When you’re starting out in your career it can be easy to be intimidated by those you think know more than you.
But according to tech entrepreneur and professional explorer, Yossi Ghinsberg, sometimes the lack of experience can be what keeps you going and, ultimately, brings success.
He should know. At 21, he managed to survive 3 weeks stranded in the depths of the Amazon with no prior experience of South America, let alone the jungle.
“Sometimes experience is an obstacle because you cast your future based on your past experience,” Ghinsberg told CNBC’s “Life Hacks Live” at YPO Edge in Singapore.
By contrast, a “naive mind” can achieve what an experienced professional never will, Ghinsberg, who is in his late 50s, said.
“A professional knows what’s impossible. If you know it’s impossible, it is impossible. But if you don’t know it’s impossible, suddenly it is possible,” he said.
“That clean mind, that naivety, is a huge virtue.”
Ghinsberg’s willingness to enter the unknown is what has spurred him to explore remote territories.
His story later spurred a biographical survival movie, in which he was played by British actor Daniel Radcliffe.
But he has also tried his hand at multiple jobs, among them motivational speaking, writing, humanitarian work and, most recently, app development.
Ghinsberg was in his early 50s when he embarked on his technology career, launching social media aggregation apps Headbox and Blinq in 2013 and 2015, respectively.
Entering a new industry at that stage, when everyone else including his co-founder, was half his age, was proof to him that experience is not everything, he said.
“It’s not about knowledge, it’s about learning, it’s about assimilating, it’s about letting go,” Ghinsberg said.
“That was my biggest challenge because I was the founder and the CEO and I had young people following me. I needed to show them that I can learn fast, I can assimilate, I can let go,” he said.
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