Olivia: The most successful people in a chaotic world aren't the fastest, the most innovative, or the boldest risk-takers. They're the most disciplined, the most paranoid, and sometimes, the best copycats. Jackson: Whoa, hold on. That's a tough pill to swallow for our 'move fast and break things' culture. The best copycats? That feels like heresy in the business world. That definitely goes against everything you hear in Silicon Valley. Where is this idea coming from? Olivia: It comes from a massive nine-year research project by Jim Collins and Morten T. Hansen in their book, Great by Choice: Uncertainty, Chaos, and Luck--Why Some Thrive Despite Them All. And what's fascinating is they started this research right after 9/11, in a period of huge global turmoil. They were specifically trying to answer why some leaders and companies thrive in utter chaos while others, who look just as good on paper, completely fall apart. Jackson: Okay, that context makes a huge difference. They weren't studying success in a calm, predictable market. They were studying it in a storm. So what's the secret sauce? What's the first thing these chaos-thrivers do differently? Olivia: To understand their mindset, which the authors call the '10Xer' mindset because these leaders outperform their industries by at least ten times, we have to go back to 1911. To the most brutal, unforgiving race on Earth: the quest for the South Pole.

Jackson: The South Pole? I love a good historical drama. What does polar exploration have to do with running a business? Olivia: Everything, it turns out. You have two teams. One led by the Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen, the other by the British naval officer Robert Falcon Scott. Both have the same goal: be the first human to reach the South Pole. It's a 1400-mile round trip in temperatures that can hit 20 below, with gale-force winds. No communication, no chance of rescue. Jackson: The stakes couldn't be higher. So how did they approach it? Olivia: This is where the difference is staggering. Amundsen was a fanatic about preparation. He studied the methods of the Eskimos, the people who actually knew how to survive in those conditions. He chose dogs to pull his sleds because they were proven. He meticulously planned his supply depots, placing 20 black flags for miles on either side of each one so they'd be impossible to miss in a blizzard. He even tested his team's diet by experimenting with eating dolphin meat to see how their bodies would react. Jackson: That is an insane level of detail. What about Scott? Olivia: Scott was more of a romantic hero figure. He was brave, but he gambled. He chose ponies, which weren't suited for the Antarctic, and new, untested motor sledges. The sledges broke down almost immediately. The ponies froze and had to be shot. His supply depots were marked with a single flag. He was essentially betting on good weather and good luck. Jackson: I have a bad feeling about this. This sounds like a disaster movie in the making. Olivia: It was. Amundsen's team followed a strict regimen. They committed to marching between 15 and 20 miles every single day. On good days, when the sun was out and the path was clear, they'd stop after 20 miles, rest, and conserve energy. On bad days, in the middle of a raging blizzard, they'd push themselves to the absolute limit to hit their 15-mile minimum. They were consistent. Jackson: And Scott? Olivia: Scott's team did the opposite. On good days, they'd push themselves to exhaustion, going as far as they could. On bad days, they'd hunker down in their tents and complain about their terrible luck. Scott's own journal is filled with entries like, "Our luck in weather is preposterous." Jackson: Oh, man. He was blaming the world instead of his plan. So what happened? Olivia: Amundsen reached the South Pole and returned safely, a triumphant hero. Scott’s team reached the pole a month later, only to find the Norwegian flag already there. They were demoralized, exhausted, and running out of supplies. On the return journey, they all perished. They were found frozen in their tent, just 11 miles from their main supply depot, which they couldn't find in a storm. Jackson: Wow. That's just brutal. It’s a powerful lesson, but so tragic. So Scott wasn't just unlucky, he was... unprepared. He gambled and lost everything. But how does this translate to business? That's a great story, but how does marching 20 miles a day apply to a company? Olivia: Collins and Hansen call this principle the "20 Mile March." It's a tangible performance benchmark that you commit to hitting with relentless consistency, year after year. It has two parts. First, a lower bound: you have to hit your march even in tough times. But second, and this is the crucial part, an upper bound: you have to hold yourself back from going too far in good times. Jackson: But isn't that leaving money on the table? If you can grow 100% in a year, why wouldn't you? That feels so counterintuitive. Olivia: Because that's how you create a bubble that bursts. Look at the medical technology company Stryker. Their CEO, John Brown, set a 20 Mile March: they would achieve 20% net income growth every single year. It was, in his words, "the law." From 1977 to 1998, they hit that mark almost every year. In a recession year when their industry was down, they pushed like crazy to hit their 20%. But in a boom year, when they could have grown 40%, they held back. They deliberately reined in growth to ensure they didn't overextend. Jackson: And their comparison company? Olivia: A company called USSC. They were in the same industry, with similar opportunities. But they were erratic. Some years they grew over 300%. Other years, their income plummeted by 200%. They chased every opportunity, pushed inventory on hospitals so aggressively that they once collapsed a storeroom ceiling. When healthcare reform hit, they were overextended and unprepared. They were eventually acquired and disappeared. Stryker, the consistent 20 Mile Marcher, became a giant in the industry. Jackson: So the discipline to hold back is just as important as the discipline to push forward. That’s a powerful idea. It’s about building resilience, not just chasing short-term wins. Olivia: Exactly. It builds confidence that you can perform under pressure, and it prevents the kind of catastrophic failure that comes from hubris in good times.

Olivia: And that discipline of holding back connects directly to their second major behavior, which completely debunks the myth of innovation that we all worship. Jackson: You mean the "innovate or die" mantra? I thought that was gospel. Olivia: We all do. But the research found that the 10X companies were not, on average, more innovative than their less successful comparisons. They weren't necessarily first to market, and they didn't have more patents. Jackson: Wait, that can't be right. So what did they have? Olivia: They had what the authors call "Empirical Creativity." They combined their discipline with a very specific kind of innovation strategy: Fire Bullets, Then Cannonballs. Jackson: Okay, that's a great metaphor. What does it mean? Olivia: A bullet is a low-cost, low-risk, low-distraction experiment. It's a small test to see what works. You fire a lot of them. You see what hits. A cannonball is a huge, high-risk bet. It's when you concentrate all your resources and fire a big, uncalibrated shot, hoping it works. The 10Xers fire bullets first to get empirical proof—real-world evidence—that something works. Only then, once a bullet has hit its mark, do they fire a cannonball, concentrating their resources behind the now-proven idea. Jackson: So it's about reducing risk. Firing bullets is like A/B testing a website headline before you spend a million dollars on an ad campaign. Olivia: Precisely. And the comparison companies? They tended to fire uncalibrated cannonballs all the time. Let's look at Southwest Airlines. Everyone thinks of them as this brilliant innovator. Jackson: Right, the low-cost, fun-loving airline. They changed the game. Olivia: They didn't, actually. They were brilliant copycats. The innovator was an airline called Pacific Southwest Airlines, or PSA. In the 60s, PSA pioneered the low-fare, no-frills, high-spirit model. They even painted smiley faces on their planes. Southwest's founders literally flew to PSA, took detailed notes, and copied their entire operating manual. Their president at the time, Lamar Muse, even said, "We don’t mind being copycats of an operation like that." Jackson: So you can just copy someone else's idea and win? That feels... wrong. Olivia: It's not just about copying. It's about the principle of empirical validation. Southwest saw a model that was proven to work. That was their bullet. They took that proven concept and then applied their 20 Mile March discipline to it, expanding slowly and methodically, always remaining profitable. Jackson: And what happened to the innovator, PSA? Olivia: PSA started firing uncalibrated cannonballs. They launched a huge, untested venture called "Fly-Drive-Sleep," buying hotels and a rental car company. It was a disaster. Then they bought a fleet of massive new jumbo jets right before the 1970s oil embargo doubled fuel prices. They were betting big on ideas that had no empirical validation. They never recovered and were eventually bought by US Air. The copycat thrived, the innovator died. Jackson: That is a stunning reversal. So the lesson isn't "don't innovate." It's "don't gamble." Validate your creative ideas with small, real-world tests before you bet the farm. Olivia: Exactly. The research found that calibrated cannonballs—the ones fired after a successful bullet—had a success rate of nearly 90%. Uncalibrated cannonballs? Less than 25%. It's a huge difference.

Jackson: So if they're so disciplined and careful, are these 10X leaders just... boring? Are they just spreadsheet-obsessed accountants? Olivia: (Laughs) Far from it. They're actually hyper-vigilant, a trait the authors call "Productive Paranoia." They are constantly asking, "What if?" What if a key supplier goes bankrupt? What if a new technology disrupts our industry? What if a global pandemic hits? Jackson: Okay, that I get. It's that little voice in your head that says 'what if everything goes wrong?' Most of us try to ignore that voice. Olivia: 10Xers listen to it. But they channel that fear into productive action, not panic. The perfect example is Bill Gates in the early 90s. Microsoft is on top of the world, Windows is about to become a global standard. And what does Gates do? He writes a memo to his top executives titled "The Nightmare Memo," listing all the threats that could destroy them. Jackson: At the peak of his success, he's focused on his nightmares. That's wild. Olivia: It's more than that. He maintained a policy of always having enough cash in the bank to run the company for a full year with zero revenue. He was building buffers, shock absorbers. He was preparing for a storm even on the sunniest day. That's productive paranoia. It’s not just worrying; it’s preparing. Jackson: And he channeled it into preparation, not panic. That makes sense. It's the difference between anxiety and vigilance. Olivia: Exactly. And that preparation is what allows them to get a high "Return on Luck." This is the final piece of the puzzle and maybe the most profound. Jackson: Return on Luck. R-O-L. I like it. Olivia: The authors argue that the 10X companies weren't luckier than the comparison companies. They analyzed thousands of events and found that both groups had a similar number of both good and bad luck events. The critical question isn't "Are you lucky?" It's "Do you get a high return on the luck you get?" Jackson: What does that mean in practice? Olivia: It means when a good luck event happens, you're prepared to pounce on it and exploit it to the max. But more importantly, it means you're so well-prepared that you can withstand a bad luck event and even turn it into an advantage. There's an asymmetry to luck: a single stroke of extremely bad luck can kill you, but a single stroke of good luck, by itself, will never make you a great company. Jackson: So survival is the key. You have to stay in the game long enough for good luck to find you. Olivia: Precisely. And the best example of getting a negative return on luck is the story of AMD in the 1990s. They were Intel's main competitor, and they got a firehose of good luck. A court ruling allowed them to clone Intel's chips. Then Intel's flagship Pentium chip had a famous math bug, and IBM halted shipments, creating a huge opening for AMD. The market shifted to cheaper PCs, which favored AMD's chips. It was one lucky break after another. Jackson: They must have crushed it. Olivia: They squandered it. Their own chip, the K5, was delayed. When they finally had a hit with the K6 chip, their manufacturing couldn't keep up with demand. They had all the luck in the world, but they couldn't execute. They got a terrible return on their good luck. As their CEO at the time, Jerry Sanders, wrote, "AMD developed a rip in its mainsail, and we didn’t catch the wind." Jackson: This is where some critics push back, right? They say Collins over-emphasizes choice and downplays the sheer randomness of luck. Is it really all about what you do with the luck? Olivia: It's a valid critique, and the book acknowledges that some luck events are so catastrophic they're almost impossible to survive. But the core message is about agency. The 10Xers don't blame bad luck for their failures; they take responsibility. And they don't credit good luck for their success; they credit their preparation. They believe that what they do matters more than what the world does to them.

Olivia: So when you put it all together, you get this incredible paradox. To thrive in chaos, you need the fanatic discipline of a 20 Mile Marcher, the empirical creativity to fire bullets before cannonballs, and the productive paranoia to prepare for storms even on sunny days. Greatness isn't about being a visionary genius who can predict the future. It's about being a prepared, disciplined empiricist who can build a great future, no matter what comes. Jackson: It really makes you question our modern obsession with speed and disruption for its own sake. The real question isn't 'how fast can we go?' but 'how consistently can we perform?' It makes me wonder... what's my personal 20 Mile March? What's the one metric in my own work or life that I could commit to hitting, day in and day out, good weather or bad? Olivia: That's a great question for everyone listening. What does a 20 Mile March look like in your life or your work? Is it writing 500 words a day? Is it making five sales calls? Is it spending 30 uninterrupted minutes with your family? We'd love to hear your thoughts. Find us and share your ideas. Jackson: It's a simple but profound challenge. And it feels much more achievable than trying to be the next big innovator or risk-taker. It's about choice and discipline. Olivia: This is Aibrary, signing off.