It does fit into my view. Our first shareholder letter, in 1997, was entitled, “It’s all about the long term.” If everything you do needs to work on a three-year time horizon, then you’re competing against a lot of people. But if you’re willing to invest on a seven-year time horizon, you’re now competing against a fraction of those people, because very few companies are willing to do that. Just by lengthening the time horizon, you can engage in endeavors that you could never otherwise pursue. At Amazon we like things to work in five to seven years. We’re willing to plant seeds, let them grow—and we’re very stubborn. We say we’re stubborn on vision and flexible on details.
- Jeff Bezos, from “6 Things Jeff Bezos Knew in 1997 That Made Amazon a Gorilla”
Nothing signals genius like this type of thinking. And if you haven’t read that first letter to shareholders from ‘97 that he referenced, you really should.
Source: forbes.com
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