Tools for progress #53
Thoughts on thinking, Why it’s so hard to scale new materials, Good struggle vs bad struggle
We (humans) read hundreds of articles on company building, angel investing, and self-management and curate the best ones into a weekly summary—helping founders and operators stay on the top of their game.
Better thinking
Thoughts on thinking (3 minute read)
A writer discovers that using AI to develop ideas has killed their creativity. While they know more facts than ever, they feel intellectually duller because AI robs them of the messy mental work that actually builds thinking skills and generates real insights. Sometimes it feels good to spar ideas with AI, but are we actually undermining our ability to think?
Why 99% of AI startups will be dead by 2026 (14 minute read)
A breakdown of the “wrapper economy.” Most “AI-powered” startups are just expensive interfaces built on OpenAI’s API that anyone could replicate for pennies. And they sit atop a house of cards, NVIDIA makes the chips, Microsoft provides the infrastructure, and OpenAI supplies the brains. The wrappers have no moats, and they’re easily replicated. Soon enough, companies will be building their own wrappers (they already are). The only antidote is having deeply embedded workflows, which is likely the product of being a highly useful SaaS before you integrate AI. “AI-native” is a spoof.
I want to do everything, so I do nothing (4 minute read)
Getting side-tracked by something more appealing and delaying an important task? With endless possibilities to choose from at any moment like learning a new language or picking up a new skill, it’s easy to become overwhelmed. Forget about the task that you promised you would complete - your innate desire to do everything means you do nothing. With no constraints, you never see anything through and go from one thing to another. If you find yourself in such a position, allow yourself to be a beginner at something. Try different things, just not at the same time.
Operational tactics
The bar today for a Series B (4 minute read)
Looking at data from over 10,000 startups, it’s clear the Series B game has changed. Most companies now need 2-3 years after Series A to level up, with nearly half making it by year 4. The bar’s definitely higher - SaaS companies now need $4-8M in ARR instead of the old $2-4M, plus you’ve got to show you’re not burning cash like it’s 2021.
AI is kicking off the next revolution of B2B PLG (3 minute read)
AI tools like Lovable are upending product-led growth (PLG) motions and this shift is bigger than the move from on-prem to cloud or the rise of PLG itself. We have officially entered an age which is changing both how software is developed and who builds it. You don’t have to be technical to build something from scratch, raise a round to ship a product, or wait for a roadmap update to solve your own workflow. What this means in practice is that anyone can think and act like a product manager.
How Revolut trains world-class product managers (70 minute listen)
Dmitry Zlokazov is the head of product at Revolut, the $45 billion fintech giant operating in over 50 countries, serving more than 50 million customers, and producing some of the world’s top product leaders. Dmitry shares his hard-won lessons, contrarian org design principles, and day-to-day practices that power Revolut’s relentless shipping velocity, culture of ownership, and unparalleled ‘wow’ product experience.
Refer and we’ll send you our favorite books as a “thank you” for spreading the word.
Angel investing
A list of angels in Perplexity’s first round (1 minute read)
What’s wild is that we’re often told that angel investing is a numbers game. You need to adequately diversify into 30/40/50+ companies before you start to see returns. Did these investors just get lucky? The majority have <10 investments, with >2 exits already - one of which is Perplexity. Positioning seems to matter more than diversification.
Why it’s so hard to scale new materials (16 minute read)
Nodes is quite excited by materials as a venture opportunity. It’s easy to love the material, hard to see how it goes mainstream. Discoveries in materials science rarely make it to market. The core issue is a broken system where academic researchers focus on novelty over real-world viability. Meanwhile, the massive costs of scaling production create situations where promising materials can’t find markets to justify the investment needed to make them affordable.
Biotech companies I wish existed (4 minute read)
Elad Gil’s bat-signal for increased biotech activity in important and commercially viable pre-existing biology areas ranging from fertility to longevity that can be translated into real world applications but continue to be ignored by the biopharma industrial complex.
Managing your career
Using custom GPTs to become a better manager (36 minute watch)
Hilary Gridley, Head of Core Product at Whoop, shares how she uses dozens of custom GPTs for her team that think and give feedback like her, allowing her to scale herself up and create time for higher-value work.
Exceptional leadership: some qualities, behaviors, and styles (4 minute read)
Exceptional leaders have the foresight to predict changing currents, ability to execute at the highest level, and put their customer and people above their personal ambitions. They’re not afraid to remove obstacles such as politics, unnecessary bureaucracy, confusion, etc. and more often than not, they know when to get out of the way. These exceptional leaders can exhibit different leadership styles like ‘the commando’ who excels in ambiguous, high-risk environments or ‘the soldier’ who can lead teams through rapid growth and scaling. Ultimately, leaders have the self-awareness to recognize their superpowers and growth areas, and the humility to get help from others who complement them.
Good struggle vs bad struggle (2 minute read)
Ambitious people often reframe anxiety as excitement, but sometimes anxiety is just anxiety. The key is distinguishing good struggles from bad ones. Good struggles involve the messiness of developing skills and conviction, this can't be outsourced. Bad struggles are circular thinking and trying to change incompatible people. These just drain you without progress. Develop self-awareness to know when to push through versus when to pivot.