Y Combinator Millionaire Sam Altman - How To Achieve Extreme Success

28/11/2020 Y Combinator millionaire Sam Altman: How to achieve extreme success
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SUCCESS
33-year-old self-made multimillionaire: Here’s how to

achieve extreme success
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Catherine Clifford
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Sam Altman, president of Y Combinator Patrick T. Fallon | Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images
In his mid-20s, Sam Altman sold the Silicon Valley start-up he founded for $43.4
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/01/30/y-combinator-millionaire-sam-altman-how-to-achieve-extreme-success.html?__source=facebook%7Cmain&fbclid=IwAR14L5iW… 1/6
million. Now Altman is famous for being a partner at legendary start-up shop Y
Combinator, which has funded start-ups (including the likes of Aribnb and Dropbox)
that are now worth a combined total of over $100 billion.
On Thursday, Altman revealed how to achieve such extreme success in blog post
called “How To Be Successful.” It’s been viewed more than 200,000 times, according
to Altman’s site, and he calls it “one of the most important things I’ve ever written.”
“I’ve observed thousands of founders and thought a lot about what it takes to make
a huge amount of money or to create something important. Usually, people start off
wanting the former and end up wanting the latter,” Altman writes. “Everything here is
easier to do once you’ve already reached a baseline degree of success (through
privilege or effort) and want to put in the work to turn that into outlier success. But
much of it applies to anyone.”
Here are seven pieces of advice from Altman on how to be extraordinarily successful.
Think for yourself
“One of the most powerful lessons to learn is that you can figure out what to do in
situations that seem to have no solution. The more times you do this, the more you
will believe it. Grit comes from learning you can get back up after you get knocked
down,” Altman writes.
Believe in yourself
Also immensely powerful is “self-belief,” he says. “The most successful people I know
believe in themselves almost to the point of delusion.”
“If you don’t believe in yourself, it’s hard to let yourself have contrarian ideas about
the future. But this is where most value gets created,” Altman explains.
Elon Musk gave Altman a tour of SpaceX “many years ago” and heard the tech
entrepreneur talk about manufacturing rockets, “but the thing that sticks in memory
was the look of absolute certainty on his face when he talked about sending large
rockets to Mars. I left thinking ‘huh, so that’s the benchmark for what conviction
looks like,’” Altman says.
But equally important is listening to feedback.
“Self-belief must be balanced with self-awareness. I used to hate criticism of any sort
and actively avoided it. Now I try to always listen to it with the assumption that it’s
true, and then decide if I want to act on it or not. Truth-seeking is hard and often
painful, but it is what separates self-belief from self-delusion,” Altman says.
This is very long, but I think one of the most important things I’ve ever written.
Learn to focus
Quality trumps quantity.
“It is much more important to work on the right thing than it is to work many hours,”
says Altman. “Once you have figured out what to do, be unstoppable about getting
your small handful of priorities accomplished quickly. I have yet to meet a slow-
moving person who is very successful.”
Work smart and hard
“You can get to about the 90th percentile in your field by working either smart or
hard, which is still a great accomplishment,” says Altman. “But getting to the 99th
percentile requires both—you will be competing with other very talented people who
will have great ideas and be willing to work a lot.”
And “the earlier you do it, the more time you have for the benefits to pay off. It’s also
easier to work hard when you have fewer other responsibilities, which is frequently
but not always the case when you’re young,” Altman says.
Still, to work at peak capacity for extended periods of time you’ll have to find ways to
avoid burnout.
“People find their own strategies for this, but one that almost always works is to find
work you like doing with people you enjoy spending a lot of time with,” Altman says.
Go for exponential growth
“I am willing to take as much time as needed between projects to find my next thing.
But I always want it to be a project that, if successful, will make the rest of my career
look like a footnote,” Altman says. “Most people get bogged down in linear
opportunities. Be willing to let small opportunities go to focus on potential step
changes.”
Be persistent
“A big secret is that you can bend the world to your will a surprising percentage of
the time — most people don’t even try, and just accept that things are the way that
they are,” writes Altman.
Your salary won’t make you rich — owning things will
You can own real estate, a part of a business, intellectual property or a natural
resource. “But somehow or other, you need to own equity in something, instead of
just selling your time. Time only scales linearly,” Altman writes.
You can find all 13 of Altman’s tips here.
See also:
Top Silicon Valley tech exec on cash handouts: Let’s eliminate poverty for all
Americans
Top Silicon Valley exec on why Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk are both right about
A.I.
This Silicon Valley tech leader wants to fix California’s housing crisis by scrapping
the $64 billion bullet train from L.A. to S.F.
 12:01
Money and happiness: Does the perfect salary exist?
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28/11/2020 Y Combinator millionaire Sam Altman: How to achieve extreme success

33-year-old self-made multimillionaire: Here’s how to

Think for yourself

But equally important is listening to feedback.

Quality trumps quantity.

Work smart and hard

Go for exponential growth

Your salary won’t make you rich — owning things will

You can find all 13 of Altman’s tips here.

Money and happiness: Does the perfect salary exist?

Like this story? Subscribe to CNBC Make It on YouTube!

Stay in the loop

Privacy Policy | Do Not Sell My Personal Information

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