- “The Struggle” is Horowitz’s name for the psychological toll of running a company through decisions with no good outcome — the chapter is a page-long litany of the feeling, ending on the claim that the Struggle is not failure itself but “where greatness comes from” [1].
- Peacetime and wartime require different management: peacetime CEOs broaden opportunity and tolerate deviation from process; wartime CEOs, facing an existential threat, violate protocol and focus obsessively on the mission because the company has only “a single bullet in the chamber” [2].
- When a team is behind on a hard technical problem, there is often no silver bullet — only “lead bullets”: the grind of applying sustained, unglamorous effort until the problem yields [3].
- Jim Barksdale’s rule for company priorities: take care of the people, the products, and the profits — in that order [2].
- Management debt works like technical debt: an expedient, short-term management decision (skipping a hard conversation, leaving an org problem unaddressed) accrues interest, and the deferred cost compounds until you pay it [4].
- In a consensus-based hiring process for an executive, the committee will find every candidate’s weaknesses but under-weight whether any candidate is world-class where the role actually needs greatness — so you hire someone with no sharp weaknesses who is mediocre exactly where you needed excellence [5].
The Hard Thing About Hard Things
Horowitz's book on building and running a company through the decisions that have no good outcomes, drawn from his time running Loudcloud/Opsware.
- Author
- Published
- 2014 · HarperBusiness, New York
- Purchase
- Amazon
- You’re leading through a stretch with no good options — a raise that won’t close, a launch that’s slipping, a key employee who might quit: without this book, the exhaustion and doubt read as evidence you’re doing it wrong. Horowitz’s Struggle names the feeling as normal to the job, not a signal to quit.
- Your company shifts from steady growth to fighting for survival: without this book, you keep running peacetime habits — consensus process, tolerance for underperformance — into a fight where they get you killed. Horowitz’s peacetime/wartime distinction tells you when to switch modes and what wartime actually requires.
- A team is stuck on a hard problem and looking for a shortcut: without this book, you keep hunting for the one clever fix. Horowitz’s lead-bullets principle says some problems only yield to sustained grinding, and looking for a silver bullet wastes the time you could spend firing lead ones.
- You’re building The MOC for a senior hire and a hiring committee is involved: without this book, the committee optimizes for “no red flags” and quietly downgrades the one strength you actually needed at a world-class level. Horowitz’s warning is to protect the bar on the specific competency the role demands, not just screen out weakness.