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There is no silver bullet. There are always options and the options have consequences.

Ben Horowitz

Note to self: It’s a good idea to ask, “What am I not doing?
BEN HOROWITZ

Ask Good Ideas Notes Self
You can take somebody’s job, you have to take their job, but you don’t have to take their dignity.
BEN HOROWITZ

Dignity Jobs Management
Here’s where we are and here’s what I didn’t recognize about us and about you when I made the decision, and now it is what it is.
BEN HOROWITZ

About Decision Made Now Recognize
In a company, hundreds of decisions get made, but objectives and goals are thin.
BEN HOROWITZ

Decision Goal Made
Your employees know each other better than they know you.
BEN HOROWITZ

Employee Knows Management
When I was CEO, and I’d listen to music, a lot of people listen to music and you get inspiration from it. And a lot of things in hip hop are very instructive for being in business. Particularly, hip hop is a lot about business, and so it was very useful for me in any job.
BEN HOROWITZ

Express Inspiration Jobs People
When you’re making a critical decision, you have to understand how it’s going to be interpreted from all points of view. Not just your point of view, not just the person you’re talking to, but the people that aren’t in the room. Everybody else.
BEN HOROWITZ

Critical Decisions Talking Views
In Silicon Valley, when you’re a private company, the entrepreneur can do no wrong.
BEN HOROWITZ

Company Entrepreneur Valleys
Here’s Kanye, the great musical genius of his generation in hip hop, but, like, society really can’t even deal with him because he’s always saying something that people go, ‘Oh, I can’t believe Kanye said that. I can’t believe he did that.’
BEN HOROWITZ

Believe Musical Genius People
Most large mistakes in organizational design come from putting the individual ambitions of the people at the top of the organization ahead of the communication paths for the people at the bottom of the organization.
BEN HOROWITZ

Ambition Communication Mistakes
As a company grows, communication becomes its biggest challenge.
BEN HOROWITZ

Challenges Communication Company
Over the last ten years, technological advances have dramatically lowered the financial bar for starting a new company, but the courage bar for building a great company remains as high as it has ever been.
BEN HOROWITZ

Bar Company Lasts Lower Years
Breakthrough ideas usually come from guys who look like they’re hallucinating
BEN HOROWITZ

Guy Hallucinating Ideas Looks
It’s hard in daily life. It’s even harder in management because it’s the stress of the moment.
BEN HOROWITZ

Daily Life Management Stress
The only thing that prepares you to run a company is running a company.
BEN HOROWITZ

Company Repair Running
The trouble with innovation is that truly innovative ideas often look like bad ideas at the time.
BEN HOROWITZ

Ideas Innovation Looks
What do you get when you cross a herd of sheep with a herd of lemmings? A herd of venture capitalists.
BEN HOROWITZ

Lemming Sheep Venture
The key to high-quality communication is trust, and its hard to trust somebody that you dont know.
BEN HOROWITZ

Communication Keys Quality
I believe in strength over lack of weakness.
BEN HOROWITZ

Believe Strength Weakness
The bigger you get, the harder this gets because the more aggressive the people working for you are.
BEN HOROWITZ

Bigger Management People
A key thing in being a leader is you’ve got to pause yourself.
BEN HOROWITZ

Keys Leader Management
Business ends up being very dynamic and situational.
BEN HOROWITZ

Business Dynamic Ends Situation
Generally the reason they fail in the job is, you made some mistake in the hiring process in that you didn’t match… them to the needs of your company accurately enough. That’s the #1 reason this fails. And that’s generally a good place to start.
BEN HOROWITZ

Accurate Decision Good Jobs Mistake Place Reason
A manager can’t act like a role model. They need to BE a role model.
BEN HOROWITZ

Manager Models Needs Role
There are no shortcuts to knowledge, especially knowledge gained from personal experience. Following conventional wisdom and relying on shortcuts can be worse than knowing nothing at all.
BEN HOROWITZ

Knowing Knowledge Gain Nothing Shortcut
For example, the vast majority of security break-ins occur as a result of problems with known fixes. With an automated system, you can keep up to date.
BEN HOROWITZ

Date Example Majority Problem Result
There is no silver bullet. There are always options and the options have consequences.
BEN HOROWITZ

Bullets Consequences Silver

There is no silver bullet. There are always options and the options have consequences.

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There is no silver bullet. There are always options and the options have consequences.

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Popular Authors

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