The Cheat Code

by Brian Wong

  You walk into a room full of these individuals, and you immediately think: “What can they possibly want from me?”

  They know what looks good and sounds good in a presentation, and they know what they want to hear and what they want to see. Their preferences—and their rules of thumb for doing business—start to look identical. It makes their job easier.

  But it doesn’t make your job easier. That’s exactly how they want it.

  So the cheat is: Don’t go in there and play by their rules. Don’t even study their rules.

  The scariest guy at a table of business sharks is someone like me—a guy who’s created a different way to play the game. It was especially like that when I was nineteen and had just started my company—because back then I didn’t know anything. All I knew was that I wanted to win.

  When I was nineteen, first pitching potential investors about my company, I had no idea what I was doing. I figured I should probably have a mock-up, or at least something to show people, so I wouldn’t look like some kid with a great idea and nothing to illustrate it. But due to my lack of experience, my “mock-up” consisted of a few slides I put together using my existing knowledge of HTML.

  It was far from a slick presentation, but it got people’s attention, and they saw that I had the balls to do things my way instead of the old way. They also saw that I simply wanted to do.

  Since I wasn’t obsessing over dotting i’s and crossing t’s, my passion for the product came out. I looked like a kid who was really, really passionate about his idea—which was a damn good idea—but who didn’t know everything in the world yet, and didn’t pretend to. That was the key.

  To veterans at a poker table, that’s terrifying.

  To investors and executives, that’s electrifying.

  There’s a simple cheat that can disable fear: Contemplate the worst-case scenario—within reason—and go from there.

  More often than not, the worst thing that can happen isn’t particularly devastating. Sure, it might be a setback, or even the end of something you love, but it’s not the end of the world.

  If you perceive big problems unreasonably, as if your life is over, you’re probably not going to make it as an entrepreneur. If so, you may be wise to find another avenue for your ambitions.

  When you look for absolute, life-shattering catastrophe in every problem, you usually find it.

  This phenomenon extends far beyond business. If you think breaking up with your girlfriend or boyfriend means you’ll never be in love again, you’re just creating a self-fulfilling prophecy. When something like that happens, the smart thing to do is take a deep breath—literally and figuratively—assess your damages, and realize that what happened is endurable.

  Things could be worse.

  Are there other fish in the sea? You bet! A whole ocean of them!

  Not succeeding happens to everybody—all the time. Almost all entrepreneurs, and most people in general, have at least as many failures as successes. Thomas Edison once described himself as the man who created a thousand ways not to invent the lightbulb. He wasn’t just being humble. He was proud that he had the strength of character and the breadth of intellect to deal with that much failure.

  He did not have a thousand excuses for not inventing the lightbulb. He had no interest in, nor need for, excuses.

  He had reasons, though. And each reason was something that ruled out an ineffective method and brought him closer to one that worked.

  The mere fact that you make excuses—whether they’re valid or not—means you are not naturally entrepreneurial. It means that you have discovered a way to demotivate yourself. The ability to demotivate yourself is enough, in and of itself, to rule you out as an entrepreneur.

  The exercise for moving beyond the haunting fear of disaster is simple. Ask yourself, “What’s the worst thing that can happen if this doesn’t work?”

  An entrepreneurial person realizes that the worst thing that might happen is virtually never something that cannot be endured.

  Sure, you might lose a contract, a job, your company, your house, your life savings, or the esteem of others. That would suck. But life would go on.

  Some people can accept the continuation of life as enough.

  Some people can’t.

  If you can’t, you are not entrepreneurial.

  In fact, not charging forward in the face of loss and fear sets you up to suffer in a multitude of ways: financially, romantically, socially, and psychologically.

  When things go south, look for something else to do. When you find it, ask yourself what’s the worst-case scenario if you proceed.

  Then proceed, with gusto!

  There I was at South by Southwest, the Oscars of emerging technology and start-ups, and my voice sounded like a cross between a talking rooster’s and a motivational speaker’s, because in the last fifty hours I’d met about five hundred new people out of the fifty-one thousand who were there—and they were some of the most interesting people on earth. They were the future of business, and that made them part of my future. SXSW is the quintessential networking event for entrepreneurs who want to lead change instead of follow it.

  Think of SXSW as Davos for Nerds.

  Imagine all the primary players from thousands of the hottest start-ups crammed together in one big room at an insane, high-octane event. This is not the time to spare your throat. It’s the time for ABP: Always Be Pitching. But the key to making the most out of an opportunity like SXSW is not to be pitching your business; it’s to be pitching your own personal brand.

  People working for a company tend to think of that company as their brand. That’s why it’s good to work for a big brand, like Google. You introduce yourself this way: “Hi, I’m John Smith, of Google.” People are like: “Mr. Google, it’s such a thrill to meet you. I’ve heard so much about you!”

  Your company is rarely your primary brand, though. Your main brand is you. Don’t forget that, and don’t be ashamed of it. Everybody loves being on a team—especially an all-star one like Google—but think about it this way: People change teams (and jobs) all the time, and you’ll still be you long after you’ve left Google.

  One variation, therefore, of ABP is Always Be Pitching Yourself.

  If you look around, you’ll see that the smart people at high-opportunity networking events like these are pitching their own persona—their selfhood. They’re making connections, not deals. They know that deals are for later, if ever.

  There’s scattered talk about who’s doing what, which companies are being funded for how much, and so on. But the real conversations are always about the same two topics: you and the person you’re talking to.

  In other words, your goal should be to get people to invest in you, not your project—because smart people never invest their time, money, or reputation in just a project. It’s always personal.

  Plus, when you open yourself up and let people see who you are—as a person, not just the extension or representation of the company you work for—you’re more open to the serendipity of meeting the right people: That’s how I met Pete Cashmore, CEO of Mashable, a few years ago at SXSW. I went to the Mashable party and a mutual friend just said, “Pete, meet Brian, and Brian, this is Pete.” Very casual. No expectations. Neither of us knew much about the other, but we found out we were both starting new companies, and that’s something that’s easy to bond over.

  Back then neither Pete nor I thought we’d soon be on Forbes’s “30 Under 30,” a list of the most prominent young people in business, or that Pete would be one of Time’s “100 Most Influential People of 2012.” Our meeting wasn’t about where we were going or how one of us might be able to help the other out in the future. It was about two guys with similar interests getting to know each other a little.

  Think how different a relationship like that is from one that starts with somebody giving you an elevator pitch along the lines of, “I’ve got an amazing business idea: Uber for pizza! Boom!” That relationship is just about
that one idea, and when the idea dies, the relationship goes with it.

  Also, the reality is, nobody gives a fuck about what you’re doing, or your funding, or the last deal you closed. Why should they? You’re just one of a million start-ups at a place like SXSW.

  That is, nobody gives a fuck about you until you help them understand why they should: because of who you are as a human being. In other words, if you want to make a true connection, you need to cut through the superficial clutter of deals, titles, and achievements (news flash: people will see right through them) and show your true self.

  So you don’t go to a place like SXSW—or any gathering of important people for whatever industry or line of work you’re in—full of hubris. You go in grateful: to be at this place, to be learning and growing, and to be making extraordinary friends.

  That creates the serendipity of right person, right place, right time, and those are the connections that eventually bring opportunities that lead to your success.

  But the key word here is “eventually.” I rarely do business right away with the people I meet. Instead, I wait for the right time and the right opportunity—and in the meantime, I continue to cultivate the relationship, keep it strong. I still haven’t done any business with Pete Cashmore—but maybe someday I will.

  The point is, over time, authentic relationships will yield value for your business, in addition to the value they yield for your life as friendships. It might start when you see the other person again at a conference, at a party, or at some other industry event. Then you’ll meet as old friends, who know each other for the right reason—that you like and respect each other—rather than the wrong reason, which is that you think you can make money off each other.

  The truly golden relationships start when your goal is to not force anything but to share some of yourself with people, learn from them.

  I’ve found that if you ask people for advice, they’ll give you money, and that if you ask them for money, they’ll give you advice. But the higher you climb in business, the less your relationships revolve around money and the more they revolve around being the person other people want to spend time with.

  It’s really fun to be the guy people want to be around. I experienced this a couple of years ago at SXSW, when Kiip threw an incredible party cosponsored by a client, Decentralized Dance Party. DDP coordinates sensational events all around the world—the kind of parties that stick in your mind forever and are well worth the expense. After all, nothing amortizes better than a good memory.

  Our DDP party in Austin consisted of taking an FM radio tuner off an iPod, synching it to two hundred boomboxes, and turning it into a huge parade that marched all around the city. It was sick—everybody was talking about it. At least a thousand people got involved, and when people found out that Kiip was behind the event, nobody needed to ask me, “What does your company do?”

  Everybody just wanted to know the guy leading the parade.

  My first day at college, I had a hard choice to make. I was fourteen, younger than just about anybody else at the University of British Columbia, and needed to decide how to present myself. I could be seen either as the young, insecure, introverted kid who was lucky to be there, or the young, confident, extroverted kid who was lucky to be there.

  Problem: on the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, I’m 55 percent extroverted and 45 percent introverted. I tell people I’m an introverted extrovert (and a shocking number say, “Me too!”).

  But I knew even then that the first impression you create in any setting sets the tone for the rest of the time you’re there—especially if it’s negative. If you start out like a hermit or a grouch, it’s hard to reverse that.

  But, Myers-Briggs aside, my choice back then sort of made itself, because I was just so excited to meet these people. I’d always been around bright kids—and older kids too, because I’d sailed through school—but the UBC students were smart and interesting on a whole new level, especially in the business program, my major.

  So I put a big smile on my face—really, it was more like I couldn’t get it off—and started saying hi to everybody I saw.

  I can’t overemphasize the power of a smile! It can disarm someone who’s angry, warm up someone who doesn’t know why they’re talking to you, make an awkward situation funny, and make a stranger a friend.

  It’s like putting the sun on your face. It lights you up, and that light shines on the person you’re smiling at. Key lesson: A good impression isn’t about how you make people feel about you, it’s how you make them feel about themselves.

  Sometimes after I’ve talked to somebody, I forget what we talked about, but I always remember how I felt. If people remember feeling happy around you and laughing, that’s the best impression ever.

  A smile helps create what’s called the halo effect, the element of a first impression that makes people look for reasons to like you instead of reasons to be wary of you. And when people like you, it opens doors.

  You can say the exact same words to somebody with a smile on your face—or without one, and get a totally different response.

  There’s even a theory from psychology that says smiling makes you happy almost as much as happiness makes you smile.

  At UBC, my halo effect made me super-popular despite my age. It even helped get me elected to a student office—without most people knowing what I stood for.

  The halo effect can be equally effective in business. At the first company I worked for—Digg, a news aggregator—I did the same ultra-friendly meet-and-greet, and it had the same magical effect.

  Think about it: Isn’t that how you make decisions about other people? If somebody is nice to you, you tend to trust them. And in turn you don’t give them the third degree. You give them opportunities instead.

  These days, a good reputation starts with what other people say when your name comes up. It’s like: “Brian, yeah, I know him—he’s a cool guy. He’s always wearing a smile.”

  You might wonder what the hell “cool guy” means. It means whatever the listener wants it to mean. (Huge cheat coming up: People are looking for reasons to like you.) If somebody hears that you’re a cool guy, they’ll fill in the blanks with whatever they want it to mean: a loyal guy, a smart guy, a nice guy, a fun guy.

  Each time your name gets mentioned, your halo gets brighter and brighter. As your reputation expands, people keep hearing the same good things about you. Your halo turns into a force field and keeps negative bullshit at bay.

  The best part is that you’ve already got your halo right on your face. So light it up, light up the people around you—and get ready for good things to happen!

  Here’s another thing I learned from entering the business world at a ridiculously young age: No matter who you are or what you do in life, you have a superpower—and by that I mean something you do far better than most people. If you’re not using it, you’re crazy.

  If I ever interview you for a job, expect me to ask: “What’s your superpower?”

  Here’s mine: I’m really good at getting people excited about stuff. That’s my job, and I love it. Or: I love it, and that’s my job. Both are equally true.

  I can sit in front of you and make you excited about whatever—just by how I describe it and how I feel. It’s contagious, and you’ll just go, “Wow! That is so cool!”

  I do it even when I don’t need to. Can’t help it. That’s just me. And that’s how I know it’s my superpower.

  So what’s yours?

  You probably already know what it is. If you’re hesitating, it’s probably just because we live in an era of fake humility and you don’t want to look arrogant. But confident people aren’t arrogant. They don’t need to be.

  Don’t be afraid to know your superpower and name it. Nobody will mind. We’re all looking for all the help we can get.

  I learned my first superpower from my mother, when I was a kid playing hockey. My mom took me to practice, stuck around and watched, and helped me see my strengths and weak
nesses. She taught me to hone my strengths into veritable superpowers, and how to play away from my weaknesses.

  In the early years, I could compete with almost anybody, but then all the guys started getting big and muscular, and I stayed average in size. My mom said, “That’s your new strength. Speed. Agility. Wits.”

  It wasn’t the mainstream style, but it kept me in the game and taught me a huge life lesson: Don’t try to fix your weaknesses. Build your strengths—and make one into a superpower.

  This lesson has served me well time and time again. Long before I quit hockey, I looked around for other things I loved and was good at, and realized I was good with computers and had an eye for design. So I downloaded a program on graphic design and taught it to myself in no time.

  Remember, we’re in the golden age of do-it-yourself learning. You don’t need a certificate or degree to actually know something—just a little aptitude and the willingness to give something a try.

  So I got pretty good at design, but my design work never got perfect. Yet I kept trying. Big mistake. I did quite a bit of the design in my first two companies, and I started to feel good about my skills—until I met one of my current partners, Amadeus Demarzi, an interaction designer who worked at a hot design agency called Sequence. Amadeus blew me away. Design was his superpower. That’s when I realized it wasn’t mine. So I told him, “You do the design stuff, and I’ll build the business side of the company.”

  This was an easy decision and turned out to be one of the best I ever made. Moral of the story: When you divide tasks according to strengths, amazing things happen—fast.

  It’s fine not to be good at everything. People who have mad talents at one thing usually suck at something else. That’s just how the brain works. Think about the bad handwriting of doctors and engineers—they’re famous for marginal manual dexterity, but have huge brains for spatial reasoning and long-term memory.