{"id":6085,"date":"2015-04-06T14:42:16","date_gmt":"2015-04-06T14:42:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.fabricegrinda.com\/?p=6085"},"modified":"2023-09-08T04:38:37","modified_gmt":"2023-09-08T04:38:37","slug":"i-failed-my-way-to-success","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/grinda.org\/vi\/i-failed-my-way-to-success\/","title":{"rendered":"I failed my way to success!"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">I wanted to share a fun interview I gave to JobSpotting. They kindly allowed me to reproduce it on my blog.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Fabrice Grinda likes building things. He also happens to be very, very good at it. Since starting his first company at age 23, Grinda has become one of the world\u2019s most successful Internet entrepreneurs and investors.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Originally from France, Grinda has built his career in the USA, having moved there at age 17 to attend university, founding his first startup just 6 years later.\u00a0Now, with\u00a0over $300m in exits and 150 investments under his belt, startups globally vie for his attention, but Fabrice will only entertain a potential investment if they tick each of his <a href=\"http:\/\/fabricegrinda.com\/9-business-selection-criteria\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><br \/>\n9 business selection criteria<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Talking to Fabrice, you get the sense that he doesn\u2019t do anything by halves, whether it\u2019s answering emails, or embarking on a project to reconnect with his friends. He very kindly took some time out of his schedule to answer some of my questions about success, failure and what startups need to do to catch his eye. So here\u2019s Fabrice Grinda on\u2026<\/p>\n<p><center><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"840\" height=\"630\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/IBLHa9XCBIY?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" gesture=\"media\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><\/center><\/p>\n<h5 style=\"text-align: left;\"><\/h5>\n<h5 style=\"text-align: left;\">\u2026 Why Risk is Over-Estimated<\/h5>\n<p>\u201cFailure is a lot less risky than people suspect. The reality is my first startup failed, the second one was in the process of failing and you know\u2026 what\u2019s the worst that can happen? I know I\u2019m a valuable individual who many companies would be delighted to have me [working] with them, so I didn\u2019t see there was risk.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">So where other people saw risk, I saw opportunity because the worst that could happen was that I\u2019d land on my feet [\u2026] I never saw what I was doing as risky and I was willing to go and take more risk than most people think is reasonable.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">At the same time, I don\u2019t mind rejection. If you\u2019re going to succeed as an entrepreneur you need to deal with both failure and rejection on a permanent basis [\u2026] but I realised at the end of the day that I only needed one yes. So I already had the no, I just needed to convert it into a yes.\u201d<\/p>\n<h5>\u2026 Getting Over Introversion<\/h5>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">\u201cIf you\u2019re CEO of a company, you have to be a public person. You\u2019re speaking to the press, you\u2019re speaking to investors, you\u2019re speaking to employees, you\u2019re the public face of the company and so kind of naturally you become more extroverted, more outwards facing.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">So it goes with the job and you get good at it as part of the process. And in my case I think I was kind of like that originally, I just didn\u2019t know it. I was like an extrovert hidden in the body of a shy introvert. My fundamental personality was extroverted, I just wasn\u2019t aware of it.\u201d<\/p>\n<h5>\u2026 Failing Your Way to Success<\/h5>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">\u201cAs an entrepreneur you keep trying things, and I try everything. I try business ideas, on our website we test everything, iterate, iterate, iterate. Is the button white or orange or green or yellow? Does it say \u2018sell\u2019, or \u2018sell now\u2019, or \u2018on sale\u2019 or \u2018for sale\u2019? You test, you test, you test and most of the ideas you try fail and so I would argue I failed my way to success<b>. <\/b>It\u2019s the sum total of all these little tests and if you do enough little 1% improvements, the sum total of them leads to disruptive product change.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">I think it\u2019s a very deliberate approach. Tonnes of hard work and intelligence, grit, tenacity, passion and good fortune. I mean I was also lucky multiple times. In all of these, the most important I would say is grit tenacity, passion, willingness to go the extra mile, willingness to never back down \u2026 the hard work probably trumps everything else.\u201d<\/p>\n<h5>\u2026 Productivity and Being Present<\/h5>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">\u201cWhatever I\u2019m doing, I\u2019m doing just that task at that one moment, whether it\u2019s emails \u2013 which I batch process \u2013 or calls etc \u2026 in a way they all work together because the ideas are related.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">My key productivity tip is have all notifications off so [\u2026] you should not be distracted \u2013\u00a0focus on the present and batch process everything and decrease transaction costs.\u201d<\/p>\n<h5>\u00a0\u2026 How Entrepreneurship Has Changed<\/h5>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">\u201cIt\u2019s a lot easier than ever before. When I started my first company, you needed to build your own servers, you needed data centres, you needed Oracle or Microsoft licenses so \u2026 it cost hundreds of thousands upon millions just to get started. Today, with all the open source tools \u2026 it\u2019s much easier and also marketing now with tracking tools etc. it\u2019s easier and cheaper than ever before to build a startup. If anything, at that time, at 23 I was the exception. Today I\u2019m not the exception. Today a lot of entrepreneurs are very young when they start their first company because it\u2019s easier and cheaper than ever before.\u201d<\/p>\n<h5>\u2026 Some Predictions for the Future<\/h5>\n<p><center><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"840\" height=\"473\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/kxEnRTq5-XI?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" gesture=\"media\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><\/center><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">\u201cI see that all of the major segments of the economy are going to be revolutionised be they in education with things like the MOOCs like <a href=\"https:\/\/www.coursera.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Coursera<\/a> and, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.codecademy.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Codecademy<\/a>\u2026 and also gamified learning on iPad, and iPhones that in general are playing a big role.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">We\u2019re going to have a revolution in medicine, especially on the diagnostics side [\u2026] all the diagnostics will happen for free or at a marginal cost of 0, so you\u2019ll have like a 5 or 10 minute HIV test for free and basic diagnostics and it\u2019s going to be especially powerful in emerging markets where the number of doctors is very small.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">And manufacturing, you\u2019re going to see a revolution in 3D printing where we\u2019re seeing more and more bespoke additions to product runs and also the output from 3D printers will become more and more integrated in traditional manufacturing processes. And I think also you\u2019ll start seeing 3D printers being used in medicine.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">I think robotics is going to be more and more revolutionised. Not just with things like the Roomba but more effective robots, so robots will move out of the factory and into the home. I\u2019m extremely optimistic.\u201d<\/p>\n<h5>\u2026 His Number One Tip for Aspiring Entrepreneurs<\/h5>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">\u201cLearn computer science. It\u2019s extraordinarily helpful. I like recommending learning economics as well so they think in terms of business, they have rational frameworks for looking at the world, but yeah, computer science is an amazing way to get into, even if you want to be CEO, having a tech background is helpful.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><em>Featured image by <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Kmeron\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Kmeron<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I wanted to share a fun interview I gave to JobSpotting. They kindly allowed me to reproduce it on my blog. Fabrice Grinda likes building things. He also happens to &hellip; <a href=\"\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":21049,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,39],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6085","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-entrepreneurship","category-interviews-fireside-chats"],"acf":[],"contentUpdated":"I failed my way to success!. Categories - Entrepreneurship, Interviews &amp; Fireside Chats. Date-Posted - 2015-04-06T14:42:16 . I wanted to share a fun interview I gave to JobSpotting. They kindly allowed me to reproduce it on my blog.\n Fabrice Grinda likes building things. He also happens to be very, very good at it. Since starting his first company at age 23, Grinda has become one of the world\u2019s most successful Internet entrepreneurs and investors.\n Originally from France, Grinda has built his career in the USA, having moved there at age 17 to attend university, founding his first startup just 6 years later.\u00a0Now, with\u00a0over $300m in exits and 150 investments under his belt, startups globally vie for his attention, but Fabrice will only entertain a potential investment if they tick each of his \n 9 business selection criteria.\n Talking to Fabrice, you get the sense that he doesn\u2019t do anything by halves, whether it\u2019s answering emails, or embarking on a project to reconnect with his friends. He very kindly took some time out of his schedule to answer some of my questions about success, failure and what startups need to do to catch his eye. So here\u2019s Fabrice Grinda on\u2026\n \u2026 Why Risk is Over-Estimated\n \u201cFailure is a lot less risky than people suspect. The reality is my first startup failed, the second one was in the process of failing and you know\u2026 what\u2019s the worst that can happen? I know I\u2019m a valuable individual who many companies would be delighted to have me [working] with them, so I didn\u2019t see there was risk.\n So where other people saw risk, I saw opportunity because the worst that could happen was that I\u2019d land on my feet [\u2026] I never saw what I was doing as risky and I was willing to go and take more risk than most people think is reasonable.\n At the same time, I don\u2019t mind rejection. If you\u2019re going to succeed as an entrepreneur you need to deal with both failure and rejection on a permanent basis [\u2026] but I realised at the end of the day that I only needed one yes. So I already had the no, I just needed to convert it into a yes.\u201d\n \u2026 Getting Over Introversion\n \u201cIf you\u2019re CEO of a company, you have to be a public person. You\u2019re speaking to the press, you\u2019re speaking to investors, you\u2019re speaking to employees, you\u2019re the public face of the company and so kind of naturally you become more extroverted, more outwards facing.\n So it goes with the job and you get good at it as part of the process. And in my case I think I was kind of like that originally, I just didn\u2019t know it. I was like an extrovert hidden in the body of a shy introvert. My fundamental personality was extroverted, I just wasn\u2019t aware of it.\u201d\n \u2026 Failing Your Way to Success\n \u201cAs an entrepreneur you keep trying things, and I try everything. I try business ideas, on our website we test everything, iterate, iterate, iterate. Is the button white or orange or green or yellow? Does it say \u2018sell\u2019, or \u2018sell now\u2019, or \u2018on sale\u2019 or \u2018for sale\u2019? You test, you test, you test and most of the ideas you try fail and so I would argue I failed my way to success. It\u2019s the sum total of all these little tests and if you do enough little 1% improvements, the sum total of them leads to disruptive product change.\n I think it\u2019s a very deliberate approach. Tonnes of hard work and intelligence, grit, tenacity, passion and good fortune. I mean I was also lucky multiple times. In all of these, the most important I would say is grit tenacity, passion, willingness to go the extra mile, willingness to never back down \u2026 the hard work probably trumps everything else.\u201d\n \u2026 Productivity and Being Present\n \u201cWhatever I\u2019m doing, I\u2019m doing just that task at that one moment, whether it\u2019s emails \u2013 which I batch process \u2013 or calls etc \u2026 in a way they all work together because the ideas are related.\n My key productivity tip is have all notifications off so [\u2026] you should not be distracted \u2013\u00a0focus on the present and batch process everything and decrease transaction costs.\u201d\n \u00a0\u2026 How Entrepreneurship Has Changed\n \u201cIt\u2019s a lot easier than ever before. When I started my first company, you needed to build your own servers, you needed data centres, you needed Oracle or Microsoft licenses so \u2026 it cost hundreds of thousands upon millions just to get started. Today, with all the open source tools \u2026 it\u2019s much easier and also marketing now with tracking tools etc. it\u2019s easier and cheaper than ever before to build a startup. If anything, at that time, at 23 I was the exception. Today I\u2019m not the exception. Today a lot of entrepreneurs are very young when they start their first company because it\u2019s easier and cheaper than ever before.\u201d\n \u2026 Some Predictions for the Future\n \u201cI see that all of the major segments of the economy are going to be revolutionised be they in education with things like the MOOCs like Coursera and, Codecademy\u2026 and also gamified learning on iPad, and iPhones that in general are playing a big role.\n We\u2019re going to have a revolution in medicine, especially on the diagnostics side [\u2026] all the diagnostics will happen for free or at a marginal cost of 0, so you\u2019ll have like a 5 or 10 minute HIV test for free and basic diagnostics and it\u2019s going to be especially powerful in emerging markets where the number of doctors is very small.\n And manufacturing, you\u2019re going to see a revolution in 3D printing where we\u2019re seeing more and more bespoke additions to product runs and also the output from 3D printers will become more and more integrated in traditional manufacturing processes. And I think also you\u2019ll start seeing 3D printers being used in medicine.\n I think robotics is going to be more and more revolutionised. Not just with things like the Roomba but more effective robots, so robots will move out of the factory and into the home. I\u2019m extremely optimistic.\u201d\n \u2026 His Number One Tip for Aspiring Entrepreneurs\n \u201cLearn computer science. It\u2019s extraordinarily helpful. I like recommending learning economics as well so they think in terms of business, they have rational frameworks for looking at the world, but yeah, computer science is an amazing way to get into, even if you want to be CEO, having a tech background is helpful.\u201d\n Featured image by Kmeron\n ","Category":["Entrepreneurship","Interviews &amp; Fireside Chats"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/grinda.org\/vi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6085","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/grinda.org\/vi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/grinda.org\/vi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/grinda.org\/vi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/grinda.org\/vi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6085"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/grinda.org\/vi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6085\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21176,"href":"https:\/\/grinda.org\/vi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6085\/revisions\/21176"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/grinda.org\/vi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21049"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/grinda.org\/vi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6085"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/grinda.org\/vi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6085"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/grinda.org\/vi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6085"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}