Latest / The Start, Scale & Succeed Podcast / Stop Renting Out Your Best Years with Daniel Carpio (stage 1) - Ep. 440

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Stop Renting Out Your Best Years with Daniel Carpio (stage 1) - Ep. 440 · The Start, Scale & Succeed Podcast

0:00
Scott Ritzheimer: Hello, hello, and welcome, welcome once again
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to the Start Scale and Succeed podcast, the only podcast that
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grows with you through all seven levels of your journey as a
0:08
founder. I'm your host Scott Ritzheimer, and there's a
0:11
challenge that I believe virtually every single employee
0:14
faces, and that is that your income, your benefits, your
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network, your identity all seem to sit with one employer, and
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historically we would call that safe, but now I think more than
0:24
ever that's really a concentration risk, and I also
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believe that never has it been more risky and less necessary
0:33
than it is today. Here to help us explore this further is our
0:37
guest Danny Carpio, who is an organizational architect,
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systems builder, entrepreneur, and author of the upcoming book
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*The Unfirm* The New Unit of Scale Is You. Over the past 13
0:49
years, he's helped build organizations that raised more
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than $25 million in capital and achieved nine-figure valuations.
0:57
Danny specializes in organizational design, AI-native
1:00
operating systems and helping founders and small teams achieve
1:03
self-scale by creating smarter systems instead of relying on
1:07
traditional organizational growth. Danny, welcome to the
1:11
show. Glad to have you here. I'm excited about this conversation,
1:14
in particular because a lot has changed recently. But before we
1:18
dive into what all of that is necessarily, what change that
1:23
specifically led you to write your new book?
1:27
Daniel Carpio: Hey, Scott, thank you so much for that intro and
1:30
for the your thoughtful preparation here. I'm really
1:32
excited to have this conversation, so so I appreciate
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it. Like you said, everything has just changed so fast, even
1:41
from from when I first started writing the book, I'll tell you
1:44
that I never really wanted to like work in the system that
1:49
existed, and so I it was always just harder for me. But I ended
1:52
up I was always a network builder, and so I I found that
1:56
the most satisfying way to independently build in a
2:01
de-risked manner was by having positive some relationships with
2:04
other people who were aligned, and so I ended up absorbing
2:08
other people's scale in a networked way and helping them
2:11
win and set up stuff. And so as I helped people over a long
2:15
time, you know that builds a lot of trust, and so it ended up
2:19
being difficult and like harder than what it would have been if
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I had just kind of gone into a more traditional work
2:26
environment, but way more fulfilling. And I learned a ton
2:29
of other stuff. And then right before the book, I thought that
2:34
this is now more possible. Now, is this better? Like, is this
2:41
the better way now to compete because of what technology can
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now do for us? That was a I call them fever dreams, right? And
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that was like just I was like oh like I've been doing it this
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way, but now you know ChatGPT came out, you know back in the
2:55
day, and and and then I started I've always been a fan of AI,
2:58
but you know it seems so far, and now it was just close, and
3:03
so it started off. And it's funny how just things go. You
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know, God is good, and like we, it everything came into place as
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I was writing it. It was such a, it was very thesis driven and
3:14
theoretical, and I was trying to put to pieces like what did I
3:16
actually do, and what does that actually mean, and how does that
3:19
help people? Because I work in a very unique way, and it's very
3:21
custom now for each of us. And so, as as I got closer to the
3:27
the book launch, everything just accelerated, you know, and it's
3:32
still happening. And so, what changed was AI just became way
3:35
more capable, way more cheap. The thesis bore out in a lot of
3:39
ways, and so the the first part of the book is very much we have
3:42
to relook again. I have to explain my thesis. I was like,
3:44
"Hey, do we agree that this is what's happening right now? You
3:47
know, I think because if if you we agree, or at the very least
3:51
you think it's possible, like let's let's keep reading because
3:53
there's a lot of new risks, and now there's a brand new way to
3:56
approach things that are optimal. And this is a I think
3:59
this will help you think through it, even if you don't agree that
4:01
that's the right way. And so, as we started moving forward, I
4:06
started seeing that these enterprises started making these
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organizational changes. They started just collapsing down,
4:15
and and it started happening. The thesis started happening
4:18
live, and now we're seeing that to this day, like Muse is now, I
4:22
think we consumer AI agents is now in everyone's pocket, and so
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we just had a brand new accelerant. And so, what's
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changed is that things are changing much faster than they
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ever have, and the thesis is just born out more.
4:36
Scott Ritzheimer: So let's let's talk about the thesis because
4:38
when folks look at AI, there's just this whole like, what is
4:41
it? What does it mean for me? That's really what everyone's
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asking, and a lot of what makes the news is you know the rich
4:49
get richer and you know the layoffs and and there's there's
4:52
a lot of negative consequences in one respect and and I think
4:56
all of those are are true and important, but you kind of
4:59
approach. This to some extent from another another direction.
5:03
That there's there's also an opportunity in this, especially
5:06
for folks that are struggling, you know, as employees
5:09
somewhere, or even a small business owner. What's the
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what's the opportunity that's available in all of this,
5:15
especially for the individual?
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Daniel Carpio: Yeah, I think it's massive. You know, look at
5:19
the end of the day, the thesis can be alarming, and so I never
5:23
meant to alarm people because at the end of the day, I do view it
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as a mass democratization event. Like what is actually happening
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is that you no longer need all those things around you to
5:33
execute your visions and to express value societally that
5:38
can drive economic value for yourself too, and others, and so
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all of the components that would have been barriers to entry, and
5:46
they were very real, very systemic, and that's why the old
5:48
structures worked. Those are gone, but like new things are
5:52
hard, and so it's not like the end. Like doing stuff is not
5:54
easy now, but doing those things that were barriers to entry are
6:00
easy and cheap. So what does that mean? What does that mean
6:02
now for for markets and for what people are willing to pay for,
6:06
for where complexity is, for for the value of labor and of your
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time, and for how you've managed your risk? And so I think I
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think I like to say scale is now relevant to everyone. It wasn't
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relevant to you because there was a a labor employment
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relationship that was systemic in nature, and in that you
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traded away the benefits of scale, but also the risks that
6:30
was required to bear it to other people, and they carried the
6:32
upside. And their goal was to drive operating leverage with
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inputs of scale, and we were one of those, you know, through that
6:37
structure. But now that dependent side no longer needs
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that for their units of scale, in fact, it's if they don't
6:43
change, they die, right? As an institution, and so that there's
6:46
systemic risk now in that labor trade that didn't exist, and so
6:50
that so that's one component. But what does that mean for you?
6:53
Is that this is designed for for smaller units to be able to
6:58
scale, and so now you can go compete and go bring value to
7:02
market in a way that you have never been able to do before.
7:06
And I know that that sounds these are like abstractions. And
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my wife always clowns on me because she's like, Danny, no
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one understands what you're saying. So like, so I like
7:14
examples because you know my I want the most important thing is
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that people understand and feel empowered. As far you know, I
7:20
don't want to just talk to South, you know, with big words.
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I want people to like internalize this, and I love
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examples. Thinking, I'm thinking, I think about it in
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two ways. One is the four minute mile, right? For for most of
7:32
human history, it was impossible. It was going to kill
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you if you ran four minute miles. The doctors would tell
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everyone believed that to be true. That was the truth, and
7:41
then someone just did it, and then like a bunch of people have
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done it since, and like someone just broke another record three
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minutes and like like 42 seconds, whatever that is. It's
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no longer possible, and so once that breaks down, what happens?
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You know, and then another like adjacent example that helps, I
7:56
think, is how Elon Musk and SpaceX did their reusable
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rocket. How they collapsed the cost of space travel so much
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that they made their own market. Everyone had to come do it.
8:09
That's what's happening now with the ability to scale. Is it's
8:11
collapsed down. We have a reusable rocket, but now we have
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to put it together for ourselves and go use it. So now everyone
8:15
can do it, and that's very exciting. But that has other
8:17
challenges like market saturation. We can go into
8:19
those, but I think that those two examples, I think are are
8:24
instrumental for like breaking down the perception that you
8:26
can't do stuff. A lot of like barriers that aren't just aren't
8:28
there anymore. A lot of brand new risks that kind of should
8:32
propel us towards revisiting our assumptions, and then a lot of
8:36
tools that can go launch us off.
8:38
Scott Ritzheimer: Yeah. So let's let's kind of zoomed down to the
8:41
individual level here because now there's an opportunity. Like
8:43
there's a whole lot that you can do. It almost feel feels like
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you know the the saying we've used all along. You can do
8:50
anything. It's like you can do anything if you set AI to it. Is
8:53
kind of what what it feels like now. How do we know what we
8:57
should do? One of the things I really liked about the book was
9:00
it wasn't just you can do anything, do anything. It was a
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much more structured approach to leveraging the power that you
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have as an individual, especially with the technology
9:09
available today. So my question for you is: When we can do so
9:13
many things, and we arguably more than ever should do
9:17
something different, at least from the way we've done it, how
9:20
do we know what to do,
9:23
Daniel Carpio: Scott? That's that is the million dollar
9:27
question, the billion dollar question. That is the risk. The
9:31
new when I say that new things are hard, what you just
9:34
identified is potentially the hardest part. I find myself
9:36
struggling with it daily. Should I have? Should I be doing this?
9:40
It's so easy to just be like look at you know spin it up do
9:43
it I systematize this this is cool look at me I'm doing AI and
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then something like what did I actually do I have so many dead
9:48
things that just died because I just never used them but you
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learn stuff and and all that but feedback loops what the the
9:56
biggest risk is that you continually do and compound the.
10:00
Wrong things, and there's an opportunity cost there, and so
10:03
you're missing the compounding that other people are getting.
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And even if you get it right, that doesn't mean you're right
10:08
next because market cycles are collapsing and they're learning,
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and so people can can just take what you did and go do it
10:14
themselves. And so in in a lot of ways, we I that's why the
10:19
feedback loop is the master thing as far as I'm concerned,
10:21
because what we're doing is we're exploring a brand new
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operating environment, and the predictive value of old
10:29
knowledge and systems is lower than it's ever been. If it's
10:31
even valuable, to be honest, I think we have to go in like with
10:36
an explorer's mindset, and we have to, I think, probe our
10:40
operating reality and get proper, adequate feedback for
10:43
what in fact works and what we can, what is not possible, and
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it's got to be tight, and we have to be able to update it,
10:49
and our foundation has to be able to absorb that so that we
10:53
can function. And part of that is, what did I just do? Like you
10:57
can take an action, get feedback, incorporate it, and
11:00
then go do that at every unit of your time. You know the time
11:02
architecture component of the book is is what really sort of
11:06
unlocks that. Is that there's a fractal component to your
11:08
approach of time that is very much is operating reality what I
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think it is? Am I good at what I think I am? Am I bad at what I
11:16
think I am? Is that constraint? Do I need capital right now? The
11:20
answer is probably no. More most of the time, right now, where it
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would have been yes, and so there's a lot of probing,
11:27
exploring, getting feedback, and then updating. I think because
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we have to have an explorer's mindset because our perspectives
11:34
and old assumptions that are baked in, they're all kind of
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gone. And so I think that the value of feedback to solve what
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you just said-that risk is critical infrastructure. We have
11:45
to be able to go in with tight feedback loops at every unit of
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time over in in like a fractal manner. So day, week, month,
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year, multi-year macro of what we're doing, and we have to
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always update that DMO cycle that we talk about in the book.
12:00
Right? Is is there's no other way. Otherwise, you're gonna go
12:03
fly blind doing stuff, thinking it's good, and then before you
12:07
know it, you're gonna be cooked, and it's gonna be really hard to
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undo that and get that time back.
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Scott Ritzheimer: For someone at the front end of this journey,
12:14
right? Really recognizing, yes, the game has changed, and and I
12:17
have to start thinking differently about it. What's one
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practical step from the book that you think you know anyone
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listening or watching today could take.
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Daniel Carpio: This sounds go do something, and I know that that
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sounds like I don't I I literally I mean like go go do
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go do go do something that you think you can't and and go have
12:38
an idea and go go try to execute, but but in order to do
12:44
that, you have to you have to start with what we call radical
12:47
self assessment. You got to know what you're cooking with, and
12:50
you can't copy paste someone's someone's strategy. You know the
12:54
idea that you're going to go run my playbook or your scott, or
12:56
and you will fail. You can't. It has to be custom to what is
12:59
actually at your disposal. You have a toolkit. You are good at
13:02
stuff. You're smart. People come to you for stuff, right? If your
13:06
buddies come to you for X, Y, Z, what is that? Like, what are the
13:09
things that people come to you for? What are things that you go
13:12
to other people? What are your constraints? Identifying what
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you are capable of and what tools you have at your disposal
13:19
is the number one thing you can do is is really just take a look
13:23
at it and understand what do I wield in this new environment?
13:26
Like what is not right? And then once you have done that, that is
13:30
a constraint based design thing that makes sure that what you
13:33
design you're not creating barriers for yourself, right?
13:36
Because if you design a strategy with things that you're either
13:39
not good at or that you need like $100,000 for, like you're
13:41
just you setting yourself up for failure, and so number one is
13:45
you have to radically assess yourself and your assets not
13:50
from like a like ephemeral emotional like from like a
13:54
practical datafication of what you have at your disposal to go
13:58
wield in the environment to go create and capture value
14:01
economically because that's what we're talking about here, right?
14:03
And so once once you do that, then you just keep updating it.
14:07
You go probe your reality and you update that. You get more
14:09
skills. You fill stuff in and you go execute strategy. Some of
14:12
them work, some of them don't. And so it's challenging. And the
14:15
book I I had to push back on on my publishing partner because
14:21
they were like, this is hard to read, and it got harder. And and
14:24
as I was writing, I was like, it just is hard. This is not easy.
14:27
And so it is hard. It's meant to be reread and re reapplied
14:32
because it it's not like snake oil. It's just it's it's a
14:35
framework. No one can do it for you. You can't delegate this.
14:38
You are the only one who can do this. And if you don't
14:42
adequately understand yourself, your assets, and what you're not
14:45
good at, and every constraint possible, and go go to work,
14:49
you're going to fail because you're building someone else's
14:51
strategy onto onto your own, and and that's not going to work for
14:54
you.
14:55
Scott Ritzheimer: Yeah, it's very true. There's a question,
14:57
Danny, that I ask all my guests. I'm interested to see what you'd
14:59
have to. Especially in the context of this conversation in
15:01
your book, what would you say is the biggest secret that you wish
15:05
wasn't a secret at all? What's that one thing you wish every
15:08
founder or leader watching or listening today knew?
15:14
Daniel Carpio: I think I'll call it a something we know, but that
15:18
we have to always remind ourselves as We go, and and that
15:23
is that you can't delegate away your responsibilities at certain
15:26
certain responsibilities. I call them non delegable duties
15:28
because I have legal training, but there are just things that
15:31
we can't delegate away, and those are largely risk based at
15:35
things that create critical risk for yourself. And I think
15:37
people, and I say this because I think most people are used to
15:41
delegating away certain risks into an old labor trade that
15:45
doesn't work, and I think that this is probably one of the
15:46
biggest hurdles that most people will face: is that that
15:52
stability is not there for you anymore. There is urgency and
15:55
opportunity, and that if you don't properly reassess what is
16:02
your main responsibility, which is what you are accountable for.
16:05
You have to be accountable for what can you not delegate those
16:08
critical risks. You have to take that seriously. It's hard. It
16:11
will always be hard. The other when scale is relevant to you,
16:14
life is hard. It just is. You know, I've won a lot. I've lost
16:18
more than I've won. But I'm out here trying to do it again.
16:20
There's no guarantee I'm going to do it. So I'm grinding. I'm
16:22
working my tail off, right? And so that's what it is. The other
16:26
side, when scale is relevant to you, it's an opportunity like
16:29
you've never had at global scale. But it's incredibly hard,
16:32
and and most people don't have the skill set or the perspective
16:35
to go do that. And the book is a challenge to for them to think
16:38
about what that means for them, not a demand that they agree
16:41
with me, and so that is whether that's a secret. I think that is
16:44
something that we is easy to forget, and it's easy to fall
16:47
into a comfort bias. And I and I have to challenge myself to
16:50
that, and I think everyone does too.
16:52
Scott Ritzheimer: Yeah, Danny. For folks who who want to
16:55
explore this further, who'd love to hear more from you, tell us
16:58
where can they get a copy of the book, and how can they reach out
17:01
or connect with you for more information?
17:04
Daniel Carpio: Yeah, absolutely. The book is available anywhere
17:06
you can buy books online as a ebook, a soft cover, and a
17:10
hardcover. If you're a professional or you're serious
17:13
about this, you can reach out to me on LinkedIn, Danny Carpio,
17:17
and on Twitter we we post content through the handle
17:22
augmented things, and so that is where we we distribute, and
17:26
we're we're we're building a lot of stuff right now that we're
17:28
about to go go live with on that side, as far as how we are doing
17:32
this and the teams around us. What is the infrastructure for
17:35
people who want to go pursue self scale? Yeah,
17:39
Scott Ritzheimer: fantastic, fantastic, very very interesting
17:42
time. Very, very interesting book, and I think it's gonna be
17:44
really helpful for a lot of folks. So I'd highly recommend
17:46
that you check it out. Danny, thanks so much for being on,
17:49
being with us here today. It was a real privilege and honor
17:52
having you here. And for those of you watching and listening,
17:55
you know your time and attention mean the world to us. I hope you
17:58
got as much out of this conversation as I know, I did,
18:01
and I cannot wait to see you next time. Take care. Hey
18:08
everyone, Scott Ritzheimer here. Thank you so much for listening
18:11
to the Start Scale and Succeed podcast. I hope this episode
18:14
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