Organizations & Teams

Reading guide

Robin’s opening question: can employees feel the mission in their daily work rather than merely read slogans in a handbook? Jack Welch argues that a mission should answer how the business will win, involving choices and direction while balancing the achievable with the ideal. Values are concrete principles for action. Managers must keep mission, values, and everyday decisions aligned; repeated messaging is not the same as putting them into practice. Consistency between words and actions matters. The GE mission statement is reproduced from the book and has not been independently verified.

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A retelling of Drucker’s The Effective Executive. Time management begins not with planning, but with recording, as it happens, where time actually goes. Most managers’ perceptions differ strikingly from reality. Second, eliminate: cancel unnecessary work, delegate what others can do, and develop systems for recurring crises. Third, consolidate fragments into uninterrupted blocks for important work. Do not remain busy with tasks whose costs are already sunk, or rank priorities by pressure alone. Examples and proportions come from the book; the claim that a busy factory must be poorly managed is overstated, and genuine emergencies cannot be ignored.

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Drucker’s approach to people asks what someone can do rather than what weaknesses they have. Organizations enable ordinary people to do extraordinary things, not by finding all-round perfection, but by placing each person’s strengths where they matter. The Lincoln–Grant story illustrates this: when others complained about Grant’s drinking, Lincoln reportedly asked what brand he drank so he could send barrels to the other generals. The same logic applies to managing up: help your boss use their strengths rather than merely complain. Historical details follow the book’s account; accepting shortcomings does not mean tolerating harm or violations.

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An excerpted account of 37signals’ Rework. Once goals are set, behavior can be distorted to meet them: cancellation becomes difficult to protect retention, or charging by company size to increase revenue drives away small customers. The authors are not saying goals are wrong; they remind us to keep the essentials beneath our feet in view while looking toward distant goals. Preserve both perspectives: do the work at hand well, and keep looking for new opportunities. This is an excerpted version; the original includes later discussion of opportunities and efficiency.

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Asked about the harshest thing he had said to entrepreneurs, Robin answers: think it through. He tests commitment through concentric circles. Will you commit full-time? Can you discuss several years of income uncertainty with your partner? Would you ask your parents to risk retirement savings? Can you persuade talented people to join for less pay? Customers are the outer circle: can you convince them to replace their current solution? Each circle requires persuasion; do not rush outward if you cannot persuade those closest to the center. ‘Risking everything’ is a metaphor for testing commitment, not advice to use essential family assets.

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This reprinted article examines a motivational mistake: chasing tasks and transmitting anxiety will not bring out employees’ best work. Underappreciated alternatives include sincere recognition in conversation, attention to health and sustainable working rhythms, and thoughtful seating arrangements that support collaboration. Leaders need three kinds of language to mobilize a team: clear direction, empathy for people’s circumstances, and meaning in the work. Goals without meaning leave a team merely following orders. The reprint does not identify the studies it cites; measures such as seating changes must account for employees’ needs.

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This excerpt groups startup mistakes into three areas. Product: a founder thinks it will change the world, but the market does not urgently need it—painkillers beat vitamins. Leadership: founders cling to the CEO role even though different stages need different leaders; replacing a CEO does not invalidate the founder. Finance: discipline breaks down when any investor’s money is accepted and burn becomes uncontrolled. The book argues that many startups die from financial mismanagement rather than the product. Products matter more than celebrity endorsements or patents. Claims such as most failures arising from financial management are the book’s views and have not been verified.

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This excerpt from Amazon’s 2015 shareholder letter explains how retail and AWS, though seemingly different businesses, share a culture of customer focus, invention, long-term thinking, and operational excellence. Bezos discusses failure and scale: take every bet offering a one-in-ten chance of a hundredfold return, and let the scale of failures grow with the company. Yet size cuts both ways, enabling accomplishments while potentially slowing the organization. Prime Now’s 111 days from concept to launch illustrates speed inside a large company. The betting logic is the letter’s view, not a claim of unlimited capital or permission to ignore losses; figures refer to 2015.

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This account of James Kilts’s Gillette turnaround describes a ‘doom loop’: unrealistic 18% growth targets, short-term measures to inflate results when targets are missed, then another disappointing quarter. Kilts prepared in detail before taking over, established direction and responsibilities immediately, and forced the organization to confront reality rather than repeat unrealistic targets and expedient fixes. His reforms addressed strategy, finance, and organization together. Merger values and financial figures are reproduced from the book and have not been independently verified. This is part one; the detailed measures follow in part two.

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Lei Jun’s experience suggests that hundreds of bilingual business-plan pages can fail to secure investment. Busy investors begin with the recommender’s credibility, then assess the team, then give you five minutes to explain what you do and the opportunity five to ten years ahead. Robin draws four lessons: seek a reliable personal introduction from someone willing to invest too; do not scatter business plans indiscriminately; make the first three to five minutes count; and get to the point without fashionable jargon. Disliking long plans does not eliminate information needs, and a recommender’s willingness to invest is a trust signal rather than a substitute for due diligence.

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Robin’s opening thought is to do meaningful, valuable work that helps others grow and makes a difference to them. An excerpt from Build follows: the greatest benefit of being an Apple executive or Nest CEO is the opportunity to help people. Many arrive able to do one thing well and leave able to do a hundred. They simply need a push beyond their own V1 and the limits of what they imagine they can do. Like a product’s first version, V1 is never good enough, but development does not stop there. Leaders keep providing momentum, even when resented. The reward may arrive years later in a letter: ‘I hated every minute then, but that moment changed my career.’

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Robin’s personal impression is that YC selects teams for their promise rather than the quality of the initial idea. Airbnb’s idea was doubted, but selling cereal impressed Paul Graham; reportedly, more than a third of teams change ideas during the program. Changing direction early is therefore not the problem—pivoting promptly matters more. A case in Gao Chengzhang Siwei describes Apple’s integration of podcasts into iTunes devastating Evan Williams’s Odeo platform. The board asked whether he had other ideas; a hackathon surfaced Biz Stone and Jack Dorsey’s group-texting project, later Twitter. The YC selection account is Robin’s impression; quotations have not been independently verified.

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Notes from Silicon Valley 101’s discussion of the Middle East. The Arabic-speaking Middle East and North Africa is described as a roughly 400-million-person cultural market with similar language and culture. The Gulf Cooperation Council states, described as about 100 million people, are the wealthiest segment. The proposed path is to validate the business in Dubai, around four million people, expand quickly across the Gulf, then reach the wider region. Dubai’s ecosystem is described as self-sustaining, while Riyadh and Abu Dhabi remain government-led. Saudi Arabia’s PIF and Abu Dhabi sovereign funds, each described at hundreds of billions of U.S. dollars, are active investors. Robin recommends the episode to startups seeking overseas markets.

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An imagined scene from The Power Law: an engineer at a large company has a great idea but an unsupportive boss—Christensen’s innovator’s dilemma. Without VC, the idea dies. With VC, a conversation opens: quit and I will invest; never founded a business? I will help; need engineers? We have a database; worried about failure? We can find work elsewhere in the portfolio. Eric Schmidt reportedly joined Google because John Doerr promised another CEO role if it failed. VC offers more than money: it makes risk less frightening. Robin says Taiwan’s VC industry must work harder at helping founders build teams and introducing senior executives.

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An investment scenario: the sector is hot and growth impressive, but investment manager R has not fully understood the destination or path. Should he invest? Early-stage teams and investors often cannot see the endgame or sequence clearly. R identifies three situations. A clear story, well-developed thinking, and strong data attract fierce competition. A great storyteller with ordinary products and metrics warrants more observation; experienced investors have learned from years of being misled. The key is the second case: a good product, favorable market momentum, and rapid growth without a clear path. R would try to advance the investment and then jointly explore operating data, traffic conversion, and possible business models. An aside: R is short of deals.

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Robin sees a classic Taiwanese angel-investing case. In 2015, 500 Startups launched 500 Rookies, Taiwan’s first student VC fund. Six students trained for almost a year independently led a US$5,000 investment in voiceprint-encryption payment tool TapPay. In 2022, PChome subsidiary 21st Century announced a share swap and strategic investment totaling NT$940 million to merge with TapPay’s parent, Cherri Tech. Its Cross-site no-redirect technology, Apple and Google payment-processing licenses in Taiwan in 2017, and payment volume above NT$50 billion in 2021 illustrate the trajectory. The guide contrasts that student-fund investment with what it describes as a 900-million merger nine years later.

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Paradigm partner Casey Caruso’s early-stage due diligence checklist starts with founders: the team is the constant in the early-stage equation, so ask whether you would work with this person. Next, assess the opportunity’s size and think ambitiously about the market. Always use the product yourself—a frequently skipped step. Talk to users about how they discovered it, what they used before, and what would make them leave. Analyze growth and drop-off rates against competitors. Ask why now: most ideas have been tried before, so understand why earlier attempts failed. Examine competition, moats, and whether the market is winner-take-all. Finally, trust your sixth sense: decisions sometimes need to happen faster, and intuition should not be underestimated.

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Robin urges patience in choosing investors. Investment is a two-way choice, and rushing to choose an investor or portfolio company can create lasting problems for both parties. Entrepreneurship should create and deliver value and earn reasonable, sustainable profits. The quoted article warns that investor money is not free: taking certain investors’ funding can change a company’s goals and displace its original purpose with a drive to satisfy investors. When faced with a lengthy three-to-six-month process versus immediately available money, founders may make impulsive mistakes. Robin adds the reverse warning: investors should not be taken in by polished pitches from ‘2VC’ teams that cater to investors rather than customers.

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Venture capital returns follow a power law. In an early internal analysis, when Y Combinator had backed around 200 teams, its top investment returned more than numbers 2–200 combined; the second returned more than numbers 3–200 combined. The fear is therefore not losing money on a bad company but missing a good one. FOMO—fear of missing out—means preferring a hundred mistaken investments over missing the one that determines success. This helps explain backing seemingly eccentric founders: you might have passed on Jobs in 1978, an undergraduate Zuckerberg in 2004, or the Mars-obsessed Musk in 2003, yet each could change an entire generation through individual effort.

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After discussing share-price volatility with a portfolio company’s chairman and general manager, Robin recommends first sending employees an internal letter. Prices reflect excessive optimism and pessimism; what goes up can come down. The company cannot control capital markets, but it can do its work well. Its real purpose is creating and delivering value to consumers, who should determine the company’s and employees’ value. Even employee shareholders should not let daily price moves dictate their mood or distract them from long-term value creation. Robin’s real concern is an unsettled management team losing focus, rather than the price itself. He closes by joking that he hopes his child’s writing will surpass Dad’s.

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A global flood of capital is bringing a new VC wave. Where is Taiwan’s opportunity? Early-stage and growth-stage VC may represent only 1–2% relative to real estate, fixed income, and secondary equity markets, yet that small share helped create Apple, Amazon, Google, Facebook, and Tesla. Taiwan’s long-term planning should direct a small amount of capital toward the future. Defending Taiwanese VC, Robin argues that the industry is deeply local: the best deal flow requires lasting roots, trust, and reputation. China Development’s early U.S. and China offices did not ensure first access to the best deals. The priority should be helping Taiwanese teams internationalize effectively, rather than appearing international through overseas offices.

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Klook raised US$200 million, bringing cumulative funding to US$720 million, with each round a multiple of KKday’s; KKday had completed a US$75 million round the previous year. Robin compares this with Lion Travel, Taiwan’s largest travel agency, whose market capitalization was under NT$5 billion: a single Klook round exceeded the market value built over Lion Travel’s decades in business. Three lessons follow: traditional giants must transform digitally; startup business-model innovation can always challenge incumbents; and capital remains a powerful way to accelerate change. The figures refer to January 2021.

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Why do seemingly similar startup ideas with strong teams diverge, with some quickly attracting investment and others eliminated? A company’s speed and ceiling depend heavily on the future its founder can see. That understanding shapes market positioning, strategic choices, business models, product development, and competitive barriers. Teams that look similar initially can be far apart within a year or two. An investor said Didi founder Cheng Wei thought most deeply and saw furthest into ride-hailing and mobility among more than twenty companies reviewed, which explained the investment. Wang Xing leading Meituan out of China’s group-buying wars illustrates the same idea. Robin asks what future you see, whether investors will join you, and whether you have Jobs’s reality distortion field.

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In episode 77 of M觀點’s (M Viewpoint) Investing Is Hard, Miula compares NVIDIA and Tesla using three considerations: industry prospects and trends, the company’s moat, and management capability. Founders seeking VC should explain four things: industry structure and future trends; why the team deserves investment, including its accumulated advantages and responses to difficulty; why it can succeed rather than giant competitors; and completed validation and feedback. The reprinted passage argues for investing in ‘the day after tomorrow’: yesterday is past, today is crowded, and tomorrow is already expensive. The day after tomorrow is taking shape but remains uncertain, with early-round pricing and ample room to develop—the stage that most excites venture investors.

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Secondary markets react quickly to company value. Netflix, a global streaming giant spending US$18 billion a year on production, was built by visionary founder Reed Hastings, who defeated Blockbuster, created a streaming industry, disrupted cable television, and influenced Silicon Valley through a distinctive culture. Even such a legendary company could lose 70% of its market value in six months. Why should private-market startups insist on last year’s peak valuation—or more? Robin adds that global inflation, monetary tightening, and rising interest rates would make fundraising harder in the near term than in the second half of 2021. To keep moving, founders need tangible results and compelling reasons for investors to support them. These observations date to April 2022.

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Management teams have partnered with private equity funds to take companies such as Fusheng, Nien Made, LCY, and On-Bright private. The first two returned to capital markets, with Fusheng first separating its golf business; LCY and On-Bright still needed time to reorganize after their acquisitions and delistings. Privatization can simplify restructuring before relisting, while some companies seek higher price-to-earnings ratios and valuations in another market. Robin warns that abundant capital may bring more such deals but can also signal a bubble. Many private equity deals made before 2008 became difficult hot potatoes once the industry’s best moment had passed.

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An observation from an afternoon corporate-governance class: topics like this have little to do with an ordinary, cash-strapped person. In this #WhyStartABusiness post, Robin says that if you can talk Alibaba’s 18 founding members into joining, as Jack Ma did, and persuade Joe Tsai to leave a job with an eight-figure annual salary, move to Hangzhou, and accept RMB500 a month, you may be ready to begin that great journey.

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After FITI, the From IP to IPO Program, ended, Robin continued introducing startup teams to a listed company with a market capitalization of NT$10 billion for business discussions. There seemed to be substantial progress, and investment was being discussed, too. A brief glimpse of day-to-day work in venture capital.

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The second half of an interview with Shen Nanpeng. On an era dominated by leaders: the internet is winner-take-all, with perhaps two food-delivery companies and four or five e-commerce survivors. Mergers need clear commercial logic: no one wants 1+1=0.5, while everyone is eager for 1+1=5; investors act as advisers who articulate that logic. Three investment criteria have remained unchanged for fifteen years: the entrepreneur, industry size, and business model, including natural barriers to entry. Early-stage founder assessment remains an art. “Invest in the track rather than the racer” is a major misconception: the founder comes first, and confidence in values and ability can justify a “blind bet.” Long-term thinking requires resisting short-term temptations, intellectual honesty, and the courage to knock again on the door of a company you misjudged. Fund life matters more than size: how can you think long term with only seven or eight years?

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Three interpretations of long-term thinking: Luo Zhenyu describes compounding over time, with long-term certainty helping us withstand external uncertainty; Liang Ning describes meeting uncertainty with inner order; Harvard Business Review describes Amazon’s success as a victory for long-term thinking. The main text is a long essay by Zuoyebang founder Hou Jianbin: invest time, energy, and resources in lasting competitiveness, and ask whether each day’s work builds something or consumes it. If something can simply be bought, it does not distinguish you from peers. His examples include achieving 80% market share in photo-based question search, building an internal teacher-development system, and separating curriculum research from teaching. Milestones mean stronger core capabilities, not a listing or market share. Hiring weights culture six parts, ability three, and experience one. Written in 2020, before the subsequent upheaval in China’s tutoring industry.

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A special purpose acquisition company (SPAC), also called a blank-check company, has no operating assets and promises to use its IPO proceeds to acquire a business. In 2020, roughly one-fifth of newly listed US companies used this structure. Compared with an IPO or direct listing, a SPAC skips many steps, has no lockup period, and can take a company public in weeks. Its sponsor, usually a private equity or asset management firm, covers listing costs, initially contributes about 5%, and receives 20% of the equity after listing. A private target must be acquired within two years of the IPO. For the target, it is effectively a backdoor listing through a clean shell containing only cash. Roadshows explain a vision rather than operations—“fundraising by slide deck,” in a sense. A record of the enthusiasm as of August 2020.

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Robin’s extended response to Gogoro’s announced US listing through a SPAC. First, Taiwan’s capital market: it is not psychologically ready for a business with potentially over NT$10 billion in accumulated losses, very low or negative equity, and continuing large losses. Regulators and investors need to learn together. Second, Gogoro itself: choosing the most suitable listing venue is reasonable, but US-market visibility requires a large opportunity, a top-three regional position, and high growth, as with Grab. His concerns include the potential of electric scooters, revenue concentrated in Taiwan, the closure of European partner Coup, and slowing or declining figures. Third, advice to regulators: 91APP is accepted because it has demonstrated its model. Taiwan may not yet accommodate a US$2 billion unicorn, but could best support startups valued at US$100 million–US$1 billion, attracting strong international teams to list here. Written in September 2021.

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Google is among the world’s most technologically advanced companies, yet product development is not always smooth: it has launched and abandoned more than a hundred products. Google Glass provides a case study. Its spectacular skydiving livestream at I/O 2012 was followed by problems: a US$1,500 price consumers resisted, marketing that overhyped a prototype whose features were still in development, Bluetooth and battery issues, privacy concerns about the camera, and no killer use case. A deeper issue was that a star engineering team was still arguing halfway through development about whether it was a consumer device or a professional tool. An unclear direction set it up to fail. Explaining failure afterward is easy; judging it in advance is hard.

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Many entrepreneurs discover halfway through a project that their idea rests on a false premise. The difficulty is judging implementability in advance: something impossible three years ago may work today; what team A cannot do, team B may accomplish. Three tests: first, an idea that plainly violates accepted laws or theorems is unworkable, but distinguish immutable principles from old rules that can be broken—using the former to break the latter is a means of innovation. Second, geographically constrained projects cannot conflict with local mainstream culture; online-to-offline projects especially must respect differing habits. Third, ideas requiring new user habits or skills demand special psychological and financial preparation. Educating a market is expensive, but success can create the strongest barriers, as the iPhone did for iOS users.

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Professor Christensen’s fundamental point: even excellently managed companies can fail. A success formula hardens, trapping a business in a value network governed by customer orientation, profit assessment, and resource allocation. That network cannot accommodate a new-business team, so an independent small organization outside the established system should confront disruption. One company can rarely sustain two cost structures and operating models. Three tests: can the innovation disrupt the original market—did people previously need an inconvenient centralized location, or lack the money, equipment, or technology to use it? Does it work at the low end—will customers pay less for imperfect performance, and can a low-priced model remain profitable while “overserving” them? Finally, can the strategy disrupt all major incumbents?

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After Bezos announced that he would step down as Amazon CEO in Q3 2021 and hand over to cloud-business leader Andy Jassy, Robin revisits his decision-making through Keji Daodu’s introduction. Bezos distinguishes irreversible, consequential one-way doors, which require careful, methodical, slow deliberation, from reversible two-way doors that teams can handle quickly. Ideally, the first type takes 10% of working time; avoid it when angry, hungry, lonely, or exhausted. A suboptimal reversible choice can be undone, but reversibility is no excuse for recklessness. Bezos even saw founding Amazon as reversible: if it failed, he could return to work, having learned much and without regretting the attempt. “If I make three good decisions a day, that is enough.”

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Robin began introducing Zoom and Eric Yuan around 2016; Taiwanese entrepreneurs were also its most important angel investors. Born in Shandong, without an elite-university background, with limited English and eight visa rejections, Yuan eventually became a CEO loved by employees. His startup began with unhappiness: at Cisco, he wanted to rebuild WebEx as a mobile-first, video-centered solution, tried for a year, and left when it did not happen. He concluded that life is about happiness, and lasting happiness comes from making others happy. A CEO’s first job is therefore not customers or products, but employees’ happiness: happy engineers write better code. Zoom’s value is one word, “care.” His father’s advice: do your best and stay humble every day. Robin also urges seeing the world with as few personal filters as possible.

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Published in 1966, The Effective Executive remains fresh and thought-provoking. Drucker on time management: executives spend enormous amounts of time on work that contributes nothing, yet few recognize it. If you cannot know yourself, at least know your time. Record and review its allocation; ruthlessly eliminate waste, cancel what should be canceled, and delegate what should be delegated. Stop keeping the organization in firefighting mode, make exceptional situations routine, and consolidate fragmented time into blocks for deep thought. Two priority rules: do not stay busy with yesterday’s tasks—abandon sunk costs and path dependence decisively—and do not let pressure set priorities. “Later” really means “never.” Finally, do one thing at a time.

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Google is often seen as abandoning products such as Google+ before seeing them through. But Robin also admires its product management: when something is not working, it closes it without worrying about saving face. This reflects bottom-up innovation and high tolerance for failure. Success produces a killer product like Gmail; failures like Buzz, Wave, and Glass are decisively stopped, backed by financial strength and the willingness to cut losses. After acquiring YouTube, Google even abandoned its own heavily funded video service. Apple works differently: top-down, with a small product line and usually one major product in development at a time. Neither philosophy is inherently superior. What matters is finding product-market fit sooner than rivals. Google was fortunate to achieve it before burning through its funds.

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From UCLA professor Richard Rumelt’s work. Robin sums it up: “If you cannot make clear trade-offs, you can only produce bad strategy.” Much bad strategy comes from refusing to give things up. Abandoning goals hurts interests and meets resistance, so organizations choose a mishmash to please everyone, requiring neither serious analysis nor rigorous logic nor sacrifice. It covers everything and fails. Operation Desert Storm in 1991 provides a contrast: feint in front and outflank from the side. The difficulty was focus—keeping 8,000 elite Marines waiting aboard ships, using airborne troops to distract attention, rejecting a simultaneous air-force attack on Baghdad, and suppressing proposals inconsistent with the main strategy. Concentrating key resources on a few right targets often produces unexpected victories.