Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has answered a lot of questions in a question and answer session at his company’s headquarters. The question that got a lot of interest was, “Why do you wear the same T-shirt every day?”
For those who haven’t noticed, Zuckerberg wears the same gray T-shirt at most public events. While many expected a playful response, Zuckerberg gave a pretty serious answer for his penchant to wear the same gray shirt.
“I really want to clear my life to make it so that I have to make as few decisions as possible about anything except how to best serve this community,” Zuckerberg said, after clarifying that he had “multiple same shirts.”
He said even small decisions like choosing what to wear or what to eat for breakfast could be tiring and consume energy, and he didn’t want to waste any time on that.
“I’m in this really lucky position, where I get to wake up every day and help serve more than a billion people. And I feel like I’m not doing my job if I spend any of my energy on things that are silly or frivolous about my life,” he said.
Zuckerberg pointed out numerous other influential people, like Apple founder Steve Jobs or President Barack Obama, having the same theory with regards to choosing their outfits. Jobs – who was famously devoted to the black turtleneck – in fact, told biographer Walter Isaacson that he even wanted to have all Apple employees wear the same vest. Obama sticks to gray or blue suits for work, which helps him “focus his decision-making energy”.
The idea is to spend less time making nonwork and noncritical decisions and to keep all your mental energy available for more important stuff (saving the world from doom, inventing iPhones, etc.). There’s a body of research showing that your decision-making capabilities actually diminish as you are forced to make more decisions. It’s called “decision fatigue.”
www.businessinsider.com, Huffington Post
| headquarters | quartier generale |
| penchant | propensione |
| to consume | consumare |
| frivolous | superficiale |
| influential | influente |
| outfit | completo |
| to be devoted to | essere devoto a |
| turtleneck | dolcevita |
| suit | vestito da uomo |
| decision-making | prendere delle decisioni |
| doom | rovina, sventura |
| to invent | inventare |
| capability | capacità |
| to diminish | diminuire |
| fatigue | affaticamento, stanchezza |
