Ask HN: How to develop competitive spirit?

[jhjhjhjhj]

Ok. This may sound weird to many but let me tell you my story. I am a proficient developer and entrepreneur. I always come with many big ideas. But, as soon as I realize that it will affect someone else badly directly or indirectly, I stop working on it. Whenever I think that if I win , someone else will lose, I stop participating in that competition. I hate Amazon and Walmart, as they destroyed many local shops. I learnt quite a lot in robotics but gave it up when I realized that many people will lose jobs because of automation. These ideas have got fixed in my mind and I can't remove them. I am not able to progress in the real world but I can't find any flaw in my ideas. I don't understand why people compete. Does any one of you feel the same? Did you ever have this thought? If yes, how did you overcome it? Or do we even need to overcome it?

[b0ttler0cket]

As a side note (because your way of thinking is very interesting), here's a small thought exercise. I would love to know what you would do in this situation. (This might further convince you that the way you think fails some tests). I think taking the time to really understand this train of thinking is important, as it will dictate many of your decisions in the future. :)

ActionA hurts 1 person. B,2 C,3 D,4

Which one do you chose? A or no choice? To compound the problem.

ActionA hurts 1 person you really like. B,2 ppl you kinda like; C,3 ppl you are ambivalent towards; D,4 ppl you utterly dislike (each emotion containing logical reasons, e.g. A is your girlfriend, D is a cruel warlord.)

Now your decision might change, might it not? This is how I demonstrate to you why uncertainty destroys any chance you have of effectively making decisions.

So in all, I believe your way of thinking fails at 3 levels.

1. You believe your actions always hurt someone, though not realizing that because you're a capable and well-meaning person, your inaction may hurt many many more people.

2. You believe firmly (so firmly that you don't commit to anything you want to do in life) that you are dealing with information when you are in fact dealing only in pure, non-founded speculation. You have NO basis to believe you are hurting people. You speculate. I would say you have information that you are hurting people when you can tell me the names of who you're hurting. This is a bad illusion to live under. It gives you the feeling that your making an active decision to do something when all you're doing is absolutely nothing except believing you've made an active decision. You set yourself a devious little trap.

3. You do not have enough information to use the system you are using. Even if you had enough information (as demonstrated above) you would need additional rules and ways to rank the impact of your actions and who they impact, which you currently completely lack.

I know this is going to help you. Let it. If I was in your situation and someone told me this, it would've helped me. :)

[jhjhjhjhj]

Thanks b0ttler0cket. Your comments definitely helped me. Though I am not 100% convinced. I will give more thoughts to your comments.

[soneca]

Great comment by b0ttler0cket! He is completely right.

Sharing my point of view, I am also have no competitive spirit at all (and I don't want to grow any also). My high school used to divide students in classes according to our grades. I consciously chose no to study to the finals in order to stay on the same class of my friends. I am a good soccer player, but, unsurprisingly, I am always at the loser side of a game - sport is a field where competitive matters, not entrepreneurship.

As a founder myself, not being competitive certainly has implications, but that doesn't give any reason to create a "fear paralysis". Sure, we both doesn't have the right fit to create a copycat business. Create a local Groupon where we would have to ferociously compete for markets. But what about innovation? Blue ocean strategy? Non-profit startups? Social business? Research? I may even say that creating a new social networking site don't justify your fears (or are you actually afraid of being so successfull that you will make all Facebook employees fired??).

See how many possibilities? I can't not say something, and I am only saying this because I can completely relate to your spirit and I really have no intention to offend here. But, to me, sounds one of two options: or you are extremely short-sighted about what can you achieve or you are just rationalizing all of this in order to justify your inaction, your fear of getting out of your comfort zone.

On a final note, a misconception: Capitalism is not a zero sum game. Not at all. Even Karl Marx, the biggest, most important, most inteligent, most profound, most ferocious critic of capitalism says that capitalism imply in poverty, that for some to get rich, some have to be poor. No, the capitalism itself doesn't demand this. The way we practice capitalism today has this consequence, but this is changing. Less poverty in the world is better for rich people and rich countries. China growth allowed a better life for both USA wealthy people and chinese poorest - there is no way a continual world growth is possible without including Africa in world's economy. It is perfectly possible to create a business where you create wealth for every stakeholders and doesn't destroy wealth with some externality. *Marx's criticism is more in the line that capitalism leads to individualism, fetishism, human degradation(not through poverty), reification (thingification of social relations).

[codegeek]

Competing is not only about killing or destroying someone (a business in your context). It is also about encouraging the players to continuously improve and challenge themselves. Yes it is true that whenever someone wins, someone else loses. But instead of looking only at the loss, look at what new gains are coming in ? You say you ate Amazon etc. because they destroyed many local shops. How about the thousands of jobs they also created ? How about the value they brought to consumers all over the world which the local shops wouldn't have. Also it is not a zero sum game. There still are local shops in cities around you. They still exist.

Look at the positives of anything. Stop worrying about negatives. I am sure those local shops would have found something else to do and who knows, they might even be doing better now.

[jhjhjhjhj]

"How about the thousands of jobs they also created ?" -> This was true in the past with big corporations,huge number of jobs were also created. But, now a days, even this is not true. Eg. Amazon Warehouse Automation, Automation in industries, etc. People are losing their jobs. In developing countries, as simple jobs are getting replaced by machines, many lower class are finding it even difficult to survive. The big enterprises are doing much more harm than the value they are creating. And yet I see people dreaming of making it big just because of our greed. What is good about big?

[codegeek]

you need to think about this more. If at one end, some industries are getting automated due to technological advancements, it is also creating a new set of industry where you need to hire. Sure if there aren't enough warehouse jobs, people will find something they can fit in. Like I said, don't look at it as a zero sum game.

[soneca]

Definetly you should think more about this. I live in Brazil, we are a developing country, we are implementing a lot of automation - particularly in our biggest business, agriculture - and our unemployment rate is one of the lowest in the planet right now.

[b0ttler0cket]

Dear jhjhjhjhj,

1. Not acting is hurting someone too.

You can look at this from a psychological standpoint. I've read the other comments and I agree with some of them, especially mnicole's in which s/he says "you're opening the door for another or making them step up their game." You may be "hurting" someone, but you have the potential to help many more. So from a philosophical point, you are solid. Just remember that breaking a window to employ the window maker does not add to the system. It actually just leaves you minus a window. If you don't commit to your ideas, you're breaking the window.

2. You don't have enough information. Uncertainty.

You can look at this also from a logical standpoint. What you're saying is you are immobilized due to various reasons. These reasons, we call constraints. You are in a situation saturated with so many constraints that you can effectively do nothing. Start one thing, find bad implications, stop. Start another, stop. This is a signature sign of a bad and failing system. You HAVE to change the rules by default, assuming you want to develop a better system.

As such, forget this rule:

If I "affect someone else badly directly or indirectly, I stop working on it."

This to me is the equivalent of voodoo magic. You cannot quantify or in anyway measure the extent of your negative impacts. This means you are in a system rife with uncertainty. The special quality of uncertainty (as the 2002-2008 WS financial engineers observed) is that no matter what metrics you use, it is unquantifiable and that an overabundance denotes a system bound to fail. Your system of decision is therefore one that fails. It is not grounded in reality, but in uncertainty. You sound like a smart person ("proficient developer and entrepreneur"). You must be able to see why this is true.

Do not make decisions based on uncertainty. There's literally nothing you can do for these people you believe you might be hurting. Make decisions on reality. Go for what you want. Develop your projects and feel liberated doing so.

Now, having reconciled our philosophy with our logic, I hope you can find a better peace of mind to continue onward. :)

[mnicole]

If you don't, someone else will, and they might be even less ethical than you are. Additionally, like codegeek said, you may be shutting one person out, but you're opening the door for another or making them step up their game. There's also no reason to feel guilty because someone didn't do enough research into their profession's outlook. I saw first-hand how co-workers struggled with making the switch from desktop publishing to web; it was awful for them, but it would have been worse for everyone if the web had never come along at all. Many high schoolers are given aptitude tests that show the future growth of the industries they showed potential in. These same tests are probably available for free online at this point. Think less about the individual and more about the bigger picture; the individual will get through it and the opportunity to do something grand has much greater return for everyone.

Another way to look at it: a lot of people will work for companies they morally or ethically despise, but the pay and other factors keep them around until they've accumulated enough of this dirty money to go on to use it to do better things. If you are concerned that your best ideas are disruptive to the point of guilt, just remind yourself that you don't need to do it forever, and if you'd feel better as a philanthropist, the bad can fund the good.

[1123581321]

You should look into companies like Gore and Mondragon. There are ways to build great, competitive companies that create great jobs and ways of living that didn't exist before.

[mjdn]

There is a correlation between testosterone levels and competitiveness. Exercise will increase your testosterone levels and this may increase your competitiveness

[kohanz]

Simple solution: work on medical robotics (e.g. minimally invasive surgery). Nobody loses their job and your work affects people positively.

[t0]

Business is a ruthless game. There is limited market saturation. A few are on the court, while a lot more are always on the bench.

I don't think it has to be this way, but it certainly shouldn't keep you out of the game completely.

[jhjhjhjhj]

Most think it should not be this way. Then why can't we change it? How will participating in the game help? I can't convince myself.

[t0]

You shouldn't do nothing because you might hurt someone's feelings. Chances are they have no issue hurting yours. Necessary evil if you will.

I'd love to change it.. but it may not even be possible. Only a limited number of businesses can exist in any one market. Some will do better work than others. The ones doing the better work will remain and profit, while the others will perish. How can that be done differently?

[b0ttler0cket]

I have to disagree.

I don't like to think of this as a necessary evil. Given the OP's philosophy, I definitely don't think it's appropriate to describe what he should do as an "evil."

It can be done differently. He's not questioning the fact that there's "only a limited number of businesses [that] can exist in any one market." Jh understands that the world is finite. What he doesn't understand is that this concept of "hurting" someone is not real. It's not sports, where the aim is to defeat the opponent (yes that is the aim of sports...I know what I'm talking about there). This is business. If there's too much in one place, go somewhere else. Jh's problem is that he can't go anywhere else. He's stuck in the middle of nowhere because every decision is blocked by an internal rule he has written.

There is no necessary "evil" here, there's just necessary. You have to abandon your train of thought. :) That is, if you want the solution to your dilemma. :)

[bmelton]

From the guidelines: "Please don't sign comments, especially with your url. They're already signed with your username. If other users want to learn more about you, they can click on it to see your profile."

Could you, pretty please, stop prefacing all your posts with your username? It ends up appearing directly below your username, and is kind of distracting.

[b0ttler0cket]

Oops. Sorry. :)

[capitalboom]

And I'll bet if you were around thousands of years ago and invented fire you'd have forseen guns and rockets and given up on fire....

[logjam]

I say no need to overcome your philosophy, and you can be highly successful without the rather silly idea people have around the need for competition.

Cooperation, symbiosis, or whatever you want to call it, is a higher good than competition.

[lutusp]

Logjam, I apologize for replying to your comment in another thread (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5501739) in this unorthodox way, but you replied to one of my comments in a recent thread and before I could reply to yours, the originator of the thread killed it, which action prevented any more correspondence and might have led you to believe I had no reply to your remarks. But I do. Here's your comment followed by my reply:

>>...you're only adding to the perception that women lie [emphasis added] about sex crimes. And they do [emphasis added]...20%-40%...are simply false... blah blah

> Oh. My. Lie. Speaking of sleazy, do tell us more about your oddly worded little insinuation, when the article you linked goes on to say:

> "First, the category of 'false accusations' does not distinguish between accusers who lie and those who are honestly mistaken. Nor does it indicate that a rape did not occur, merely that the specific accused is innocent....Third, the 1-in-4 figure has 'fuzzy' aspects that could influence the results. For example, Neufeld and Scheck mention only sexual assault cases that were "referred to the FBI where results could be obtained."

First, your comments aren't a reply to my comment, but to yours -- your having edited my remarks, and added emphasis not present in the original, changes its meaning. I never said that 20% to 40% of sex reports are lies, as you insinuate in your edit of my remarks, I said they are false, and they are. My claim is fully backed up by the FBI report.

Second, when a woman identifies a man as a rapist in a criminal trial, but is not certain of her identification, in a legal sense she is lying, because to offer testimony in a criminal trial, a witness must be certain -- and judges and juries assume witnesses understand this responsibility. If the witness is uncertain, saying under oath, "He's the perpetrator" in a criminal trial is not an "honest mistake", it's a separate crime. Therefore a witness saying "I was mistaken" after the fact, after the legal system makes the assumption that the identification was certain, is unacceptable, and the original testimony constitutes a lie.

The responsible-adult solution is obvious -- it's a criminal trial, someone may lose his freedom and be marked for life with the vilest kind of stigma, therefore if a witness is not certain, she absolutely must say, "I am not certain". Therefore the 20% to 40% figure quoted in the article consists of (a) liars and (b) people who are being criminally irresponsible.

And believe me when I tell you, the prevailing FBI statistics can only hurt women who come forth to report real sex crimes. The fact that 20% to 40% of such reports are false is often used by defense attorneys to ruin a woman's chance to receive a fair hearing. As Wendy McElroy says in the article I linked, "False accusations are not rare. They are common."

When a woman chooses to accuse any convenient suspect, she may feel a temporary vindication that some man pays for another man's crime, but in the long run, all women pay the price for that irresponsible act.