James Barry

Should You Go First or Last?

by | Dec 31, 2021 | Random Musings

In Squid Games (SPOILERS AHEAD), the penultimate competition starts with a room full of jerseys numbered one through sixteen. The contestants have absolutely no clue what they mean.

Do they want the low numbers?

The high number?

When this competition popped up, I had a deep feeling in my gut the protagonist needed to pick a high number. Unless you know exactly what the competition entails, it’s usually not a good choice to go first.

When the game is revealed a few minutes later, it becomes clear I was right.

The challenge is straightforward: cross a bridge, but with one big catch: not every panel supports your weight. At each stage there are two distinct panels, one of tempered glass that can hold human weight and one of… normal glass (which cannot support human weight).

If you choose on the wrong panel, you die. Therefore, the people with low numbers who had to go first were doomed.

Squid Games is not reality. It does have a lot of similarities though.

This game is one of them, where a massive advantage is given to those that go last.

As the youngest of five children, I can directly attest to this. Whenever I do anything in life, I’m usually the last one to do it.

I got more leniency from my parents. (My siblings already pushed them to their limits growing up).

My brothers and sisters make big life decisions before I do, like having kids or getting married.

I can see how everything plays out before I ever need to do it, and learn from the mistakes of those that went first.

In business, a similar advantage plays out. There is what is known as the “First-Mover Myth”: which falsely states that if you are the first to market with a new product, you will likely to gain the most market share. According to Forbes, 50% of first movers fail and only 11% dominated their space.

Apple for example, has rarely had the first-mover advantage.

Think of an iPad, iPod, or Apple Watch. All of these pieces of hardware existed before Apple launched their product. Apple just designed significantly superior versions.

Even the iPhone was preceded by the Blackberry, which was even preceded by General Magic, a 90s venture to build a smartphone that failed even with an incredible group of designers and engineers. The public was just not ready for their product.

When you move first you have one big thing working against you: You don’t benefit from anybody else’s experience.

In fact, you are the one who is creating experience at an incredibly high personal cost to you. The lessons you learn and trailblaze may help you eventually make a better decision, but if you can learn those lessons from other people’s hard won experience that is even better.

Going last does come with its disadvantages. You may not get the recognition for being the first to do something, but even so the benefits usually outweigh any drawbacks.

But First, Your Foundation

by | Dec 29, 2021 | Mindset, Time Allocation

Foundation(Noun): The lowest load-bearing part of a building, typically below ground level.

When you create a building, you start with the foundation.

This choice is due to a lot of things, but most importantly gravity.

You can’t build the penthouse first.

You can’t build the second floor without a first floor.

You can’t build that first floor without a solid foundation.

Everything you build sits on that foundation. A strong one will support a massive structure, while a weak one will support… much, much less.

In society, the educational system along with our parents builds our foundation.

The foundation most education systems provide are a “one-size” fits all approach.

Some math here, some history there, and of course many, many English classes. (You need to know how to speak and read after all).

While you might be able to make a few independent choices, the foundation school gives you is pretty similar to everybody else.

Then the foundation that your parents provide you is 100% unique.

It is based off their own experiences, what their parents taught them, and what they think will best set you up for success.

If you received both of these foundations: a good education and supportive family, you are lucky. Not everybody gets that in life.

Regardless, once you graduate high school and leave your house, you enter the blue ocean of the world.

An infinite pool of possibilities. You can pursue anything you want. Be whoever you want to be.

The foundations you have though, may not support that new version of you.

In fact, they likely don’t.

When I was in my mid-20s I wanted to be an entrepreneur. I still do (kind of).

Looking back on it though, I didn’t have the discipline or approach required to be successful.

My ego wanted to immediately jump from 0 to 100 in life, while skipping important steps along the way.

I had never led a team, had no experience building product, or running marketing campaigns. Really, I lacked most of the foundational requirements needed to succeed as an entrepreneur.

WHICH IS FINE!

Failure is a part of life.

Today though, when I decide what to do in my free time, I focus on what will help me succeed if I do start a business again. My foundation.

I currently working in a sales / marketing role (critical for building any business).

In my free time, I am learning how to code and build things.

In my spare time, I write. A lot.

When I first tried to do something new, my foundation was not strong enough.

Nobody teaches you to be an entrepreneur in high school. So I failed.

When I try the next time, I may very well fail again. (Hopefully not).

This time though, I know my foundation will at least be stronger.

Build for whatever you want to be in the future. You never know when it may come in handy.

What If We Treated Life Like A Videogame?

by | Dec 23, 2021 | Mindset

Growing up, I played a LOT of videogames. Hundreds of different ones.

I was a late millennial, and at the turn of the century I was just six years old. The internet was the Wild Wild West.

Among the many games I played, there is one I will always remember: Stick RPG.

It’s a straightforward, early 2000s RPG. Not too many things to do, but definitely enough to keep my 6-year old brain entertained.

At the root of the game you had three basic stats: Charm. Strength. Intelligence.

The more stats you had in one category, the more you could do in the game.

For example, if you had more strength, you could deal more damage in fight.

If you had more charm, you had more options when interacting with others.

The most important stat though was intelligence.

More intelligence would allow you to work better jobs, allowing you to make more money, allowing you to buy more things.

At the end of the day, the entire game was about making more money.

So what’s the first thing that I would do in the game?

I would get a skateboard (so I could move around faster), but then immediately after that spend every single day at the U of S. (University of Stick of course)

After about 30-days of learning at U of S, I finally had enough intelligence to get a high paying job.

I would then work a few days a week, which gave me enough money to do anything else I wanted in the game.

While this is not how life actually works, it made me think about what parallels there might be.

Specifically, what are the most important skills you should learn first?

Quora says adapting to change.

Common sense says communication, finances, and how to live independently.

Anything that can compound over time, is something I think that’s worth learning early on.

The most important part though, is to just keep on learning. Regardless of what you decide to learn.

Just Bring A Notepad

by | Dec 17, 2021 | Random Musings

There are a few things that seem to hold true across many facets of life.

One of them is taking notes.

Whether or not you work in a business or are an artist, if you’re in class, a meeting, or just taking walking around, a notepad is essential for getting anything done.

That’s because there’s one massive weakness every human shares.

We forget things. CONSTANTLY. All of the time.

One time, I even completely forgot about an article I published.

If I can’t even remember something I wrote, how can I possibly remember anything that I think.

At least the important stuff that is. That’s why you need to write it down.

When you hear people talk about the founders of Airbnb, one quote always comes to mind (for me at least):

“No one ever worked harder during YC than the Airbnbs did. When you talked to the Airbnbs, they took notes. If you suggested an idea to them in office hours, the next time you talked to them they’d not only have implemented it, but also implemented two new ideas they had in the process.

– Paul Graham

This shows how important note taking is.

There’s a complete sentence devoted to the fact that they took notes.

While this example is clearly related to business, the concept of taking notes is universal across life.

Just as an example, think about being creative.

You have SO many thoughts, every single day. According to the all mighty Google, each of us has over 6,000 thoughts per day.

Most of those thoughts are probably garbage. (No offense)

There are a few diamonds though, and those are the ones you need to write down.

Creativity can’t be forced, and it isn’t time bound. Sometimes, it just happens.

So don’t forget that notepad.

Pure Writing Introspection

by | Dec 14, 2021 | Mindset

I started writing because I wanted to accomplish something.

Anything at all.

I thought “writing an article once a week for a year will be an impressive achievement”.

Now that I’m on my 40th something article, (47th to be exact if you count this one), I would not call it impressive.

It’s an achievement for sure. A hard one at that.

But it’s not “impressive”.

Writing 52 GOOD articles would have been impressive.

Every single one, well-written. All tied together with a specific topic and focus.

That does not describe this blog, at least not yet.

What this blog does show though, in a very, very cool way, is my journey becoming a writer.

A writer so cool, that he still uses the word very twice in a row.

In a way, it’s a personal journey that helped me better understand what I enjoy writing about. What I feel comfortable publishing.

I also wrote on social media (specifically LinkedIn), but that writing was meant to manufacture engagement.

Which eventually made it super boring, or I oriented too much towards storytelling and sharing.

Not the same.

This blog allowed me to learn what I was good at writing, and what I also enjoyed about it.

How to better manage and develop a creative process.

Organize my ideas and my time. (Definitely ideas, still not so great at managing time)

It’s also given me a super fun habit that I feel allows me to just freely express myself.

Which in a way, is writing’s best reward.