A Harvard entrepreneur who sold his company for hundreds of millions told Bridger that at his stage, the downside of starting a business was tiny: $400-500 monthly expenses, plus friends who'd let him crash if it failed. The upside was unlimited. That asymmetrical bet changed how Bridger thought about risk.
Chapters
This really successful guy from Harvard came to our school and gave us this presentation. He went to Harvard, sold his company for hundreds of millions of dollars, and at the end of his presentation, I snuck back to the back of the room where he's at and I wanted to talk to him. And I said, hey, I'm Bridger. I've started a few businesses. I'm just worried about the risk of entrepreneurship and losing it all. In your opinion, is it better to get a safe job or just go for it and just try to start a business in college? And what he said to me changed my life. He said, Bridger, if you fail, do you have a friend, a parent, a grandparent that if you really hit rock bottom, you could go move in for a month and they would feed you and you could kind of live there for a little bit? And I said, yeah, you know, to be honest, like if I really hit rock bottom, yeah, I could probably bum around for a couple months while I get back on my feet. And he goes, what are your living expenses? I'm like, I spend about $400 a month, $500 a month. And at this time, I was living super cheap. And he goes, Bridger, what are you talking about? Your risk level is so small. If you lose it all, if you risk it all and lose it all, your outcome is you get to move in with a friend or family member that loves you. You have a bed or maybe a spot on the floor that you can sleep with, maybe food in the fridge. And at any time, you can go work at McDonald's and make a few thousand a month, which covers your living expenses plus plenty more. We're not even talking about the same level of risk. He goes, that doesn't sound that risky to me, but at the same time, you have an opportunity to get huge amounts of reward. Why wouldn't you go after that huge reward to sacrifice a little bit of risk? And that one line spurred me on to all the entrepreneurship stuff I've done today.
