Nik Storonsky is one of the most hardcore and competitive founders I’ve ever talked to. He’s the founder of Revolut, a $115 billion company, and wants to be the number one bank in 100 countries. When someone asked Nik if he was coming for Jamie Dimon's lunch, he said “I’m coming for his dinner.” “We want to dominate, otherwise what’s the point?” He removed every VC from his board, and when one investor pushed him too far, he started his own fund to compete with them. Nik has a lot of ideas on talent, product design, marketing, constraints, and what makes founder-led companies special. This is a fascinating conversation about competition, speed, and building a machine-like company. 0:00 Coming for Jamie Dimon's dinner 2:04 Building the #1 bank in 100 countries 6:12 Why founders beat professional CEOs 8:45 Revolut's biggest mistake 12:47 Why legacy banks can't innovate 17:20 Running a company like a machine 20:28 Funding winners and cutting losers like a trader 23:31 How AI is changing Revolut's team structure 25:23 50 direct reports and spreading innovation fast 29:59 Hiring self-guided missiles 33:31 Too much money makes founders weaker 37:38 What Europe's constraints taught Revolut 41:08 Why VCs are like football cheerleaders 49:28 Starting a fund to compete with VCs 54:28 From zero marketing to buying Europe's airports 1:00:21 Funding moonshots like a global tech company 1:03:58 Building an unstoppable machine Includes paid partnerships.

Revolut CEO Nik Storonsky says most VCs are like cheerleaders trying to play on the field: “These people basically think that because of them, the company was created because they gave money, and that they are entitled to a large part of its success.” “My advice to entrepreneurs would be: even if you raise money from VCs, pay a lot of attention to shareholder agreement.” “Ensure that they’re purely financial players, with no voting rights and no seat at the table in decision-making.” “If something goes wrong, you effectively have cheerleaders who look at the match, and then try to play the match instead of professional players. That’s always a disaster.”

Revolut CEO Nik Storonsky says easy money makes soft founders: “A lot of founders think money is free, which it almost is in California because you can raise so much money at ridiculous valuations and then just spend.” “There is a different culture of trying to solve problems with money rather than with your brains.”

Revolut CEO Nik Storonsky on why it’s easier for founders to build great businesses than professional CEOs: “Professional CEOs optimize certain metrics, but they’re not 10X people.” “They're just there for their bonuses effectively for 3-4 years. As a result, they don't make bold decisions. They always play defense. They never play offense.” “Professional CEOs, ultimately their goal is to protect their job. They think about themselves and the company as two entities. I think about myself and the company as one entity.” “It's much easier to compete against non founders. If I would be competing with all the banks and they were all founder-led, as a world, we would all have much better products by now. That's not what's happening.”

Revolut founder Nik Storonsky says one of his investors tried forcing him to fire his best person: “He was forcing me to fire my best person, because he was too hardcore.” “Of course I didn’t fire him. I said no.” “Pretty early on I realized that quite a few VCs, they are not very operational, and they can be actually dangerous for the company if they have enough power. So every single investment round, we just remove VCs.” “Now I don't have any VCs on the board. I think that's the best. You always need to have operators rather than VCs on the board, people who actually build business and who know how to do things.”

Some of my favorite photos from my conversation with @NStoronsky, co-founder and CEO of @Revolut. Episode is out tomorrow.

Does @RickRubin have a self-critical voice playing in his head while he works? "Never." "What it usually is, is it starts apprehensive when we start, because it could be anything. So at first it's scary." "I know I'm patient and I know I'll wait until it's great." "As soon as there's a glimmer, as soon as I hear something that's good, then I relax." "Once something lands, whatever it is, I relax. Okay, we have at least a direction to move in. It doesn't mean we stay in that direction forever. But having a direction is better than not having a direction."

Why @AriEmanuel went on a five-day meditation retreat at the top of his career: "Day one, it was going over my childhood, dyslexia, finding identity, or the lack of identity, trying to get identity and what that means, fear of being found out." "My father was an immigrant, my mother is the first generation. From my father's side, we're the first generation. Education, and that was everything. I wasn't great at it, I couldn't read, right?" "I just got calmer in this process of, you're not stupid, you don't have to worry, you're not going to be found out that you're stupid. What I do is an art form." "And that doesn't take away from any of my aggression, any of my desire to be successful, any of that other stuff." "I say it all the time, I just want my mom to love me for one week more than she loves you guys."

I just spoke with @BenWilsonTweets and he said the response to the episode has been “life-affirming”. Since it was released he’s received introductions to other people who have beaten advanced cancer and so far you have helped raise over $800,000 for Ben and his family. Ben’s doctor originally gave him a year to live. With the new medication Ben is on (that’s working!) the goal is to push that out to 2 to 3 years and then with new therapies push 2 to 3 to 10, and then 10 to 25, and 25 to 50 and Ben gets to see his 4 small children grow up. Even today someone offered to make an introduction to Ben for a promising new therapy. I’d like to ask you to keep helping spread the word about Ben. Someone out there that doesn’t know about Ben (yet) could have information that could save his life. And if you’d like to donate you can do that here. Every little bit matters: gofundme.com/f/help-ben-figh…

I love @ZachBDell’s two notebook idea: "I'm the kind of person who needs to write clearly to think clearly." Two different colored notebooks to distinguish when you're working in your business vs working on your business. Working "in" the business (red notebook, at the office): Handling day-to-day operational problems and near-term issues. "When I'm working in the business I'm blocking and tackling and solving problems that are blocking us today. I'm trying to figure out personnel problems and product problems and acute issues that are near term." Working "on" the business (black notebook, at home after hours): Strategic thinking, planning 6–12 months out, war-gaming, and imagining big ideas. "When I'm working on the business I'm thinking six months out, 12 months out, and kind of strategic war gaming and chess playing." Zach deliberately segments his day: office hours for operational work, then time at home (after his wife goes to bed) with no phone or computer, just the black notebook for focused strategy: