DHH: Being at the right time at the right place is not the secret ingredient.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ISOSyr_dMU

by div • 16 years ago

51 43 16 years ago

asdflkj• 16 years ago

Whom is he arguing against? Does anyone say any of those things that he impersonated?

div• 16 years ago

Maybe to a lesser extent on Hacker news, but I have definitely heard people attributing success to luck or just being at the right place at the right time more then a few times.

armandososa• 16 years ago

Isn't it the whole thesis of the Outliers book?

tpz• 16 years ago

And not just that. A pattern I've been more consciously noticing recently (I'm sure it has been there the whole time but that I've just been noticing it more often for some reason) is the huge tendency for people to not just attribute success to luck but to attribute success to luck and failure to error/inherent crappiness, and to do so much more often than they are willing to attribute success to avoidance of error and an inherent goodness and attribute failure to bad luck.

I suspect this stems from some kind of ego factor in that when others succeed one wants it to be due to luck and not some factor that makes the other person "better" than they are, and that when others fail one wants it to be due to the other person being "worse" than they are.

Edit: I must admit that I've seen more and more of this on HN as its audience grows and changes, which is rather unfortunate. :(

scootklein• 16 years ago

i think he's talking about the small sliver of people on the opposite end of those that say "only by my bootstraps did i get to where i am". there definitely are people that revel in being seen as super humble and full of humility.

he said it briefly toward the beginning - "sure, there is some of that" (referring to luck playing at least somewhat of a role in most success). most people seem to be in this camp.

jonpaul2• 16 years ago

Yup... I agree: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1385086

jefarmstrong• 16 years ago

What he's trying to say, I think, is that you can only benefit from "being at the right place at the right time" if you have put in the effort to be ready to capitalize on that moment. If you put in the hard work, then there are many right moments and right places, otherwise they're just another moment that passes you by. DHH seems to be very angry lately, no?

stcredzero• 16 years ago

Luck comes to the prepared mind. --Louis Pasteur

_3ex7• 16 years ago

luck = preparation + oppurtunity

- Jim Greco

pchristensen• 16 years ago

DHH has always been like that. His personal website is loudthinking.com

ellyagg2• 16 years ago

He's absolutely right. The problem is that people buy their listeners some temporary comfort with their false modesty, but at the same time disempower them in the long term by saying that success is a function of luck.

Few people say their success was all luck, but many give it a bigger role than it deservers. It you are successful on a 10% play, it's easy to pass that off as luck. But if you made 10 plays like that, it's not really luck, now, is it?

Of course, sometimes the magnitude of the success is mostly luck.

_delirium• 16 years ago

I think the last part might be why some big winners are modest about it. They don't think of the question as, "was it luck that I was successful?", but as "was it luck that I made $2 billion?". The answer's probably a lot closer to yes on the 2nd question, which can make it tempting to say that you succeeded due to luck.

ellyagg2• 16 years ago

That's true. My mind doesn't normally jump to the tiny fraction of outlying billionaires when I think of successful people though.

frederickcook• 16 years ago

The size of the opportunity you choose to go after has a significant role in the maximum success you may have, and that choice should not be discounted. Founders of billion-dollar companies such as PayPal and YouTube foresaw that the world was changing, and given many industries to choose from, they picked a couple of the largest possible markets where they could have an impact.

If you decide to spend the next four years of your life making, say, appointment scheduling software (first thing that came to mind), that is a conscious choice not to go after a billion-dollar market, and right off the bat, the potential magnitude of your success is constrained.

joshu5• 16 years ago

I think that luck can be manufactured. Being in the right place gets easier if you can be in more places and get a sense for when to not be in the wrong place.

Also, a LOT of entrepreneurs do stuff that minimizes their chances - not doing that allows any luck you might actually get to shine through.

rmorrison2• 16 years ago

a LOT of entrepreneurs do stuff that minimizes their chances

Could you please give some examples of what you're referring to?

billswift• 16 years ago

I'm not sure what he is referring to, but I would suggest narrowing your focus too much to make use of unanticipated opportunities (or even notice them, if you're narrow enough). As PG has repeatedly written, many successful startups end up changing direction at least once before they get a successful product.

joshu5• 16 years ago

Terrible communication. Story-based reasoning. Lack of planning. Betting on low-odds outcomes, etc. Not being persistent. Being too persistent. Being distracted. List goes on and on and on.

jonpaul2• 16 years ago

I wrote this comment: I completely agree with the spirit of what DHH is saying. However, I think the most important message as he states is that people shouldn’t blame lack of success due to not being lucky. That’s where the emphasis on this topic should be placed. Those that say “I just go lucky” or “I was in the right place at the right time” might just be trying to be humble. At least that’s what I take from Jim Collins book “From Good to Great”

To recap: let’s emphasize the message that luck is bullshit and that it’s not necessary for success.

antidaily• 16 years ago

"the more I practiced the luckier I got" - golfer Ben Hogan.

rjett• 16 years ago

"The harder I work, the luckier I get" -Samuel Goldwyn

jimmyjim• 16 years ago

"Audentes fortuna iuvat" ('Fortune favors the bold') - Vergil

ori_b• 16 years ago

I don't know about that. It seems to me that luck is one of the secret ingredients. It's not what turns an abject failure into a success, but it is what sets apart the thousands of above-average individuals who are doing fine from the roaring successes.

Ability is a necessary ingredient. Luck gives you the initial break, and lets you set up a feedback loop of success. At least, this seems to be what I've observed.

10ren• 16 years ago

The reasoning reminds me of the Carol Dweck stuff (kids praised for their talent are disempowered; those praised for their efforts are empowered), where she was talking about the specific subset of luck that is natural talent.

nostromo• 16 years ago

Let's take Mark Zuckerberg or Bill Gates. Smart? Yes. Hard working? Yes. But are they 1,000 or 10,000 times harder working and smarter than the average techie? No way.

They were indeed working their asses off in the right place at the right time.

mapleoin• 16 years ago

but maybe finding that right place and time is also one of their learned skills

linkfrek• 16 years ago

quick byte: -(37signals before DH) During a job interview in which JF wasnt very serious about landing the job, he randomly met an acquaintance. This person agreed to work for 37signals as a designer. This person brought a former client with him to 37signals. This client spent atleast 200,000 in services from 37signals.

Who knows how 37signals would have turned out without that 200k during its early years. This was 37signals big break, not saying it "made" 37signals, just saying that 200k obviously helps and luck was a factor. Source: a mixergy interview with JF.

c00p3r• 16 years ago

...you also need to be prepared (have a rich parents with good connections, in the first place, plus some character and perhaps some experience =)

The 'Catch the moment!' saying is a several thousands year old.

david927• 16 years ago

It was for you, David.

vannevar2• 16 years ago

When in doubt, apply Occam's razor. Consider a room full of 1000 coin flippers. Each flips his coin, and if it comes up tails, he must leave the room. After ten flips, there will be likely be one player who has flipped 10 heads in a row. He will be hailed as an expert coin flipper and make millions writing a book about how he did it.

What's more, unlike coin flipping, money has memory. Having money makes it easier to get more. Capital provides interest income with no labor required, and more significantly, investors are much quicker to invest in someone with a track record.

Hard work and intelligence can buy you the opportunity and provide a good standard of living, but they alone cannot make you rich, at least not in the short time frames we tend to think in.

DHH: Being at the right time at the right place is not the secret ingredient.

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