I am truly blessed to have the opportunity to talk to a whole bunch of insanely awesome people on a regular basis.
People like Jim Cook, who was an early employee at Intuit, co-founded Netflix and is now the long-time CFO of Mozilla. Or Randy Haykin, who was the founding vice president of marking and sales at Yahoo, sold NetChannel to America Online, cofounded one of the first venuture incubators and spent five years at Apple. Or Jeff Burton who was an early employee at Atari, cofounded Electronic Arts and later built Berkeley’s accelerator program.
What all these amazing folks keep teaching me on a constant basis is:
Life is in a constant state of flux and careers are long. As much as we obsess about the short-term, the immediate and the adrenaline rush of the moment — your career, your success and your legacy are created and built in the long-term.
With that comes the constant need to learn and evolve. As a leader you will always keep honing your skills, learn new ways of doing things and gain new insights into yourself and your effect on others and the world at large.
Become infinitely curious, ask lots of questions and take time to reflect. You will be a better person, a more engaging leader and a more successful entrepreneur for it.