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Ask HN: How do you avoid one shot events and still be successful?

5 points by jmilinion ↗ HN
You have a job interview with X company and you have only one shot to impress them. You have a pitch with a VC, you only have one shot to show them what you have. You have a meeting with Y company, you have only one shot to sell your product.

I can't stand these kinds of events. How can you avoid them and still be successful?

7 comments

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soneca
Well, just avoid thinking these events as one shot events. Prepare yourself for being a good professional, delivering a good product, for long term value creation. So when this opportunities show up, you just try, try hard and, if it doesn't happen, just move on. I don't believe anyone would ever have just one opportunity to be successfull. Normally the case is that you fantasize that one accomplishment, that job at Google, that VC funding.
iamwil
I think soneca is probably right on this one, though it's kinda subtle. One thing he doesn't mention is that you have to work on being good--so good that they can't ignore you, even when you're not interviewing. So that when you finally do interview, with a little bit of preparation, it's not that big of a deal. And if per chance you didn't get it, you move on.

Kinda like how athletes ideally practice and drill so much that by the time a game rolls around, it's as if they're quite familiar with it, and going through the motions. It's not a surprise when you win.

jmilinion
What happens if I'm not that good?

There's so many things to do that I feel so left behind. Just when I think I reached the finish line, I realized I just barely made it to the starting line for a very competitive race.

iamwil
I remember when I got back into programming after having left it for electrical engineering for a while. When I looked on the bookshelves at Borders, there just seemed to be an overwhelming amount of stuff to learn.

Nowadays, when I look at the bookstore shelves, there's only a couple topics of interest to me. When I noticed that difference, I asked myself why.

I guess it's because I got better at figuring out what to ignore--developed a sort of taste. I didn't try to learn everything. The only way to cultivate this is to try different things, and learn the core concept, not the actual language or technology.

I think the other thing is to realize that you'll never be #1 in just one thing, unless you're willing to work harder than anyone at it. Like Olympic level hard. Sometimes that's not practical. However, if you can be pretty good, say top 20%, at two things, that when put together is pretty valuable, then that's actually quite doable.

I can always be better myself as well, and have been looking to be better.

lsiunsuex
Agreed on not thinking the events are 1 shot. I always try to speak from experience and I can say, over the last 9 months of having a very niche website in production, that there is never just 1 shot.

Keep trying. There is not just 1 customer; there is not just 1 job; there is not just 1 investor.

The more you get your name out there, the more people will recognize who you are and what your capable of.

In regards to my website, there was a time 9 months ago, no one had any idea who we were. Now we go to an event and people come up to us and say "hey, i've heard of you guys. What do you do?"

And they probably will not signup for the website that night no matter how hard I try. But they remember you and next time they may, or 3 months from now, they may.

Don't look at it as 1 shot; look at it you have x minutes in front of this person(s) to prove yourself / your product. Plan for it, and embrace it.

orangethirty
I have failed at more businesses than most people here will ever dare to start. Products I spent time and money developing have had to be shelved due to circumstances outside of my control. Every day I get rejected by people (prospects) who I pitch to. Of all the investors I have pitched to, I have only managed to bring two on-board (on different occasions). I spend about four hours a week emailing and messaging people in order to get them to buy my products. Most of that time is lost on people who never respond. Its a constant uphill battle that only gets easier as you move along. You can't avoid any of this, because you cannot avoid failure.
argonaut
Most of those are not actually one shot events.

If you get rejected by X company, you can reapply later after gaining more experience or finishing new side projects that you can show off.

If you get rejected by a VC, you can always come back and pitch again once you have better numbers to show off (users, traction).

Etc. etc.