Ben Horowitz's Brutal Truth: Easy Choices Are Slowly Turning You Into A 'Coward'

Ben Horowitz, cofounder and general partner at Andreessen Horowitz (A16z), once wrote that his toughest business calls demanded grit more than intelligence or knowledge.

What Happened: In a 2011 essay, Horowitz wrote that "the most important decisions tested my courage far more than my intelligence," a mindset he says shapes A16z's screening of founders for "brilliance and courage."

He said, "the right decision is often obvious," yet leaders face intense pressure to do the easier, wrong thing, and that pressure only grows as companies scale.

Horowitz illustrated the tension with a familiar pitch-room scene where cofounders who insist they "both" run the company and plan to do so "forever," force employees to chase double approvals because the leaders won't decide who's in charge.

The fix, he wrote, is developing courage, ignoring fear, making the hard call and accepting that even a slight preference towards a choice may pit you against smarter, more experienced voices, which will question your resolve.

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“Every time you make the hard, correct decision, you become a bit more courageous and every time you make the easy, wrong decision, you become a bit more cowardly," he wrote, saying choices define a "courageous or cowardly company."

Why It Matters: Many of today's marquee leaders echo the theme. Warren Buffett's playbook champions contrarian nerve. Buffett wrote in a 2003 shareholder letter, "Be fearful when others are greedy and greedy when others are fearful," a principle widely cited to explain Berkshire Hathaway’s discipline through booms and busts.

Jeff Bezos frames courage as taking asymmetrical bets. "Given a 10% chance of a 100 times payoff, you should take that bet every time," he once wrote, arguing that one big winner can fund many failures and that innovation requires being misunderstood.

Elon Musk links progress to risk tolerance, telling audiences, "Failure is an option here. If things are not failing, you are not innovating enough," while urging people to pursue hard problems even when the odds look bad.

Photo Courtesy: PHOTOCREO Michal Bednarek on Shutterstock.com

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