Guy Kawasaki
I was born in Honolulu, Hawaii in 1954. My family lived in a tough part of Honolulu called Kalihi Valley. We weren’t rich, but I never felt poor-because my mother and father made many sacrifices for my sister and me. My mother was a housewife, and my father was a fireman, real estate broker, state senator, and government official during his long, distinguished career.
I attended Iolani School where I graduated in 1972. Iolani is not as well known as its rival, Punahou because no presidents of the U. S. went there, but I got a fantastic and formative education there. (Punahou is “USC,” and Iolani is “Stanford”—but I digress.) I pay special tribute to Harold Keables, my AP English teacher.He taught me that the key to writing is editing. No one in the universe would be more shocked that I have written ten books (or one book ten times) than Harold Keables.
After Iolani, I matriculated to Stanford; I graduated in 1976 with a major in psychology—which was the easiest major I could find. I loved Stanford. I sometimes wish I could go back in time to my undergraduate days “on the farm.”
After Stanford, I attended the law school at U.C. Davis because, like all Asian-American parents, my folks wanted me to be a “doctor, lawyer, or dentist.” I only lasted one week because I couldn’t deal with the law school teachers telling me that I was crap and that they were going to remake me.
The following year I entered the MBA program at UCLA. I liked this curriculum much better. While there, I worked for a fine-jewelry manufacturer called Nova Stylings; hence, my first real job was literally counting diamonds. From Nova, its CEO Marty Gruber, and my Jewish colleagues in the jewelry business, I learned how to sell, and this skill was vital to my entire career.
I remained at Nova for a few years until the the Apple II removed the scales from my eyes. Then I went to work for an educational software company called EduWare Services. However, Peachtree Software acquired the company and wanted me to move to Atlanta. “I don’t think so.” I can’t live in a city where people call sushi “bait.”
Luckily, my Stanford roommate, Mike Boich, got me a job at Apple; for giving me my chance at Apple, I owe Mike a great debt. When I saw what a Macintosh could do, the clouds parted and the angels started singing. For four years I evangelized Macintosh to software and hardware developers and led the charge against world-wide domination by IBM. I also met my wife Beth at Apple during this timeframe—Apple has been very good to me.
Around 1987, my job at Apple was done. Macintosh had plenty of software by then, so I left to start a Macintosh database company called ACIUS. It published a product called 4th Dimension. To this day, 4th Dimension remains a great database.
I ran ACIUS for two years and then left to pursue my bliss of writing, speaking, and consulting. I’ve written for Macuser, Macworld, and Forbes. I call these the “Wonder Years” as in “I wonder how I came to deserve such a good life.”
In 1989, I started another software company called Fog City Software with three of the best co-founders in the world: Will Mayall, Kathryn Henkens, and Jud Spencer. We created an email product called Emailer which we sold to Claris and then a list server product called LetterRip.
In 1995 I returned to Apple as an Apple fellow. At the time, according to the pundits, Apple was supposed to die. (Apple should have died about ten times in the past twenty years according to the pundits.) My job on this tour of duty was to maintain and rejuvenate the Macintosh cult.
A couple years later, I left Apple to start an angel investor matchmaking service called Garage.com with Craig Johnson of Venture Law Group and Rich Karlgaard of Forbes. Version 2.0 of Garage.com was an investment bank for helping entrepreneurs raise money from venture capitalists. Today, version 3.0 of Garage.com is called Garage Technology Ven
“When you’ve worked hard and done well and walked through that doorway of opportunity, you do not slam it shut behind you.”
“Do you know what the difference is between PR and advertising? Advertising is when you say how great you are. PR is when other people say how great you are. PR is better.”
“The beauty of Goodreads is that you know you’re sowing in a field where everyone, by definition and self-selection, loves to read.”
“You’ll learn that the key to a great book is editing — grinding, buffing, and polishing — not writing.”
“Good blurbs are short, sweet, and limited to six. They answer the question “Why should I buy this book?”
“The first good reason to write a book is to add value to people’s lives.”
“Starting your book is only the first five miles of a twenty-six-mile marathon that’s one-third of a triathlon (authoring, publishing, and entrepreneuring).”
“The self-edited author is as foolish as the self-medicated patient.”
“I have a hardcore attitude: a “self-published, ghost-written book” is wrong because the concept behind self publishing is that you have knowledge or emotions that you want to express. Whenpeople read a book—particularly a self-published one—they have the right to expect that it’s the person’s writing, not cleaned-up dictation or slapping a name on a book that someone else wrote.”
“Do not write to impress others. Authors who write to impress people have difficulty remaining true to themselves. A better path is to write what pleases you and pray that there are others like you. Your first and most important reader is you. If you write a book that pleases you, at least you know one person will like it.”
“Writingis therapeutic. It helps you cope with issues that seem gargantuan at the time.The process of expressing yourself about a problem, editing your thoughts, andwriting some more can help you control issues that you face.”
“Inertia. Guy’s law of enchantment: “People at rest will remain at rest, and people in motion will keep moving in the same direction unless an outside enchanter acts upon them.”
“Remember that nobodies are the new somebodies.”
“Take my word for it: More people will like you if you believe that people are good until proven bad.”
“If you want to make a good first impression, smile at people. What does it cost to smile? Nothing. What does it cost not to smile? Everything, if not smiling prevents you from enchanting people.”
“• People deserve a break. The stressed and unorganized person who doesn’t have the same priorities as you may be dealing with an autistic child, abusive spouse, fading parents, or cancer. Don’t judge people until you’ve walked a mile in their shoes. Give them a break instead.”
“• Everyone is better than you at something. If you have a tough time accepting others, it’s probably because you think you’re superior to them. However, you’re not superior to every person in every way.”
“A magnificent cause can overcome a prickly personality, but your ability to enchant people increases if they like you, so you should aspire to both. You’ll know that you’re likeable when you can communicate freely, casually, and comfortably with people.”
“Defy the crowd. The crowd isn’t always wise. It can also lead you down a path of silliness, sub-optimal choices, and downright destruction. Enchantment is as necessary for people to diverge from a crowd as it is to get people to join one.”
“Want to change the world? Upset the status quo? This takes more than run-of-the-mill relationships. You need to make people dream the same dream that you do.”
“Pursuing your passions makes you more interesting, and interesting people are enchanting.”
“Writing a book isn’t an easy process nor is it always enjoyable, but it is one of life’s most satisfying achievements.”
“Writing is the starting point from which all goodness (and crappiness) flows.”
“If you don't toot your own horn, don't complain that there's no music.”
“The next time you think that there's something that you "can't live without", wait for a week and then see if you're still alive or not”
“To me a book is a message from the gods to mankind; or, if not, should never be published at all.”
“Let yourself be enchanted in small ways.”
“Knowledge is great. Competence is great. But the combination of both encourages people to trust you and increases your powers of enchantment. And in this world, the combination is a breath of fresh air.”
“While we're living, we need to get over ourselves and accept others if we want to enchant people.”
“Steve Jobs has a saying that A players hire A players. But B players hire C players, and C players hire D players. It doesn't take long to get to F players. This trickle-down effect causes bozo explosions in companies.”
“Organizations are successful because of good implementation,not good business plans.”
“Steve [Jobs] proves that it's OK to be an asshole... He just has a different OS.”