Founders Speed, Raising Aspirations, Doing The Thing and AI in 2027

No wasted movement. No wasted effort.

Good morning

In today's edition, among other things:

• Founders Speed

• Raise Aspirations

• Doing the Thing

• How the LinkedIn Algorithm Works

• AI 2027

• Baseline Expectations

• Career Development: What It Really Means to Be a Manager, Director, or VP

• A PM's Complete Guide to User Research

• This Is Why You're Not Shipping

Onwards!

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Founders Speed

Do not underestimate the importance of speed as a founder (and as an investor looking at a founder). Here’s Nikunj Kothari:

Most founders move fast. The great ones break time itself.

The signs are unmistakable. Context switching that drains teams energizes them. They demand the fifteenth design iteration mid-launch, then wake up redesigning the entire system. While you celebrate shipping features, they're already three demands ahead. Normal speed feels like standing still.

This isn't about working harder. Hustle creates burnout. These founders see paths others miss. They test with users while teams polish specs. They skip steps by questioning what "necessary" really means. A six-month plan dissolves in a single meeting.

The best ones reshape physics. Where others seek consensus, they ship and course-correct in hours. While teams perfect one approach, they're running five competing versions. When you plan the quarter, they're already proving you wrong. Like bringing an F1 car to a go-kart race—they're playing a different game entirely.

What you see as impossible execution they see as unbearable delay. Every milestone reached spawns three harder targets. Each win immediately doubles the stakes. You're mapping the route while they're building new roads.

Some learn to modulate this tempo—pressing for impossible speed without breaking their teams. But that drive never slows, that constant urge to bend reality faster than it should move. The rage at normal pace never fades.

The rest think they're racing competitors. The best know they're racing time itself.

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Raise Aspirations

One of the reasons why speed is essential is that it raises the aspirations of others. Here’s Jay Yang:

Economics professor Tyler Cowen on raising the aspirations of others:

Yesterday I had lunch with a former Ph.D student of mine, who is now highly successful and tenured at a very good school. I was reminded that, over twenty years ago, I was Graduate Director of Admissions. One of my favorite strategies was to take strong candidates who applied for Masters and also offer them Ph.D admissions, suggesting they might do the latter. My lunch partner was a beneficiary of this de facto policy.

At least two of our very best students went down this route... neither realized that it was common simply to apply straight to a Ph.D program, skipping over the Masters. I believe this is now better known, but the point is this.

At critical moments in time, you can raise the aspirations of other people significantly, especially when they are relatively young, simply by suggesting they do something better or more ambitious than what they might have in mind. It costs you relatively little to do this, but the benefit to them, and to the broader world, may be enormous. This is in fact one of the most valuable things you can do with your time and with your life."

Did you raise anyone's aspirations lately?

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Doing the Thing

From The Strangest Loop:

Things that aren't doing the thing:

• Preparing to do the thing isn't doing the thing.

• Scheduling time to do the thing isn't doing the thing.

• Making a to-do list for the thing isn't doing the thing.

• Telling people you're going to do the thing isn't doing the thing.

• Messaging friends who may or may not be doing the thing isn't doing the thing.

• Writing a banger tweet about how you're going to do the thing isn't doing the thing.

• Hating on yourself for not doing the thing isn't doing the thing.

• Hating on other people who have done the thing isn't doing the thing.

• Hating on the obstacles in the way of doing the thing isn't doing the thing.

• Fantasizing about all of the adoration you'll receive once you do the thing isn't doing the thing.

• Reading about how to do the thing isn't doing the thing.

• Reading about how other people did the thing isn't doing the thing.

• Reading this essay isn't doing the thing.

The only thing that is doing the thing is doing the thing.

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AI 2027

We predict that the impact of superhuman AI over the next decade will be enormous, exceeding that of the Industrial Revolution.

We wrote a scenario that represents our best guess about what that might look like. It’s informed by trend extrapolations, wargames, expert feedback, experience at OpenAI, and previous forecasting successes.

We encourage you to debate and counter this scenario. We hope to spark a broad conversation about where we're headed and how to steer toward positive futures. To incentivize this, we're announcing the bets and bounties program.

The scenario: LINK

PDF version: https://ai-2027.com/scenario.pdf

YouTube:

The whole work is a detailed scenario for the development of Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) and superintelligence between mid-2025 and late 2028. It argues that the impact of superhuman AI could arrive by the end of the decade, potentially exceeding that of the Industrial Revolution, yet society is largely unprepared. The scenario was developed through research, expert interviews, and trend extrapolation, aiming to spark conversation about plausible futures and necessary preparations.

It’s all very granular and worth looking at in details: