On Leadership, Courage… And Sucking

It’s the kind of thing that just sticks to your brain.

I have mentioned this before, but I am a huge fan of Kevin Rose‘s (ex. Digg and now Google Ventures) video podcast called, Foundation. The problem with podcasts – in terms of consumption – is that I often find myself discovering something that is somewhat older. I find it hard to keep up with all of the compelling content. I also find myself looking at the episodes of a podcast and choosing the episodes that feature themes or personalities that are familiar to me. Foundation is no exception. So, I jump to the episodes featuring people like Chad Hurley, Tony Hsieh and Elon Musk and hold off on the names that aren’t all that familiar to me. I know the name Ben Horowitz… and you should too. Horowitz is the cofounder and Partner (along with Marc Andreessen) of the venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz (investors in companies like Airbnb, Facebook, Fab, Foursquare, Instagram, Jawbone, Pinterest, Quirky, Skype, Twitter and the list goes on). Horowitz has had a long and respected career in technology and Silicon Valley, but he’s an acute skill in understanding leadership and what makes a great company. This conversation was published in November 2012… and I wished I would have watched it back then.

Courage.

There are so many illuminating moments in this short 40-minute conversation about startups, growth, the changing business landscape and the philosophy of business, that it would be impossible to summarize (so, do yourself a favor and watch this tonight instead of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills). There is one word that I will encourage you to ruminate on as this conversation unfolds: courage. Does your organization truly have the courage to make the right decisions (which are often the hard decisions).

Before jumping to any conclusions, please watch this: