Always Day One: A new book about how the tech giants build products

Always Day One is a new book exploring how the tech titans invent. The book features 130+ interviews with insiders from Mark Zuckerberg to hourly workers, offering an unprecedented look into Amazon, Apple, Facebook, Google, and Microsoft's inner workings.

Hi Alex, I’m wondering if you only concentrated on the tech giants in your book or maybe you have tried to compare “normal” people from tech that do their things. Or maybe have you looked into their beginnings or only how they do it now? I’m asking you that because I’m a bit fed up with hearing or reading how the giants are doing stuff when I’m not a giant and I just can’t do it their way most often. Ps. Is your book on audio as well and where?

@pvb73 Hi Tomasz! We often speak about the tech giants in a way that make them seem mysterious, unbeatable, and unknowable. But having looked deeply inside these companies, there's little they do that's out of reach for the rest of us. It starts with the mentality: The tech giants succeed because they're willing to reinvent themselves repeatedly, with little regard for legacy. They'll build the next product even if it hurts their current business. That's why the book is called "Always Day One." Most companies will wait until the last second before reinventing themselves (a "pivot"). These acts of desperation rarely succeed. It doesn't have to be this way. And today, we're living in a world where many companies are reinventing themselves out of necessity to due coronavirus. It will help them build the muscle to reinvent again and again going forward. Consider: A stage building company in Ireland is now building desks for people working at home. A company that places artwork in offices and hotels is now commissioning artists to make social distancing signage for grocers. Airbnb has built a new business on experiences through video conferencing. These examples are proof that anyone can apply the lessons in the book. It starts with a belief that you can and a willingness to try.

@pvb73 Also, yes! We're on Audible. You can find it here: https://www.audible.com/pd/Alway...

@kantrowitz great! Thanks for the answer and you bought me! Book bought on Audible and will start reading tomorrow!

@kantrowitz Read the book and rated it 5/5 stars on Audible. I think you did a great job analyzing these company cultures. Congrats!

@pvb73 Awesome, Thank you Tomasz!

I'll ask the first Q! You did a ton of research and interviews with some fo the folks that built the world's largest tech platforms. What was the biggest "OMG" moment, @kantrowitz?

@rrhoover Hi Ryan! Thanks for the question. A few years ago, I met with Mark Zuckerberg for a briefing on an upcoming announcement. Walking into Facebook headquarters, I expected a typical CEO interaction: a speech followed by limited time for questions. But Zuckerberg instead spent much of our discussion trying to elicit feedback. To him, the meeting wasn’t an opportunity to sell as much as it was a chance to learn. I had studied labor relations in college, exploring how companies develop cultures and how leaders lead. And though I had largely put that life out of my mind as a tech reporter, it all came roaring back. This was not how the “leaders” I was familiar with typically behaved. It set off an investigation.  In time, I learned that Zuckerberg and his fellow tech giant CEOs — Sundar Pichai at Google, Jeff Bezos at Amazon, and Satya Nadella at Microsoft — aren’t the prototypical product visionaries I imagined. Instead of coming up with all the ideas and having everyone else execute, they work to spark ideas in their employees and build systems to bring those ideas to life. The request for feedback (built into Facebook’s culture) was a glimpse into one such system. I had never considered writing a book before, but when I saw this shift underway in some of the most powerful firms in the world, I felt an urgency to share this “omg” moment with everyone. If we learn these systems, we'll have a chance to even the playing field with the tech giants.

@kantrowitz iiinteresting. All of those CEOs are extreme outliers so I'm not surprised their leadership doesn't fit the stereotype.

@rrhoover Yes, and that's essentially the idea in the book. They are outliers, but they don't need to be. They're lapping the economy because they do things differently. When the rest of us catch up, we'll be on more equal footing.

This looks great! Would be interesting if you did what Jim Collins did in Good to Great by interviewing tech companies that aren’t doing well at all or have recently failed and then finding the key contrasts between the successful tech ones and the unsuccessful

@abagh0703 Hi Aram! Great suggestion :) Luckily in the book, we had a natural case study: Microsoft! Why did Microsoft struggle under Steve Ballmer and then turn it around under Satya Nadella? The answer is culture. In the book, I explain how the tech giants have reimagined work to turn themselves into invention machines. These companies use technology to automate/minimize work supporting existing products in order to make room for new ideas. Then, they build systems to bring those ideas to life. Under Ballmer, Microsoft had a culture that prioritized the loudest voice in the room, was concerned almost entirely with Windows, and spent a lot of time supporting that product. When Nadella took over, he prioritized listening to all voices, putting Microsoft's future ahead of Windows, and using technology to enable more "idea work" and hence more invention.

Always Day One

A new book about how the tech giants build products

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