3 ms·

You are precisely demonstrating the original post, no? You had 2 of 9 businesses succeed. You are demonstrating roughly 1:5 odds of rolling a successful busin

by bsder 4y ago

You are precisely demonstrating the original post, no? You had 2 of 9 businesses succeed. You are demonstrating roughly 1:5 odds of rolling a successful business. With 1:5 odds if we reroll you doing 10 businesses over and over, 10% of you never succeed. About 1/3 of you win once, 1/3 of you win twice, and 20% of you win 3 times. The versions of you that won 3 times are not any different than the versions of you who won never. Any advice you give is neither more accurate because a version of you won 3 times nor less accurate because a version of you won never.

kjksf 4y ago
Those are not the odds, just his success rate. If you do everything badly (i.e. come up with bad business ides, cannot implement even those bad ideas, are bad at hiring, managing money, paying taxes etc.) then your success rate will be 0%, not 20%. The issue here isn't about how hard starting a business is. It's obviously hard enough that many (most?) people who try will fail. The issue is: can you do things better? Is doing things better lead to higher probability of success? The "it's all luck" people say that you can't. There is no better or worse way. It's just luck. Therefore any advice is useless. The opposite point of view is: yes. There are better and worse ways of doing things. And if you know what they are then you can tell other people. And that advice will help them to achieve success. But not guarantee.
- ZephyrBlu 4y ago
  I think one of the main problems is that for a lot of people, starting a business basically has a 0% chance of success. Some people may be able to increase their chances, but maybe not everyone.
- fountainofage 4y ago
  "but not guarantee" is almost the entire point of what folks are pointing out and what the OP meant - you could do literally everything perfect and still it's VERY likely you will fail.

by bsder 4y ago

kjksf 4y ago

Those are not the odds, just his success rate. If you do everything badly (i.e. come up with bad business ides, cannot implement even those bad ideas, are bad at hiring, managing money, paying taxes etc.) then your success rate will be 0%, not 20%. The issue here isn't about how hard starting a business is. It's obviously hard enough that many (most?) people who try will fail. The issue is: can you do things better? Is doing things better lead to higher probability of success? The "it's all luck" people say that you can't. There is no better or worse way. It's just luck. Therefore any advice is useless. The opposite point of view is: yes. There are better and worse ways of doing things. And if you know what they are then you can tell other people. And that advice will help them to achieve success. But not guarantee.

ZephyrBlu 4y ago
I think one of the main problems is that for a lot of people, starting a business basically has a 0% chance of success. Some people may be able to increase their chances, but maybe not everyone.
fountainofage 4y ago
"but not guarantee" is almost the entire point of what folks are pointing out and what the OP meant - you could do literally everything perfect and still it's VERY likely you will fail.