Poke The Box by Seth Godin

My notes on “Poke The Box” by Seth Godin

Kinds of capital

What can you invest? What can your company invest?

• Financial capital – Money in the bank that can be put to work on a project or investment
• Network capital – People you know, connections you can make, retailers and systems you can plug into
• Intellectual capital – Smarts. Software systems, Access to people with insight
• Physical capital – Plant and machinery and tools and trucks
• Prestige capital – Your reputation
• Instigation capital – The desire to move forward. The ability and guts to say yes. This is the most important capital of our new economy

Three Thousand TED Talks

• If you had a chance to do a TED talk, what would it be about.? What have you discovered, what do you know, what can you teach. You should do one. Even if you don’t do one, you should be prepared to do one.

The Joy of Wrong

• The first Starbucks sold coffee beans and tea leaves and herbs. It was wrong. One of the founders changed it to be about the coffee.
• What if the “wrong” Starbucks had never been built? What if the founders had said “We’re not sure if this bean thing is going to work, so let’s do nothing”? One led to the other by the usual route, which is never a straight line
• Start. Then Ship.

The Person Who Fails the Most Usually Wins

• If you succeed often enough to be given the privilege of failing next time, then you’re on the road to a series of failures. Fail, succeed, fail, fail, fail, succeed – you get the idea

Juggling is About Throwing, Not Catching

• That’s why it’s so difficult to learn how to juggle. We’re conditioned to make the catch. “No matter what, don’t drop the ball”
• If you get better at throwing, the catching takes care of itself
• The only way to get better at throwing is to throw. Throw poorly, throw again. Throw well, throw again. Get good at throwing first

Start. Then Ship

• Then start again. Then ship again.
• Fail, fail, fail, succeed, fail, fail, succeed…