November 2025 Lessons Learned
Rework, tech, and rich people
Development
Add indexes to tables where joins happen and on filtered columns when working on complicated queries. For example, if you want to get a list of inventory items with less than 10 units remaining (“units” column in this example), add an index to the “units” column. This can speed up queries, if even by a little bit. I don’t know about all relational databases, but it is true for MySQL.
Cursor agent can be very helpful in working through performance issues within a part of a codebase. I was able to ask Cursor what was causing performance issue when pulling data from a database. The agent then generated a list of things to look into and ways to test those suggestions. Managed to help improve data load time from 15+ seconds to under 5 seconds.
Go still doesn’t have Enum support and it might be the reason that I do not recommend the language to most developers.
YouTube
Alex Hormozi: “Don’t listen to the people that are closest to you, listen to the people who are the closest to your goals”
Rich people think different... Here’s 8 ways how
You Become What You Do (The Skill Stack)
Success is 45% habit. You don’t need to be the top 1% in the world at one thing. Instead, use the “Skill Stack” concept: aim to be in the top 10% of multiple complementary skills (e.g., public speaking + finance + writing).
Actionable Tactic: “Power of Place.” If you cannot change your habits, change your environment. It is easier to change your geography or friend group than to willpower your way out of a bad routine.
You Must Become an Owner (Equity > Salary)
You cannot get “rich” (wealthy/free) on a salary alone. Even the world’s highest-paid CEOs (Tim Cook, Sundar Pichai) make the vast majority of their wealth through stock (equity), not their paycheck.
Actionable Tactic: If you are a high-performing employee, you must negotiate for equity/ownership. If that isn’t possible, you must start a side business. You need an asset that disconnects your time from your money.
Obsess Over Reputation (Long-Term Games)
Wealth requires trust. One bad decision can ruin a reputation built over decades. The wealthy refuse to play short-term games (lying, cheating, cutting corners) because the long-term cost is too high.
Actionable Tactic: Use the “Old Friends Test.” When evaluating a partner or leader, check if they have long-term friends or employees. Psychopaths and short-term thinkers rarely maintain relationships for 10+ years.
Follow Through (The Integrity Gap)
The rarest trait in the marketplace is doing exactly what you said you would do. High standards are contagious; if you tolerate substandard performance in yourself or others, that becomes the new standard.
Actionable Tactic: **The 2-Hour Compound.** Instead of trying to finish a massive goal in one day, commit to two focused hours every single day on your “one thing.”
The Greatest Muscle is Urgency
Speed is a weapon. The wealthy work to shrink the gap between having an idea and taking action. They use Parkinson’s Law to their advantage (work expands to fill the time allowed).
Actionable Tactic: “The 24-Hour Rule” If a task usually takes a week, ask, “How can we get this done in 24 hours?” Aggressive deadlines eliminate procrastination and force innovation.
Keep Going When It Gets Hard (Resilience)
Resilience isn’t a bonus; it’s the baseline. The wealthy anticipate the “dark night of the soul”—the moment where you have no idea what to do next.
Actionable Tactic: When things go wrong, take ownership. View failures as your fault to fix, rather than the world’s fault for happening. This gives you control over the outcome.
Choose Your Circle Wisely (Audit Your Circle)
Your environment is a mirror. If you hang out with people who are winning, you will drift toward winning. If you hang out with people stuck in the past, they will anchor you there.
Actionable Tactic: Audit your relationships. Are your friends from high school supportive of the new you, or are they attached to the old you? It is okay to outgrow people.
Avoid Small Talk (Go Deep Fast)
Low-trust relationships yield no money; high-trust relationships yield opportunities. Small talk (weather, sports) does not build trust. Vulnerability does.
Actionable Tactic: Don’t speak just to fill the air. Ask open-ended questions about what people are struggling with or excited about. Being vulnerable first (admitting a struggle) signals confidence and invites deep connection.
Rework by Jason Fried and David Heinemeier Hansson
Business plans and financials are all just guesses. Things change so fast that you don’t want to stay committed to something because it was the plan.
Focus on this week and what the next important thing is, rather than the 1 year “plan”
Don’t make assumptions about how big you are going to be ahead of time. It could just be you. Hire slowly and figure out the right size one person at a time.
Nonstop (workaholics) is not maintainable. You will burn out eventually. Work smarter, not just put in more hours.
Build something you actually want
What tools / software do you want to use?
Stand for something. Have strong opinions. It will certainly upset some people, but others will love you and your product / service even more
Drawing a line in the sand also means you are much more likely to be proud of the work you do.
Instead of thinking about your exit strategy, think about how you are going to create something that will last. Build a business that thinks about revenue, profits, and expenses. Not just a startup you want to build fast and sell.
Find the epicenter of your offering.
Ask yourself this question “If I took this away would what I am selling still exist?”
Put all your energy into making the epicenter the best that it can be.
Don’t focus on the details right away. Those come later. You will probably change them later and you don’t know what is best until you get something out there.
Just make a decision. Just thinking things over does not move things forward at all.
Schedule “no talk” focus times to avoid distractions so people can get some serious work done.
Decrease the chances your product or services becomes a commodity by injecting something special about you. It could be your custom service, your details to something specific about you, or something you greatly value.
Calling out, or even taking shots at, competitors can get people bought into your company and what you stand for. If they really don’t like a competitor as well they will side with you. Competition is also very emotional and gets people fired up.
Don’t get caught trying to one up your competition. That leads to a battle where you constantly try to spend more and add more features. Instead, focus on the things you do better, because you are doing less. This may mean you don’t win some customers because you don’t have a feature they want, but you will make the features you do have superior.
Do not track individual customer requests. If a feature is important, you will be hearing about it a lot and you won’t need to write it down.
Instead of spending money on ads, instead focus on building an audience and teaching people by writing, speaking, or creating videos
Be real, not someone who tries to look perfect. People don’t buy “perfect” because it feels like you are hiding something. Instead, showing your cracks makes you human and more relatable.
Give something away for free. For services this could ba a free audit or small block of time to research or fix something. Maybe not free either, a starter package?
Hire slowly and only when you have a recurring pain that you cannot resolve. A lot of problems arise because companies hire too fast.
Create mini projects for candidates to actually work on. This will give you a much better feel for their performance than any interview will. Should only be a 20-40 hour project. It should be meaningfully difficult but not so hard people cannot finish within a 20-40 hour block of time.
Own your mistakes. Be honest about it and tell people what you are doing to fix it. These things are going to be found out anyway, so get in front of it and communicate what is going on yourself.
You don’t create culture. It grows by what you allow and do not allow.