Newsletter for Software Engineers. Teaching how to solve career and life problems with first principles thinking. One email. Once a week.
Why Rejection Is A Good Thing 🍀
First Principles — Issue #48
Overcoming Rejection
Sometimes the word "no" stings.
A partner breaking up with you, a friend saying they won't support you, a job turning you down.
Odds are you get rejected way more than you get accepted.
Ironically having less fear rejection primes you for success. Its feels counter-intuitive, but people who find successful have failed more than anybody else.
Conditioning yourself to rejection has tons of upside. Lean in to it, make rejection happen, and get rejected until there is little discomfort.
After tons of rejection in my life, here are 3 frames of thinking that help me bounce back fast:
The Truth About Fear
Nothing will plague your life more than letting fear take the wheel.
- Doing a job you have because you fear what people will thing
- Killing a budding love story because you fear they don't feel the same
- Ignoring your internal voice because you fear the bad parts of taking a chance
Avoiding rejection is at the top of this list.
For rejection to exist there must be an opportunity. A potential partner, a potential customer, a potential job, or a potential friend. Something must be at stake.
In the normal case – a person "shoots their shot" and gets a yes or a no. This is optimal. By at least taking the chance you offload the responsibility of rejection to the prospect. This means you did your part, and presented your case.
In the worst case – a person never "shoots their shot". This is the worst case scenario. By never shooting your shot you refused the prospect the opportunity to reject you. However, you also refused them the opportunity to accept you. In other words you killed the opportunity.
By avoiding rejection you guarantee rejection.
By avoiding rejection you rejected yourself.
At least have the dignity to allow somebody else to do the rejecting. Don't let fear kill your opportunities.
Rejection Is A Data Point
On an emotional level, rejection sucks.
From a pragmatic level, rejection is fantastic data.
We are all human. When you get rejected you will feel the sting for a moment. However, when that feeling subsides, it's important to come back.
Of all the data you can use to help you get closer to success nothing is as valuable as a rejection. Rejection is a piece of data showing you exactly what to correct. Meaning, in the future, you have the opportunity to eliminate one more reason you could potentially get rejected.
In other words: By getting rejected more you decrease your odds of rejection in the future.
For me, it has helped to approach a potential rejection with the view that this is either an amazing moment, or a great data point. It takes pressure off the rejection to view both outcomes as potential upside.
It Pays To Be A "Player"
Everybody likes to hate on the player.
Theres always a guy at the party who walks around, hits on 10 different girls, and gets rejected by 9 of them.
But this is how players win. Think about baseball. Players who succeed i do not improve their batting average by theorizing about the perfect swing. They improve their batting average by swinging at more baseballs.
An Amazing batter in baseball has a 0.35 batting average. This means when they go to the plate there is a 35% chance they get a hit. The average batter has a 0.25 batting average. If the average batter goes to the plate twice as much as the amazing batter they still hit 1.43x more baseballs. Just because they just took more swings. Much easier than increasing a batting average through years of practice.
Take tech jobs for example. Lets say you have an average of a 2% response rate on applications, and a 20% success rate on interviews. If you apply to 100 jobs, h ear back from 2, then have a 30% chance of landing 2 jobs? That comes out to landing 0.6 jobs. Not amazing odds.
If you apply to 500 jobs ? You hear back from 10, then have a 30% chance of landing those 10 jobs. That comes out to 3 jobs you can pick from. Not bad!
Do not focus on increasing success rate.
Focus on taking more swings.
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Until next week 👋
First Principles
Newsletter for Software Engineers. Teaching how to solve career and life problems with first principles thinking. One email. Once a week.
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