Assertion Partly supported
Godin: Authors can buy a NYT bestseller spot for $65,000
“Because I can tell you how to do it for 65,000 dollars. There are people who have to Books on there. Paid money to game their way onto it.”
Insight
Seth Godin: Never quit during the hard part of a project
“Never quit at the hard part. Either quit before you start, Or quit after the hard part, but see that the hard part is coming, right?”
Insight
Godin: Rejection is always valid given what the decision-maker heard
“Because everyone who makes a decision is correct based on who they are, what they believe, what they want, and what they heard from you. Every single time they are correct. And if you want a different answer, you need to tell a different story and create diffe…”
Insight
Godin: High school indoctrinates people to obey authority and seek corporate status
“High school is where we got indoctrinated. Indoctrinated to go get a job at a famous company. Indoctrinated to do what the boss says. Indoctrinated to say, will this be on the test? Over and over and over again, the hierarchies, the status, the affiliation, it…”
Opinion
Godin: Corporate Mission Statements Are Interchangeable and Obscure Profit Motives
“And if you look at giant corporations, their mission statements are all interchangeable, and they mean nothing, and they're hiding the truth, and the truth is, we're here to make money.”
Insight
Godin: Founders Should Probably Sell Once a Business Requires Management
“And then, when it's time for the business to be managed, you should probably sell it.”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Godin: Shark Tank Asked Me to Audition as Nasty Judge
“They called me up a bunch of years ago when it was first starting, and they said, well, you auditioned for Shark Tank. We want you to be one of the judges on Shark Tank. And I said, well, what do you think? And they said, well, you would be the nasty judge. An…”
Insight
Godin: Creators Cannot Expect Mass Appeal Without Making Mass Compromises
“If you want the prizes that come from that, you have to pay the price that comes from that. So in your case, there's an alignment. There are a few people who when you like it, they like it. And that's great, but if you want to be Oprah, you can't do that. Beca…”
Assertion Not checkable as stated
Godin: YouTube creators cannot make a living with under one million followers
“If you're on YouTube and you don't have a million, you're not gonna make a living.”
Insight
Godin: The internet is a terrible mass medium but a great micromedium
“That's what the internet's for. It's a terrible mass medium. It's a very good micromedium.”
Insight
Godin: Writer's block is a myth because talker's block doesn't exist
“No one has writer's block. Writer's block is a myth. You don't get talker's block. So write down what you say. You're done. You wrote.”
Opinion
Godin: Workplace mechanization has made it harder for workers to find joy
“It has made it harder for freelancers and for people with a day job to find joy in their work, because they basically have mechanized Everything turned us into keystroke counting cogs.”
Insight
Godin: Deciding once on a daily habit eliminates daily decision fatigue
“I made a decision once, and then I don't have to make it again. So there's going to be a blog post for me tomorrow, not because it's the best blog post I ever wrote, but because it's Thursday.”
Insight
Godin: Resistance to tasks stems from feeling obligated rather than the activity
“People go on vacation and do things that they just paid a lot of money to do that are supposed to be fun, but if that was their job, they would hate it.”
Insight
Seth Godin: Quitting is an investment opportunity, not failure
“Quitting isn't failing. What's failing is sticking with something that's not working and not making me happy. Quitting is a chance to invest in the thing that I ought to be doing next.”
Insight
Godin: Selling Is Offering Value Rather Than Asking for Favors
“You're not asking for a favor when you're selling something. You're not asking for a favor when you engage with someone. You are offering them something. And if you're not offering people something of value, listen to them, and go build a thing that is actuall…”
Insight
Godin: Zuckerberg uses likes and comments to extract free labor
“Because Mark Zuckerberg wants you to have a feedback loop of likes, and what people are saying about you in the comments, because if he can get you hooked on that, you will work for free, and his advertisers will have something to buy.”
Insight
Godin: Entrepreneurs should tell mismatched customers 'it's not for you'
“One of the most powerful things an entrepreneur, a salesperson, a creator, an artist has, is a simple sentence, which is, thank you, it's not for you. It might be for somebody. You should make something for somebody, but if someone rejects you because they are…”
Disclosure
Godin: Why I refuse to track blog traffic or book sales
“My blog has no comments. I don't know the stats on my blog. I don't know how many people read my blog. I don't know how many books I sell.”
Insight
Godin: Useful compromise serves client needs, while bad compromise breeds mediocrity
“If you are an architect, and you have a client, and you bring your perfect building to them, and they ask you to make changes to it so it will work better for their business, that's a useful compromise. That's a powerful compromise. On the other hand, if you b…”
Insight
Godin: Most people choose mediocrity because they require impossible guarantees
“Most people would rather be mediocre. Most people would rather stay in the middle, because those guarantees are not on the table.”
Insight
Seth Godin: Demonstrating agency earns more freedom in organizations
“We get freedom by using the agency we deny we have well, so that the people around us will give us more.”
Insight
Godin: AI causes anxiety because it automates repetitive knowledge work
“If you're doing insurance claims, You're on the assembly line, and this is one reason why AI is freaking so many people out, because AI is eager to go into the assembly line doing the same thing over and over again.”
Insight
Godin: Leadership Is Voluntary While Management Relies on Authority
“Managers use power and authority to get people to do a job they know can be done. So we need managers at hotels, at fast food restaurants, someone to make sure that the subway's running on time, that's management. Leadership is voluntary. You can't require peo…”
Seth Godin