Thinking differently, conviction in your ideas
Tension between conventional wisdom and your big ideas
I had a lot to think about yesterday during the 3-hour climb. Primarily, I focused on not dying, but I also pondered the balance between conventional wisdom and having conviction in my own ideas.
As I embarked on the pre-dawn start of the famous Mount Superior, I noticed the people in front of me gradually giving up. The wind was ripping, the cold was biting, and the mention of avalanche risk by those turning back added to the fear. As someone who has conquered this peak dozens of times, it still manages to scare the hell out of me. Death seems to be waving at you while climbing this peak; in fact, it has even tapped me on the shoulder multiple times in the past as if to say, "In case you've forgotten about me... I'm right here" - the Angel of Death.
A quick history of this peak: it is known as the "Jewel of the Wasatch" and ranks among the top 50 backcountry ski runs in the US. That's quite the statement, considering the sheer number of mountains that exist on the West Coast. Cody Townsend brought even more fame to this peak while filming for his FIFTY project. The first time he attempted the peak, he was turned away; however, on his second try, he nailed it. For those who love skiing, you'll appreciate the second part of this video:
Think of conventional wisdom like convection, a term from my chemical engineering days, when so many people are flowing in one direction like gas molecules with their ideas. In this case, they're physically passing me to go back the way they came, and it can impact you. Do they know something I don't know? Are they more experienced than me? This individual coming back is older than me; maybe they know something I don't. Are they just a tourist? Amateurs in over their heads, chasing a big objective they are not qualified to pursue? Or, more concerning, is my personal avalanche risk tolerance too edgy, am I wrong? Am I the idiot? I do make some people nervous when they accompany me.
I kept going, drawing on my own experience and conviction that I was right. And I WAS right—the south peak ended up being more stable than any of them had imagined, and I enjoyed the benefits of a very empty mountain. On the same day, I relished 3,000 feet of Utah's best snow, chuckling about all the people who had tapped out, only to find out that someone had died in an avalanche less than an hour away. Sometimes our convictions can end in catastrophe—not necessarily death, per se, but perhaps in business terms, existential indeed.
Now, let's bring this back to technology, innovation, creativity, and work. I have doubted some of my best ideas, wondering if I should pause. Am I wrong? Is conventional wisdom right?
Big Idea Story 1:
I had an experience in graduate school when I proposed an idea: shouldn't we be able to take advantage of the symmetry in this math problem? The professor doubted my idea, saying I was "too junior, naive," and that the researchers I was competing against were smarter and better funded by an order of magnitude. If there was an opportunity like the one I was suggesting, they would have found it. I can be stubborn with good ideas; some might see that as a strength or a character flaw. My passion, foundation of knowledge, and perhaps my ethos make me lean in. A week later, I came back with a new mathematical derivation:
that was 10 times faster with no loss in accuracy. It took a few days to convince the doubting professor, but once I did, he realized I had found a real breakthrough. The funny thing about breakthroughs is that sometimes they cause problems. This breakthrough led to one of the most toxic fights in academia that I have ever heard of, which resulted in the professor threatening to expel me without graduation. He was worried that this breakthrough would become public after my graduation and that he wouldn't get proper credit for his contribution to a derivation he couldn't even explain. I digress—onward and upward on this hero's journey for your big ideas!
Big Idea Story 2:
Another big idea that faced plenty of headwinds was the 10,000 Casts Project. Could you build an AI dataset to predict when a fish would strike at a dry fly cast? Humans have intuition; they can anticipate when this will happen, which is part of the sport's appeal. This idea was considered foolish by nearly everyone, and many other executives didn't support it. However, a few key people did (Thanks Nick! Gilday! Isamar! Mike!). I coined the term "reckless commitment" years ago during a DSGO keynote. The concept is to just push the cart down the hill, with no turning back. I did that for this project and, at times, hated myself for it—literally calling myself a dumbass while hiking solo at night with a gun in Wyoming, testing the trip. The two test trips ahead of the project's go-date failed miserably, with no fish and terrible weather. What was I doing?! I suppose it was the moment of despair in the hero's journey.
I was determined to film at Lonesome Lake, a challenging 20-mile round-trip hike over Jackass Pass (8,500ft elevation). I wanted the shot of the fisherman to inspire, evoke a sense of wonder, and awaken emotions in the audience. Here's a screenshot from that project, capturing an incredible fish breaking the glassy reflection during a perfect sunrise, with Pingora in the background and not a soul in sight—every fisherman's dream. A near-spiritual moment, captured for the viewer. This project later went on to be nominated for a Webby Award and was successfully used as an executive catalyst in the sales cycle to awaken the "art of the possible" or the "inner child" needed to move a buyer.
Big Ideas Change The World
Often, some of the biggest innovations come from those who defy the headwinds of conventional wisdom and cast it aside. Consider speech recognition, with Andrew Ng leading the charge on DeepSpeech 2 and facing headwinds where "experts" in the field voiced opposition, claiming that AI could never replace the concept of a "phoneme" and publicly disagreeing with him. Many experts have biases in their experience; they can't imagine an outsider disrupting their "expert turf," but it happens all the time—just look at SpaceX.
When I was feeling anxious about dropping out of my PhD program to start an AI startup, I sent Ryan Smith, the founder and CEO of Qualtrics, a heartfelt email. I had heard he had dropped out to focus on his company, which, after that email, went on to set a record with the $8B SAP acquisition. I wanted to know if he had any regrets or how he dealt with the loss of not accomplishing a higher educational goal. My email was pathetic. After going through the chaos of a startup myself with Ziff.ai, which later, due to a lawsuit, became Zeff.ai (like the show Silicon Valley? I hate it because I've lived it), here's the key point for most successful founders:
The idea matter most!
It mattered more than all the convection, the headwinds, the conventional wisdom. Their conviction was extreme, and they needed it for the tough days, of which there are many. Some of the most successful founders and CEOs I know had everyone telling them to give up—parents, family, friends, literally EVERYONE. How do you dig deep? How do you maintain conviction when you're worried others are right? Life is short; face-planting on your big idea is not the end of the world. If your conviction is strong enough, count to 3 (a trick I do when I'm dropping a scary line or cliff), and then recklessly commit yourself to that big idea and fight like hell for a good outcome. You might get lucky or even make your own luck.
This was a great read! I'm definitely going to try out out the count to three and commit method you mentioned.