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>4. Make friends/Surround yourself with smart people.: Not extremely practical unless you are a famous VC but even then not trivial. I think it's quite practic
by lsc 12y ago
>4. Make friends/Surround yourself with smart people.: Not extremely practical unless you are a famous VC but even then not trivial.
I think it's quite practical to surround yourself with smart people without being a famous VC. I've done it. it might even be easier without being famous, unless by smart, you mean "Smart, tall and well-spoken" or "Smart, tall, and able to hold the right kind of conflicting ideas in your head without emotional distress" - which is often what VC seem to mean by smart. I mean, don't get me wrong, a lot of the ycombinater kids I've met really seemed pretty smart, but they also had the social bits you need to be good business people, and if you demand those social bits along with the 'smart' - and you should, if you are looking for business people and not just technical people - those people become dramatically more difficult to find, and when you do find them, they're difficult to be friends with, as you said, unless you are very high status, because they are very high status.
If you just want someone with a high G, though, and are okay with people who are short or shy or fat or who have emotional issues, as you should be if you are looking for people who can become good technical people, G alone does not confer much by way of status in this society. I've hired more than one person who tests two standard deviations better than I do by that measure. hell I've dated a few people who test two standard deviations better than I do.
Now, PG, I imagine, when talking about making investment decisions, probably is talking about "vc smart" - people who are smart, but also good looking, who have good attitudes and who have the other business person attributes, so in the context of this article, you're probably right. but I'm just saying, smart people usually aren't high status people. It's not hard to get smart friends, if you are willing to skimp on some of the status-granting attributes.
- paul 12y agoWhat makes you think height is so important? I have not noticed any correlation. One of the nice things about startups vs politics is that appearance is much less important for success. (unless you think Bill Gates is some kind of super model :)
- lsc 12y agoThe relationship between height and income is very well documented, at least for men. It's not absolute, certainly, we can all come up with the names of successful short men, just like we can come up with the names of successful black men and successful women. It doesn't mean those things don't put you at a serious disadvantage when talking to VC or trying to get a job.
- paul 12y agoShow me the documentation where tall people get more venture funding.
- lsc 12y agoI don't have that documentation. I started this conversation, a couple messages back, in response to this quote from sytelus: >4. Make friends/Surround yourself with smart people.: Not extremely practical unless you are a famous VC but even then not trivial. Which I read as someone claiming that it is difficult to become friends with high-G individuals, unless you are a high-status individual. My argument was that G, in and of itself, does not confer status, and thus high-G individuals who aren't high-status aren't going to have any more people competing to be their friends than people of similar status who are more average. If you want smart friends, go find them. There isn't much competition. That was my point. I don't think you took issue with any of that. I think the problem was that I said: >unless by smart, you mean "Smart, tall and well-spoken" or "Smart, tall, and able to hold the right kind of conflicting ideas in your head without emotional distress" - which is often what VC seem to mean by smart. And you taking offense to this, really, is pretty reasonable. I'd take it as an insult if someone claimed people like me hired on irrelevant personal biases, too. One way to make this seem less insulting is to say that I lump in the "tall and well spoken and able to hold the right kind of conflicting ideas in your head" with "social and business skills" - because in the work world, this has been my experience. It's possible that things are different in the VC world.
- paul 12y agoYes, I think tech is one of the few places in society where being awkward and nerdy does not prevent you from being highly successful :)