(highlight:: Where do I Find Executive Assistants and How Much Do They Cost?
Summary:
Executive assistants can be sourced through agencies like Athena or Shepherd, with Athena being higher-end and costing around 15 to 20 dollars an hour, while Shepherd is on the cheaper side, costing around 5 dollars an hour.
Directly sourcing assistants can also be done through platforms like Upwork, where talent can be found for a lower cost, but it may involve more overhead and less structured management.
Transcript:
Speaker 2
So sourcing, what some of the better options are, and then how you evaluate?
Speaker 1
There are several ways you can go about sourcing. I've always found the best way to do is to work with an agency. We work with Athena. There are an agency out of the Philippines. They're really the higher end of agencies and they cost more. And so it really depends on how much you value that. Other options would be you can source them directly, which tend to be cheaper. I think Athena's 15, $20 an hour, typically, and you can find talent for $5 an hour if you source it yourself.
Speaker 2
How would you source that directly for people who were interested in the lower end?
Speaker 1
Yeah, so Upwork is a place where people often go to find them. There's also another agency that's sort of on the cheaper side, which is Shepherd. My friend Nick is involved with them. They tend to be more like $5 an hour, but it requires a lot more overhead. So they don't have their own management team. It's really you and them figuring it out as opposed to having more of a structure around it.)
- Time 0:37:21
- delegation, executive_assistants, 1socialdont-post,

(highlight:: Level's Company Onboarding Process
Summary:
The company has a well-guided onboarding checklist for all employees, which spans over a full month.
Each new employee is guided to take onboarding seriously, and not expected to start producing for the first month. There is emphasis on reading specific documentation that outlines the company's culture, which is highlighted as significantly different from past experiences.
The company eases new employees into the transparency of operations and has a unique practice of requiring employees to update the onboarding process at the end of the month, reflecting the value that 'everything's written in pencil' and is subject to change.
Transcript:
Speaker 1
And we have an onboarding checklist in notion. We have a template. We copy it for each new person that joins and they have a set of tasks that they do each day. It's pretty well guided. I can share the template with you if you're curious. That'd be amazing.
Speaker 2
I would love that. Is this for all employees or EA specifically? All employees. All employees. Okay.
Speaker 1
And there is a video of me at the start of each week. It's a loom where I specifically say, Hey, at this point, people usually want to skip onboarding and start jumping into their tasks. Don't do that. It's always a mistake. Really take onboarding seriously. Our onboarding process is a full month. And we don't expect people to start producing for a month. It really does take that long for a lot of people to get fully up to speed. And we help guide them in more slowly. Read these books. Read this documentation that we have about how we built our culture, especially for our case, because the way that we operate is very different than a lot of people's previous experiences. And so it's pretty jarring when you see a lot of the transparency of when your first one on one gets published to the rest of the company, it's pretty jarring.
Speaker 2
And so we try to ease people into these things. You know, it's also going to be jarring is if you become a public company, yeah, totally. Things will have to change a bit. Probably. But yeah, continues. All right. That's a job.
Speaker 1
That's true. And over time, people get used to it over the course of about a month. I think the biggest thing is the cultural assimilation. In our case, has been the biggest hurdle over the course of onboarding is getting people reading the memos, practicing some of the things. One of the cultural values that we have is everything's written in pencil. But also you can change things here. And one of the things that we do is at the end of onboarding, everybody is required to update the onboarding process for something that was out of date, and then post to a channel confirming What they changed and just giving a list of what they changed. And it's pretty weird for people, especially those who come from larger companies, like when they've had, you know, the same onboarding process that the company's had for 20 years, And then they go in the actual files and edit it themselves. I'm a new employee.)
- Time 0:56:14
- information_upkeep, onboarding, 1socialpost-queue,

(highlight:: Organizational Entropy: the tendency for artifacts you produce to start rotting immediately
Summary:
Any artifact produced within an organization immediately begins to deteriorate, much like a new car losing its value.
Once published, such as a memo, it begins to become outdated. Entropy, in this context, always increases, requiring continual input of energy to prevent deterioration.
This demands the creation of reinforcement mechanisms to ensure that all content remains current and functional, such as periodically checking and updating a database of memos.
Transcript:
Speaker 1
Organizational entropy, which is any artifact that you produce immediately starts rotting the moment that you have created it.
Speaker 2
It's like driving a new car after a lot.
Speaker 1
Yeah, the moment that anything is published in the company, you write a memo, it is already rotting. It is already going to be out of date. And so the concept of entropy is it is always increasing. And so the only way to keep entropy at bay is you have to add more energy into the system. So you have to create reinforcement mechanisms for any piece of content that you have. If you have a database of all your memos, you have to check them every once in a while to make sure they're up to date. You need to create more energy always has to go in in order to keep things fresh and functional.)
- Time 0:58:45
- information_upkeep, knowledge_half-life, organizational_entropy, content_management, information_management, 1socialpost-queue,

(highlight:: News Sobriety: Protect Your Attention by Seeking Out Information
Summary:
News sobriety means not allowing others to impose information upon your attention and actively seeking out information.
Seemingly trivial information can have a significant subconscious impact, leading to an availability bias problem. For example, seeing a plane crash on the news may lead to subconscious fear of planes, despite knowing the statistics.
It's hard to overcome the mental impact of visual information.
Transcript:
Speaker 1
One of the biggest ones is news sobriety. And I think that encapsulates a lot more. One of my personal philosophies is that I do not allow others to impose upon my attention. And so if I am getting information, I would like to seek it out. And I don't want other people to take my time against my will or tell me what I should be thinking or focused on whether I want to or not. That's been a big challenge is I think almost everyone underestimates how impactful even seemingly trivial information is of like seeing a plane crash on the news will make you fear Planes subconsciously. It is an availability bias problem. You can know the statistics and you can say that it's safer. But in your mind, if you see it happen, or you see something on the news, you assume that it is representative of the world. And it's really hard to beat.)
- Time 1:19:21
- attention, information_diets,
- [note::Reminds me of the impact of sci fi movies on national policy (e.g. Biden watches Terminator and asks so-and-so about AI safety, which ends up funding a new initiative). I think this is what the "butterfly effect" tries to communicate - that the smallest, most trivial actions often cause huge effects down the line.]

(highlight:: What You Do With Your Time Determines Your Life's Priorities
Summary:
Your priorities are determined by how you spend your time.
Your actions define who you are, and your calendar reflects your true priorities in life.
Transcript:
Speaker 1
How you spend your time are your priorities. And that's a difficult thing for people to understand. But it really is like an epistemological problem where the example would be if you're an axe murderer, but you go your whole life and you never murder someone with an axe, are you actually An axe murderer? Like the act is what makes you what you are. Yeah, I think this is Ben Horitz's book, like what you do is who you are. That is what it is, how you spend your time. Doesn't matter. Your calendar is your priorities.)
- Time 1:49:19
- life, attention, goals, prioritization, purpose,

(highlight:: Optimize for Eigenvector Centrality in your Professional Network
Summary:
Understanding the value of relationships in professional and personal contexts is crucial.
Eigenvector centrality, a form of network centrality highlighted in the paper 'The Strength of Weak Ties', emphasizes the significance of weak ties over strong ties in finding opportunities. Dense networks, where everyone knows each other, limit the introduction of new information and opportunities.
Therefore, connecting with individuals outside of your immediate network (second, third degree, and beyond) holds great value.
Focusing on building relationships with individuals in different dense networks opens up access to novel opportunities.
This approach contrasts with traditional measures of popularity or degree centrality, which simply quantify the number of people one knows. Prioritizing eigenvector centrality in professional networking, such as in fundraising or business development, can lead to unexpected valuable connections and opportunities.
Transcript:
Speaker 1
And so network theory is really understanding why some of these relationships are more valuable in whatever way you choose to describe value. Is it professionally valuable? Is it personally valuable? Whatever the thing is. And there are several categories that are especially relevant for interpersonal human networks. One that is, it's a really underappreciated form of network centralities. It was called eigenvectors centrality. There's a famous paper by Paul Granovetor. I think written in the 70s called The Strength of Weak Ties. Cool title. Yeah, it's a very important paper in network theory, which it talks about how much more important weak ties are than strong ties. How you are more likely to find your next job from somebody who is an acquaintance rather than a friend. How you are more likely to find your life partner from an acquaintance rather than a friend.
Speaker 2
Is that because the close friends are so overlapping that there's the introduction of novelties less likely? Exactly.
Speaker 1
It's what's known as a dense network. It is a network where all the people in the network know each other. And so almost necessarily, you already know all those people and you already have all that information. So if there was a job in that group, you would already know about it. And so the second degree and the third degree eigenvectors like the nth degree outside of your network are the people who you should really be thinking a lot more about. And that's where a lot of the value comes from. And so eigenvector centrality is when I really understood this concept, I started shifting the way that I spend my time and building a network of it is infinitely more valuable to have One friend who is in a different dense network than another friend in the same dense network. Because you suddenly have access, like knowing one person in the apparel space versus zero makes a massive difference because they probably know all the people in the apparel space. Knowing one person who's a professional basketball player is way different than knowing zero because they know all the people in pro basketball. And so this is more thinking about it from a professional lens of when you're doing fundraising or you're building a company, you never know where this value is going to come from. And so finding ways of creating this strong eigenvector centrality, as opposed to what most people think of when they think of popularity is what's called degree centrality, which Is how many people you know. And like, if you're the mayor of a small town or how many people know you, sure, this is a slightly different thing. But yes, that would be called diffusion centrality.)
- Time 2:29:42
- eigenvector_centrality, professional_networking,

Finding the Right Balance Between Spending Time Strong Ties (Friendships v.s. Weak Ties
Summary:
The speaker has adopted a different approach to networking by focusing on positive interactions and minimizing time with individuals who produce negative emotional states.
They prioritize spending time with a small group of people who have had disproportionately positive impacts. The speaker considers the energetic cost and trade-offs of engaging with new people versus investing time in existing strong ties.
They emphasize the importance of prioritizing time with close friends before seeking new opportunities, highlighting the potential benefits of investing in strong ties over numerous weak ties.
Transcript:
Speaker 2
I find that logically makes a lot of sense if you are trying to increase the surface area upon which opportunities and sort of serendipitous introduction slash information can stick. And in the last few years, I've taken a very different approach. I don't know the network theory terms for it, but I've looked at my calendar every year. I do this. I do a past year review. Look at my calendar and identify among other things the people who produced the peak low and high emotional valence. So if I'm looking at the positive interactions that were disproportionately positive and then the people I interacted with who produced very disproportionate negative emotional States, I cut out the latter or dramatically reduced to the extent possible. And then I try to increase the time with the people who are grouped in the former. What I find is that's a very small group for me. So when I've had opportunities, and this is probably, life is about trade-offs oftentimes, right? So when I have people offer to make introductions, and I know that's going to consume a certain amount of time, the question that I ask myself is like looking at your calendar, I'm like, Okay, I know this could consume many hours. Even if I don't want to engage, I will now have an open mode of communication with someone, which will have some bearing on like energetic cost. Am I willing to apply that time to this new person? Or would I rather apply that to people with whom I would already want to spend more time in the sense that I'm like, these are your best friends. Do you spend as much time with these people as you would like to? Did you spend enough time or as much time as you'd like in the last year? For a lot of people, the answer is going to be no. So I'm like, until I check that, I'm not going to look for new opportunities. Although I'm in a somewhat, I guess I accomplished maybe what you're describing through say the podcast, right? I've had 700 podcasts in different fields. So it's pretty easy for me to find something as like a just-in-time introduction as opposed to just-in-case introduction. But I guess what I'm wondering is at this point you've hosted whatever it is, 100 salons, I would imagine you have at least one node, like a weak tie in most places. For sure. So what are the benefits, the potential benefits that come from a thousand people of quarter? That just seems like at face value to me, like incredible overkill.)
- Time 2:32:49
- friendship, relationship_strength, relationships,

(highlight:: Where do I Find Executive Assistants and How Much Do They Cost?
Summary:
Executive assistants can be sourced through agencies like Athena or Shepherd, with Athena being higher-end and costing around 15 to 20 dollars an hour, while Shepherd is on the cheaper side, costing around 5 dollars an hour.
Directly sourcing assistants can also be done through platforms like Upwork, where talent can be found for a lower cost, but it may involve more overhead and less structured management.
Transcript:
Speaker 2
So sourcing, what some of the better options are, and then how you evaluate?
Speaker 1
There are several ways you can go about sourcing. I've always found the best way to do is to work with an agency. We work with Athena. There are an agency out of the Philippines. They're really the higher end of agencies and they cost more. And so it really depends on how much you value that. Other options would be you can source them directly, which tend to be cheaper. I think Athena's 15, $20 an hour, typically, and you can find talent for $5 an hour if you source it yourself.
Speaker 2
How would you source that directly for people who were interested in the lower end?
Speaker 1
Yeah, so Upwork is a place where people often go to find them. There's also another agency that's sort of on the cheaper side, which is Shepherd. My friend Nick is involved with them. They tend to be more like $5 an hour, but it requires a lot more overhead. So they don't have their own management team. It's really you and them figuring it out as opposed to having more of a structure around it.)
- Time 0:37:21
- delegation, executive_assistants, 1socialdont-post,

(highlight:: Level's Company Onboarding Process
Summary:
The company has a well-guided onboarding checklist for all employees, which spans over a full month.
Each new employee is guided to take onboarding seriously, and not expected to start producing for the first month. There is emphasis on reading specific documentation that outlines the company's culture, which is highlighted as significantly different from past experiences.
The company eases new employees into the transparency of operations and has a unique practice of requiring employees to update the onboarding process at the end of the month, reflecting the value that 'everything's written in pencil' and is subject to change.
Transcript:
Speaker 1
And we have an onboarding checklist in notion. We have a template. We copy it for each new person that joins and they have a set of tasks that they do each day. It's pretty well guided. I can share the template with you if you're curious. That'd be amazing.
Speaker 2
I would love that. Is this for all employees or EA specifically? All employees. All employees. Okay.
Speaker 1
And there is a video of me at the start of each week. It's a loom where I specifically say, Hey, at this point, people usually want to skip onboarding and start jumping into their tasks. Don't do that. It's always a mistake. Really take onboarding seriously. Our onboarding process is a full month. And we don't expect people to start producing for a month. It really does take that long for a lot of people to get fully up to speed. And we help guide them in more slowly. Read these books. Read this documentation that we have about how we built our culture, especially for our case, because the way that we operate is very different than a lot of people's previous experiences. And so it's pretty jarring when you see a lot of the transparency of when your first one on one gets published to the rest of the company, it's pretty jarring.
Speaker 2
And so we try to ease people into these things. You know, it's also going to be jarring is if you become a public company, yeah, totally. Things will have to change a bit. Probably. But yeah, continues. All right. That's a job.
Speaker 1
That's true. And over time, people get used to it over the course of about a month. I think the biggest thing is the cultural assimilation. In our case, has been the biggest hurdle over the course of onboarding is getting people reading the memos, practicing some of the things. One of the cultural values that we have is everything's written in pencil. But also you can change things here. And one of the things that we do is at the end of onboarding, everybody is required to update the onboarding process for something that was out of date, and then post to a channel confirming What they changed and just giving a list of what they changed. And it's pretty weird for people, especially those who come from larger companies, like when they've had, you know, the same onboarding process that the company's had for 20 years, And then they go in the actual files and edit it themselves. I'm a new employee.)
- Time 0:56:14
- information_upkeep, onboarding, 1socialpost-queue,

(highlight:: Organizational Entropy: the tendency for artifacts you produce to start rotting immediately
Summary:
Any artifact produced within an organization immediately begins to deteriorate, much like a new car losing its value.
Once published, such as a memo, it begins to become outdated. Entropy, in this context, always increases, requiring continual input of energy to prevent deterioration.
This demands the creation of reinforcement mechanisms to ensure that all content remains current and functional, such as periodically checking and updating a database of memos.
Transcript:
Speaker 1
Organizational entropy, which is any artifact that you produce immediately starts rotting the moment that you have created it.
Speaker 2
It's like driving a new car after a lot.
Speaker 1
Yeah, the moment that anything is published in the company, you write a memo, it is already rotting. It is already going to be out of date. And so the concept of entropy is it is always increasing. And so the only way to keep entropy at bay is you have to add more energy into the system. So you have to create reinforcement mechanisms for any piece of content that you have. If you have a database of all your memos, you have to check them every once in a while to make sure they're up to date. You need to create more energy always has to go in in order to keep things fresh and functional.)
- Time 0:58:45
- information_upkeep, knowledge_half-life, organizational_entropy, content_management, information_management, 1socialpost-queue,

(highlight:: News Sobriety: Protect Your Attention by Seeking Out Information
Summary:
News sobriety means not allowing others to impose information upon your attention and actively seeking out information.
Seemingly trivial information can have a significant subconscious impact, leading to an availability bias problem. For example, seeing a plane crash on the news may lead to subconscious fear of planes, despite knowing the statistics.
It's hard to overcome the mental impact of visual information.
Transcript:
Speaker 1
One of the biggest ones is news sobriety. And I think that encapsulates a lot more. One of my personal philosophies is that I do not allow others to impose upon my attention. And so if I am getting information, I would like to seek it out. And I don't want other people to take my time against my will or tell me what I should be thinking or focused on whether I want to or not. That's been a big challenge is I think almost everyone underestimates how impactful even seemingly trivial information is of like seeing a plane crash on the news will make you fear Planes subconsciously. It is an availability bias problem. You can know the statistics and you can say that it's safer. But in your mind, if you see it happen, or you see something on the news, you assume that it is representative of the world. And it's really hard to beat.)
- Time 1:19:21
- attention, information_diets,
- [note::Reminds me of the impact of sci fi movies on national policy (e.g. Biden watches Terminator and asks so-and-so about AI safety, which ends up funding a new initiative). I think this is what the "butterfly effect" tries to communicate - that the smallest, most trivial actions often cause huge effects down the line.]

(highlight:: What You Do With Your Time Determines Your Life's Priorities
Summary:
Your priorities are determined by how you spend your time.
Your actions define who you are, and your calendar reflects your true priorities in life.
Transcript:
Speaker 1
How you spend your time are your priorities. And that's a difficult thing for people to understand. But it really is like an epistemological problem where the example would be if you're an axe murderer, but you go your whole life and you never murder someone with an axe, are you actually An axe murderer? Like the act is what makes you what you are. Yeah, I think this is Ben Horitz's book, like what you do is who you are. That is what it is, how you spend your time. Doesn't matter. Your calendar is your priorities.)
- Time 1:49:19
- life, attention, goals, prioritization, purpose,

(highlight:: Optimize for Eigenvector Centrality in your Professional Network
Summary:
Understanding the value of relationships in professional and personal contexts is crucial.
Eigenvector centrality, a form of network centrality highlighted in the paper 'The Strength of Weak Ties', emphasizes the significance of weak ties over strong ties in finding opportunities. Dense networks, where everyone knows each other, limit the introduction of new information and opportunities.
Therefore, connecting with individuals outside of your immediate network (second, third degree, and beyond) holds great value.
Focusing on building relationships with individuals in different dense networks opens up access to novel opportunities.
This approach contrasts with traditional measures of popularity or degree centrality, which simply quantify the number of people one knows. Prioritizing eigenvector centrality in professional networking, such as in fundraising or business development, can lead to unexpected valuable connections and opportunities.
Transcript:
Speaker 1
And so network theory is really understanding why some of these relationships are more valuable in whatever way you choose to describe value. Is it professionally valuable? Is it personally valuable? Whatever the thing is. And there are several categories that are especially relevant for interpersonal human networks. One that is, it's a really underappreciated form of network centralities. It was called eigenvectors centrality. There's a famous paper by Paul Granovetor. I think written in the 70s called The Strength of Weak Ties. Cool title. Yeah, it's a very important paper in network theory, which it talks about how much more important weak ties are than strong ties. How you are more likely to find your next job from somebody who is an acquaintance rather than a friend. How you are more likely to find your life partner from an acquaintance rather than a friend.
Speaker 2
Is that because the close friends are so overlapping that there's the introduction of novelties less likely? Exactly.
Speaker 1
It's what's known as a dense network. It is a network where all the people in the network know each other. And so almost necessarily, you already know all those people and you already have all that information. So if there was a job in that group, you would already know about it. And so the second degree and the third degree eigenvectors like the nth degree outside of your network are the people who you should really be thinking a lot more about. And that's where a lot of the value comes from. And so eigenvector centrality is when I really understood this concept, I started shifting the way that I spend my time and building a network of it is infinitely more valuable to have One friend who is in a different dense network than another friend in the same dense network. Because you suddenly have access, like knowing one person in the apparel space versus zero makes a massive difference because they probably know all the people in the apparel space. Knowing one person who's a professional basketball player is way different than knowing zero because they know all the people in pro basketball. And so this is more thinking about it from a professional lens of when you're doing fundraising or you're building a company, you never know where this value is going to come from. And so finding ways of creating this strong eigenvector centrality, as opposed to what most people think of when they think of popularity is what's called degree centrality, which Is how many people you know. And like, if you're the mayor of a small town or how many people know you, sure, this is a slightly different thing. But yes, that would be called diffusion centrality.)
- Time 2:29:42
- eigenvector_centrality, professional_networking,

Finding the Right Balance Between Spending Time Strong Ties (Friendships v.s. Weak Ties
Summary:
The speaker has adopted a different approach to networking by focusing on positive interactions and minimizing time with individuals who produce negative emotional states.
They prioritize spending time with a small group of people who have had disproportionately positive impacts. The speaker considers the energetic cost and trade-offs of engaging with new people versus investing time in existing strong ties.
They emphasize the importance of prioritizing time with close friends before seeking new opportunities, highlighting the potential benefits of investing in strong ties over numerous weak ties.
Transcript:
Speaker 2
I find that logically makes a lot of sense if you are trying to increase the surface area upon which opportunities and sort of serendipitous introduction slash information can stick. And in the last few years, I've taken a very different approach. I don't know the network theory terms for it, but I've looked at my calendar every year. I do this. I do a past year review. Look at my calendar and identify among other things the people who produced the peak low and high emotional valence. So if I'm looking at the positive interactions that were disproportionately positive and then the people I interacted with who produced very disproportionate negative emotional States, I cut out the latter or dramatically reduced to the extent possible. And then I try to increase the time with the people who are grouped in the former. What I find is that's a very small group for me. So when I've had opportunities, and this is probably, life is about trade-offs oftentimes, right? So when I have people offer to make introductions, and I know that's going to consume a certain amount of time, the question that I ask myself is like looking at your calendar, I'm like, Okay, I know this could consume many hours. Even if I don't want to engage, I will now have an open mode of communication with someone, which will have some bearing on like energetic cost. Am I willing to apply that time to this new person? Or would I rather apply that to people with whom I would already want to spend more time in the sense that I'm like, these are your best friends. Do you spend as much time with these people as you would like to? Did you spend enough time or as much time as you'd like in the last year? For a lot of people, the answer is going to be no. So I'm like, until I check that, I'm not going to look for new opportunities. Although I'm in a somewhat, I guess I accomplished maybe what you're describing through say the podcast, right? I've had 700 podcasts in different fields. So it's pretty easy for me to find something as like a just-in-time introduction as opposed to just-in-case introduction. But I guess what I'm wondering is at this point you've hosted whatever it is, 100 salons, I would imagine you have at least one node, like a weak tie in most places. For sure. So what are the benefits, the potential benefits that come from a thousand people of quarter? That just seems like at face value to me, like incredible overkill.)
- Time 2:32:49
- friendship, relationship_strength, relationships,