$46B of Hard Truths

The worst thing that you do as a leader is you hesitate on the next decision.

当领导最糟糕的事，就是你在下一个决策上犹豫。

The thing that causes you to hesitate is both decisions are horrible.

让你犹豫的，是两个选项都烂透了。

Probably one of my bigger ones on that was we went public with $2 million in trailing 12 months revenue at 18 months old.

我自己比较大的一次，是公司成立 18 个月、过去 12 个月收入只有 $2 million 的时候就上市了。

That's obviously a bad idea.

这显然是个馊主意。

But the truth of it was the alternative was going bankrupt, and that's a worse idea.

但真相是，另一个选项是破产，那更糟。

It's a very difficult and painful to be a CEO, to be a founder.

当 CEO、当创始人，是件极其艰难又痛苦的事。

In spite of that.

尽管如此。

So many people want to start companies.

还是有那么多人想创业。

The psychological muscle you have to build to be a great leader is to be able to look in the abyss and go, "Okay, that way's slightly better.

想当一个了不起的领导者，你必须练出的那块心理肌肉，是能盯着深渊说：“好，那条路稍微好一点。

We're going to go that way.

我们就走那条。

If everybody agrees with the decision, then you didn't add any value because they would've done that without you."

如果所有人都赞同这个决定，那你没创造任何价值——没有你他们也会那么干。”

So the only value you ever add is when you make a decision that most people don't like.

所以你唯一创造价值的时刻，就是你做了一个多数人不喜欢的决定。

You are famous for writing one of the most popular pieces of literature for product managers.

你写过产品经理圈里流传最广的文章之一，因此出了名。

What I was trying to get out in Good Product Manager, Bad Product Manager, was the job is fundamentally a leadership job.

我在 Good Product Manager, Bad Product Manager 里想讲的是：这份工作本质上是个领导岗。

And it's a tricky leadership job because nobody is actually reporting to you.

而且是个很棘手的领导岗，因为其实没有一个人向你汇报。

There's always this kind of sense that the PM is not the mini CEO.

圈里总有一种说法：PM 不是什么“小 CEO”。

How dare you call yourself that?

你也配这么自称？

I actually think that's exactly what the PM is.

但我恰恰觉得，PM 就是这个角色。

It doesn't matter if you write a good, spec or you have a good interview or you do this or do that.

你 spec 写得好不好、访谈做得漂不漂亮、这个那个做没做，都不重要。

What matters is that the product works.

唯一重要的是：产品成不成。

Today my guest is Ben Horowitz.

今天的嘉宾是 Ben Horowitz。

Ben is the Z in a16z, the world's largest venture capital firm with over 46 billion in committed capital.

Ben 就是 a16z 里的那个 Z——全球规模最大的风投机构，承诺资本超过 46 billion。

They're investors in OpenAI, Cursor, Anduril, Databricks, Figma, basically every generational tech company.

他们投了 OpenAI、Cursor、Anduril、Databricks、Figma，基本上每一家划时代的科技公司背后都有他们。

He's also the author of two New York Times bestselling books, the Hard Thing About Hard Things and What You Do is Who you are.

他还写过两本《纽约时报》畅销书：The Hard Thing About Hard Things 和 What You Do Is Who You Are。

Ben is endlessly fascinating.

Ben 这个人有意思到没有尽头。

He started a rap group when he was younger.

他年轻时组过说唱团体。

He started his career as a product manager and wrote the now famous Good Product Manager, Bad Product Manager piece.

他的职业生涯从产品经理起步，写下了如今广为流传的那篇 Good Product Manager, Bad Product Manager。

In our wide-ranging conversation, we cover a ton of ground and Ben shares stories and insights that he's never shared anywhere else.

这次对话跨度极大，聊了非常多，Ben 讲了不少他从没在别处讲过的故事和洞见。

A huge thank you to Shaka Senghor, Ali Ghodsi, and Adam Neumann for suggesting topics for this conversation.

特别感谢 Shaka Senghor、Ali Ghodsi 和 Adam Neumann 为这次对话提供了话题建议。

If you enjoy this podcast, don't forget to subscribe and follow it in your favorite podcasting app or YouTube.

如果你喜欢这档播客，别忘了在你常用的播客 app 或 YouTube 上订阅关注。

It helps tremendously.

这对我们帮助极大。

And if you become an annual subscriber of my newsletter, you get a year free of 15 incredible products, including a year free of Lovable, Replit, Bolt, n8n, Linear, Superhuman, Descript, Wispr Flow, Gamma, Perplexity, Warp, Granola, Magic Patterns, Raycast, ChatPRD, and Mobbin.

如果你成为我 newsletter 的年度订阅者，还能免费用一年 15 款优秀产品，包括 Lovable、Replit、Bolt、n8n、Linear、Superhuman、Descript、Wispr Flow、Gamma、Perplexity、Warp、Granola、Magic Patterns、Raycast、ChatPRD 和 Mobbin。

Check it out at lennysnewsletter.com and click Product Pass.

去 lennysnewsletter.com 看看，点 Product Pass。

With that, I bring you Ben Horowitz.

那么，有请 Ben Horowitz。

Today's episode is brought to you by DX, the developer intelligence platform designed by leading researchers.

本期节目由 DX 赞助播出，这是一个由顶尖研究者设计的开发者智能平台。

To thrive in the AI era, organizations need to adapt quickly.

想在 AI 时代活得好，组织必须快速适应。

But many organization leaders struggle to answer pressing questions like which tools are working?

但很多组织的负责人答不上来一些迫在眉睫的问题：哪些工具真的有用？

How are they being used?

它们到底怎么被用起来的？

What's actually driving value?

什么在真正创造价值？

DX provides the data and insights leaders need to navigate this shift.

DX 提供管理者穿越这轮变化所需要的数据和洞见。

With DX.

用上 DX 之后。

Companies like Dropbox, Booking.com, Adyen, and Intercom get a deep understanding of how AI is providing value to their developers and what impact AI is having on engineering productivity.

Dropbox、Booking.com、Adyen、Intercom 这些公司深入看清了 AI 给自家开发者带来了什么价值，以及 AI 对工程效率的影响。

To learn more, visit DX's website at getdx.com/Lenny.

想了解更多，访问 DX 的网站 getdx.com/Lenny。

That's getdx.com/Lenny.

就是 getdx.com/Lenny。

This episode is brought to you by Basecamp.

本期节目由 Basecamp 赞助播出。

Basecamp is the famously straightforward project management system from 37signals.

Basecamp 是 37signals 出品的项目管理系统，以简单直接著称。

Most project management systems are either inadequate or frustratingly complex, but Basecamp is refreshingly clear.

大多数项目管理系统要么功能不够，要么复杂得让人抓狂，Basecamp 则清爽得让人耳目一新。

It's simple to get started, easy to organize, and Basecamp's visual tools help you see exactly what everyone is working on and how all work is progressing.

上手简单、整理方便，Basecamp 的可视化工具让你一眼看清每个人在做什么、所有工作推进到哪一步。

Keep all your files and conversations about projects directly connected to the projects themselves, so that you always know where stuff is and you're not constantly switching contexts.

项目相关的所有文件和对话都直接挂在项目上，你永远知道东西在哪，不用一直切换上下文。

Running a business is hard.

经营一家公司很难。

Managing your project should be easy.

管理项目应该很容易。

I've been a long-time fan of what 37signals has been up to, and I'm really excited to be sharing this with you.

我关注 37signals 在做的事很久了，很高兴能把它推荐给你。

Sign up for a free account at basecamp.com/lenny.

去 basecamp.com/lenny 免费注册一个账号。

Get somewhere with Basecamp.

用 Basecamp，把事推到位。

Ben, thank you so much for being here and welcome to the podcast.

Ben，非常感谢你来，欢迎做客节目。

All right, thank you Lenny.

好的，谢谢你 Lenny。

Excited to be here.

很高兴来这儿。

I'm even more excited to have you here.

我更高兴你能来。

I want to start with a question that a close friend of yours suggested I ask you, Shaka Senghor.

开场我想问一个问题，是你的好朋友 Shaka Senghor 建议我问的。

So Shaka, he's, we could do an hour just on how interesting this guy and the things he's done.

Shaka 这个人——光是聊他这个人有多有意思、他做过些什么，就能聊一个小时。

Three hours on Joe Rogan that day.

那天他在 Joe Rogan 那儿聊了三个小时。

He is very-

他非常——

So we're not going to do that.

所以我们就不聊那么久了。

Just to give a glimpse, he was in prison for 19 years.

简单勾勒一下：他坐了 19 年牢。

He was in solitary for seven years.

其中七年是单独监禁。

He led a huge prison gang.

他领导过一个规模很大的监狱帮派。

You wrote about him in your book as a great exemplar of great culture in the prison gang that he ran.

你在书里写过他，把他运营的那个监狱帮派当成优秀文化的典范。

So interesting.

太有意思了。

But something that he learned from you that he told me I need to ask you about is about success and how to be successful and how it's not what people think.

但他从你这儿学到的一件事，他说我一定得问问你，是关于成功——怎么才算成功，以及它跟大家想的根本不是一回事。

And he said that you learned this lesson from a pilot.

他说这个道理你是从一个飞行员那儿学来的。

What is that story?

那个故事是什么？

What is that lesson?

那个道理是什么？

I mean, I would say it's a long life lesson.

我会说，这是一辈子的功课。

But the pilot story is I actually, I ask people silly questions sometimes when they meet them.

但飞行员那个故事是这样：我见到人的时候，有时候会问一些傻问题。

And so I met this gentleman who was a pilot and it was right around the time JFK Jr.

我认识了一位飞行员，那阵子正好是 JFK Jr.

crashed his airplane and ultimately died.

驾机失事、最后遇难的时候。

And I asked him, I was like, "What happened?"

我就问他：“到底发生了什么？”

Because there's always the story in the press, and I know this from them writing about me or anything, is it's always what's the best narrative not what's true.

因为媒体上永远有一个版本的故事，这一点我很清楚——他们写我的时候也一样——那永远是最好的叙事，而不是真相。

So you can never actually find out what happened, you just find the best story version of what happened.

所以你永远查不到真正发生了什么，你只能看到一个最会讲的版本。

And the story in the press was all about, "Oh, he wasn't trained on instrumentation was flying at night."

媒体的说法全都是：“哦，他没受过仪表飞行训练，还在夜里飞。”

And I wanted to know is that right?

我想知道，这说法对吗？

And the pilot said, "Well," he said, "really, it's like all plane crashes are a series of bad decisions.

飞行员说：“其实吧，所有的空难都是一连串糟糕决策。

And none of the decisions by themselves is that bad, but when you add them up, it's bad."

每一个决策单拎出来都不算太糟，但加起来就要命了。”

So the first decision was he needed to get wherever he was going and that was the priority.

第一个决策是：他必须赶到目的地，这是最高优先级。

And in flying, that can't ever be the priority because there are conditions, there are things that happen.

而在飞行里，这永远不能是最高优先级，因为天气有条件、路上有意外。

And then the second one was, "Well, his timing of when the sun would go down was wrong."

第二个是：“他把日落的时间算错了。”

So he thought he'd be flying in sunlight and he wasn't.

他以为自己会在日光里飞，结果不是。

And then once he got up there, it was when the plane was going down making it go up was a bad decision because he was upside down.

然后飞上去之后，飞机在往下掉的时候他去拉升，这是个坏决策，因为当时飞机是倒着的。

And so it was like, I can't remember all the things, but this guy had 17 bad decisions in a row.

我记不全所有细节了，但这家伙连着做了 17 个糟糕决策。

And the big thing for me that I felt was really true is it's one decision leads to another.

对我来说最大的、我觉得特别真实的一点是：一个决策会牵出下一个决策。

And so if you can break psychologically, you can take the sunk cost, then that gets you out of a lot of bad paths.

所以如果你能在心理上刹住车，能认掉沉没成本，就能把自己从很多条错路上拽出来。

And then a little good decision may be difficult, but you have to believe it's going to lead to the next one.

然后一个小的好决策，也许很难做，但你得相信它会牵出下一个好决策。

And a lot of success is about that.

成功很大程度上就是这么回事。

It's a small thing, a small thing that's hard to do that doesn't seem to have a high impact, but it leads to the next small hard to do thing and then eventually you get an outcome, so that was kind of the concept.

是一件小事，一件很难做、看上去也没什么影响力的小事，但它会牵出下一件难做的小事，最后你就拿到了结果——大概是这么个概念。

So the lesson there is just success is just a bunch of little things.

所以这里的道理是：成功就是一堆小事堆出来的。

It's not this, "Cool, I got here in a big thing."

不是那种“太好了，我靠一件大事到这儿了”。

If somebody were to write a story about me, they would be like, "Then Ben this really smart thing and blah, blah, blah, happy ending."

如果有人给我写个故事，会写成：“然后 Ben 做了这么一件绝顶聪明的事，balabala，皆大欢喜。”

But it really wasn't like that and I don't think it's like that for you or anybody.

但根本不是那样，我觉得对你、对任何人都不是那样。

And I spent a lot of time with Shaka on how, because it's always your own psychology that gets you.

我和 Shaka 花了很多时间聊这个，因为最终绊住你的永远是你自己的心理。

And one of the most insightful things he said to me is, because most people who are in solitary for seven years, that's it.

他跟我说过一句特别有洞察力的话——因为大多数人在单独监禁待七年，就到头了。

You're insane.

你会疯掉。

You're never coming back from that.

你再也回不来了。

It's just an impossible thing.

这几乎是不可能的事。

But if you study his story, he actually really was massively self-improved coming out of solitary, and he wouldn't recommend that for anybody, just to be clear.

但如果你研究他的经历，他从单独监禁出来之后是真的脱胎换骨了——先说清楚，他绝不建议任何人去走这条路。

It wasn't solitary.

起作用的不是单独监禁本身。

But what it was was he changed, in solitary he was able to change a big set of beliefs that he had about himself that got him out of that.

真正起作用的是，在单独监禁里他改掉了一大套关于自己的信念，是这个把他捞了出来。

And the thing that his conclusion from it, which I thought was really interesting, he's like, "Look, was in prison for 19 years.

他得出的结论我觉得特别有意思，他说：“你看，我坐了 19 年牢。

I was in solitary for seven.

其中七年单独监禁。

I come out, I can't rent an apartment, I can't vote, I can't get a gun, I can't do, no rights.

出来以后，我租不了房、投不了票、买不了枪，什么都做不了，没有任何权利。

None of that was anything compared to what I did to myself."

但这些加起来，都比不上我曾经对自己做的那些事。”

And I think that's very true for CEOs in general and people in general is all the things that you perceive that are happening to you that are bad, be it the systems against you or somebody undercuts you or racism or sexism or this or that or the other is very small compared to ...

我觉得这一点对 CEO、对所有人都非常成立：所有你以为正在发生在你身上的坏事——体制针对你、有人背后捅你、种族歧视、性别歧视、这个那个——跟那件事比起来都很小。

It means a lot if you believe it.

它有多大分量，取决于你信不信。

If you believe what people say about you, if you believe what they did to you, then that destroys you.

如果你信了别人怎么说你，如果你信了别人对你做过的事，那它就毁了你。

But if you go, "That's not me," you can overcome almost anything.

但如果你说“那不是我”，你几乎可以扛过任何事。

And he's got a new book out on that anyway that I think is very good because that's the, I'd say more than anything, that's the key to success.

他刚出了本新书讲这个，我觉得很好，因为这——要我说，这比什么都重要，这就是成功的钥匙。

If you look at all the writing you've done, it's essentially about the struggle and pain and suffering of being a CEO, your first [inaudible 00:09:59] to Hard Thing About Hard Things.

回看你写过的所有东西，本质上都是在写当 CEO 的挣扎、痛苦和煎熬，你的第一本书 [听不清 00:09:59] The Hard Thing About Hard Things。

There's a lot of talk these days about just how important struggle is and how valuable it is to go through struggle.

这几年很多人在谈挣扎有多重要、走过一遍挣扎有多值钱。

Jensen's big on this.

Jensen 对这事特别执着。

He talks a lot about just you have to go through pain and suffering to be a great leader.

他一直在讲：你必须经历痛苦和煎熬，才能成为一个了不起的领导者。

You don't really have a choice.

你其实没得选。

That's true.

这是真的。

There's something that I saw you share that I love, which is running towards fear versus running away from fear.

我看到你分享过一个说法，我特别喜欢：迎着恐惧上，而不是逃开恐惧。

Something that you tell all your leaders to work on.

这是你让所有你带的领导者都去练的一件事。

Easy to hear, hard to do.

听着容易，做起来难。

We don't like doing things that are scary, running towards things that are scary.

我们都不喜欢做吓人的事，更不喜欢主动往吓人的事上冲。

Why is this so important?

为什么这件事这么重要？

Why is this something people need to learn to do?

为什么这是每个人都得学会的？

Well, so the biggest mistake that you make, the worst thing that you do as a leader, there's things in your control and there's things out of your control and hesitation, that's generally the most destructive.

最大的错误、当领导者最糟糕的那件事——有些事在你控制之内，有些不在——而犹豫通常是最有破坏力的。

And I go through all the ways that it's destructive, but it's extremely bad.

它有多少种破坏方式我都能一条条讲，但总之极其糟糕。

And the thing that causes you to hesitate is both decisions are horrible.

而让你犹豫的原因是：两个决策都烂透了。

It's that business school where you're going through a case study, "And if you had done that, then the company would have gone this way.

商学院里做案例分析是那样的：“你要是选了那个，公司就走上这条路。

But if you had done that, it's a great success."

你要是选了这个，就是大成功。”

That's not actually what happens to you as CEO.

但当 CEO 的时候根本不是这么回事。

What happens to as CEO, it's like, "Okay, if we rearchitect, this product, the architecture is not actually get us to where we need to go.

当 CEO 真实发生的是：“好，如果我们重构这个产品——现在的架构其实撑不到我们想去的地方。

I kind of know that.

这个我心里有数。

But if we rearchitect it, we're going to probably miss all the features, miss the quarter, have trouble raising money, shudder, et cetera.

但如果重构，我们大概率会做不完所有功能、砸掉这个季度、融资出问题、股价跳水，等等。

So that's really bad.

所以这条路很糟。

And then not rearchitecting is really bad, and so I'm just going to try to and avoid this subject because I don't even want to deal with either of those."

然后不重构也很糟，所以我干脆躲着这个话题不谈，因为我哪一边都不想面对。”

And that's the worst thing, because if action is the better choice and that's good.

这才是最糟的，因为如果行动是更好的选择，那就该行动。

And then if you don't make an explicit decision, then the whole company's going to get nervous because they know that the architecture is whack and you got to fix it.

而如果你不做出一个明确的决定，整个公司都会开始不安，因为他们知道架构烂透了，你必须修。

And probably one of my bigger ones on that was we went public with $2 million in trailing 12 months revenue at 18 months old.

我自己比较大的一次，是公司成立 18 个月、过去 12 个月收入只有 $2 million 的时候就上市了。

That's obviously a bad idea.

这显然是个馊主意。

I mean, there's no question that wasn't a bad idea.

毫无疑问，这确实是个馊主意。

But the truth of it was the alternative because of where the private markets were was going bankrupt.

但真相是，鉴于当时私募市场的状况，另一个选项是破产。

And that's a worse idea.

那更糟。

And if you look at that time, March of 2001 when we went public, you just look at the number of CEOs that hesitated on that and didn't do it and went bankrupt.

你回头看那个时间点，我们上市是 2001 年 3 月，你数数有多少 CEO 在这件事上犹豫了、没做、然后破产了。

It's a lot.

非常多。

And so that getting good at making a decision that everybody's going to go, "Wow, that was insane, Ben."

所以练成那种能力——做一个所有人都会说“天呐 Ben，这太疯了”的决定。

The Wall Street Journal wrote a whole long story about how stupid I was.

《华尔街日报》专门写了一篇长文讲我有多蠢。

And then Businessweek wrote a story called the IPO From Hell.

然后《商业周刊》写了一篇叫《地狱来的 IPO》。

That was the name of our idea, the IPO from hell, which was accurate in a sense.

这就成了我们那次的名号，地狱来的 IPO——某种意义上还挺准确。

So that's really bad, but it wasn't as bad, and this is why it's so scary you make that decision that's going to happen.

所以这很糟，但没有那么糟；正因为你知道这些一定会发生，做那个决定才这么吓人。

I knew those stories would get written, there was no question.

我当时就知道那些报道一定会被写出来，毫无疑问。

And yeah, that's the kind of muscle.

对，这就是那块肌肉。

So if you think about the psychological muscle you have to build to be a great leader is to be able to look in the abyss and go, "Okay, that way slightly better.

所以你想想，想当一个了不起的领导者，你必须练出的那块心理肌肉，是能盯着深渊说：“好，那条路稍微好一点。

We're going to go that way.

我们就走那条。

And it's very hard to do."

这非常难做到。”

I would say it's a thing people struggle with.

我会说这是大家普遍卡住的地方。

And it began something, should I fire the head of sales?

一开始可能只是一件小事：我该不该开掉销售负责人？

So I don't want to have that conversation.

我不想去谈那场话。

And then I'll have to replace them.

然后我还得再招一个。

And then there's going to be a bad PR story.

然后会出一篇负面公关报道。

And you can kind of quickly calculate all the bad stuff that's going to happen if you do it.

你能很快算出来，做了会有哪些坏事。

But if you don't do it, that's probably going to be much worse and that's why you have to run towards the pain in darkness.

但你不做，多半会糟糕得多——所以你必须朝着黑暗中的痛处走过去。

What is the advice you share with founders?

你会给创始人什么建议？

Because as you said, it's very hard to do this, just what helps them actually get better at this?

因为像你说的，这非常难做，到底什么能帮他们真的变强？

Is it just Ben being by their side telling them this is how it is?

是不是就得有个 Ben 在旁边告诉他们事实就是这样？

Is there anything else you can share?

还有别的可以分享吗？

No, no.

没有，没有。

I would say this is one where I can't really coach you to be good at this.

我得说，这件事我真没法把你教会。

I can point it out so that you recognize that you were slow or whatever.

我能做的是把它点出来，让你意识到自己刚才慢了半拍之类的。

But it's kind of like I always liken when I talk to them, it's like football.

我跟他们聊的时候常打个比方，就像橄榄球。

You can have a really fast great athlete, but if they don't trust their eyes, if they don't run to the ball when they see it, if they think, "Oh, maybe that was a fake," then they're that step slower and then they'll never be as good.

你可以有一个特别快的顶级运动员，但如果他不信自己的眼睛，看到球不冲上去，心里想“哦，这会不会是个假动作”，那他就慢了那一步，永远成不了顶尖。

And CEOs are like that.

CEO 也一样。

If you don't trust what you see and you don't run at it, then you're just not going to be good.

如果你不信自己看到的东西，不朝它冲过去，那你就是做不好。

And it's hard to get CEOs not to hesitate.

让 CEO 不犹豫，很难。

But look, the thing that does help is they look at it and I look at it and I confirm, "No, that is as it appears."

但确实有用的是：他们看一眼，我也看一眼，然后我确认——“没错，它就是你看到的那样。”

And sometimes they're afraid of the conversation.

有时候他们是害怕那场对话。

So that one I can help with.

这个我倒能帮上忙。

So A CEO might be afraid, like they want to do something but they don't know how to say it.

比如一位 CEO 可能心里怕，他想做某件事，但不知道怎么开口。

They don't know how to have the conversation with the employee so I can walk them through that.

他不知道怎么跟员工谈这件事，那我可以陪他过一遍。

I had an instance where the CEO said, "Hey, I need your help, Ben.

有一次一位 CEO 说：“Ben，我需要你帮个忙。

My CTO, he's an asshole."

我的 CTO，他是个混蛋。”

And I was like, "Okay, great."

我说：“好啊，太好了。”

I said, "But you're not going to fire him because I know he's a good CTO, or are you asking me should you fire him?"

我说：“但你不会开掉他，因为我知道他是个好 CTO——还是说你在问我该不该开掉他？”

He said, "No, no, I don't want to fire him."

他说：“不不不，我不想开掉他。”

And I was like, "So you're asking me what to do?

我就说：“所以你是在问我该怎么办？

You don't know how have that conversation with him about being an without him quitting.

你不知道怎么跟他谈他是个混蛋这件事，又不让他撂挑子走人。

That's what you're saying?"

你是这个意思吧？”

And he goes, "Yeah, that's the problem."

他说：“对，问题就在这儿。”

And so I go, "Well, why is he an asshole?"

我就问：“那他为什么是个混蛋？”

And he says, "Well, he's an asshole because the other day he made a very junior young woman in our finance organization cry."

他说：“他是个混蛋，是因为前几天他把我们财务部一个很年轻的姑娘说哭了。”

And I was like, "Yeah, I got you."

我说：“行，我懂了。”

I said, "Look, this is what I would say to him.

我说：“听着，换我会这么跟他讲。

I'd say I just sit them down and I would say, 'Look, you're a really good director of engineering because you do a great job at managing the team, get the products out, all that.

我会把他叫过来坐下，说：‘听着，你是个非常好的工程总监，因为你团队带得好、产品交付得好，这些都做得漂亮。

But you're not really a CTO because to be a CTO, you have to be effective with other parts of the organization.

但你还不是一个 CTO，因为要当 CTO，你得能跟组织的其他部分打交道并且有效。

You can't just be effective only with engineering.

你不能只在工程内部有效。

And making somebody cry, she's never going to do anything you want.

你把人说哭了，她以后不会再为你做任何事。

You lost all effectiveness with all of finance by doing that.

你那一下把整个财务部门对你的有效性全丢光了。

And so if you want to get good at that, I'll help you.

如果你想练好这一块，我帮你。

I'll work with you on it, but if you don't, I'm going to have to hire a CTO at some point because obviously I need that.'"

我会跟你一起弄；但如果你不想，那我早晚得再招一个 CTO，因为这块能力我显然需要。’”

And then he was like, "Oh, okay, I can have that conversation.

然后他说：“哦，好，这个话我说得出口。

I can't have the conversation that, 'Hey, you're an asshole,' because I don't want them to quit, but I can have the conversation that's more specific."

我说不出口的是‘嘿，你是个混蛋’，因为我不想让他走人；但更具体的这个版本，我说得出来。”

And a lot of getting people not to hesitate is just getting them over that.

让人不犹豫，很大一部分就是帮他们跨过这道坎。

And so often, and I would say early in a CEO's career, a lot of it is just not knowing how to have the conversation.

而且我得说，一个 CEO 生涯早期，很多时候就是不知道那场对话该怎么谈。

There's also I imagine an element of I just want to be liked.

我想还有一层是：我就是想被人喜欢。

I don't want people to hate me.

我不想让别人恨我。

You have this great line that you want to be liked and respected in the long run, not the short run.

你有句话我很喜欢：你要的是长期被喜欢和被尊重，而不是短期。

Yeah, that's tricky.

对，这事很微妙。

By the way, I have to deal with this in the firm too, and people want to be entrepreneur friendly.

顺便说，我在自己公司里也得处理这个，大家都想“对创业者友好”。

I'm like, "No, it's not friendly.

我说：“不，不是友好。

Respectful.

是尊重。

But you've got to be able to tell them the truth in a way that you probably don't tell most of your friends the truth."

但你必须能用一种你多半不会对朋友用的方式，把真话告诉他们。”

Because your friend, look anthropologically, we want people to like us.

因为朋友嘛——从人类学的角度看，我们本能地希望别人喜欢我们。

It's just so they don't throw us to the lion or whatever.

无非是怕被扔去喂狮子之类的。

That's just kind of a thing.

这就是人的本能。

So you say tell people what they want to hear, but in dealing at a company level in a context of you're on the board of somebody's company, you've got to be able to tell them what they don't want to hear.

所以你会倾向于说别人爱听的话；但在公司层面，在你坐在某人董事会里的语境下，你必须能说出他不爱听的话。

That's the most important thing you're going to say.

那才是你要说的最重要的东西。

And yes, they're not going to like it when you say it, there's no question.

是，说的当口他们肯定不爱听，这毫无疑问。

But over time it could save the company.

但长期看，它可能救了这家公司。

And all the most important things I've said are things that I've said to CEOs that they did not want to hear.

我说过的所有最重要的话，都是说给 CEO 听、而他们并不想听的。

And that's what the leadership is about.

领导力就是这么回事。

If everybody agrees with the decision, then you didn't add any value because they would've done that without you.

如果所有人都赞同这个决定，那你没创造任何价值——没有你他们也会那么干。

So the only value you ever add is when you make a decision that most people don't like and that's where leadership comes in because you know that's where it's got to get to.

所以你唯一创造价值的时刻，就是你做了一个多数人不喜欢的决定；领导力恰恰体现在这儿，因为你知道最后必须走到那一步。

And that's the thing that takes practice.

而这件事需要练。

I think when Jensen talks about luck, you've got to get to near death to get yourself to do that.

我觉得 Jensen 讲运气的时候是这个意思：你得走到濒死那一步，才能逼自己做到这个。

That's true.

这是真的。

It's hard to build that if everything's going great.

一路顺风顺水，是很难练出这块肌肉的。

And I would say the CEOs who had an easy run of it for their, let's say, they just launched a product that's an instant hit, it's very hard for them to develop that muscle compared to the ones that built a company like Jensen where he gutted it out for multiple decades before they had big success.

要我说，那些一路走得轻松的 CEO——比如一上来发个产品就爆了——他们练出这块肌肉的难度，比 Jensen 那种熬了几十年才做出大成绩的人要大得多。

Clearly, it's very difficult and painful to be a CEO, to be a founder.

显然，当 CEO、当创始人极其艰难又痛苦。

In spite of that so many people want to start companies.

尽管如此，还是有那么多人想创业。

So many people dream of having their own company.

那么多人梦想有一家自己的公司。

Who is not right to start a company?

什么样的人不适合创业？

What advice do you share with folks that are thinking about starting a company that may not understand just what they're about to get into?

对于那些正在考虑创业、可能还没搞清楚自己要跳进什么坑里的人，你会给什么建议？

Yeah, so it's funny.

嗯，说来有意思。

So there's a couple of things.

有那么几件事。

John Reed, who was the CEO of Citigroup when I started as CEO, said to me something I never forget.

John Reed，我当 CEO 那会儿他是花旗集团的 CEO，跟我说过一句我一直忘不了的话。

He said, "Ben, the only reason to start a company is because you have an irrational desire to do so, because it's not worth the money."

他说：“Ben，创业唯一的理由，是你有一种不理性的冲动要去做——因为它不值这个钱。”

And I was like, "Wow, he doesn't even quantify how much money and this guy's running Citigroup."

我当时想：“天，他连多少钱都懒得算，而这人管着花旗。”

So he is a very numbers, banking guy and he didn't quantify it.

他是个极度数字导向的银行家，居然不给它定量。

And I remember when we sold LoudCloud for $1.6 billion, I remember thinking, "Wow, that wasn't worth the money whatsoever."

我记得我们把 LoudCloud 卖了 $1.6 billion 的时候，我心想：“天呐，这压根不值这个钱。”

So I think if you're doing it for the money, that's a very bad reason and it will be extremely difficult to get you an outcome.

所以我觉得，如果你是为了钱去干这件事，那是个非常糟的理由，而且会让你极难拿到结果。

You really have to have an irrational desire to do something larger than yourself to improve the world in some way that somehow that is your purpose.

你必须真的有一种不理性的冲动，去做一件比你自己更大的事，去以某种方式让世界变好，仿佛那就是你的天命。

And if you don't feel that, then you'll never get through it.

如果你没有那种感觉，你永远熬不过去。

It's just too many bad things happen along the way.

路上要发生的糟心事实在太多了。

So then how do you think of founders that are looking around for ideas that brainstorm, that look for market opportunities versus come from, "I have this a mission, I've got to do this thing in the world."

那你怎么看这样的创始人：他们四处找点子、头脑风暴、找市场机会，而不是那种“我有一个使命，我非把这件事做出来不可”？

My business partner Mark always talks about that.

我的合伙人 Mark 老聊这个。

So if you have a product that forces you to build a company, that is a great case of it, right?

如果你手上有个产品，逼着你不得不去建一家公司，那是最好的情形，对吧？

Okay, you built something and the world wants it and you need a company to deliver it, you know, already have the right product.

你造出了个东西，世界想要它，你需要一家公司来交付它——你已经有对的产品了。

And so that's very helpful.

这种情况非常好办。

I think there are cases of people, I think Hewlett-Packard was built that way, that they're like, "Okay, we've got to build technology," it was that abstract, "We've got built in technology for the world."

但我觉得也有另一种，惠普我觉得就是这么起来的：他们的想法是“我们要做技术”，抽象到这个程度，“我们要为世界做技术”。

And then they started with, "Well, what do you need?"

然后他们从这儿开始问：“那你需要什么？”

They called it the next bench thing.

他们管这叫“隔壁工作台”。

What does the engineer sitting next to me need?

坐我旁边的那个工程师需要什么？

The next engineer on the bench?

工作台上下一个工程师需要什么？

So how they define the first set of products.

他们就是这么定义第一批产品的。

So it can work the other way, but I think the thing that is in common is it's just a very abstract idea that you have to build something that's going to be important that people are going to like working there, people are going to benefit from the products.

所以反过来也行得通，但我觉得共同点在于：那是一个非常抽象的念头——你必须造出某个重要的东西，让大家愿意在这儿工作、让大家能从产品里受益。

You have to have some weird concept other than, "Oh, this is going to be successful and I'm going to make a lot of money."

你必须有某种奇怪的执念，而不是“哦，这个会成，我能赚一大笔”。

I think way better off taking Zuck's offer at Meta and just doing that.

那还不如去接 Zuck 在 Meta 给你的 offer，直接干那个。

That's a way better deal.

那是划算得多的买卖。

Along these lines, something else Shaka suggested I ask you about, apparently there's a story where the CEO of Databricks asked you for $200,000 in the early days and you said no.

顺着这条线，还有一个 Shaka 建议我问你的事：好像有个故事是 Databricks 的 CEO 早期找你要 $200,000，你说不。

And it's not because you didn't want to invest and it was more about helping them think bigger.

不是因为你不想投，更多是想帮他们把格局放大。

What happened there?

当时发生了什么？

So there were six of them, they were six PhD students, well, and Ion Stoica who was their professor.

他们一共六个人，六个博士生，还有他们的教授 Ion Stoica。

And Ion was this super genius, but when I met with them, they were like, "We need to raise $200,000."

Ion 是个超级天才，但我见他们的时候，他们说：“我们要融 $200,000。”

And I knew at the time that what they had was this thing called Spark and the competitor was something called Hadoop.

我当时就知道，他们手上这个东西叫 Spark，而竞争对手是一个叫 Hadoop 的东西。

And Hadoop had very well-funded companies already running towards it and Spark was open source, so the clock was ticking.

Hadoop 那边已经有几家融资很充足的公司在往前冲了，Spark 是开源的，所以时钟在滴答走。

And I think they didn't quite know what they had.

我觉得他们不太清楚自己手里握着什么。

And then there's also a thing always, although I wouldn't say Ion has this mentality, but professors in general it's a pretty big win if you start a company and you make $50 million.

另外还有一件事一直存在——虽然我不会说 Ion 有这种心态——但教授群体普遍会觉得，你创个业赚了 $50 million 就已经是相当大的胜利了。

You're a hero on campus.

你在校园里就是英雄。

That's a pretty cool thing to have done.

那确实是件挺酷的事。

And so I'm always a little nervous about a company that comes out of academia thinking too small anyway.

所以对于从学术圈里出来的公司，我总有点担心它们想得太小。

And so I said, "Look, I'm not going to write you a check for $200,000.

于是我说：“听着，我不会给你开一张 $200,000 的支票。

I'll write you a check for $10 million because this company, you need to build a company.

我给你开一张 $10 million 的。因为这家公司——你得去建一家公司。

You need to really go for it if you're going to do this, otherwise you guys should stay in school."

你要做这件事，就得真的往死里做；不然你们就该继续待在学校。”

And they were all graduating right then, so that was kind of that.

而他们当时正好都要毕业了，所以就这么定了。

And Ali actually was VP of engineering at the time, and it was a while before I made him CEO and that was very good luck on my part because I had no idea that they had a guide that good inside the company who could become CEO when I invested.

Ali 当时其实是工程 VP，过了一阵我才让他当 CEO——这一点上我运气极好，因为我投的时候完全不知道公司里藏着这么一号能接 CEO 的人。

That was just, God smiled on me and gave me that one.

那纯粹是上天赏了我一个。

So speaking of Ali, I actually asked him what to ask you about, and he immediately shared this story.

说到 Ali，我其实也问过他该问你点什么，他张口就讲了这个故事。

I don't know if you remember this.

不知道你还记不记得。

In your first one-on-one with him, after you-

你们第一次 one-on-one，在你——

I don't know if you remember this.

不知道你还记不记得。

In your first one-on-one with him, after you made him CEO, he was struggling with a bunch of low performers because he was coming in to lead the company and he was trying to turn things around, trying to coach them, trying to level them up.

你们第一次 one-on-one，在你让他当 CEO 之后，他正被一堆低绩效的人折腾得够呛，因为他刚接手要带这家公司、要扭转局面，一直在试着辅导他们、把他们的水平拉上来。

And your advice to him was quote, "You don't make people great.

你给他的建议原话是：“你没法把人变得很强。

You find people that make you great, that make the company great, that you learned from, not the other way around."

你要找的是那些能让你变强、能让公司变强、你能从他们身上学到东西的人，而不是反过来。”

And there's something that he called managerial leverage.

还有一个他称之为管理杠杆的东西。

What is that all about?

这到底是什么意思？

What's the lesson there?

这里的道理是什么？

Oh yeah, yeah.

哦对，对。

So understand, he had just become CEO.

你得理解，他当时刚当上 CEO。

So I was teaching him, he had been VP of Engineering and CEO is different.

所以我是在教他：他之前是工程 VP，而 CEO 是另一回事。

And I'll get into why and what I mean by leverage.

我马上会讲到为什么，以及我说的杠杆是什么意思。

So I actually wrote a post about this with a Lil Wayne quote where I think the quote was, "The truth is hard to swallow and hard to say too but I graduated from that bullshit, now I hate school."

我其实为这事写过一篇文章，开头引了一句 Lil Wayne 的词，我记得是：“真话难以下咽，也难以出口／但我从那堆屁话里毕业了，现在我恨学校。”

And that was always my feeling about this particular idea was, look, if you're VP of engineering, you can develop people.

我对这件事的感受一直是：你看，如果你是工程 VP，你可以培养人。

You can teach them to be better engineers.

你可以教他们成为更好的工程师。

You can teach them, be better engineering managers.

你可以教他们成为更好的工程经理。

That's very doable.

这完全做得到。

But if you're a CEO, what do you know about being CFO?

但如果你是 CEO，你对当 CFO 懂什么？

Like what do you know about being VP, HR?

你对当 HR 的 VP 懂什么？

What do you know about any of these jobs except maybe VP of engineering?

除了工程 VP，这些岗位你哪个懂？

And so the idea that you're going to take somebody who isn't world-class at marketing and make and you them world class and you don't know anything about marketing, is a dumb idea.

所以那种想法——你要拿一个在市场上不是世界级的人，把他培养成世界级，而你自己对市场一无所知——是个蠢主意。

It just doesn't work.

它就是行不通。

And then the company can't afford for you to be spending time on that because they need you to make very high quality, fast decisions.

而且公司也承受不起你把时间花在这上面，因为公司需要你做出非常高质量、非常快的决策。

They need you to set the direction for the company and they need you to have a world-class team.

公司需要你定方向，需要你有一支世界级的团队。

And so it's a very hard lesson if you've been VP of engineering because if you're a good VP of engineering, you do develop your people.

所以如果你出身工程 VP，这一课特别难学，因为一个好的工程 VP 是真的会培养自己的人。

But as a CEO, it's not like you don't do any of it, but it is very, very small compared to it.

但作为 CEO，不是说你完全不做这件事，而是它占的比重非常非常小。

So I like to make things just very stark.

所以我喜欢把话说得特别绝。

So you get what I'm saying?

你懂我意思吧？

I don't like to hedge it.

我不喜欢留余地。

And then managerial leverage means it is very simple.

至于管理杠杆，意思其实很简单。

It's okay.

是这样。

If I have the ideas about what your department should do next.

如果你的部门下一步该做什么，主意是我出的。

If I am kind of pushing you to kind of move your organization forward, then that's no leverage.

如果是我在推着你、推着你的组织往前走，那就是零杠杆。

What's leverage is if you're telling me what you should do and how you can push the company forward, that's leverage, then I'm getting more than I'd have if you weren't there otherwise I could just manage a team.

有杠杆是反过来：你来告诉我你该做什么、你能怎么把公司往前推，那才叫杠杆——我从你身上拿到的，比没有你的时候多；不然我自己带个团队就完了。

And that's the point when you feel like you're not getting leverage.

而当你感觉自己拿不到杠杆的时候，就到那个点了。

When you got to go say, "Hey, why aren't we doing this?

当你不得不开口问：“嘿，我们怎么没在做这个？

Why aren't we doing that?"

怎么没在做那个？”

That's when you got to make a change.

那就是你该换人的时候。

And by the way, he's unbelievable at that, as good as anybody I've seen as a guy who's not callous as a CEO.

顺便说，他在这件事上强得惊人，是我见过的人里最强的之一，而且他还不是那种冷血的 CEO。

He really cares about the people who work for him.

他真心在意为他工作的人。

He really wants him to have great careers and all that, but he does not hesitate.

他真心希望他们有很好的职业发展，但他绝不犹豫。

If he's losing leverage, he'll make a move.

一旦他发现杠杆在流失，他就会动手。

Kind of going back to the origin story of a16z something you guys were really big on was helping founders stay CEOs become great CEOs, not replace them with professional CEOs.

回到 a16z 最初的故事，你们当年特别看重的一件事，是帮创始人留在 CEO 位子上、成为优秀的 CEO，而不是换成职业经理人 CEO。

I want to flip this question on you.

我想把这个问题反过来问你。

When does it actually make sense to replace CEO?

什么时候换掉 CEO 才是真的合理？

When are people not going to make great CEOs?

什么样的人是当不好 CEO 的？

There's a very consistent thing that happens, which is when somebody doesn't make it and it kind of starts with confidence is the way I would put it.

有一个非常固定的模式：一个人做不下去，我会说，起点通常是信心。

So if you invent a product, you kind of recruit a team so forth, all of a sudden you're CEO, but you don't run a big organization, you don't know how to do that.

你发明了一个产品，招了个团队之类的，忽然之间你就是 CEO 了，可你从没管过一个大组织，你不会这个。

Most founders are like that.

大多数创始人都是这样。

And so, if you don't know what you're doing, you're going to make mistakes and they all make a lot of mistakes.

所以，如果你不知道自己在干什么，你就会犯错，而他们全都犯很多错。

And then when you make those mistakes, they're very expensive.

而这些错犯下去，代价非常高。

They could cost you to do a down round or they could cost you to lose a company or they could cost you a customer or you scrub the product.

可能让你做一轮 down round，可能让你丢掉公司，可能让你丢掉一个客户，或者产品被推翻重来。

They're very high impact and not just on you, but everybody who you talked into joining you.

这些事影响极大，而且不只影响你，还影响所有被你说动加入的人。

And so that kind of motion can really cause you to lose confidence.

这种动静真的会让你失去信心。

And then if you lose confidence, what happens is you hesitate on the next decision.

而一旦你失去信心，接下来发生的就是：你在下一个决策上犹豫了。

And as we talked about, hesitation is very dangerous because one, it locks up the company, but even worse what happens is if you have senior people working for you, they get very nervous and they feel like they need to jump into that void and make the decision for you.

正如我们说过的，犹豫非常危险：一是它把公司锁死了；更糟的是，如果你手下有资深的人，他们会变得非常不安，觉得自己得跳进这个真空、替你把决定做了。

And that's when it gets political, very political, because people are vying for power inside your little screwed up company.

然后事情就变得政治化，极度政治化，因为大家开始在你这家一团糟的小公司里争权。

And so now you've got a political dysfunctional organization and that's generally where, okay, the founder probably can't run this thing anymore.

于是你就有了一个政治化、功能失调的组织，通常到这儿就是：好吧，这位创始人多半带不动这家公司了。

That's how it happens.

事情就是这么发生的。

So most of what we do as a firm is to try to help people with that confidence problem and there's a whole series of ideas that we have around that, but you kind of have to somehow climb the confidence and the competency curve together.

所以我们这家机构做的大部分事，就是帮人解决那个信心问题，围绕这个我们有一整套做法；但你必须想办法让信心和能力这两条曲线一起往上爬。

It's very hard to do and particularly if you're an engineer and you're used to getting things right or if you've been a straight A student or something like that, it's very disconcerting.

这非常难，尤其如果你是工程师、习惯了把事情做对，或者你一直是个全 A 学生之类的，那会让你极度错乱。

Sometimes it's better to have CEOs who are like C minus students.

有时候 CEO 是 C- 学生出身反而更好。

Why is that?

为什么？

Yeah, a little facetious.

嗯，这话有点开玩笑。

Well, it's just good to be used to failing.

不过习惯失败确实是件好事。

So I think I wrote this, but the median on the CEO kind of test is like 18.

我好像写过：CEO 这门考试的中位分大概是 18 分。

It's not like 90.

不是 90 分。

And so you got to be comfortable getting a lot of D minuses because the D minus is fine, as long as you don't get the F, as long as you don't run out of cash, as long as you don't lose all thing.

所以你得能接受拿一堆 D-，因为 D- 没事，只要你别拿 F、别把现金烧光、别把一切都丢了。

Okay, you got through it, keep going.

好，你熬过来了，继续往前走。

And match, that's a lot of the thing that we try to do CEOs.

差不多，这就是我们努力想帮 CEO 做到的事。

Yeah, it comes back to your core, I don't know, message through your first book is just how much you'll fail and how much you'll struggle and how much pain you'll go through as CEO.

嗯，这又回到了你第一本书的核心讯息——当 CEO 你会失败多少次、会挣扎多久、会经历多少痛苦。

Yeah, yeah, and I mean a lot of why I wrote that book was just to normalize it.

对，对，我写那本书很大程度上就是为了让它变成一件正常的事。

I think what happens is, particularly when I wrote it, and I think it's come back and been true now, is the way the narrative gets written on all these successes is like, "Ph, they came up with a genius idea and then they built this company and they hired all these smart people and it was all great."

我觉得会这样，尤其我写它的时候，而且我觉得这事到今天又轮回了一遍：所有这些成功故事的叙事都被写成“哦，他们想出了一个天才点子，然后建了这家公司，招了一堆聪明人，一切都很美好”。

But that's not at all how it happens and I've spent enough time with everybody from Mark Zuckerberg to Sam Altman and so forth, that they all go through that same thing that who has your struggling company go through?

但事情完全不是这么发生的；我跟从 Mark Zuckerberg 到 Sam Altman 这些人都待过足够长的时间，他们全都经历过同一件事——你那家苦苦挣扎的公司经历过的事。

You screw a lot of things up and they have massive consequences, but you have to maintain your confidence.

你会把很多事搞砸，后果非常严重，但你必须守住自己的信心。

Actually, I was at a storytelling event last night and I was chatting with someone that I ran into there and told her I was chatting with you today, and she said how meaningful your first book was to her as a founder.

其实我昨晚在一个讲故事的活动上，跟一个偶然遇到的人聊天，说我今天要跟你录节目，她说你的第一本书对身为创始人的她有多大意义。

Exactly as you said, normalizing that it's very hard and painful and this is just the way it is.

正如你说的，它把“这件事非常难、非常痛苦，本来就是这样”变成了一件正常的事。

And the feeling, look, if you think about organizational design or goals and objectives or OKRs or whatever management technique, you need a basic eighth grade education to do any of that stuff.

还有那种感受——你想想组织设计、目标和 OKR，或者任何一种管理方法，做这些事只需要八年级的教育水平。

It is not that complicated.

它没那么复杂。

The difficult part is the feeling that you have when you have to do it is very, the hard thing of matter a reorg is you're redistributing power, so you're going to have people really fricking mad at you because somebody's losing power if you do it correctly.

难的是你做这件事时的那种感受：重组真正难的地方在于你在重新分配权力，所以一定会有人气得要死，因为只要你做对了，就一定有人失去权力。

And that person may be a really good employee.

而那个人可能还是个很好的员工。

Dealing with that is the hard thing.

应付这个，才是那个难事。

Knowing how the organization should work to make communication better, it's not that complex.

至于弄明白组织该怎么运转、怎么让沟通更顺畅，那没多复杂。

Yeah, I think about I was at Airbnb for a long time and just thinking of Brian, who I don't know even know if he had a job before Airbnb now.

嗯，我想到我在 Airbnb 待了很久，想到 Brian——我甚至不知道他在 Airbnb 之前有没有打过工。

Oh yeah.

哦是的。

I spent a lot of time with Brian and after COVID, it all kind of clicked for him and then he did that he and that good talk on founder mode and so forth.

我跟 Brian 待了很多时间，COVID 之后一切在他脑子里都对上了，然后他做了那场关于 founder mode 的著名演讲之类的。

But the reason that was so articulate is he had screwed every one of those things up and he hired LT and all this stuff, and these are very senior people and he wanted to defer to them, but you can't defer as the CEO because you know what Airbnb should be doing.

但他之所以能讲得那么透，是因为那些坑他一个不落全踩过：他招了一整个 LT，全是非常资深的人，他想放手让他们决定；可作为 CEO 你不能放手，因为你才知道 Airbnb 该做什么。

He may know what finance should do, but you know what Airbnb should do and this kind of thing.

他也许知道财务该怎么做，但你才知道 Airbnb 该往哪走，是这个道理。

And then it gets really wild when you can't defer decisions as the CEO.

然后作为 CEO，你没法把决策推出去的时候，事情就变得非常野。

You got to understand what people are saying and go, "Now we're going to do this."

你得听懂大家在说什么，然后说：“好，我们现在就这么干。”

And this again comes back to the point of you have to go through the struggle and pain and failure to learn those lessons.

这又回到了那个点：你必须亲身经历挣扎、痛苦和失败，才能学到这些。

Yeah, no.

对，没错。

They're really hard to learn without doing and often without paying the consequence.

这些东西不亲手做过很难学会，而且往往得先付出代价。

Even I, like I make mistakes.

连我自己也一样，我也犯错。

I was having conversation with Ali the other day and I was like, he's like, "How's it going Ben?"

前几天我跟 Ali 聊天，他说：“最近怎么样 Ben？”

And I was like, "Well, I'm finally dealing with something that I had put off for a very long time."

我说：“我终于在处理一件拖了非常久的事了。”

And he said, "Why'd you put it off?"

他问：“那你为什么一直拖着？”

I said, "Because things were going too good.

我说：“因为一切都太顺了。

I didn't have to deal with it.

我不处理也没事。”

"And he was like, "Yeah."

他说：“是啊。”

He said, "I know that."

他说：“我懂这个。”

I'd say Ali is one of the, if not the kind of best private company CEO out there, and he's making a mistake and I'm making a mistakes.

要我说，Ali 就算不是最好的，也是最好的非上市公司 CEO 之一；他在犯错，我也在犯错。

So, it is just tough.

所以，这事就是难。

You said that one of maybe the main reason founders fail the CEOs is they lose confidence, and you had some ideas that you guys have to help founders work through that.

你说过创始人当不成 CEO 的主要原因之一是失去信心，而你们有一些帮创始人渡过这一关的做法。

Are there a couple you can share how you help?

能分享一两个你们怎么帮的吗？

Yeah.

好。

So we do a lot of things on that.

我们在这上面做了很多事。

So the kind of design of the firm is about confidence.

整家机构的设计，围绕的就是信心。

So the first thing is, well, what would give you?

第一件事是：那么，什么能给你信心？

Well if you can get stuff done.

如果你能把事办成。

So what if I could give you a network that's as good as Bob Iger's network, day one, the day you stepped into the job.

所以，假如我能给你一张跟 Bob Iger 一样好的关系网，从第一天起，从你上任那天起。

And so we have 600 people at the firm and why is that?

我们机构有 600 人，为什么？

Well, most of them are building that network for you, so you can call any CEO or anybody in Washington or any executive or that kind of thing and get them on the phone and they'll talk to you and you can kind of deal with that thing.

因为他们大部分人是在替你搭那张网，让你能给任何一位 CEO、华盛顿的任何人、任何一位高管打电话，他们会接、会跟你聊，你就能把那件事办掉。

And then that just makes you feel like a CEO.

然后这件事本身就让你感觉自己像个 CEO。

And then we have a lot of people in the firm like myself, who you can talk to on a CEO to CEO basis, as opposed to an investor to CEO, and just kind of feel that.

另外机构里有很多像我这样的人，你可以用 CEO 对 CEO 的方式跟他聊，而不是投资人对 CEO，那种感觉是不一样的。

Early in the firm days, we used to do this thing.

机构早年我们做过一件事。

I think I'm going to bring back in some form this thing called the CEO barbecue.

我打算换个形式把它捡回来，叫 CEO 烧烤会。

And it was like a lot of people have these events where they bring in speakers and this and that and the other.

当时很多人办那种活动，请一堆讲者，讲这个讲那个。

And I always felt like those were one, they were too many days.

我一直觉得那些活动，一是天数太长。

And then sometimes what they said wasn't really applicable and that kind of thing.

二是他们讲的东西有时候根本用不上，就这类问题。

So I said, "Why don't we just have a barbecue?"

所以我说：“我们干脆就办个烧烤呗？”

I would barbecue.

我来烤。

We get everybody in my backyard because was 500 people at the peak, which is why at the stuff I couldn't cook that much, that kind of stuff.

把大家都请到我家后院——高峰时有 500 人，所以后来我一个人烤不过来了，就这类问题。

And then we'd have Larry Page and Mark Zuckerberg and Kanye West, and so you're a CEO in there with portfolio.

然后现场会有 Larry Page、Mark Zuckerberg、Kanye West，而你是被投公司的 CEO，就站在他们中间。

You're like, "Wow, I must be important.

你会想：“哇，我一定挺重要的。

I'm here with all these guys" and we're just hanging out having a drink, eating barbecue.

我跟这些人一起在这儿”，我们就是随便聊聊、喝点东西、吃烧烤。

And so then when I go back to my company, I feel like I am somebody.

然后回到自己公司，我就觉得我是个人物了。

And okay, I might not be perfect at all this, but I am really a CEO.

好吧，我可能不是样样都行，但我真的是个 CEO。

I was at the CEO barbecue, for crying out loud and that kind of thing.

我可是去过 CEO 烧烤会的人，就这种感觉。

But the whole idea was always like, "Okay, do you feel like you can do it?"

但整件事的核心一直是：“你觉得自己干得了这个吗？”

Because that's half the battle?

因为这就是一半的胜负。

And look, having been in and every CEO has been in a position where they feel like, "Well, maybe I shouldn't be the one running this thing.

你看，每个 CEO 都有过那种时刻，觉得“也许带这家公司的不该是我。

Maybe it's just too big for me."

也许它对我来说太大了”。

And that's a bad, you don't want to go there.

那是个很糟的地方，你不想去那儿。

And because as we've said, founders can get to the next product and that's something that almost no professional CEO is able to do.

因为像我们说的，创始人能做出下一个产品，而这件事几乎没有职业经理人 CEO 做得到。

There've been rare cases, but very rare.

有过极少数的例外，但非常少。

So clearly you've worked with a lot of companies, a lot of founders.

你显然跟非常多公司、非常多创始人打过交道。

Let me kind of zoom out a little bit and ask you this question.

我把镜头往外拉一点，问你这么个问题。

What's the most counterintuitive lesson you've learned about building companies that goes against common startup wisdom?

关于建公司，你学到的最反直觉、最跟主流创业智慧对着干的一课是什么？

Well, the common startup wisdom keeps changing.

主流创业智慧本身一直在变。

One of the early ones that was wrong, and Brian articulated it, and then now I think a little bit of what people have gone to is also wrong.

早期有一条是错的，Brian 把它讲清楚了；而现在大家转向的那一套，我觉得也有一部分是错的。

So the first idea that was wrong was like, okay, build a team of senior executives as soon as you get product market fit as fast as possible and they can scale the thing.

第一个错的观念是：好，一拿到 product market fit 就尽快组一支资深高管班子，让他们把公司规模化。

And I think that you got to build that team slowly and deliberately, kind of pace to your ability to integrate and then manage them.

我认为这支队伍必须慢慢地、有意识地搭，节奏要匹配你消化和管理他们的能力。

Because if you bring in a bunch of senior people and you don't know really how they match to your company or how that function works or so forth, then you're going to start deferring.

因为如果你一下子引进一堆资深的人，而你并不真的清楚他们跟你公司怎么匹配、那个职能到底怎么运转，你就会开始放手。

And once you start deferring, it's going to get out of control very fast because they're going to build empires, they're going to get political, they're going to do all that kind of thing.

一旦你开始放手，局面会失控得非常快，因为他们会建自己的山头、会搞政治、会做各种这类事。

So that was bad advice.

所以那是个坏建议。

You kind of have to do it in a measured way.

你得用一种有节制的方式来做。

I think that founder mode, I think a lot of people have taken to never hire anybody with experience.

至于 founder mode，我觉得很多人把它理解成了永远别招有经验的人。

And that's also bad advice in that, look, somebody who knows how to do something can really accelerate your thing.

这同样是个坏建议——你看，一个知道怎么做某件事的人，是真的能让你加速的。

So very early on, one of the founders, great founder Arsalan at Databricks was running sales.

所以很早的时候，Databricks 有一位很了不起的创始人 Arsalan 在管销售。

And I'm like, "Ali, you're going to have to hire somebody who knows sales because Arsalan's, PhD in computer science.

我就说：“Ali，你必须招一个懂销售的人，因为 Arsalan 是计算机科学博士。

I like that, but that's probably not where you're going to have to start if you're going to catch these guys before they take Spark and use it against you."

我很喜欢这一点，但如果你想在这些人拿 Spark 反过来打你之前追上他们，这多半不是你该从这儿起步的地方。”

And I sat down with Arsalan and I explained why.

然后我跟 Arsalan 坐下来，跟他解释为什么。

I said, "Look, a lot of what sales, there's a lot of knowledge in how to build a worldwide sales organization; maybe knowledge of customers, territories, territory splitting, rep profiles.

我说：“听着，销售这件事里有大量的知识——怎么搭一个全球销售组织，客户认知、区域划分、区域拆分、销售代表画像。

There's just a litany of stuff that you really can only learn by doing trial and error and you don't know anything.

一大堆东西你只能靠试错做出来才学得会，而你现在什么都不懂。

And so you're phenomenal.

你本人非常出色。

Let's get you.

我们把你用在该用的地方。

And still, he's a very senior executive in the company now, but we need somebody who knows that.

他现在仍然是公司里非常资深的高管，但我们需要一个懂那件事的人。

And the idea that there are companies that go, " Okay, we're just not going to hire that in founder mode."

至于那种“好，我们在 founder mode 里就是不招这种人”的公司，

That's also a mistake.

那同样是个错误。

So there's a lot of, it's more subtle than you think, and it's more complex than you think.

所以这里面有很多东西，它比你想的更微妙，也比你想的更复杂。

And so you kind of have to get all the way to the truth.

你必须一路挖到底、挖到真相。

And these little snippets of advice that he sees good, because they watch some fucking podcasts, are all fucking stupid.

而那些听起来很妙的建议碎片——因为他们看了几档傻逼播客——全都蠢得要命。

There's a lot of depth to these things.

这些事都是有深度的。

You have to know the answer to the next question, the next question and the next question, and it does drive me crazy.

你必须知道下一个问题的答案、再下一个、再下一个，这事真能把我逼疯。

One of the funnier things that happened along these lines, just to show you how little.

沿着这条线，发生过一件挺好笑的事，正好说明作为投资人，

You know as an investor, about what it means to be CEO.

你对当 CEO 到底是怎么回事，懂得有多少。

We were at a board dinner.

我们当时在一场董事会晚餐上。

One of the CEOs says to me, he goes, or one of our CEO says, "Hey Ben, that thing you told me a while ago about don't be CEO at home."

一位 CEO 跟我说，他说，我们被投公司的一位 CEO 说：“嘿 Ben，你之前跟我讲过那个‘别把 CEO 带回家’。

He said, "I was doing that and I stopped and it really helped me."

他说：“我之前一直在犯这个毛病，后来改了，真的帮了我很多。”

And then the other kind of VC said, " Yeah.

然后旁边另一位 VC 说：“对啊。

You got to unplug some time."

人总得有时候拔掉插头休息一下。”

And I said, I was like, "What the fuck are you talking about?

我当时就说，我说：“你他妈在说什么？

He's CEO.

他是 CEO。

He's not unplugging.

他没法拔插头。

He's getting shit all the fucking time.

他他妈随时都在挨事。

He's got to deal with that.

他必须去处理。

That was not what I meant.

我说的根本不是那个意思。

I was like, you can't go home and boss your family around.

我的意思是，你别回到家还对家里人发号施令。

That's what I meant."

我是这个意思。”

You hear something from somebody who, but if you haven't done it, you don't even know what that means.

你从某个人那儿听来一句话，但如果你自己没做过，你根本不懂那句话是什么意思。

And so then you then trying to transfer the advice to the next guy, that's not going to work.

然后你再把这个建议转手传给下一个人，那是行不通的。

So anyway, but he was very innocent.

总之，他人是很单纯的。

I just don't want to kind of speak bad of him, but that's how it sounds, right?

我不想说他坏话，但听起来就是那样，对吧？

But that's not what it is.

可事情根本不是那么回事。

That's an amazing story.

这故事太精彩了。

So the advice partly here, is just don't believe everything you see on Twitter and little sound bites of advice.

所以这里的建议之一是：别把你在 Twitter 上看到的一切、别把那些建议短句当真。

I think actual CEOs know it.

我觉得真正当过 CEO 的人是知道的。

And that's kind of how people in my profession going to get a bad rap.

我这一行的人之所以名声不好，多半就是因为这个。

Because giving advice, that's not something that you know but something that you heard, is very dangerous, I think.

因为给建议时讲的不是你真懂的东西，而是你听来的东西，我觉得这非常危险。

So speaking of advice that you've shared that might be out of date now, you are famous for writing one of the most popular pieces of literature for product managers.

说到可能已经过时的建议——你写过产品经理圈里流传最广的文章之一，因此出了名。

There's a lot of PMs that listen to this podcast called Good Product Manager, Bad Product Manager.

听这档播客的 PM 非常多，那篇文章叫 Good Product Manager, Bad Product Manager。

And if you actually go to that post today at the top you say, "This document was written 15 years ago and it's probably not relevant today for PMs.

而如果你今天去看那篇文章，开头你写着：“本文写于 15 年前，对今天的 PM 很可能已经不适用了。

I present this nearly as an example of a useful training document."

我把它放在这儿，主要是作为一份有用的培训文档的范例。”

Still people link to it.

但大家还是在转它。

I actually just link to it as just like this is something every PM needs to read.

我自己就在转，觉得这是每个 PM 都该读的东西。

What is it that you think people should maybe not take away from it, and what do you think people still should take away from that piece?

你觉得大家从里面不该再拿走的是什么？还该拿走的又是什么？

Yeah, so the reason I wrote it when I wrote it was that I had a lot of product managers.

好，我当年写它的原因是：我手下有很多产品经理。

And one thing about product management is it's a job that's completely different at every company and there is no training for it.

产品管理这份工作有个特点——它在每家公司都完全不一样，而且没有任何培训。

So everybody kind of figures it out as they go.

所以每个人都是边干边摸索。

And depending on what's being emphasized, they'll get wrapped around the axle on if it's an enterprise company, well pitching to customers or I need to be really good with the press, or I need to be really good at writing the product requirements document or that kind of thing.

至于摸索出什么，取决于公司强调什么：如果是家 to B 公司，他们就会死磕给客户做 pitch，或者“我得跟媒体打交道打得特别好”，或者“我得特别擅长写产品需求文档”这类事。

And those are all these tasks, but none of those were the job and what I was trying to get out in Good Product Manager, Bad Product Manager was, the job is fundamentally a leadership job and it's a tricky leadership job because nobody is actually reporting to you.

这些全都是任务，但没有一个是这份工作本身；而我在 Good Product Manager, Bad Product Manager 里想讲的是：这份工作本质上是个领导岗，而且是个很棘手的领导岗，因为其实没有一个人向你汇报。

So it's like this influence, how do I get people to do what I want even though I'm not paying them.

所以它讲的是影响力：我不给他们发工资，怎么让他们做我想要的事？

I can't fire them.

我不能开除他们。

I can't promote them, and so forth, which is kind of the essence of real leadership because if you start to rely on promotion and firing and so forth for authority, then you're never going to be good at being CEO or anything.

我不能给他们升职，等等——而这恰恰是真正的领导力的本质，因为一旦你开始靠升职、开除这类东西来获得权威，你就永远做不好 CEO 或任何岗位。

So I wanted them to get into the mindset of, "Okay, your actual job is to get a product into market that customers love that's better than anything that anybody else in the world puts in market.

所以我想让他们进入这样一种心态：“好，你真正的工作是把一个产品送进市场，让客户爱上它，而且比世界上任何人送进市场的东西都好。

That's your job."

这就是你的工作。”

And so to accomplish that job, you need engineering to understand you with clarity.

而要完成这份工作，你需要工程清清楚楚地理解你。

You need to understand engineering with clarity.

你需要清清楚楚地理解工程。

You need to have a really good view of the market and the competitors and the technology and so forth and you need to put that all together and deliver the thing.

你需要对市场、竞争对手、技术等等有非常好的判断，然后把这一切拼起来，把东西交付出去。

And all the other things are tasks that you may or may not need to do.

其他所有事都只是任务，你可能需要做，也可能不需要。

I don't know if you need to do them, but the thing is, you have to be the leader.

我不知道你需不需要做，但关键是：你必须是那个领导者。

You've got to get the thing done.

你必须把这件事干成。

And so what I think it's still good on is that the mindset, be the leader, I think the details of any kind of thing that was kind of task specific was really for my group a Netscape in 1996, whenever the hell I wrote it.

所以我觉得它今天仍然成立的是那个心态——去当领导者；至于那些跟具体任务相关的细节，那真的只是给我 1996 年在 Netscape 带的那个组写的，我也记不清到底哪年写的了。

So as a kind of document I wrote out of frustration.

所以那是一份我在憋着火的时候写出来的文档。

But I am glad that the people still like it, and I think leadership in general is undervalued, underestimated.

但我很高兴大家还喜欢它；而且我觉得领导力这件事整体上被低估了、被小看了。

It's the most powerful thing.

它是最有力量的东西。

And most of the great companies, Jensen is a great example.

大多数伟大的公司都是这样，Jensen 就是个绝佳例子。

What a phenomenal leader he is not just of Nvidia, but of the whole industry.

他是个多么出色的领导者——不只是对 Nvidia，而是对整个行业。

And he doesn't have authority over the industry, but he drives it forth and that's why the Good Product Manager, Bad Product Manager is so important because that thing, if you learn how to do it, that's the thing.

他对这个行业并没有职权，却把它往前推着走；这也正是 Good Product Manager, Bad Product Manager 之所以重要的原因，因为那件事，你要是学会了怎么做，那就是关键。

I didn't realize you wrote that initially as just an internal document and then you made a-

我之前不知道你最初只是把它当成一份内部文档写的，然后你才——

It was kind of before blogging took off, so it is just an internal thing and I published it later.

那会儿写博客还没兴起，所以它就是个内部的东西，我是后来才发出来的。

I was just getting so mad.

我当时真是气坏了。

And by the way, my product management team at the time was very good, very talented people.

顺便说，我那时的产品管理团队非常好，都是很有才华的人。

They just were not getting that concept.

他们就是没能 get 到那个概念。

So like David Weiden said, Khosla Ventures, Raghu Raghuram, who went on to be CEO of VMware, the team was like that team, but they were driving me crazy.

比如 David Weiden，Khosla Ventures 的；还有 Raghu Raghuram，后来当了 VMware 的 CEO——那个团队就是这么一支队伍，可他们当时把我逼疯了。

And so I was like, "I can't yell at people anymore.

所以我就想：“我不能再冲人吼了。

I have to explain to myself."

我得把话给自己讲清楚。”

And so it's a good thing if you find yourself yelling at people, you probably haven't explained what you want, was the other big takeaway from that.

所以这是件好事：如果你发现自己在冲人吼，那多半是你没把你要什么解释清楚——这是那篇文章的另一个大收获。

Did you ever think that piece would be so long-lasting?

你当时想过那篇东西能活这么久吗？

And so, I don't know, popular?

还有，怎么说呢，这么受欢迎？

I didn't even know.

我压根没想到。

I thought it was kind of like aggressive when I wrote it.

我写的时候还觉得它挺冲的。

You could tell I was mad.

你能看出来我在气头上。

I called a Good Product Manager, Bad Product Manager.

我给它起名叫 Good Product Manager, Bad Product Manager。

It's like bad dog, bad, bad, bad product manager.

就像骂狗那样——坏狗，坏，坏，坏产品经理。

That was kind of the emotion I had.

那就是我当时的情绪。

So, it is kind shocking some of the things that you write.

所以有些你写出来的东西，结果还挺让人意外的。

I would say that that's and kind of creative, and you probably know this.

我想说这也跟创作有关，你大概也懂：

The idea is that you have the things that you write in five minutes end up being much better than things you write in five weeks.

你花五分钟写出来的东西，最后往往比你花五周写出来的好得多。

And I find in talking to musicians or writers or everybody has that same experience.

我跟音乐人、作家聊，发现大家都有同样的体验。

The thing that you've already synthesized so much that you just have to write it out, that's the best stuff.

那种你已经在心里消化到位、只差把它写出来的东西，才是最好的。

There's something that you mentioned there in your answer about the PM being the leader.

你刚才回答里提到 PM 是领导者。

There's always this kind of sense that the PM is not the mini CEO.

圈里总有一种说法：PM 不是什么“小 CEO”。

How dare you call yourself that.

你也配这么自称。

I actually think that's exactly what the PM is.

但我恰恰觉得，PM 就是这个角色。

They're basically the closest to the CEO.

他们基本上是最接近 CEO 的人。

Their kind job is to think like the CEO within the team.

他们的工作，就是在团队里像 CEO 那样思考。

People get mad because everybody, this is the whole challenge of management in general.

大家会生气，因为——这就是管理这件事整体上的挑战。

People get jealous over stewardship.

大家会嫉妒那种“主人翁地位”。

But from the perspective of the PM, it doesn't matter if you write a good spec or you have a good interview or you do this or do that.

但站在 PM 的角度：你 spec 写得好不好、访谈做得漂不漂亮、这个那个做没做，都不重要。

What matters is that the product works.

唯一重要的是产品成不成。

And you have to get all the way to there and work backwards from that and you can't do that without leadership because it is about, okay, we want to build that.

你必须一路走到那儿，再从那儿倒推；而没有领导力你做不到这件事，因为它讲的是：好，我们要造那个东西。

And you're not necessarily the person who comes up with every idea or this or that, or that.

你未必是那个想出每一个点子的人，这个那个的都未必。

You're just the keeper of the vision.

你只是那个愿景的守护者。

And that's true for CEOs too.

这对 CEO 也一样。

You don't want every idea in a company coming from the CEO.

你不会希望公司里每一个点子都出自 CEO。

I think it's a misunderstanding of what a CEO is, is why people don't like that.

我觉得大家不喜欢“PM 是小 CEO”这个说法，是因为他们误解了 CEO 是什么。

They don't know what a CEO is.

他们不知道 CEO 是什么。

But a CEO isn't the one who has every idea it gives, every order does every.

CEO 并不是那个想出每个点子、下每道命令、干每件事的人。

That's not the way it works.

事情不是这么运转的。

The way it works is there's somebody who's got to consolidate, get all the good ideas, prioritize them, decide which good ideas we're going to do, and then get everybody on the same page, so that they have very high fidelity understanding of what that is.

真实的运转方式是：有一个人必须把所有好点子收拢起来、排出优先级、决定我们要做哪些，然后让所有人对齐到同一页上，让大家对那件事有非常高保真的理解。

And so that it is a CEO, kind of function.

所以这确实是个 CEO 式的职能。

Now, it doesn't mean I'm better than you, it just means that...

这并不意味着我比你强，只是意味着……

... kind of function.

……式的职能。

Now, it doesn't mean like I'm better than you.

这并不意味着我比你强。

It just means that that's what I'm doing.

只是意味着这就是我在做的事。

This episode is brought to you by Miro.

本期节目由 Miro 赞助播出。

Every day, new headlines are scaring us about all the ways that AI is coming for our jobs, creating a lot of anxiety and fear.

每天都有新的头条在吓唬我们，说 AI 会怎样抢走我们的工作，制造了大量焦虑和恐惧。

But a recent survey for Miro tells a different story.

但 Miro 最近的一项调查讲了另一个故事。

76% of people believe that AI can benefit their role, but over 50% of people struggle to know when to use it.

76% 的人相信 AI 能让自己的岗位受益，但超过 50% 的人不知道该在什么时候用它。

Enter Miro's Innovation Workspace, an intelligent platform that brings people and AI together in a shared space to get great work done.

于是有了 Miro 的 Innovation Workspace——一个把人和 AI 放进同一个共享空间、一起把好活干出来的智能平台。

Miro has been empowering teams to transform bold ideas into the next big thing for over a decade.

十多年来，Miro 一直在帮团队把大胆的想法变成下一个大东西。

Today, they're at the forefront of bringing products to market even faster by unleashing the combined power of AI and human potential.

今天，他们正走在最前面，把 AI 和人的潜能合起来释放，让产品更快地推向市场。

Guests of this podcast often share Miro templates.

这档播客的嘉宾经常分享 Miro 模板。

I use it all the time to brainstorm ideas with my team.

我自己一直用它跟团队一起做头脑风暴。

Teams especially can work with Miro AI to turn to unstructured data, like sticky notes or screenshots into usable diagrams, product briefs, data tables, and prototypes in minutes.

团队尤其可以用 Miro AI，把便利贴、截图这类非结构化的东西，在几分钟内变成能用的图表、产品 brief、数据表和原型。

You don't have to be an AI master or to toggle yet another tool.

你不用是个 AI 高手，也不用再多切一个工具。

The work you're already doing in Miro's Canvas is the prompt.

你在 Miro 画布上已经在做的那些事，本身就是 prompt。

Help your teams get great work done with Miro.

用 Miro，帮你的团队把好活干出来。

Check it out at miro.com/lenny.

去 miro.com/lenny 看看。

That's M-I-R-O.com/lenny.

就是 M-I-R-O.com/lenny。

Let's talk about AI.

我们来聊 AI。

I'm very proud of us.

我为我们俩感到骄傲。

It's been almost an hour.

快一个小时了。

We haven't even mentioned AI.

我们连 AI 都没提过。

I think that's a record.

我觉得这是个纪录。

Okay, so I asked Adam Neumann, WeWork founder, now Flow founder, someone you work closely with now what to ask you about.

好，我问了 Adam Neumann——WeWork 创始人，现在是 Flow 的创始人，也是你现在密切合作的人——该问你点什么。

And he said he has some really interesting insights about how AI is impacting hiring.

他说你对 AI 正在怎样冲击招聘有一些非常有意思的洞见。

Adam is probably the single most controversial investment that we ever made.

Adam 大概是我们做过的最有争议的一笔投资。

We got called everything from stupid to sexist to racist to this and that for literally just funding that.

就为了投这一笔，我们被骂了个遍，从蠢到性别歧视到种族歧视，什么都有。

And I think it's going to end up being one of the best investments we ever made.

而我觉得它最后会成为我们做过的最好的投资之一。

He's doing a phenomenal job there.

他在那边干得非常漂亮。

There's an important principle in that which we do as a firm, which I think is not widely done, but I would love it if people copied it, which is, and it's something I learned somewhat from Shaka, which is you don't judge a person by the worst thing that ever happened to them.

这里面有一条很重要的原则，是我们作为一家机构在践行的，我觉得它并不普及，但我特别希望别人也这么做——这一点我多少是从 Shaka 那儿学来的——就是：不要用一个人身上发生过的最糟的事去评判他。

We've all had bad things happen to us.

我们都有过糟糕的事。

We've all made bad decisions.

我们都做过糟糕的决定。

Most of them, they don't make a miniseries about.

只不过大部分人的事，没人给拍成迷你剧。

And so to judge them on that, you want to judge people on what they do well, not what they screwed up, because that's where you see the talent.

所以用那件事去评判他们——你要评判的应该是一个人做得好的地方，而不是他搞砸的地方，因为才华是从前者里看出来的。

If you look at what Adam did well, it's truly spectacular.

如果你去看 Adam 做得好的地方，那真是相当惊人。

Everybody knows WeWork.

人人都知道 WeWork。

Name a more important commercial real estate brand than WeWork.

你说出一个比 WeWork 更重要的商业地产品牌来。

You can't.

你说不出来。

And so what an accomplishment.

这是多大的成就。

And there were so many things that went into that and so many things he did right.

里面有太多东西促成了它，他做对了太多事。

And then if you kind of look at really unravel the things that went wrong, most of it was like a combination of inexperience and nobody around him that would tell him the truth.

然后如果你去真正拆解那些出问题的地方，大部分是经验不足，加上身边没有一个人愿意跟他讲真话。

And, yeah, maybe he wasn't good at listening to the truth either at the time, but to throw away a guy on that, which is by the way, the world was so mad at us for not throwing him away, for believing in him, is just that it's a big mistake.

是，也许他当时也不擅长听真话；但就因为这个把一个人扔掉——顺便说，全世界当时就是因为我们没把他扔掉、因为我们还信他而对我们暴怒——那是个大错误。

And I credit Mark because Mark is the one who called him up originally, and just said, "Hey, Adam, what are you doing?"

这事我得记 Mark 一功，因为最早给他打电话的人是 Mark，他就说：“嘿 Adam，你在忙什么？

Because we watched what you did at WeWork and we thought it was pretty impressive.

因为我们看了你在 WeWork 做的事，觉得挺了不起。”

And so I think that that's probably the biggest secret there.

所以我觉得那大概就是这里最大的秘密。

Judge Al Davis once said, "Coach players on what they can do."

Al Davis 说过：“按球员能做到的事去带他。”

And I think that's very true.

我觉得这话非常对。

Judge people on what they can do, coach people on what they can do, help them take their strengths and use them as opposed to over focus on their weaknesses and just hand wringing about the one fucking thing they don't know how to do.

按人能做到的事去评判他、去带他，帮他把长处拿出来用，而不是过度盯着他的短处、为他他妈的那一件不会的事捶胸顿足。

Because look, everybody's uneven.

因为你看，每个人都是不平衡的。

What you're describing, essentially, this is the job of an investor, is to find an underappreciated asset and invest or before something people don't see.

你描述的这件事，本质上就是投资人的工作——找到一个被低估的资产，在别人看见之前投进去。

Venture capital is really about investing in people.

风险投资真正投的是人。

You have ideas as an investor, but what you really are ultimately betting on is the entrepreneur and the entrepreneur's idea because the initial idea isn't where they end up usually.

作为投资人你会有自己的判断，但你最终押注的其实是创业者和创业者的想法——因为最初那个想法通常不是他们最后落脚的地方。

It changes a lot with everybody we invest in.

我们投的每一家，它都变了很多。

So you kind of have to make the judgment on the person.

所以你必须对人做出判断。

And how you do that is really, really important.

而怎么做这个判断，非常非常重要。

And one of the things we emphasize inside the firm is, look, we're investing in strength, not lack of weakness.

我们在机构内部强调的一点是：我们投的是长处，不是“没有短处”。

I want to know how good, are they world-class?

我想知道他有多强，他是不是世界级的？

Do they have a world-class strength?

他有没有一项世界级的强项？

And can that beat anybody?

那项强项能不能打赢所有人？

And look, everybody's flawed.

而且你看，每个人都有缺陷。

And so let's help them deal with the flaws and surround them with people who can handle that and put the right person on the board who can talk to them.

所以我们要帮他处理那些缺陷，给他配上能兜住的人，把对的人放进董事会去跟他讲话。

You know Mark's on the board, I go to all his board meetings because I'm the one who's good at killing a guy who's that confident when he's like, "Okay, that's not your best idea."

你知道 Mark 在他董事会里，我每场董事会都去，因为我是那个擅长在一个人自信爆棚的时候把他按住的人——“行了，那不是你最好的主意。”

That's good role for me.

这个角色挺适合我。

But that's how you deal with that.

但这就是处理这件事的方式。

You don't throw them away and go, "Oh, okay, we don't want to be called names.

你不会把人扔掉，然后说：“哦，好吧，我们不想被人骂。

So we're not going to invest in Adam Neumann after we built WeWork.

所以我们不投做过 WeWork 的 Adam Neumann。”

That's crazy.

那才叫疯了。

That's also why you guys invested in Cluely, I imagine similar.

我猜你们投 Cluely 也是同样的道理。

Yeah, yeah, no, that's right.

对对，没错。

I mean, look, if you look at what those guys did, that was some high level marketing genius too, and that's really something.

你看那帮人干的事，那也是相当高段位的营销天才，很有东西。

Plus the product is awesome.

而且产品本身很棒。

I'm going to bring us back to AI.

我把话题拉回 AI。

Something that a lot of people are talking about right now while we're recording this is this potential huge bubble we're in with AI.

我们录这期的时候，很多人正在谈的一件事，是我们可能正处在一个巨大的 AI 泡沫里。

Sam Altman said, "We're in a big bubble," which is, that's saying a lot.

Sam Altman 说“我们正处在一个大泡沫里”——这话从他嘴里说出来，分量很重。

I'm curious just how you that it-

我很好奇你怎么——

What is it saying?

它重在哪儿？

First of all, I should qualify this by saying I am an investor and Sam's a CEO.

首先我得声明一下：我是投资人，Sam 是 CEO。

So CEOs have to have much more purpose when they talk.

CEO 说话时必须带着更强的目的性。

Investors just have to be entertained.

投资人只需要有趣就行了。

So you got to give Sam credit for what is it in his interest to say it?

所以你得佩服 Sam——说这句话对他有什么好处？

Well, if it's a bubble, then the one thing you should invest in is him and not all these guys chasing after him.

如果这是泡沫，那你唯一该投的就是他，而不是那一堆追着他跑的人。

I would say that's very smart.

我会说这非常聪明。

And then the other thing that's smart about it is there's nothing that you can say to the press that will make them love you more than saying, "All investors and entrepreneurs chasing this are idiots."

另一个聪明的地方是：你对媒体说什么都比不上说“所有追这一波的投资人和创业者都是白痴”更能让他们爱你。

They love them.

他们爱死这个了。

The press are generally haters, and so it's just red meat for the haters, which was also super clever.

媒体整体上是一群 hater，所以这就是喂给 hater 的红肉，同样极其高明。

So I think whether even he believes that or not, that was a super smart thing to say.

所以我觉得，不管他自己信不信，这话说得都极其聪明。

So I'll just put it there.

我就先把这个放在这儿。

Whereas what I'm going to say won't be as smart, but it will...

至于我接下来要说的，就没那么聪明了，但它会……

I don't really have an ax to grind here.

我在这件事上没什么斧子要磨。

I mean, I could have an ax to grind and say, "Okay, let's get all the other investors out."

我是说，我本来也可以磨一把，说：“好，把其他投资人都赶走。”

I'll say, "It's a massive bubble."

我就说：“这是个巨大的泡沫。”

But what I would say about that is, so the first thing, the one thing about bubbles is anytime everybody thinks it's a bubble, it's not a bubble because in order for it to bubble, you need capitulation.

但我对这件事的判断是：首先，关于泡沫有一点——任何时候只要所有人都觉得这是泡沫，那它就不是泡沫；因为要形成泡沫，你需要的是全面投降。

In that you need everybody to believe it's not a bubble, because then the prices really go out of control.

就是所有人都得相信这不是泡沫，价格才会真的失控。

But as long as there's people who think it's a bubble, then it's hard for that to happen.

但只要还有人觉得这是泡沫，那件事就很难发生。

And it's funny, I had this debate in The Economist, I think with Steve Blank in like 2011 or '12 when everybody thought it was a tech bubble, if you can imagine that, which it absolutely was not.

有意思的是，我 2011 还是 2012 年在《经济学人》上跟 Steve Blank 辩过这个，当时所有人都觉得是科技泡沫——你能想象吗——而它绝对不是。

But because there were 1,400 articles saying that we were in a tech bubble, and I mean where prices were then compared to where they are now.

因为当时有 1,400 篇文章说我们身处科技泡沫，可你看看那会儿的价格和现在的价格。

But I knew because everybody was saying it was a bubble, it wasn't a bubble.

但我知道，正因为所有人都在说是泡沫，它就不是泡沫。

I knew that.

这一点我很确定。

The prices were higher, but the reason the prices were higher was we're getting to a global market.

价格是更高了，但价格更高的原因是我们正在走向一个全球市场。

AI prices are higher than prior prices, but if you look at the revenue growth and numbers, we had not seen anything like it.

AI 的价格比过去的价格高，但如果你看收入增速和那些数字，这种东西我们从来没见过。

Sam's product worked so amazingly, we'd never seen that before.

Sam 的产品跑得好到不可思议，我们以前从没见过。

Not even Google, not anybody.

连 Google 都没有，谁都没有。

And so that's real.

所以这是真的。

And we have companies that went from zero to 800 million in a year and that kind of thing.

我们有公司在一年里从零做到 8 亿，就这种事。

I would say there's a basis for the prices going up, first of all.

首先我会说，价格上涨是有依据的。

I think the thing that's right about what Sam is saying is the landscape is early, really early.

我觉得 Sam 说得对的地方在于：这个格局还很早，非常早。

The technology is very immature.

技术非常不成熟。

As amazingly as it works, there's a long way to go to improve it.

它已经好用到这个程度了，可要改进的路还长得很。

So it's very possible when you have that much technological change, that the positions that these companies have achieved with their high revenue isn't sustainable, and that there'll be a competitive change that either lowers prices or a new number one emerges or that kind of thing.

所以完全可能出现这种情况：技术变化这么剧烈，这些公司靠高收入拿到的位置未必守得住，会有竞争格局的变化——要么价格被打下来，要么冒出一个新的第一名，就这类事。

Yeah, that's possible.

对，这是可能的。

But I wouldn't characterize that as being a financial bubble in that if you go back to the great dot-com bubble that everybody is always waiting for it to happen again, which I was CEO during.

但我不会把那称作金融泡沫。因为如果你回到那场伟大的互联网泡沫——所有人都在等它重演，而我当时正是一名 CEO——

The thing that happened there was very different, which is it was the internet and every smart investor knew that the internet was a big deal.

那时候发生的事非常不一样：那是互联网，每个聪明的投资人都知道互联网是件大事。

How could you not fucking know that the internet was, of course it's a big deal.

你他妈怎么可能不知道互联网是——当然是件大事。

But if you go back to 1996, at Netscape, we had 90% browser share and we had 50 million users.

但你回到 1996 年，在 Netscape，我们有 90% 的浏览器份额、5,000 万用户。

So there were 55 million people on the internet in total, and half of those were on dial-up.

也就是说全世界上网的一共 5,500 万人，其中一半还是拨号上网。

And then to build a product like Evite, the greeting card company, had 300 engineers.

而那时候要做出 Evite 这样一个电子贺卡产品，得雇 300 个工程师。

That's how hard it was to build this stuff.

做这些东西就是这么难。

And so the math didn't work, and the math didn't work on any of those ideas, but the investors kept pouring money in.

所以账算不过来，那些点子的账全都算不过来，可投资人还在不停往里砸钱。

And then eventually everybody went bankrupt because there was no revenue coming in.

最后所有人都破产了，因为根本没有收入进来。

And when they figured that out, then nobody would invest in anything.

等大家想明白这一点，就再没人愿意投任何东西了。

And of course then everybody realized, well, the internet was actually real and Paul Krugman didn't know what he's talking about, and like it was going to be a big thing.

当然后来所有人又意识到，互联网是真的，Paul Krugman 压根不知道自己在说什么，它确实会成为一件大事。

And then Facebook and Google and all these things emerged.

然后 Facebook、Google 这些东西就冒出来了。

But the thing that made it a bubble was the unit economics didn't work, the businesses didn't work.

但让它成为泡沫的，是单位经济模型算不过来、生意本身不成立。

These businesses are all working, and they're being priced appropriately for how they're growing.

而现在这些生意全都成立，而且是按它们的增长速度被合理定价的。

So that's not in effect.

所以那个因素不在。

The thing that you could say is, "They're not going to keep growing like that," and so forth.

你能说的是：“它们不会一直这么长下去”，这类话。

And I'm not sure about that.

这个我倒不确定。

The products, like I said, are working so much better than any technology product that we've ever built has worked.

像我说的，这些产品跑得比我们造过的任何技术产品都好得多。

It's just mind-blowing how good this stuff is.

这东西好到让人脑子发懵。

And so, I don't know, if I had to bet, I would bet not a bubble.

所以，我不知道，如果非要我押，我押不是泡沫。

I think there'll be some dislocation.

我觉得会有一些错位。

I think always in venture capital, if you've got a run like this, then the great company and the crap company both get funded.

我一直觉得，在风险投资里只要有这么一波行情，好公司和垃圾公司都会拿到钱。

But that's just venture capital.

但这就是风险投资。

That's not a bubble.

这不叫泡沫。

Four founders starting companies these days.

对现在正在创业的创始人来说。

When you look into the future of the AI industry, say in five, 10 years, how do you think things will play out slash where do you think the biggest opportunities remain?

你往前看 AI 行业的五年、十年，你觉得局面会怎么演化，或者说你觉得最大的机会还剩在哪儿？

Where are you guys looking to invest most?

你们现在最想投的是哪一块？

In infrastructure.

基础设施。

I think that there is obviously a real estate power cooling play.

我觉得显然有一个地产、电力、散热的生意。

I think that's a little outside of hardcore technology investing that we do.

那块稍微超出我们做的硬核技术投资的范围。

But there's another layer which is take a given open source model, who can run it the cheapest with the lowest latency?

但还有另外一层：给定一个开源模型，谁能用最低的成本、最低的延迟把它跑起来？

And that's going to be extremely valuable, whoever has that.

谁拿到这个，谁就极其值钱。

And Google has been historically very good at that and so forth, and Sam is really trying to build that now with Stargate.

Google 历史上一直很擅长这个，等等；而 Sam 现在正用 Stargate 拼命在建这个。

And so I think that's going to be a very important layer of value.

所以我觉得那会是价值链上非常重要的一层。

I think that on the foundation model side, you have to be very selective as an investor.

至于基座模型这一侧，作为投资人你必须非常挑。

So in order to compete in foundational model world, our basic rule of thumb is you have to be able to, without much product progress, raise at least $ 2 billion because that's basically what it's going to cost you to train something that gets you competitive enough to make money.

要在基座模型这个世界里竞争，我们的基本判断标准是：你得能在没什么产品进展的情况下，至少融到 $2 billion，因为这基本就是你训练出一个有竞争力、能挣到钱的东西所需要的成本。

And there are just very few founders like that.

而这种量级的创始人非常少。

So Ilya is one of those.

Ilya 是一个。

Mira's one of those, Fei-Fei is one of those, but that's the kind of class of person you need.

Mira 是一个，Fei-Fei 是一个，但你需要的就是这一类人。

And there's whatever.

大概就这样吧。

There's certainly less than 10 of those in the world.

全世界这样的人肯定不到 10 个。

And so that's kind of an important area, but a small area.

所以那是个重要的领域，但是个小领域。

And then I think the application layer is going to be very, very interesting.

然后我觉得应用层会非常非常有意思。

And I think that if you look at Sam, he's making most of his money off ChatGPT, almost all his money off ChatGPT now.

而且我觉得你看 Sam，他的钱现在大部分来自 ChatGPT，几乎全部的钱都来自 ChatGPT。

And ChatGPT, like it or not, it's got a real moat.

而 ChatGPT，不管你喜不喜欢，它有一条真正的护城河。

It's very hard to knock it off.

想把它掀翻非常难。

It's perched.

它稳稳坐在那儿。

Everybody's taking a shot at it, people, great distribution like Google and Elon and Zuckerberg and everybody.

所有人都在往它身上开枪，那些手握强分发的人——Google、Elon、Zuckerberg，所有人。

And that thing just keeps going like it is.

可那东西就是照着现在这样一路往前跑。

So I think the applications are both more complex and kind of stickier than people thought they were originally.

所以我觉得应用比大家最初以为的更复杂，也更有黏性。

The thing that people got very wrong is this whole thin wrapper around GPT, that's really wrong.

大家搞错得最厉害的一点，是那个“GPT 之上的一层薄套壳”的说法，这真的大错特错。

In fact, here's how wrong it is.

说实话，错到什么程度呢。

Back in the '80s, that same phrase was used, but it was thin wrapper around an RDBMS-

八十年代那会儿，同一个说法就被用过，只不过当时说的是“RDBMS 之上的一层薄套壳”——

Database.

数据库。

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

对对对。

So it meant companies like Salesforce were basically just a thin wrapper.

所以按那个说法，Salesforce 这样的公司基本上就只是个薄套壳。

And I think that that's kind of the mistake people made.

我觉得这就是大家犯的那种错误。

So we're at this company Cursor, and if you look under the covers in Cursor, they've built 14 different models to really understand how a developer works, a high-end, a real developer.

我们投了 Cursor 这家公司，如果你掀开 Cursor 的盖子看，他们造了 14 个不同的模型，就为了真正搞懂一个开发者是怎么工作的——一个高水平的、真正的开发者。

Those models have tons and tons of interactions with how people talk to their friend Cursor about how they should design their programming so forth.

那些模型积累了海量海量的交互数据：人们是怎么跟他们的朋友 Cursor 讨论自己该怎么设计程序的，等等。

And that's real, that's not just a thin layer on a foundation model.

那是真东西，不是基座模型上的一层薄壳。

And I think there are many, many applications like that.

我觉得这样的应用有非常非常多。

And so I think there's going to be a lot of opportunity at the application layer.

所以我觉得应用层会有大量机会。

There's going to be some opportunity at the foundation model, and of course you can invest in Sam, you can invest in Anthropic and so forth as well.

基座模型那层会有一些机会，当然你也可以投 Sam、可以投 Anthropic 之类的。

But there will probably be a very small number of companies at that set, and then a almost unlimited number of companies at the application layer.

但那一档里公司的数量大概会非常少，而应用层的公司数量几乎是无限的。

And then as the technology advances, we'll of course see more things we can body to AI.

然后随着技术推进，我们当然会看到更多可以给 AI 装上身体的东西。

I mean already autonomous cars are working really well now after a long, long, long, long time.

我是说，自动驾驶现在已经跑得很好了，虽然走了很长很长很长很长的时间。

Since I think Sebastian won the challenge in 2006 when he drove the self-driving car across the country.

我记得 Sebastian 是 2006 年赢的那个挑战赛，他把自动驾驶汽车开着横穿了整个国家。

And here we are 20 years later and now they're deployed.

结果 20 年过去了，现在它们才真正铺开。

So that was a long time.

所以那真是很长一段路。

Robots I think is a harder problem than self-driving cars.

机器人我觉得是个比自动驾驶更难的问题。

So we'll see how that goes.

所以我们看它怎么走。

But, yeah, there's certainly a lot in that world as well.

但没错，那个世界里的东西同样非常多。

Wow, okay.

哇，好。

There's a lot to this answer.

这个回答信息量很大。

No, that was exactly what I was looking for.

不，这正是我想听的。

The Cursor example, it's something that comes up a lot on this podcast, in the application layer specifically.

Cursor 这个例子，在这档播客里被提到很多次，尤其是在应用层这一块。

The thought that the way to win in this space and to build a moat is, as you said, "Build your own model slash have proprietary data that you build through people using your product."

大家的想法是，在这个赛道要赢、要建护城河，就得像你说的：“自己造模型，或者靠用户用你的产品积累出专有数据。”

Thoughts on that?

你怎么看？

Yeah, I mean, I think that ends up just being what's required.

对，我觉得这最后就是必须做的事。

So it turns out that the universe is long-tailed, is fat-tailed, and humans are very fat-tailed in terms of human behavior, human conversation and so forth.

事实证明这个世界是长尾的、是肥尾的，而人类在行为、对话这些方面非常肥尾。

So to get to the real meaning of it and to get to the kind of essence of the problem, in any domain turns out to be, I think, more complex than we thought.

所以要触到问题真正的含义、触到任何一个领域里问题的本质，我觉得都比我们原以为的更复杂。

And so the early things and people were running around saying, "Okay, there's going to be one big brain to rule them all on these kinds of things."

所以早期那些说法，大家到处嚷嚷“会有一个统治一切的大脑来搞定这些事”。

That's kind of not played out yet.

那件事到现在还没发生。

And in fact, if you look underneath the covers, you have LLMs, which have generalized pretty in fascinating ways, but they've kind of also asymptoted in that we have run out of data for the most part.

而且实际上，如果你掀开盖子看，你有 LLM，它们的泛化能力确实到了让人着迷的程度，但也差不多到顶了——因为数据基本上已经被我们用光了。

And so if you look at the GPT-5 LLM compared to the GPT-4.1 and how much more it costs to train and so forth, it's definitely not going linear anymore.

所以你看 GPT-5 这一代 LLM，对比 GPT-4.1，训练成本高了多少，就知道它明显已经不是线性的了。

On the other hand, the reinforcement learning side has been linear, but it doesn't generalize.

另一方面，强化学习那一侧一直是线性的，但它不泛化。

So if you build a great programming model, it may be an idiot at math.

所以如果你训出一个很好的编程模型，它在数学上可能是个白痴。

And so that I think is just very different than what people would've said three years ago.

我觉得这一点跟三年前大家会说的完全不一样。

And I think that there's not something that's both scaling and generalizing yet, and maybe we'll get there, but that certainly opens the door to something that's more user-friendly, that's more effective in any number of domains than just the basic foundation model infrastructure.

而且我觉得现在还没有一个东西是既能 scaling、又能泛化的；也许我们会走到那一步，但这确实为另一类东西打开了大门：比基础的基座模型基础设施更好用、在各个领域里更有效的东西。

Now those models are incredibly important, and I think OpenAI is probably 80% of the revenue in AI are something like that now.

当然那些模型极其重要，我觉得 OpenAI 现在大概占了 AI 收入的 80%，差不多这个数。

It's massive, and so that foundation model is really, really important.

体量巨大，所以基座模型真的真的很重要。

And then the basic consumer app is really, really important.

然后那个最基础的消费级应用也真的真的很重要。

That just answers whatever the hell you want to know.

它就是回答你想知道的任何鬼东西。

Those things are very, very real.

这些东西非常非常真实。

But I do think particularly, and then if you get into enterprise stuff and then it's no longer internet data, it's their data that becomes very different.

但我确实觉得，尤其当你进到企业级，那就不再是互联网数据了，而是他们自己的数据，这就变得非常不一样。

Databricks is having a lot of success there because, okay, well, once you're inside a company, guess what?

Databricks 在这块做得很成功，因为一旦你进到一家公司内部，你猜怎么着？

You care about access control.

你得关心权限控制。

That's hard with an AI world.

这在 AI 的世界里很难办。

It gets trained on some stuff.

它在一堆东西上被训练过。

How does it know who has access to that information and who doesn't, and so forth.

它怎么知道谁有权访问那条信息、谁没有，等等。

You have semantic issues.

还有语义问题。

So if you look at an enterprise, find 10 enterprises, they all have a different definition of what a customer means.

你去看企业，找 10 家企业，它们对“客户”这个词的定义各不相同。

You would think customer is a basic thing.

你会觉得“客户”是个再基础不过的概念。

Well, is it a department at AT&T?

那么，客户是 AT&T 的一个部门？

Is it AT&T?

是 AT&T 这家公司？

Is it a person at AT&T?

还是 AT&T 里的某个人？

What the hell is the customer?

客户到底他妈是什么？

And it turns out to be very, very meaningful, particularly if you're trying to figure out important things like churn and this and that and third.

结果这件事非常非常要紧，尤其当你想算清楚流失这类重要指标的时候。

So that kind of stuff matters.

所以这类事情是有分量的。

So I would just say the problem space is a lot bigger than you can just attack with a basic foundation model currently.

所以我会说，问题空间比你能用一个基础基座模型直接怼上去的范围要大得多，至少现在是。

Maybe that will change, and if that changes, then certain prices will have, in retrospect, look way inflated and others will look too low.

也许这个会变；如果它变了，那某些价格回头看会显得虚高，另一些会显得太低。

But that is TBD.

但这个还没定。

So a big takeaway from this is that there's still tons of opportunity for founders to start companies building AI products.

所以一个大的结论是：对创始人来说，做 AI 产品、创办公司的机会仍然非常多。

I think so.

我觉得是的。

Everything that we couldn't solve with software we can solve now, almost.

所有我们以前用软件解决不了的问题，现在几乎都能解决了。

So it's a really big world.

所以这是个非常大的世界。

And it's funny because we're investors in Waymo, and one of the things when you get into what took so long to make Waymo so safe like they are now, it wasn't the things that everybody reported on the podcast.

说来有意思，我们投了 Waymo；当你去弄清楚是什么让 Waymo 花了这么久才做到今天这么安全的时候，你会发现根本不是播客上大家报道的那些东西。

There wasn't sleet and heavy rain, it was people.

不是雨夹雪和暴雨，是人。

It was like the human who was driving 75 in the 25 zone.

是那个在限速 25 的路段开到 75 的人。

It was very hard for the AI to anticipate because it was rare but important.

AI 很难预判这种情况，因为它罕见但要命。

And the number of rare, important crazy shit that humans do is very high.

而人类会干出的那种罕见、要命、疯狂的破事，数量非常高。

And I think that that goes for all of AI.

我觉得整个 AI 都是这个道理。

So to make things work really well, you have to understand this very kind of fat tail of human behavior.

所以要让东西真的跑得好，你必须理解人类行为这条非常肥的尾巴。

Along this AI thread, something that is really important to you, clearly something you talk a lot about is the US being successful in AI, in leading the world in AI.

沿着 AI 这条线，有一件对你显然非常重要、你也谈得很多的事：美国要在 AI 上做成，要在 AI 上领导世界。

Why is this so important?

为什么这件事这么重要？

Why is something you spend a lot of time on?

为什么这是你花大量时间在做的事？

It starts with, I think, my view of the US and its role in the world.

这得从我对美国及其世界角色的看法说起。

My personal view is it's very, very, very important.

我个人的看法是，它非常、非常、非常重要。

Not for society to be completely fair because it's not going to be completely fair or completely equal because we've never had one that's been completely equal.

不是说社会要做到完全公平，因为它不会完全公平、也不会完全平等——我们从来没有过一个完全平等的社会。

But it's important that everybody have a chance at life, and particularly both culturally, but also just you can't advance the world if you can't tap into all of your resources.

但重要的是每个人在人生里都要有机会，这既是文化层面的，也是很实际的：如果你调动不了自己所有的资源，你就没法推动世界前进。

And so if you kind of take away motivation and these kinds of things, you get into trouble.

所以如果你把动力抽掉之类的，麻烦就来了。

And if you look at the kind of every country today, and this is by the way, so you want the right amount of decentralized power.

你看今天的每一个国家——顺便说，所以你要的是恰当程度的权力分散。

You don't want it to be completely concentrated, concentrated power makes it very, very difficult for everybody to have a chance.

你不希望权力完全集中，集中的权力会让每个人都极难获得机会。

This is the big lesson of communism over the last hundred years is it turned out right.

这是过去一百年共产主义给出的最大教训，事实证明它是对的。

And we still have politicians selling it this way today, it's like, "Oh, it's power to the people."

而今天还有政客在这么兜售：“哦，这是把权力还给人民。”

No, no, no.

不不不。

It's power to you because you're removing all power from the private sector and installing it into the government, and then you're putting yourself in charge of the government.

这是把权力给你自己——因为你把所有权力从私营部门抽走、装进政府，然后你自己坐进政府的头把交椅。

And so I become extremely powerful.

于是我就变得极其有权。

And this is why it didn't matter if it was Mao or Pol Pot or Ceausescu or Stalin, everybody died because when you give anybody that much power, nobody has a chance.

这也是为什么无论是毛、波尔布特、齐奥塞斯库还是斯大林，结果都一样：人大批地死。因为你给任何人这么大的权力，所有人就都没机会了。

There is no incentive, there's no carrot, there's only stick.

没有激励，没有胡萝卜，只剩大棒。

And so you use that stick, and that's just the nature.

于是你就用那根大棒，事情的本质就是这样。

It's a system's problem.

这是制度的问题。

It's not a person problem.

不是人的问题。

It's not Stalin was evil, Ceausescu is evil.

不是斯大林是恶的、齐奥塞斯库是恶的。

It was that system is evil.

是那个制度是恶的。

And-

而且——

It was evil.

它就是恶的。

It was like that system is evil.

就是那个制度是恶的。

And that's the saying with fascism.

法西斯主义也是同一句话。

Be it Hitler or Mussolini, it doesn't matter.

不管是希特勒还是墨索里尼，都一样。

That level of power is evil.

那个量级的权力就是恶的。

And the US does the best job.

而美国这件事做得最好。

Systematically, it's the best system.

从制度上讲，它是最好的制度。

It's got all kinds of issues, it's got problems.

它有各种各样的毛病，有一堆问题。

People always try to defeat it.

总有人想把它搞垮。

But one of the things that if you look at the Declaration of Independence or the Constitution, the language is very important.

但有一点：如果你去看《独立宣言》或者《宪法》，那个措辞非常重要。

It's, "We hold these truths to be self-evident."

它写的是“我们认为这些真理是不言而喻的”。

What does that mean?

这是什么意思？

It means it's not my rule, it's not the president's rule, it's God's rule.

意思是这不是我定的规矩，不是总统定的规矩，是上帝定的规矩。

And so those rules are above the President, and then you work in that context and that distributes the power, because you're under the law, not under the person.

所以那些规则高于总统，然后你在那个框架里做事，权力因此被分散——因为你受制于法，而不是受制于人。

We see that now even with Europe, where the leaders are going, "Well, I have a rule.

我们现在在欧洲已经看到了：那边的领导人在说“我有一条规矩。

It's you can't say certain things or I'll throw you in jail."

某些话你不能说，说了我就把你关起来”。

And the kind of shield they hide behind as well, we have to keep the kids safe.

他们躲在后面的挡箭牌是“我们得保护孩子”。

But if you say something that I don't agree with and the kids hear it, they're not safe.

但只要你说了我不认同的话、又被孩子听到了，孩子就不安全了。

So the kind of transited property of bullshit is going to override.

所以这种“扯淡的传递律”就要压过一切。

And so it's really important that we have at least one society.

所以至少得有一个这样的社会，这件事非常重要。

And as flawed as we are, as flawed as the US is, it's still the best.

尽管我们有那么多缺陷，尽管美国有那么多缺陷，它仍然是最好的。

And you can see it by the number of new company creations, the number of new ideas that come out of here and so forth.

你从新公司诞生的数量、从这里冒出来的新想法的数量，就能看出来。

It's really, really important that the US stays important and powerful in the world.

美国在世界上保持重要和强大，真的真的很重要。

We know from the last century, if you look at the last century, who were the countries that had economic power, military power, cultural power?

从上个世纪我们就知道了：你回看上个世纪，哪些国家拥有经济实力、军事实力、文化影响力？

They were the ones that industrialized, and the ones that industrialized first and best.

是那些完成了工业化的国家，是最早、最好地完成工业化的那些。

And the ones that did became Communists, like Russia, China.

而那些没做到的就成了共产国家，比如俄罗斯、中国。

They were slow on industrialization and they fell into this very fucking dangerous system.

它们工业化慢了，于是掉进了这套他妈的极度危险的制度里。

Looking forward, that's going to happen again, but it's going to be AI.

往前看，这件事会再演一遍，只不过这次是 AI。

And so it is fundamentally important, not just to America, but to humanity, that America succeed at that.

所以美国在这件事上成功，不只对美国、而是对人类都具有根本性的重要意义。

We don't have to be the one winner or this or that, but we do have to be in that tier.

我们不必是那个唯一的赢家之类的，但我们必须待在那一档里。

And as I go around the world and travel, I can't tell you, everybody ... and then everybody was getting, by the way, very, very worried about us earlier.

而我满世界跑的时候，我跟你讲，每个人……顺便说，前一阵子每个人都非常非常担心我们。

And they say, "Look, we need you to succeed.

他们说：“听着，我们需要你们成功。

Don't destroy the dollar.

别把美元搞垮。

Don't fall behind in AI.

别在 AI 上掉队。

Don't over-regulate it too early.

别过早地把它管死。

Don't do these things, please, because we need you to win, because we're all counting on that."

拜托别做这些事，因为我们需要你们赢，我们都指望着这个。”

And I think it's the most important work that we do.

我觉得这是我们做的最重要的工作。

It's why we're so involved in policy and so forth.

这也是我们为什么这么深地介入政策之类的事情。

I think this is also going to be very, very true with crypto, which ends up being an incredibly important networking technology that complements AI.

我觉得这一点在加密上同样会非常非常成立——它最后会成为一项极其重要的、与 AI 互补的网络技术。

That work is, I would say, beyond for the money.

这份工作，我会说，超出了钱的范畴。

Although we will end up making a lot of money with the right policies, so I don't want to seem totally philanthropic on this, but it's more important than that.

虽然只要政策对，我们最后也会赚很多钱，所以我不想把自己说得完全是在做慈善，但它比钱更重要。

It's certainly more important than us succeeding or anything like that, that the country succeed.

它当然比我们自己成功之类的更重要——重要的是这个国家成功。

Speaking of philanthropic and other passions of yours, something that I don't think most people know about you, and I think will give them another insight into how interesting you are, you run an organization called Paid in Full, which is incredibly cool.

说到慈善和你的其他热爱——有件事我觉得大多数人并不知道，我觉得它会让大家更看清你这个人有多有意思——你在运营一个叫 Paid in Full 的组织，特别酷。

Talk about what that's about, why this is so important to you.

讲讲这是干什么的，为什么它对你这么重要。

Our ethos as a firm is kind of what I'd say is something from nothing.

我们这家机构的精神内核，用我的话说就是“从无到有”。

This is the greatness of entrepreneurship.

这就是创业最了不起的地方。

You start with nothing and then you make something really important.

你从一无所有开始，然后做出一个真正重要的东西。

That is also how Hip-hop started, where you have a bunch of kids who didn't even have instruments, and they created something out of nothing.

Hip-hop 也是这么起来的：一群孩子连乐器都没有，硬是从虚空里创造出了一个东西。

And the people in that world always talk about that.

那个圈子里的人一直在讲这件事。

And one of the really unfortunate things that happens is, the people who invent the art form, and certainly in the case of Hip-hop, don't get anywhere near the kind of proportional benefit of their invention.

而其中一件非常令人遗憾的事是：发明了这门艺术形式的人——尤其在 Hip-hop 这个例子里——完全没有拿到跟他们的发明相称的那份回报。

And a lot of the guys, people have forgotten about, or are struggling to make ends meet, and so forth.

其中很多人已经被大家忘了，或者还在为温饱挣扎，等等。

So what we created was this thing called the Paid in Full Foundation, named after the Rakim, Eric B. song, which I did call Rakim and ask him for permission to use the name, so we didn't just take it.

所以我们做了一个东西叫 Paid in Full 基金会，名字取自 Rakim 和 Eric B. 的那首歌——我特意打电话给 Rakim 请他允许我们用这个名字，没有直接拿来就用。

What we do is, we give essentially pensions to the old rappers, that enable them to kind of continue their work.

我们做的事，本质上是给那些老一辈说唱歌手发养老金，让他们能继续自己的创作。

And then we have a big event go to paidinfullfoundation.org for tickets, which is amazing, where they get the award and they're celebrated by all their peers and so forth.

然后我们有一场大型活动，去 paidinfullfoundation.org 买票——那场面非常棒，他们在那儿领奖，被所有同行一起庆祝。

And it's really phenomenal.

真的非常了不起。

Some of the awardees have been Rakim, Scarface from the Geto Boys, Roxanne Shante, Grandmaster Caz, Kool Moe Dee.

得过奖的有 Rakim、Geto Boys 的 Scarface、Roxanne Shante、Grandmaster Caz、Kool Moe Dee。

This year we're honoring George Clinton for being sampled, Kool G Rap and Grand Puba, and also Jalil from Whodini.

今年我们要表彰 George Clinton 对采样的贡献，还有 Kool G Rap、Grand Puba，以及 Whodini 的 Jalil。

I can't even describe how high impact it is on these guys.

这件事对这些人的影响之大，我都形容不出来。

I think Rakim was touring close to 200 nights a year, and he got his award, and came out with his first album in 15 years and is doing amazingly well.

我记得 Rakim 那时候一年要巡演近 200 个晚上；拿了奖之后，他出了 15 年来的第一张专辑，而且反响非常好。

All of a sudden everybody's going, "Oh yeah, that's the greatest rapper of all time."

忽然之间所有人都在说：“对啊，那是史上最伟大的说唱歌手。”

They're finally going back and remembering all the things he did.

大家终于回头去记起他做过的所有事。

Roxanne Shante, nobody had mentioned her in years and years and years.

Roxanne Shante，已经很多很多年没人提起她了。

I think six months after we gave her the award, the Grammys gave her a lifetime achievement award, which is amazing.

我们给她颁奖之后大概半年，格莱美给了她终身成就奖，太棒了。

It's super high impact.

影响力非常大。

It's a great thing.

这是件很棒的事。

As a Hip-hop fan, I say dream come true.

作为一个 Hip-hop 迷，我会说这是梦想成真。

It's my only guilt.

这是我唯一的私心。

What's the origin story of you and Hip-hop?

你和 Hip-hop 的缘分是怎么开始的？

I imagine many people look at you and wouldn't imagine these records behind you, Nas gifted you.

我猜很多人看着你，很难想象你身后这些唱片是 Nas 送你的。

You are so deep into the community, just how did this all begin?

你在这个圈子里扎得这么深，这一切到底是怎么开始的？

Well, I actually wrote a blog post on it called The Legend of the Blind MC, which I think would be, if you're really interested, it's worth reading.

我其实写过一篇博客讲这个，叫 The Legend of the Blind MC，如果你真感兴趣，我觉得值得一读。

But it is kind of a story of me becoming a rapper, and how that occurred, and how it went, and so forth.

它讲的是我怎么成了一个说唱歌手、那件事是怎么发生的、后来怎么样了，等等。

I always say the very short story is, I was in New York at the birth of Hip-hop and when it really became big, '84 through '88.

我总说最短的版本是：我在纽约，正赶上 Hip-hop 诞生、并且真正做大的那几年，1984 到 1988。

It's just the most exciting thing to see a new art form pop out and the creativity and everything.

亲眼看着一种新的艺术形式冒出来、看那种创造力和一切，是最让人兴奋的事。

Once music becomes mainstream, I would say it's very shaped by business.

一旦音乐进入主流，我会说它就被生意塑造得很厉害了。

And in the early days, everybody's just coming out with whatever idea they have and so forth.

而早期的时候，每个人就是把自己脑子里的任何想法直接掏出来，等等。

The early days of rock and roll were like that.

摇滚乐的早期就是那样。

The early days of jazz were like that.

爵士的早期也是那样。

I see now even more why you guys brought on Erik Torenberg.

我现在更明白你们为什么把 Erik Torenberg 招进来了。

Beyond his many talents, he's also really big into rap himself.

除了他那一堆本事，他自己也非常痴迷说唱。

Yeah, that's a good reminder.

对，这个提醒得好。

I need to make sure he gets to Paid in Full.

我得确保他去一趟 Paid in Full。

Ben, this was incredible.

Ben，这太精彩了。

Is there anything else that you want to leave listeners with or share before we get to our very exciting, quick lightning round?

在我们进入非常刺激的快问快答之前，你还有什么想留给听众的、想分享的吗？

Yeah, I would just say, if you're a CEO listening to this, then know that how you feel about yourself is going to end up meaning as much as anything, and take your time on that.

有，我想说的是：如果你是个正在听这期节目的 CEO，那你要知道，你怎么看待自己，最后跟任何事情一样重要，请在这件事上花点时间。

Self-evaluation is ... one of my favorite quotes is that when my old manager saw me, as select players know, "From this day on, no credit will be given for predicting rain, only credit for building an ark."

自我评估是……我最喜欢的一句话，是我以前的老板看着我说的：“从今天起，预测下雨拿不到任何分数，只有造出方舟才算。”

And I think that's more true for CEOs than anybody.

我觉得这句话对 CEO 比对任何人都更成立。

You have to build the ark.

你必须把那艘方舟造出来。

It doesn't matter if you predict you're going to fail, you've still failed.

你预测到自己会失败，没用，你还是失败了。

It gets you nothing.

那什么都换不来。

So what you have to do is figure your way out of it and spend all your time on that.

所以你要做的是想办法从里面走出来，把你所有时间都花在这上面。

Well, with that, we've reached our very exciting lightning round.

那么，我们就进入非常刺激的快问快答环节。

I've got five questions for you.

我有五个问题要问你。

Are you ready?

准备好了吗？

Yes, sir.

好的。

First question, what are two or three books that you find yourself recommending most to other people, not including your own books?

第一个问题：有哪两三本书是你最常推荐给别人的？不算你自己写的。

So two that I learned a lot from, one is The Weirdest People in the World, which it's a kind of big history book, but through an anthropological kind of cultural lens.

有两本我学到很多的，一本是 The Weirdest People in the World，算是一本大历史书，但用的是人类学、文化的视角。

It's really fascinating.

非常引人入胜。

It explains an awful lot about how society works and how little changes in the rules completely change the culture.

它解释了很多关于社会如何运转的事，以及规则上的微小变化如何彻底改变文化。

One of the things that he basically endeavors to explain, why did the West get ahead on the rest of the world?

他试图解释的问题之一是：为什么西方跑到了世界其他地方前面？

It kind of comes down to a weird anomaly with the Catholic Church, where they enforced monogamous marriage.

归根到底是天主教会的一个奇怪的反常之处——他们强制推行了一夫一妻制。

And it turns out that the natural state of humans is polygamy, but the problem with polygamy is, there's no cooperation among men, which is a problem.

结果证明，人类的自然状态是一夫多妻，而一夫多妻的问题在于男性之间没有合作，这是个大麻烦。

And as a result, and then everything is secret, so there's no sharing of knowledge, because it's all kept in the family, in what he calls kin-based culture.

结果就是，一切都是秘密的，知识不会被分享，因为全都锁在家族内部，也就是他所说的亲缘文化。

It leads to something called kin-based culture.

它会导向一种叫亲缘文化的东西。

And even recipes won't be shared if you're in a kin-based culture, because it's a secret.

在亲缘文化里，连菜谱都不会外传，因为那是秘密。

So you can't build science, you can't build cities, you can't build big companies.

所以你没法建立科学、没法建起城市、没法建起大公司。

So because the West kind of enforced broad monogamous marriage early, it was able to evolve into all these things.

正因为西方很早就大范围强制推行了一夫一妻制，它才得以演化出这一切。

And he kind of shows why and how.

他会把为什么、以及是怎么发生的，都讲清楚。

He does these psychological tests today with people from monogamous marriage culture, Western culture, and kin-based culture.

他今天还会做这样的心理测试，找一夫一妻制文化、西方文化的人，和亲缘文化的人来做。

And the psychology is completely different.

结果心理反应完全不同。

He gives examples like if a person murders another person, is that still murder if that person who did the murder is your brother?

他举的例子是：如果一个人杀了另一个人，而杀人的那个是你的兄弟，那这还算谋杀吗？

And in Western society, yeah, that's a murder.

在西方社会，那当然算谋杀。

In kin-based culture, it's not a murder.

在亲缘文化里，那不算谋杀。

It's just not.

就是不算。

And so that's really different.

所以差别非常大。

And so morality is different, everything comes off of that.

所以道德也是不同的，一切都由此衍生。

So it's just a fascinating, fascinating book.

所以这是一本极其极其迷人的书。

So that's one.

这是第一本。

Another book that I recommend a lot is Shaka's book, his first book, Writing My Wrongs.

另一本我常推荐的是 Shaka 的书，他的第一本，Writing My Wrongs。

He has a new book that I think is better, which is called How to Be Free.

他有一本新书我觉得更好，叫 How to Be Free。

It's not quite out, or maybe it's releasing.

好像还没上市，也可能正在发。

It's releasing next month, so I recommend it.

下个月发，所以我推荐它。

What it does is, it goes through how did he work his way out of prison and solitary confinement to his current psychology, and what are the techniques he used?

它讲的是：他是怎么一步步从监狱和单独监禁里，走到今天这样的心理状态的，他用了哪些方法？

They're very powerful, very powerful ideas.

那些方法非常有力，是非常有力的想法。

CEOs always asks me, "How do you deal with it?

CEO 们总问我：“你是怎么扛过来的？

How do you deal with it?"

你是怎么扛过来的？”

They'll ask in a work-life balance.

他们会用 work-life balance 的框架来问。

It's like, "What are you talking about?

我就想：“你在说什么？

No work-life balance for CEOs," or particularly entrepreneur CEOs, come on.

CEO 没有什么 work-life balance”，尤其是创业者 CEO，别开玩笑了。

But what do you do?

但那你到底做什么呢？

Do you meditate?

你冥想吗？

Do you do this or that?

你做这个做那个吗？

But he kind of goes through the things that you really ought to do.

而他把那些你真正应该做的事一件件讲了出来。

That's what I would recommend, if somebody's wondering, how do you deal with all this pressure?

所以如果有人在想“这么大的压力你怎么扛”，我就推荐这本。

I love this.

我太喜欢这个了。

Just the whole idea of Shaka being this help for CEOs, someone that killed someone, went to prison, led a prison gang.

光是 Shaka 能成为 CEO 们的帮手这件事——一个杀过人、坐过牢、领导过监狱帮派的人。

I just love that, how valuable his lessons-

我太喜欢这一点了，他的经验有多值钱——

Prison gangs turn out to be really complicated things to manage.

监狱帮派其实是种非常复杂的东西，很难管。

Sorry for getting into this, but the problem with running a prison gang is, you're just dealing with people who all come from broken culture.

抱歉又扯到这个，但管一个监狱帮派的难点在于：你面对的全是从破碎文化里出来的人。

So in any organization, like the fundamental thing is trust.

而在任何组织里，最根本的东西是信任。

And so you're bringing in a bunch of no trust people.

你却引进了一群零信任的人。

And so again, it's kind of like a military organization.

所以说到底，它有点像一个军事组织。

It's a gang.

它是个帮派。

If you think about a military operation, if you don't have trust, people don't trust the order, then you're completely dysfunctional.

你想想一次军事行动，如果没有信任、大家不信任那道命令，那你就彻底失灵了。

So how do you build trust from zero is a very interesting problem.

所以怎么从零开始建立信任，是个非常有意思的问题。

And he's a genius at that, by the way.

顺便说，他在这件事上是个天才。

And I learned a lot from talking to him about it.

我跟他聊这个学到了很多。

So from a management standpoint, I would just say it's an important kind of boundary case of how you build culture.

所以从管理的角度，我会说这是一个关于怎么建文化的重要边界案例。

He is very, very smart at that.

他在这上面非常非常聪明。

Like I said, you have to look at people about their greatness, not the worst thing they ever did.

像我说的，你得看一个人身上的伟大之处，而不是他做过的最糟的事。

I know it's the lightning round, but can you just share one example of something he did that was like, wow, that's a really good lesson, someone trying to create a good culture that worked for him?

我知道这是快问快答，但你能不能就举一个他做过的例子，那种“哇，这一课真好”、对想建立好文化的人有用的？

Yeah.

好。

So one of the things that he did that I thought was really smart is ...

他做过的一件我觉得特别聪明的事是……

Well, he did a couple of things.

其实他做了好几件。

One is just a simple thing.

一件很简单的事。

He just made everybody eat lunch together in the gang, just to build rapport, relationship, trust, like it's all one thing.

他让帮派里所有人一起吃午饭，就为了建立默契、建立关系、建立信任，让大家觉得是一体的。

We're all together on that.

我们是一伙的。

And I think particularly in the remote work world and so forth, people really underestimate how powerful just that idea can be.

我觉得尤其在远程办公的世界里，大家严重低估了光是这一个做法能有多大力量。

And then another thing he did is, he made morality ... he had very specific things about, you had to be good to your word internally and externally.

他做的另一件事是把道德……他有一些非常具体的要求：你对内对外都必须说话算话。

So normally a gang, like I said, it's kind of a kin-based culture thing.

因为通常一个帮派，像我说的，多少有点亲缘文化的意思。

But it made it much more powerful when he said, "Look, you can't do devious shit outside the gang either."

但当他说“听着，你在帮派外面也不许干阴人的事”，这件事的力量就大得多了。

And he had a bunch of examples of that, that I went through in the book.

他有一堆这样的例子，我在书里都写了。

Like I said, because you're building it from zero, you really have to take a hard line on things that I think people in companies don't even take a hard line on.

像我说的，因为你是从零开始建，你必须在一些事情上划死线——而我觉得公司里的人对这些事根本不划线。

Is it okay to lie internally?

对内说谎可以吗？

Probably not.

多半不行。

Is it okay to lie to a customer?

对客户说谎可以吗？

Well, in some organizations it is, but in Shaka's organization, that's as big a penalty as lying internally.

在有些组织里可以，但在 Shaka 的组织里，那和对内说谎是一样重的罚。

These things, I think, end up being really important.

我觉得这些东西最后都非常要紧。

We're going to link to this book.

我们会把这本书链上。

This is, What You Do is Who You Are.

就是这本 What You Do Is Who You Are。

This is your second book that fewer people know about.

这是你的第二本书，知道的人少一些。

And this is one of the stories you tell and just what the lessons are for building-

这里讲的就是其中一个故事，以及它对建公司的启示——

Yeah.

对。

It's kind of the more advanced book.

它算是更进阶的那一本。

You kind of have to survive to want to care about dealing with the cultural issues.

你得先活下来，才会想去关心文化层面的问题。

And so the survival book has a bigger audience.

所以那本讲活下来的书受众更大。

Amazing.

太好了。

We're going to keep going with Lightning Round.

我们继续快问快答。

Is there a favorite recent movie or TV show you have really enjoyed?

最近有没有你特别喜欢的电影或电视剧？

Well on TV, I really like Slow Horses, which is the show about the MI6 cast-off guys.

电视剧的话，我很喜欢 Slow Horses，讲一帮被 MI6 淘汰下来的人的剧。

And then I haven't seen a lot of movies lately, but I watched Sinners.

电影我最近看得不多，不过我看了 Sinners。

I went to theater for Sinners.

我是专门去电影院看的 Sinners。

Just the cinematography is unbelievable, and the story is really original, and the acting is incredible, and the costumes are amazing.

光是摄影就不可思议，故事非常原创，表演极好，服装也很棒。

It's just a great, comprehensive piece of work.

它是一件完整度极高的作品。

The craftsmanship on that thing is just a lot beyond what most people making movies are doing these days, so I really enjoyed that.

那东西的手艺水平，远远超过现在大多数拍电影的人，所以我真的很享受。

I hate scary movies, but I watched it and loved it.

我讨厌恐怖片，但我还是看了，而且很喜欢。

It wasn't that scary.

其实没那么恐怖。

It wasn't that scary, but still, it was zombies popping out of corners.

是没那么恐怖，但毕竟还是有僵尸从角落里蹦出来。

That's not my jam usually.

那通常不是我的菜。

Is there a product you recently discovered that you really love?

有没有你最近发现的、特别喜欢的产品？

It could be a gadget, it could be clothes, could be something else.

可以是小玩意儿，可以是衣服，也可以是别的。

I bought a coffee machine called the Technivorm Moccamaster, which is freaking incredible.

我买了一台叫 Technivorm Moccamaster 的咖啡机，好得要命。

In fact, a friend of mine saw it and was like, "What is that?"

说真的，我一个朋友看见它就问：“这是什么？”

And I just bought it for him too, because it's so awesome.

我干脆也给他买了一台，因为实在太棒了。

This thing makes coffee that it's just perfect.

这机器煮出来的咖啡就是完美。

There's no bitterness.

一点苦味都没有。

It's completely clean.

干干净净。

It's amazing.

太神了。

The only problem with it is, I can't drink coffee that it doesn't make anymore.

它唯一的问题是：不是它煮的咖啡，我现在喝不下去了。

I don't know if that's a good thing or bad thing, but ...

我不知道这算好事还是坏事，不过……

That might come out someday in the AI future.

说不定哪天 AI 的未来会解决这个。

Yeah.

对。

Two more questions.

还有两个问题。

One, is there a life motto that you often come back to, find really useful in work or in life?

第一，有没有一句人生信条，是你经常回想起、在工作或生活里特别管用的？

The thing that I would say has had the biggest effect on me is something my father said to me years ago, which is, "Life isn't fair."

对我影响最大的，是我父亲很多年前跟我说的一句话：“人生是不公平的。”

That seems really, really simple, but I think that the thing that defeats people more than any other thing that I've seen, just in life, is the expectation of some fairness.

这听起来非常非常简单，但我见过的、把人击垮得最厉害的东西，就是对公平的期待。

It's just not fair.

它就是不公平。

There are all kinds of stuff that are going to happen to you, and happen to everybody, that don't happen to other people, that are completely unfair.

会有各种各样的事发生在你身上、发生在每个人身上，而没有发生在别人身上，完全不公平。

But it doesn't matter, because that's the way it is.

但那不重要，因为事情本来就是这样。

As soon as you get that idea out of your mind, then you can just deal with it, like, oh yeah, of course it's not fair, but what should I do now, which is the real question, not how do I go back and get people to be fair?

一旦你把这个念头从脑子里拿掉，你就能直接面对它了——对啊，当然不公平，那我现在该做什么？这才是真正的问题，而不是我怎么回头逼别人变公平。

Nobody's going to be fair.

没有人会公平。

It's not fair.

它就是不公平。

It's the nature of it.

这是事物的本性。

If you think about it for more than five seconds, you'll realize that.

你只要想超过五秒钟，就会明白。

It's as an individual, if you want to make the world a better place, whatever, but as an individual, do not expect anything to be fair, it'll only defeat.

作为个人——如果你想让世界变得更好，随便你；但作为个人，别指望任何事情是公平的，那只会把你击垮。

Final question.

最后一个问题。

This comes from Shaka, actually.

这个其实也来自 Shaka。

He gave me so many great suggestions.

他给了我太多好建议了。

I hate to save this one for last.

我特别舍不得把这个留到最后。

So the question is, if you had to build a business curriculum from two Hip-hop albums and one Funk album, what would they be and why?

问题是：如果让你用两张 Hip-hop 专辑和一张 Funk 专辑搭一门商业课，你会选哪几张，为什么？

I think probably Follow the Leader by Rakim.

我想大概会是 Rakim 的 Follow the Leader。

And the reason is what we had kind of gotten into earlier, which is leadership.

理由就是我们前面聊过的那件事——领导力。

When he came out with that song, which was maybe the greatest Hip-hop song ever written, he's telling people to follow him, follow the leader.

他出那首歌的时候——那可能是史上最伟大的 Hip-hop 歌曲——他是在告诉人们跟着他走，追随这个领导者。

And just to have the idea that he was the leader of the entire art form, not just his band, it is amazing idea.

光是他敢有这个念头：他是整个艺术形式的领导者，而不只是自己乐队的领导者，这想法就了不起。

And then the way he expressed it was incredible.

而他表达出来的方式更是不可思议。

And then he's got other great concepts in there that would give you ...

里面还有其他很棒的概念，能给你……

It's hard to listen to that record and not have confidence.

听那张唱片，你很难不生出信心。

I think from a competitive, purely competitive standpoint, Stillmatic from Nas, that's the one with Get Ur Self a Gun, that's the one with You're da Man.

从竞争、纯粹竞争的角度，我会选 Nas 的 Stillmatic，就是有 Get Ur Self a Gun 的那张，也是有 You're da Man 的那张。

It's like all of the idea of competition is encapsulated in that album, so that would be the other one.

竞争这件事的全部含义都被浓缩在那张专辑里，所以那会是第二张。

And then Funk, One Nation Under a Groove, for sure.

然后 Funk，肯定是 One Nation Under a Groove。

Because it's like, how do you initiate people into a concept or an idea, and how do you infuse them?

因为它讲的是：你怎么把人带进一个概念、一个想法里，你怎么让他们浸进去？

One Nation Under a Groove is all about joining the nation, and it's so musically interesting and getting people to be part of that.

One Nation Under a Groove 整张都在讲加入这个“国度”，而且它在音乐上非常有意思，能把人拉进来成为其中一员。

[inaudible 01:36:58] If you asked me tomorrow, I'd probably have three other ones.

[听不清 01:36:58] 你要是明天再问我，我大概会说另外三张。

Incredible.

太棒了。

I'm going to go listen to these.

我要去听这几张。

Ben, final question, how can listeners be useful to you?

Ben，最后一个问题：听众可以怎么帮到你？

If you get something that makes you better, please take it.

如果你从这里拿到了什么让你变得更好的东西，请拿走。

If you need more advice on it, let me know.

如果你需要更多这方面的建议，告诉我。

Look, my job is to help everybody build something great, so if you're an entrepreneur, thank you for that.

听着，我的工作就是帮所有人建出伟大的东西，所以如果你是个创业者，先谢谢你。

Also, check out Paid in Full, paidinfullfoundation.org, if you want to learn more about that nonprofit.

另外，如果你想更多了解那家非营利组织，去看看 Paid in Full，paidinfullfoundation.org。

Yes, definitely, we would love to have you.

对，一定要去，我们非常欢迎你。

Amazing.

太好了。

Ben, thank you so much for being here.

Ben，非常感谢你来。

All right, awesome.

好的，太棒了。

Thank you, Lenny.

谢谢你，Lenny。

Bye, everyone.

各位再见。

Thank you so much for listening.

非常感谢你的收听。

If you found this valuable, you can subscribe to the show on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast app.

如果你觉得这期有价值，可以在 Apple Podcasts、Spotify 或你常用的播客 app 上订阅本节目。

Also, please consider giving us a rating or leaving a review, as that really helps other listeners find the podcast.

也请考虑给我们打个分或留个评价，这真的能帮到其他听众发现这档播客。

You can find all past episodes or learn more about the show at lennyspodcast.com.

你可以在 lennyspodcast.com 找到所有往期节目，或了解更多关于这档节目的信息。

See you in the next episode.

下期见。