Notes from "The Difference Between God and Larry Ellison"

Strategic Thinking & Positioning

1. Pick your enemies carefully - Ellison deliberately positioned Oracle against Microsoft and IBM rather than smaller database companies. This elevated Oracle's brand by association and forced constant improvement.

2. Be contrarian when you have conviction - When everyone said relational databases would never work commercially, Ellison bet the company on it. When everyone wanted client-server, he burned the boats and went all-in on Internet applications.

3. Simple messages always win - Product names matter enormously (changing "Network Computing Architecture" to "Internet Computing Architecture" dramatically boosted sales). Keep your messaging clear and repeatable.

Operational Excellence

4. Control costs obsessively - Like Sam Walton and Andrew Carnegie, Ellison understood that while revenues are cyclical, cost savings are permanent competitive advantages.

5. Engineer every process, not just products - After the 1991 crisis, Ellison realized he needed to apply engineering discipline to sales, marketing, HR, and every business process.

6. Eliminate complexity ruthlessly - Oracle had 70 HR systems to track employees. Complexity is the "cardinal sin" of business - constantly simplify.

7. Fix your incentive structures - Oracle's sales team was incentivized to give massive discounts at quarter-end and push deals through partners even when it hurt the company. Wrong incentives nearly killed Oracle.

Leadership & Self-Awareness

8. Know yourself and hire to complement weaknesses - Ellison admitted he was a "sprinter not a grinder" and hired Safra Catz to handle execution while he focused on vision and problem-solving.

9. You can't run a company without checks and balances - Ellison's "abdication" management style in early Oracle nearly destroyed the company. You need controls even if you hate bureaucracy.

10. Being smart isn't enough - execution matters - Ellison learned the hard way that hiring brilliant people who can't "do their fucking job" is worthless.

Competitive Philosophy

11. Build once, sell forever - Ellison quickly moved from consulting to software products because "software offered the ultimate leverage."

12. When you find a winning system, invest heavily in customer acquisition - Like Amazon, Oracle knew that once customers chose their database, they were locked in for 10+ years.

13. Silicon Valley is a killing field - Very few tech companies survive, but those that do become immensely valuable. Survival requires constant evolution.

14. Be motivated by fear of failure more than greed - "I hate to lose" drove Ellison more than money ever did.

Personal Development

15. Never rest on laurels - As Steve Jobs said, "If you do something and it turns out pretty good, go do something else wonderful, not dwell on it."

16. Test your limits constantly - "Whenever I got too close to a goal, I'd raise the bar for fear of actually clearing it."

17. Find what you love or settle for what's important - After achieving financial independence, you need a real reason to keep working.

Crisis Management

18. You can't run away from crisis - When Oracle nearly died in 1991, Ellison said "I couldn't run away. I had to save Oracle to save myself."

19. Burn the boats on strategic bets - When Ellison believed in something (relational databases, Internet computing), he went all-in with no backup plan.

20. Leadership requires projecting confidence - "You cannot lead if you're filled with uncertainty" - even when uncertain, leaders must project confidence to inspire others to follow.