It is not enough to be good at something | Show Your Work!

Sent on June 1st, 2021

Hi , I’m Aravind Balla and you are reading letter #11 from the Hackletter where I talk about the learnings and give you behind the scenes of things I keep doing for fun.

Takeaways from Show Your Work!

It’s a great book. If you haven’t read it yet, I highly recommend getting a copy. It’s short one packed with gold. I couldn’t resist taking notes while reading the book. These are my takeaways from it.

Share your journey

We generally have the tendency to share things when we release something. We announce when we are done. But then, that announcement, on social media, doesn’t get the reach and engagement we wanted to have.

In comparison, imagine you were tweeting about what you are building at every small win. These series of tweets are capable of reaching more eyes. And people who resonate will stick around. People connect with the stories. Not just success stories, but also failure ones. Tell how you failed. And what you learned from it. Stories make us human.

But human beings are interested in other human beings and what other human beings do.

Be discoverable

But it’s not enough to be good. In order to be found, you have to be findable.

This is the key #1 takeaway for me. How will anyone find out about you if are not discoverable. Put yourself out there.

How? 👇

Teach what you know

Teaching people doesn’t subtract value from what you do, it actually adds to it. When you teach someone how to do your work, you are, in effect, generating more interest in your work.

People feel closer to your work when you let them know how it's done. You grow more as a community, than as an individual who is working by keeping their methods as a secret.

When one teaches, two learn. The person you are teaching and you.

When you try explaining to others, that topic gets clarified in your head as well. In turn, you will be developing a strong understanding of that topic.

Don’t assume what you know is obvious and think that others would know it as well.

That’s all for this letter. I have a lengthy notes on this one and will post a complete summary on my blog later.

Thanks reading and I’d appreciate if you share this with your friends if you think they’ll enjoy too. Have a great week.

See you next Tuesday. ✌️