black
grey
blue
red
brown
white

Go after the customers that are working in the future, but haven’t totally lost their minds.

Aaron Levie

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
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
Do things that incumbents can’t or won’t do because it’s economically or technically infeasible.
AARON LEVIE

Building Incumbent Infeasible Technical Thing
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
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
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
We’re going from a world of customized software to standardized platforms.
AARON LEVIE

Building Custom Platform Standard World
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
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
If every customer is using your product “correctly”, you’ll never learn anything interesting about what to do next.
AARON LEVIE

Correct Customer Interest Interesting Next
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
The only barrier to entry you can create is to consistently build a great product.
AARON LEVIE

Barrie Consistently Create Entry Great Product
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
Companies have never won. You’re always either fighting for survival, or fighting for relevance.
AARON LEVIE

Entrepreneur Fighting Relevance Survival
The chance of failure is almost always better than the guarantee of never knowing.
AARON LEVIE

Always Chance Failure Guarantee Know Knowing
The best technology is aimed far enough in the future that it stands out, but close enough to the present that it blends in.
AARON LEVIE

Close Enough Out Present Standing Technology

Go after the customers that are working in the future, but haven’t totally lost their minds.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

Go after the customers that are working in the future, but haven’t totally lost their minds.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

More Aaron Levie Quotes