Business School with Sharran Srivatsaa

Episode: Lego Blocks of Leverage (Sept 30, 2025)

Brief Overview

In this high-impact, densely packed episode, Sharran Srivatsaa explores why hard work alone isn’t enough for success and how identifying your unique strengths—and the right “vehicle” to leverage them—makes all the difference. Using personal stories, vivid analogies, and practical frameworks, he introduces the concept of "Lego Blocks of Leverage," urging listeners to stack their own blocks for exponential growth, fulfillment, and flow.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Vehicle Problem: Effort Alone Isn’t Enough

• Surface Matters: Sharran uses tennis and career analogies to highlight how being in the wrong environment (vehicle) can stall even your best efforts.
  • “If you spend your whole career pushing on the wrong surface, it doesn’t matter how hard you work, you’re never going to feel like you’re winning. And that’s what I call a vehicle problem. You have level 10 effort in a level 2 vehicle.” (04:24)
• The answer isn’t always doubling down on effort; sometimes, you must switch vehicles or environments.
  • "The way out...is not more effort, it's...awareness and selection." (09:01)

2. You Market Fit vs Product Market Fit

• Traditional advice talks about "product market fit.” Sharran reframes this as “you market fit”—finding where your skills, personality, and energy align with opportunity.
  • “Some people are meant to be founders. Some are meant for scale. Some are meant to shine in smaller rooms. Some are meant to come alive in chaos. Some should never have a boss again. Some should always have a boss. And once you see that clearly, that's where freedom comes from.” (11:45)
• Avoid copying other people's paths—design your own work-life fit based on your strengths.

3. Personal Story: Discovering the Growth Infrastructure Gift

• Sharran describes his winding career path—from software engineering and tennis to leadership and business exits—before recognizing his core strength: building scalable "growth infrastructure."
  • “I realized that I got a lot of energy from what I call growth infrastructure—not just growth, not just infrastructure, but the combination.” (15:40)
• Prefers roles that allow him to think in systems, build modular assets, and enable scale (rather than personality-driven, founder-fronted businesses).

4. The Lego Blocks of Leverage Framework

• Sharran's superpower is building “Lego blocks”—reusable, modular systems/playbooks/tools applicable across businesses.
  • “I see everything as a Lego block. Like, what block can I build that plugs into this business? What block can I build that becomes a playbook for that department?” (20:30)
• This modular approach allows for rapid scaling and problem-solving without reinventing the wheel.
  • “Because everything for me is modular. When you slot in modular things, you don’t have to reinvent thinking—you don’t have to reinvent the wheel, because I already have the wheel.” (22:18)

5. Freedom Beyond Titles: Choosing the Right Role

• Real breakthrough came when he let go of chasing top jobs/titles and refocused on doing the most impactful work in the right environment.
  • “I didn’t care about being CEO anymore. I just wanted the biggest version of the role that lets me do my best work—that lets me build more Lego blocks of leverage.” (25:02)

6. Discovering Your Own "Lego Blocks": The Three E’s Framework

• Energy: What makes time disappear for you?
• Edge: Where do you consistently win, even when the odds are against you?
• Ease: What feels natural to you but looks hard to others?
  • “Energy: What makes time disappear for you? Edge: Where do you consistently win? Ease: What feels so natural to you, but it looks hard for everyone else?” (31:22)
• Joe Polish’s ELF vs. HALF business concept: Aim for work that is Easy, Lucrative, and Fun—not Hard, Annoying, Lame, and Frustrating.

7. Compounding Leverage and Finding Flow

• Once you start stacking your own "Lego blocks" in your chosen environment, work shifts from grind to glide—a state of flow.
  • “Life feels like a total grind when you're playing the wrong game... The second you lock in to your real surface... Everything will change... Your grind becomes kind of like this glide.” (36:18)
• Quoting Naval Ravikant: “It should feel like play to you, but it should look like work to others. That is how you know you’re going to win.” (38:25)

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Vehicles and Effort:

  “Level 10 effort in a level 2 vehicle, you’re going to lose.”
  – Sharran Srivatsaa (05:52)

• On Environments That Crush Your Gifts:

  “The environment will crush the very thing that makes you special.”
  – Sharran Srivatsaa (10:05)

• On Unique Ability:

  “Your entire job of your life is to find the purity of that superpower. Dan Sullivan calls it ‘unique ability.’ I really like that word.”
  – Sharran Srivatsaa (19:40)

• On Letting Go of the Title:

  “I realized that I did not need the top job. I did not need the accolades. I just wanted the biggest version of the work that I can do.”
  – Sharran Srivatsaa (27:10)

• On the Three Es:

  “Energy: what makes time disappear for you? Edge: where do you consistently win? Ease: what feels so natural to you, but it looks hard for everyone else?”
  – Sharran Srivatsaa (31:22)

• On Seeking Flow:

  “Your grind becomes kind of like this glide. This force will turn into flow and make you feel... That is the test. That is how you know you’re founded. That is how you know you’re going to win.”
  – Sharran Srivatsaa (37:12)

• Naval Ravikant’s Test:

  “It should feel like play to you, but look like work to others.”
  – quoted by Sharran Srivatsaa (38:25)

Timestamps for Key Segments

• [03:15] The Roger Federer analogy—why the “surface” you choose matters
• [05:10] Level 10 effort in a level 2 vehicle—identifying when you’re in the wrong game
• [10:05] The cost of the wrong environment—how organizations can crush your gift
• [15:40] Sharran’s personal journey—discovering growth infrastructure as a superpower
• [20:30] Introduction to Lego Blocks of Leverage—what it means in practice
• [25:02] The breakthrough: Letting go of job titles to maximize impact
• [31:22] The Three E’s: A practical filter for finding your unique leverage
• [35:50] Switching from grind to glide—finding flow and stacking leverage
• [38:25] Quoting Naval: The ultimate test for finding your zone

Practical Challenge for Listeners

• Take 5 minutes to self-audit:
  • Where do you feel energy?
  • Where do you have an edge?
  • Where do you find ease?
• Use these insights to identify your own “Lego blocks”—and make work shift from grind to glide.

Episode Tone & Language

Sharran’s tone is candid, direct, and energetic with a no-nonsense, motivational bent. He mixes personal anecdotes with frameworks and practical advice, making the episode actionable and relatable—never fluffy or abstract.

Summary

This episode is a call to high performers and hard workers: Stop grinding in the wrong game. Instead, find your unique zone of genius, identify your “Lego blocks of leverage,” and stack them in the right environment. When you do, work will go from grind to glide, and success, fulfillment, and real leverage will follow.