Short monologue from a CEO/founder describing behaviors that differentiate lower- vs higher-scale CEOs: intense focus on high-anxiety, high-impact tasks; extensive rehearsal of plans; defaulting to messy action and iterative improvement; delegating with broad trust to avoid being a bottleneck; strict time defense while remaining available for urgent meetings; continuous cost-cutting and treating money as a reinvestable tool rather than an end in itself.
I work harder than anybody in this company. I don't focus on putting in hours. I focus on the things that give me anxiety that are scary because I know that those things are going to push the business forward. I go over the plan 20 times before I take any action. I just default to action. I mean I start messy and I just iterate until it works out. It's just way faster if I just do things myself. I give my team an irresponsible amount of trust otherwise I'll just be the bottleneck. I'm always making time for last second meetings. I defend my time like my life depends on it. If it's in the calendar it doesn't happen. I'm always looking for places to cut costs so I can make a few extra dollars. Money is a tool, not the goal. If it's just sitting in a bank account not doing anything it's useless. So I want to reinvest it in the business.
