In this talk, seasoned founder Sean Everett draws a parallel between the elite training of Top Gun pilots and the demands of today’s startup ecosystem. He argues that only the top 1% talent, equipped with multiple cross‑functional skills, can thrive in the hyper‑competitive, fast‑paced “dogfight” of modern business. Everett introduces the OODA loop (Observe, Orient, Decide, Act) as a mental model for rapid iteration and decisive action, emphasizing that execution—building, shipping, and delivering market‑validated products—trumps endless discussion. He stresses the need for a solid strategy, a durable competitive advantage, and relentless execution to win in the marketplace.
Chapters
Okay. What does Top Gun have to do with startups? Let's get into it. All right. A little background first. So I've spent 20 years building, operating, founding startups. Every stage, early stage, growth stage, big brand name, names you never heard of, bootstrapped, VC-backed, PE-backed, you name it, right? Top Gun: Maverick, the new movie came out. Just watched it yesterday. So that's where the analogy is coming in. Basically top 1%, right, are invited to Top Gun school, best aviators in the world. Startups used to be viewed and software used to be viewed as sort of like child's play. Like this is kindergarten grade by corporate America. That's all changed in the last 10 years. Now, if you want to run a successful startup, you need the best in the world talent, period. And Top 1% at everything you do and you need to have multiple skills, right? So I've seen a lot of people that, you know, have been doing the corporate thing, want to shift to startups, think they can make a bunch of money and they just fall over because some of their skills requires 5, 10 skills rather than just one, have atrophied over the years if they had them. And it's really hard to increase the pace sometimes. So, if you want to operate a startup in today's environment, it is the most competitive, fast-paced environment on the planet where if you compare it to sports, a game, any game lasts maybe a couple hours. Imagine a game that you never stop playing for decades. That is this. And you're going up against the most well-funded, smartest, hungriest, most capable On the planet, and make no mistake, it is a dogfight out there. Like business is war; startups are the tip of the spear. So what's the? How do you win? Well, first thing, you need really good strategy. You need a good idea. Second thing, you need incredible world-class talent to execute it. And what is execution? Well, in fighter pilot school, they teach you something called the OODA loop: O O D A. Observe, orient. Decide, act. And it's the loop that people use to constantly improve their position against another opponent and make sure that they win in a dogfight. So, you know, you could even break it down more. I mean, I've said this for years. Basically, if you want to win on the internet or in startups, it's just do things. That is it. Like, I've found so many different companies, startups even, people will just sit on Zoom calls All day and just talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk, talk. Doesn't work. Like nothing's happening. You're not producing anything. The market doesn't care that you know you got your whole engineering team sitting on conference calls trying to decide like some weird architectural decision. I mean granted that comes into play and it works, but it really doesn't matter at the end of the day. What matters is like are you executing? Are you putting something into the market that people want? Are they paying for it? And do you have a strategic competitive advantage? Over the other players in the market, and why is it durable? And how can you last longer than others? Because that's how you win. All right, that's it for me. A little intense today. I'm just feeling that Maverick mindset. All right, totals, oodaloops.
