needs to serve and like an existing business model and all the things like the odds that you are created brain would that's won't an idea that also was like should be on have such that just seems like unlikely to me or just like an unnecessary MIT that I wouldn't put on? okay. So then they say there is an idea that you you get excited about your version of space sex or whatever is you're neural link whatever ideas either.

Well, hub sets not limiting me and i'm getting these benefits. Okay, call, there's that trade. So it's kind of like what would you gain if you actually were out on your own? You would like there's like all these things, like when people have their job and they try to a so there is one great thing when you go and you quit your job to do a start up with that. You've now quit your job to do a startup.

You've now told the world, you told yourself, you told everybody that, like, i'm going to make a thing because I just gave up a thing, and that means I got to have a new thing now. And I think that they burn the boats. Thing is, I probably one of the only assets or advantages are start up in general haz or entrepreneur haz is that they they just go all in on something.

They don't have any meetings about anything else. There are no distractions. And theyve told the world, i'm gonna a do this. And I think there's something very powerful about that.

And I think the if I really wanted to turn the knob and be like, what would be the by the way, you don't have to do this and I think one needs to do this in life. But it's like, let me see what I can. Let me see how fast this car can go.

Let me see what i'm capable. love. I just view that you are more likely to see the highest potential version of you outside of hubs. T versus doing side projects while using household and then doing talking IT in bound and then taking these meetings and gotta the the unblended version, the concentrate version had to be more poor than the blended version.

That's my case. Shod tried to convert a billionaire of a finder of a thirty five billion dog company.

What you, the ant, telling the elephant how how you to click .

your job and actually do something with your life and going on .

side project 要不然 thank you as a compliment。

That means I view you as A U on level character you know.

very hype. Thank you. Um i'll say this.

I think it's, uh, miss you said I am a big, big believer um in kind of taking that leap of faith right um and and going out and doing the thing and that's great and say it's kind of sound defensive IT as I don't mean IT to be um but like as I kind of write the next chapters of my life as i'm looking out, like one of the questions i've asked myself is like, okay, like what does success look like, right? Like, okay, so like what do I want? I want to reflect back on of the things that I did, right? It's and a couple of things are going to emerge from that reflection is I like to build things.

And like that is like the truest thing that there is a i'd like to build things, right. And so one thing i've kind of managed to do, which doesn't happen often, so I don't have any direct reports because I would keep me from building things right. I if ever there was a time I was like out, like I can no longer build things as a result of x, whatever acts happens to be, I will break down that well whatever is obscured or otherwise that's in one thing um and I I will say this I think I think your points really well taken, which is most of the time.

We can have kind of actually impose rules on us. For instance, if you're an engineer as like, well, you're C T O. You shouldn't writing code anymore. Like and I know I do not uh accept that thesis because h software is a creative discipline, is a very hit driven business. You have to be right a very few number of times is like we don't tell musician that's really, really good.

You can just stop like writing music and doing music and go hier something we don't tell except al writers to stop writing and imagine team of writers like keep writing like the others and do your best to minimize the stuff that's not writing time. And that's what I feel like. I'm doing a maxims ing my bill time up and to me and my personal mission statement is to help millions grow Better.

But that's the simple that I won't be able look back on IT. And then I had a positive impact on the most number of people like that, that both play us like example of impact, where that impact is on why number of people. That's my choose function.

And this is why don't do one on one meeting because that doesn't scale, right? This is one. The reason i'm here and not elsewhere is not just because I like you guys, it's because I can have an impact.

And the reason I chose the topic like this, what I want to talk with, ah yeah, what's the best way for me to use this time that if I look back on or the people they are spending an hour and a half h yeah listening to this, like was that a good use of my time to actually did darmon deliver on the promise of at least margin increased me my probability of making my first year next million? right? That's you.

You do this a lot. You like are telling a story and you have like these little like bits that are like wildly fascinating. One of them being that you have like a personal mission, do you have personal values like a company? Does that you you in your family or just you Operate against?

We've talked about that. We haven't done IT. We have um so the the hub spot values are effectively the founders values, right? That's where the original kind of company values came from and there and most companies are actually a reflection of their .

founders um what what is the most controversial or value that has the big gest trade off? Like not everybody would choose this, but we choose this. What is that for you guys like not like integrity or you like whatever things like that?

Yeah one of one that uh almost didn't make the cut, uh, not because we don't agree with the value, but there are others, is humility like commonness right? And like the common argument that comes back is like we're supposed be a winning team or aggressive, which we are right. And so people often confuse humility with a lack of confidence or a lack of aggression, assertive, miss, or all these things that's not in at all right. The human is being self where is being able to recognize and nothing and know I was like, i'm here to learn having that um uh and and that is a large part of what drives housewife so I kind of I bought for that value for a long, long time. The second most controversial one is empathy, which is our second value, and that I didn't always used to be apathy.

We changed along the way.

And what's values on the yeah the question is asking this is like I been like, think about like, do I have values? Like what are my values? Like it's kind of cook is .

a danna value or a jack is .

going to like to fy IT um but no, like we don't well, like we kind of have values like we say we ve had people on the pod who I have done like bad stuff and you and they're like are you going to like specify me like like our defauts is not to like criticize. It's like to build people up but sometimes that might help but anyway we like so we have a couple, but it's interesting to kind of explicitly save. These are the values of X, Y, Z.

And Marks that I I read this good thing about him, maybe even tell me in the potion where he was like, a value means you have to sacrifice something. So move fast and break things means we are going to move fast. And because of that, I am OK with breaking stuff. Uh, like like too many people. Their values are things that are just obvious that don't well involve a sacrifice.

There are a lot. And by the way, there there's not many of these. So for example, move reservation things, I think is the pantheon, the hall fame of, like our values. Another one is like great dale's bridge water thing they have like radical onest Y A radical canter, which is like we are going to uncomfortable ly be honest with each other. And we just think that, that maximizes in the long run. But in the short run, this is not to be like anywhere else you work because we take that, we take that series, we take the trade off, which is discomfort for the upside of being radically honest.

I think what did I have just because jump to me and I think it's it's it's a useful thing so we talk about maxi zing, right? And that's uh I I love that word and maybe you likely heard of this a notion like finding the maximum um and then the the trap that people fall into spending the local maximum versus the global maximum just from a lay persons perspective is like imagine that you're looking at a graph like a Normal imagine a belk of for those listening like there's a point at which that values is higher, right?

Pop of the hills l to speak on in mathematical terms, the kind of local versus global max a is like, okay, well, that's the highest point, but lets you to zoom out on that same graph and then there's other belk right next to IT, which is an even higher maximum, is like, okay, well, if you were just filling based on that good that you are looking at because you were zoom in, you didn't actually find a maxim. You ve found the local maxim, not the global maxim. That's the and so here's the so that won that part of is obvious and non obvious part, uh, is that often in order to even see the global maximum, you actually have to climb the local maximum hill IT caped abstracts that all the sidelines as ago.

I'm going to go wander around yeah what you have to do sometimes you have make the effort to climb the small er hill you get to the top smelt like, oh, now I see the landscape and there's that massive mount over there which is the thing time actually meant to go due right? And so part of them this goes back to the kind of connecting dots thesis as well. Like sometimes you have to do the thing that does that seem like the big bet in order to have the perspective to see what the big, big best going to beat, right?

If you ve heard this concept of race, like instead of sas .

company's rest put that on there. And I was like, is that like a different word? Like rice.

But is I was like, this is like rass is is you going to make fun of? Is rass me like you're going to make one of me? Like i'm going to ask you.

no, this is a big idea. Dr, you others .

we all know, which is software as a service um and we contrast soft a service to software as I used to exist back like back in my day. I can say that now and back my day, software was shipped in boxes on cds and things like that and you kind of put them into your computer and load of the software up um to do whatever you want to do and so after the service was, oh, you don't actually buy the box. You don't buy the C D, whatever. We just the value of the software to you as a service over over the interact, over the cloud results as a service is like actually you do to access the software, you tell us what IT is that you actually want to do. What's the outcome that you're looking for and want to tell .

you that you want to link in love post at the end, a good example .

would be like o uh, I could tell you like legal software to go to allies a contract in the real state space that will give you commentary on whether this matches benchMarks or even in the VC world, uh, a cherrie or something like that so I got your soft that will help you like power, right? Uh, a real star track and the it's like hub spot.

Here's software that you can write blog posts to capture emails and get more customers.

yes, but this thing is like, okay, well, what if you could just give the intermediate steps like, oh, you run more customers, what are you went to pay for customers? And this this idea is almost as all this time, right, which is because we've had in that particular example, we've had legion companies forever, right, which is effectively results as a service like don't worry about phone numbers. Don't worry about this thing called the interact K S X mart dollars every time your photo .

ings well and it's also a sales technique which is like, do you want guest to feel great at your home and to be popular? Okay, buy your vacuum to keep your carpet clean.

Yes, that's exactly t yes, we've had that. The copy is that people t don't want drills. They want holes right like the drill, the tool holds the actual outcome desired. So that is kind of the next uh kind of wave of software, which there will still be software being used uh, by whoever is providing the results of the service. Ah that's how the thing is accomplished.

But the way that might be packaged and sold um you know my end of big rza what they are a discuses out on the uh on the asian fruit this is to call the action so um I forget the name of the guide that built the element involved. great. Yeah great.

okay. So what greg did in ms like sequencing these things together, right? So he effectively built an agent, right? But he has multi steps. Uh, each individual steps make all the other IOS. Uh, age of that. A I not only is a uh professor network for distributing agents and finding agent, discovering agents, reviewing and rating agents and tokyo agents, IT also has was called agent builder, which is a platform for building agents without writing code. You've had a .

good quarter. A have spent stock I think almost hit all time high. You sold the business or you sold the domain to OpenAI .

came on the podcast.

You came on the pod.

You know, I don't I don't care what .

they say about you.

Don't mesure do okay. I do okay. OK.

thank you. I don't know what they say. You're alright.

What I love about you, you have a bunch of things that sound like paradoxes, like you're extreme, gentle and kind. You're also like, I would say, competitive and aggressive in in, in other ways. I think you are humble, but then you're also a marketer and you're like I could see the marketing value of this and the the practical value of this, but I also you know i'd rather be you know quite low key. I don't need to brag. And so you have all these like contradictory things that makes you interesting.

by the way, is this you said there's you go as soon I get on a leader board, I want to be .

number one yeah I .

don't want to be .

board is a more like I would like to be richer because I would be like like I think you you might try to be cool, be like, no, i'm happy but like I think with every level you are on, whether you are with one billion, you want to get ten, whether you have ten, you to get baby. Just like no matter how rip do you get, you want to a little bit more rip like um is is how .

much of a .

motivator is like, you know, IT says one on forms. Now how do I make IT at ten ten billion?

Yeah, yes. yeah. Well, it's it's a really good question. I tend not to have explicit goals. A goals setting is not something and i'm not discounting IT. I'm not um disparaging IT at all.

And the smart people um you have have those kind of like really concrete things that are shooting for. I thought that I don't do IT now I never really did that right. Like, okay, I want to get Better.

I want you. I want to have money. I want to be able to have freedom, make choices. I want to have the things that in this, i've said this a in the before, i'd like to configure the universe to my liking, to the best of my ability and whatever resources I can have a crew to help make that possible.

I I will go try to find a way to make that possible right that's um but like so like deep down inside my soul and I have a math and physics sky that's not all enough to be a math and physics sky right and in my truth function is like I said before, it's like okay, i'm trying to create them and based on a mission statement POS impact for the most number of people like multiple I X py y. And the marketing is part of that as I OK well, i'm not going to be able to impact people, uh, if i'm not doing some marketing is, like I can say, the most brilliant in the world. If only seventeen people look at them in the value of x seventeen for that particular unit of unit of work.

And that's just not how I Operate. I will make sacrifice is and other funds in order to solve the truth, like truth function to solve the mission. Uh for me personally that to that was the the baLance there. We talked about .

a bunch of stuff. You had opening reMarks. Do you have a closing remark is is there a way you want to end IT? Did you achieve your mission of of saying what you thought would help somebody increase their odds?

Uh, my ask my favor is a leave a comment and let me know what you thought. That's what what he keeps. Cn, that's the little boy i'm after right now. He is like, I number five on the youtube. I know comments and engagement actually help the outer them probably more than lights do, by the way.

for the record so man preciate to do in this I have a note here um where I take notes and I going to turn IT I don't want people to see IT but um I have filled three pages of notes um so you're the man is .

all you beyond thanks for having me thanks for indulging my indulging my .

quick great man you're fun. Hang out with you were found to hang out with you're fun to talk to I feel energized .

when I talk to appreciate you that's a pod.

I feel like.

All less travel, never looking back.

Hey, show. Here are quick break to tell you an evolution stories. He started twitter, and before that, he sold the company to google four hundred million dollars.

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