Lessons Learned from Acquired

I read recently this theory that every person knows, at most, three "perfect" people. We know dozens who are kind and funny, hundreds who are smart, and maybe, if we're lucky, a handful that we love dearly; but the unique relationship dynamic where one becomes infallible is preserved for at most three in our lives. 

I'm not sure I wholly believe this, but if true, my three are Mr. Gibbons (obviously) and the two hosts of my favorite podcast in the world: Ben Gilbert and David Rosenthal. 

Their podcast, Acquired, has changed my life. The general premise is remarkably simple: Ben and David cover, in-depth, the history of the world's most interesting and influential companies, writing the history textbook every business student ought to read. It's done more than make me a better investor and finance student (though make no mistake, it's done that, too). In the darkest moments of this last semester, jamming my AirPods into my ears and turning on a four hour episode of theirs has felt like home, a comfort I feel far too rarely these days. So today, in honor and in gratitude, I'm going to summarize the lessons this show has taught me. 

1. Life only makes sense looking backwards, no matter how much we strive to understand it going forward.

Part of investigating the greatest companies of all time is investigating those who lead and build them. Over the past six months, I've learned that Paul Allen wrote the code for Microsoft's interpreter on a napkin whilst on a plane to Argentina. Bernard Arnoult, the richest man in the world, made six billion dollars in what is widely considered the worst transaction of his career. Reed Hastings's decision to make Netflix a streaming company is what cannibalized Blockbuster and ensured his market dominance.

Surrounded by these legends, whose narrative arcs are such clean, triumphant lines, it's hard not to despair. At eighteen, Jim Simons was publishing academic papers on probability that would go on to define the field. How can I ever measure up?

But the other thing you begin to notice, after listening to enough of these stories, is that legends aren't born, but made. There is nothing inherently special about Allen or Arnoult, besides grit and luck. The difference between us and the richest man alive is just dollars. 

2. There are no bad choices

After listening to hundreds of the "Great Stories of Business", I expected to find some common threads. Perhaps a quality every leader possesses, or some feature of a business model that guarantees success. And...I found none. For every CEO that chose to reinvent, another made his riches by remaining true to the original brand. Perhaps Alex Dumas made his millions by doing the exact opposite of his peers, but Sam Walton's reputation was keenly observing (read: copying) them as needed. 

Put another way: for every metaphorical fork in the narrative road of our lives, there are enough ways to fail and enough ways to succeed no matter which road you take. There's no landmine to the left or paradise to the right; honestly, there's just more dirt in both directions. 

For a generation that puts off our happiness until some unnamed goal is reached, this is a hard pill to swallow: that no, your life doesn't fix itself upon receiving a diploma or job offer. Rather, the hard truth settles in -- that with everything comes the promise of more. More joy, more pain, more work, more boredom, more moving goalposts.

3. Women run everything

A quick list of facts I recently learned: 

• Walmart's competitive differentiator is that it exists for those in less affluent, less-connected areas. Sam Walton only made Walmart a rural brand because his wife refused to move into the city, and encouraged him to just "do that here" instead. ('That', of course, being 'start a conglomerate of grocery stores that would dominate the United States for the next half-century'.)
• The best idea Ben Silbermann, founder of Pinterest, ever had was not creating a social media app for the DIY-soccer moms, but rather, marrying Divya Bhaskaran, who would go on to become the first HR employee at Facebook. Not only would she support him and their family alone while Silbermann quit his job to pursue the start-up idea, but she would also go on to create the brand aesthetic, assist in the scouting of employees from other top technology firms, and even come up with the name of the company itself.
• Jeff Bezos's ex-wife, Mackenzie Scott was heavily involved in Amazon's early days. She is a contributor to some of the company's earliest documents, which detail Amazon's business model, accounts, early shipping orders, and more. She is known to have negotiated Amazon's first freight contract, and as a former personal student of the Toni Morrison, she selected books to sell when Amazon was nothing more than a used bookstore operating out of Bezos's garage. 

All this to say, most of the Great Founding Stories (particularly in technology-driven companies) center around young men and their ambition. But I can't help but wonder how many villages of women surround these men, guaranteeing their success and supporting them through their failures. I'm half-inspired to start a sister podcast to Acquired, and call it The Wives -- we'll talk about how women are the angel investors Silicon Valley cannot do without, investing their time and trust in ideas before anyone else sees the potential.

4. Value Created, Value Captured

An important segment on Acquired is known as Value Created, Value Captured. In it, Ben and David ask a key question about the value of the business they're currently evaluating:

Of the value that you create in the world, how much do you own?

And yes, on the podcast, this question is accompanied by some highly technical evaluations of total addressable market and industry size, but I've learned that this question is fundamentally broader: of the good you do in this world, how much do you take credit for? How much can be traced back to you? How much do you own? 

I encourage you, my dear reader, to ask yourself this very question tonight before you fall asleep. What value have you created? Of that, who has captured the most of it? For me, the value I've created has too often gone to those who don't deserve it-- classmates on group projects reap the rewards of my hard work; too many ex-friends have used my kindness and time to self-actualize, while I have yet to extend myself that same grace. I've unfairly captured value from those around me, too; how else can I describe my family's endless sacrifices to provide the lifestyle I currently take for granted? 

To succeed, we must do more than create value. We must do more than capture others' value, too. We must balance the scales, creating the same energy we absorb.

5. The best deals are the ones you believe in, and the best time to invest in them was yesterday, but the second-best time is now.

As former VCs and investment bankers, I cannot fathom how terrifying it must've been to leave behind that world in favor of long-form podcasts. Yet, without taking that leap into the unknown, would Ben and David ever had the chance to interview Charlie Munger a mere weeks before his death? 

Which is to say: take the deal you believe in. And more-- take it with the right partner. There's a heartwarming anecdote I return to often from the 2023 Acquired Holiday Episode. In it, Ben said that the best career decision he ever made was meeting David. I'd grown up hearing the age old adage that "if you love what you do, you'll never work a day in your life". I'd like to now amend that statement: you have to love who you do it with, too.