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My dad is a chemical engineer, and my mom was a teacher. They were pretty serious about education, but I always thought about things a little bit differently.

Aaron Levie

Sometimes things are the way they are and can’t be changed, other times it’s because no one ever tried. Your job is to find the latter.
AARON LEVIE

Change Jobs Latter Sometime Tried Way
What happens to the Microsofts, Oracles and IBMs of the world is that when they get big enough, they don’t think they need to bring that same level of focus and energy to the end-user experience.
AARON LEVIE

Energy Focus IBM Microsoft Oracle Thinking World
Startups live at the intersection of existential crisis and everything going perfectly great.
AARON LEVIE

Crisis Existential Great Perfectly Startup
That’s already been tried before only means the first attempt got it wrong.
AARON LEVIE

Attempt First Mean Tried Wrong
I think bad politics are incredibly dangerous, so it’s important to make sure that people are communicating well. Culture and morale are super important. It’s best to not force it, but let it happen organically and genuinely.
AARON LEVIE

Dangerous Important Incredible People Politics Thinking
You can keep ‘consumer’ DNA at the center of your product. That will always mean that adoption is easier.
AARON LEVIE

Adoption Consumer DNA Easier Mean
You intentionally start small, because you will not be able to compete with an incumbent… because the incumbent is always going to go for the full solution.
AARON LEVIE

Able Building Incumbent Intention Start
My dad is a chemical engineer, and my mom was a teacher. They were pretty serious about education, but I always thought about things a little bit differently.
AARON LEVIE

Dad Education Mom Pretty Serious Teacher
You can look at the cost structure of an incumbent company and discover: where are they not going to be able to drop their prices… because that business model is fundamental to the existence of the company.
AARON LEVIE

Company Cost Discover Fundamental Look Structure
Innovation is hard because solving problems people didn’t know they had & building something no one needs look identical at first.
AARON LEVIE

Build Innovation Need People Problem Solve
Why we do what we do: that moment when you get to see the future on your computer screen before the rest of the world.
AARON LEVIE

Computer Future Moment Screen World
The product that wins is the one that bridges customers to the future, not the one that requires a giant leap.
AARON LEVIE

Bridge Future Giant Leap Require Winning
Better to be too early and have to try again, than be too late and have to catch up.
AARON LEVIE

Catch Early Late Too Try Trying
Do things that incumbents can’t or won’t do because it’s economically or technically infeasible.
AARON LEVIE

Building Incumbent Infeasible Technical Thing
There’s a lot of pride that business owners have. It’s actually really critical that pride and ownership extends to everyone in the organization. I think of everyone is in the same boat in driving the company forward.
AARON LEVIE

Extend Organization Ownership Pride Thinking
I’m obsessed with speed. I’m always asking myself, ‘Why can’t we do things faster? Why can’t it happen more efficiently? Why is this requiring three meetings instead of one?’
AARON LEVIE

Asking Brilliant Fast Obsessed Three

My dad is a chemical engineer, and my mom was a teacher. They were pretty serious about education, but I always thought about things a little bit differently.

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My dad is a chemical engineer, and my mom was a teacher. They were pretty serious about education, but I always thought about things a little bit differently.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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