Sam Altman on how to not give up, Naval Ravikant on being all in, and the best founder personality traits according to Zero to One

Jan 13, 2025
by
Z Fellows

1: Sam Altman’s advice on how to not give up

“I think most people give up on things way too early. So the mistake that most people make is they try something, it does not immediately work. You see this particularly in young entrepreneurs. It does not immediately work.

Most of the founders that I have spent a lot of time with that have gone on to be super successful spent a very long time on their idea when a lot of other people would have given up and either people said it sucks, or people said nothing at all.

A framework that I have for when to give up and when to keep working is it should be an internal not an external decision. If people aren't using it or if people are saying it's bad, that alone is not a reason to give up.

Source: Sam Altman : How to Build the Future

2: Naval Ravikant on being all in

"If you're not 100 percent into it, somebody else who is 100 percent into it will outperform you. And they won't just outperform you by a little bit—they'll outperform you by a lot because now we're operating in the domain of ideas, compound interest really applies and leverage really applies.

If you are fundamentally building and marketing something that is an extension of who you are, no one can compete with you on that."

Source: The Almanack of Naval Ravikant, by Eric Jorgenson

3: Peter Thiel on Founder Personality Traits

Source: Zero to One, by Peter Thiel