You don’t need to be first with an idea, you just need to be able to execute well.
This is the essence of an idea from James Gardner discussing the theme of innovation, as picked up by the ever wonderful Dave Briggs. It articulates, in one short sentence, something I’ve felt for a long time and which I’d articulated in a much worse way (i.e. that the world doesn’t need new ideas; it just needs to take the stuff that we know works and enable it to work at scale).
A fascinating discussion on the topic, led by Gardner, is embedded below:
arbitrary constant 