Daniel Gross presents a practical and healthy approach to becoming a successful startup entrepreneur. He points out common mistakes entrepreneurs make, and emphasizes that in order to succeed, you need to go beyond just working hard and learn how to work smart. In particular, he explains that it is important to optimize the mind and strengthen leadership capabilities based on basic physical care such as sleep, diet, and exercise.

1. Introduction: Startups are like the Olympics 🏅

YC founder and former partner Daniel Gross spoke to help startup entrepreneurs successfully navigate this difficult journey while remaining mentally healthy and sane. He compared entrepreneurs to training like Olympic athletes and wanted to share how to avoid common mistakes that beginner athletes make.

"You're all essentially playing a game, and you want to win it." "The mindset you have as an entrepreneur is like that of an athlete, and startups are a kind of Olympic. It's one of the hardest things you can do."

Daniel points out that many entrepreneurs make the mistake of working 'hard' and not 'smart'. They consider it a virtue to be constantly in the office or work late, but they emphasized that simply putting in time (input) does not lead to good output (output).

"Nobody wants to work for a tired idiot."

He wants to teach entrepreneurs how to pedal smart so they don't make the mistake of 'pedaling really hard but getting nowhere'. We analyzed that the reason these mistakes are repeated is because many entrepreneurs have not experienced a respectable boss and lack successful role models.

2. Maslow's Pyramid for Success: Basic Health Care 🧘‍♀️

Daniel presents a kind of 'Maslow's hierarchy of needs' for startup success, and says that they must be addressed one by one, starting with the most basic steps. He said this advice may sound obvious, but he regrets that most people overlook it.

"My advice to you is that, ironically, about half the people here and many more people online will make all of these mistakes despite hearing what I'm trying to say."

2.1. Sleep: The best nootropic 😴

Sleep is the most important 'nootropic' for entrepreneurs. Reducing your sleep time will never help your company, and unless it's an emergency, you need to get enough sleep. The amount of sleep each person needs is different, but it is important to find a time that suits you and get enough sleep.

"Sleep is the best nootropic. It just takes a few hours to take effect." "In no way would losing that hour of sleep be worth it to your company, unless it was a real emergency."

Daniel advises investing generously in optimizing your sleep environment. In particular, I mentioned the Sleep Mask as a very inexpensive but highly effective item. Additionally, if possible, try to wake up naturally without an alarm clock, and when your sleep pattern is disrupted, it is a good idea to take a small amount of melatonin to reset your biological rhythm.

2.2. Diet: Maintaining healthy judgment 🥦

If you want to perform at your best as an entrepreneur, you need to treat your body like an athlete. Eating unhealthy foods can impair your judgment, which in turn can have a negative impact on the entire team. No matter what diet you follow, he says it's important to eat foods you consider 'healthy.'

"Trash food impairs your judgment." "I realized that if I didn't treat my body like an athlete, I would be letting down everyone on my team."

It is also important to keep junk food out of the office. He emphasized that healthy food can be found as cheaply as junk food. They also advise that drinking plenty of water to avoid dehydration is essential to staying in shape.

2.3. Exercise: Relieve stress and improve concentration 🏃‍♀️

Exercise is just as important as sleep and essential to your mental health. If you don't have time to exercise, try to do more outdoor activities, and holding 1:1 meetings with your team members outdoors is also a good idea.

"Think of your competitors working out four times a week and thinking better and more creatively."

Running is recommended as the most effective exercise for time, and the important thing is how to persuade yourself to exercise consistently. It's important not to overdo it from the beginning, but to celebrate small successes and create positive memories. For example, drinking a Frappuccino after running a mile! ☕️ It can also be a good motivator to find people to exercise with or to feel accountable by letting others know you are working out.

3. Mental Optimization: Intellectual Training to Grow as a Leader 🧠

Once you've taken care of your basic health, it's time to think about how to optimize your mind and grow as a leader.

3.1. Nourishing Your Brain: Inform and Recharge 📚

Many people focus on nourishing their bodies, but neglect to nourish their brains. The brain works by constantly recognizing patterns, so it is important to consistently consume quality information.

• No one day a week from work: You should take one day a week off from work completely to recharge. I like doing activities that help me recharge, like spending time in nature or going to the beach.

  "You should rest one day a week without working." "Your competitors are probably doing this and will find better answers than you."

• Reading long-form texts: Reading long-form texts (books) stimulates the brain more deeply than fragmentary information and helps change the way you think. It is important to break away from the compulsion to read a book to the end and develop the habit of reading any book consistently.

  "The value of a book is not just that it provides information. It actually shapes your mind in a certain way."

• Log out of your smartphone: Logging out of social media and other apps on your phone to make them less accessible can help you stay focused.

3.2. Mindset shift: from first person to third person 🧐

It is important to develop the habit of thinking from a 'third person perspective', looking at yourself objectively without being swayed by personal emotions. This means recognizing one's emotions, such as 'I am feeling angry' rather than 'I am angry.' This approach is often called 'mindfulness', but Daniel wanted to package it in a more interesting way.

"You'll want to switch from a mode where you play in first person to a mode where you play in third person." "It's not that I'm angry, it's more like I'm feeling angry."

This mindset helps you react more wisely instead of emotionally when things aren't going well or in conflict with your team members. Although this ability can be developed naturally through meditation or as we age, it is said to be most effective to consciously recognize and practice this concept.

3.3. Stay in flow: Maximize engagement and productivity 🚀

You should aim to spend as much time as possible during the day in a state of 'flow'**. Flow refers to the state of being immersed in an activity without noticing the passage of time, and this is well explained in Professor Csikszentmihalyi Mihalyi's book.

"You should spend as much time as possible in your day in 'flow'."

Entrepreneurs and the entire team must strive to maintain a state of flow. To achieve this, an attitude of continuous experimentation and improvement (launch and iterate) is required. For example, you need to constantly experiment with meeting times, work methods, and even productivity-boosting music to find the most efficient environment for each team member.

4. Strengthening leadership capacity: Wisdom to lead a team 🌟

When building and leading a team, the most important thing is to be a great, inspirational leader. Daniel introduced Robert Kegan's Theory of Adult Development and explained the stages of leadership growth.

4.1. Understanding Adult Development Stages (Robert Keegan's Theory) 📈

Keegan proposed five mindset stages that adults go through as they grow. We specifically cover steps 2 through 5 here.

• Level 2: Imperial Mind - Selfish and Transactional 😈

  • Focus only on your own goals and view relationships with others as a means to achieve your goals.
  • Difficulty understanding other people's perspectives, making long-term cooperation difficult.
  • For entrepreneurs, this can present problems as team members leaving or feeling unattractive.

• Stage 3: Socialized Mind - Relying on the perspectives of others 🎭

  • I understand other people's perspectives, but at the same time, I am too greatly influenced by other people's views and opinions.
  • Like 'non-playable characters (NPCs)', they lack self-independence and are easily swayed by social norms.
  • For entrepreneurs, it makes it difficult for them to think independently and make decisions in unknown situations.

• Step 4: Self-Authoring Mind - Clear Values and Responsibility 🧭

  • Act with your own consistent values and ideals rather than social recognition.
  • You can take responsibility for your own emotions and look at yourself from a 'third person perspective'.
  • You will be able to play an 'infinite game' that seeks optimization for the entire group.
  • This may be the ideal stage for entrepreneurs, as it allows them to lead the company with a clear vision and emotional stability.

• Step 5: Self-Transforming Mind - Systems Thinking and Flexibility 💡

  • Rather than being bound by your own values, you are willing to accept and expand on the opinions and ideas of those around you.
  • Think systematically and try to understand the background of every situation and person. It's like looking down on the entire city from the 100th floor of a building.
  • Suitable for managing and inspiring highly talented people, and able to lead people with diverse ideologies harmoniously.

• Elon Musk or Steve Jobs in the early stages of starting a business may be closer to level 4, but I think level 5 leadership is necessary for a company to grow and build a strong management team.

4.2. Practical advice for leadership growth 🗣️

• Understanding the Concept: Just by understanding Keegan's theory, you can categorize and improve your way of thinking.
• Ask sincere questions: When talking to others, ask genuine questions and listen to the other person's answers. Rather than asking formal questions, you should try to ask questions that can change the other person's perspective.

  "You should try to only ask questions that you genuinely want to hear."

5. Conclusion: Infinite games and continuous growth 🌱

Daniel concludes his talk by sharing some important thoughts.

• Treat yourself like an athlete: Like an athlete participating in the Olympics, you must value your time and take good care of your body and mind. Entrepreneurs can easily become the company's bottleneck, so they must stay in a state where they can handle important tasks rather than focusing only on urgent tasks.

  "Your time is truly precious, and especially as your team grows, you will become more and more of a bottleneck in getting things done." "So if you want to survive in this game, you have to treat yourself like an athlete."

• Assume your competitors are ahead of you: Assume that other entrepreneurs are already doing a good job of managing you, and you should try to catch up.

• Importance of Third Person Perspective: The startup journey is a roller coaster, and when emotional challenges arise, it is important to look at yourself in the third person. It helps you make wise decisions by judging the situation objectively without being swayed by emotions.

  "You're definitely going to have days, weeks and months where you're going to get punched in the face a lot." "The only way to survive that situation and still make the right chess moves is to experience your emotions in the third person. Otherwise, you get caught up in them and, frankly, you become miserable."

• 'Launch and iterate' attitude: You need to collect data on how your body and mind react, and continuously update and improve your model. There is no right answer, but you need to find the best method that suits you.

• True curiosity about others: If you become truly interested in other people, you will find that they are the most interesting beings in the world. This is essential to attracting and motivating great talent.

• Playing Infinite Games: Look at life as an infinite game, not as a finite game. It is important to show goodwill and build cooperative relationships from a long-term perspective, rather than being tied to short-term wins and losses or interests.

  "You want to move from playing a very finite game in life to playing an infinite game." "You need to focus on winning across the entire flow of interaction, not just focusing on short-term wins."

6. Q&A 💬

6.1. Adaptation problems for entrepreneurs from large corporations 🧑‍💻

Some entrepreneurs find it difficult to leave the comfort of a large company and adapt to the unpredictable roller coaster ride of a startup. In these cases, there are two main reactions: avoidance or adaptation. Entrepreneurs who avoid it have a high chance of failure, but most entrepreneurs are resilient and eventually adapt. What matters most is whether they are intrinsically interested in the problem they are trying to solve. If you truly care about a problem, you will stay engaged despite the difficulties.

6.2. Online activity and mental health 📱

When social media use is essential for your business, how do you avoid addiction and protect your mental health? Daniel shares fun ways to increase accountability by creating the physical environment. It is said that in the past, companies installed monitors facing each other to achieve a silent surveillance effect. Additionally, he advises that focusing on growing quickly will force you to reduce unnecessary online activity.

6.3. Personal startup philosophy 💡

Daniel likens startups to 'a video game played in expert mode', saying it's all about managing your own psychology and building a product that works. He emphasized that the process of starting a business is not always painful, and that the joy of success is also great. Ultimately, his core philosophy is that you should truly enjoy making something.

6.4. The importance of community and mentorship 🤝

One of the biggest benefits of YC and Startup School is that they get mutual motivation through interaction with their peer group. People naturally have a tendency to compare themselves with their peers and try to improve themselves. Ivy League universities also explain that outstanding colleagues have a greater stimulating effect than curriculum.

6.5. People who succeed in a way that is the opposite of lectures 🤨

Daniel is skeptical about stories of people who have achieved success by doing the exact opposite of what he advises. He counters that many successful entrepreneurs regret their past mistakes and that you don't have to suffer or make mistakes to be successful.

6.6. Discover your next idea and manage risk 🔍

When looking for the next product idea or changing business direction, I advise you not to be in too much of a hurry, but to take your time to come up with ideas. He says the best ideas don't come from pressure, and it's important to break away from the compulsion to start a startup.

When it comes to risk management, we refer to Jeff Bezos' 'Type 1 decision' and 'Type 2 decision' framework. Type 1 decisions have irreversible and fatal consequences, while Type 2 decisions are decisions that are okay even if they go wrong. People often mistake Type 2 decisions for Type 1 decisions and tend to be overly cautious, but Daniel says that in most cases, taking bold risks is the better choice.

6.7. Convince co-founder 🗣️

How do you convince your co-founder when he doesn't understand the importance of health care or mindset? Daniel emphasizes that this is not a matter of 'laziness' but of 'survival'**. Disagreements between co-founders are a common problem, so we suggest defining clear areas of responsibility, defining time frames, and having one person make the final decision. For example, designate a person in charge of a specific area for 6 months and discuss it again after the period is over.