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July 8, 2024

— John Lennon

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Do you have a Personal Board of Directors? Today’s newsletter is about how two members of the most successful collaborative teams in history met: John Lennon and Paul McCartney, who went on to write 180 songs together and perform in this little group you might have heard of, called The Beatles. I really think you’ll enjoy the story, and I hope you’ll take a bit of inspiration from it. Total coincidence, but if you’re looking for a 21st century way to “find your people” and maybe even take your career to the next level, I think it’s worth trying to put together a Personal Board of Directors. Imagine: a trusted peer group, with battle-tested perspectives and proven playbooks, that you can have real, tactical discussions with, and propel forward. With Sidebar, senior leaders are matched with a small group of highly-vetted, private, and supportive peers to lean on for unbiased opinions, diverse perspectives, and raw feedback. Everyone has their own zone of genius. Together, we’re better prepared to navigate professional pitfalls and push each other to do more, do it better, and do it faster. Join over 37,000 top senior leaders from companies like Microsoft and Meta who have taken the first step towards career growth with Sidebar, and request your invitation to join today. Request invite to join

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A young man not easily astonished

On Saturday, July 6, a 15-year-old boy was asked if he'd like to go and see a band with some other teenage musicians playing at a church event.

They were pretty good, he was told. Also, there would probably be a lot of good-looking girls.

Nah, he said. That sounds stupid. I'd rather stay home and look at my phone and play video games.

Only kidding; he said yes and agreed to go. Thus, July 6, 1957 (so not two days ago but instead 67 years ago) became the date on which Paul McCartney met a 16-year-old John Lennon for the first time.

The occasion was the annual Woolton Parish Church Garden Fete, which included a parade and a party, where Lennon's band, The Quarrymen, were one of the supporting acts -- playing backup to a brass band and a literal dog and pony show.

Afterward, the friend who had invited Paul, Ivan Vaughan, introduced him to John.

• Paul's impression of John: A good musician, but even more importantly, a leader with swagger and charisma who caught and held the attention of everyone in the crowd -- but especially the hundreds of teenagers who were part of the audience.
• John's impression of Paul: At first, not much. But then Paul picked up a guitar and began to play and sing a song that John had struggled with, Twenty Flight Rock by Eddie Cochran, and John was impressed.

The two teens played a series of songs and riffs for each other. Paul showed John how to tune his guitar better, and by the end of the evening, they realized they had too much in common not to try to play together.

“A young man not easily astonished, Lennon [was] astonished,” author Jim O’Donnell wrote in a 2007 book called, The Day John Met Paul, an almost minute-by-minute account.

Two weeks after their meeting, John invited Paul to join The Quarrymen. A year later, Paul recruited George Harrison, then just 14.

Two years later, they were in Hamburg on their first three-month residency, playing 106 five-hour shows; later they returned for another 92 shows.

Then Ringo Starr replaced drummer Pete Best, and a few years after that, they were the biggest band in the world. John and Paul became one of the most successful creative partnerships of all time, writing 180 jointly credited songs.

Ivan Vaughn, who originally introduced the two, married and became a father around the time the Beatles were taking off; the Beatles put him on the payroll of their Apple production company for a while. He died in 1993.

(Vaughn's wife, Jan, who taught Romance languages, did uncredited work on the 1965 Beatles song, "Michelle," coming up with the name of the French woman in the song, and providing the translation for "these are words that go together well.")

There are so many quotes we could use for today's installment, so many things that both John and Paul said about this meeting, and their work together, and their good times and bad. But in researching this I came across the last thing John apparently ever said to Paul, and as codas go, it's hard to beat.

Very simple words: "Think about me every now and then, old friend."

Have a great day, make friends, and say yes to invitations.

What a week to take off from writing the newsletter, right? First ... the debacle in Atlanta on June 27 ... then, the uninspiring performance afterward. We definitely need new leadership.

So let me go on record here:

Wait — did you think I was talking about something else? (I know this is very niche, but the two things I follow closely out there in the world of social media are politics and soccer, so to see these two debates going on constantly at the same time has been ... interesting.)

Anyway: We're back! And I have a bit of a change to announce ... but since I'm running out of room, I think we'll save it for tomorrow. Stay tuned!

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85 Bazillion Other Things

So much has happened since I last wrote to you, only the week before last. We have a few things to catch up on.

• We had two of the most consequential U.S. Supreme Court cases in most of our lifetimes came down last week: one doing away with 40 years of deference to federal regulators, meaning the courts will fill-in the inevitable blanks in almost all federal laws, and one granting immunity from criminal prosecution to presidents for any act that can be considered official. (CBS News)
• President Biden's halting debate performance last week raised serious questions about his physical and mental capacity to run. A prime time interview with ABC on Friday fuelled further speculation about his campaign's future. Amid the uncertainty, Mr Biden appeared at two campaign events in Pennsylvania, a key swing state, on Sunday. But those efforts have not stopped the president's fellow Democrats from weighing the risks and rewards of keeping Mr Biden, 81, at the top of the ticket. (BBC)
• Equal time here: The Heritage Foundation, authors of the Project 2025 conservative policy blueprint for the next Republican administration that former President Trump is trying to distance himself from, is facing blowback in the wake of foundation president Kevin Robert's comments about an ongoing second American revolution that will “remain bloodless ... if the left allows it to be.” (The Hill)
• Governments in the UK and France both took sharp turns to the left since we last wrote this newsletter. In London, Labour leader Keir Starmer became prime minister after the Conservative party had its worst electoral showing in a century. Meanwhile, in the second round of elections, French voters rejected a far-right party and gave power to a left-wing coalition. (Bloomberg, Euronews)
• After the lockdown years, teens want one thing from their jobs: friends. Pandemic isolation has unleashed a generation of workers eager for social interaction: ‘I don’t care how much I get paid. I love it here.’ (WSJ)
• Set atop a hill on the Italian island of Sicily, Agrigento is a heritage tourist’s paradise. Beneath the archaeological structures and relics of its Valley of the Temples lies an ancient maze-like aqueduct system that still captures water today. But the aqueduct, and others built in modern times, are running so dry that small hotels and guesthouses in the city and nearby coast are being forced to turn tourists away. They don’t have enough water to guarantee their guests a toilet that flushes or a shower after a day out in the summer heat. (CNN)
• The crew of a NASA mission to Mars emerged from their craft after a yearlong voyage that never left Earth. The four volunteer crew members spent more than 12 months inside NASA’s first simulated Mars environment at Johnson Space Center in Houston, coming out of the artificial alien environment Saturday around 5 p.m. "Hello," said mission commander Kelly Haston after emerging. "It’s actually just so wonderful to be able to say ‘hello’ to you all." (AP)