Intensity is not a bug, it’s a feature

JC's Newsletter #216

Dear friends,

Every week, I’m sharing an essay that relates to what we are building and learning at Alan. Those essays are fed by the article I’m lucky enough to read and capitalise on.

I’m going to try to be provocative in those essays to trigger a discussion with the community. Please answer, comment, and ping me!

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Intensity is not a bug, it's a feature.

It's necessary to have intensity to do great things.

• I don't know of any company, researcher, or artist who hasn't worked very hard to maintain success over time, who hasn't produced a lot, tried to iterate a lot, been passionate about what they do, etc.

• Or even top-level athletes, when I talk to top-level athletes who are in the French rugby team, the French national football team, Olympic handball champions, there's always this same level of intensity in the work and preparation.

• So, that's clearly a necessity  for success. 

Where I agree is that there's no point in having counterproductive intensity.

• Being exhausted, tired, not in good shape, doesn't help to maintain intensity, it even reduces intensity and leads to poor work.

• So for me, intensity is not necessarily about working every night.

• I think that's bad and it shouldn't happen.

• I don't think it's about working 9:30 AM to 6 PM with a huge lunch break and thinking everything will be fine. “There's no free lunch”

• If you want to do great things, grow, and have an impact, you need to invest the time.

• There is a continuum between the two, and that is where people need to find their sweet spot. 

• There are multiple paths, we need to adapt to everyone's needs, and it also depends on roles and seniority.

In the end, what matters in my opinion is 

• 1) finding people who take joy and pleasure in intensity, and we have plenty of those at Alan,

• 2) helping people to set limits so they are not overwhelmed by intensity

  • It's about how I give myself tools

  • How I set priorities

  • How I truly disconnect when I disconnect (not having Slack on my phone for example)

  • How I take holidays regularly

  • How I have long moments of intense work where I am not interrupted by my WhatsApp messages, by Slack, which actually allows me to move mountains quite quickly, instead of getting nothing done because I spend my time being interrupted.

If we give these tools to people, if we help them make good decisions, if we recruit the right people, it really creates magic. I've been doing this for 15 years now, and I've seen it just hundreds of times.

• However, again, I think sometimes we really need to help people take a step back on how they manage their intensity and workload.

• It's OK to have a peak for a while if we have a real deadline, something important, something that matters.

• It's not OK if it is all the time.  I don't want that to happen.

So, how do we find the right dose of intensity which is again very productive, which makes our work a joy, what we are building together a joy to create happiness and greatness.

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Some good articles I have read this week

👉The Huberman-ization of America (Rex Woodbury)

• We should have something around alcool (his episode on alcohol is the single most-shared podcast episode of the year)

• The importance of community and belonging to a group of health enthusiasts that we don’t leverage enough!

• Telehealth derm consultations and subscriptions to skincare products seems very big! 

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👉 Abridge, which automatically transcribes conversations between doctors and their patients, has raised a new round, led by Lightspeed Venture Partners and Redpoint Ventures, at a $850 million post-investment valuation.

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👉Twitter Lori Shemek, PhD: Cancer absolutely hates mushrooms. (@LoriShemek)

• I’d love us to explore the research on mushroom x cancer for our longevity x nutrition approach

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Let’s talk about this together on LinkedIn or on Twitter. Have a good week!

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