Moments In Succession

Facebook filed to go public last Wednesday, and we are all awash in hagiographies to Zuckerberg, stories of the determined, bright young Harvard drop out who, through force of will, has revolutionized the internet and human relations. Like all invention myths, these stories leave out both the inevitability of the evolution of a facebook-like platform, and the unoriginality of the idea at the time of Facebook’s launch.

This meme is not new – we all know that invention is usually evolutionary, more like the aleatory, methodical process of natural selection than the “Eureka!” shouting epiphany of intelligent design (Steven Johnson’s Where Good Ideas Come From is insightful on this point). We exaggerate the impact of individual geniuses, without whom we like to think the world would be profoundly different, for two reasons, as far as I can tell: Because it makes for better stories, and because we want to elevate human agency, we want to believe in our individual power to bend the world with the force of our will.

We are not wrong, it’s an extraordinary time for innovation, and individuals can have profound impact. But at the same time I think wildly successful people have an obligation to say: “Yes I worked my tail off, and no, I am no dummy, but it’s also true that I got really really lucky.”

I have gotten lucky, and I am working hard to get luckier still.  Clearly Success = some combination of hard work, intelligence (more the ability to learn incrementally from experience than some kind of mystical genius) and luck. The first two are requirements for admission, and you have to keep at it until you find the third. Older and wiser people like Warren Buffet and Bill Gates are more likely to acknowledge the role of luck in their success – both of then have spoken about it eloquently — and Malcolm Gladwell did a good job of describing the luck factor in Outliers. Bo Peabody came clean in his thoughtful book, Lucky or Smart. But it remains wildly under-recognized, in my opinion.

Why does this matter? It matters because if people think innovation happens because of the actions of Isolated Geniuses, they draw the wrong conclusions about their own potential and how innovation happens. It’s easy to draw the wrong lessons from hyperbolized success stories. You could conclude, for instance, that when brought into a new social media startup, you should stall, rip off the idea, and go it alone (Zuckerberg). Or that true visionaries scream at developers and designers, tell them their products are shit, and storm out of the room (Jobs). Needless to say there is much that we can learn from Jobs and Zuckerberg, two brilliant innovators — some if it is useful and broadly applicable, the rest historically specific and potentially misleading.

I am about half way through the Jobs biography (its been temporarily displaced by Thinking Fast and Slow due to my AMPs syndrome), and I think Isaacson deserves enormous credit for keeping the extraordinary story of Steve Jobs tethered to the ground. If there ever were a case that individuals can be overpowering forces on history, lead-weighted billiard balls that profoundly alter the picture, Jobs is right up there with Einstein and Hitler among the strongest cases. He achieved extraordinary success not once but thrice with Apple 1.0, Pixar, and Apple 2.0, and he was a wildly original rogue force.

The problem, however, with Jobs as an example, is that what has worked for Apple is very nearly the inverse of what works more broadly online. The idea of locking people in sealed chambers for years at a time to develop products incompatible with other standards, without any feedback from users, is pretty much the antithesis of the best way to navigate the emergent connected, social-media-accelerated world, in my opinion.

My guess is that if you were to plop Steve Jobs in various places and times in history – the precisely same Steve Jobs with his peculiar psychological blend of brilliance, iconoclasm, and a borderline sado-masochistic stinginess with warmth and affirmation (arbuably a result of his fraught relationship with having been put up for adoption, according to many of his intimates) – in 9 out of 10 cases he would not have been a business success. He would have been, as Steve himself said, a broke poet in Paris (a career path I think of warmly, by the way). It’s not easy to be successful in business if you are uncollaborative, egotistical, disinclined to give others credit, and very nearly completely blind to the obstacles. Indeed, you are highly likely to fail with that disposition, it’s a low probability approach, but if you succeed, you have a shot at doing so on a large scale, in a memorable way. And thank goodness Steve Jobs did so — as many of you know, I am among the faithful when it comes to Apple products, and believe a forceful personality was necessary in this case to elevate design in the anarchic world of technology.This is what’s missing from so many of the success stories that surround us, in vivid Technicolor: data on probability. It’s a classic case of availability bias, and in the Gladwellian era of business journalism, we are ever more focused on celebration of individual stories, often selecting for the anomalous.

My personal reality distortion field is a case of optimism, and I believe there is mounting evidence that the business environment is changing in ways that increasingly favor the kind, generous business leader.  “Nice guy” business leaders still fire people who don’t perform and make hard decisions, but they consider it their job to create warm supportive environments with opportunities for growth. The Barry Diller approach, which Steve Jobs was also susceptible to, is going the way of the hammered dulcimer. There are three reasons for this:

1)   The importance of attracting talent – the best people are less and less willing to deal with hot-headed leaders, because every year it’s getting easier to start companies or change jobs if you have desirable skills.

2)   Customers are more and more informed, and they like supporting companies that are forces for good.  Obnoxious leaders breed obnoxious companies, and the cost of alienating even a very small subset of the population has gotten lot higher.

3)   Industries are increasingly non-zero sum, and consequently businesses with more collaborative cultures outcompete those with less collaborative ones. This is category dependent, of course – Amazon’s winner-take-all approach may be well adapted to the low margin e-commerce environment.

All in, I believe that the highest probability paths to success and happiness — two conditions, it should be noted, that are often uncorrelated – are not well exemplified by Jobs or Zuckerberg. Ruthlessness born of misanthropy or alienation has propelled business leaders for generations in zero sum game industries, but it’s increasingly ill-adapted to the modern world, and from a happiness perspective, you don’t want to be that guy. This was one of the more surprising take aways from the Jobs biography – he seems remarkably discontent, all things considered. He treated us customers a lot better than he did the people immediately around him, and the latter is what sets the table for life satisfaction.

As Steven Covey said years ago, helping others succeed may not always be the fastest way to succeed, but it never fails.  It’s not the Jobsian way, but if you only have one life to live it’s the higher probability path.

When I started this blog a little over a year ago, I had just lost most of the writings and photographs I had from the first half of my life due to a bill paying snafu with American Self-Storage. I wrote in my first post that this loss had caused me to feel quite painfully how evanescent our memories are, more gaseous than a solid at the end of the day. I wrote that I felt “the loss that a prosecuting attorney must feel when critical evidence is destroyed. Evidence of my younger self – how I thought, felt, came at the world.”

It was also freeing — nostalgia is the original ball and chain, and I knew none of the material was world-changing — but it smarted. I had forgotten at the time that one trunk stuffed with old papers that I had intended to bring to storage was still in a corner in our office. I have thought about this trunk quite a bit since I re-discovered it six months ago, but I haven’t had the time, and more critically the emotional energy, to address it. I have quietly kindled hope that it might contain a stash of old writings and photographs of some significance to me, and as that hope has risen so too has a proportional fear that it’s filled with nothing but worthless old bills. So I haven’t been able to bring myself to open it. This despite the fact that the trunk has been sitting in the middle of the reception area in our office, staring me down every day.

Today, Sunday, I came in to the office and summoned the strength to crack it open. I was overwhelmed by the contents: dozens of old photos including one of my beloved old Kawasaki 450 LTD ; copies of Mondo 2000, an early 90s magazine about technology that some of you will remember; files of book reviews and whimsical essays I wrote for the Arkansas Democrat Gazette during my Little Rock years (which I never thought I would see again, published pre-internet); a pamphlet about “how to get on-line (sic) with E-World and the Internet!” — Apple’s ill-fated answer to AOL in the early 90s; a flyer for a mail order t-shirt company I had started called Wordwear (which taught me the important lesson that my taste is not universal); a big stack of letters from Jack Murnighan and Leif Ueland in their post-college years; a book proposal which would be picked up by a new york agent (very exciting at the time), but would not result in a book contract; two binders of college writings; a dorky invitation to a going away party I threw when I moved from Little Rock to New York (see below); a copy of Lotus 1-2-3 for the mac; and a photo of me as a child in my father’s lap, among other things.

Among this sundry detritus of my hapless 20s, I just found a handwritten note on a random piece of paper about the state of my relationship with the lovely but ultimately incompatible woman with whom I was living at the time. The note is dated November 18, 1993, which was, extraordinarily, 17 years ago (I was about 25). I am changing the name to protect the innocent:

“I sometimes feel that Z and my relationship has terminal problems. I get depressed, feel vulnerable, and then feel more in love with Z than ever. I have a solitary side of me that is not simply a form of solace in the absence of love, as it appeared to me during long years living in the absence of love: it is a relishing of our human condition that will always be with me. And I have a carefree, social side that is constitutionally autonomous. And I also have a powerful need to love and be loved exclusively. I do not think these facets of my personality are incompatible with one another, but they require a soulmate who does not feel that these other parts of my life are competition — a soulmate who shares these qualities.

“I think Z does share these qualities but nonetheless sees them as competition (mine anyway) for our love. And I do not know whether or not this can change.“

I think this was a long winded way of saying that I needed to find a woman who was willing to give me room for my sometimes solitary relationship with myself, and my appetite for social shenanigans. It’s wonderful to read this years later realizing that I have found, married, and had three children with such a woman.

My favorite line from the above, which of course I have no recollection of having written, is this one — “I have a  solitary side of me that is not simply a form of solace in the absence  of love, as it appeared to me during long years living in the absence of  love … ” Apparently I thought, before I had fully experienced a loving relationship with a woman, that my relationship with myself was a consolation prize. It’s nice to learn otherwise.

a few pieces of dorky detritus from my 20s follows …

We are thrilled to announce the birth of our third boy, Rye Griscom — Rye Frederic Volkman Griscom. He was born last Tuesday, October 5th, at 8:36 a.m. He weighed 8 pounds and .4 ounces, and he had not only ten fingers and ten toes, but also ten names until very close to his departure on Saturday. We are utterly elated, needless to say … we had our first breakfast this morning as a family of five, and the house felt full, fully full, in a way it hasn’t before. And of course we are sobered by the certain knowledge that with three boys under roof, we are in for it.

Here, for your amusement and edification, is a photo documentary of the grisly and beautiful series of events:

Alisa not lifting heavy objects the night before delivery.

Mr. Bubble, the family patron saint, who makes getting clean almost as much fun as getting dirty, looked over the birth of Rye much as he did the births of our first two sons.

before

Even the third time around, despite the relative sterility of the c-section experience, we were dewy-eyed fools.

Collecting our little Russian doll complete with antibiotic eye ointment.

Demonstrating his usefulness, Rye put on his game face wednesday morning for a thorough plundering of the spoils of the New York Presbyterian breakfast cart.

The incomparable softness of baby skull peach fuzz.

This photo renders me all blubbery and verklempt. I think Declan is taking in the exciting implications of a 100% increase in the population of his constituency.

Leaving Saturday morning, outnumbered.

There is a great piece in today’s Sunday Business section of the New York Times titled “Just Manic Enough: Seeking the Perfect Entrepreneur.” The thrust of it is that a certain level of hypomania – mild, non-psychotic mania associated with high energy, compulsive focus and productivity, but also sometimes delusional overconfidence – may be necessary in order to succeed as an entrepreneur.

The piece describes Seth Priebatch’s impressively maniacal evangelism on behalf of scvngr.com, a company that seeks “to build a game layer on top of the world.” It’s an interesting, grandiose business mission, which is what we expect of internet startups – non-grandiose missions aren’t worth putting up on the wall.

David Segal, the author of this piece (beautifully executed, David), says,

“The hypomanic temperament is, of course, not limited to entrepreneurs. It’s found in politics (Theodore Roosevelt) the military (George S. Patton), Hollywood (the studio head David O. Selznick) and virtually any field where outsize risks yield enormous rewards.  But the business world has contributed more than its share of hypomanics, particularly the abusive, ornery kind. The most colorful of the breed was arguably Henry Ford.”

He goes on to talk about Steve Jobs as an archetypal case.

A simpler phrase for hypomania might be “high octane, reality-proof optimism” – you have to have a certain measure of this succeed as an entrepreneur. Meanwhile, a large dose of this condition makes it nearly impossible to be an effective operator – reality must pierce the semi-permeable boundary of one’s optimism if you are to generate somewhat realistic time projections, which is in turn a pre-requisite for somewhat competent manage of a team. Which is why successful companies are, more often than not, handed off from one personality type to the next at some point in the growth process.

This article fortified a belief I have had for some time now, which is that all the most common forms of “mental illnesses,” in their mild forms, confer advantages as well as disadvantages. Brains come in flavors – some of us are more anxious, some more manic, some more depressive, some more distractible – and these different flavors have been evolutionarily selected for over time because they enable success in different environments.

This is an emergent view – see the great “Science of Success” article in the Altantic last December – but it’s a radical deviation from the convention thinking of what we call, inappropriately, “the mental health profession.” The conventional assumption is that there is a single optimal type of human brain / personality, which we call “normal,” which is the right kind. Any significant deviation from that “normal” brain — which functions as a kind of Copernican sun around which mental illness rotates — is a mental disorder, a neurosis or psychosis that makes its host less functional. (SIDE NOTE: I have great respect for the mental health profession, even though I think it needs to be renamed – my mother is psychoanalyst, and she is an articulate and nuanced spokesperson for the conventional view). I would like to offer a different metaphor – just as there is no one optimal body type, but rather many body types that offer advantages for different sporting events, there is also no single optimal brain, or personality. There is certainly such a thing as a “well rounded” brain or personality that can do a lot of things well, just as there is a body type that can do a lot of sports well. But the best are specialists. Swimming selects for people with long trunks (they float better) and large feet and hands (for better propulsion). Sprinters are stouter with bulkier mucles (which have a higher percentage of fast twitch fibers) and marathon runners are lighter with endurance focused muscles (more slow twitch fibers) and massive cardio capacity relative to body weight. The ideal squash player, I have heard it said, would have short, muscular legs (for rapid acceleration) and long arms (for court coverage).

The many different mental challenges we face select for a similar variation in thinking styles / personality types /brains. What are the most successful among them? Here, it’s interesting to consult the National Institute of Mental Health’s overview of mental disorders. The NIMH website says that 26.2 percent of American adults suffer from a diagnosable mental disorder in a given year. Presumably there are far more with mild cases that do not seek help, and a far higher percentage that suffer from a mental disorder, as they say, in the course of their lives. Could evolution really have screwed up this badly? Here are the most common mental disorders:

• Mood disorders (Depression, bipolar disorder, hypomania, et al) – 9.5% of the population
• Anxiety disorders (obsessive compulsive disorder, panic attacks, various phobias) – 18.1% of the population
• ADHD  — 4.1% of the population
• Personality disorders – antisocial, histrionic, narcissistic, paranoid – 9.1% of the population

The New York Times article effectively described the advantages of mild mania – more energy, more focus, more optimism. Of course these benefits come with liabilities, which is why, from a game theory perspective, it makes sense that we are not all manic. And of course I recognize that the people who suffer from the extreme forms of all these conditions do indeed suffer and need help – please understand I am talking here about the functional majority of the population, not the small minority that cannot function.

ADHD is associated with creativity – it encourages swift movement between different subjects, which makes it easier to scan for interesting relationships, and ADHD is also associated with hyperfocus once the individual seizes on something that attracts their attention. A disproportionate number of people with ADHD are over-achievers, and, I suspect, a disproportionate number are also underachievers. I wouldn’t be surprised if ADHD and hypomania sometimes afflict the same individual.

I suspect that people with mild anxiety disorders, such as mild phobias and obsessive compulsive disorder, can be unusually good at detecting danger, and unusually good at persistent execution and attention to detail. Every successful business needs people in this spectrum – people hypersensitive to very small problems, who can hunt down deviations in spreadsheets, or errant zeros and ones. Who better to open hundreds of franchises across the country with unerring attention to detail, or perform other important, repetitive tasks precisely, than someone “suffering from” a mild case of obsessive compulsive disorder?

My point here is that any group of people – a society, a business, a tribe in the ancestral savanna – benefits from having a range of personality types. I learned early on that if I only hired people like me, my business would fail. I think the comparison between a modern small business trying to adapt to rapid technology change and a tribe of a few hundred people on the African savanna 100,000 years ago is actually quite relevant. In both cases groups comprised of people with different kinds of brain specialization are likely to outcompete those comprised of a single personality type.

Every group needs a range of specialists – people great at thinking up new ideas and then obsessing on them until they are perfect; people great at executing a vision in a systematic, consistent format and leading a team; anxious people who wake up in the middle of the night worrying about competing groups or threats that haven’t emerged in years. These varying, complimentary (albeit not always chummy) personality types are all highly valuable to the collective.

Alisa, my lovely, nearly perfect wife, sometimes jokingly calls herself “the watchtower woman.” If she hears a faint sound in the middle of the night she bolts upright. She periodically gets migranes which make her so sensitive to sounds and light that she has to sit in a silent dark room with a towel over her head. She has an extraordinary ability to contemplate every possible danger — not just physical danger but a broader, sophisticated risk analysis — that could beset our family. If you know her, you might not have guessed this; she is very outgoing and adventurous and at ease the vast majority of the time. But she is genetically (and culturally … I agree with you Mr. Shenk;)  wired to be a sentinal – as she puts it, the watchtower woman.

I think I have a mild case of ADHD (more on this come in a later post). Much as Alisa likes to think of her mild anxieties in the context of the positive function they perform for the group, I like to think of my ADHD  as AMPs – Absent Minded Professor Sydrome. I enjoy the advantages of the way my brain works, even as I take small steps (daily exercise, obsessive self-management systems) to mitigate the disadvantages.

It’s reasonable to ask why this matters. Mild mental disorders are not as stigmatized as they once were — references to one’s therapist have been fashionable in New York since the 1970s. Having said that, we are not quite at the point at which you can comfortably say that you have mild obsessive compulsive disorder or ADHD or hypomania in a job interview. But we should be headed in that direction. We are each better able to manage our thinking styles — to build on our strengths and compensate for our weaknesses — if we gladly own them. We are more likely to own them, even if they are called neuroses or psychoses, if we understand their benefits. And we are better able to appreciate the different (yes sometimes annoying) thinking styles of other people if we appreciate that the group, in the end, benefits.

For years I have been going to the beach with standard old beach umbrellas. No longer. I discovered a few days ago a grass fringed lime green beach umbrella at Waldbaum’s in East Hampton (on sale for $9.99, down from $19.99 — run, don’t walk), and I will tell you, there is no going back. There is something about a little grass fringe in your peripheral vision that fundamental changes your outlook on the world for the better.