🥐 Create your version of the cronut
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What you need to know
🥐 Create your version of the cronut
⚡️ Unlock the electricity of sight
🎯 How a billionaire frames his bets
🪩 Rethink industries stuck in the 80s
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The cronut framework
My First Million: Work Like Ocean's 11, Sam Bankman Fried, and the Deepfake Dilemma on Apple Pod...
4 min read vs 1 hour 7 mins listening
The whole is greater than the sum of its parts. In the case of the cronut, there are only two parts - croissant and donut - but the rule still applies. The cronut became a social media sensation when it debuted in 2013. Why? Because it combined two of New York’s favourite pastries.
Shaan shares how My First Million uses the cronut framework to differentiate from other business podcasts, and then reveals a startup that’s solving the future of work by combining freelancers and full stack agencies. Call it the lovechild of Fiverr and Ogilvy. Let’s dive in.
What they say
Shaan opens with the cronut framework
I’m really obsessed with the idea of combining two things that are usually not combined. You don’t have to be great at either one of the things because you’ve created a whole new combination.
This happens in food all the time. Purple ketchup. Dorito tacos. It’s not that it’s better, it’s just so different.
It’s like this podcast: Are we the richest? No. Are we the smartest? No. Are we the best prepared? No. Do we have the best insights and research? Absolutely not. Are we the funniest? No. But we have the right combination of ‘We’re having a good time, we make ourselves laugh, and make you laugh.’ It’s just enough business and just enough make you laugh.
I’m pretty interested in this idea of stacking unique skills. You don’t have to be the best at either, you just have to be dangerous enough at both, but if you combine them you’ll be completely differentiated in your market.
Shaan Puri
He then talks about the future of work
Have you seen this business called A Team? The letter a.team is their website. They’ve just raised $60M.
I once heard Naval on a podcast talking about the future of work. Naval’s thing is ‘I think the future of work is like Ocean’s 11’.
He goes ‘You’re going to have your crew the same way that Ocean’s 11 is this badass team. You’ve got the pick pocket guy, you’ve got the comms guy, you have the planner, you have the guy who can gather intel.
You’re just going to get a message that says: All right guys, round up, we’ve got a mission to go on.
For work it’s going to be like ‘Here’s this brand that are killing it in the US and they’re trying to expand into India.’
You might be the Ocean’s 11 team that continuously gets called on to take a brand and expand them into India. You come as a group who’s good at accomplishing certain types of missions.
You won’t just have one team, you’ll probably float around with a couple of teams. You sprint, you crush it, then you relax until the next mission.
You get reputation that’s built not on a resume but through verified ratings. You may or may not even know the identities of the other people. You could be like ‘My nickname is Starwing.’ That’s the future of work.
A Team is an idea of that. You want to build an e-commerce website? We have the designer, the developer and conversion optimiser who will swoop in and do it for you in 2 weeks.
Shaan Puri
What I say
Why it matters: A Team and the cronut are great examples of combining two things to make a killer product. A Team combines Ogilvy standards with Fiverr affordability to give businesses a middle ground option for outsourcing large projects. You may want to try this out rather than hiring more FTEs in the current climate. I’ve not tired it myself so let me know how you get on if you use it!
Between the lines: The cronut framework can be used as a lens to build new businesses. A few examples:
Shipping Container + Pool = Modpools
Wordpress + NoCode = Softr
MailChimp + Referral Program = Beehiiv
Blinkist + Podcasts = Podup
Paint a picture with your words
Brains: Writing Nonfiction with Wait But Why and David Perell on Apple Podcasts
Show Brains, Ep Writing Nonfiction with Wait But Why and David Perell - 5 Apr 2022
4 min read vs 29 mins listening
This episode was my version of ASMR. As I listened, a cloud enshrouded my brain. A cloud so thick that jolts of lighting jumped out, sending hair-raising sensations down the back of my neck.
Ok, I massively over exaggerated here. But, you get the point - this was a damn good episode. My attempt at descriptive imagery is a precursor to the importance of visual storytelling.
What they say
The personal blogging renaissance
I think you write a personal blog to think better and to meet great people.
The written word forces you to not lie to yourself, compared to other platforms, and it also forces you to think very rigorously about things.
When you write on the internet, you realise your personal obsessions that are super niche [are shared by others].
When you’re hanging out with normal people, they’re like ‘Shut-up dude, we don’t want to hear about this anymore, you talk about this all the time.’
Somehow on the internet, once you put these things out there, you now have this abundance of people who want to talk about those things.
David Perell
How to make your writing memorable
The best advice I got on this was from Boris Johnson of all people. He talks about a lot of the famous speeches going back to Churchill.
[Boris] quotes [Churchill]: ‘We shall fight on the beaches. We shall fight on the landing grounds. We shall fight in the fields and in the streets.’
[Boris] says: 'What’s the lesson, why is that line so famous? You should talk about real things in the world and make your writing vivid and make people see.'
How do you make people see what it is that you’re saying? You do this with metaphors, you do it with analogies.
That’s why these famous speeches are talking about things so often that are concrete and tactile. It’s easy for people to then go from an abstract word on a page to recreate that image in their mind.
David Perell
What I say
Why it matters: Writing is the most powerful medium for clarity of thought. One of the most famous examples of this is Amazon’s 6-page memo. Rather than presentations, Amazon encourages 6-page memos to be written and shared at the start of meetings. Employees independently read the memo, make notes, and prepare questions before using the later 2/3 of the meeting to critique, discuss and align. Here are a few fun tidbits you may not be aware of:
Amazon memos are to be written so that people unfamiliar with the subject can still understand what’s going on without additional research.
The best memos often take weeks to write, with multiple revisions, and have already been reviewed by key stakeholders before the meeting.
Memos do not include bullet point lists, images, or charts. Any data or visuals can only be included in the appendix to maintain a clear, written narrative.
Memo structure: Introduction, Goals, Tenets, State of Business, Lessons Learned, Strategic Priorities (includes the plan and how to execute).
Between the lines: Regardless of the medium, you should always aim to get your audience to paint a picture of what you’re saying in their own head. For your next presentation, try making the majority of your slides with a single heading and large image. For your next memo or meeting agenda, try writing a vivid description of the problem at hand. You’ll find it easier to persuade your audience to adopt your point of view if they can visually see the problem you’re trying to solve for.
Should you follow advice from billionaires?
What's Your Problem?: Sam Bankman-Fried Wants to Save the World on Apple Podcasts
Show What's Your Problem?, Ep Sam Bankman-Fried Wants to Save the World - 23 May 2022
4 min read vs 24 mins listening
What do Brian Armstrong, Changpeng Zhao, and Sam Bankman-Fried all have in common? They’re the wealthiest crypto billionaires (excluding Satoshi Nakamoto) and founders of the three biggest crypto exchanges, Coinbase, Binance and FTX.
At 30 years old, Sam is a generational prodigy. He talks to Jacob Goldstein about expected value, his framework for starting new projects. He did this all while playing a video game at the same time - who said multi-tasking isn’t a thing?!
What they say
Jacob introduces expected value
I want to take a minute to set up this one big idea. This really useful intellectual framework which drives almost everything Sam does. It’s called expected value.
When [Sam] thought about starting FTX, he knew there was a really good chance it might fail. It might ultimately be worth zero. But, on the other hand, if it succeeded it could be worth $10B+.
Here’s a slightly oversimplified version of how you would use expected value in this case. Say Sam thought there was only a 1% chance that his exchange would be really successful, but if it were really successful it would make him $20B. The expected value of starting the exchange is the probability of it being successful, 1%, multiplied by the value of that success if it happens, $20B. Which comes out to $200M. So, in 2019, Sam started FTX.
Jacob Goldstein
Sam shares his view on expected value
One of the takeaways of thinking hard and critically about expected values is that going big is often the right thing to do.
If you really care linearly about money, then it should lead you to think that the best outcomes might be outcomes that have a 99% chance of failure.
You should really stress test this and think ‘Do I really believe this? Do I really actually think that there is compelling evidence that these numbers that I’m looking at are as big as I’m claiming they are, or am I bullshitting myself on this?’ You should absolutely have some humility around that.
Sam Bankman-Fried
What I say
Why it matters: Expected value is a good framework if you’re confident of the possible outcome and probability of success. I’d suggest using this framework with a grain of salt. Life isn’t often black and white, so expected value can be very misleading if you’re not working with concrete assumptions. Sam is a bit of a genius so this method works for him, but most of us don’t have the luxury of a brain as powerful as a supercomputer.
Between the lines: One more reason to avoid using a billionaire’s framework for success - misaligned goals. It’s very unlikely that you’re reading this and have aspirations to become a billionaire. Sure, you’d like to be rich. But, you don’t make every decision based on this.
Sam, on the other hand, practices effective altruism. You can think of this philosophy as ‘earning to give’. You maximise your income in order to maximise the impact you can have on the world. Expected values is great for Sam, but often a small outcome with medium probability of success can make a bigger difference to your life than an enormous outcome with a tiny probability of success.
TL;DR - don’t copy billionaires!
Make baseball great again
My First Million: "The Real Life Ted Lasso," Martin Shkreli, Liver King, and Other Cult Leaders ...
3 min read vs 1 hour and 11 mins listening
Pretend you own a baseball team in Savannah, Georgia. What would you call it? Jesse Cole was in that exact position six years ago. He called his team the Savannah Bananas. This is a playbook for turning an antiquated industry upside down by creating a truly wonderful customer experience.
What they say
Sam sets the scene
The best way I can describe this thing is it’s like Harlem Globetrotters but for baseball.
Savannah Georgia had a minor league baseball team, they gave it to this guy Jesse Cole.
They give him this stadium and it’s completely empty and he’s like ‘How do I get people to come? Alright, screw it. We’re going to do one thing which is make baseball fun’.
They have normal games in the league where they’re trying to win, but even at those games when the umpire goes down to sweep the batters box, he drops down low and they play Get Low by Lil Jon and it’s just hilarious stuff.
Sam Parr
Shaan shares the details
They do trick plays. They have choreographed dances that the players do in between innings. Instead of a hot dance team they have a grandmothers dance team, so all the dancers are really old and move really slow.
He’s like ‘I read every Walt Disney book for inspiration and I realised it’s not about baseball, it’s about entertainment. We’re here to create the most fun environment where people feel like they belong.’
He’s like: ‘What are the things that I hate about a baseball game? I’m going to do the exact opposite. I hate that buying a beer is $14. You feel like you’re getting gauged.’
So they switched their ticket prices to be all inconclusive, so you buy a ticket and get unlimited food and drink.
Baseball’s really slow, so it’s a 2 hour limit to these games. There’s no bunts. They did all these things to speed up the game and make it more fun and entertaining.
I love that they don’t take this too seriously and boring, it’s so counter to everything else you see in sports.
This is a level 2 opportunity but done with a level 14 execution. This is the best execution of a pretty crappy, capped opportunity.
Shaan Puri
What I say
Why it matters: Most companies say they care about their customers. Few go above and beyond to delight them. Regardless of industry, you can win by offering an 11 star experience. Doing so becomes that much easier in an industry (like baseball) where your competitor’s service is poor.
Between the lines: The easiest place to find poor customer experience is regulated industries. Governments can make it overly complex to operate, so there’s often less incentive for companies to offer an 11 star experience (think banking, telecom, utilities, and healthcare).
Another way to find businesses ripe for disruption is to find those with awful cancellation policies. If you have to write a letter to cancel your subscription, I’d bet my bottom dollar customers hate the service and would leave in a heartbeat. Aggressive or misleading billing practices guarantee a low NPS. And low NPS means an opportunity to disrupt.