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Jack Butcher

20 Jan, 8 tweets, 3 min read

"Finding your passion" will have you going in circles.

Finding a problem you're passionate about solving will give you direction.

@austin_rief

Credit to @austin_rief for sparking this thought:

https://twitter.com/austin_rief/status/1351271066845519875

Ironically, what you despise the most will probably do a better job of locating something within you that you can turn into something useful than what you love.

I don't love graphic design, I hate nonsensical jargon, and the barriers that poor communication creates around good information.

There is more opportunity in identifying what you hate than what you love.

If you love it, chances are, others do — and if you hate it, chances are, others do.

If everyone loves it = huge competition.
If everyone hates it = huge opportunity.

@tomosman

Another real example, I just hired @tomosman because I hate the state of the back-end of our business.

I don't think Tom woke up one day and decided he was passionate about 45 part software automations, more likely he got frustrated and learned how to fix the problem himself.

@austin_rief

Are @austin_rief and @businessbarista passionate about writing emails?

Probably not.

Did they think the state of business media was absolutely dire and uninspiring? Probably.

@APompliano

Does @APompliano recite the bitcoin whitepaper to himself every night?

Probably not.

Does he think the global financial system is built on dodgy incentives could use an overhaul? Probably.

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More from @jackbutcher

Jack Butcher

@jackbutcher

19 Jan

Automate or die:

↓

The bigger our business grows, the less time we can spend on the things that made our business grow in the first place.

More and more time is spent sending emails and scrolling through spreadsheets instead of working on product.

Fortunately, the most time consuming "commodity tasks" can be automated: billing, enrollment, documentation, content scheduling etc.

Read 7 tweets

Jack Butcher

@jackbutcher

9 Jan

@SahilBloom

Circle of Competence 101:

@SahilBloom x @jackbutcher

↓

1/

A Circle of Competence is the set of topic areas that align with a person's expertise.

If the entire world of information were to be expressed in a circle, an individual's Circle of Competence is the small sub-circle that represents their expertise.

2/

The idea surfaced in the 1996 BH annual letter.

"You don’t have to be an expert on every company...you only have to be able to evaluate companies within your circle of competence. The size of that circle is not very important; knowing its boundaries, however, is vital."

Read 14 tweets

Jack Butcher

@jackbutcher

7 Jan

Building Principles:

↓

1/

Value = doing things that other people don't do, won't do or can't do.

"You get paid in direct proportion to the difficulty of problems you solve" — Elon Musk

2/

Service is high-touch result generation (building experience), product is low-touch result generation (scaling experience).

Read 9 tweets

Jack Butcher

@jackbutcher

4 Jan

Skill is the safest hedge.

↓

Speculation is exhilarating, skill building is not.

Building a skill is time-intensive, with slow feedback loops that pay dividends months/years/decades in the future.

As platforms gamify absolutely everything, it's hard to not feel like you're getting left behind by unplugging and learning something useful.

Unintuitive as it feels, the unrealized gains you build "offline" become your edge when you return to the game.

Read 4 tweets

Jack Butcher

@jackbutcher

3 Jan

Why promoting yourself/your business/your ideas feels uncomfortable:

You must repeat things that are obvious to you until they become obvious to others.

This is why most people hire marketers or outsource the amplification of their message.

The problem with that is no one is an invested as you are, and no one knows your message like you do.