Leah Solivan (TaskRabbit founder) — 'They are not exceptions. They are clues.'

Leah Solivan, founder of TaskRabbit and host of Breaking Precedent, published a long-form Substack essay on The Precedent Collective today framed around Eric Ries's Incorruptible. She uses her IKEA acquisition experience as the lens for Eric's argument that companies like Costco, IKEA, Patagonia, and Novo Nordisk are not exceptions but clues.

“After reading Eric Ries's upcoming book, Incorruptible, and speaking with him recently on Breaking Precedent, I think I finally do. Throughout Incorruptible, he highlights companies that consistently ignore conventional governance wisdom and yet continue to outperform. Companies like Costco, IKEA, Patagonia, and Novo Nordisk have all built enduring institutions by operating differently than many experts would recommend. The traditional explanation is that these companies are exceptions. That explanation has always bothered me. Eric proposes a different interpretation. He argues that these companies are not exceptions. They are clues. We assume that best practices are best because they work. It sounds self-evident. What if some practices survive not because they are the most effective, but because they are the most repeated? What if the thing everyone assumes is best is simply the thing everyone copied?” — Leah Solivan on The Precedent Collective (Substack)