Steve Case and Scott Cook built their companies around obsessive customer focus. Steve Jobs hired a Pepsi CEO who got distracted by private jets and luxury cars, and Apple lost its way. Founder-led companies need to stay hungry for customers, not perks.
Focus on the customer, stupid. I'm reading that book right now that I told you about, Company of Giants, right? And when you read about like Steve Case of AOL or Scott Cook from Intuit, right? These guys were just like, it's all about the customer, stupid. It's not about this financial model. But the moment things start to really grow, and this was in the Steve Jobs interview in there, I remember Steve Jobs hired the Pepsi CEO and then the Pepsi CEO, all they did at that point was they focused on private jets flying to nice islands and things like that. And it was all about making sure they have nice company cars and all that. It was no longer about the customers. And so I think for you, Because you're founder-led and you own the lion's share of the company, you get to call the shots. You understand, again, fundamentally your job is to help these companies grow and you have to understand where the fuck is going.
