The Long Game

Most of the decisions I am proudest of looked mildly irrational when I made them. Choosing the slower supplier. Turning down the growth that would have required us to lie a little. Paying for the material nobody would ever see. On a ten-week horizon these are mistakes; on a ten-year horizon they are the only reason anything still stands. Durability is unfashionable because it produces no news. But hype depreciates and reputation appreciates, and the gap between them widens every year you stay honest. There is a particular kind of product that becomes more valuable with time: a chair that has been sat in for fifteen years, a school programme whose first students are now adults you can point to, a place that people return to with their children. You cannot manufacture that. You can only survive long enough to have it. Delayed gratification is not patience for its own sake; it is a bet that the market eventually notices who was telling the truth.