3 Reasons Why You Should Read “Build” by Tony Fadell
Good Today Book Club
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Good Today Book Club 〰️
*This post is not a paid promotion. I just really like this book and think you might as well.
I picked up a copy of Tony Fadell’s book, Build: An Unorthodox Guide to Making Things Worth Making at a used bookstore a few months ago, simply because I thought the cover was very well designed (yes, I do judge books by covers).
I had never heard of this Tony Fadell person, and one Saturday afternoon I sat out on my front porch and cracked the book open. EIGHT hours later, my wife told me I had to put the book down so I could go to sleep.
I was sucked into this book immediately, and I’d bet money that if you’re interested in starting a business, creating a product, or learning to take responsible risk and grow (in basically in any profession), you’ll love this book too.
Tony has an amazing story. He’s played an integral role in several products that you not only have heard of, but probably have been using in your life daily for years (I’m looking at you, millennial who misses the iPod days). Build is a great book. Although its name is a little verbose, each chapter is written conversationally, like you’re sitting down with Tony as he shares insights from his very successful career.
Although my brain is much too small to ever build a product like the Nest Thermostat or the iPhone, I gleaned a lot of helpful tips and practical advice from this book. Here are three of the most impactful.
1. “Failure” can often be a crucial learning opportunity.
Having read several books written by entrepreneurs, I think an understated theme that runs through the lives of many of our world’s most successful individuals is the willingness to try and fail. There’s an assumption that some ideas simply won’t work, but there’s no way to know unless someone is willing to try.
But it goes deeper than that.
“School has not prepared you to be successful for the rest of your life. Adulthood is your opportunity to screw up continually until you learn how to screw up a little bit less.”
For much of Tony’s career, his failures were defining moments in his life. He learned valuable lessons that helped pave his way to success later in his life. He turned his failure into opportunities for growth. That’s a great perspective!
Transparently, I’m afraid of failure. I weigh the opinion of others much higher than I probably should. And this book really helped me to fight for a perspective where I’m willing to try things, even if they don’t work out the way I want them to. Because as I’ve grown older, I’ve realized that, much of my experience has been marked by failure, learning, and growth. If that’s how life works most of the time, then we should be people who are willing to try and humbly learn from our mistakes!
Imagine where your life could be in ten years if, instead of waiting for the perfect moment to do the perfect thing, you got the ball rolling and started trying to do it today.
There’s something good about setting a vision for the future of what you want to achieve, and then day-by-day making progress towards that goal (even if you fail along the way). Because, one day, when you finally do reach that goal, you not only achieve whatever it is you set out to do, but you also have a life lived with practical experience and wisdom from the effort it took to get there in the first place.
2. Consistency is vital for success.
This takeaway was important for me as I started out this blog. Currently while writing this post, it is 5:28am on a Tuesday morning. The 5am-7am window each day is really the only time I can dedicate to this website before my wife and kid wake up, I go to work, and then come home to be with my family before we go to bed.
I say all this because consistency is hard. It’s hard to wake up each morning and write blog posts, schedule social media posts, and not just roll over in bed and hit snooze. No matter what you do: CEO of a Fortune 500, Stay-at-home mom, Manager of a restaurant, bartender, your job will come with things you don’t want to do.
If you’re reading this, you may not be in the same boat as me, but I’m sure there are tasks each day that you’d rather not do. But that’s where the wisdom of Tony Fadell comes into play.
Yet, if you want to see both your business and yourself grow, you have to put in the work. And consistency is the key to success.
There’s an internal and external reality about consistency in work that will be beneficial to anything you try to do in life.
Internally, consistency helps you to be able to know what you need to do and which direction your organization needs to be moving. Put in the hard work, create a schedule of tasks that will keep you on track, and more than likely, you’ll be moving towards success. There’s a level of predictability in life that serves people (and you).
Externally, people who will be doing business with you will be served by your consistency. They’ll know what to expect. They’ll be prepared for the changes that come in the future as your organization grows. It turns your everyday tasks into a blessing for other people as they interact with you.
“Predictability allows your team to know when they should be heads down working and when they should be looking up to check in with other teams or to make sure that they’re still headed in the right direction.”
This idea challenged me to grow in being a man of my word and showing up everyday, even when it’s hard. As you look around at your own life, what are ways you can grow in being dependable and consistent in your responsibilities? How might consistency help you to grow more as an individual, bless the people you work with, and benefit the relationships with the people you do business with?
3. Success (usually) takes time.
Believe me, I get it. We all want to create something and find instant success at it. Unfortunately, that simply isn’t the norm. Some people do have that incredible idea that immediately translates into millions of dollars! But, Tony gives us the hard truth that we need to hear. Success takes time, trial and error, and growth to turn an idea into a brilliant business.
Tony Fadell has experience in this field that I trust. He has been an integral part in several products that have revolutionized the world we live in. If he says that it takes time to create an excellent product, I respect that.
Think about your dream job. Maybe it’s owning a massively successfully company. Maybe it’s being a homeschool parent that teaches with excellence, maybe it’s creating art or a product that changes the world.
Realistically, you aren’t going to be able to have the perfect ability or concept that will make that dream job happen. You’ll have to spend months (maybe even years!) trying, failing, growing, to reach the place you want to be.
“You make the product. You fix the product. You build the business.”
That’s the entire reason we launched the Good Today Collective. We want to inspire and help people who are wanting to start something that can change the world. We want to empower people to have the confidence needed to start, fail, and the keep going!
Imagine this scenario: you have an idea to make something. You really think that this idea can not only be massively successful financially, but could provide you with a lifestyle that you’re excited about. It is your idea after all! You spend the time to create it. You market it. You sell it.
It flops.
Do you give up, or do you push on? Do you accept defeat, or do you take all of the data from your failed “first version,” take it back to the drawing board, and learn from it as you make your second version!
Whatever you’re trying to do, I think this book can inspire you. There’s a ton of helpful insights I haven’t been able to discuss in detail, but I do believe that Build can help you get started on that dream of yours, and who knows?
Maybe in ten years, you’ll be writing a book about how you grew and learned and turned into one of the leading minds on entrepreneurship. If so, hit me up, I’ll write a book review of it!
