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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.

Aaron Levie

Listen to your customers, but don’t always build exactly what they’re telling you. This is a really key distinction around building enterprise software.
AARON LEVIE

Building Customer Distinction Key Listen Software Tell
Tip: Take the stodgiest, oldest, slowest moving industry you can find. And build amazing software for it.
AARON LEVIE

Amazing Industry Moving Slow Software Stodgiest
Opportunity lives at the intersection of what people need tomorrow and can be just barely built today.
AARON LEVIE

Bare Build Need Opportunity People Tomorrow
The benefit to building a startup is that customers don’t have the same kind of friction when they adopt new technology.
AARON LEVIE

Adopt Benefits Customer Friction Kind Technology
Read these 3 books – Crossing the Chasm, Innovators Dilemma and Behind the Cloud.
AARON LEVIE

Book Building Chasm Cloud Clouds Innovator
In a user lead model, users are bringing in their own technology… and you can build software then, around the user.
AARON LEVIE

Bringing Building Lead Model Software Technology
Everything about the enterprise, and then by definition the software the enterprise uses has changed – just in the last 5 years.
AARON LEVIE

Change Definition Enterprise Software Use Year
Uber is a $3.5 billion lesson in building for how the world *should* work instead of optimizing for how the world *does* work
AARON LEVIE

Billion Doe Instead Optimize Uber World
Every single industry is going through a major business model and technology oriented disruption.
AARON LEVIE

Building Business Disruption Model Oriented Technology
In an IT lead world, incumbents generally win because they have the existing relationship with the IT organization.
AARON LEVIE

Incumbent IT Organisation Organization Relationship Winning World
Startups live at the intersection of existential crisis and everything going perfectly great.
AARON LEVIE

Crisis Existential Great Perfectly Startup
Modularize, don’t customize. Build a platform as opposed to building all of the custom technology and custom vertical experiences.
AARON LEVIE

Building Custom Modularize Oppose Platform Technology
The only way to avoid disruption is to constantly do what you would if you were just starting out.
AARON LEVIE

Constant Disruption Out Starting Way
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.
AARON LEVIE

Focus Long Term Today Tomorrow
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.
AARON LEVIE

Certain Creation Involve People Prestige Simply
Startups often win because it’s easier to see what comes next when you don’t have to worry about maintaining what came last.
AARON LEVIE

Come Easier Last Startup Winning Worry

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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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.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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