E38: Whurley – Founder & CEO of Strangeworks – 8 of 8 – control yourself, not your team

The final episode of an 8 part series with Whurley, CEO & Founder of of Strangeworks, a company accelerating the evolution of quantum computing. He doubles down on the advice and recommends 2 things to CEOs and founders. 1. They should respond, not react. Always take your time to respond to anything serious, or seemingly serious – and be very careful not to make assumptions.2. Influence your team, but don’t control them.  “Understand the difference between reaction and response. One is voluntary. And the other is not …. When innovation happens in a company and somebody brings an idea and says ‘I think we should do this crazy thing’, you shouldn’t say ‘You know here’s all the reasons we can’t’  … you should provide the opportunity, the space for that innovation to thrive. When you’re at a start-up and an investor says no, you shouldn’t fire an email off and say “well thanks … f*** you for not giving me this money .. you know, maybe you shouldn’t respond to him for a week or two… because I guarantee you no matter what problem you have in a startup or as an entrepreneur, if you sleep on it for 72 hours, it’ll look completely different.”