Greetings from Charlotte, NC!

Hope your weekend was a great one.​

🧀⚾️ Personally, the Packers owned my Saturday, and then we had the first-ever Pro Day at Tread on Sunday. The Packers won and the guys threw well. All-in-all, a great weekend.​


​🎧 I spent my commutes this week re-listening to the first three chapters of The Hard Thing About Hard Things by Ben Horowitz. If you haven’t read that book, I can’t recommend it highly enough.​

It was my third time reading it and the thing that really stood out to me is the fact that decision-making doesn’t have a playbook. Decisions are made with incomplete information and often don’t have a “perfect” answer. This makes decision-making more like statistics than calculus. (To understand this distinction, I’d recommend reading Superforecasting by Philip Tetlock)​

A perfect example of this comes from Horowitz’s essay, Peacetime CEO/Wartime CEO.​ For example, “Peacetime CEO always has a contingency plan. Wartime CEO knows that sometimes you gotta roll a hard six.​”

It’s a great book, and in my opinion, it’s best when listened to. And as a special treat for newsletter subscribers, you can get the audiobook version for free right here.​


📥 Improving Your Inputs​

If you’ve been around here for a while, you know that I love studying startups and drawing inspiration from that space.​

And one thing I’ve learned in the last year is that a simple formula for innovation is to look for what’s worked/is working in a different industry and then apply what’s useful to what you’re doing. Sam Hinkie calls this a never-ending thirst for better, more diverse inputs. Innovation is driven by the unfamiliar, and innovators are constantly on the lookout for those better inputs.​

In my own search, I’ve recently come across WaitWho.is. It’s a growing directory of all sorts of fascinating people’s writing as well as their podcast and video appearances. For example, if you were intrigued by Ben Horowitz, you could head over to his profile and dig around.​

A few of my favorites are Patrick CollisonKeith RaboisSam AltmanSahil Lavingia, and Bret Victor (specifically his videos — “Inventing on Principle” is incredible).​

Can’t wait to see what you take away from some of the most interesting people in tech to give you and your team the competitive edge you’re after!


❓ Asking Better Questions​

When’s the last time somebody asked you a truly great question?​

One thing I’ve noticed is that so many people (myself included) ask default questions. “How’s it going?” “How was your day?” “What do you want to do in 5 years?” That kind of thing.​​

If you’re like me, you’ve grown frustrated with your question-asking and want to get better at it.​

No worries. I got you.​

This article on high-velocity questions is phenomenal and gives a tremendous example of the intentionality that goes into asking great questions.​

My takeaway for coaches is this: great questions come from being prepared. You can improve your baseline questioning skills simply by caring, but high-velocity questions, questions that accelerate the conversation, come from knowing the person you’re talking with and asking a question that is surprising, exciting, and engaging.​


✌🏼 That’s all for this week. Thanks for hanging out!

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Appreciate you starting your week with Monday Morning Edge,

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