Tag: contrarian thinking

The “ball bearings” philosophy is something that I first heard about from Tim Ferriss’ podcast. He was interviewing Adam Robinson, a world-renowned advisor to many of the world’s largest hedge funds (and co-founder of the Princeton Review), and Robinson was asked about what advice he had for people trying to make an impact. Almost immediately — and to the audience’s delight — Robinson responded, “ball bearings.”

Adam’s point was not that everyone should actually go devote their lives to ball bearings, but rather, that innovation often comes when people explore topics that no one (or relatively few people) have ever looked at. He gave the examples of Uber and Airbnb: who ever thought that two of the most valuable companies in human history would come from studying the problems revolving taxis and hotels?

The “ball bearings” philosophy: look into places where most people have never looked at (and therefore there are the most opportunities), hone and apply your skills in the subject, and innovate.

Last month, I had the chance to sit down and talk to Farhat Ali, the previous President and CEO of Fujitsu America, as well as a member of the Princeton Class of 1977. Our talk spanned everywhere from topics like combining business school with a technical degree, to appropriately managing a startup. However, I think one of the most interesting pieces of insight I got from Farhat was his explanation of the difference between “invention” and “innovation.”

Strictly speaking, an invention is some novel creation — U.S. patent law defines it as “a new, useful process, machine, improvement, etc., that did not exist previously and that is recognized as the product of some unique intuition or genius, as distinguished from ordinary mechanical skill or craftsmanship.”

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I recently got the chance to read through Sam Hinkie’s Philadelphia 76ers resignation letter in full. For those of you unfamiliar with Sam Hinkie and his time in the NBA, Sam Hinkie was the former General Manager and President of Basketball Operations of the Philadelphia 76ers, rather infamous for his contrarian approaches to managing a basketball team, an approach that was undoubtedly influenced by his background in management consulting and finance.

After embarking on a multi-year quest of stockpiling young players and orchestrating a variety of other non-traditional basketball moves, Hinkie suddenly resigned from his position. In a leaked resignation letter, he revealed the motivating theories and ideas that drove his decision-making process — I’ve included a few of the more noteworthy quotes and ideas from the letter, and have also added my own thoughts and reactions.

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