Molly Graham — early Google, Facebook (Chan Zuckerberg Initiative under Zuck), scaling Quip with Bret Taylor, now running Glue Club for operators in fast-changing companies — has built her practice around one paradox: to grow with your company, you have to keep handing back what you've gotten good at.
The core frameworks:
- Give away your Legos. 'You have to grow as fast as your company is growing if you really want to take advantage, both learning to give away what you've gotten good at and move on to the next shiny pile of Legos.' The reason this hurts: you got good at the old pile and it feels like yours. The reason you do it anyway: the next pile is always more interesting and only available to people who've already let go.
- The J-curve vs. the stairs. Chamath drew her two career paths on a whiteboard: the stairs (predictable promotions every two years, boring), or the J-curve — jump off the cliff, fall for 6-9 months, then climb out far higher than the stairs ever reached. The J-curve is what you choose when you give away your Legos.
- Bob the monster. Every change — getting layered, a new hire, losing a project — comes with a wave of emotion that says send the rage email, push them over, take it back. Molly externalized that voice into a character named Bob. 'Bob's job is to make me the worst version of myself.' You don't need to make Bob go away; you need to not act on him.
- The two-week rule. 'These emotions do not go away in 24 hours.' Most reactions roll through in days. Anything still there after two weeks is real signal — go talk to someone about it.
- Embrace change, step into the future. 'Holding onto things almost always leads us to the worst version of ourselves.' You can't see around the corner; the move is to step into it.
For the mid-level PM: this is a week-by-week practice. Which Lego are you holding because it's familiar? What email is Bob trying to send? What change are you fighting that you should be stepping into?