Jeff Bezos on betting against conventional wisdom, Warren Buffett on character, and the Japanese concept of Ikigai

Welcome back to the Z Fellows newsletter! Every Monday we share 3 ideas - to help you build companies, ship products, and create your life's work.

1: Jeff Bezos on betting against conventional wisdom

"Outsized returns often come from betting against conventional wisdom, and conventional wisdom is usually right. Given a ten percent chance of a 100 times payoff, you should take that bet every time. But you’re still going to be wrong nine times out of ten. We all know that if you swing for the fences, you’re going to strike out a lot, but you’re also going to hit some home runs.

The difference between baseball and business, however, is that baseball has a truncated outcome distribution. When you swing, no matter how well you connect with the ball, the most runs you can get is four. In business, every once in a while, when you step up to the plate, you can score 1,000 runs.

This long-tailed distribution of returns is why it’s important to be bold."

Source: Shareholder letter from Jeff Bezos

2: Warren Buffett on character

“Pretend I’ve made you a great offer: You can pick any one of your classmates and you get 10% of their earnings for the rest of their lives. What goes through your mind in determining who you would pick?

You probably wouldn’t pick the person who gets the highest grades in the class. There’s nothing wrong with getting the highest grades, but that’s not going to be the quality that sets apart a big winner from the rest of the pack… I think you’ll find that it gets down to a bunch of qualities that, interestingly enough, are self-made.

It’s integrity, it’s honesty, it’s generosity, it’s being willing to do more than your share.

Who do you think is going to do the worst in the class? It isn’t the person with the lowest grades, or anything of the sort. It’s the person who just doesn’t shape up in the character department.

When you write down the habits of that person you’d like to buy 10% of, look at that list and ask yourself, ‘Is there anything on that list that I couldn’t do?’ And the answer is that there won’t be.“

Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2a9Lx9J8uSs

3: The Japanese concept of Ikigai

Ikigai is a framework about finding what gives your life purpose, meaning, and value.

Best of The Week

See you next Monday,

- The Z Fellows Team

New here?

Subscribe here to get our email every Monday.