Learn broadly. Think independently. Act decisively.
I’m Ian Greer, an author, investor, and program manager based in California. I study how strategy, incentives, technology, and human behavior shape consequential decisions.
That work takes three forms: The Blueprint, Elwood Research, and a growing library of essays written to make complex ideas clearer and more useful.
Curiosity is the method. Judgment is the product.
I’ve never been interested in collecting information for its own sake. I read to find the patterns underneath it.
Each year I read roughly 100 books, then follow the most useful questions into biographies, markets, technology, politics, primary documents, filings, and data. I look for the decisions that compound, the incentives people miss, and the behaviors that repeat across industries and eras.
The goal is not to sound informed. It is to reach a clearer view, and to turn that view into something useful: a decision, a framework, a piece of research, or a sentence worth keeping.
Durable ideas. Clear language. Independent judgment. Real consequences.
Three kinds of work. One body of work.
Each project starts with the same question: what is worth understanding well enough to act on?
- The BlueprintTwenty-seven recurring behaviors across business, investing, and political strategy, distilled from hundreds of biographies.
- Elwood ResearchIndependent research on digital assets, AI infrastructure, and the technology companies building the future.
- Ideas worth keepingField notes on business, finance, technology, power, and human nature, written to be concise and useful.
The work starts with the source material.
A simple discipline for turning a wide field of information into a defensible point of view.
Read beyond category
The best ideas rarely respect disciplinary boundaries. Business sharpens investing; history sharpens strategy; psychology sharpens both.
Start with evidence
Biographies, filings, data, and primary sources come before summaries and consensus.
Look for recurrence
One example is an anecdote. The same behavior across different lives, markets, and eras may be a pattern.
Write toward decisions
The test of an idea is whether it makes judgment clearer and action more deliberate.
Good work begins with a useful question.
For research, strategy, collaborations, speaking, and other inquiries.