Change the World or Go Home!
Bare with me, because this is going to be long…
I really admire what Hugh McLeod’s doing with Blue Monster, which challenges Microsoft to change the world or go home. But really, we should all take up that challenge. What are you doing to change the world? Because look at it, how many of us are 100% happy with the world today? Even if you’re a die-hard reactionary, that means you want to change the world. So put up or shut up, as they say.
Here’s my impromptu philosophy of life: we should always seek to improve the human condition. That is, we should make people’s lives better. And what humans do best? We create things; we are truly Homo Faber. So we improve the human condition by creating value, by making things others value. And value is not an economic concept - artistically, politically, economically, value can be found in many different forms - it’s just what people care about and there needn’t be any rhyme or reason to it.
And everyone is a creator, because everyone creates value in some fashion. If nothing else, value is created in almost every economic activity. Put simply, making money is a sign that other people find that the value you give them is so great that they still come out ahead when they give you money that they could have used to create value. The only exception I can think of where people make money without creating value is landholders, since we can’t create more land. Well, normally we can’t: making islands is one way around our world’s physical limitations and building up is another way - what is not a skyscraper but a massive exercise in land creation? Of course, I guess you could say that a landlord is creating value, but since a plot of land can only be used by one person and landowners can’t create more, I would argue that they actually are just transferring value from one person to another (nominally to someone that values it more) rather than creating new value.
Sure I like money just as much as the next person – and probably more than many – but I really find interesting is it as a tool. Money is power – and yes, power is money – and power is really what matters. Power lets you do things, it lets you change the world. Good or evil, that’s up to you but power is the ultimate tool for change. So when you have lots of money, you have an enormous amount of power. Or rather, you have the potential. If you squander it on things with little impact or meaning, than all that money didn’t add up to much power. But if you’re smart, if you’re strategic, if you’re efficient, you’ll do things that people thought impossible. What a heady thought! To be able to change the world, to make your mark on the world and say ‘I was here and I made things better’, what more could you want? Maybe it’s all just a massive ego trip, but if good comes out of it, who cares? And besides, if you’re truly looking to maximise your world-changing potential, you’ll avoid all the self-flattery and ego-promotion that are obvious distractions from the goal of changing the world.
I’ve had many conversations with people about the success of Silicon Valley and the failure to duplicate it elsewhere. It’s a complex topic with no simple answer, if any. That being said, I’m struck (perhaps falsely) by the sense that many more Europeans who make lots of money through world-changing businesses are content to simply husband their wealth than American successful entrepreneurs. Look at someone like Alan Sugar, who, if we are to believe the UK version of The Apprentice, is an interesting businessman. Sure he has a lot of money, a notable portion earned from a pioneering computer company in the 80s, but what has he done since then? Nothing exciting. Niklas Zennström and Janus Friis are providing a welcome counter-example.
There is one big difference I see between Silicon Valley and Europe: successful entrepreneurs using their windfall to change the world. Look at someone like Richard Branson. Sure, he’s made lots of money and he’s obviously a good businessman. I’m sure he’s a good human being. But what a squandered opportunity! Why keep starting yet another business under the Virgin label when you could be using all that money and skill to change the world. Instead, among other things, he runs an exclusive resort on his private island (which is apparently very nice, according to friends who have stayed there). That’s just boring! Look at someone like Bill Gates, financing of so many incredible initiatives, or Vinod Khosla, making big investments in biofuels. So more Borels, fewer Bransons!
This is why how you use your money matters: if you use it well, it’s a force multiplier. This is why I’ve become so interested in venture capital. Venture capital can be the ultimate way to multiply influence: some amount of money (read power/ability to change the world) is invested and multiplied by creating other agents for change. When the investments are successful the process becomes self-perpetuating, leading to geometric or even exponential change. Of course you can do this through any sort of investment, but venture capital seems particularly suited to changing the world because of its embrace of risk, search for high returns – which usually comes from world-changing developments (or cornering the drug trade =) – and focus on creating businesses, rather than simply growing wealth (of course, that’s why venture capitalists invest in businesses).
But where does that leave me? Like (I hope) many, I’ve got an idealistic streak in me, but I also tend to have a pragmatic and strategic approach to things. Being in Amsterdam and talk to Ville and other people, I’ve come to appreciate that I have a rather unusual perspective, with hopefully good knowledge of both how things work in Silicon Valley and in Europe (of course, it’s a gross generalisation to talk about Europe as a whole but less than it used to be). I want to develop this expertise and hopefully do more and more work in this area. I want to bring the incredible world of innovation found in Silicon Valley and create an ecosystem in Europe so smart, ambitious Europeans don’t have to go to Silicon Valley to change the world (though they’re still welcome to, it’s a great place!). Web design may pay the bills but, let’s face it, PHP code by itself doesn’t change the world – it’s what you do with your code that matters.
Stay tuned…
Tags: big ideas, Business, change the world or go home, creating value, Europe, improving the human condition, Silicon Valley, startups, venture capital
November 21st, 2007 at 6:30 pm
Hey Peter,
OK its great that you want to change the world, but before you start looking at how, shouldn’t you consider (and outline) in what way you want to change the world. This way you can decide if the tools you are suggesting are actually useful for those purposes.
Basically you are saying money is the way to change the world, becasue money is power. (and you create value by making money)
First you however state that we improve the human condition by creating value ‘which is not an economic concept. It’s what people care about’
The way you then go on about fantastic money making through innovation in Silicon value I am sorry but reminds me of Thomas Friedman’s euphoric chant about america’s technology and innovation lead and model, and how the flat world is going to improve everybodys life, while totally ignoring the downsides of the drive for ‘efficiency’.
You suggest the only money makers not creating value are landowners, hmmm. I actually think they have an important and essential role in value creation. But I can assure you that there is lots of money making going on that does not create value. What about speculation? Sure you can see that as useful investment but i’m not so sure. A great deal of money making is not about creating value it is about making money. And making money can also have the effect of destroying value. For example, the critique on the way private equity works;emptying a company of its value and then moving on. And that is really only on example.
Venture capital is not going to change the world untill its gains are put in a charitable fund and used purposefully, neither is it going to lift living standards in the west if the capital it delivers it is not taxed .
By seeing money as a tool to have power, do you mean to imply that there should be a charitable model where the responsibility for changing the world is a matter of volunteerism (so a very american model, indeed it is more in the culture of teh US then in Europe to use your own money in a charitable way, this has to do with the fact the US does not have the redistribution system European countries in general have, where the the less privileged are not so dependent on charity. Yet the concept is not strange to Europeans and I think George Soros is doing a pretty good job)
To conclude: let’s not kid ourselves, we are not going to change the worl by making money. I think the first question we should ask ourselves is ‘how do we want to change the world? what’s wrong?where do we want to improve the human condition?’