Greg McKeown:
Welcome. I’m your host, Greg McKeown, and I’m here with you on this journey to learn. Many entrepreneurs fall in love with their products, services, and ideas, but according to my guest today, this is wrong. What Uri Levine argues is that you have to fall in love with the problem, not the solution. Uri Levine is a passionate entrepreneur. Unicorns companies that reach a valuation of more than a billion dollars are rare, but Uri is built to. He’s the co-founder of Waze, which is the world’s largest community-based driving traffic and navigation app with more than 700 million users to date in which Google acquired for more than a billion dollars.
In part two of our conversation today, he reveals the formula that drove these companies to compete with industry veterans and giants alike. By the end of this episode, you’ll be able to be more relevant and valuable to your customers than your very best competitors. Let’s begin.
And if you want to learn faster and understand more deeply today’s episode, then teach one idea that you’re here today with one other person within the next 24 to 48 hours.
Do you use this problem-solving and decision-making approach in your personal life as well, or just in your entrepreneurial work?
Uri Levine:
You know what? I’m not sure. I would say, in general, it’s way easier for me when people share their problem with me, and then I can become valuable for them because my mission in, in life, my destiny is about value creation, and I try to do that through multiple ways, right? So, you know, if you’ll tell me this is my problem, then all of a sudden I sign up to create value for you, by solving that problem. So, in general, I would say, this is my destiny, and this is being reflected by two aspects, right? So number one, I’m an entrepreneur in building startups. Number two, I’m also a teacher. And so I will feel equally rewarded if I build stuff myself, where I help someone to build it. And in my mind, I create value for that someone and empower them to build value for everyone else, right?
And I have, you know, different startups that I mentor the CEO and the value that I create for them about helping them to become more successful in enjoying the success that they have and the suffering with them, by the way, in the parts of the rollercoaster journey. And this is what eventually led me to write this book is, you know, the dream to or, and the mission to create value to all entrepreneurs and essentially all business people in the world to help them to become more successful. So in my mind, if, as a result of this podcast, someone is going to take the book, read it, and that book is going to create value for them, I fulfilled my destiny, and I’m a happy person.
Greg McKeown:
There’s a psychological distinction between two kinds of intelligence. There’s fluid intelligence, which is an individual’s ability to process new information, learn, solve problems, and then there’s crystallized intelligence, which is your stored knowledge accumulated over the years. And what’s interesting is that between, maybe, let’s say, the first half of somebody’s life, they have a higher level of fluid intelligence. And then, as they move into the second half, that fluid intelligence does decrease. I mean, speaking broadly, but crystallized intelligence increases. And I just think it seems at least symbolic that you’re writing the book at this phase where your crystallized intelligence is increasing. And so your, all of that stored knowledge is now, you know, becoming more helpful and more codified to be able to help more people. Did you use the same kind of process that you’ve been talking about so far when you were writing the book?
Uri Levine:
So I didn’t even know that you call that this way, but let me say that differently, right? The difference between in theory and in practice is way bigger in practice than it is in theory, right? And, and I’m writing this book, or I wrote this book from the perspective of sharing not my knowledge, my know-how and the know-how is exactly what you’re saying.
Greg McKeown:
Did you follow the process of identifying the big problem, and you know, this falling in love with the problem by talking to entrepreneurs about their challenges? Did you go through that process when you were writing this book, or did you really say, okay, let me just take everything I’ve learned over all these years and codify it in a book, which sounds more like the process?
Uri Levine:
I meet a lot of entrepreneurs, and for a second, I would say this is, an accumulative knowledge of many, including also many dialogues with entrepreneurs and, you know, being involved in multiple journeys. And I think that the book was born some years back when actually was doing an entrepreneurship seminar for MBA students. And I’ve created a set of presentations that at the end of it I said, wait a minute, I actually have your account for the book. And then I started to validate that, and it was only during Covid that I actually found the time to sit down and write the book.
Greg McKeown:
So Steve Wozniak writes the forward to the book, how did that come about?
Uri Levine:
He also appears in the book, by the way, in a chapter that speaks about understanding users. So let me start with that. I met Steve Wozniak some years back at a conference in somewhere in Latin America. I think it was in Guatemala in 2015 or 16 or something like that. And we were both speakers at the conference, and we actually met the night before, and we had dinner together, and I wanted a selfie with Steve Wazniak, right? For me, Steve Wozniak is one of the gurus when I grew up, right? So I’m a little bit younger than him. And Apple was, at the time, the one that is building the computers that everyone wants to use, right? And not have to use but wanted to use. And so I want to take a selfie with him. And, on the iPhone, you can take a picture by clicking on the screen right here, or actually using the volume button on the phone, right?
And so you can take a picture like that, right? And this is exactly what I did. I take a selfie with him and clicking on the right side on the volume button, and he said, “Finally.”
And I said, “Finally, what?”
He said, “Finally, someone using it the way that I meant it to be.”
And there is a whole chapter that speaks about understanding users and realizing that users are not all the same. They’re actually very different and in particular in their ability to adapt to new technology or new product. So when I approached him with the initial chapters, you say, look, I like your presentation. I like the way that you present things with obstructive clearance. And I will read the chapter, and I’ll let you know. And after he read the chapter, he told me, I wish I had that when I started. You’re not going to write a forward to your book. And later on, you know, he called that the Bible for entrepreneurs.
Greg McKeown:
And he also said, I had to read every word taking handwritten notes on paper. I even noted many typos in an early draft. I could tell from the start that this book was very meaningful to me, but for a business book, it was natural and understandable. And I think that that’s the essence of you in person and also you in your written format.
Uri Levine:
That was the whole world, right? That was the whole world for me because, you know, you are doing something and then someone that you used to look up to all your life and basically saying, you are doing an amazing job. This is the whole world.
Greg McKeown:
Yeah, this is the whole world. You mentioned just a moment ago that there’s another chapter that kind of meant that you were connected because of this original conference with Steve Wozniak. This is Understand the User, You Are Only a Sample of One. What are the most practical insights that you have garnered on that subject beyond what we’ve already talked about?
Uri Levine:
So, you’re right, you are only a sample of one is critical in order for you to understand users. Because usually, what happens is that we have our own perception, right? And we are using a product in a certain way. And we basically, when you use a product, you don’t even think that there are other people on this planet that use it differently. In fact, you think this is the only way that can be used. And if you would think that there are other ways to use this product, then your mindset is going to be even worse, right? You’re going to say, I’m using it correctly, and everyone else is not. Right? But you are actually only a sample of one person. Now, that reflects to the problem as well, right? Your perception of the problem is different than my perception of the problem. Something that is really frustrating for me.
You will basically say, you know what, it’s not a big deal. And the result is that we have different perceptions. Now, when it’s come to product and you are trying to build a product, the biggest problem is that you, as the builder is a sample of one. And your underlining assumption is that going to be that everyone is like me, right? Now the challenge is that when you start to look at different people, you, you’ve realized that their behaviors in term of adopting a new product is very different. And in many cases, we can break that into several groups of the population and basically say, okay, we have innovators, and then we have, and this is about maybe 1 or 2% of the population. And then we have early adapters that are about 15% in the early majority, which is really the significant group of about one-third of the population.
And then there are other groups, but for a second, I will ignore them. And the biggest issue is that if you belong to one of the groups, you cannot even imagine someone in a different group. So the first, the innovators, they’re going to use a new product because it’s new. That’s the main reason for them to use that, right? So, in general, I would call them enthusiastic amateurs. They care about your space sometimes even more than you. And you are building something that they are going to try it out because it’s new. The second group, which are the early adopters, they are going to try something new as soon as they realize the value. So if you’ll tell them, okay, the value is I’m going to help you to avoid traffic jams, then they will say, yeah, that’s valuable for me. I’m going to try that out.
The third group, the early majority, they are not going to try something new. They are afraid of change, and their mindset is going to be, don’t rock the boat. Right? Whatever I’m currently doing, I’m, it’s good enough for me, I don’t need to change. And yet you will need to someone to walk them by their hand and help them to change that, right? So to a certain extent, I would say if you are a product developer, if you are the product lead, if you are responsible for the product market fit of the company, and your mindset is a sample of one, you need to watch those users. And that’s the only way that we can figure out that there are different users than you, and they will face challenges that you don’t even have. You didn’t even think that there are challenges like that, right?
So if you’re going to speak with people that are using the product, they are not going to tell you anything new. If you are going to use people that don’t use the product anymore, have tried it, and don’t use it anymore, they’re going to tell you something really dramatic. Why, what happened that they decided not to use the product? And that’s the part that you need to learn in order to improve the product through the iterations. When you speak with users, we, when you speak with customers, what you’re looking for until you figure out product market fit is you need to ask the people, the non-users, one question why? Now, usually, what happens is that we tend to speak with the users, and then they don’t tell us anything new.
Greg McKeown:
Yeah. So you, you’ve got to remember the people who aren’t in the room, not just the people who are in your room, think at the very periphery. You share a little story. Perhaps I missed it when you were talking about snac before that, when you went to take this photograph with him, you reached your finger to the volume button on the side of the phone. How did Wozniak respond?
Uri Levine:
So on that, he said finally. And I said, finally, what? And then he said, finally, someone is using it the way that I meant it to be
Because when he built the iPhone, the idea was to actually take the digital camera and embed that into the phone, right? Remember the ages of the cameras? This is how we took picture, right? We were holding it like they can click right here, this is where the volume button is. And so the concept was that we are evolutions of digital cameras into the phone and not someone is going to use it concretely differently.
Greg McKeown:
And you went on to explain that even with Waze, you were sure that there was a right way to use it to input a destination and then leave it running on your car’s dashboard. But as it turned out, people used it in a different way. Tell me.
Uri Levine:
So when we started Waze, our journey was, or our mission was, we going to help drivers to avoid traffic jams. And over the years, we realized that not all the people care about that. In fact, most people care more about the estimated time of arrival, the ETA, than they care about saving a few minutes of the, of the right, right?
So just for a second, just imagine that you are in the Bay area and you happen to drive from Cupertino to San Francisco, and you can choose the 101 or the 280. Now, most people will drive the same route every day, and they don’t necessarily need to find the fastest route. What they do need is to know how long it’s going to take them. And so we ended up with the, where we started with the point of view that saving time is the most significant value, ended up that creating certainty is the most significant value, right? And then when you have the certainty as opposed to uncertainty that we had before, that actually creates more value for you than you know, being able, to save five minutes of your ride. Now, obviously, if there is something, if there is major construction on the 101 and the road is closed completely, then you would prefer to take the 280.
Greg McKeown:
So the solution, as you’re saying, is to get out of your own head and get into the head of the users and also the people who are not using the product yet to use what you described in the book as a humble approach. You are an amazing sample of one person you wrote, but there’s much more to it, and you’re trying to go and, and develop this precise insight from other people. How did you go about understanding people who were not users of the product yet, and why?
Uri Levine:
The people that are the most important for your journey of figuring out product market fit is not those that are not using, it’s those that have tried it and quit because you were not valuable enough for them. And this is where you want to find out why you were not valuable for them. What is it that didn’t work for them? And maybe it’s a gap in the expectation. Maybe it’s about simplicity, right? So the product was too complex for them to figure out the value, and maybe there was no value. And these answers are going to be different, and you will need to address any of those issues that will become, you know, will, will become feedback to your journey.
So if this is about complexity, then you will need to answer that through simplicity. If this is about not enough value, then you will need to figure out where is enough value or what is enough value and create, and increase the value. If this is about the gap in the expectation, maybe it’s easier to address that with the expectations and not with the product. And these are the barriers that you will eventually have in your product, and whatever your product is, these are the top three categories of barriers that you’re going to face.
Greg McKeown:
When you were doing this iterative process with Waze, you mentioned some leapfrogging that happened when you were successful with those iterations. What was an example of one of those leapfrogs?
Uri Levine:
For a second. I would say it’s not important. It’s not important because that was very specific to the value proposition of ways and to the product of ways that we have changed something in the algorithm that made this leapfrog, right? But in the journey of other entrepreneurs, this is going to be a different one, right? And so, for a second, I would say prepare for long, long journeys of iterations. And some of them are going to be impactful, and some of them are going to be moving the notch just a little. And some of them are going to be even worse than before. And you will need to make a lot of those in order to figure that out.
Greg McKeown:
Talk to me about this point you were just describing about, you’ve got the innovators, the early adopters, of course, then there’s the chasm, and there’s lots, it’s been written about crossing the chasm. If you want to be able to reach, you know, a million people, a hundred million people, a billion people, you’re going to have to get those people who are afraid of change to try the new experience. You described it as handholding. What did you do with ways to be able to get people to cross the chasm?
Uri Levine:
Watching those users? And, this is really easy, right? So you have friends that are not using Waze, right? And so you ask them, why don’t you use Waze? And then you say, they will tell you I’m doing very well until now. Why do I need it? Or this is too much of a hassle. And then you encourage them to try, and you watch them when they try. And, that’s the critical learning in order to understand. And usually, what he’ll need to do is at least simplify the product cuz you’ll end up with something that is too complex, and then you basically build your marketing strategy based on addressing the concerns and not just the value. And, then, you encourage other people that are already using ways to tell other people and to encourage them to actually have more users to join because Waze has a network effect, of crowdsourcing the data, right? So the more users that we have, the better service, and therefore this is your incentive to encourage more people to use that. And we tell them that, okay, you might need to show them how
Greg McKeown:
You mentioned simplification. What’s the best way to approach simplification? Do you have any concrete ideas for people who are trying to simplify their product?
Uri Levine:
So, maybe two thoughts. One is the real job of a product lead, or product manager is to remove features and not to add features. And let me tell you the story of LinkedIn, and this is probably going to be helpful. I heard this story, I don’t know how accurate it is, but, when LinkedIn started, they actually created a list of 30 features that they need to have in the product. And then, when they started to get some feedback, people told them that 30 is way too much and they need to narrow it down. And they ended up with a list of 10 features that are mandatory, and they cannot even launch the product without those ten features. And obviously, later on, they launched the product and turns out to be very successful, and they went public for the first time about a decade after. And the main question is how many of those ten features were developed when they went public? So ten years later. And the answer is one. Now, I don’t know if this story is accurate, but I like it a lot because it delivers the message. But I want you to think of the following, right?
So, we mentioned earlier, all the top applications that you’re using every day on your iPhone, and for each one of them, now I want you to think of something else. How many features do you use in this product? How many features have you used today at Waze? And the answer is one, maybe two, right? How many features have you used today on Netflix? One, maybe two. So the importance is to explore and bring these features forward by eliminating the rest of the features. Because if you create now ten different features, you create a barrier for me to figure out what is the features that I really need. What is the valuable features?
So if I am, you know, an early adapter, then I might be able to use the many of them and then figure out, okay, this is my important feature. If I’m an early majority, I prefer to have one feature. Now, in many cases, the first-time experience, and this is where it’s becoming complex, right? So I’m the product lead, I am with the version number 13 of the product. I’ve used that for the first time three years ago, and I’m using every new feature every time again and again and again. And I cannot even dream of someone that this is the first time that they’re going to meet the product.
No one can experience the first time for the second time. And the result, and this is critical, is that there is only one way for me to understand is watching users for the first time.
Greg McKeown:
Do you recommend you do that in a formal process? Invite people in, watch them, or are you really talking about your neighbor, you know, your family member, your friend, and just, you know, watching them access it?
Uri Levine:
Both. Start with the, you know, speaking with people that you meet on the street and then start to build a general form of gathering feedback. So bring them to the office, give them beer and pizza or something that will make them happy. And then watch them.
Greg McKeown:
Let me ask you to express the value of this premise. Fall in love with the problem, not the solution, in the opposite way. What happens if entrepreneurs don’t do this? What if they fall in love with the solution, not the problem? What is the primary reason they should adopt this way?
Uri Levine:
So, number one, let me start by saying that there are a lot of people that started with this solution and ended up being very successful, right? So we cannot basically say this is not going to work, it does work, but let’s likely. And, I think that what happens is that when you fall in love with this solution, if something happens to the problem, if the perception of the problem disappears, if the problem shifts someplace else, if someone else is addressing the problem differently, you are now starting to fight an uphill battle with relevancy because you are not relevant anymore.
Greg McKeown:
And, just be captain obvious for a moment, why does that matter?
Uri Levine:
You know, it seems like you are the better expert in psychology here. So, but in general, I would say people follow over their path, and they get vested and vetted into their journey, and they’re basically saying, this is my baby, right? This is my solution, this is what I’m going to build on. Again, when this happens, then the biggest challenge is that what happens if, if something changes, right? Because look, most of the solution-based stories are going to be mine is better. And what you really want to say is, mine is different. Better is not a good enough reason for people to switch. Good enough is going to win the market. You don’t need to be perfect. In fact, the biggest enemy of good enough is perfect. And if you are trying to address a problem, then you realize that good enough is actually going to be enough. And you try to get there and not to become perfect, by the way, you will become way closer to perfect over time because you are doing two things, right? Number one, you are doing mistakes fast. So you are doing a lot of iterations. And number two, you are listening to the user. So you are improving all the time.
Greg McKeown:
Uri Levine, thank you so much for being on the podcast.
Uri Levine:
Thank you. Thank you.
Greg McKeown:
What is one idea you heard today that caught your attention? Why does that matter so much? And who is one person you can share that with within the next 24 to 48 hours?
If you found value in this episode, please write a review on Apple Podcasts. The first five people to write a review of this episode will receive free access to the Essentialism Academy. For more details, go to essentialism.com/podcastpromo. Thank you. Really, thank you for listening, and I’ll see you next time.
