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There should be no separation between what the product will be and how it will be explained—the story has to be utterly cohesive from the beginning.

Your messaging is your product.

With every piece of marketing we made, we got better at marketing. I got better at marketing. The entire company got better at marketing.

the customer needs a voice on the team. Engineers like to build products using the coolest new technology. Sales wants to build products that will make them a lot of money. But the product manager’s sole focus and responsibility is to build the right products for their customers.

That’s the job.

The money is important. We were a small company with limited resources but we invested in marketing. We invested in creating beautiful things because we knew we’d amortize the hell out of them. We used every expensive, gorgeous photo in a thousand different places; we played every high-quality video everywhere we could. The team picked the elements that would have the most impact—that we could use and reuse for years—then spent the money to do them well.

Today, ten years later, Google Nest is still using some of the photos and assets we created before we even launched our company.

Not everyone can be a great designer, but everyone can think like one. Designing isn’t something in your DNA that you’re simply born with—it’s something you learn. You can bring in coaches and teachers, classes and books to help get everyone into the right mindset.

Here’s my advice: do not vacation like Steve Jobs.

Steve would typically take two weeks off, twice a year. We’d always dread those vacations at Apple. The first forty-eight hours were quiet. After that it would be a storm of nonstop calls.

Makers often focus on the shiny object—the product they’re building—and forget about the rest of the journey until they’re almost ready to deliver it to the customer. But customers see it all, experience it all.

The customer is always right, right?

Except customer panels can’t design for shit.

Follow your curiosity rather than a business school playbook about how to make money.

Even the greatest designers in the world can’t do it alone. Most people look at Apple design and say: this is the work of Steve Jobs. This is the work of Jony Ive. But that’s not remotely true. It’s never just one or two people pouring out their genius into a sketchbook, then handing it to some lowly employees to execute. Thousands upon thousands of people design for Apple—and it’s those teams that come together and create something truly unique and wonderful.

Imagine you’re looking through your closet, getting ready for a job interview: your customer is your interviewer, your product is yourself, and you’re designing your outfit for the day. Should you wear jeans? A button-down? Is the company culture formal or informal? What do you want to project about yourself? Making that decision is a design process. Getting to the best outcome requires design thinking, even if it’s unconscious.

And it all starts with “why.”

Why does this thing need to exist? Why does it matter? Why will people need it? Why will they love it?

To find that “why,” you need to understand the core of the problem you’re trying to solve, the real issue your customers face on a regular basis.

But pushing for greatness doesn’t make you an asshole. Not tolerating mediocrity doesn’t make you an asshole. Challenging assumptions doesn’t make you an asshole. Before dismissing someone as “just an asshole,” you need to understand their motivations.

Early adulthood is about watching your dreams go up in flames and learning as much as you can from the ashes. Do, fail, learn. The rest will follow.