The Jordan Harbinger Show - 336: Kevin Systrom | Life Lessons from an Instagram Founder Part Two

Episode Date: April 9, 2020

Kevin Systrom (@kevin) is a computer programmer and entrepreneur who co-founded Instagram in 2010 with Mike Krieger. This is part two of a two-part episode. Make sure to catch part one here! What We Discuss with Kevin Systrom: How Kevin and Mike made decisions at Instagram to best avoid project-crippling bottlenecks. Why checking yourself is a good way to ensure that you are less likely to wreck yourself. The game-changing but simple purchase Kevin made when Instagram became a verifiable success. Has Instagram contributed to Kevin's own feelings of FOMO? The strategy Kevin employs for reading books with optimal efficiency. And much more... Full show notes and resources can be found here: https://jordanharbinger.com/336 Sign up for Six-Minute Networking -- our free networking and relationship development mini course -- at jordanharbinger.com/course! The James Altucher Show brings you into the lives of peak-performers: billionaires, best-selling authors, rappers, astronauts, athletes, comedians, actors, and world champions! Check it out here! (Or wherever you prefer listening to podcasts in your ear-holes!) Like this show? Please leave us a review here -- even one sentence helps! Consider including your Twitter handle so we can thank you personally!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Welcome to the show. I'm Jordan Harbinger. As always, I'm here with my producer, Jason DePhilippo. On the Jordan Harbinger show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most brilliant people and turn their wisdom into practical advice you can use to impact your own life and those around you. We want to help you see the Matrix when it comes to how these amazing people think and behave, and help you become a better thinker. If you're new to the show, we've got episodes with spies and CEOs, athletes and authors, thinkers and performers, as well as toolboxes for skills like negotiation, body language, persuasion, and more. So if you're smart and you like to learn and improve, you'll be right at home here with us. Today, part two with Kevin Sistrup, founder of Instagram.

We'll continue our conversation from last time and share wisdom about how to hire the right people in your organization or how to be the right hire for your organization. We'll also delve into unique problem-solving strategies from the mind of a unicorn app creator, or Unicorn Tech creator, I should say, and some wisdom on learning how to read in the most effective way possible. All this and a lot more on today's episode of the show. If you're wondering how I manage to book all these folks, they always come through my network. I manage my relationships, using systems and tiny habits in just a few minutes per day. You should do the same. Check out our six-minute networking course. It's free. I'm teaching you how to do that. It's at Jordan Harbinger.com

slash course. And by the way, most of the guests you hear on the show, they subscribe to the course in the newsletter. So you'll be in smart company. Now, here's part two with Kevin Sistram. I heard that you had meetings with your co-founder where you just made decisions. Like you had lists of decisions. Can you take us through that? That's a great idea, actually. Well, I had read this book called The Goal. And this was towards the end of Instagram, by the way. We figured this out many years into Instagram. This was not at the beginning. And after reading the goal, it was basically about manufacturing, but it was, you know, if you want to go read it, go read it. But the lesson is effectively like the weakest link in any quote unquote chain or manufacturing

chain is the thing that will dictate the overall output of that chain. And I started thinking about that as it applies to work. And I was just like, man, people complain about X, Y, or Z like not moving. I was like, I think we're just like a giant decision factory, right? Like you just have to like, I'm definitely a decision machine. meaning like I am the thing standing in the way of things getting greenlit or yellow lit or redlet. I think we call that the bottleneck. Yeah.

Thank you. The bottleneck. Like, I'm not sure that the decision making has to be the bottleneck. But I was thinking to myself how if decisions don't get made quickly enough, then all the other work in the organization pauses. So I had this idea where I was like, I just think we just need to inventory all the outstanding decisions, all the things you just need to blow through and list them and go one by one. And if there are hard ones, let's mark it and come back to it. And we would go through all the easy ones. Then we'd narrow it down, narrow it down.

Then we'd get to like two or three really hard ones. And sometimes they'd be related and complex. But we'd be able to have really in-depth conversations about that decision and, like, schedule a meeting for that decision, all the right people in the room for that decision. And that was really helpful. I should probably do that in my daily life now. I don't really. I think the bottleneck now, or maybe it's just better to out. source most of the decisions. Like, for me, I try to just say, Jen, if you need me for a decision,

great, you know, but if you don't, just do it. And then I can sort of like secretly get a little annoyed later, but it's never worth it. It's always just better to have it done. Yeah, I am, I struggle with this because on the one hand, I really like being involved in things. I really like having control. And on the other hand, I like things getting done. Oh, man. So it's a balance. but listen, I started a company and years later and I'm still working out. So I guess what I'm saying is, like, I hope to meet people that are great at this and maybe start companies with them. Yeah. No kidding.

Yeah, I don't blame you. Sometimes I think our nature just takes over. It's like, look, I'm never going to be that much better. The odds of you going, you know what, I don't need to be in control of everything. That will be either something that never goes away or your daughter as a teenager. You'll just be like, I am now powerless and I have to accept that. It's all good. Yeah.

early on, you guys were struggling to scale. I know the server was down and you had this alarm going off. You had like PTSD from this ringer or whatever from your phone. Yeah, I never want to hear it again. I can imagine. There were other competitors at the same time that had tens of millions in funding that had all their infrastructure built out. How come they didn't crush you guys?

So a couple things. One, those companies were failing two, meaning I remember giant outages of Foursquare or the fail will on Twitter. Oh, yeah. Like, it's not like we were the only ones struggling to keep. or infrastructure running. I mean, we're all, it's kind of like a science now and you can find really good people. But back then, I think it was a lot harder because a lot of this stuff was just brand new. Why didn't they just kill us? I mean, one, we were doing very different things. I mean,

let's take Twitter, for instance. Like, Twitter's just a very different product than Instagram. And while there's some overlap in use case and people have limited time in the day, sure, they're not the same. So I think the more important question is like, okay, why didn't companies pivot into doing what we were doing if they were big? And then why didn't other small companies win better than us? Those are the two categories. In terms of small companies, I don't know. I mean, was it luck, was it talent? Was it a combination of both? I don't know those other companies. I mean, I know their names, but I don't know how they ran. I don't know. Like, I can't diagnose that. But all I can say is like we worked hard and we tried and we had enough at bats.

and we hit one grand slam, right? Like, it's all you got to do in life, one grand slam. So I have as many at bats as possible. In terms of the big companies, I think it's classic innovators slammer where big companies, they first write you off because they think you're a gimmick. And then eventually they start seeing that, oh, wait, like there's an actual use case there. But it's really hard for them to pivot because of something they hold dear. I'm not in the boardroom or in the product development process for these larger companies like Facebook or Twitter.

But I'd imagine it's just like, in order to do that thing that that other company is doing, we'd need to shift something fundamental. So take like, for instance, the follow graph of Instagram. Facebook ended up having it, but it didn't really work the same way. What is this again? The follow graph. What is that even? Sorry, instead of you and I having to be friends to see each other's content, I can just follow you and you. And you don't have to follow graph.

Oh, follow graph. Okay. Asymmetric follow graph. Got it. I thought this was like some sort of fancy word that started with a pH. No, no, no, no, no, follow series graph. Got it. Asymmetric following, meaning we don't have to be friends, non-friend relationships. Right, like broadcasting.

Yeah, basically, right? My point is, it's very hard to pivot to that if your whole company, like, not even like just your ethos, but like your infrastructure is based on friends. Then you got to like design this other thing and now they both exist together and it's like, wait, am I friends with you or am I following you? Yeah. It's hard. So, I mean, this is true with Instagram too. I mean, when we decided we were going to compete in the Snapchat world and, like, work on stories, most of our effort was not figuring out how to build stories because I don't know, the product was there. You could see it.

It was how does this thing fit in nicely and neatly with the existing system and not crush the – and that's really hard. It is hard. But I think we pulled that off fairly well. And that's why it ended up working. Yeah, I love that. That's competing well as a big company. As much – The biggest relative, because we're small.

That's true. I guess you were really agile. I look at the stats and it was like Twitter had like multiples of the number of employees that you guys had. What do you have like 11? And they had like 300, 450 or something like that. And then you look at Snapchat had multiples of whatever you had. This is a benefit. It is a benefit.

I'm working on ideas now and I'm just like, man, but we don't have a lot of people. So like how are we going to do that? And often the thing I have to remind myself is sometimes not being from an industry and sometimes being able to move. really quickly is in fact your advantage. Not always, but often, especially if you get into a disruptive like area that feels new and weird. If you're playing in existing spaces, I think it's a lot easier to just get crushed by big players. But if you're trying something new, it takes a lot of time to steer the Titanic away from an iceberg, if that makes sense. Yeah, it does. Yeah. Yeah, I think looking back now, I just couldn't do it. I'm 39. Like, I'm the two, there's a part of me

it's like, I'm too old for this, right? I just couldn't, I couldn't do. No one's ever too old for anything. That's what I... It's true, but it's also like, it's hard to wrap your mind around starting over, although if you have to do it, you'll figure it out, most likely.

Yeah. When did you finally realize you guys had something? Was it like... Day one. Really? Yeah, it was really clear to me. Like, people just started signing out. I'd never seen anything like it.

I knew people with startups, and like, no one saw the volume we saw on day one. I was like, this is like an instant hit with people. And like, I think, didn't have data that showed they were retaining. So it was definitely overconfidence, trust me. Like, I didn't really know. But day one, I was like, this is different. And something's new and something's weird. And like, we've created something I'm not entirely sure at what scale. But this thing is, it's meaningful. Did you have 25,000 downloads the first

day? Not downloads. Signups. Signups, I mean? Yeah. Yeah. Probably more downloads. Which is mind-blowing because it's like, how do you even get, if I downloaded that right at 12.01 a.m. in the beginning of the day. And I texted everyone in my phone book that they had to wake their ass up and get this app and sign up for an account. It would be hard to get that many in one day. I agree. And you did it. Companies struggle with that. Yeah. No, that was a special time. Did you ever think, oh, God, this is too good to be true. I'm going to wake up one day and it's like, oh, it's over. No. You don't have that kind of anxiety? No. In fact, I worried more that, oh, God, we're screwing it up. Like, oh, God, like, we're down again. Everyone's going to leave.

they're going to think we're terrible. Like, I had more of those feelings than, like, we're a flash in the pan. And I don't know if that was just, like, naivete or whatever you want to call. Like, it might have been. But no, it's interesting. Like, when working on the startup, I just never had a feeling we were going to fail. Not that we were going to be successful.

Just I never, like, like, once we launched, it was like, no, this thing's going to work. Like, I'm not sure exactly at what scale, but people like it, you know? Yeah. Yeah. Probably should have been a little bit more. worried. Yeah, would that have served you at all? I don't know. It seems like it would great. So you get less sleep? I mean, what's the point? Yeah, we didn't have time to worry. That's another thing. Yeah. What would that have done? Like, hey, don't get excited. All that passion that's keeping you

through all these hard times, get rid of that because we want to temper your expectations. Like, there's no room for that, really. I think things are either positive feedback loops or negative feedback loops. Like, what's the phrase like you're either living or you're dying? Like, you're either like growing and this thing's a positive feedback loop and it's spreading and people are retaining and it's good or it's a leaky bucket in which case that's pretty clear pretty quickly. It's rare that it's somewhere in the middle and you can't tell. So I just like it was growing. And then the question was like, how do we not screw this thing up?

Yeah. I mean, you stayed for six years even after the acquisition. I looked at other companies and how long the founders stay and it's like three months, six months, one year, two years, sometime, I think one guy. I think the PayPal founders, like Peter Thiel, I think, left the day after the acquisition or something. I'm rich. No, it's funny.

I don't know. Listen, I don't know him and I don't know their, like, reasons for staying or leaving. That's not my point, actually. I think the YouTube founders were there for a while. Yeah, we were in like three standard deviations out beyond, I think. I haven't done a study. I guess I could know with all the time. Yeah, sure.

Not going to. people often ask why. The answer is really simple. I had the coolest job in the entire world. Like running Instagram, I still think, like, that period of time at Instagram was, I don't know, if you love what I love, which is social media, creating something that people use, creativity, creating an awesome brand, blah, blah, blah, right? That was the coolest job to have for those six years. I couldn't think of anything else in the entire world I'd rather be doing. And yeah, it's like it was an epic, epic ride.

I think everything has an expiration date. Like, you know, no one stays doing everything forever. And with life, I think goals change to, which is like you want to work on other things. I want to, you know, I'm not going to name the person, but I once talk to a very famous musician who's like in a very, very famous band. think like not modern band, but like 70s, okay? And they were just crushing it. And this person was on the top of their game. And all they wanted to do was talk about their new musical projects, not that thing in the past.

And I think even people at the pinnacle there. And I'm not saying we were like that band or anything. But like, I realize there's just a certain amount of like you're a person and there's new stuff out there and you want to do new things. and when priorities change at the company internally, it shows that even more clearly. How was Paul McCartney in person? I've never heard of Paul McCartney, unfortunately. Decent guess, though. I would just have trouble saying knowing that I've got all these resources now and being

like my wife wants to have more kids and I can go skiing every single day. Like going and doing something for a while would start, there's like a limited, very finite amount of patients I would have for like finding parking at the Facebook building and like waiting in Palo Alto traffic. I'd be like, okay. I once tried to get in my building and the security guard asked if I was here for an interview. I was like, no, I run it. Your own building. Yeah, it was a bit surreal. But we became good friends after. He was a very nice security guard. He was just doing his job, I guess. He was just doing his job. But I guess I looked professional. I get, maybe I was wearing a tie that day or something. I don't know. Used to wear ties. That was a weird

period of life. Yeah. But no, I actually think that's one of the more. dangerous things about having any amount of money at all is just like becoming like intolerant of some of the harder things of life like waiting. Yeah. I think it's dangerous. And I think you have to live as normal life as you possibly can no matter what your level of success. You have to have to like face that life isn't easy.

It's not handed to you. It doesn't mean you shouldn't like optimize the crap out of it. You should. Yeah. But it's like staying normal is half. the half the game. You're listening to the Jordan Harbinger Show. We'll be right back.

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Subscribing to the show is absolutely free. It just means that you get all of the latest episodes downloaded automatically to your podcast player so you don't miss a single thing. And now back to the show. How do you keep yourself in check then? Do you have a process where like, wait, am I really getting this bent out of shape about this? I think the second you ask yourself, like, am I in check?

You're like one of the good ones. Like no one who like has to ask themselves that, ask themselves that. Does that make sense? Yeah, totally does. It's like the Hollywood thing. Like, am I being a dick? No, because of the fact that you ask that means you're at least like one toe is still in the ground.

It's the guy who goes ballistic at the check in clerk. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, like, I think everyone has blind spots and maybe I don't see stuff. But I think like it's almost good not to be at the company anymore and running it anymore because it allows you to see one, like, who are your friends who are your friends? And then who are all the people that just liked the fact that you had a title or a position or they wanted something out of you. It's been great to realize how many people are actually there because they like you,

but also to stay grounded because you're like, yeah, like you can't get verified anymore by bugging. I was just going to say, and how many people have stopped bugging you for a blue checkmark? Unfortunately, not many. I still get messages every day. And I'm like, I just, I don't work there. I'm sorry. Like, I have as much power as you do now, buddy. Apply.

I mean, I know people, but, you know. You don't have to be careful. Yeah, you don't have to let that bit of knowledge go. Is there anything that? Like everyone's verified now. I noticed that. I look and I'm like, oh, what does this person do? Wait, they're the blogger.

It says influencer or something. Yeah, it's as influencer. And I'm like, oh, okay. I mean, I'm like one standard deviation to the left of that. But yeah, like, it's fine. It is what it is. The check mark has lost all meaning. Maybe.

Is there anything that you did look at when you finally got the payout where you're like, I'm finally going to buy this? I always wonder, like, when I talked to like rock stars, I'm like, What was the first thing you bought? And it's always laundry. Laundry. Yeah, because I was living in an apartment, didn't have a laundry machine. And we had to, like, lug everything, like three blocks.

And by the way, San Francisco, for those listening that don't live in San Francisco, very few people realize that summer here is winter. And it's just like, it's rainy. And I, you know, we'd have to, you know, and it's fun. Like, it was, it's character building. You know, you go off on the weekend and, you know, my girlfriend at the time, now wife, just lug all our stuff down. But the first thing was like, we're getting too long. laundry machines. Like, now that I have.

Because if one breaks down, that's like you want to be able to do darks and whites. At the same time. Exactly. Yeah. You had your time in half. But that, no, you think I'm joking. But that was like, we ended up looking for a place to live in the same area we were before. But like, I remember the real estate agent being like, and it has two washers and dryers.

And we just like our jaws were on the floor. Yeah. Give me that. Where do I sign? I guess I'm a simple person in some way. I don't know. I wish it was like I could say like, oh, a Gulfstream, but no, not even that. Yeah, it was like, did you price islands? And then they're like, dang, these things are really expensive. No, no. It was like, man, how great would it be to have two washers and dryers?

It sounds silly, but it's like amazing. Yeah. Well, I'm doing laundry on the West Wing, because I'm watching TV in here and I don't want to hear the buzzer. Yeah. That's, do you have FOMO now at all? Like, Instagram is sort of intimately associated with FOMO, right? I didn't even know what that word, that term was. before people started using it. And I'm wondering if it's affected you at all. Yeah, but not in the way you'd expect. Like, we just had a kid. So we have a, I guess, seven weeks at this point. I'd have to go and count it. It feels like it changes too quickly.

But basically that meant that over the holidays, everyone was like doing their amazing holiday trips and everyone's everywhere. And we were like inside with a screaming baby. It's raining. You know, we're going nowhere. So there is a little bit of FOMO. So I was like, okay, Nicole,

let's just delay the holidays. We still celebrated everything, but let's just like take our holiday vacation once we can. So we went last week and we went the Hawaii thing. And it was great. And by the way, more people should do this because like no one's there. Everything's cheaper.

Everything's cheaper. Everything's great. Like, no one's there. You have the whole place to yourself. I can't remember what the question was, but I told me interesting. It was, do you still get FOMO? Oh, do I still get FOMO? So, yeah, there was that a little bit.

But no, I feel like I've done, like, I've been to the Oscars. I've done the grant. It's all super fun and it's really interesting. But like you do it once and you're just like, okay, like start to really like hanging out with your family. And I now think about like what really interesting places on earth do I want to travel. And, you know, with little kids, you're just a little bit more restricted. So my list is growing.

Let's just put it that way. Are there places you feel like you can't go because you're too high profile? I know that sounds kind of ridiculous because you're like, what, I found it in an app, you know. But. No, I, it's actually, again, like, not running the thing. Like, we'd have these moments where, like, I don't know, I'd like be on the cover of some magazine. And there'd be like a month where I would walk into a place and people would like, I don't know, point or like, you could just tell when you walk in, they get quiet and they're like, talk to our front of the phone. It's the founder of Instagram.

But now that doesn't happen anymore, I feel so nice. And I'm so thankful that podcasts don't, you know, have visuals. Or I guess we have visuals. Except for all these cameras. All of, yeah. Nor the cameras are relating. No, I think one of the most amazing things is to be able to create something with a team, not alone, with a team that's really special in the world. But also to be able to have your personal freedom and, like, just go out to eat and not be bothered.

I know that's not the case for a lot of people. That's true. Yeah. It's hard for a lot of people to feel bad for those people because they go, oh, where, where, where, you're rich and famous. It must be so hard. But I would imagine it's a huge pain. We were talking before my videographer, Nathaniel and I, We're talking before this.

He's like, all right, I'm not a conspiracy theory guy, but if you're that rich, wouldn't you want to fake your own death just so you could live a normal life? And I'm like, I don't think it works that way, but it's not like... That was the briefing for this? That was the briefing for this. Like, do you think Kevin will eventually fake his own death until he can live a normal life? No, no. I don't know what a normal life is first.

Right. Meaning, I don't think anyone does. Everyone thinks, like, I think I live a pretty normal life. But the second thing is, I don't know you just got to be your own person. and love what you love. And I mean, do the things that bring you passion and be kind of like, don't apologize for it. On a serious note, though, you've built some serious generational wealth,

which is awesome. I wonder, has this added pressure to your life in some way? Because now you've got to, and I put got to an air quotes here, it's like you have to do something very grand, or it's like a waste, you know? And I don't know if this is, again, not my opinion, but there's a whole body of people like that Bill Gates is saying things Like, if you die wealthy, you've failed.

I don't know if it's, is it Bill Gates or Warren Buffett? Somebody said, if you die wealthy, you've failed. And it's like, give away all your money at the end of the day. Start some crazy charity and make some sort of world-changing thing happen. And you see it a lot. You see a lot of people doing this. Do you feel that added stress? The stress, I feel, well, first off, so I don't want to jinx myself.

I'm 36, so I still think I have some time. Tons of time. Yeah. Yeah. The people you're quoting are not 36. So I think they're thinking about other things. the thing I think mostly about is the big pressure is what do I want to do with the other 36 years or 60 years maybe.

That's way harder than like signing a paper that says when I die, all this goes to some foundation. Like that's easy. That's the easy way out. Yeah. Like that's easy. So I think having impact in the world while you're still living is the hardest thing to figure out, especially when you've had something like Instagram was chapter one, right? That's my question.

Yeah. It's like, I don't know. There's this hot dog stand. I've always been dreaming about and it's got like a really good recipe. I think that's way harder. And it's way harder to be a beginner again at stuff. Like I, when I left Instagram, I decided that I didn't want to work on tech, but I wanted to learn something and I wanted to work my brain hard. So I learned to fly. It was like a dream of mine. It was on a list. I looked at the list. And I was like, yeah, that's the thing because that's going to be hard. And what I learned

was, man, like everything's hard, whether it's super impactful or not. Like learning to fly was just as hard as learning to program. But like learning to program for me, like allowed me to create things for other people that then hopefully improve their lives in some way. And learning to fly was really fun because I don't know, it's a cool hobby, but like I can't create an Instagram out of learning to fly if that makes sense. It's not very scalable. There's some cool company who's working in the flying space right now, meaning like personal transports and stuff with like electric vertical takeoff and landing. It's super cool. That stuff is cool. But you actually don't need to be a pilot to like start that company. Anyway, backing up, I'll say figuring out what to do with your time to make a

meaningful impact on the world, that's super interesting and tough. But the one thing that I think people forget is we all live life day to day and it feels like every second is a minute, right? Like you got to figure out what to do for this podcast and you're going to figure out this other thing and then you you've got to get home and your kids got to go see. And it feels like a giant day. And that is a fraction of a fraction of your life. And that like maybe great ideas. take a year or maybe they take five years or maybe they take 10 years to germinate. You'd never really know. And you have to kind of be patient. And I think that's what I'm learning through this process is that like, you know, I want to spend my time doing really fun stuff that I love

that's hard. So it's going to have some not so fun stuff involved. But it's got to be an area I care deeply about. And hopefully it impacts more than like just me, right? It impacts a lot of people. But Instagram is a good one. And if that's the only one I ever have, then so be it. Yeah, you can always be like the troop leader for your... It's fine. Troop leaders are like, yeah. It's super important.

People don't really realize it. I'm definitely going to coach soccer at some point, for sure. There's some bad soccer dance. You've got to keep it together. Yeah, I'll read a book first. Yeah, I know that's your thing. I'm going to, after the show, I'll go over your book reading strategy. I didn't want to ask you about it because it's kind of out there already.

Okay, that's fair. I will go over it because you do have a... You're the only person I know who reads, books about how to read books. Yeah. Well, there's only one book that's about how to read books from what I know. But yes, it was meta. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Very much so. Was there a part of you that maybe left a little bit of your identity in Instagram? I know leaving a company, sometimes it's like, well, crap, who am I without being this person? Like the CEO, you're still the founder. Nobody can take that away from you. But if you're not doing that day to day to day, it's like, well,

oh, crap, I have like this little identity crisis. Like I get up in the morning and I'm not sure. Am I the same person. I had that when I started a new company. It was kind of for this weird, surreal experience that I didn't expect. Yeah. The answer is yes and no, but like, let me explain. I think, I may be wrong here, but I think 95% of it is being the co-founder of Instagram. That will remain true for the rest of my life. We had a great run. We created something really special. We grew it to a massive size. People were very, I think, happy with it where we left it. And like 5% of it was this like temporary, you happen to have this title, you happen to like be able to hire people. Like you're right.

Like that is far less important than thinking back on the memory of the time that we spent building it into what it is today. And, you know, at least that's how I, that's my mental framework for it. It is freeing to say now, okay, but now I can do anything. Like you could start a different company in social media or you could decide social media is never for me and I'm going to go work in, I don't know, philanthropy or politics or something. Like I'm just going to do something completely different. And that's really interesting. When you realize that you're one of a few people who gets to have a chapter two, right? Like a lot of people don't.

You feel really like super grateful for that. I would imagine it's hard for somebody as competitive as you to slow down. Do you find that? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, my wife pokes fun at me. I don't go at things in cruise control. It's definitely either full throttle or nothing at all. Yeah, I mean, we were just talking about reading a book to learn how to read books better. So you don't seem like they kind of guys like, I'm just going to wing this one. But I'm not like, see, there's a difference between being competitive and being challenge oriented. I don't think I'm super competitive, meaning like I don't wake up in the morning trying to crush other people. Like, that's not my. But I do wake up in the morning thinking like, okay, if my fastest,

mile time was X. How can I get it down 30 seconds? We're all the crazy ways to get there. And that's really fun for me. That's healthier, though, because that's you versus yourself, whereas I think your previous example was kind of you versus the world, which might be a little bit unhealthy. Yeah, but it can be challenging at times because sometimes you wake up and like, you know, I was like really hard on myself about the flying thing because I was like, I got to be good at this. I got my license in like three months. And that's like a really short amount of time. Yeah, it's all scary. Well, no, it's like I had more hours than you usually have. In fact, like, it's fine. But I was like frustrated it took so long. And someone was like, dude, like,

most people take like a year to, like, chill out. Like, and sometimes you forget that in the process. You forget to get like maybe cut yourself a little slack out of it, you know. Yeah. But I think it's important to sometimes we would be really, I'll give you an example as it relates to Instagram. We were really hard on ourselves about things going wrong at the company or, you know, just like how we were running it or mistakes we had made. But then we'd like go meet with other companies who will remain nameless. And they'd ask for advice and we'll be like, well, this, this and this. And you'd realize really quickly actually like as broken as some things were at the company, you were still operating like maybe a good head and shoulders above some other people. Not everyone.

There's some really great companies out there. But I think that when your yardstick is your own, you can forget that the yardstick's really big. That's true, right? You're kind of losing sight of, hey, we're in the 99th percent. I'm waiting for that to become a T-shirt. Was that? When your yardstick is around, that doesn't make any sense. Sorry.

It's good bumper sticker. Yeah, it's okay. Or the worst bumper sticker. You're listening to the Jordan Harbinger show. We'll be right back after this. Thank you for listening and supporting the show. Your support of our advertisers keeps us on the air. To learn more and get links to all the great discounts you just heard so you can check out those amazing sponsors, visit jordanharbinger.com slash deals.

And don't forget the worksheet for today's episode. That link is in the show notes at Jordan Harbinger.com slash podcast. If you're listening to us on the Overcast Player, please click that little star next to the episode. We really appreciate it. And now back to the show. You have kids now, as we talked about before, how do you feel about their use of social media? I mean, look, I think your kids seven weeks old. I love this question because I'm like, it's.

easy. They're really young and they don't use social media. And by the time they're old enough to use social media, it's going to be a completely different thing. Totally. Why don't I answer, this is artfully doing the thing, right? I expected you to do this. Thank you. Let's talk about their use of technology. It starts simple, right? Like, my daughter loves to color. She loves to color, but the markers get everywhere and it's all over a rug, right? So I figured out that there are these digital tablets where literally you could just color all you want and then press a button and it clears the page. And she loves it. I'm like, isn't this such a better solution than markers all over the rug? And then I'm just thinking, you know, my experience

with technology as a kid was that it was a good thing. It was a fun way to explore what you could build. And I think treating technology is this like soul-sucking, windowless world. Like, that's really sad. That's a really pessimistic view of technology. I think it's all in what are the experiences is we give our kids when they're using technology. So are we letting them watch, you know, vapid cartoons, or are we allowing them to, you know, my daughter loves hippos? I don't know why. She's obsessed with them.

I mean, kids love hippos. Right? But, like, she's, like, especially excited about hippos. We were watching videos of hippos at different zoos, and we spent a bunch of time and she was asking questions. And, like, that's such an important experience. And my point is technology can enable important experiences like that. I guess if watching hippos is important.

I think that, yeah, I totally understand that. And it's not a black or white issue. I think it's like it's in your control how these things get used. If you, what do you think about like TikTok and the fact that that's owned by the Chinese Communist Party and all this stuff? Like, would you let your kids use something like that if they were old enough? That's kind of a sticky wicket. Yeah, I'm not, that's a really good question. I honestly, I don't know enough to answer that question.

think like it's not really relevant because I'm not sure, listen, I'm sure TikTok's great and I'm sure all these apps, Instagram, Facebook, et cetera, I will be happy if Instagram is still around and kicking when my daughter is of the age to use it. Like, that would be a good thing. And I think unprecedented in terms of social media. Yeah, I think you're probably right. Oh, also off the record, it looks like you stopped using Instagram and then I was like Googled it. And it's like, oh, you deleted all his posts. Like, what is that a thing you can talk about or is it just like you just stopped using it? Okay, so a couple things. One, the six. still on the record. We're rolling.

Okay. Yeah, we're rolling. I just would cut it out if one. Okay. Did you delete your Instagram? No, no, no, no. Two is I use Instagram more than any app. I browse Instagram a lot. That doesn't mean I post. I went back to my profile, and I just decided I wanted my profile to represent me and my family and what I did in life. So I just got rid of a bunch of like the more, hey, I'm the CEO and I'm doing a PSA on this thing posts because I'm I just, I felt like it wasn't representative of what I was doing now. But it wasn't like, yeah, I don't know.

People like to like watch things and read into things. Yeah. I'm not posting on Instagram right now, mostly just because like I think when you're not in it, you just want to take a step back and be able to do whatever you want, not feel like you got to post about it with a hashtag that's clever. And like, I love that people love using Instagram and posting to it. It's great. But I'm just in more of maybe a private period where that's not as much for me.

but I'm happy to share it. Okay, that's good. Then we'll leave it in because people were wondering, I thought maybe you deleted the one with your plane because it's like, well, if they have that number, they can like see where I'm at and that's kind of weird. It's kind of like because they can track your plane. Well, two things.

One, that's not my plane. That was a rental. Yeah. And two, you can block those numbers. Oh, I didn't know that. Yeah. Yeah, that's cool. It's all good.

What do you think are the responsibilities of a platform in terms of free speech and moderating comments and content? Because you guys were great at, like knocking out bullying. Yeah. How many people have used Instagram and they're like, I had an awful experience there, maybe younger people. But as adults, you can go on Twitter now, guaranteed one out of a 100 experiences. You're going to have some craziness. Instagram, I can't even remember the last time somebody did something where I wasn't just like,

eh, crazy person, lock, and done. Yeah. I mean, it's a delicate question because, one, I'm no longer in a seat in which I'm able to, like, able to affect it. I can still have opinions and I can probably, you know, sway things here or there. But let me put it this way. It's delicate. And I think the reason it's delicate is because you have to decide who is to blame. Is it the maker, the hoster or the doer? And I think at the end of the day, the doer, it's like, absolutely. Are you also going to hold Apple accountable for what people do on their computers, right? Like, okay, like some people might say, absolutely. And some people might say, that sounds crazy. But there's like a line, right? What about the chip? set manufacturers. Like, are they liable? Like, is it just the services? Is it certain teams at the services? Is it the executive? And I think that people should be responsible for their own behavior first and foremost. I think there should be laws governing that. I think we should probably

be more strict about it, right? That gets complicated because these services are multinational. So you're running, you know, your rules in Brazil are different than your rules in the U.S. are different than your rules in Europe. And you have to figure out all these rule sets. And so my point is it's complicated to run. But holding services accountable for the content is where it gets tricky because that content was created by people, not the service. And those services are now running at a scale where it's not like you can go through every Instagram post before it gets posted and say, and by the way, they do in certain services like, you know, there are certain services in China where when people post and it has to go through a vetting process and it gets reviewed by human reviewers. But like, so far as a society, at least in the United States, we have made the decision that that is not the balance we want. So my more political answer would just be, I think we have to decide as a society where we want that line between freedom of expression and that fluidity of posting and like the beautiful things that happen because of these services.

Do we want that to exist in its current form? or do we believe the costs associated with people saying or doing whatever they want online are too great, so we should put more onus on the companies that host them? It's really difficult at scale. I mean, if you have, I don't know, 2.5, whatever, a billion people posting every single day. Yeah. I'm not making excuses. No, I don't take it that way at all. I don't know how to have to be.

But for everyone listening, like, it's not about making excuses. It's just I think we as society have to decide where do you want that line because there is a tradeoff. And we can decide we want everything to be reviewed and we want everything. and we want everything seen before it goes out. And that'll, I think just like on the scale of like free creativity, meaning free expression and creativity towards total censorship, I think generally the United States has fallen more on free expression and creativity and freedom of speech.

But of course, this gets very complicated in certain instances. And I'm not in the seat to make that decision right now. Of course. You're probably glad that you're not in the seat to make that decision. I don't know if I could handle that kind of responsibility. I don't know. I think it's super important. important for the world. And I think anyone who makes those types of decisions has to take it super

seriously, and I hope they make the right ones. What do you think about the candidates that are like, we got to break up big tech? I assume, I mean, well, this is tough because you're a shareholder of a big tech company. But aside from that, let me go first. It still seems like a weird, bad idea that doesn't have to happen. But I'm curious what you think. I believe that people don't quite understand the problem that they're trying to solve. I think that in general, tech has been villainized for being big. And I think that's problematic because I think one of the things about the society here in the U.S. is that we can create companies that scale to billions of people and that that's rewarded and that that's, isn't that exciting that that's happening here, not overseas,

not anywhere else like here. And it's people that go to college and, you know, a year later, massive value in the world, it changes all of our lives. It's not like people hate these services. I mean, they use them every day, right? Yeah. So being big doesn't feel like a crime itself. And that's, that's what strikes me as hard to just say, break them all up. That doesn't feel right. Because it's like, okay, if you could point at what you're solving by doing that, is it, you know, creating more competition and advertising? Is it creating more freedom for consumers to choose? What is it that you're trying to do, I think I'd be more excited to entertain those ideas. But when it feels like just an indictment of all tech, that just shows me that the critical thinking hasn't happened. And then

it worries me more that we're playing with political agenda than we are solving real problems, which is what I think we want our representatives to do. Sure. But, you know, like everything, people say, you know, build the wall and then it's not clear the wall gets built. So we'll see how much of this becomes a reality. And at the end of the day, all I hope is that it reflects the wants and the desires and the will of the people that elect these folks. If that's true, then we're in a good space. That's a really good answer. Did you wing that or have you answered this before? I don't do many questions about this. That was a great answer. I don't think I really, I'm impressed by that answer. That really happens. So you want to- It is true, though. It is true.

Yeah. I agree with it. People forget that you like elect people to carry out the will of the people. And if everyone in the United States is like, we want to break up tech because it's the right thing, then maybe it's the right thing to do. But I don't think that's what most people think. No, I think to me it seems like it's a good sort of way to say, hey, look, we're going to punch that big tall guy in the face. That's what people want to do. Yeah, you screw big tech. They're not like, hey, if we break these up, then they won't sell our data in these harmful ways. No, we're just going to have 30 smaller companies that sell our data in whatever way they want.

It'll be harder to regulate if anything else. Well, I'll tell you maybe a closing thought on this is that I think, you know, wealth disparity has a fair amount to do with this. And if, you know, there are people who have done studies on populism throughout time and I've read these things. And it's pretty striking the themes that come about that when wealth disparity increases and populism increases, you tend to get these radical views of making big changes. And sometimes that leads to productive outcomes. I just really hope in the current situation that we can find a way to keep the amazing value that's been created by some of these companies. Think about all the value Amazon brings to people's lives or Google or like, I want to make

sure that America remains the center of that type of innovation and that's rewarded and that we have all the right checks and balances to make sure that with great power comes great responsibility. But, you know, to squander that would just be like a sad day in history for the United States, I think so. I know you don't know what you're going to do next. But are we thinking more along the lines of new technology, new app, or are we thinking more along the lines of like full Tony Stark? And with that, I will decline to answer. It was so much. This is fun. Yeah, thanks. Thanks to Kevin for coming out. And thanks to Kevin Rapp, Nathaniel Gerdes, and Kevin Rose for helping make this one happen. During the show, we mentioned a book called The Goal by Gold Rat. We'll link to that in the show notes. Essentially the thesis of that is that any system, is most constrained by the slowest process.

The line, the assembly line can only move as fast as the slowest process. The slowest person in organization limits the progress of the whole. And this applies to decision-making as well. If everything routes through you as the CEO or as the founder of a startup or the boss in your company or your unit, this is the equivalent of inventory stacking up in front of a machine on an assembly line. Do not be the limiting factor in your business. You can find out more by getting the goal by Goldrack.

When you buy books, by the way, through our show notes, you do support the show. We get, you know, a little bit of change. It's not much, but it's, you know, every little bit counts. And sometimes we donate the whole stinking lot to charity. So if you do decide to buy the books you hear on the show, please do so through the show notes, which are at Jordan Harbinger.com. Another thing I promised you that I'm going to put in detail in the worksheets, Kevin's reading how to read or learning how to read, we'll throw that process in the

worksheets for today's episode. So make sure you go grab those as well. There was so much that I didn't get a chance to ask Kevin, maybe another time. Of course, I think it's a lot of luck, not just that he succeeded based on luck, but luck that his co-founder and him saw eye to eye. They didn't have a ton of fights and have meltdowns. Not just the market, not just the phone progress, the camera progress on the phones, not just that they had stumbled upon lightning in a bottle, but actually that they didn't implode

based on their own self-sabotage. Co-founders and having co-founders, it's like a business marriage. Most people don't realize they're in a business marriage until there are a few months or a few years into the relationship. I also got some hiring and management advice from Kevin. You want to hire people that are much better than you, regardless of their background or experience. I thought that was fascinating. You have to ask yourself, could you see yourself working for them in the future? Not just, well, I can get them to work for me.

Could you work for them? That's going to be important because they're going to be managing other people in the organization most likely. and you're going to have to work with them. You want the feedback and the direction to go both ways. Other advice to entrepreneurs is to solve a problem. Ideas are not companies. They are not products. You need to solve a problem. Does your product, does your service, does your idea, do people feel relieved that what you have created now exists? That's the question that you need to answer. Other advice that he gave regarding simplicity, the best products are usually built on personal experiences from your past. That's a quote from him here.

This experience he had in Florence, Italy, directly impacted how he went on to design Instagram. That experience we talked about with his professor giving him a cheap camera and telling him keep it simple. Just the basics. And filters, those are his wife's idea. She said, well, I like the idea of a photo app, but I'm not good at taking photos. Your friend, so-and-so, his photos are great. And Kevin said, well, he uses filters, so that's why his photos look so good. And she said, well, then you should put filters in the app.

Dada, Instagram. Unbelievable. This did for the app at scale what, of course, filters were doing for individuals who were spending hours doing it. And that was what Kevin was talking about when he said we took what you can do in Photoshop through hours. You can now do in half a second or a few milliseconds. Just absolutely a brilliant, simple play. And one main lesson that we didn't harp on too much, but I thought was worth repeating, actually do the thing.

Start it. Do something. Nothing can substitute for real experience. If you want to be a founder, especially a tech founder, you have to start a startup. You can't learn about investing without investing. Real experience is better than books. However, of course, Kevin does love books, and again, we'll have his system for reading in the worksheets.

We'll outline that very specifically. Last but not least, I thought a little funny little story to end with, which we ran out of time. He's met the pope, right? He showed the pope Instagram and got the pope on Instagram, and it just kind of reinforces my idea and my question of what the heck? do you do when you retire at 30, whatever, 33 or 34 at that time, and you've got one point something billion dollars, you've already met the Pope, what the heck do you do? A lot of pressure

there. Kevin, thank you for your time today. This was absolutely amazing. Remember, y'all, there's a video of this interview on our YouTube channel at jordanharbinger.com slash YouTube. And also in the show notes, there are worksheets for every episode, including this one, so you can review what you learned here today from Kevin Sistram. We also now have transcripts for each episode, and those can be found in the show notes as well. I'm teaching you how to connect with great people and manage relationships using systems and tiny habits over in our six-minute networking course. That's completely free over at Jordan Harbinger.com slash course. Now, I know you want to do it later. I know you want to kick that can down the road, but you cannot make up for lost time

when it comes to relationships and networking. The number one mistake I see people make is postponing this and not digging the well before they get thirsty. Once you need relationships, you might be too late to make them. Procrastination leads to stagnation. You know it's true because it rhymes. So make sure you get on this. These drills take just a few minutes per day. If I'd known this 20 years ago, well, I'd be broadcasting right now from my freaking yacht. It's not fluff. It's crucial, and you can find it for free at Jordan Harbinger.com slash course. By the way, most of the guests on the show, they actually subscribe to the course and the newsletter. So come join us. You'll be in smart company. Speaking of building relationships, you can always reach out and or follow me on social. I'm

at Jordan Harbinger on both Twitter and, of course, Instagram. This show is created in association with Podcast One. This episode was produced by Jen Harbinger and Jason DeFilippo, engineered by Jay Sanderson. Show notes and worksheets by Robert Fogarty, music by Evan Viola. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. Our advice and opinions and those of our guests are their own. And yeah, I'm a lawyer, but I'm not your lawyer. I'm sure as heck not a doctor or a therapist, not that you should need one after this

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