Do things that incumbents can’t or won’t do because it’s economically or technically infeasible.
AARON LEVIEWe’re enamored with the concept that there’s always a price. But sometimes, your goal is to build a great company, not sell it.
More Aaron Levie Quotes
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Your product should sell itself, but that does not mean you don’t need salespeople.
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Innovation is hard because solving problems people didn’t know they had & building something no one needs look identical at first.
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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.
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We’re going from a world of customized software to standardized platforms.
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Modularize, don’t customize. Build a platform as opposed to building all of the custom technology and custom vertical experiences.
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Focus too much on the near-term and you won’t get tomorrow’s customers, focus too much on the long-term and you won’t get today’s.
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I think people are always able to achieve more than they think they can. While that’s cliche, I don’t know if managers think about that enough. You have to set your sights extremely high.
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Start with the assumption that the best way to do something is not the way it’s being done right now.
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Startups live at the intersection of existential crisis and everything going perfectly great.
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In an IT lead world, incumbents generally win because they have the existing relationship with the IT organization.
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Everything about the enterprise, and then by definition the software the enterprise uses has changed – just in the last 5 years.
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In a user lead model, users are bringing in their own technology… and you can build software then, around the user.
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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.
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The only way to avoid disruption is to constantly do what you would if you were just starting out.
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Uber is a $3.5 billion lesson in building for how the world *should* work instead of optimizing for how the world *does* work
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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.
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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.
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Read these 3 books – Crossing the Chasm, Innovators Dilemma and Behind the Cloud.
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The benefit to building a startup is that customers don’t have the same kind of friction when they adopt new technology.
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You’ll learn more in a day talking to customers than a week of brainstorming, a month of watching competitors, or a year of market research.
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In the enterprise you want to start intentionally small.
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I’m certainly not into money and prestige. For me there is simply nothing more exciting than people involved in the creation of great products. That is what drives me.
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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?’
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If there could’ve ever been a magical time to build an enterprise software company, now is absolutely that time.
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Go after the customers that are working in the future, but haven’t totally lost their minds.
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My workday begins around 11 A.M., with a cup of black coffee in each hand. If I had more hands, there would be more coffee.
AARON LEVIE