{"id":28493836,"date":"2020-01-13T22:45:59","date_gmt":"2020-01-13T22:45:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nav.al\/?p=28493836"},"modified":"2025-11-07T08:13:59","modified_gmt":"2025-11-07T16:13:59","slug":"finding-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nav.al\/finding-time","title":{"rendered":"Finding Time to Invest in Yourself"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

This is a transcript of the bonus material at the end of the giant How to Get Rich<\/a> episode.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nivi: <\/strong>A common question we get: \u201cHow do I find the time to start investing in myself? I have a job.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You have to rent your time to get started<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In one of the tweets from the cutting room floor, you wrote: \u201cYou will need to rent your time to get started. This is only acceptable when you are learning and saving. Preferably in a business where society does not yet know how to train people and apprenticeship is the only model.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Naval:<\/strong> Try to learn something that people haven\u2019t quite figured out how to teach yet. That can happen if you\u2019re working in a new and quickly expanding field. It\u2019s also common in fields that are circumstantial\u2014where the details matter and it\u2019s always moving. Investing is one of those fields; so is entrepreneurship.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Chief of Staff for a founder is one of the most coveted jobs for young people starting out in Silicon Valley. The brightest kids will follow an entrepreneur around and do whatever he or she needs them to do. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In many cases, the person is way overqualified. Someone with multiple graduate degrees might be running the CEO\u2019s laundry because that\u2019s the most important thing at the moment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the same time, that person gets to attend the most important meetings. They are privy to all the stress and theatrics, the fundraising decks and the innovation\u2014knowledge that can only come from being in the room.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Coming out of college, Warren Buffett wanted to work for Benjamin Graham to learn to be a value investor. Buffett offered to work for free, and Graham responded, \u201cYou\u2019re overpriced.\u201d What that means is you have to make sacrifices to take on an apprenticeship. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Find the part of the job with the steepest learning curve<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you can\u2019t learn in an apprenticeship model because you need to make money, try to be innovative in the context of your job. Take on new challenges and responsibilities. Find the part of the job with the steepest learning curve.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You want to avoid repetitive drudgery\u2014that\u2019s just biding time until your job is automated away.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you\u2019re a barista at the coffee shop, figure out how to make connections with the customers. Figure out how to innovate the service you offer and delight the customer. Managers, founders and owners will take notice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Develop a founder mentality<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The hardest thing for any founder is finding employees with a founder mentality. This is a fancy way of saying they care enough. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

People will say, \u201cWell, I\u2019m not the founder. I\u2019m not being paid enough to care.\u201d Actually, you are: The knowledge and skills you gain by developing a founder mentality set you up to be a founder down the line; that\u2019s your compensation. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

You can get a lot out of almost any position. You just have to put a lot into it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Accountability is something you can take on immediately<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nivi: <\/strong>We\u2019ve discussed accountability, judgment, specific knowledge and leverage. If I\u2019m working a \u201cnormal\u201d job, is specific knowledge the one I should focus on? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Naval: <\/strong>Judgment takes experience. It takes a lot of time to build up. You have to put yourself in positions where you can exercise judgment. That\u2019ll come from taking on accountability.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Leverage is something that society gives you after you\u2019ve demonstrated judgment. You can get it faster by learning high-leverage skills like coding or working with the media. These are permissionless<\/em> leverage. This is why I encourage people to learn to code or produce media, even if it\u2019s just nights and weekends. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, judgment and leverage tend to come later. Accountability is something you can take on immediately. You can say, \u201cHey, I\u2019ll take charge of this thing that nobody wants to take charge of.\u201d When you take on accountability, you\u2019re also publicly putting your neck on the chopping block\u2014so you have to deliver. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

You build specific knowledge by taking accountability for things that other people don\u2019t know how to do. Perhaps they\u2019re things you enjoy doing or are naturally inclined towards doing anyway.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you work in a factory, the hardest thing may be raising capital to keep the factory running. Maybe that\u2019s what the owner is always stressed out about.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You might notice this and think, \u201cI\u2019m good at balancing my checkbook and have a good head for numbers; but I haven\u2019t raised money before.\u201d You offer to help and become the owner\u2019s sidekick solving their fundraising problem. If you have a natural aptitude and take on accountability, you can put yourself in a position to learn quickly. Before long, you\u2019ll become the heir apparent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Early on, find things that interest you and allow you to take on accountability. Don\u2019t worry about short-term compensation. Compensation comes when you\u2019re tired of waiting for it and have given up on it. This is the way the whole system works. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you take on accountability and solve problems on the edge of knowledge that others can\u2019t solve, people will line up behind you. The leverage will come.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Specific knowledge can be timely or timeless<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are two forms of specific knowledge: timely<\/em> and timeless<\/em>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you become a world-class expert in machine learning just as it takes off and you got there through genuine intellectual interest, you\u2019re going to do really well. But 20 years from now, machine learning may be second hat; the world may have moved on to something else. That\u2019s timely<\/em> knowledge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you\u2019re good at persuading people, it\u2019s probably a skill you picked up early on in life. It\u2019s always going to apply, because persuading people is always going to be valuable. That\u2019s timeless <\/em>knowledge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Now, persuasion is a generic skill\u2014it\u2019s probably not enough to build a career on. You need to combine it in a skill stack, as Scott Adams writes<\/a>. You might combine persuasion with accounting and an understanding of semiconductor production lines. Now you can become the best semiconductor salesperson and, later on, the best semiconductor company CEO.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Timeless <\/em>specific knowledge usually can\u2019t be taught, and it sticks with you forever. Timely<\/em> specific knowledge comes and goes; but it tends to have a fairly long shelf life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Technology is a good place to find those timely skills sets. If you can bring in a more generic specialized knowledge skill set from the outside, then you\u2019ve got gold.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Technology is an intellectual frontier for gaining specific knowledge<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nivi:<\/strong> There were a couple other tweets from the cutting-room floor on this topic. The first: \u201cThe technology industry is a great place to acquire specific knowledge. The frontier is always moving forward. If you are genuinely intellectually curious, you will acquire the knowledge ahead of others.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Naval:<\/strong> Danny Hillis<\/a> famously said technology is everything that doesn\u2019t work yet<\/a>. Technology is around us everywhere. The spoon was technology once; fire was technology once. When we figured out how to make them work, they disappeared in the background and became part of our everyday lives. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Technology is, by definition, the intellectual frontier. It\u2019s taking things from science and culture that we have not figured out how to mass produce or create efficiently and figuring out how to commercialize it and make it available to everybody.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Technology will always be a great field where you can pick up specific knowledge that is valuable to society.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you don\u2019t have accountability, do something different<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nivi: <\/strong>Here\u2019s another tweet from the cutting-room floor related to accountability: \u201cCompanies don\u2019t know how to measure outputs, so they measure inputs instead. Work in a way that your outputs are visible and measurable. If you don\u2019t have accountability, do something different.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Naval: <\/strong>The entire structure of rewarding people comes from the agricultural and industrial ages, when inputs and outputs matched up closely. The amount of hours you put into doing something was a reliable proxy for what kind of output you\u2019d get. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today, it\u2019s extremely nonlinear. One good investment decision can make a company $10 million or $100 million. One good product feature can be the difference between product-market fit and complete failure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As a result, judgment and accountability matter much more. Often the best engineers aren\u2019t the hardest workers. Sometimes they don\u2019t work very hard at all, but they dependably ship that one critical product at just the right time. It\u2019s similar to the salesperson who closes the huge deal that makes the company\u2019s numbers for the quarter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

People need to be able to tell what role you had in the company\u2019s success. That doesn\u2019t mean stomping all over your team\u2014people are extremely sensitive to others taking too much credit. You always want to be giving out credit. Smart people will know who was responsible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some jobs are too removed from the customer for this type of accountability. You\u2019re just a cog in a machine.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Consulting is a good example. As a consultant, your ideas are delivered through someone else within the organization. You may not have visibility to the top people; you may be hidden behind a screen. That\u2019s a trade-off you\u2019re making in exchange for your independence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You\u2019ll develop thick-skin if you take on accountability<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

When you have accountability, you get a lot more credit when things go right. Of course, the downside is you get hurt a lot more when things go wrong. When you stick your neck out, you have to be willing to be blamed, sacrificed and even attacked.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you\u2019re the kind of person who thrives in a high-accountability environment, you\u2019re going to end up thick-skinned over time. You\u2019re going to get hurt a lot. People are going to attack you if you fail.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Scale your specific knowledge with apprentices<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nivi: <\/strong>Once you get some specific knowledge, you can scale it by training your own apprentices and outsourcing tasks to them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Naval: <\/strong>For example, I made good investments and figured out the venture business. I could have kept doing that and making money. Instead, I co-founded Spearhead to train up-and-coming founders to become angels and venture investors. We give them a checkbook to start investing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s an apprenticeship model. They come to us with deals they\u2019re looking at, and we help them think it through. This model is more scalable than my personal investing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Specific knowledge comes on the job, not in a classroom<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

At Spearhead we lead classes teaching founders about investing, and we also hold office hours to discuss specific deals they bring.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It turns out the classes and talks we lead are largely worthless. You can give all the generic advice people need in about an hour. After that, the advice gets so circumstantial that it essentially cancels to zero. But the office hours are incredibly useful. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This reinforces the notion that investing is one of those skills that can only be learned on the job. When you find a skill like that, you\u2019re dealing with specific knowledge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another good indicator of specific knowledge is when someone can\u2019t give a straight answer to the question: \u201cWhat do you do every day?\u201d Or you get an answer along the lines of, \u201cEvery day is different based on what\u2019s going on.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The thing is so complicated and dependent upon circumstances that it can\u2019t be boiled down into a textbook form.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nivi: <\/strong>The mafia figured out this apprenticeship model a long time ago. The best way to end up running one of the families was to become the driver for the Don.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Naval: <\/strong>Tony Soprano<\/a> was a businessman who had to enforce his own contracts. That\u2019s a very complicated business. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This is a transcript of the bonus material at the end of the giant How to Get Rich<\/a> episode.<\/p>\n

A common question we get: \u201cHow do I find the time to start investing in myself? I have a job.\u201d<\/p>\n

In one of the tweets from the cutting room floor, you wrote: \u201cYou will need to rent your time to get started.<\/span> More <\/i><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[6,15],"tags":[54,45,59],"class_list":["post-28493836","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-podcast","category-wealth","tag-entrepreneurship","tag-freedom","tag-wealth-creation"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nFinding Time to Invest in Yourself<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/nav.al\/finding-time\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Finding Time to Invest in Yourself\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"This is a transcript of the bonus material at the end of the giant How to Get Rich episode. 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