On following the nerds, succeeding at a startup, and bicycle brains

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: The Origin of Good Ideas

Tim Ferriss asks 3 key questions to determine where things may be trending:

1. What are the nerds doing at night and on weekends?

2. What are rich people doing now, that everyone might be doing 10 years from now?

3. Where are people cobbling together awkward solutions?

Source: Tim Ferriss: How to Learn Better & Create Your Best Future | Huberman Lab Podcast

2: Succeeding As A Founding Startup Employee

Let’s say you’ve found a startup that you really believe in — how do you maximize your odds of success?

1) Figure out the company’s top priorities

• Until a startup has product/market fit, the #1, #2, and #3 priority of every single person in the company should be talking to customers and iterating the product for them until PMF is achieved.

2) Create a success plan for yourself

• What is the company’s mission, and how does my role contribute to it?

• What are my top 3 priorities, in order of importance?

• What will I get done by day 30? What will I get done by day 60? What by day 90?

3) Execute your plan

• Brainstorm the top 20 things you could be working on for the business.

• Rank them in order of importance.

• Focus only on getting the top 3 done at any point in time. Don’t do anything else.

Source: The Ultimate Guide to Joining A Startup by Adam Guild

3: Bicycle of The Mind

Steve Jobs’ metaphor for the computer:

“I think one of the things that really separates us from the high primates is that we’re tool builders. I read a study that measured the efficiency of locomotion for various species on the planet.

The condor used the least energy to move a kilometer. And, humans came in with a rather unimpressive showing, about a third of the way down the list. It was not too proud a showing for the crown of creation. So, that didn’t look so good.

But, then somebody at Scientific American had the insight to test the efficiency of locomotion for a man on a bicycle. And, a man on a bicycle, a human on a bicycle, blew the condor away, completely off the top of the charts. And that’s what a computer is to me.

What a computer is to me is it’s the most remarkable tool that we’ve ever come up with, and it’s the equivalent of a bicycle for our minds.”

Source: Steve Jobs (Bicycle of The Mind)

See you next Monday,

- Jay + The Z Fellows Team

PS — Did someone forward this to you?

Man, your friends are awesome. Subscribe here if you want to get more insights like these every Monday morning.