Secure Your First Front Before Opening a Second

The first people displaced by technology are often those who abandon their original strengths to chase the next trend. When your business is thriving, do not pay too much attention to other temptations or rush to cross into new fields. Buffett has an investment principle: when the stocks you hold are still performing well, do not consider selling them to search for new opportunities. Similarly, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt said internally that when a company’s core business is growing rapidly, it should keep reinvesting profits in it. Only when growth slows and other opportunities may offer better returns should it consider diversification. Of course, Schmidt was talking more about investing people and resources. The same applies to individuals. When you are doing well at a company, learn through your work rather than through your spare time. At a technology company, continually solving the problems in front of you is technological progress. A skill becomes useful when you master it well enough to earn money. A new technology must be learned beyond a certain threshold; superficial familiarity is meaningless. #Wu Jun’s Letters 2 ---- Robin: ‘Taiwanese startups rush to open a second or third front. Yet, first, they may not have secured the first one and could still be overtaken or replaced. Second, if that first market still has enormous room and their share remains extremely low, they should plant the first foot firmly before stepping forward.’