Build

Author: Tony Fadell

Review

Tony Fadell, inventor of the nest, talks about his framework to building exceptional products. He divides it into four parts: starting from the self and ones career and ending at the product and the team.

Fadell believes in having a north star, both when designing a life and a product. The particular destination isn’t as important as having a higher calling to strive for and surrounding yourself with exceptional people that can get there.

He places an emphasis on story telling, decision making, and deeply understanding the customer journey. Every feature of a product should have a narrative that explains the “why”. While the team should stay flexible during the design and rollout of a product, there should be 1-2 things core to the product that endures.

Its a good book with lots of actionable advice.

Notes

• build self, career, product, team
• self
  • chase excellence and people that strive for it
  • need a goal to strive for
• career
  • every decision driven by primarily data or opinion, not both #star
  • story telling is spark to get people to take the leap
• product
  • understand customer journey
  • every product should have a narrative that explains why it needs to exist
  • virus of doubt: get into peoples head and remind them of a daily frustration #star
  • use analogies
  • usually 1-2 things core to your product
  • heartbeats to stay on track
• business
  • 3 elements to great idea
    • solve why
    • daily problem
    • your passionate about it