November 2023 - Curiosity, Contrarians & Change:
This month, we explore the power of staying curious, Argentina's new leader and a product launch that is dividing critics in a whirlwind month for AI.
The Double Nudge: A relatable guide to personal growth
The words in this newsletter are entirely our own, but the insights and ideas have been inspired by others. Our goal is to synthesise the best information we have consumed each month, and relate it to our everyday lives.
This is our attempt to get better each day, and we would love you to join us.
Quote of the Month: “The mind that opens to a new idea never returns to its original size” - Albert Einstein
Our Challenge of the Month - Staying Curious:
Paul Graham’s essay ‘How to Do Great Work’ has had a profound impact on me. He talks about the three most powerful motives for work being curiosity, delight and the desire to do something impressive.
When these things collide, beautiful things happen intrinsically for the individual involved as well as the output delivered for the world.
This month, I took time away from work and spent two weeks in Mexico.
An embarrassing realisation I had was that for the first time since starting Bounce, I felt like I fully switched off. This allowed my curiosity to flourish through reading, writing and thinking and frankly, it was amazing.
Each day, I had an “excited curiosity” that were both the engine and the rudder, as Paul describes it, for what I was going to dive into while panning out on the beach (a tough decision, I know).
You can’t click your fingers and be a curious person, but it can be nurtured. Being away from the day-to-day chaos of Bounce made me realise I had neglected it for a long time. This not only dwindles my intuitive exploration of new topics in my personal life, but has a negative impact on my performance at Bounce - let me explain.
“Curiosity is itself a kind of originality; it's roughly to questions what originality is to answers. And since questions at their best are a big component of answers, curiosity at its best is a creative force.”
This creative force Paul mentions to explore new disciplines, topics and technologies enables founders like myself to look at problems differently. To have a broader and unrelated knowledge base creates a unique perspective, which often drives better decisions.
This realisation at the start of the holiday created a bad case of the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon, also called the frequency illusion, a cognitive bias where something you recently learned seems to appear everywhere, making it feel like it's more common than it actually is.
It seemed like every book, podcast or article I consumed had reference to how staying curious is the key to doing great work, particularly as a founder:
Twice a year, Bill Gates takes a self-proclaimed “think week”. He spends seven days in solitude, allowing time to rest, think and solve problems above the parapet of daily interruptions.
In David Epstein’s book, Range, he argues that expertise across multiple disciplines creates an ability for individuals to outperform those with narrow experiences. His research aims to debunk the 10,000 hour rule, and recommends that everyone captures the power of breadth, diverse experience and interdisciplinary exploration.
Sebastian Mallaby cites multiple examples of outperforming venture capitalists like Vinad Khosla that avoid selecting traditionally experienced founders or CEO’s to run companies, but instead biassing for drive, curiosity and bold visions in the book ‘The Power Law’.
In ‘Start Up Nation’, the authors explain that after Silicon Valley, Israel has become the epicentre of entrepreneurship partly thanks to their multi-disciplinary backgrounds driven from their conscription military and education strategy. This helps founders solve problems in ways that other educations and upbringings don’t enable.
That holiday was not only the most fun I’ve had in years and memories that I’ll take to my grave, but it has reinvigorated a sense of what I love doing when I allow creativity to guide me.
It was a powerful reminder of how important nurturing my curiosity is for personal discovery alongside enhanced performance as a problem-solver, which is often the best description for an entrepreneur.
I’d encourage everyone to allow themselves the time and space to allow that ‘dance with curiosity’ as Paul explains it.
Our Trend of the Month - Sweeping Changes in Argentina?
Much of our readership are unlikely to keep a keen eye on Argentinian politics, but this month Javier Milei’s election caught ours.
Typically, we steer clear of politics on these pages, but every so often, there is something so contrarian that needs spotlight.
In short, Milei is advocating for the shutdown of the central bank (a “non-negotiable matter”), the dollarisation of the economy and substantial cuts to government spending.
Sweeping changes, that have likely been brought about by Argentina’s precarious economic position:
40% living below the poverty line:
Crippling hyperinflation:
Argentina is the IMF’s top debtor:
With great economic hardship, comes a strong appetite for change and can catalyse these sort of drastic events.
The impact of such a move remains to be seen but highlights the precarious nature of life in Argentina right now and indeed many other countries engulfed by intense inflation.
Going forward, it would be unsurprising to see more and more atypical appointments. Talk is cheap, time and results will tell.
Start-Up / Founder of the Month - Luke Mackey of Kota:
This month, I have the pleasure of writing about an incredible Irish founder and business that has generated much-deserved hype this year.
Kota, the retirement and employee benefits platform enables easy and accessible management for employers around the world. It was founded by Luke, Patrick O’Boyle & Deepak Baliga, and raised €5M a few weeks ago to continue delivering on the hype.
I’m fortunate enough to know Luke, the co-founder and CEO, from his time at Bamboo when he advised me in the early days of starting Bounce. He has a refreshing candour and ability to deliver on a bold vision, a blend investors like about strong second-time founders (see his CV of failures from his time at Bamboo here)
He was an early guest on Gary Fox’s podcast back in October 2019, and from meeting him recently for a coffee, there’s something amazing about watching him evolve as an entrepreneur.
Ireland needs more role models like Luke, Patrick & Deepak for aspiring founders to show them the way. They are one of the many brainchildren of Dogpatch Labs who continue to do remarkable work for the Irish start-up ecosystem.
Investment / Fundraise in Focus - Humane’s AI Pin Launch
AI caused quite the stir this month. Most recently, Sam Altman’s shocking departure from Open AI and before that Humane’s product launch devoured my X feed. Their AI pin, the first artificially intelligent device, product launch was a glimpse into the future.
Admittedly, I was rather captivated, yet also felt disappointed at the same time. The pin felt like a massive leap forward and tech breakthrough, but the first 3 minutes of the video were spent discussing the colour range and the unique value prop was only later showcased.
The below mindbranch is perhaps the most succinct means of showcasing the width of its capabilities.
Clearly Humane’s ex-Apple founding team has been busy over the past 5 years, raising $240 million and lodging 25 patents.
It feels like a potentially incredible breakthrough but for now a wearable that may struggle to find adoption in the near term - a non-essential wearable that seeks to eliminate the need for smartphones, with even more technology. At $700 for the device and a monthly $24 subscription, it is not for the faint hearted.
Content Corner:
OpenAI’s Dev Day 2023: Their first developer’s conference unveiled product launches that shook the technology world. Here is a breakdown from Techcrunch on the key announcements. Little did they know the chaos that would ensue in the weeks to follow…
Confessions of a Middle Class Founder: A thought-provoking article here by a founder on his story, and the harsh realities of falling into the start-up trap.
When Should you join a Start-up? Here is an article breaking down what stage of start-up offers the best risk-reward trade off from an analysis of 14,000 US companies between 2014-2015.
The Dunning-Kruger Effect: The Dunning-Kruger effect occurs when a person's lack of knowledge and skills in a certain area cause them to overestimate their own competence - here is an article explaining how this cognitive bias occurs (you’ll start to see it everywhere…)
The Gender Pay Gap: Last week, Claudia Goldin became the first solo woman to win the Nobel Prize for Economics for her analysis on the gender pay gap. Irish economist, David McWilliams, explains this in great detail on his podcast here.
10 Lessons from ‘Hidden Potential’ by Adam Grant: One of the best self-development authors on the science behind achieving great things. A short summary here on the takeaways.
What I Learned Getting Acquired by Google: A brilliant article here by Shreyands Bhansali, the co-founder of the ed-tech company that was acquired by Google in March 2018.
Ireland is a Happy & Generous Place: According to a recent global Ipsos report, Ireland is perceived as the 3rd happiest nation in the world (New Zealand is no.1) and the 3rd most generous (Canada is first).
Oil Prices Ineffective in Control: Russia has circumvented all oil controls, and is sold below $60 price cap here.
Thought Provoking Graphics:
A look at China’s population density across the country, with 94% of their 1.4BN people in one part of the country.
The concept of Ikigai is a Japanese concept that combines the terms iki, meaning “alive” or “life,” and gai, meaning “benefit” or “worth.” When combined, these terms mean that which gives your life worth, meaning, or purpose.
If you’re looking for a framework for guiding how you spent your time, or a choice of career, this is quite helpful.
Meme Corner:
For anyone following the OpenAI scandal this month…