I've probably failed more often than anybody else in Silicon Valley. Those don't matter. I don't remember the failures. You remember the big successes.
Interpretation
Failures are often overshadowed by achievements, which define our journey.
In this quote, Vinod Khosla reflects on the nature of success and failure in his career in Silicon Valley. He acknowledges that while he may have experienced numerous failures, they are insignificant compared to the successes he remembers. This highlights the importance of resilience and focusing on positive outcomes rather than dwelling on setbacks.
In practice
During a motivational speech at a startup event.
Seeking an acquisition from the start is more than just bad advice for an entrepreneur. For the entrepreneur it leads to short term tactical decisions rather than company-building decisions and in my view often reduces the probability of success.
Is it 10 years, 20, 50 before we reach that tipping point where climate change becomes irreversible? Nobody can know. There's clearly a probability distribution. We need to ensure this planet, and we need to do it quickly.
Entrepreneurs have the flexibility and the ability to do things that large companies simply cannot. Could a large company pull off a trick like Amyris, going from anti-malaria medicine to next-generation fuel?
The only way you multiply resources is with technology. To really affect poverty, energy, health, education, or anything else - there is no other way.
You need a degree of foolishness to cause disruptive change in healthcare. Dare to dream.
Did Google know much about media? Or Amazon about commerce? Tesla about cars? SpaceX about rockets? EBay about classifieds? What did I know about computing when I started Sun Microsystems? We should celebrate these entrepreneurs, not pillory them for fighting entrenched incumbent industries that have political influence and money.
Yeah, I wasn't chosen to be first. I was just chosen to command that flight. Circumstance put me in that particular role. That wasn't planned by anyone.
I do think that the success, although still not complete... in the recognition of equal rights... to all Americans, regardless of color, creed and so forth, was also one of the best stories we've had to report.
Talent is insignificant. I know a lot of talented ruins. Beyond talent lie all the usual words: discipline, love, luck, but, most of all, endurance.
Focus is scary—until you realize that it only means turning your back on markets you could never have anyway. Sharp focus on jobs that customers are trying to get done holds the promise of greatly improving the odds of success in new-product development.
Once the festival achieved a certain level of notoriety, then people began to come here with agendas that were not the same as ours. We can't do anything about that. We can't control that.
You have to work hard AND well. There are a lot of people who work hard but not well.
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