Tony Fadell of iPod, iPhone, and Nest Fame — Stories of Steve Jobs on “Vacation,” Product Design and Team Building, Good Assholes vs. Bad Assholes, Investing in

“It’s about the mission, not about your ego.”

— Tony Fadell

Tony Fadell (@tfadell) is an active investor and entrepreneur with a 30+ year history of founding companies and designing products that profoundly improve people’s lives. As the principal at Future Shape, a global investment and advisory firm coaching engineers and scientists working on foundational deep technology, he is continuing to help bring technology out of the lab and into our lives. Currently, Future Shape is coaching 200+ startups innovating game-changing technologies. 

Tony began his career in Silicon Valley at General Magic, the most influential startup nobody has ever heard of. He is the founder and former CEO of Nest, the company that pioneered the “Internet of Things” and created the Nest Learning Thermostat. Tony was the SVP of Apple’s iPod Division and led the team that created the first 18 generations of the iPod and the first three generations of the iPhone. Throughout his career, Tony has authored more than 300 patents. In May 2016, TIME named the Nest Learning Thermostat, the iPod, and the iPhone as three of the “50 Most Influential Gadgets of All Time.” 

His new book is Build: An Unorthodox Guide to Making Things Worth Making. 

Please enjoy!

Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Overcast, Podcast Addict, Pocket Casts, Stitcher, Castbox, Google Podcasts, Amazon Music, or on your favorite podcast platform. You can watch the interview on YouTube here.

Brought to you by LinkedIn Marketing Solutions marketing platform with ~770M users, LMNT electrolyte supplement, and Eight Sleep’s Pod Pro Cover sleeping solution for dynamic cooling and heating. More on all three below.

---

This episode is brought to you by LinkedIn Marketing Solutions, the go-to tool for B2B marketers and advertisers who want to drive brand awareness, generate leads, or build long-term relationships that result in real business impact.

With a community of more than 770 million professionals, LinkedIn is gigantic, but it can be hyper-specific. You have access to a diverse group of people all searching for things they need to grow professionally. LinkedIn has the marketing tools to help you target your customers with precision, right down to job title, company name, industry, etc. To redeem your free $100 LinkedIn ad credit and launch your first campaign, go to LinkedIn.com/TFS!

---

This episode is brought to you by Eight Sleep! Eight Sleep’s Pod Pro Cover is the easiest and fastest way to sleep at the perfect temperature. It pairs dynamic cooling and heating with biometric tracking to offer the most advanced (and user-friendly) solution on the market. Simply add the Pod Pro Cover to your current mattress and start sleeping as cool as 55°F or as hot as 110°F. It also splits your bed in half, so your partner can choose a totally different temperature.

And now, my dear listeners—that’s you—can get $250 off the Pod Pro Cover. Simply go to EightSleep.com/Tim or use code TIM at checkout. 

---

This episode is brought to you by LMNT! What is LMNT? It’s a delicious, sugar-free electrolyte drink mix. I’ve stocked up on boxes and boxes of this and usually use it 1–2 times per day. LMNT is formulated to help anyone with their electrolyte needs and perfectly suited to folks following a keto, low-carb, or Paleo diet. If you are on a low-carb diet or fasting, electrolytes play a key role in relieving hunger, cramps, headaches, tiredness, and dizziness.

LMNT came up with a very special offer for you, my dear listeners. For a limited time, you can claim a free LMNT Sample Pack—you only cover the cost of shipping. For US customers, this means you can receive an 8-count sample pack for only $5. Simply go to DrinkLMNT.com/Tim to claim your free 8-count sample pack.

---

What was your favorite quote or lesson from this episode? Please let me know in the comments.

SCROLL BELOW FOR LINKS AND SHOW NOTES…

Want to hear the last time Tony was on the show? Listen to our conversation here, in which we discussed the repercussions of quitting caffeine cold turkey, why companies sometimes fail in spite of retaining a solid roster of talent, advice for people learning to lead on the fly, valuable lessons learned from Steve Jobs, seeing problems and building skills from a curious beginner’s perspective, managing impatience as a driving force without ticking off the other people working on a project, and much more.

SELECTED LINKS FROM THE EPISODE

• Connect with Tony Fadell:

Personal Twitter | Future Shape Twitter | Instagram

• Build: An Unorthodox Guide to Making Things Worth Making by Tony Fadell | Amazon
• Out of the Lab and Into Our Lives | Future Shape
• Tony Fadell — On Building the iPod, iPhone, Nest, and a Life of Curiosity | The Tim Ferriss Show #403
• Organizational Chart | Wikipedia
• Tribe of Mentors: Short Life Advice from the Best in the World by Timothy Ferriss | Amazon
• Steve Jobs’ Favorite Vacation Spot | Steve Jurvetson, Flickr
• General Magic (Documentary) | Prime Video
• Jodorowsky’s Dune | Prime Video
• Complete Dune Series by Frank Herbert | Amazon
• Alien | Prime Video
• What is ADHD? | CDC
• Job Burnout: How to Spot It and Take Action | Mayo Clinic
• The Future of Work After COVID-19 | McKinsey
• Your Digital HQ | Slack
• Simple, Secure, Reliable Messaging | WhatsApp
• Stay Connected With Free Video Calls Worldwide | Skype
• For Tony Fadell, the Future of Startups Is Connected and Sustainable | TechCrunch
• The Key to Tackling Climate Change: Electrify Everything | Vox
• Sustainability Is Just Good Business | Turntide Technologies
• The Next Generation of Electrification | Menlo Microsystems
• Of Wolves and Men by Barry Lopez | Amazon
• Jamie Foxx on Workout Routines, Success Habits, and Untold Hollywood Stories | The Tim Ferriss Show #124
• Steve Jobs’? Lesson about Storytelling | LinkedIn
• Why a Former Employee Thinks Apple Is ‘Boring’ under Tim Cook | Mashable
• What “Machiavellian” Really Means | TED-Ed
• Nest Founder Says Plastic Apologists Are ‘Lying’ | Fortune
• Frequently Asked Questions about Plastic Recycling and Composting | US EPA
• What is E-waste Recycling? | Conserve Energy Future
• Sustainable Materials Power the Future | Redwood Materials
• Tony Fadell Looks to Disrupt Silicon Valley | SURFACE
• “The World’s First Trillionaire Will Be Made in Climate Change.” | Chamath Palihapitiya, Twitter
• Building the Global Hydrogen Economy | CSIS
• Biomass Fueling America’s Growing Clean Energy Economy | Department of Energy
• Gigaton Carbon Removal and the Paris Climate Agreement | Atlantic Council
• Achieve Net Zero Targets | Climeworks
• Biochar | Wikipedia
• What is Carbon Sequestration? | US Geological Survey
• Carbon Capture, Utilization, & Storage | Department of Energy
• Put Oil Back Underground | Charm Industrial
• Next-Generation Carbon Removal | Carbo Culture
• Carbon Capture for Semi-Trucks | Remora
• The Shark and Remora Relationship | Scuba.com
• A Look inside China’s Timely Charging Infrastructure Plan | Greenbiz
• America’s Electric-Vehicle Charging Infrastructure | McKinsey
• What the War in Ukraine Means for Energy, Climate and Food | Nature
• 10 Alternatives to Lithium-Ion Batteries: Which New Tech Will Power the Future? | Green Authority
• The New US Plan to Rival China’s Dominance in Rare Earth Metals | CNBC
• Reforming Global Fossil Fuel Subsidies: How the United States Can Restart International Cooperation | The Brookings Institution
• To Counter China’s Economic Influence, Rebuild the American Heartland | The Brookings Institution
• Opinion: Inflation Myths Have Reached Fan-Fiction Proportions | The Washington Post
• The Coming Revolution in the American Economy | The New Republic
• You Are What You Read: Six Ways to Change Your Media Diet | Ethical Journalism Network
• It’s Time to Unite the World to Fight the COVID-19 Pandemic | Forbes
• Legendary Investor John Doerr on Picking Winners — From Google in 1999 to Solving the Climate Crisis Now | The Tim Ferriss Show #543
• Speed & Scale: An Action Plan for Solving Our Climate Crisis Now by John Doerr | Amazon
• Unleashing Climate Innovation | MCJ Collective
• The Hundred-Year Marathon: China’s Secret Strategy to Replace America as the Global Superpower by Michael Pillsbury | Amazon
• The Changing World Order: Why Nations Succeed and Fail by Ray Dalio | Amazon

SHOW NOTES

• How did Tony overcome his lack of patience long enough to write Build: An Unorthodox Guide to Making Things Worth Making? [07:38]
• What did Tony learn from Steve Jobs about taking vacations, and why did he lead the “Killing Yourself for Work” chapter in Build with this story? [12:30]
• As a CEO, what did Tony accomplish in his downtime? [21:03]
• Tony shares his thoughts on managing big jobs with small teams, and how to chalk up wins that best alleviate burnout. [24:07]
• The best practices Tony has found for efficiently dividing labor among the members of a small team. [28:40]
• What do the headcount and org chart look like within Future Shape? [36:20]
• How does Future Shape differ from a VC firm, and what is its mission? Why was the COVID pandemic minimally disruptive to the way the company handles meetings and does business? [39:17]
• What is programmable electrification, and how is Future Shape involved in its development? [44:50]
• “The story doesn’t exist to sell your product. It’s there to help you define it.” Tony shares how this concept played into the creation of Build, and what Build is intended to provide to its readership. [51:00]
• How did Steve Jobs use story to define projects and products at Apple? [59:47]
• Tony admits that plenty of people think he’s an asshole. But what differentiates an acceptable asshole from an unacceptable asshole? [1:01:43]
• In our last conversation, Tony drove home the necessity of finding creative ways to cope with the world’s overabundance of plastics. What progress has been made on this front since then, and what other materials can be reclaimed from the things we throw away regularly? [1:06:12]
• How does Tony’s small team leverage its time and resources to focus on solving the problems that will have the largest impact? [1:09:17]
• Underestimated targets related to climate change that Tony thinks deserve more attention. [1:13:16]
• Tony’s thoughts on the efficacy of carbon removal, and companies that are aiming to do it right. [1:17:45]
• How will geopolitics figure into the supply chain for an electron-based economy? [1:24:28]
• How can we cultivate optimism in our younger generations when the constant barrage of doom and gloom from the media is generating higher-than-ever levels of apathy and passivism in the populace? What can we do to consume a healthier media diet? [1:30:34]
• Audience asks and parting thoughts. [1:37:58]

MORE TONY FADELL QUOTES FROM THE INTERVIEW

“The story doesn’t exist to sell your product. It’s there to help you define it.”
— Tony Fadell

“All energy in the world today that is created, 60 percent of that is lost in inefficiencies. It doesn’t even do work. So just imagine what our climate crisis would be if we just saved that energy.”
— Tony Fadell

“To me, waste is horrid. I abhor waste. I loathe waste. When I go to the trash can each day, I’m like, ‘Okay, this is organic. I know where that could go. But where is this thing going? Where is that thing going?’ And it drives me nuts. And so when I see something like 60 percent of energy goes away just in losses, I’m like, ‘Where can we go target that?’ “
— Tony Fadell

“We don’t ever want to add more people to the team because we think lean and mean is better, but at some point you’re killing each other because you’re trying to do too much. So either do less, or you’ve got to add capabilities and hands to the situation.”
— Tony Fadell

“We call ourselves mentors with money.”
— Tony Fadell

“Our planet is incredibly sick and we caused it. Nobody else did. You can’t just sit around and go, ‘Well, it’s sick. I don’t know what to do.’ It’s a family member. It’s so important. What are you doing to be on the right side and trying to find solutions, both personally and professionally?”

— Tony Fadell

“It’s about the mission, not about your ego.”
— Tony Fadell

PEOPLE MENTIONED

Related and Recommended

The Tim Ferriss Show is one of the most popular podcasts in the world with more than 700 million downloads. It has been selected for “Best of Apple Podcasts” three times, it is often the #1 interview podcast across all of Apple Podcasts, and it’s been ranked #1 out of 400,000+ podcasts on many occasions. To listen to any of the past episodes for free, check out this page.