Elco

“Human beings have an innate inner drive to be autonomous, self-determined, and connected to one another. And when that drive is liberated, people achieve more and live richer lives.” - Daniel Pink

I love the markets in Barça

I love the diversity of London

I love the kindness of Colombia

I love the freedom of Berlin

Each place gives me something unique.

What do I love about San Francisco?

When speaking to someone from San Fran I am reminded how driven people can be. It's OK to dream big. Do you love to succeed? Do you love to win? Do you love to create something great?

That's America right at ya. Success is celebrated.

"The American Dream is the belief that anyone, regardless of where they were born or what class they were born into, can attain their own version of success in a society where upward mobility is possible for everyone. The American Dream is achieved through sacrifice, risk-taking, and hard work, rather than by chance." - Wikipedia

In order to win, you need to take a lot of risks and believe in yourself to the point of absurd:

"Have almost too much self-belief. Self-belief is immensely powerful. The most successful people I know believe in themselves almost to the point of delusion. Cultivate this early. As you get more data points that your judgment is good and you can consistently deliver results, trust yourself more. If you don’t believe in yourself, it’s hard to let yourself have contrarian ideas about the future. But this is where most value gets created." - Sam Altman (President YCombinator)

The drive to succeed causes people to push the limits on what would be considered "rude" in Europe

"Hey, you are Elco right?" Someone approached me on my second day in San Francisco and I was completely stunned that someone knew my name. We were at an event at a co-working space which was going bankrupt. People were in distress. Jeff saw my application for his co-working space the day before and came there to acquire clients. This is shark-level 1000. Jeff did "acquire me" as a co-work space member.

The American attitude is to make small bets with money quickly to build relationships and unlock value

"Let's do a test I'll send you $2k" A founder of a bootstrapped marketing tech platform just met me at a conference, we chatted for 15 mins on a call and then he said let's do a test. Next week $2k was in our bank account. SF has such a high concentration of capital and competition, making people entrepreneurial and causing them to make small bets to win all the time. It's positive.

Though working in the city of big tech is competitive

"Working at Facebook in London or San Francisco is a completely different world. In London, I was just cruising." In the US, your colleagues would talk about the other colleagues and say like "You know these guys are in level 7 and basically are doing the same work as us, we should get paid more and ask for a raise".

"San Francisco is a Mono-culture" - Convo with an Environment system's designer at IDEO San Francisco. She noted that everyone in SF is a high-achieving tech worker or basic service working. Culture has left the city.

"Hey try this on" said a friend ex-Googler, who's building RogaLife.com, a wearable that reduces anxiety without the need for drugs ;). It's a device that you connect behind your ears, earphones as its wired to your iPhone. It sends you stimulating 432 megahertz sounds and smells and vibrations, so that you unwind and destress. It's like Calm & Headspace on steroids.

Final thoughts, what makes San Francisco (and America) a fascinating place?

"You are expected to dream and punch above your weight". In Europe this doesn't really exist. You shouldn't talk about success. In America, it's the opposite. You are going to try to make it and you will tell the world about it. The way to succeed is to first believe it yourself and then communicating that to the outside world, so you will exude confidence the more you do it.

In SF it's the norm to push yourself to greatness. As you can stay true to your own values and beliefs, it's great because it holds this promise that everything you dream of is possible.