Quitting Mediocre Success

Shaan Puri shares his perspective on the underrated skill of knowing when to quit, particularly emphasizing the challenge of leaving ventures that are neither failing nor highly successful. He argues that the most difficult quitting decisions involve moderately successful projects that consume resources without delivering optimal returns.

Key Points:

• The Art of Quitting is Undervalued:

  • Society emphasizes never quitting
  • Quitting serves a valuable function in business and life
  • Most people are taught perseverance over strategic quitting

• Three Zones of Business Performance:

  • Easy to Quit: Obviously failing ventures
  • Hard to Quit: The "danger zone" of mediocrity
  • Shouldn't Quit: Clearly successful ventures

• The "Middle Zone" Challenge:

  • Not consuming all attention, but taking up some
  • Not failing completely, but not achieving full potential
  • Hardest to recognize and act upon
  • Most people struggle to quit these ventures

• Personal Example from Shaan:

  • Had a venture fund deploying ~$10M annually
  • Fund was profitable and "good enough"
  • Found better opportunities elsewhere
  • Made a ruthless decision to stop immediately
  • Didn't let it "chug along and eat away at focus"

• Strategic Quitting Approach:

  • Be ruthless about evaluating middle-performing ventures
  • Don't let mediocrity consume resources
  • Make clean breaks when better opportunities arise
  • Act quickly once decision is made ("stopping it yesterday")