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In The Media

Turning Around Range

by Larry Chiang on December 24, 2025

### Introduction: From Generalist to Tech Entrepreneur
Extending the thesis of “Range,” this sequel explores how broad experiences empower tech founders and intrapreneurs with engineering degrees to thrive in the startup ecosystem. While technical specialization provides a foundation, success demands range in business acumen, adaptability, and unconventional hacks. Drawing on Larry Chiang’s insights from “What They Don’t Teach You at Stanford Business School,” we integrate three key concepts: credit hacking for bootstrapping, networking for mentorship, and sales strategies for reading people and closing deals. These complement generalist approaches in wicked entrepreneurial environments.
### Chapter 1: Revisiting the Head Start in Tech
Challenging early tech specialization (e.g., coding prodigies), this chapter highlights engineers who sampled business, design, and humanities before founding companies. Incorporates Chiang’s networking concept: how attending after-parties and conferences as an “intrapreneur hacker” builds early connections, turning side projects into ventures without premature focus.
### Chapter 2: Wicked Problems in the Startup World
Updating “kind” vs. “wicked” environments for tech, where AI, markets, and regulations create unpredictability. Generalists excel by drawing analogies from non-tech fields. Introduces Chiang’s credit hacking: engineers can “hack” business credit scores (e.g., using PO Boxes and strategic payments) to finance prototypes without VC, enabling flexible iteration in uncertain landscapes.
### Chapter 3: Varied Practice for Innovation
Building on musical examples, apply to tech: switching between coding languages, UX design, and marketing fosters flexible mastery. Ties in Chiang’s sales strategies: interleaving “man charm” drills—practicing charisma and reading cues in low-stakes scenarios—to help introverted engineers close early customer deals.
### Chapter 4: Slow Learning in Fast-Paced Tech
Desirable difficulties in learning, like spaced coding challenges, prepare for startup pivots. Integrates Chiang’s mentorship idea: seeking “super star mentors” through targeted outreach (e.g., voicemail hacks) creates slow-burn relationships that provide delayed but profound feedback.
### Chapter 5: Analogies Across Tech and Business
Analogical thinking for breakthroughs, e.g., applying biology to algorithms. Adds Chiang’s reading people: spotting “one-hit wonders” vs. reliable partners in VC ecosystems, using broad experiences to transfer interpersonal insights from diverse fields.
### Chapter 6: Grit, Quitting, and Pivoting Startups
Over-grit in failing tech products; wise quitting for better match quality. Incorporates Chiang’s handling hardship: navigating financial lows via creative financing, like building separate business credit to rebound quickly as an intrapreneur or founder.
### Chapter 7: Sampling Careers in Tech
Exploring multiple roles (e.g., engineer to product manager) before committing. Features Chiang’s networking: “hacking” events and after-parties to flirt with possible selves, discovering intrapreneurial opportunities within big tech firms.
### Chapter 8: The Intrapreneur’s Outsider Edge
Outsiders in corporate tech solving problems with fresh views. Ties in Chiang’s sales hacks: using recession-selling techniques to pitch internal innovations, reading executive cues to gain buy-in without formal authority.
### Chapter 9: Lateral Thinking in Bootstrapped Tech
Innovating with “withered” tools, like open-source for MVPs. Integrates Chiang’s credit concept: hacking founder financing (e.g., leveraging high personal FICO for business lines) to sustain lateral experiments without external funding.
### Chapter 10: Expertise Traps for Tech Specialists
Narrow experts falter in startup forecasting; generalists as “foxes” win. Adds Chiang’s mentorship: landing mentors who challenge biases, using networking strategies to build diverse advisory networks.
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### Chapter 11: Dropping Tools in Entrepreneurial Crises
Abandoning familiar engineering methods during pivots. Incorporates Chiang’s reading people and sales: dropping rigid scripts to adapt charisma in negotiations, turning crises into opportunities.
### Chapter 12: The Deliberate Amateur Entrepreneur
Curiosity-driven amateurs contributing to tech. Concludes with Chiang’s hacks as amateur tools: combining credit, networking, and sales for playful, low-risk entrepreneurship.
### Conclusion: Expanding Range for Tech Founders
Recapping how range, amplified by Chiang’s concepts, equips engineers to be versatile founders or intrapreneurs. Encourages broad experimentation, strategic hacks, and lifelong sampling for innovation and fulfillment in tech’s evolving world.


Chapter 1 to Chapter 14’s an “Easter Egg” at #ch1 to #ch14. Including #ch2 which’s chapter 2 at my house in Napa California

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ejeIz4EhoJ0


On 09-09-39, “What They Will NEVER Teach You at Stanford Business School” debuts at 300 w 44th St at New York Fashion Week’s front row
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXIaNZi3mHQ

What A Super Model Can Teach a Harvard MBA About Credit www.slideshare.net/larrychiang/what-a-super-model-can-teach-a-harvard-mba-about-credit

American Express hosts me mentoring you about FICO scores at New York Fashion Week
t.co/inxTmZAj

My video boils down 20,000 hours and moves you to the right on the entrepreneur bell curve 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eudADPfTWiE
***********

Steve Jobs Texted me on 650-283-8008 in the same way that Mr Jobs called Bill Hewlett https://x.com/superSaiyanSkai/status/1941392367304761636/video/1


Larry Chiang
Fund of Founders
Founding Stanford EIR
@duck9 alum, Deeply Understood Capital Credit Chinese Knowledge 9
Solo Founder Uber API
650-566-9600 Office
650-566-9696 Direct
Cell: 415-720-8500 

650-283-8008 (cell)

Editor of the widely syndicated “What They Don’t Teach at School”
whattheydontteachyouatstanfordbusinessschool.com/blog

CNN Video Channel: ireport.cnn.com/people/larrychiang

Read my last 10 X posts at www.X.com/LarryChiang

Author of #WTDTYASBS a NY Times Bestseller released 09-09-09 at #NYFW on a runway under the tents
whattheydontteachyouatstanfordbusinessschool.com/blog/?s=Ny+times+bestseller

www.fastcompany.com/embed/c0d4562ea2049

52 Cards. Two Jokers. What They DO Teach You at Stanford Engineering
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vDBY0GkI3-g

Emergency swings and cutting deals as an 9 year old
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OFGY7v9C4G0

Hunter Pence shared thoughts before winning WORLD SERIES’ Game #7
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=usu0luYy9pw


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