Fadell learned to say “no” more than “yes” while working at Apple and he found creative ways to “disappear” when Jobs was in “one of his moods.”
But in 10 years of working with Steve Jobs, the Apple cofounder often revealed his softer side. For example, when Fadell became a father for the first time, Jobs took him for a walk and advised him not to over-schedule his child.
“Make sure they’re bored sometimes,” said Jobs.
What did he mean?
Fadell explains: Kids need the time to find themselves…be creative, and solve problems.
Although critics say he micromanages his teams, Fadell sees himself as a mentor (see more below).
On Google Glass
Glass is definitely a side project for Fadell…he checks in with his Glass design team sporadically. He’s still CEO of Nest and that remains his primary focus, since, as he underlines, “it’s actually shipping product.” He’s laser focused on making sure it’s being done right (see Leadership below).
On Tech Security
Fadell reckons people today are obsessed with tech security and that in reality “nothing is secure…people in the security business are stirring up the shit.”
On Moving Meditation
Fadell starts his work day at 5:30 am and does what he calls a “moving meditation,” be that running, or yoga (one hour, three times a week). That gives him time to problem solve and prepare for his “roller coaster” day of “back-to-back” meetings.
I challenged him to demonstrate one of his favorite poses: the Vriksasana, or tree pose and as you can see…he likes a good challenge.
For non-yogis out there, it’s a great pose for increasing balance, focus, and memory. It also strengthens your feet, ankles and knees.
The main event at the salon was an excellent fireside chat between Fadell and Kevin Surace, SVForum board member and serial entrepreneur. I’ll post a link to the video here, when it’s available.
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Here are some of the highlights of that conversation and my observations:
On Leadership
Make sure your projects don’t take over 18 months to ship, otherwise “it’s impossible to keep your team together,” says Fadell.
Although Fadell has lost several key members of Nest recently, he insists that his young team “need mentored to grow into the next leaders in Silicon Valley.” He says that those who walk out the door are examples of “the Tinder generation.”
Like Steve Jobs, Fadell has a reputation for being an intense leader, a micromanager or even a bully.
As Ben Austen so eloquently describes in Wired, “Steve Jobs has become a Rorschach test, a screen onto which entrepreneurs and executives can project a justification of their own lives: choices they would have made anyway, difficult traits they already possess.”
Perhaps Fadell needs to do a little more yoga and a little less yelling?
Larry Page vs Steve Jobs
Fadell characterizes his new Google boss, Larry Page as “an incredible scientist” who respects products and likes deep research to push the limits of technology. By contrast, he found Steve Jobs more focused on marketing, “more business, less science” and says he often took, or even “stole ownership of ideas.”
On Failure
Fadell says before joining Apple, he’d had 10 years of failure, at General Magic and other enterprises. In 1998 he was a DJ in his spare time, and founded a hardware startup for music collections. He made about 80 pitches to VCs without success. It was the intense fear of failure that helped him stay strong in negotiations with Steve Jobs. He agreed to work on what would become the iPod, only after Jobs assured him, “if you can build it, we’ll put every marketing dollar into this.” And of course, the rest is history.
Should tech companies build cars?
Fadell gives this question a resounding “YES!” He describes a recent meeting with some members of the board at Ford, “I could see fear in their eyes,” he says.
He views cars – especially self-driving cars – as “lots of computer with a little bit of car,” and says that car companies “need to do a 180 and compete with computers on wheels.”
Immigration – it’s a hot button issue in this year’s U.S. presidential race. I was delighted when my senior editor at the BBC gave me this fascinating assignment: find some African immigrants in Silicon Valley, explore the cultural chasm they’ve crossed and how they keep close ties – both economic and emotional – to their homelands. What do friends back home think of life here in the United States? Cameroonian, Marie-Ange Eyoum described it thus:
“They look at the U.S. as heaven, they believe they’ll have more opportunity, be much more successful…” Marie-Ange Eyoum
But of course, it’s not all fun and games. Gabriel Tor (who was one of the Lost Boys of Sudan) works two jobs to help support eleven family members back home. He reckons he’ll have to work through retirement to pay off his $20,000 college loan.
This week, I joined the BBC’s Roger Hearing on the World Service’s Business Matters program. Here’s a transcript of our dialogue and my report (edited for length and clarity):
Roger Hearing: Now Alison, where you are in Silicon Valley…we’ve been asking you to take a look at something quite specific – to do with the ways people from the developing world, specifically Africa, manage to find their way to work there. Now, just introduce your report for us, if you would.
Alison van Diggelen: Immigration is a very topical issue this election year in America. I focused on three Africans who’ve come here in the last 10-20 years – one from South Sudan, one from Cameroon and one from Nigeria. I wanted to explore:
How are they contributing to Silicon Valley?
How do they give back to their families in Africa?
And how do those friends and family view their lives over here?
Here’s the report: Africans in Silicon Valley
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Africans may not be plentiful in Silicon Valley but some are making profound impacts back in their homeland. Meet Gabriel Tor. He’s one of several dozen Lost Boys of Sudan who arrived here as a refugees in the early 2000’s.
Gabriel Tor: How we live as South Sudanese…we have seen it all: how to live with something or how to live with nothing…
Tor works as a security guard and taxi driver. He has over 20,000 dollars in student debt, after completing a bachelor’s degree at San Jose State. Yet he still manages to send home about $3,000 each year to support his mother and 10 family members, exiled in Kenya (from the conflict in South Sudan.)
I ask him how long it will take to pay off his loan?
Gabriel: I think it’s going to take me up to the retirement age…I don’t have the courage to calculate the years…(laughter). I know it’s going to be a long time…it’s going to take decades to pay it off.
So what keeps him going? His brow furrows as he describes his first visit back to see his family – yet another generation forced to escape the violence that’s returned to South Sudan.
Gabriel: When I first visited, almost everybody was starving. It broke my heart.
Alison: Did you explain your tears to them?
Gabriel: To them, I had to hold my tears (back)… On the bus with other strangers, I broke into tears. It’s a situation that’s been made poorer by civil war.
Marie-Ange Eyoum also feels that tug to her homeland, in Cameroon.
Marie-Ange: I can be driving somewhere and I see the waste…how much food is being wasted, and my heart just goes back home.
Eyoum is ecstatic that she “won the lottery” – the diversity visa lottery that is – while completing her PhD in engineering (at Berkeley). Eyoum now works as a product manager for a tech company.
She goes back to Cameroon regularly to give leadership talks at universities and visit her high school, where she picks “the smartest ones” she says “mostly girls” to fund their education. So what do her friends in Cameroon think of SV?
Marie-Ange: The young people: They look at the US as heaven, they believe they’ll have more opportunity, be much more successful than in Cameroon.
Eyoum once tried to create a Leadership training startup in Cameroon but it floundered.
Marie-Ange:In Cameroon, yes doesn’t usually mean yes. No doesn’t mean no…So you kind of have to read under the line what is really happening…
Would she ever return to Cameroon? For now she feels she can make a greater difference being in Silicon Valley.
Marie-Ange: Definitely you need to be on the ground to do biz in Africa. It’s difficult being in SV. We are two oceans away, 9 hours time difference, two time zones.
I dearly love Cameroon and I would love to put in place something that would make a difference for future generations…
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Nigerian, Stephen Ozoigbo knows all about being on the ground in Africa. He went back nine times last year. In 2013 he founded an African tech foundation where he’s helping bring the Silicon Valley entrepreneurial spirit, wisdom –and funding – to Africa. We met in a busy Silicon Valley café…
Ozoigbo: Africa has the youngest people on the planet…there are so many unemployed …you throw in all of the necessary elements to an active, aspirational population and what you’ll find is a big spark, a big explosion actually…of young entrepreneurs.
Like many Africans in Silicon Valley, Ozoigbo is patient person. He knows real change takes time.
Ozoigbo: It’s a marathon, not a sprint. Silicon Valley was not built in a day… Silicon Valley had to be welcoming to this new immigrant population…
Extras (that didn’t make the final cut)
On Forgiveness
“Holding on to a painful past doesn’t help. Grudges don’t help anybody. Forgiveness can connect a lot of things and gives you peaceful living,” Gabriel Tor was one of the Lost Boys of Sudan.
On Feeling Welcome in Silicon Valley
“100% yes. I’ve never felt out of place…In Virginia…every time I speak, people would say – where are you from? I get that question in Silicon Valley but it’s an honest question (not a loaded one) – to really understand where you are from, to appreciate the culture…In Silicon Valley people say: I LOVE your accent, where are you from? They have a curiosity to see my perspective.” Marie-Ange Eyoum, Senior Product Manager at Intel.
On Africa’s Future
“Africa’s future will be reinvented on the backbone of young tech savvy entrepreneurs. The Internet has flattened a lot of things. Information is democratized. ..that will shorten the marathon race. Africa has Gatorade now, we have better running shoes and we understand our aerodynamics and can do so much better on this race and not just stick to the legacy of race running,” Stephen Ozoigbo, founder of African Technology Foundation.
Why are women still struggling to reach parity in the Indian and Silicon Valley jobs market? Why is rock star economist Thomas Piketty predicting that revolution could be the great equalizer? And what explains the unexpected and dramatic rise in popularity of Bernie Sanders in the US election? All this and more was discussed last night on the BBC’s Business Matters.
I joined a lively discussion with BBC host Anu Anand who’s based in Delhi, and Jayati Ghosh, Professor of Economics at Jawaharlal Nehru University in Delhi. Listen to the podcast here (Jan 29, 2016)
Here are some highlights from our conversation, (starting at 20:43, edited for length and clarity):
Anu Anand: Alison, you’ve reported from Japan where there’s a real impetus to bring women into the workforce. Any lessons from there?
Alison van Diggelen: Prime Minister Abe has a goal of reaching 30% of women in positions of leadership by 2020. What he’s doing is mandating that large companies reveal their diversity statistics. Someone I interviewed there -Elizabeth Handover – called it a “shaming and blaming” strategy. In other words: release your figures and the shame upon you will incentive you to get more women into positions of power…But as in India, there is a big cultural pressure in Japan for women to stay at home, especially if they’ve had children.
Anu Anand: You’re in the heart of Silicon Valley.Would you say that women have achieved parity in the high tech workforce?
Alison van Diggelen: No, not at all. Women make up only 30% of these tech companies, and then tech jobs within that are only between 12% and 18%. We have a long way to go, but we’re moving in the right direction…
Justin Rowlatt: In India we see very rapid growth, an economy growing at 7%. In a society growing that quickly, surely inequality is less of an issue?
Thomas Piketty:Inequality is an even bigger problem in emerging countries. One important lesson from my historical study of inequality is that it took very big shocks, major shocks – World War I, Wold War II, the Great Depression, the Bolshevik Revolution for the Western elites to accept the kind of social, and fiscal reforms which brought a reduction in inequality and increased economic growth….
The big risk here in India like in other parts of the world, is that extreme inequality tends to lead to sometimes violence, some politicians to try to exploit…that’s why it’s so important to have more transparency about the complex relationship between caste and income and wealth; and address it through adequate reservation systems, adequate social policy…
Anu Anand: Let’s turn to Alison van Diggelen, host of Fresh Dialogues in San Francisco and Jayati Ghosh, Professor of Economics here in Delhi….Women are bearing the burden of growing inequality?
Jayati Ghosh: The proportion of women who get any kind of income from working (in India) is only about 2%. About 90% of women are working and they’re really engaged in unpaid work. Policies and processes don’t even bother to recognize this work so they don’t do anything to reduce it…for e.g. piped water, which would reduce the burden of going to fetch it. Piketty is right: India is one of the higher inequality countries in the world…the elite in India… holds on to most of the assets, grabs the natural resources, concentrates the wealth and shapes policies to make more of this…This leads to violence.
Anu Anand: Alison, inequality in the US has been growing too. It’s certainly a big point of debate at the moment, especially with the presidential candidates sparring with each other?
Alison van Diggelen: Absolutely, it’s a huge issue here. The inequality is the highest today since the 1930’s. The surprise popularity of Bernie Sanders – who has made inequality and poverty one of his number one issues – he calls it “The Great Moral Issue of our Time”…He came from nowhere – it’s to do with his message resonating that income inequality affects us all. A lot of people thought Hillary Clinton had the Democratic nomination in the bag. Sanders has really grasped on that and he’s riding on inequality and really giving Hillary Clinton a run for her money for this Democratic nomination.
Anu Anand: Do you see a world in which we’re not going to have to talk about inequality? Both india and America are very market driven economies?
Alison van Diggelen: I think inequality is rife here however, two studies in 2015 confirmed that people – both rich and poor alike – still believe in a brighter future. It may be misguided, but there is that aspirational idea and the class system in my experience – especially in Silicon Valley full of inspiring entrepreneurs – is less prevalent than I experienced growing up in Britain, where you’re encouraged to stay in the class you’re born. For example, when I was offered a place at Cambridge University, my father, a working-class union man from Glasgow asked me: what do you want to go there for? Aren’t the universities in Scotland good enough? There was that “stay in your place” attitude that I broke away from.
Check back soon for a report on online education and its potential to help close the income divide by increasing access to education and tech jobs.
Japan is facing a double whammy: shrinking population and massive labor shortages. For some experts, the solution is simple: unleash the power of women.
Tonight on the BBC’s World Service, Jon Bithrey, host of Business Matters aired my report from Japan and we discussed the enormous challenges the country faces.
Prime Minister Abe’s government has been taking baby steps in Womenomics with some success, but in the longer term, what more needs done to change deeply entrenched cultural norms? In August, Japan’s government passed legislation mandating that Japanese companies with over 300 employees disclose their diversity statistics and goals in 2016. The Prime Minister’s ambitious target is for 30% of leadership positions in business and government to be filled by women by 2020.
What is Womenomics and why could it become a template for other Asian countries? I went to Tokyo to investigate for the BBC World Service…
Alison van Diggelen: I’m here in Tokyo to explore the promise of Womenomics, Prime Minister Abe’s plan to increase the country’s GDP by up to 15% by tapping its most underutilized resource. That is: Japanese women.
What exactly is Womenomics?
The term was coined by Kathy Matsui in a Goldman Sachs report outlining the economic potential of closing the gender gap. Japan faces a time bomb of a rapidly shrinking and ageing population; and a low female labor participation rate (although it has increased recently, many female workers work only part-time). This year, Prime Minister Abe, perhaps in desperation, is rebooting Womenomics and has set a 30% leadership goal for women in business and government.
[Atmos: Tokyo Metro announcements, doors closing, and passenger hubbub]
My first stop was the Gender Equality Bureau at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. I asked Rui Matsukawa who’s Director of the Gender Mainstreaming Division: what’s the promise of Womenomics?
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Rui Matsukawa: Womenomics’ essence is unleashing the talents of women in quality and quantity and make that help for the prosperous future of Japan. If Japan can change, that’ll be good prospects for the other countries. My conviction is: Japan will change is a very constructive way…where each individual is given the opportunity to fully express his or her own potential.
She points out that diversity is a great source of innovation.
And that’s one of Japan’s biggest challenges today.
Womenomics policy faces an uphill struggle: Japan’s cultural norms, and its male-centered, long and inflexible working hours.
I met with Elizabeth Handover, a Brit who’s lived in Japan for decades. She’s cofounder of the Women’s Leadership Development Center, in Tokyo.
Elizabeth Handover: Japan is struggling right now…some companies are still stuck in a Victorian hierarchy era…It’s that hierarchy that women get trapped in…
Alison van Diggelen: How do you think the PM’s goals will help?
Elizabeth Handover: One thing that’s really powerful in Japan is that companies don’t like to be “shamed and blamed”, so when the appalling statistics come out about how many female managers they’ve got, I think that’ll be a big influence for them to make changes.
I caught up with the former Governor of Hong Kong, Chris Patten and he shared a global perspective.
[Atmos: breakfast meeting audio]
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Chris Patten: I think it’s a very good idea that a PM should be so determined to increase the number of women in leadership positions. It’s not just a problem in Japan… I think it’s a big issue everywhere.
van Diggelen: What do you think is the PM’s greatest challenge? Do you think it’s a societal cultural shift that needs to happen?
Patten: Some of the changes that he has to cope with are common to other societies as well, but plainly, the main issue in Japan – as elsewhere – is the attitude of men.
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Yumiko Murakami is Head of the Tokyo Center of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. She cites Akira Matsumoto, the CEO of Calbee, a Japanese snack company, as being a male champion of diversity. She’s hopeful that the mandated release of diversity stats will spur change.
Yumiko Marakami: Japanese society is very a homogeneous society…there is a very strong cultural pressure to follow the herd.
Murakami is concerned about shrinking population and is convinced that Japan’s policy will have global implications.
Yumiko Murakami: Japan is facing this humongous time bomb – companies don’t have enough people to hire, it’s really hurting the bottom line. China is going to face the same future…Korea is exactly the same thing. If we succeed in Japan today, maximizing the talent pool, other countries they are going to get good practice policy lessons.
But some female executives in Japan feel more could be done: like addressing the childcare shortage and changing the existing tax laws, which discourage married women working full time.
[Atmos: Tokyo Metro announcements, doors closing, hubbub]
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Before leaving Tokyo, I took the Metro to meet with Aya Usui, a senior consultant at Lumina Learning, a leadership training business. She’s expecting her third child and commutes 4 hours a day.
Alison van Diggelen: Are you encouraged by PM Abe’s commitment to Womenomics?
Aya Usui: To tell the truth…not really…
Alison van Diggelen: What would you like to see him do?
Aya Usui: I’d ask him to invest more money and time to develop female leadership because many females have a lot of talent and a lot of potential, but they’re not used enough…they’re killing their possibility…If we can achieve full potential it’s really a wonderful world this world becomes…
That’s the promise of Womenomics: a wonderful world where everyone achieves their full potential. The world will be watching in 2016 to see if Prime Minister Abe’s shaming and blaming will work.
Last night, Elon Musk’s SpaceX achieved a spectacular milestone in the history of space travel: its Falcon 9 rocket launched 11 satellites into orbit, performed a spin and landed back on earth, six miles from where it launched. Why is this ultimate recycling feat so consequential?
Quite simply, this could revolutionize space travel as we know it today.
During our in-depth 2013 interview, an emotional Elon Musk told me of his disappointment at the progress of space exploration and his ultimate goal: to make human life multi-planetary. He explained that if he could “show the way” by making rockets as reusable as airplanes, this would:
1. dramatically reduce the cost of space travel
2. re-energize support for NASA’s mission
3. increase NASA’s budget
and “then we could resume the journey”…to Mars and beyond. Watch the interview, starting at 35:00
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The back story of SpaceX
“I always thought that we’d make much more progress in space…and it just didn’t happen…it was really disappointing, so I was really quite bothered by it. So when we went to the moon, we were supposed to have a base on the moon, we were supposed to send people to Mars and that stuff just didn’t happen. We went backwards. I thought, well maybe it’s a question of there not being enough intention or ‘will’ to do this. This was a wrong assumption. That’s the reason for the greenhouse idea…if there could be a small philanthropic mission to Mars…a small greenhouse with seeds and dehydrated nutrients, you’d have this great shot of a little greenhouse with little green plants on a red background. I thought that would get people excited…you have to imagine the money shot. I thought this would result in a bigger budget for NASA and then we could resume the journey…”
On negotiations with the Russian military to buy two ICBMs
“They just thought I was crazy…I had three quite interesting trips to Russia to try to negotiate purchase of two Russian ICBMs…minus the nukes…I slightly got the feeling that was on the table, which was very alarming. Those were very weird meetings with the Russian military…’remarkably capitalist’ was my impression (of the Russians).”
Why he chose to create his own rocket company, SpaceX
“I came to the conclusion that my initial premise was wrong that in fact that there’s a great deal of will, there’s not such a shortage. But people don’t think there’s a way. And if people thought there was a way or something that wouldn’t break the federal budget, then people would support it. The United States is a distillation of the human spirit of exploration. People came here from other places…people need to believe that it’s possible, so I thought it’s a question of showing people that there’s a way…There wasn’t really a good reason for rockets to be so expensive. If one could make them reusable, like airplanes then the cost of rocketry (and space travel) would drop dramatically.”
On Working with Steve Jobs
On Moving Meditation
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