Founders

What I learned from reading Working by Robert Caro. This episode is brought to you by Meter: Meter is the easiest way for your business to get fast, secure, and reliable internet and WiFi in any commercial space. Go to meter.com/founders----This episode is brought to you by Tiny: Tiny is the easiest way to sell your business. Tiny provides quick and straightforward exits for Founders. Get in touch by emailing hi@tiny.com----Listen to one of my favorite podcasts: Invest Like the Best: Sam Hinkie: Find Your People ----Subscribe to listen to Founders Premium — Subscribers can ask me questions directly and listen to Ask Me Anything (AMA) episodes.----[3:40] You can't get very deep into Johnson's life without realizing that the central fact of his life was his relationship with his father.[8:00] It was the hill country and his father's failures that taught him how terrible could be the consequences of a single mistake.[8:45] Lyndon Johnson wouldn't understand. He would refuse to understand. He would threaten you, would cajole you, bribe you or charm you. He would do whatever he had to do, but he would get that vote.[9:00] What mattered to him was winning because he knew what losing could be. What its consequences could be.[9:50] Robert Caro books I've read: The Power Broker The Path to PowerMeans of Ascent Master of The Senate (currently reading) [11:00] about what I wanted to do with my life and my books (which are my life)[11:40] I am a reflection of what I do. — Steve Jobs[23:20] There are certain moments in your life when you suddenly understand something about yourself. I loved going through those files, making them yield up their secrets to me.[24:10] Turn every page. Never assume anything. Turn every goddamn page.[27:50] Robert Caro snaps: No, that's not why highways get built where they get built. They get built there because Robert Moses wants them there.[28:15] Robert Moses had power that no one understood. Power that nobody else was even thinking about.[29:50] There are sentences that are said to you in your life that are chiseled into your memory.[34:00] Three of the editors took me to some fancy restaurant and told me they could make me a star. Bob Gottlieb said, Well, I don't go out for lunch but we can have a sandwich at my desk and talk about your book. So of course I picked him.[37:15] Robert Moses was a ruthless genius with savage energy.[38:30] Ambitious people are rare, so if everyone is mixed together randomly, as they tend to be early in people's lives, then the ambitious ones won't have many ambitious peers. When you take people like this and put them together with other ambitious people, they bloom like dying plants given water. Probably most ambitious people are starved for the sort of encouragement they'd get from ambitious peers, whatever their age.— Paul Graham’s essays. (Founders #275-277)[42:30] in a couple of sentences these two men —idols of mine — had wiped away five years of doubt.[42:50] There is not a more mysterious craft than entrepreneurship.[48:15] I now had a picture of Lyndon Johnson's youth, that terrible youth, that character hardening youth.[54:00] I wasn't fully understanding what these people were telling me about the depth of Lyndon Johnson's determination, about the frantic urgency, the desperation, to get ahead, and to get ahead fast.As if the passions, the ambitions that he brought to Washington, strong though they were, were somehow intensified by the fact that he was finally there, in the place where he had always wanted to be.I wanted to show the contrast between what he was coming from the poverty, the insecurity —and what he was trying for.[55:15] I wanted to make the reader see the contrast between what he was coming from and what he was trying for. Something on the way to work had excited him and thrilled him so much that he'd break into a run every morning.[56:15] And as Lyndon Johnson came up Capitol Hill in the morning, he would be running.Well, of course he was running—from the land of poverty to this. Everything he had ever wanted, everything he had ever hoped for, was there.---Subscribe to listen to Founders Premium — Subscribers can ask me questions directly and listen to Ask Me Anything (AMA) episodes.----Join my free email newsletter to get my top 10 highlights from every book----“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — GarethBe like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading Sol Price: Retail Revolutionary by Robert Price. ----This episode is brought to you by EightSleep: Get the best sleep of your life and unlock more energy with the Pod 3. Go to eightsleep.com/founders/----This episode is brought to you by Meter: Meter is the easiest way for your business to get fast, secure, and reliable internet and WiFi in any commercial space. Go to meter.com/founders----This episode is brought to you by Tiny: Tiny is the easiest way to sell your business. Tiny provides quick and straightforward exits for Founders. Get in touch by emailing hi@tiny.com----Subscribe to listen to Founders Premium — Subscribers can ask me questions directly and listen to Ask Me Anything (AMA) episodes.----[6:50] He believed in developing strong operating efficiencies, and he continually emphasized passing on savings to customers.[8:48] It's pretty incredible to think about that Sol's ideas have created trillions of dollars of value.[11:18] You can always understand the son by the story of his father. The story of the father is embedded in the son. —Francis Ford Coppola: A Filmmaker's Life by Michael Schumacher. (Founders #242)[14:00] Stephen King on the belief and support he received from his wife: “Having someone who believes in you makes a lot of difference”— Stephen King On Writing: A Memoir of the Craftby Stephen King. (Founders #210)[16:00] True education is gained through the discipline of life. —Henry Ford[19:45] Sol kept a small sign in his office: “Do it now.”[24:00] Sol finds an idea future generations of entrepreneurs will use: A membership retail store targeted to a specific niche.[24:45] When you have people driving far distances to save money that is a very good sign. — Sam Walton: Made In America by Sam Walton. (Founders #234)[26:45] Daniel Ek interview on the Acquired podcast. [39:10] If you’re not spending 90% of your time teaching, you’re not doing your job. —Jim Sinegal.[39:45] You train an animal, you teach a person.[40:00] He was not a fan of training manuals because he believed that manuals were a substitute for thinking.[43:00] What does limited selection have to do with efficiency? Because payroll and benefits represent 80% of a retailer’s cost of operations, pricing advantage follows labor productivity. Fewer items result in reduced labor hours throughout all of the product supply channels. Put simply, the cost to deal with 4,500 items is a lot less than the cost to deal with 50,000 items.[50:21] The operating efficiencies of the warehouse concept and the direct delivery of products from the suppliers to Price Club made it possible to sell merchandise for less.[55:00] Costco and Sam's were expanding aggressively while Price Club remained tentative.[1:03:30] Sol was a poster child for the American dream. His immigrant parents were born in a small Russian village. Sol was the first in his family to graduate college. He earned a law degree. He became an exceptionally successful businessman and philanthropist, celebrated 70 years of marriage, was a good father who instilled high values in his sons, and he never walked away from responsibility. It doesn’t get much better than that.---Subscribe to listen to Founders Premium — Subscribers can ask me questions directly and listen to Ask Me Anything (AMA) episodes.----Join my free email newsletter to get my top 10 highlights from every book----“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — GarethBe like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading The Women of Berkshire Hathaway: Lessons from Warren Buffett's Female CEOs and Directors by Karen Linder. ----This episode is brought to you by Meter: Meter is the easiest way for your business to get fast, secure, and reliable internet and WiFi in any commercial space. Go to meter.com/founders----I have these bronze busts of Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger in my home. If you want them in your house or office go to https://www.berkshirenerds.store. A fun side project by my friends at Tiny. ----Follow one of my favorite podcasts: Invest Like the Best and listen to episode 326 Alexis Rivas—A New Blueprint for Homebuilding ----Subscribe to listen to Founders Premium — Subscribers can listen to Ask Me Anything (AMA) episodes and ask me questions directly, and all future bonus episodes. ----Join my email newsletter to get my top 10 highlights from every book----[6:55] Mr. Buffett, we're going to put our competitors through a meat grinder. — Buffett: The Making of an American Capitalist by Roger Lowenstein. (Founders #182)[9:06] There are several "Going Out of Business" advertisements from competitors' stores framed and hanging on the wall.[13:26] As a general rule, bet on the quality of the business, not on the quality of the management-unless, of course, you've got a Mrs. B. in your hand. If that is the case, go all in. She was a business genius. —  The Tao of Charlie Munger (Founders #295)[20:46] Retirement is fatal. — David Ogilvy (Founders #189)[21:17] Business like raising a child, you want a good one. A child needs a mother and a business needs a boss.[21:44] What is your favorite thing to do on a nice evening? Drive around to check the competition and plan my next attack.[22:48] He was 52 and famous. I was 33 and a junior account executive. Early on, he wrote a letter to one of my clients. After listing eight reasons why some ads prepared by the company’s design department would not be effective, he delivered his ultimate argument: The only thing that can be said in favor of the layouts is that they are “different.” You could make a cow look different by removing the udder. But that cow would not produce results. So began my “David” file. Almost everyone who worked at the agency kept one.— The King of Madison Avenue: David Ogilvy and the Making of Modern Advertising by Kenneth Roman. (Founders #169)[27:21] Buffet said: If she ran a popcorn stand I’d wanna be in business with her. She's just plain smart. She's a fierce competitor and she's a tireless worker.[27:37] Buffett “on how Mrs. B ran her business:One question I always ask myself in appraising a business is how I would like, assuming I had ample capital and skilled personnel, to compete with it. I'd rather wrestle grizzlies than compete with Mrs. B.They buy brilliantly, they operate at expense ratios on to t competitors don't even dream about, and they then pass on to their customers much of the savings.It's the ideal business—one built upon exceptional value to the customer that in turn translates into exceptional economics for its owners."[30:32] She hired a chauffeur who drove her around Omaha each day. The driver took her to other stores. She looked in the windows and checked to see how many cars were in their parking lots. It didn't take long for her to plan her revenge.[31:41] There was no looking back. She just swung.[33:12] I had lunch with Sam Zell (Founders #298)[34:07] Aspiring business managers should look hard at the plain, but rare, attributes that produced Mrs. B’s incredible success. Students from 40 universities visit me every year, and I have them start the day with a visit to NFM. If they absorb Mrs. B’s lessons, they need none from me.----Subscribe to listen to Founders Premium — Subscribers can listen to Ask Me Anything (AMA) episodes and ask me questions directly, and all future bonus episodes. ----Join my email newsletter to get my top 10 highlights from every book----I use Readwise to organize and remember everything I read. You can try Readwise for 60 days for free here.  ----“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — GarethBe like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading The Mind of Napoleon: A Selection of His Written and Spoken Words edited by J. Christopher Herold. ----This episode is brought to you by EightSleep: Get the best sleep of your life and unlock more energy with the Pod 3. Go to eightsleep.com/founders/----This episode is brought to you by Meter: Meter is the easiest way for your business to get fast, secure, and reliable internet and WiFi in any commercial space. Go to meter.com/founders----This episode is brought to you by Tiny: Tiny is the easiest way to sell your business. Tiny provides quick and straightforward exits for Founders. Get in touch by emailing hi@tiny.com----Follow one of my favorite podcasts Invest Like The Best and listen to episode 326 Alexis Rivas----Subscribe to listen to Founders Premium — Subscribers can ask me questions directly and listen to Ask Me Anything (AMA) episodes.----[3:45] A man who combined energy of thought and energy of action to an exceptional degree.[4:45] He knows that men have always been the same, that nothing can change their nature. It is from the past that he will draw his lessons in order to shape the present.[5:15] Destiny must be fulfilled. That is my chief doctrine.[6:05] Napoleon: A Concise Biography by David Bell (Founders #294)[9:25] To aim at world empire seemed to Napoleon a most natural thing.[10:00] To have lived without glory, without leaving a trace of one's existence, is not to have lived at all.[10:55] The greatest improvisation of the human mind is that which gives existence to the nonexistent.[11:45] The best way to understand a person is to listen to that person directly. —  Make Something Wonderful: Steve Jobs in his own words (Founders #299)[12:55] The great majority of men attend to what is necessary only when they feel a need for it—the precise time when it is too late.[16:10] The worst way to live according to Napoleon:When on rising from sleep a man does not know what to do with himself and drags his tedious existence from place to place; when, scanning his future, he sees nothing but dreadful monotony, one day resembling the next; when he asks himself, "Why do I exist?”—then, in my opinion, he is the most wretched of all.[17:45] Instead his (Steve Jobs) ego needs and personal drives led him to seek fulfillment by creating a legacy that would awe people. A dual legacy, actually: building innovative products and building a lasting company. He wanted to be in the pantheon with, indeed a notch above, people like Edwin Land, Bill Hewlett, and David Packard. — Steve Jobs: The Exclusive Biography by Walter Isaacson. (Founders #214)[19:15] He must know himself. Until then, all endeavors are in vain, all schemes collapse.[20:15] Napoleon on George Washington: Britain refused to acknowledge either him or the independence of his country; but his success obliged them to change their minds and acknowledge both. It is success which makes the great man.[21:15] Washington saw the conflict as a struggle for power in which the colonists, if victorious, destroyed British pretentions of superiority and won control over half of a continent. — Franklin & Washington: The Founding Partnershipby Edward Larson. (Founders #251)[23:15] If you do everything you will win: All great events hang by a single thread. The clever man takes advantage of everything, neglects nothing that may give him some added opportunity; the less clever man, by neglecting one thing, sometimes misses everything.[23:45] Warren Buffett: We are individually opportunity driven. — All I Want To Know Is Where I'm Going To Die So I'll Never Go There: Buffett & Munger – A Study in Simplicity and Uncommon, Common Sense by Peter Bevelin. (Founders #286)[24:15] Imagination rules the world.[25:00] Ambition is a violent and unthinking fever that ceases only when life ceases.[34:52] The corpse of an enemy always smells sweet.[35:30] Roots of Strategy: Book 1[38:45] Robert Caro profiled two men who seeds were not high (in a tournament) they were without many advantages. And to get all the way to the top you probably had to sacrifice everything to the effort. The meta lesson is if you are not willing to pay that price presume someone else will.If you want something like the presidency (or being a billionaire) you should presume there is someone out there who will devote all their time, money, relationships, sense of ethics, everything in sacrifice of that one goal. Of course that person would win that race.  — Invest Like The Best Sam Hinkie Find Your People [40:45] I do not want be roadkill on the modern-day Napoleon's path to glory.[43:15] The ancients had a great advantage over us in that their armies were not trailed by a second army of pen pushers.[44:05] A wasted life should be your greatest fear.[46:30] Make use of every possible opportunity of increasing your chances of victory.[48:55] Paul Graham on Be Hard to Kill:The way to make a startup recession-proof is to do exactly what you should do anyway: run it as cheaply as possible.For years I've been telling founders that the surest route to success is to be the cockroaches of the corporate world. The immediate cause of death in a startup is always running out of money. So the cheaper your company is to operate, the harder it is to kill. —  Paul Graham’s essays (Founders #275)[51:30] Winning is the main thing. Keep the main thing, the main thing.----Subscribe to listen to Founders Premium — Subscribers can ask me questions directly and listen to Ask Me Anything (AMA) episodes.----Join my free email newsletter to get my top 10 highlights from every book ----“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — GarethBe like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading Tiger Woods by Jeff Benedict and Armen Keteyian.----This episode is brought to you by Tiny: Tiny is the easiest way to sell your business. Tiny provides quick and straightforward exits for Founders.  ----This episode is brought to you by Meter: Meter is the easiest way for your business to get fast, secure, and reliable internet and WiFi in any commercial space. Go to meter.com/founders----Follow one of my favorite podcasts Invest Like The Best and listen to episode 326 Alexis Rivas----Subscribe to listen to Founders Premium — Subscribers can ask me questions directly and listen to Ask Me Anything (AMA) episodes.----[3:00] He was someone no one had ever seen or will ever see again.[5:20] You can always understand the son by the story of his father. The story of the father is embedded in the son. — Francis Ford Coppola: A Filmmaker's Life by Michael Schumacher. (Founders #242)[7:15] His output was enormous, much greater than that of nine tenths of other composers. He was a mature artist in most forms at the age of twelve. There was never a month, often scarcely a week, when he did not produce a substantial score. — Mozart: A Life by Paul Johnson. (Founders #240)[7:50] Tiger's opponents were never people; it was always history.[14:05] I've always been a practice player. I believe in it. — Michael Jordan: The Lifeby Roland Lazenby. (Founders #212)[17:00] Grinding It Out: The Making of McDonald's by Ray Kroc. (Founders #293)[18:30] Tiger was filling his mind with words that were intended to make him great. He wrote some of the messages from the self-help cassettes on a sheet of paper that he taped to his bedroom wall:I believe in meI will own my own destinyI smile at obstaclesI am first in my resolveI fulfill my resolutions powerfullyMy strength is greatI stick to it, easily, naturally My will moves mountainsI focus and give it my allMy decisions are strongI do it with all my heartTiger listened to those tapes so often that he wore them out.[31:50] People would ask him how did you get so good Tiger? And he would answer, practice, practice, practice.[32:10] The world is a very malleable place. If you know what you want, and you go for it with maximum energy and drive and passion, the world will often reconfigure itself around you much more quickly and easily than you would think.  —The Pmarca Blog Archive Ebook by Marc Andreessen.[36:45] The Score Takes Care of Itself: My Philosophy of Leadership by Bill Walsh. (Founders #106)[40:15] That’s all training is. Stress. Recover. Improve. You’d think any damn fool could do it. But you don’t. You work too hard and rest too little and get hurt. — Bowerman and the Men of Oregon: The Story of Oregon's Legendary Coach and Nike's Cofounder by Kenny Moore. (Founders #153)[46:15] Money didn't motivate him. Nor did fame. He played for the hardware. He played for the win.[53:45] Robert Caro’s Books----Subscribe to listen to Founders Premium — Subscribers can ask me questions directly and listen to Ask Me Anything (AMA) episodes.----Join my free email newsletter to get my top 10 highlights from every book----I use Readwise to organize and remember everything I read. You can try Readwise for 60 days for free here.  ----“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — GarethBe like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading Against the Odds: An Autobiography by James Dyson for the 4th time. You can also find the book on Book Finder. This episode is brought to you by Meter: Meter is the easiest way for your business to get fast, secure, and reliable internet and WiFi in any commercial space. Go to meter.com/founders----This episode is brought to you by Tiny: Tiny is the easiest way to sell your business. Tiny provides quick and straightforward exits for Founders.  ----Follow one of my favorite podcasts Invest Like The Best and listen to episode 293 David Senra: Passion and Pain ----[4:30] Invention: A Life by James Dyson (Founders #205)[2:41] I am a creator of products, a builder of things, and my name appears on them. That is how I make a living and they are what have made my name at least familiar in a million homes.[11:00] Isambard Kingdom Brunel: The Definitive Biography of The Engineer, Visionary, and Great Briton by L.T.C. Rolt. (Founders #201)[13:10] After the idea there is plenty of time to learn the technology. My first cyclonic vacuum cleaner was built out of cereal packets and masking tape long before I understood how it worked.[14:15] Difference for the sake of it. In everything. Because it must be better. From the moment the idea strikes, to the running of the business. Difference, and retention of total control.[18:00] I would not be dragged into something I didn't want to do.[22:40] They were all running round and round the track like a herd of sheep and not getting any quicker. Difference itself was making me come in first.[23:34] As I grew more and more neurotic about being caught from behind I trained harder to stay in front. To this day it is the fear of failure, more than anything else, which makes me keep working at success.[27:20] Isambard Kingdom Brunel was unable to think small, and nothing was a barrier to him. The mere fact that something had never been one before presented, to Brunel, no suggestion that the doing of it was impossible.He was fired by an inner strength and self-belief almost impossible to imagine in this feckless age.While I could never lay claim to the genius of a man like that —I have tried to be as confident in my vision as he was.And at times in my life when I have encountered difficulty and self-doubt I have looked to his example to fire me on.[30:33] The vision of a single man pursued with dogged determination that was nothing less than obsession.[36:30] The root principle was to do things your way. It didn't matter how other people did it.[41:38] You simply cannot mix your messages when selling something new. A consumer can barely handle one great new idea, let alone two, or even several.[49:30] A direct relationship with the customer is the holy grail. Do not abandon it.[52:00] One of the strains of this book is about control. If you have the intimate knowledge of a product that comes with dreaming it up and then designing it, I have been trying to say, then you will be the better able to sell it and then, reciprocally, to go back to it and improve it. From there you are in the best possible position to convince others of its greatness and to inspire others to give their very best efforts to developing it, and to remain true to it, and to see it through all the way to its optimum point. To total fruition, if you like.[1:02:20] Before I went into production with the dual cyclone I had built 5,127 prototypes.[1:02:30] There is no such thing as a quantum leap. There is only dogged persistence – and in the end you make it look like a quantum leap.[1:03:30] While it is easy, of course, for me to celebrate my doggedness now and say that it is all you need to succeed, the truth is that it demoralized me terribly. I would crawl into the house every night covered in dust after a long day, exhausted and depressed because that day's cyclone had not worked. There were times when I thought it would never work, that I would keep on making cyclone after cyclone, never going forwards, never going backwards, until I died.[1:06:20] I was broke, hungry and depressed. The outlook was very dreary. My doggedness and self-belief in the absence of any real evidence that they were justified was beginning to look more and more like insanity.[1:10:30] Persistent trial and error allows them to wake up one morning after many, many mornings with a world beating product.[1:13:15] I began to consider forgetting the whole thing and doing something else with my life.[1:16:00] The poor buggers were so wrong, to think that designers knew nothing about business, or about marketing, or is about selling. It is the people who make the things that understand them, and understand what the public wants.[1:21:30] Go further. There is nothing wrong with making the consumer laugh. Conventional looks do not make a product more marketable.Subscribe to listen to Founders Premium — Subscribers can ask me questions directly and listen to Ask Me Anything (AMA) episodes.----Join my free email newsletter to get my top 10 highlights from every book----I use Readwise to organize and remember everything I read. You can try Readwise for 60 days for free here.  ----“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — GarethBe like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading Make Something Wonderful: Steve Jobs in his own words.This episode is brought to you by Tiny: Tiny is the easiest way to sell your business. Tiny provides quick and straightforward exits for Founders.  ----This episode is brought to you by Meter: Meter is the easiest way for your business to get fast, secure, and reliable internet and WiFi in any commercial space. Go to meter.com/founders ----Follow one of my favorite podcasts Invest Like The Best and listen to episode 293 David Senra: Passion and Pain ----[3:48] He gave an extraordinary amount of thought to how best to use our fleeting time.[4:24] He imagined what reality lacked and set out to remedy it.[7:27] Steve Jobs: The Lost Interview Video and My Notes.[10:02] Edwin Land episodes:Instant: The Story of Polaroid by Christopher Bonanos. (Founders #264)Land's Polaroid: A Company and the Man Who Invented It by Peter C. Wensberg (Founders #263)A Triumph of Genius: Edwin Land, Polaroid, and the Kodak Patent War by Ronald Fierstein (Founders #134)Land's Polaroid: A Company and the Man Who Invented It by Peter C. Wensberg (Founders #133)The Instant Image: Edwin Land and the Polaroid Experienceby Mark Olshaker (Founders #132)Insisting On The Impossible: The Life of Edwin Land and Instant: The Story of Polaroid(Founders #40)[13:23] Think of your life as a rainbow arcing across the horizon of this world. You appear, have a chance to blaze in the sky, then you disappear.[14:10] One from Many: VISA and the Rise of Chaordic Organization by Dee Hock. (Founders #260)[15:42] Read Jeff Bezos's shareholder letters in book form: Invent and Wander: The Collected Writings of Jeff Bezos or for free online: Amazon Investor Relations(Founders #282)[19:45] If you want to understand the entrepreneur, study the juvenile delinquent. — Let My People Go Surfing: The Education of a Reluctant Businessman by Yvon Chouinard. (Founders #297)[30:47] How important product is based on how much time you spend with it: People are going to be spending two, three hours a day interacting with these machines—longer than they spend in the car.[39:02] Return to the Little Kingdom: Steve Jobs and the Creation of Appleby Michael Moritz. (Founders #76)[40:32] The real big thing is: if you’re going to make something, it doesn’t take any more energy—and rarely does it take more money—to make it really great. All it takes is a little more time. And a willingness to do so, a willingness to persevere until it’s really great.[45:07] Creativity, Inc.: Overcoming the Unseen Forces That Stand in the Way of True Inspiration by Ed Catmull [45:31] Steve’s enthusiasm kept him writing check after check to Pixar, ultimately investing some $60 million.[47:47] It is better to have fewer people even if it means doing less. Let's build our company slowly and carefully.[53:36] I’m not so dominant that I can’t listen to creative ideas coming from other people. Successful people listen. Those who don’t listen, don’t survive long. — Driven From Within by Michael Jordan (Founders #213)[54:40] You never achieve what you want without falling on your face a few times in the process of getting there.[1:00:11] There wasn’t a hierarchy of ideas that mapped onto the hierarchy of the organization.[1:03:33] Don’t be a career. The enemy of most dreams and intuitions, and one of the most dangerous and stifling concepts ever invented by humans, is the “Career.” A career is a concept for how one is supposed to progress through stages during the training for and practicing of your working life. There are some big problems here. First and foremost is the notion that your work is different and separate from the rest of your life. If you are passionate about your life and your work, this can’t be so. They will become more or less one. This is a much better way to live one’s life.[1:05:11] Make your avocation your vocation. Make what you love your work.[1:05:58] Think of your life as a rainbow arcing across the horizon of this world. You appear, have a chance to blaze in the sky, then you disappear.[1:09:27] In the Company of Giants: Candid Conversations With the Visionaries of the Digital World by Rama Dev Jager and Rafael Ortiz. (Founders #208)[1:10:52] Much of it is also drive and passion—hard work makes up for a lot.[1:13:28] A risk-taking creative environment on the product side required a fiscally conservative environment on the business side.[1:13:57] You've got to choose what you put your love into really carefully.[1:14:38] A remarkably consistent set of values that Steve held dear: Life is short; don’t waste it. Tell the truth. Technology should enhance human creativity. Process matters. Beauty matters. Details matter. The world we know is a human creation—and we can push it forward.[1:19:24] Steve Jobs speaking to Apple employees (Video) [1:29:48] Apple is the world’s premier bridge builder between mere mortals and the exploding world of high technology.[1:30:14] Steve’s favorite quote: We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit. – Aristotle[1:32:29] The Man Behind the Microchip: Robert Noyce and the Invention of Silicon Valley by Leslie Berlin. (Founders #166)[1:42:27] That’s been the most important lesson I’ve learned in business: that the dynamic range of people dramatically exceeds things you encounter in the rest of our normal lives—and to try to find those really great people who really love what they do. [1:43:00] Jony Ive: The Genius Behind Apple's Greatest Productsby Leander Kahney. (Founders #178)[1:47:27] It’s a circus world, and you never know what’s around the next corner.[1:53:40] Bourdain: The Definitive Oral Biography by Laurie Woolever. (Founders #219)[2:01:00] All glory is fleeting.----Subscribe to listen to Founders Premium — Subscribers can ask me questions directly and listen to Ask Me Anything (AMA) episodes.----Join my free email newsletter to get my top 10 highlights from every book----I use Readwise to organize and remember everything I read. You can try Readwise for 60 days for free here.  ----“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — GarethBe like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from having lunch with Sam Zell and reading Zeckendorf: The Autobiography of The man Who Played a Real-Life Game of Monopoly and Won the Largest Real Estate Empire in History by William Zeckendorf. This episode is brought to you by Meter: Meter is the easiest way for your business to get fast, secure, and reliable internet and WiFi in any commercial space. ----This episode is brought to you by Tiny: Tiny is the easiest way to sell your business. Tiny provides quick and straightforward exits for Founders.  ----[27:31] Start of episode on Zeckendorf’s autobiography[27:44] 26 years of work was now moving down the chute.[28:36] The secret of any great project is to keep it moving, keep it from losing momentum.[34:55] If you want to understand the entrepreneur, study the juvenile delinquent. — Let My People Go Surfing: The Education of a Reluctant Businessman by Yvon Chouinard. (Founders #297)[36:21] Zeckendorf: Revisiting the legacy of a master builder[45:08] This ruthless industry has created far more bankruptcies than it has billionaires. — Risk Game: Self Portrait of an Entrepreneur by Francis Greenburger. (Founders #243)[48:49] If you want to know whether you are destined to be a success or a failure in life, you can easily find out. The test is simple and it is infallible: Are you able to save money? If not, drop out. You will lose. You may think not, but you will lose as sure as you live. The seed of success is not in you. — James J. Hill: Empire Builder of the Northwest by Michael P. Malone.[53:20] I brought energy and drive. I became the chief enthusiast.[1:08:42] I was also deeply in debt. Never, except for rare moments, have I ever had my head very far above the financial water and never have I Iet this trouble me.[1:10:51] The importance to me of being on the heights was that in an hour I could achieve what previously would've taken a year or more of effort to perform.[1:11:13] One way to succeed is by aiding and supporting the position of others through new or ingenious ideas or projects. This usefulness to others is in large part the reason for my own success.[1:14:44] Am I Being Too Subtle?: Straight Talk From a Business Rebel by Sam Zell. (Founders #269)[1:15:04] The Invisible Billionaire: Daniel Ludwig by Jerry Shields. (Founders #292)[1:21:28] The Patriarch: The Remarkable Life and Turbulent Times of Joseph P. Kennedy by David Nasaw [1:25:52] More businesses die from indigestion than starvation. — The HP Way: How Bill Hewlett and I Built Our Company by David Packard. (Founders #291)[1:29:23] Wisdom is prevention. –Charlie Munger + Be hard to kill. —Paul Graham (Founders #275)Subscribe to listen to Founders Premium — Subscribers can ask me questions directly and listen to Ask Me Anything (AMA) episodes.----Join my free email newsletter to get my top 10 highlights from every book----I use Readwise to organize and remember everything I read. You can try Readwise for 60 days for free here.  ----“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — GarethBe like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from rereading Let My People Go Surfing: The Education of a Reluctant Businessman by Yvon Chouinard.This episode is brought to you by: Tiny: Tiny is the easiest way to sell your business. Tiny provides quick and straightforward exits for Founders.  ----This episode is brought to you by Hampton: Hampton is a highly vetted membership community for entrepreneurs, founders and CEOs. Join the private network for high-growth founders.----Follow one of my favorite podcasts Invest Like The Best !----[3:45] One of my favorite sayings about entrepreneurship is: If you want to understand the entrepreneur, study the juvenile delinquent. The delinquent is saying with his actions, “This sucks. I’m going to do my own thing.”[4:32] The original intent for writing Let My People Go Surfing was for it to be a philosophical manual for the employees of Patagonia. We have always considered Patagonia an experiment in doing business in unconventional ways.[7:48] MeatEater Podcast #188 Yvon Chouinard on Belonging to Nature[7:55] The first part of our mission statement, “Make the best product,” is the cornerstone of our business philosophy. “Make the best” is a difficult goal. It doesn’t mean “among the best” or the “best at a particular price point.” It means “make the best,” period.[9:58] When I die and go to hell, the devil is going to make me the marketing director for a cola company. I’ll be in charge of trying to sell a product that no one needs, is identical to its competition, and can’t be sold on its merits. I’d be competing head-on in the cola wars, on price, distribution, advertising, and promotion, which would indeed be hell for me. I’d much rather design and sell products so good and unique that they have no competition.[14:32] We were like a wild species living on the edge of an ecosystem: adaptable, resilient, and tough.[14:49] I believe the way towards mastery of any endeavor is to work towards simplicity. The more you know, the less you need.[15:49] The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry[17:59] Complexity is often a sure sign that the functional needs have not been solved. Take the difference between the Ferrari and the Cadillac of the 1960s. The Ferrari’s clean lines suites its high-performance aims. The Cadillac really didn’t have any functional aims. It didn’t have steering, suspension, aerodynamics, or brakes appropriate to its immense horsepower. All it had to do was convey the idea of power, creature comfort, of a living room floating down the highway to the golf course. So, to a basically ugly shape were added all manner of useless chrome: fins at the back, breasts at the front. Once you lose the discipline of functionality as a design guidepost, the imagination runs amok. Once you design a monster, it tends to look like one too.[21:29] Shoe Dog: A Memoir by the Creator of Nike by Phil Knight. (Founders #186)[28:02] Becoming Trader Joe: How I Did Business My Way and Still Beat the Big Guys by Joe Coulombe. (Founders #188)[28:55] There are different ways to address a new idea or project. If you take the conservative scientific route, you study the problem in your head or on paper until you are sure there is no chance of failure. However, you have taken so long that the competition has already beaten you to market. The entrepreneurial way is to immediately take a forward step and if that feels good, take another, if not, step back. Learn by doing, it is a faster process.[31:33] Can a company that wants to make the best-quality outdoor clothing in the world be the size of Nike? Can a ten-table, three-star French restaurant retain its third star when it adds fifty tables? The question haunted me throughout the 1980s as Patagonia evolved.[35:47] I was still wondering why I was really in business.[38:17] We had to begin to make all of our decisions as though we would be in business for a hundred years.[39:02] Made in Japan: Akio Morita and Sony by Akio Morita. (Founders #102)[39:13] Jeff Bezos on what he learned from Akio Morita and how it influenced the building of Amazon:"Right after World War II, Akio Morita, the guy who founded Sony, made the mission for Sony that they were going to make Japan known for quality.And you have to remember, this was a time when Japan was known for cheap, copycat products. And Morita didn’t say we’re going to make Sony known for quality. He said we’re going to make Japan known for quality. He chose a mission for Sony that was bigger than Sony.And when we talk about earth’s most customer-centric company, we have a similar idea in mind. We want other companies to look at Amazon and see us as a standard-bearer for obsessive focus on the customer as opposed to obsessive focus on the competitor."[42:13] Keep your company in Yarak: Super alert, hungry but not weak, and ready to hunt.[42:45] Against The Odds: An Autobiography by James Dyson (Founders #200)[44:02] Jay Z: What am I here for? To be second best? I don’t think so.[44:13] The more you know, the less you need.[51:33] Teach, inform, and inspire. Do so relentlessly and the sales will follow.[53:04] I was taught by some wise people that if you manage the top line of your company-your customers, your products, your strategy-then the bottom line will follow. But if you manage the bottom line of the company and forget about the rest, you’ll eventually hit the wall because you'll take your eyes off the prize. — Steve JobsIn the Company of Giants: Candid Conversations With the Visionaries of the Digital World by Rama Dev Jager and Rafael Ortiz. (Founders #208)[56:03] Quality, not price, has the highest correlation with business success. Whenever we are faced with a serious business decision, the answer almost always is to increase quality.[56:59] Huberman Lab Podcast[57:19]  I cannot imagine any company that wants to make the best product of its kind being staffed by people who do not care passionately about the product.[57:39] One of my all time favorite quotes:A master in the art of living draws no sharp distinction between his work and his play; his labor and his leisure; his mind and his body; his education and his recreation. He hardly knows which is which. He simply pursues his vision of excellence through whatever he is doing, and leaves others to determine whether he is working or playing. To himself, he always appears to be doing both.[58:56] You should not see change as a threat, rather as an opportunity to grow and evolve to a higher level.Subscribe to listen to Founders Premium — Subscribers can ask me questions directly and listen to Ask Me Anything (AMA) episodes.----Join my free email newsletter to get my top 10 highlights from every book----I use Readwise to organize and remember everything I read. You can try Readwise for 60 days for free here.  ----“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — GarethBe like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

David Rosenthal and Ben Gilbert — of the Acquired podcast — invited me to San Francisco for a discussion on our mutual obsession: spending every waking hour studying the history of entrepreneurship and sharing those lessons on our podcasts. Follow Acquired in your podcast player here or at Acquired.fm This episode is brought to you by: Tiny: Tiny is the easiest way to sell your business. Tiny provides quick and straightforward exits for Founders. Get in touch with Tiny by emailing hi@tiny.com. [3:00] David’s time with Charlie Munger[5:30] Henry Flagler after Standard Oil[8:30] What makes a great biography, and how to capture all sides of complex characters?[11:00] Studying history is a form of leverage to achieve success[13:00] How do we figure out what the true story is for an episode we're doing?[20:30] Silicon Valley should focus more on durability than growth[21:30] How David got into reading biographies and podcasting[25:40] What were each of their influences before starting Acquired and Founders?[35:30] How to suck less over time[37:30] What motivates, Ben, David, and David to get better?[45:00] Dead ends: business model changes, paid podcasts, changing the name to “Adapting”, and Senra's “Autotelic”[51:30] “You’re not advertising to a standing army, you’re advertising to a moving parade”[56:00] Comparison of podcasting business models[1:00:10] Senra’s insane Readwise "healthy twitter" habit[1:04:30] Is it possible for the ultra-wealthy not to mess up their kids?[1:14:30] The fleeting moments you get to spend with your kids[1:17:00] The value of building relationships with best-in-class peers[1:19:30] How the book publishing industry works[1:28:45] How to differentiate yourself as an investor in 2023?[1:38:30] The greatest historical examples as content marketing[2:02:00] The best businesses are cults (and Senra starts one on the episode)[2:07:00] Senra gives feedback to Ben and David on Acquired episode format[2:15:30] Steve Jobs’ 1997 product matrix[2:17:00] The moral imperative to market products that help people[2:23:00] Ray Kroc and Steve Jobs: deeply flawed founders[2:23:30] The founders we idolize are world-builders[2:28:00] When yachts and jets are underpriced assets[2:32:00] How to compete when money is cheap vs. when there are real interest rates[2:39:30] When Ben and David have fixed broken episodes in post-production[2:44:30] Why masters of craft are so interesting to study[2:45:30] Should you listen to advice?[2:51:00] David’s first job detailing cars[2:52:30] The Cuban experience immigrating to Miami[3:01:00] College entrepreneurship programs[3:04:00] Ben’s experience learning UNIX as a kid[3:08:30] David remembers Tim Ferriss guest lecturing in collegeIf you have scrolled this far and still haven't followed Acquired in your podcast player please do so here! 

What I learned from reading The Taste of Luxury: Bernard Arnault and the Moet-Hennessy Louis Vuitton Story by Nadege Forestier and Nazanine Ravai.This episode is brought to you by: Tiny: Tiny is the easiest way to sell your business. Tiny provides quick and straightforward exits for Founders.  ----Follow one of my favorite podcasts Invest Like The Best ![1:16] I am the boss. I shall be here on Monday morning and I shall be running the company in person.[4:30] The Taste of Luxury: Bernard Arnault and the Moet-Hennessy Louis Vuitton Story by Nadege Forestier and Nazanine Ravai[5:01] I highly recommend listening to Acquired’s episode on LVMH. It is excellent.[5:16] Business Breakdowns episode LVMH: The Wolf in Cashmere’s Conglomerate[6:16] Napoleon: A Concise Biography by David Bell. (Founders #294)[6:18] Mind of Napoleon: A Selection of His Written and Spoken Words by Napoleon and J. Christopher Herold.[7:20] I’m not so dominant that I can’t listen to creative ideas coming from other people. Successful people listen. Those who don’t listen, don’t survive long. — Driven From Within by Michael Jordan (Founders #213)[9:00] “I am very competitive. I always want to win.” —Bernard Arnault[10:39] What I'm interested is in doing.[11:43] He believed in extreme discretion.[11:56] I Had Dinner With Charlie Munger (Founders #295)[16:17] Beneath his civilized appearance there lurked the spirit of an adventurer. He wanted more.[17:45] He wanted to go far. He had an iron will. At a laboriously won tennis match he said “I may lose once but I never lose twice.” —Bernard Arnault[19:45] Problems are just opportunities in work clothes.[23:30] Arnault remained inflexible. He wanted control. There was no question of his becoming the Willots’ partner.[24:15] Far from discouraging him, this consensus of opinion (that this would lead to failure) acted as a stimulus.[24:25] “I remember people telling me, it does not make sense to put together so many brands. And it was a success, it was a recognized success, and for the last 10 years now, every competitor is trying to imitate. I think they are not successful, but they try.” —Bernard Arnault[30:43] “In business, I think the most important thing is to position yourself for long-term and not be too impatient, which I am by nature, and I have to control myself.” —Bernard Arnault[33:35] He had such an appetite for victory and such a capacity for work that he was bound to succeed.[35:26] “People think of politicians having true power, but that’s less and less true. After all, they are often constrained or being edged into a corner by a whole series of contingencies ... I’m lucky in that I can say, ‘I want my group to be in such and such a situation in 10 or 20 years’ time’ and then formulate a plan to make that happen.” –Bernard Arnault[42:37] Those on the margins often come to control the center.[43:10] Invest Like the Best episode Doug Leone —Lessons From A Titan [48:31] Difference for the sake of it. In everything. Because it must be better. From the moment the idea strikes, to the running of the business. Difference, and retention of total control. — Against The Odds: An Autobiography by James Dyson (Founders #200)[1:01:20] My relationship to luxury goods is really very rational. It is the only area in which it is possible to make luxury profit margins.[1:02:45] Arnault wants to take power everywhere and immediately.[1:07:40] Arnault is an iron fist in an iron glove.Subscribe to listen to Founders Premium — Subscribers can ask me questions directly and listen to Ask Me Anything (AMA) episodes.----Join my free email newsletter to get my top 10 highlights from every book----I use Readwise to organize and remember everything I read. You can try Readwise for 60 days for free here.  ----“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — GarethBe like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from rereading The Tao of Charlie Munger.This episode is brought to you by: Tiny: Tiny is the easiest way to sell your business. Tiny provides quick and straightforward exits for Founders.  ----Follow one of my favorite podcasts Invest Like The Best ![5:45] The blueprint he gave me was simple: Forget what you know about buying fair businesses at wonderful prices; instead, buy wonderful businesses at fair prices.[8:48] He has never forgotten the importance of having friends in high places.[9:04] Most people systematically undervalue their time. — Peter Thiel[11:08] Franklin & Washington: The Founding Partnership by Edward Larson. Founders #251)[12:23] Meet You in Hell: Andrew Carnegie, Henry Clay Frick, and the Bitter Partnership That Changed America by Les Standiford. (Founders #284)[15:02] Charlie took the excess capital out of Blue Chip Stamp and invested it in profitable businesses.[12:56] Charlie started seeing the advantages of investing in better businesses that didn't have big capital requirements and did have lots of free cash that could be reinvested in expanding operations or buying new businesses.[17:38] Go for great.[21:33] In everything I’ve done it really pays to go after the best people in the world. —Steve Jobs[27:15] If you're in a good business just know that it's human nature to mess it up. Don't mess it up. Just stay there and let time do its work.[27:34] One truly great business will make your unborn grandchildren wealthy.[28:08] All I Want To Know Is Where I'm Going To Die So I'll Never Go There: Buffett & Munger – A Study in Simplicity and Uncommon, Common Sense by Peter Bevelin. (Founders #286)[34:39] I did not succeed in life by intelligence. I succeeded because I have a long attention span.[34:54] Charlie Munger on how he made $400 or $500 million by reading Barron’s for 50 years.[35:11] One of the reasons Charlie and Warren have never worried about anyone mimicking their investment style is because no other institution or individual has the discipline are the patience to wait as long as they can. [35:47] Wisdom is prevention.[36:50] Only play games where you have an edge. — A Man for All Markets: From Las Vegas to Wall Street, How I Beat the Dealer and the Market by Ed Thorp. (Founders #222)[38:31] Wise people step on big and growing troubles early.[44:51] I am continually amazed at the number of people who are presented with an opportunity and pass. There’s your basic dividing line between the people who shoot up in their careers like a rocket ship, and those who don’t — right there. — Marc Andreessen's Blog Archive (Founders #50)[46:28] The most inspiring biography I’ve read so far: Born of This Land: My Life Story by Chung Ju-yung. (Founders #117)[47:11] Invest Like The Best #204 Sam Hinkie Find Your People[42:42] Rober Caro’s Books:The Power BrokerThe Path to Power: The Years of Lyndon Johnson IMeans of Ascent: The Years of Lyndon Johnson IIMaster of the Senate: The Years of Lyndon Johnson IIIThe Passage of Power: The Years of Lyndon Johnson IV[48:46] We just got after it and we stayed after it. — Sam Walton: Made In America by Sam Walton. (Founders #234)[52:39] Some brand names own a piece of consumer's minds and they do not have any direct competition.[55:30] We are individual opportunity driven.[57:08] Size and market domination can create their own kind of durable competitive advantage.[56:15] Jony Ive: The Genius Behind Apple's Greatest Products by Leander Kahney. (Founders #178)[1:01:57] Extreme specialization is the way to succeed. Most people are way better off specializing than trying to understand the world.[1:04:44] Wise people want to avoid other people who are just total rat poison and there are a lot of them.[1:05:35] Charlie and I have seen so much of the ordinary in business that we can truly appreciate a virtuoso performance.[1:09:00] Am I Being Too Subtle?: Straight Talk From a Business Rebel by Sam Zell. (Founders #269)[1:10:15] Charlie looks at nearly everything through the lens of history. You aren't changing human nature. Things will just keep repeating forever.[1:13:13] There should be more willingness to take the blows of life as they fall. That's what manhood is, taking life as it falls. Not whining all the time and trying to fix it by whining.[1:14:40] Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire by James Wallace and Jim Erickson. (Founders #290)[1:17:00] Arnold Schwarzenegger autobiographies and episodes:Total Recall: My Unbelievably True Life Story by Arnold Schwarzenegger. (Founders #141)Arnold: The Education of a Bodybuilder by Arnold Schwarzenegger. (Founders #193)----Subscribe to listen to Founders Premium — Subscribers can ask me questions directly and listen to Ask Me Anything (AMA) episodes.----Join my free email newsletter to get my top 10 highlights from every book----I use Readwise to organize and remember everything I read. You can try Readwise for 60 days for free here.  ----“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — GarethBe like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading Napoleon: A Concise Biography by David Bell.This episode is brought to you by: Tiny: Tiny is the easiest way to sell your business. Tiny provides quick and straightforward exits for Founders.  ----Follow one of my favorite podcasts Invest Like The Best ![3:00] He could think quicker and along more individual and original lines than any of them.[4:00] John D: The Founding Father of the Rockefellers by David Freeman Hawke. (Founders #254)[4:14] Miami meetup with Shane Parrish [7:31] His life was enormously important, endlessly fascinating, and connected to some of the most controversial and constantly reinterpreted events in the world history.[8:37] Paul Johnson’s books:Churchill by Paul Johnson. (Founders #225)Mozart: A Life by Paul Johnson. (Founders #240)Socrates: A Man for Our Times by Paul Johnson. (Founders #252) [10:54] Heroes: From Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar to Churchill and de Gaulle by Paul Johnson. (Founders #226)[12:20] He knew the importance of actively crafting his image in all available media.[15:08] Napoleon found comfort and companionship in books[17:02] The revolution was overturning age old hierarchies and giving worldwide prominence to previously obscure figures.[17:24] Napoleon was ruthless.[18:36] Only after that battle did I believe myself to be a superior man. And did the ambition come to me of executing the great things, which so far had been occupying my thoughts only as a fantastic dream.[20:00] Many are the historical opportunities that have been lost for lack of talent or vision. In Napoleon's case, the man met his hour.[20:13] He could see in a moment how to maneuver everything for maximum effect.[21:03] Napoleon was a man of stone and iron.[26:27] Napoleon was something new and the keenest observers understood it.[29:06] I wanted to rule the world, who wouldn't have in my place?[29:26] If papa could see us now.[29:45] Franklin & Washington: The Founding Partnership by Edward Larson. (Founders #251)[32:15] You might as well send a cow in pursuit of a rabbit. The Indians were accustomed to these woods.[35:30] The Empire was increasingly coming to resemble a skyscraper built in haste without a proper foundation.[35:58] Driven: An Autobiography by Larry Miller. (Founders #168)[39:24] The key to victory was to plan and pursue a war exactly contrary to what the enemy wants.[39:49] Hardcore History Ghosts of the Ostfront series[41:08] The distracted do not beat the focused.[42:36] Success is never permanent. The same person that built the empire, destroyed it.----Subscribe to listen to Founders Premium — Subscribers can ask me questions directly and listen to Ask Me Anything (AMA) episodes.----Join my free email newsletter to get my top 10 highlights from every book----I use Readwise to organize and remember everything I read. You can try Readwise for 60 days for free here.  ----“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — GarethBe like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from rereading Grinding It Out: The Making of McDonald's by Ray Kroc.This episode is brought to you by: Tiny: Tiny is the easiest way to sell your business. Tiny provides quick and straightforward exits for Founders.  ----Follow one of my favorite podcasts Invest Like The Best ![2:00] I have always believed that each man makes his own happiness and is responsible for his own problems.[4:00] I was fascinated by the simplicity and effectiveness of the system they described that night.Each step in producing the limited menu was stripped down to its essence and accomplished with a minimum of effort.[5:00] When I flew back to Chicago that fateful day in 1954, I had a freshly signed contract with the McDonald brothers in my briefcase. I was a battle-scarred veteran of the business wars, but I was still eager to go into action. I was 52 years old. I had diabetes and incipient arthritis. I had lost my gall bladder and most of my thyroid gland in earlier campaigns. But I was convinced that the best was ahead of me.[6:00] It’s not what you do it’s how you do it:Ralph Lauren: The Man Behind the Mystique by Jeffrey Trachtenberg. (Founders #288)Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire by James Wallace and Jim Erickson. (Founders #290)The Invisible Billionaire: Daniel Ludwig by Jerry Shields. (Founders #292)[8:00] I never considered my dreams wasted energy. They were invariably linked to some form of action.[10:00] For me, work was play.[13:00] I vowed that this was going to be my only job. I was going to make my living at it and to hell with moonlighting of any kind. I intended to devote every ounce of my energy to selling, and that's exactly what I did.[14:00] Francis Ford Coppola: A Filmmaker's Life by Michael Schumacher. (Founders #242)[20:00] This was the first phase of grinding it out—building my personal monument to capitalism. I paid tribute, in the feudal sense, for many years before I was able to rise with McDonald's on the foundation I had laid.[21:00] Make every detail perfect and limit the number of details to perfect.[26:00] I was putting every cent I had and all I could borrow into this project.[28:00] Perfection is very difficult to achieve and perfection was what I wanted in McDonald's. Everything else was secondary.[29:00] If my competitor was drowning, I'd put a hose in his mouth.[44:00] Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefeller by Ron Chernow. (Founders #248)John D: The Founding Father of the Rockefellers by David Freeman Hawke. (Founders #254)[47:00] The advertising campaign we put together was a smash hit. It turned Californians into our parking lots as though blindfolds had been removed from their eyes.[48:00] Authority should go with the job.----Subscribe to listen to Founders Premium — Subscribers can ask me questions directly and listen to Ask Me Anything (AMA) episodes.----Join my free email newsletter to get my top 10 highlights from every book----I use Readwise to organize and remember everything I read. You can try Readwise for 60 days for free here.  ----“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — GarethBe like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from rereading The Invisible Billionaire: Daniel Ludwig by Jerry Shields. This episode is brought to you by: Tiny: Tiny is the easiest way to sell your business. Tiny provides quick and straightforward exits for Founders.  ----Follow one of my favorite podcasts Invest Like The Best !----[2:00] Obsessed with privacy, Ludwig pays a major public relations firm fat fees to keep his name out of the papers.[4:00]  An associate speaks of his unlimited ingenuity in dreaming up new ways of doing things.[5:00] Ludwig’s most notable characteristic, besides his imagination and pertinacity, is a lifelong penchant for keeping his mouth shut.[5:00] I'm in this business because I like it. I have no other hobbies.[6:00] Holding strongly to an opinion, purpose, or course of action, stubbornly or annoyingly persistent.[8:00] Risk Game: Self Portrait of an Entrepreneur by Francis Greenburger (Founders #243)[10:00] At his peak, he owned more than 200 companies in 50 countries.[23:00] War makes the demand for Ludwig's products and services skyrocket.[25:00] Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire by James Wallace and Jim Erickson. (Founders #290)[28:00] He did not mellow as he grew richer and older.[28:00] Some years later, the captain of a Ludwig ship made the extravagant mistake of mailing in a report of several pages held together by a paper clip. He received a sharp rebuke for his prodigality: "We do not pay to send ironmongery by air mail!"[29:00] Ludwig’s tightfistedness, however, persisted after the Depression, putting him in sharp contrast to such free spenders as Onassis and Niarchos. It also was largely responsible for many of his innovations in the shipbuilding industry.[29:00] Onassis: An Extravagant Life by Frank Brady. (Founders #211)[30:00] Ludwig’s ridding his ships of any feature that did not contribute to profits pleased his own obsessive sense of economy and kept him a step ahead of the competition. When someone asked why he didn't put a grand piano aboard his ships, as Stavros Niarchos did, Ludwig snapped, "You can't carry oil in a grand piano."[31:00] Stay in the game long enough to get lucky.[32:00] The world is a very malleable place. If you know what you want, and you go for it with maximum energy and drive and passion, the world will often reconfigure itself around you much more quickly and easily than you would think.  The Pmarca Blog Archive Ebook by Marc Andreessen (Founders #50)[37:00] The yacht was as much a business craft as any of his tankers and probably earned him more money than any of them.[40:00] Like the Rockefeller organization, Ludwig had mastered the practice of keeping his money by transferring it from one pocket, one company to another, while appearing to spend it.[42:00] He had learned something by now. Opportunities exist on the frontiers where most men dare not venture, and it is often the case that the farther the frontier, the greater the opportunity.[43:00] The way to escape competition is to either do something no one else is doing or do it where no one else is doing it.[43:00] Much of Ludwig's success was due to his willingness to venture where more timid entrepreneurs dared not go.----Subscribe to listen to Founders Premium — Subscribers can ask me questions directly and listen to Ask Me Anything (AMA) episodes. ----Join my free email newsletter to get my top 10 highlights from every book----I use Readwise to organize and remember everything I read. You can try Readwise for 60 days for free here.  ----“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — GarethBe like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading The HP Way: How Bill Hewlett and I Built Our Company by David Packard.This episode is brought to you by: Tiny: Tiny is the easiest way to sell your business. Quick and straightforward exits for Founders.  ----Follow one of my favorite podcasts Invest Like The Best ![2:01] Do our products offer something unique?[3:00] Customer satisfaction second to none is the only acceptable goal.[4:00] What I learned from rereading Jeff Bezos' Shareholder Letters for the 3rd time (Founders #282)[5:00] In Silicon Valley, the ultimate career standard was set by David Packard: start a company in a garage, grow it into the leading innovator in its field, then take it public, then take it into the Fortune 500 (or better yet, the Fortune 50), then become the spokesman for the industry, then go to Washington, and then become an historic global figure. Only Packard had accomplished all of this; he had set the bar, and the Valley had honored his achievement by making him the unofficial "mayor" of Silicon Valley.—The Intel Trinity: How Robert Noyce, Gordon Moore, and Andy Grove Built the World's Most Important Company by Michael Malone [6:00] Steve Jobs: The Exclusive Biography by Walter Isaacson. (Founders #214)[9:00] Gates read the encyclopedia from beginning to end when he was only seven or eight years old. — Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire by James Wallace and Jim Erickson. (Founders #290)[10:00] My father wouldn't let me quit.[11:00] Given equally good players and good teamwork, the team with the strongest will to win will prevail.[13:00] Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future by Peter Thiel. (Founders #278)[17:00] That was a very important lesson for me —that personal communication was often necessary to back up written instructions.[21:00] Insisting On The Impossible: The Life Of Edwin Land by Victor McElheny [28:00] More businesses die from indigestion than starvation.[33:00] I found, after much trial and error, that applying steady, gentle pressure from the worked best.[38:00] Bill and I knew we didn't want to be a “me too” company merely copying products already on the market.[38:00] Netbooks accounted for 20% of the laptop market. But Apple never seriously considered making one. “Netbooks aren’t better than anything,” Steve Jobs said at the time. “They’re just cheap laptops.” Jony proposed that the tablets in his lab could be Apple’s answer to the netbook.—— Jony Ive: The Genius Behind Apple's Greatest Products by Leander Kahney. (Founders #178)[46:00] Gains in quality come from meticulous attention to detail, and every step in the manufacturing process must be done as carefully as possible, not as quickly as possible.[47:00] Exponential growth is based on the principle that the state of change is proportional to the level of effort expended.----Subscribe to listen to Founders Premium — Subscribers can ask me questions directly and listen to Ask Me Anything (AMA) episodes. ----Join my free email newsletter to get my top 10 highlights from every book----I use Readwise to organize and remember everything I read. You can try Readwise for 60 days for free here.  ----“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — GarethBe like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from rereading Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire by James Wallace and Jim Erickson.This episode is brought to you by: Tiny: Tiny is the easiest way to sell your business. Quick and straightforward exits for Founders.----Follow one of my favorite podcasts Invest Like The Best and listen to episode 292 The Business of Gaming with Mitch Lasky and 293 David Senra Passion and Pain !----[4:00] Gates read the encyclopedia from beginning to end when he was only seven or eight years old.[4:00]  Gates had an obsessive personality and a compulsive need to be the best.[5:00] Everything Bill did, he did to the max. What he did always went well, well beyond everyone else.[6:00] You want to maneuver yourself into doing something in which you have an intense interest. —  Poor Charlie's Almanack: The Wit and Wisdom of Charles T. Munger.[7:00] Gates devoured everything he could get his hands on concerning computers and how to communicate with them, often teaching himself as he went.[9:00] A young man with no money and tons of enthusiasm. — The Dream of Solomeo: My Life and the Idea of Humanistic Capitalism by Brunello Cucinelli. (Founders #289)[10:00] He consumed biographies to understand how the great figures of history thought.[11:00] The idea that some people were super successful was interesting. What did they know? What did they do? What drove those kinds of successes?[12:00] Idea Man: A Memoir by the Cofounder of Microsoft by Paul Allen. (Founders #44)[13:00] “I’m going to make my first million by the time I'm 25.” It was not said as a boast, or even a prediction. He talked about the future as if his success was predestined.[15:00] Gates and Allen were convinced the computer industry was about to reach critical mass, and when it exploded it would usher in a technological revolution of astounding magnitude. They were on the threshold of one of those moments when history held its breath... and jumped, as it had done with the development of the car and the airplane. They could either lead the revolution or be swept along by it.[17:00] Bill had a monomaniacal quality. He would focus on something and really stick with it. He had a determination to master whatever it was he was doing. Bill was deciding where he was going to put his energy and to hell with what anyone else thought.[18:00] Don’t do anything that someone else can do. — Edwin Land[21:00] You've got to remember that in those days, the idea that you could own a computer, your own computer, was about as wild as the idea today of owning your own nuclear submarine. It was beyond comprehension.[23:00] There would be no unnecessary overhead or extravagant spending habits with Microsoft.[25:00] “Pertec kept telling me I was being unreasonable and they could deal with this guy [Gates]. It was like Roosevelt telling Churchill that he could deal with Stalin.[27:00] Four years in and Microsoft had only 11 employees.[28:00] Gates sustained Microsoft through tireless salesmanship. For several years he alone made the cold calls and haggled, cajoled, browbeat, and harangued the hardware makers of the emerging personal computer industry, convincing them to buy Microsoft's services and products. He was the best kind of salesman there is: he knew the product, and he believed in it. Moreover, he approached every client with the zealotry of a true believer.[29:00] When we got up to 30 employees, it was still just me, a secretary, and 28 programmers. I wrote all the checks, answered the mail, took the phone calls.[31:00] This might be Bill’s most important decision ever: IBM had talked to Gates about a fixed price for an unlimited number of copies of the software Microsoft licensed to IBM. The longer Gates thought about this proposal the more he became convinced it was bad business. Gates had decided to insist on a royalty arrangement with IBM.[34:00] You have to be uncompromised in your level of commitment to whatever you are doing, or it can disappear as fast as it appeared. Look around, just about any person or entity achieving at a high level has the same focus. The morning after Tiger Woods rallied to beat Phil Mickelson at the Ford Championship in 2005, he was in the gym by 6:30 to work out. No lights. No cameras. No glitz or glamour. Uncompromised. — Driven From Within by Michael Jordan and Mark Vancil. (Founders #213)[36:00] Overdrive: Bill Gates and the Race to Control Cyberspace by James Wallace. (Founders #174)[42:00] You can drive great people by making the speed of decision making really slow. Why would great people stay in an organization where they can't get things done? They look around after a while, and they're, like, "Look, I love the mission, but I can't get my job done because our speed of decision making is too slow."—Invent and Wander: The Collected Writings of Jeff Bezos (Founders #155)[43:00] Alexander the Great: The Brief Life and Towering Exploits of History's Greatest Conqueror--As Told By His Original Biographers by Arrian, Plutarch, and Quintus Curtius Rufus. (Founders #232)[44:00] Gates was intolerant of distractions.----Subscribe to listen to Founders Premium — Subscribers can ask me questions directly and listen to Ask Me Anything (AMA) episodes. ----Join my free email newsletter to get my top 10 highlights from every book----I use Readwise to organize and remember everything I read. You can try Readwise for 60 days for free here.  ----“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — GarethBe like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading The Dream of Solomeo: My Life and the Idea of Humanistic Capitalism by Brunello Cucinelli.This episode is brought to you by: Tiny: Tiny is the easiest way to sell your business. Quick and straightforward exits for Founders.----Follow one of my favorite podcasts Invest Like The Best and listen to episode 293 David Senra Passion and Pain ![4:00] I am reminded of Machiavelli: during his exile, he too spent his afternoons playing board games and drinking wine, while at night, in the austere silence of his studio, he engaged in solitary, literary conversations with the ancient scholars.[6:00] The true meaning of my life seems to be a spontaneous drive and energy.[7:00] I am driven by an immense desire: that my life, when it reaches its end, will not have been useless.[7:00] Brunello Cucinelli by Om Malik [8:00] God assigns to all of us a mission to fulfill. Our task is first to discover the nature of our summons, then to follow it.[11:00] We schedule time to think. Most people schedule themselves like a dentist. It's so easy to get so busy that you no longer have time to think- and you pay a huge price for that. —— All I Want To Know Is Where I'm Going To Die So I'll Never Go There: Buffett & Munger – A Study in Simplicity and Uncommon, Common Sense by Peter Bevelin. (Founders #286)[14:00] Try to be your son's teacher until he's ten years old; his father, until he's twenty; and his friend, for the rest of his life.[14:00] The problem is not getting rich, it's staying sane. —Charlie Munger[18:00] What an astonishing thing a book is. It's a flat object made from a tree with flexible parts on which are imprinted lots of funny dark squiggles. But one glance at it and you're inside the mind of another person, maybe somebody dead for thousands of years. Across the millennia, an author is speaking clearly and silently inside your head, directly to you. Writing is perhaps the greatest of human inventions, binding together people who never knew each other, citizens of distant epochs. Books break the shackles of time. A book is proof that humans are capable of working magic. —Carl Sagan[23:00] Postponing the reward increases the appreciation, a fact that has been forgotten in the current culture of impatience.[29:00] I could see the humiliation in my father's eyes. His teary eyes were the source of inspiration for my life.[33:00] I have always been firmly convinced that in order to successfully stand out you need to focus on one single project representing the dream of your life.[36:00] A young man with no money and tons of enthusiasm.[41:00] Ralph Lauren: The Man Behind the Mystique by Jeffrey Trachtenberg. (Founders #288) [43:00] One thing I never did—which I’m really proud of—was to push any of my kids too hard. I knew I was a fairly overactive fellow, and I didn’t expect them to try to be just like me. — Sam Walton: Made In America by Sam Walton. (Founders #234)[48:00] Invention: A Life by James Dyson. (Founders #205)[49:00] The greatest minds can convey deep and complex thoughts with words that are understandable to everyone.[50:00] Enthusiastically build an extraordinary reality day after day.----Subscribe to listen to Founders Premium to listen to Ask Me Anything (AMA) episodes + ask me questions directly. ----Join my free email newsletter to get my top 10 highlights from every book----I use Readwise to organize and remember everything I read. You can try Readwise for 60 days for free here.  ----“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — GarethBe like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from reading Ralph Lauren: The Man Behind the Mystique by Jeffrey Trachtenberg.This episode is brought to you by: Tiny: Tiny is the easiest way to sell your business. Quick and straightforward exits for Founders.----Follow one of my favorite podcasts Invest Like The Best and listen to episode 311 John Fio — Creating Magic for Consumers, episode 307 Jeremiah Lowin: Explaining the New AI Paradigm, and episode 293 The Business of Gaming. [2:01] When I lumped him together with a handful of other designers during casual conversation, he snapped: “Don't put me with those designers. My business is not compared to anybody else's."[3:00] In practice Ralph Lauren is a tough, intensely ambitious businessman.[3:00] Ralph has always possessed immense self-confidence; it is central to his character, an asset as valuable as his sense of color, fabric, style.[4:00] Coco Chanel: The Legend and the Life by Justine Picardie. (Founders #199)[7:00] Few outsiders understood fully how lucrative the licensing business had become. Ralph would have been a successful designer in his own right. However, he would never have qualified as one of the world's richest men without licensees willing to pay him 5 to 7 percent of sales.[7:00] His privately held fashion empire was on the brink of bankruptcy. Geffen surmised that the company should be transformed from a manufacturing firm to a design, marketing, and licensing company. "You guys stink at manufacturing," he said. "You need to get out of that business." Instead, Geffen continued, the company needed to focus on what it really knew: how to design and market the Calvin Klein brand name. — The Operator: David Geffen Builds, Buys, and Sells The New Hollywood by Tom King[14:00] When my customers come to me, they like to cross the threshold of some magic place; they feel a satisfaction that is perhaps a trace vulgar but that delights them: they are privileged characters who are incorporated into our legend. For them this is a far greater pleasure than ordering another suit.” —Coco Chanel, 1935[16:00] What he lacked in experience he compensated it for an energy and enthusiasm.[17:00] Differentiation is survival. — Jeff Bezos Jeff Bezos' Shareholder Letters (Founders #282)[19:00] Mediocrity is always invisible until passion shows up and exposes it.[22:00] From the beginning I've been aware of the need to sell everybody. — Becoming Trader Joe: How I Did Business My Way and Still Beat the Big Guys by Joe Coulombe. (Founders #188)[26:00] Difference for the sake of it. In everything. Because it must be better. From the moment the idea strikes, to the running of the business. Difference, and retention of total control. — Against The Odds: An Autobiography by James Dyson (Founders #200)[28:00] Made in Japan: Akio Morita and Sony by Akio Morita. (Founders #102)[32:00] Intransigence is my only weapon. — Charles de Gaulle by Julian Jackson. (Founders #224)[41:00] It's torture being a partner to somebody you don't want to be a partner with.[45:00] On a Thursday night he wins an award for best men’s wear designer. The next day he could not meet his payroll.[49:00] When bills come due, only cash is legal tender. Don't leave home without it. — The Essays of Warren Buffett by Warren Buffett and Lawrence Cunningham. (Founders #227)[54:00] You can make a lot of different mistakes and still recover if you run an efficient operation. Or you can be brilliant and still go out of business if you’re too inefficient. — Sam Walton: Made In America by Sam Walton.[55:00] The thing that set Ralph apart was his single-mindedness of purpose. Everybody else moved from place to place, from trend to trend. He wasn't trendy. He stayed with it. It's the single most important thing about him. To this day there are people walking around saying Ralph Lauren isn't that special, I could have done it. It's the weirdest thing. They couldn't be more wrong. Ralph is the most special guy in the apparel business.[55:00] Graham Duncan on the Tim Ferriss Show----Subscribe to listen to Founders Premium — Subscribers ask me questions directly which I answer in Ask Me Anything (AMA) episodes ----Join my free email newsletter to get my top 10 highlights from every book----I use Readwise to organize and remember everything I read. You can try Readwise for 60 days for free https://readwise.io/founders/----“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — GarethBe like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast

What I learned from rereading Rolls-Royce: The Magic of a Name: The First Forty Years of Britain s Most Prestigious Company by Peter Pugh.This episode is brought to you by: Tiny: Tiny is the easiest way to sell your business. Quick and straightforward exits for Founders.----Follow one of my favorite podcasts Invest Like The Best and listen to episode Mitch Lasky—The Business of Gaming----[2:31] Henry Royce had known poverty and hardship all his life. The only university he had graduated from was the one of hard knocks.[3:00] Rolls on Royce: I was fortunate enough to make the acquaintance of Mr. Royce and in him I found the man I had been looking for for years.[5:00] A great product has to be better than it has to be. Relentlessness wins because, in the aggregate, unseen details become visible. All those unseen details combine to produce something that's just stunning, like a thousand barely audible voices all singing in tune. — Hackers and Painters by Paul Graham (Founders #277)[6:00] You can always understand the son by the story of his father. The story of the father is embedded in the son. — Francis Ford Coppola: A Filmmaker's Life by Michael Schumacher. (Founders #242)[9:00] This ability to observe, think about and then improve on existing machines (products) was to be a consistent theme throughout Royce’s life.[10:00] Many times our position was so precarious that it seemed hopeless to continue.[12:00] Against The Odds: An Autobiography by James Dyson (Founders #287)[12:00] Some have tried to give the impression that it was almost by chance that Royce became involved in designing a motor car. Royce was not a man to rely on chance. He saw that the motor car had a great future and that it would be an ideal product for his business.[12:00] This part is excellent: There was nothing revolutionary about Royce’s car. He had taken the best of current automobile design and improved on every aspect of it. I do not think that Royce did anything of a revolutionary nature in his work on motor cars. He did, however, do much important development and a considerable amount of redesigning of existing devices so that his motor cars were far and away better than anyone else’s motor cars. He paid great attention to the smallest detail and the result of his personal consideration to every little thing resulted in the whole assembly being of a very high standard of perfection. It is rather to Royce’s thoroughness and attention to even the smallest detail than to any revolutionary invention that his products have the superlative qualities that we all know so well.[13:00] Henry Royce ruled the lives of the people around him, claimed their body and soul, even when they were asleep.[14:00] They didn't understand how important this was to me. —Coco Chanel: The Legend and the Life by Justine Picardie. (Founders #199)[16:00] He's made-and remade-Apple in his own image. Apple is Steve Jobs with ten thousand lives. — Inside Steve’s Brain by Leander Kahney. (Founders #204)[21:00] Thomas Edison on how overregulation crippled the British car industry: The motor car ought to have been British. You first invented it in the 1830s. You have roads only second to those of France. You have hundreds of thousands of skilled mechanics in your midst, but you have lost your trade by stupid legislation and prejudice.[27:00] This is a first: A company so focused on quality that they risked going to prison. Claude Johnson took the bold stand that he would tear up every drawing and go to prison rather than agree to risk inferior skills of other companies. Johnson said that the plan of using other manufacturers was futile and would yield nothing but mountains of scrap.[28:00] Royce admitted it: I prefer to be absolute boss over my own department (even if it was extremely small) rather than to be associated with a much larger technical department over which I had only joint control.[31:00] They worked in monastic seclusion in an office situated in the middle of the village about a quarter of a mile from Royce’s house. To ensure a minimum of distraction the office was for a number of years forbidden the luxury of a telephone. This was the team responsible for the design of every car and all their components from 1919 until Royce died in 1933. In matters concerning the actual model which eventually went into production, Royce’s decision was final.----Subscribe to listen to Founders Premium — Subscribers can ask me questions directly which I will answer in Ask Me Anything (AMA) episodes ----I use Readwise to organize and remember everything I read. You can try Readwise for 60 days for free https://readwise.io/founders/----“I have listened to every episode released and look forward to every episode that comes out. The only criticism I would have is that after each podcast I usually want to buy the book because I am interested so my poor wallet suffers. ” — GarethBe like Gareth. Buy a book: All the books featured on Founders Podcast