CEO Field Rule Number 1 Do not mistake power or visible success for competence that is relevant to your mission and vision. Power is contextual. Success is path-dependent. Neither transfers by proximity or association. A person can accumulate influence, wealth, or status by winning entirely different games—political survival, capital aggregation, social signaling, institutional navigation—without possessing any competence that applies to what you are building. Competence is d

People often fail to question individuals who present themselves as being associated with circles of power, even when that association cannot be independently verified. Proximity is mistaken for credibility, and affiliation is treated as evidence of competence. This happens because some people construct identity and confidence through affiliation with power. That confidence is imagined. It does not hold when competence must be measured on the individual alone, without borrowe

In 2008 I was an oil analyst at the Korea Energy Economics Institute. I was in a group private thread with the head of DOE EIA and some very famous oil analysts (10 of us - I knew my shit). I had opinions. I was wrong. What 2008—and the world I imagined would follow—taught me is that the future does not unfold by extending today forward. It often emerges by illuminating paths we did not know existed. In 2008, the picture looked dark. With oil at $147 per barrel, almost no spa