Joe Gebbia: Airbnb
EPISODE 192
Airbnb Inc. Co-Founder Joe Gebbia is stepping back from a full-time role at the home rental giant to spend more time with his family and explore new projects at the company that made him a billionaire.
The Moonshots Podcast leaps into the world of design innovation with the co-founder of Airbnb, Joe Gebbia. To celebrate his work and learn how to make design breakthroughs and discover the courage and curiosity it requires.
To me, 'design thinking' is another way of saying empathize with the customer. It's consideration for the person you're designing for. Joe Gebbia, Airbnb
INTRO: JOE GEBBIA
BEGINNINGS
Design Thinking
Airbnb Origin Story
Founders As Friends
DESIGN
Design as a Differentiator
Get Close to Customers
The Value of Tactile Insights
TRANSCRIPT
[00:00:00] Hello and welcome to the moonshots podcast. It's episode 193. I'm your cohost Mike Parsons. And as always, I'm joined by the man with the plan, Mr. Mark Pearson Freeland. Good morning, mark.
[00:00:13] Hey, good morning, Mike. I'm really excited to get into this new listener's favorite of today's show. How are you feeling about.
[00:00:21] Yeah. Even though we're in the middle of a happiness series mark to study someone who has done some amazing design work and created some incredible value and frankly has impacted society in a major way. I think this kind of makes me happy too. What about you, mark?
[00:00:41] Yeah. Yeah, I think you're right.
[00:00:42] That is a good connection to the happiness series today. Listeners and members. We are diving back into Joe Gabbia out of Airbnb, one of the co-founders and leading designers within the Airbnb history
[00:00:55] mark. Yeah, he's a very instrumental founder of Airbnb and we first studied him way back in 2017.
[00:01:09] Gosh, I didn't realize this show is getting so old. And we were quite appreciative because Back in those days, Airbnb wasn't yet publicly listed. It was starting to become apparent that Airbnb was gonna be a big thing and subsequently it really has become something very not only prestigious in, in the business world, but I think it's a big part of our consumer lives, how we take vacations, how we see and experience the world.
[00:01:40] And what is crazy is they built a billion dollar business on design and Joe, the head of design. He was the man and we have a lot to learn from him. You're right.
[00:01:53] Joe's apartment. Was the first listing ever on Airbnb. So let's just all pause for a second there. How many times have all of us used Airbnb?
[00:02:03] I use it all the time and it's a really intrinsic product that I think has been built with design first.
[00:02:11] Hasn't it? Yeah. Then, to put their success of Joe Gebbia work in context, he went and designed a product in the let's just call it the hotel, accommodation industry. He didn't own any hotels. They didn't own any houses.
[00:02:31] And they built a billion dollar business. All they have is the app where they use it on the web or they use it on your mobile. All they have is that they don't own. Hotels yet they could create an experience, which now seems so much part of the fabric of our lives and how we vacation, how we see different places yet.
[00:02:57] Here's the thing mark, 15 years ago, if I had said to you, you would rent out your place to people. You do not know who are often from a different country or otherwise you will go to different parts of the world and stay in houses of people that you don't know. You would now 15 years ago, you would've said, Mike, what have you been drinking?
[00:03:23] What have you been smoking? No way. I feel comfortable with it. It was a hotel. Wasn't it, mark.
[00:03:30] Yeah, it was because you, at that point, that's where the trust was. The trust was in the hotels. Sometimes they're big names. Maybe you could find reviews and therefore you could, just pop in anywhere in the world and go and stay there.
[00:03:43] But now through the design of the app, through the design for both the guests, as well as the hosts, I'm not only willing to go anywhere in the world and maybe stay in an Airbnb lodging. But as a host, I'm also willing to let anybody from around the world stay in my house. And that's such a unique, almost strange and alien approach to this idea of renting at your house, because it has you, you almost have zero interaction face to face, if any.
[00:04:17] So therefore Airbnb takes all of the responsibility to build the trust for both sides. Through that process. That's right. And I think that's really, it's a great demonstration. Isn't it? Mike, of focusing purely on the customer experience rather than making it something that's a little bit easy for you as a business, it's easy to churn out to make a profit.
[00:04:40] Instead they've taken the time 14 years is how long they've been going. Joe was six 26 when they started and formulated an approach that is really based on not only hard work, but importantly customer design at the forefront. Yeah.
[00:04:57] And so the exciting thing is in this show, we are gonna break down the general story of Airbnb and how they did that.
[00:05:05] So you might learn a little bit about how to find something really special, but also we are gonna get into it. We've talked about getting close to customers and that's really at the heart of what they did. We're gonna show you how to do that. And so that's so exciting. You get the chance to reflect on how Airbnb has done it and then embody those practices yourself.
[00:05:26] What a show mark.
[00:05:28] Mike, and if the listeners are just wanting that little bit more, you're also gonna experience some more moonshots thinking such as Don giving don't give up. No is an invitation to keep going. And the idea of working hard, sinking or swimming. Mike,
[00:05:42] Let's get stuck in, here's just a quick intro clip we found, I think that does a good job of highlighting some of the more recent innovations that's come out of the design team from Airbnb.
[00:05:55] Airbnb has transformed the way people travel and created a whole new category of accommodations. The service has over 3 million listings in 65,000 cities in 191 countries. And despite the hotel industry putting up regulatory roadblocks, the company's grown to a 31 billion valuation. This is the 21st century.
[00:06:15] I think 160 million people have used Airbnb and found it to be a positive experience. And so I think hotels should recognize what are the lessons that can be learned from our success here at Airbnb San Francisco headquarters. They're looking to shake up more than just the hotel industry as they roll out a whole new series of experiences around the world to transform everything about the way you travel from surf lessons, to cooking classes, to coffee and art tours.
[00:06:41] Airbnb wants to give you new ways to experience the city you already live in or anywhere you visit around the world.
[00:06:48] Yeah, their experience is actually one of my favorite things to come out of Airbnb. And the last couple of times I've traveled, I've gone on these experiences with locals and really had a fantastic time.
[00:07:01] Yeah. I was really impressed that you did that on our AMAM tour. And I've really made a note to myself to, to really dive into all the experiences that they offer. But I. What's really important for our listeners is there is so much that we can unpack on how not only Airbnb revolutionized accommodation, but they're now moving into the world of experiences.
[00:07:28] So I think this all starts with this idea of design thinking, which is really another way of saying empathizing for your customer, for your user, thinking about how they really feel and the problems to solve . And that really is at the heart of Joe's philosophy. And this really informs a lot of what Airbnb does.
[00:07:50] So why don't we jump into this next clip of Joe talking about how design plays a role at Airbnb?
[00:07:58] What I love about the founding of Airbnb is that it's a classic design story. You're faced with a problem, some insurmountable challenge, and you've got your back against the wall. The clock is ticking. And you've gotta somehow pull some kind of creative move at a thin air to save the day at the last minute.
[00:08:19] And that's exactly what happened with Airbnb, but it's exactly what we learned in design school. If you think about it. So Airbnb is really just an extension of what we learned at, in industrial design and graphic design. This idea that you can observe a problem and with design thinking or design perspective or design ethos, you can see two dots that don't make any sense, but somehow in your head you can connect them in a new and a different way.
[00:08:47] I love that visual image of the two dots, then your brain through design thinking connects them. I think it's such a great visual analogy. Yeah. I he
[00:08:58] he's such a great advocate for the role that design can play in business. And I think this really makes him quite special because a lot of great designers are very preoccupied with design and the art form itself.
[00:09:12] But I think Joe goes beyond that and sees the role it has to play in the enterprise. And what's really funny is that he had a very deep sense of entrepreneurialism very early on that accompanied his great design skills. And he always had a sort of a sense of the entrepreneurial destination that he had with his classmates from RISD.
[00:09:38] So let's. Let's have a listen to him now, jumping into the origin story of how they all came together at Airbnb
[00:09:49] until one day I'm in the living room on my laptop. And I'm looking up a design conference that's coming to San Francisco for the industrial designer society of America. Okay. And it was the international version, which meant that there were 5,000 people descending on San Francisco and on the website, it said the hotels were sold out were sorry.
[00:10:08] And I saw this and I'm like, oh, that's terrible. People wanna come last minute? Where are they gonna stay by the airport? And I look up into the living room. I'm like, we have so much space in our living room and I'm like, and then I've got the air bed in the closet. So I run up and pull the air bed out, blow it up, email Brian, say, what do you think about this notion of hosting designers for this conference in the living room?
[00:10:33] He's yeah, it's awesome. It's a great idea. Save on rent this month. Yeah. Save on rent. And then we realized we could actually invest in two more air beds and rent three out for the conference to have three guests. So okay, now we need to get the word out about this. We decided that we would call this not a bed and breakfast, but the air, bed, and breakfast.
[00:10:52] And we would design an experience. We'd pick people from the airport. We would cook breakfast in the morning. We'd give a map to San Francisco and a Bart pass to the right of the subway. And so this idea was born. And so it was incredible to see you have this hair-brained idea. That you have no idea, pretty random idea.
[00:11:10] Let's just call it what it is, right? It's out of survival, totally out of survival, right? Yeah. We need to make enough cash to save our apartment for that month. And this whole premise was just seeing two unrelated dots and combining them in a new, in a different way, creativity, anybody could have pulled that on the air bed for that conference and made air bed, breakfast.com.
[00:11:30] There was no technical innovation. There was no patent filed. There was no special algorithm. It was just like there's a need. And we have something that people want. Let's do this and let's design it. Yeah.
[00:11:42] It's such an interesting origin story that I think my favorite part is like any, anyone could have charged a hundred dollars for someone to stay on their air mattress in their apartment.
[00:11:56] But because Joe has this design, he took it that one further step and was like, you know what, I'm gonna create a website. I'm gonna formalize it. I'm gonna market it. And. I'm gonna take these people around and understand what they want when they come and visit a city. And I think it was that that set him up and Brian and Nate to take that idea and run with it.
[00:12:25] Cause you know, couch surfing has been a thing forever. But it never took off into a 31 billion company. yeah.
[00:12:34] I think it's quite healthy actually that he can sit there and say, look, no patents were filed, no proprietary solutions happening here. There was a problem. And we went out and met it and was, what's also very interesting here is how the adversity almost the need to survive was actually the driver here.
[00:12:53] And the other thing that I thought was really powerful was the way in which he saw a frustration, a need in me, it was very Richard Branson, at Branson ask. I can almost imagine Joe and the other guys at Airbnb with their chalkboards, just like Richard Branson. this is where their worlds intersect, which is when you find these big frustrations and nobody's serving those frustration, their lies, your opportunity, and.
[00:13:23] Not just their own perceived frustration, but going out into the real world and finding and asking and digging deep into their frustrations as well. And I think that's maybe what differentiates Richard Branson and Joe a bit is I see Joe as much more customer focused and getting outside of the building as they say in the startup world.
[00:13:45] Whereas Richard Branson, I do think is maybe a little selfish, solving his own problems. That's right. And they're great ideas. And, he does end up getting the traction with them and building billion dollar businesses. But I think with Joe, design thinking is really at the core of what he's building.
[00:14:02] And it, the other really fascinating thing with the origin story of Airbnb is Joe and Brian. One of his co-founders knew each other from school at RDI, but they started the company well after their time at school. And so here's a clip of Joe, just talking about the origin of his and Brian's relationship and how he saw fate doing to them as the years went on.
[00:14:30] And it was because I was in sports that I met Brian because I was running a basketball team. He was running the hockey team. Oh. And so I ended up meeting each other in the office of student life. And I'd be like, who's this guy like, and he was looking at me saying the same thing. So we nurtured this friendship during our time there largely through sports also through design of course a lot of mutual friends and skip, skip ahead to To senior year, we worked in a project together and we got paired up and our, the output of what we created was so different than everybody else that I remember thinking to myself, wow, there's something special about this guy.
[00:15:09] And I really thought that if you put us in the same room, we could think of something big. And so the night before he's graduating, I was doing a five year program. So I was there a little bit longer. The night before he's graduating, he's about to move to the west coast. And I had this feeling growing and I felt like I just needed to tell him.
[00:15:25] So I invited him out for a slice of pizza and glass. I look him in the eye and I said, Brian I think we're gonna start a business one day. And I think they're gonna write a book about it.
[00:15:35] Didn't they write a book about Airbnb, holy smoke. But Chad, don't you find it disarming that Joe, so early, just still at college had this intuition, this foretelling of what was to come? It really speaks to not only his design sense, but he truly has a sense of friendship, teamwork, and collaboration.
[00:16:01] And almost destiny is what speaks to me about that clip.
[00:16:05] Yeah. And, they almost did a little bit of like a founder dating in, in school in a way. They had a, a clearly defined kind of scope of work in this senior project for Brian in that experience, however long that was like two weeks, four weeks, they were able to see how they worked together and, Joe just, he recognized like he and I.
[00:16:28] Could do really great things. And there was probably a spark of them talking about, what, I'd like to start my own company when I get outta school or, I want to go and try and do this sort of thing. And I think that's what I'm taking away from it. Many of us, especially solo entrepreneurs, may feel like the silver bullet to our problems is a founder.
[00:16:48] And maybe sometimes we jump too soon, with a business partner or a co-founder. And I actually think what Joe and Brian had that experience of working on this senior project together is a really great kind of just a test run. And so maybe that's something that we can do . Instead of maybe just jumping into a joint venture or a partnership, we can figure out a project to work on or look at past projects and people that we've really enjoyed working with.
[00:17:14] That's why we started this podcast. We worked together in the past and said, Hey, I think you're doing some really cool stuff. Let's try this out. Yeah. And this podcast was born. So that's what I love about this story of their friend.
[00:17:27] Yeah. And I think there's another level of learning here to build on what you just said, which is, I don't think you can do great stuff, truly great stuff.
[00:17:38] As a lone Wolf, as the wizard in the tower. I think you need co-founders co-conspirator you and partners in crime. Like I could not imagine just making a podcast without you, Chad. I can't imagine so many. Yeah. And so many things here and in life require teamwork and different points of view.
[00:18:02] Sometimes co-founders nudge each other when one's down picks the other one up. I think this is a great learning experience to go out and do stuff with people. And learn if they're a good fit, but when you find people that are a good fit, those people that just feel great to work with hold onto them because you need them.
[00:18:25] And don't take. It is don't be selfish. Don't be selfish. Don't think it should be all yours because, share the pie, share the cake and the things you get in return from co-founders from having good people around you. I think the Airbnb case is proof enough. This is what happens when good buddies with talent get together on a mission.
[00:18:49] Amazing things can
[00:18:51] happened. Yeah, I think for me, especially because I've been on this solo journey for almost 10 years now, I am realizing that finding those people, that the people that I work best with always end up becoming really great friends. And I think that's just a reinforcing cycle for me too.
[00:19:09] To have people that push me to do bigger and better things.
[00:19:14] And I think that if you are a an entrepreneur listening to the show and you are thinking to yourself, I really need to go find, I really need a co-founder the best tip I can give you is go out to meetups, go out to nonprofits, go to conferences and just get over the fear of connecting to people you don't know, and really search for that person.
[00:19:42] Ask your ask your. Your friends for introductions, don't be scared because when you get over it and find somebody who's a good partner in crime, it is so worth it. But I think Joe's got a lot more than just, being a team, finding founders and to offer us, I think what we've got coming up now for our listeners is some serious design insight.
[00:20:08] So let me just say that what truly distinguishes Airbnb is the design experience. And if you're in any doubt on the power of it, I would only ask you to think, Chad. Can you think of anyone that has successfully challenged Airbnb in their business, anywhere in the world? No.
[00:20:31] And it's been there for 10 years. You don't think that someone could have come up with a competitive advantage against Airbnb. And the truth really is that they have differentiated through design, by design. They have a competitive advantage that is almost epic and scale. It's Uber like it's Amazon and that's why the hotel industry is running scared from these guys.
[00:20:56] And so they should be. So let's now go into this world of design and let's listen to Joe GI talking about how you can create differentiation by design
[00:21:10] as the internet has matured. I feel and as technology and computers have matured, the plain field in my mind is largely leveled. Yeah, like what used to be a competitive advantage, whether that was, megahertz speed or screen size or whatever Ram, like everybody now has access to the same stuff. Yeah. So the tech plane field has largely leveled, which begs the question. How else do you differentiate? And the way that we've always thought about is through design, right?
[00:21:40] Maybe the details can help us differentiate. Maybe our, sometimes insane attention to details can help us elevate beyond, the rest of the noise in, in, in our
[00:21:50] industry. And I wanna clarify too, we are using the big. Capital D design. This is not just simply icons and fonts and whatnot.
[00:22:03] This is designing the entire experience from how someone hears about Airbnb to then how someone becomes a super host on Airbnb and every little thing along the way. Yeah. I think the first learnings that came through some of the stories that Joe shared was that it was really awkward for people to be handing over cash to strangers and strangers' homes.
[00:22:30] So the first to-do list on their technical spec sheet was to implement a payments system so that people don't have that awkward exchange inside someone's home all the way to actual design decisions. Like changing the start button for listings that you wanted to save to a heart.
[00:22:52] Increased engagement. I think 30 or 40% just in one week, which is such a huge lift that they didn't even believe it. And they went to the analytics team and were like, can you double check that data? . But, when we say design, I really want everyone to know that it's the entire experience design, not just, how the app works or how the website works.
[00:23:13] And it goes to the core of every employee's experience because in their first week or two, an employee goes on a trip to an Airbnb and they take notes and it's, so it's like a vacation and a field trip at the same time. And then they come back to the company and present their research and findings to the entire company.
[00:23:34] Yeah. And things that they notice and how they can improve. And they ship on day one every engineer that and designer that works at Airbnb ships. On their very first day. And I think all of that just encapsulates how core to the business and culture design is and just how they're able to get such huge returns from that.
[00:23:53] Yeah. And
[00:23:54] I think at the heart of this emphasis that you're making Chad, is that it
[00:23:59] is thinking holistically in terms of systems thinking there's a great chat that he gives at Ted and Joe basically explains how they design for trust. We'll put that in the show links on moonshots.io. And I really recommend it to anyone who wants to understand the impact that design can make in their business.
[00:24:22] This will really show you how they did design. And there's really two parts to that, which is. Going deep and learning with your customers and then really distilling the insights and the learnings you can implement into a product. And the great news for our listeners is we've got two clips that explain exactly how that happens.
[00:24:42] So let's dive into how Airbnb gets close to its customers.
[00:24:50] Almost in, in any history of any idea that's ever been launched. There came a time in the early days where there's no customers, your assumptions were wrong. The way people actually wanted something delivered to them is different than what you had thought.
[00:25:03] And they, what they call this in the life cycle of an idea is the trough of sorrow. And it's a very bleak, dark time where you're just trying to figure out how to get your idea off the ground and the way that, that most people and the way that we figured out, how to get out of it was by going to meet our customers by going and talking to our early host and guests on Airbnb, it allowed us to understand their needs and then make something people wanted.
[00:25:29] We used to travel and actually stay with our customers. It was the. Enlightened empathy, right? You were so close to the people you're designing for that. It informed you in a way that an online survey never would. So by being so close to our customers, we were able to listen to their needs and then design a product.
[00:25:45] They loved it.
[00:25:48] Yeah, no, no more emailing of surveys to customers. , you've gotta go and stay in their homes and live with them. and I can't tell you how many startups that I've come into contact with and even worked with where they, as Joe says, sit behind their computers in collect data, instead of going to literally traveling with their feet to the customer, and it, those of us that are in the know it's a Nodus sort of thing, but you'd be surprised at how many people.
[00:26:17] Hear that. And they're like, ah, I don't really have to do that. It's no, you, if you want to innovate, you've actually got to get that close to the customer.
[00:26:24] Yeah, I totally agree. And what I've discovered is that rather than avoiding working with customers, once you get into it, you find that it becomes this essential requirement where until you've actually tested and learned and prototyped with customers, everything is a guess before.
[00:26:47] So I really can't encourage our listeners enough to dive into the world of their customers. Don't be scared, embrace your customers, watch, learn, listen, and understand them. And the path to innovation becomes so much easier once you understand the customer. You must have seen this time and time again you, Chad, you've seen it when founders or yourself, when you've really uncovered a customer problem, like things kind of line up after that.
[00:27:18] Yeah. I would like to hear from you some specific examples because I really do think it, this is so important for everyone. For me, I've done a lot of work with customers or clients that are, building end user, consumer type of products and services. And in the creation of these things, they're not doing it behind closed doors.
[00:27:43] They're actually inviting the people that will be buying and using these products and bringing them into the initial design phases, in the prototyping even before, there's 3d drawings and, molds are sent to China for these things to be produced. There are real customers real potential customers in the room with these people working together.
[00:28:04] I'm curious what kinds of environments you've seen companies getting close
[00:28:09] right to their customers. So generally I love experiences where you bring a core team of people together on the product side. And then you bring a core group of customers, potential customers for this product and you prototype like crazy.
[00:28:24] So I was working with the team at Breville, which is a luxury kitchen appliance manufacturer. And we discovered tons of problems that people have cooking at home. Chad, you and I worked together with Virgin and we discovered all of the issues that people have trying to be active and healthy in their.
[00:28:44] We even, I remember working so closely with Nike, when we designed the Nike soccer app, it was all about uncovering the real problems that young people had playing pickup soccer all over the universe. And we even went to the corners of the globe. We tested in Japan, we in Tokyo, in London, in south Paul, it was amazing.
[00:29:08] And the theme for me that is the biggest takeout for our listeners, for designers, for innovators and entrepreneurs, is that when you really get in there and understand the issues that the customer has, you are actually able to get in and create new things, connect the dots that Joe GI talks about. Find new, surprising.
[00:29:31] Powerful ways of solving this problem. And if you are focused on this is the source of not only a great feature, but a great product. And from that, you can build a great company and maybe have really big impact on the world. So it's all about getting close to customers, but I don't think that's all Joe has to teach us, right?
[00:29:52] No. It's not important to just get in front of the customers. You need to have the kind of tangible assets and feedback from the experience of the customer that you can then take back to the team or, the C-suite to get the buy-in and say, you know what? We behind closed doors thought that we should build this.
[00:30:12] But when we went to our customers here is what they told us.
[00:30:16] People's opinions whether rational or irrational Get really can become really focused when you can share a visible, tactile, tangible insight that came from somebody who's consuming your product to your service. So if you could go out into the world and you could gather tangible insights, whether it's photos or maybe some audio or some video, or just notes and observations sketches, and come back with some kind of aha, I saw something out there that I don't think any of us have seen yet.
[00:30:46] And here's what it looks like. And this is what I heard from that customer who's actually paying us right now for our service. And they said they pay us more if we did this. Why don't we talk about this a little bit more?
[00:30:57] So I, what I love about this is the perfect end note to what you called Chad design with a capital D, right?
[00:31:06] This is once you are close to the customer document, capture those insights, articulate them because the sharper and better the insight, the easier, the way designers and developers can think of new features and products and solutions, but the clearer and the more inspiring these insights, then the bigger, the potential solution can be the further the team can go.
[00:31:33] And I really like this sort. Start middle and end design is a differentiator start by getting close to your customers. And when you do that, bring back these tactile, visceral, inspiring insights to the team and let
[00:31:48] it rip. Yeah. And that is a lot of what I actually. Do in my storytelling for innovators is capturing all of this amazing innovation work that's happening in such a way that it can go back either to stake internal stakeholders or external stakeholders and say, look, this is what is going on here are customers using this prototype and they believe it's real.
[00:32:14] And they, they think it's wonderful and they'd be willing to pay, a lot of money for it. Like J Joe saying Hey, if you just did this, I would pay a lot of money. If you can have that sound bite or that, video clip of a potential customer saying that, of course your design team and engineering team and superiors are all gonna get behind that.
[00:32:30] And that's why I think it's so important to have that documentation, to give you that validation and feedback of how you're doing. Speaking of feedback. I just wanted to say thank you to all the listeners out there that have been contacting us at hello, moonshots.io. That's the email address you can use to get in touch with Mike and myself for everything moonshot.
[00:32:55] We love getting your feedback. And I just wanted to give a shout out to Brandon, a loyal listener who who's said that are branching out into different industries, outside of Silicon valley and bringing guests on like Gary and Lauren and Simon have been really, what's kept him listening to the show.
[00:33:15] And I just wanted to say thanks to Brandon. And if you have any more ideas on how Mike and I can improve the show and bring you more insights and learnings we would love to hear from you. Absolutely.
[00:33:29] I think it's so important. I know I listen to podcasts and don't offer up enough feedback, support, or insight.
[00:33:38] So I really want to ask all our listeners to, to keep those emails flowing, because it really helps us understand what people are looking for and how we can best create great content that we are learning from that you, the audience can learn from. So please, jump on, on our site@moonshots.io and there's every perceivable social media technology means of contacting us there.
[00:34:05] So we're listing. The invitation is yours to share thoughts and ideas with us here at the moonshots headquarters. So I just wanted to recap a little bit Chad and ask you, what was your biggest takeaway from the founding story of Airbnb? What stuck, what struck you as very compelling about the way Airbnb came into existence?
[00:34:33] I think the most interesting part of the story is how maybe mundane the idea is, but the execution was handled in such a way that really made it take off. And Joe he downplays it. I do think there is some ingenuity in hosting people in your home for a conference because the hotels are booked, but it was their follow through afterwards in Joe turning to Brian and be like, you know what?
[00:35:00] I think there's an idea for a business here and then turning to their other roommate, Nate. Who became a co-founder and be like, you know what, you're really great at coding and designing. Why don't, you help us iterate on this website. I think that's what stands out to me. Yeah. And
[00:35:15] in the design ideas that Joe brought us, was there something in that maybe has inspired you a little bit, Chad, as you go into a, to thinking about tomorrow, is there something that you learned from Joe that you might use in your approach to, I don't know, getting close to customers or those insights or making designers a way of differentiating your stories?
[00:35:40] I think for me, it's being more curious and intentional about getting in front of the customer, like without pitching or selling to the customer, a lot of times or executing on, on, on the work. Oftentimes I can get. Consumed by doing the work. And, I had a fantastic conversation today with a potential client that it didn't really work out there.
[00:36:03] Wasn't it wasn't the right time and budget and project or whatnot. But I just had a conversation with him really asking, Hey how is story or storytelling valuable to you and the people you work with and how can story be valuable and interesting to you? And it was really refreshing. To have that conversation removed from, oh, we're, in the middle of a project and we gotta get things done or, trying to sell them something.
[00:36:29] So that's one thing that I wanna do is, talk to my potential clients and past clients and current clients more about. You know what story means to them and the value it provides to them to try and get some of that tactical insights that I can then incorporate into my work.
[00:36:45] That's
[00:36:45] awesome. And the more of those conversations that we all have the more clearer we see our path, the more clearer we see things that need to be tackled problems that need to be solved. And I don't think you can go out in the world and use designs, a differentiator. I don't think you can build a cohort of buddies to go start something.
[00:37:08] If you don't have the right beliefs, the right mindsets, the right attitude. And like many of the entrepreneurs that we've studied, Joe has a lot to a lot to offer us in how we can go about being successful in the world. If the design is the differentiator, the hard work, the tenacity, the curiosity, the power comes from our beliefs and our mindsets.
[00:37:34] And we've got a couple of great ones from him. So let's now jump into this world of attitude and mindset. Let's go into really when we face those tough times or when we really need to step up, let's have her listen to Joe gibe, talking about sinking or swimming.
[00:37:54] I think
[00:37:54] It's this deep desire to constantly get to the next level with whatever it is.
[00:37:59] And I had this with sports too. A basketball coach in seventh grade gave me advice that I've carried through my entire life. He said took me aside one day, cause I just started playing basketball and he goes, Joe, not very tall, Joe, just a heads up at the time I was, comparatively I was pretty tall.
[00:38:13] But my shot wasn't quite on just yet, like it is today. Nice. Correct. And he took me aside and he goes, Joe, if you wanna get better play with people who are better than you. And since that moment, probably with anything I can think of in my life, I've always sought to throw myself into situations where I'm probably maybe one of the least knowledgeable in the room or, I have the least amount of experience.
[00:38:35] So I did, I started playing with upperclass. In regards to basketball at the Y M C a and at my high school at the time, I was always playing with guys who were taller than me, stronger than me had better skills than I did. And I feel like that just being thrown into an experience like that, it it forces sink or swim, like forces you and you have to find the self-reliance inside of you.
[00:38:55] Yeah.
[00:38:56] You know what this reminds me of Mike is the clip from Jack ma about hiring, where they look for hiring, someone more advanced and skilled than you are, and that's the people that you should be hiring because they'll be, your bosses one day . And I think not only that, but I just love this idea of Joe surrounding himself with people that's going to continually push him to do more and better.
[00:39:28] Yeah.
[00:39:28] And the kind of twist on this is that it's a theme that we've seen come. Not only with Jack. I think Richard Branson is also very much about hiring great people around surrounding himself with great people and the unexpected benefit of not only having more a players in your team is that you can learn from them.
[00:39:51] And from the journey of understanding how they do it and learning, I think also comes an important ingredient, inspiration. Of course, who doesn't wanna be inspired by their colleagues, their peers and their teammates yet. What's so interesting is a lot of companies have this bad habit where senior managers really feel threatened by super talented people.
[00:40:14] And I think if you just think about it the other way and embrace it and ask yourself, what can I learn? How can I be inspired by this person? I think this is a great tip for anyone looking to go and start something
[00:40:27] big. Yeah. And. It doesn't necessarily have to be, your friends or roommates in the case of Joe, he had to go and seek out the upperclassmen and other, pick up games people to find the people that could challenge him.
[00:40:42] And I'd just like to echo your advice to, going to meetups and getting out there and putting yourself out there to find those people that could be those challenging individuals. Someone that you've seen that has built maybe a few more apps than you have, or has a few more years experience in a particular area.
[00:41:02] And it's best often, if you can also provide, a bit of expertise to them as well this, it always comes back to learning, doesn't it on this show? And my, and teaching what you teaching, what you know? Yeah, I feel like that's really the core. Of so many of our discussions here on the podcast.
[00:41:22] Yeah. I would say if you were to look at the two sides of it, there's the learning. And then there seems to be this theme of hard work that needs to go with it. And without both of those two key ingredients of, learning and hard work, it seems if we were to try and distill it all down to this simple recipe, after 18 shows and hundreds of ideas that we've learned from and decoded, it would appear that it's the hard graph and the learning that seem to be the magic combination and right here, Joe gave us.
[00:41:58] This thought of think sink or swim, surround yourself with great people. And I find that really inspiring
[00:42:05] and this next clip, we have goes back and builds upon what he was talking about. Being in the valley of sorrow, where, when things aren't looking that great and everyone seems to be telling you no, as long as you've, been close to the customer and you've seen the, the wonderful experience that you're creating, that it's really just more encouragement for you to continue.
[00:42:29] So here's Joe explaining how no is just anion to keep going.
[00:42:35] I've learned over the years that no is simply an invitation to keep going and you can accept it or not. You don't have to but ask any entrepreneur, all the guys that have sat in this chair and talked to you.
[00:42:51] they've always reframed whatever's in front of them and turned it into a positive. Yeah, you have to. Yeah. Cause whether it's, a professor telling you, you can't be done or very experienced product designers telling you it'll never happen in time. Or investors rejecting your idea cuz it's weird.
[00:43:09] Yep. It's you can stop you. Okay. Wow. Geez. They said no, so I should, yeah. Ah, I shouldn't do it before. You can be like, cool. It's an opportunity to find another path.
[00:43:19] Yeah. Finding another path. I think this really comes out of this idea of when people tell you, no, it can't be done.
[00:43:27] It is your invitation to keep going. And I think that this is very much that hard work, that persistence, that relentlessness, that needs to accompany this lifelong learner attitude. And what is so fascinating, Chad is how many people, when they are told no, or when they're told that's really hard or that's impossible, how many people give up and constantly we are learning that Joe's idea.
[00:43:56] Oh, that, no, it can't be done. That's just an invitation to keep going to double down. This is absolutely the characteristic of successful entrepreneurs they don't give
[00:44:07] up. Yeah. I don't know that we've explicitly called out the idea of grit, but I really think that's what Joe. Is getting at here. And it's something I know, that's, there's been some books written about it and it's a word that's, getting out there in, in the world of education and, how can we engender grit in our kids, in our education system and entrepreneurship.
[00:44:29] And for me, it's difficult to know. I don't know that I know. You know when to keep pursuing and when not to, cause you, you could say that, some people are probably working on ideas and products that no one wants and when people are telling them no, it's maybe for a good reason. And how do we know if per, persevering and pushing through is actually the thing that we need to be doing?
[00:44:52] Yeah. So how, let me ask you this question the next time you face a great challenge. Okay. When they're saying no, it can't be done or it's too hard or it's impossible, or you're in that value of darkness, how do you think you could keep going? How do you think you could be using Joe GI thinking to push through?
[00:45:16] What does this make you think about as the solution,
[00:45:19] as the path. I think as long as I'm getting good and positive feedback from my customers, then I should keep doing it. If you notice kind of his examples is of people telling him no is, friends and family or even investors, they got turned down by the top 10 investors in the valley when they first were pitching for funding.
[00:45:42] But what he knew was that their customers were giving them amazing positive feedback. So I think if I find myself in that situation and I go to my customers and ask them, is this something that you really need and want? And they're paying they're, demonstrating that to me by, by some exchange of value, then I think it's worth pushing through.
[00:46:06] But if I go to my customers, Or my audience and there's crickets then maybe it's something that that I need, I need to find that alternate path.
[00:46:17] Yes. And there might be a different approach to to serve them. I also think a thing that I constantly remind myself and challenge myself about is am I doing something that is rooted in the desire to help people to have impact to do something that matters work that matters to use Tim O'Reilly's thinking, and sometimes you have the best of intentions, but the means you are using are not right.
[00:46:46] And sometimes we confuse the two, we think just because my approach isn't working, that the mission is therefore void, but sometimes and Joe talks about this a little bit. It's time to take a different approach, but achieving the same mission.
[00:47:03] Yeah, this I was having an existential crisis there for a second.
[00:47:07] Just like, how do you know if you're doing the right thing or not? If I should keep going, but I think talking it through with you here, Mike, and with the advice we've gotten from Joe I feel much
[00:47:17] better. I'm glad you are feeling better. If that's what an existential crisis looks like, it wasn't nearly as bad as I was expecting it.
[00:47:25] So when one comes my way. I hope it's Chad's style a few moments on a podcast and nothing more .
[00:47:33] Yeah. I you've found a great clip for us to end on ki Mike.
[00:47:38] Oh yeah. We've had so much wisdom and so many ideas from Joe and Airbnb. There's so much to learn from them that we found this amazing little anecdote that Joe tells of a of a review that was given.
[00:47:53] And we wanted to play this because it really is when you put it in context, it is really not only. Quite hilarious, but also speaks to something much bigger than being just a website. So let's have a listen to Joe GA talking about a very poignant customer review.
[00:48:16] We had a
[00:48:16] guest stay with a host in Erway and he suffered a heart attack.
[00:48:20] The host rushed him the hospital. They donated their own blood for his operation. Let me read you his review.
[00:48:30] excellent house for sedentary travelers prone to myocardial infarctions. The area is beautiful and has direct access to the best hospitals. Javier and Alejandro instantly become guardian angels who will save your life without even knowing you. They will rush you to the hospital in their own car while you're dying and stay in the waiting room.
[00:48:54] While the doctors give you a bypass, they don't let you feel lonely. They bring you books to read and they let you stay at their house extra nights without charging you highly recommended.
[00:49:05] Yeah, guests literally having their lives saved by their hosts. It doesn't get any better
[00:49:13] than that. I know. And it speaks to a little bit that connectedness that we all have I think about all these wonderful hosts I've had in so many different parts of the world. And even when I go back and stay with some host, there's absolute, genuine happiness.
[00:49:31] Oh, you are back. This is great. And it's a little nod to that greater connectedness that I think Joe and his co-founders thought that we all had and that we could all be fair, gracious, and very hospitable host to anyone from around the world. Yeah it's
[00:49:48] a very aspirational. Company and brand that just has a fundamental positive view of humanity.
[00:49:57] And I think, as tongue in cheek as this review is it's really revelatory of how that is just so pervasive all across Airbnb, both on, the hosts side. And, I genuinely think that people staying in Airbnbs are just ha happier, more friendly individuals as.
[00:50:16] Yes. And I think it's just, Airbnb is a conduit to framing this positive interaction.
[00:50:24] It, it brings if to take, Joe's thinking of, if we're all little dots, it connects them and brings them together. And I think this is why it's had such tremendous success in such a short time. And it's not only a great customer experience. It's obviously a great enterprise with so much to learn from, founding companies with people that are your friends that you can be brothers and arms with to using design as a differentiator, or I loved Joe's thought that when you hear no, it can't be done.
[00:50:56] It's simply an invitation to. Going,
[00:50:59] I would be remiss if I didn't bring up some of the, issues, if you will, around, regulations and laws, in certain cities and states and countries a about the legality of Airbnb, I think how they handle that will really determine if they continue on this massive growth trajectory or it, or if things come to light in, in the way that it, it did for Uber, where their kind of cavalier attitude towards that regulation may come back to bite them.
[00:51:34] That I think that is really. What I'm most interested in seeing how Airbnb responds and navigates that? I wish them the best because I think it's leagues it's 10 X or more the experience that you get at any, run of the mill hotel chain. But it's going to be a tricky road ahead for them.
[00:51:54] They've had lots of problems here in New York city, technically it's illegal for me to put my apartment on Airbnb. My, my landlord, could be fined tens of thousands of dollars per infraction. And that's, that's something that, that both citizens and residents and tax collecting bodies are gonna have to figure out going
[00:52:15] forward.
[00:52:16] That's so true. I think that you do a good job in comparing them to Uber, because I think that's where the difference is. I think that Airbnb is. Much more customer community centric. I think they are always leading with initiatives. I don't know if you saw, they did this initiative with refugees.
[00:52:37] They, there really are leagues in front in, and I think creating positive impact. So they don't come with any of that hubris of Uber. No, they don't come with you don't see Airbnb hosts protesting that they're being paid too little, which you do see with Uber. And I think that's where there's a stark difference.
[00:52:59] And I think the it's really exciting to see how they're gonna tackle this world of experiences that come on top of finding accommodation. It's very early times for that new service that they have. Let's see how that goes, because I think that it's really interesting to see what's ahead for them. They have so much opportunity.
[00:53:20] They have great challenges in front of them, but I do have a feeling that design as a differentiator could be the anecdote, the antidote for all of the challenges that they face.
[00:53:34] Yeah. Yeah. I'm, like I said, I'm very interested to see, what choices they make in the years to come and, continue to be inspired by their design thinking approach to building a product that 160 million people have used.
[00:53:48] And I'm sure. Love.
[00:53:50] Yeah, exactly. So now that we've de decoded, we've taken in all of this learning from the world of Joe GA and Airbnb. Chad who do you feel is tickling you a little bit for our next show? Who would you like whose world of thinking ideas, attitudes, and babies, who would you like to dive into next?
[00:54:12] This is always so hard. I never know. I think Joe's background in industrial design peaked my interest more in that. World. Cause I know you had said if you'd thrown out Deda Rams as one potential person and John Johnny I've, as, as another, I don't know enough about either of them to make an educated recommendation, but I think digging deeper into even the more kind of tangible world of things could be interesting to unpack.
[00:54:46] Yeah.
[00:54:47] Yeah. I think that, you mentioned that the feedback we'd got from a listener that gives me the inspiration to go to someone like DETA Rus, who is without doubt, one of the greatest designers of the last century and has many distilled amazing thoughts about design. He has these principles of design, Chad, which.
[00:55:12] Like timeless. They are just fantastic. So I feel that could be our path. And we also have, Phillip stark, a number of great guys, James Dyson. So I think we could go into the world of Deda Rus and we can explore that. And there's just so much for us to dig into. I do. I am, I'm really enjoying the design bent.
[00:55:32] It's it's just yet another way into innovation, isn't
[00:55:36] it? Yeah. I'm hesitant to even name the ES, but that's where my mind goes as well. Maybe for our greatest innovators of X in history. But I do like to keep it current. Yeah. But again, that was where my mind went with, just designers in every sense of the word to the core, the EES is
[00:55:57] come top of mind.
[00:55:58] Okay that sounds like plenty for us to work with as we prep up another show before we wrap up, tell me like what's the pan last on the last show. You needed to head to the gym. Have you got some boxing TaeKwonDo acrobatic workout ahead of you tonight? Or is it a little bit more relaxed?
[00:56:17] Nope, it's kickboxing again. It's my focus for this month is fitness. And so I'm getting to the kickboxing gym and, or doing yoga. That's my quote, unquote off day. Funny anecdote. I somehow accidentally stumbled into the gentle Matt yoga for yesterday. And I was about 40 years younger than than everyone in the class, but it was still fun and enjoyable and they were very welcoming.
[00:56:42] Oh, that's hilarious. That is so good. But I have to commend you on the yoga. Yoga is something I discovered actually around the time that we started working together and this whole idea of stretching and breathing at the same time. I can't tell you how good it makes me feel when I do it.
[00:56:59] Oh my gosh.
[00:57:00] Yeah. I, fitness is such an integral part of just my performance. I really just have to be sure that's all locked and dialed.
[00:57:08] Yep. I totally agree. So I've done my workout for the day. I managed to squeeze in the gym before the show, so I've got a very sunny, beautiful Sydney day ahead of me, which I'm going to thoroughly enjoy because I'll be heading to Europe next week, but we'll record while I'm on the road enjoying a rather frosty European winter, but I'll be amongst the warmth of friends.
[00:57:32] That sounds like a great way to spend some time. I think we just need to remind the, our listeners do check into moonshot.io. You'll have all the show notes, all the links to the full interviews to all our book recommendations. Absolutely. Everything is there. And I think we really want to encourage folks to share their thoughts with us.
[00:57:50] Don't we, Chad?
[00:57:51] Yeah, don't forget. You can email us at hello, moonshots.io and Mike, and I will both get those messages. I always get a smile when I hear from a listener and Mike and I will take your feedback and suggestions and try and incorporate them into the show. So we love hearing from each and every one of you.
[00:58:11] Absolutely. Absolutely. So that's it for another moonshot show. Chad, thank you. Enjoy your kickboxing. Don't hurt too many people. Okay. I won't and I'll be off into the sunny vitamin D drench day that we have here in Sydney, Australia. So from Chad and myself, a big, thank you. We look forward to you on the next show of the moonshot podcast.
[00:58:38] That's a wrap