Evan Spiegel: preference

Transcript context

…So in terms of how you operationalize this, is that the key to the innovation you've seen as this specific small design team who can work? Talk about just how you actually operationalize this sort of way of working. Yeah. I mean, I think it's an important part of it, but a lot of how we built Snap was modeled actually on mine and Bobby's original relationship, right? Where Bobby has a computer science, heavy duty computer science and stats background, mathematical and computational science, but he really likes design and likes thinking about building things for customers and empathizing with them. I have a design background, right? I was in the product design program back at school, which actually was part of the mechanical engineering department at the time. I took some computer science classes, so I sort of knew what I was talking about when it came to computer science. So we both had mutual respect for each other and our skillsets and our backgrounds and both enjoyed talking together about the types of products we wanted to create. And that dialogue created a lot of innovation. And so a lot of how we've thought about growing the company over time is like strengthening that dialogue between engineers and designers and creating an environment where folks feel comfortable throwing out really crazy ideas. But I think for the design team in particular, the thing that is probably most important is the velocity of design work. So I typically meet with our designers for a couple hours every week and we just look at work. I mean, new work every week, hundreds of ideas, I would guess, on a weekly basis that to me, if I think about where I learned how to design and build things, I have sort of an interesting combination because I went to Stanford for the product design program, which is really focused on empathy and this iterative process of understanding what people want and building prototypes and iterating, but really centered on empathy, human centered design. And then at the same time, I'd also been to art school. So I had studied at art center, I'd studied at Otis here in Los Angeles, both great art schools. And so I was used to this grinding expectation that you're making new work all the time and then just an absolutely brutal critique process on a regular basis. And so for me, as I thought about the parts of my education that I really liked, it was this combination of really developing empathy with people and the types of products that they want in their lives, but at the same time, having this really high velocity work ethic where you're not just like thinking all the time about new products, you're actually making stuff every week, all the time, and then you're talking about it as a team because that critique process is where so much of the learning sort of happens. So I would say that the velocity of work is really important because our favorite saying is, if you want to have a good idea, you have to have lots of ideas. That's really, really important. I just had Keith Rabois on the podcast. I don't know if you know this about his ... He has many contrarian takes. One is if you're building a consumer product, do not talk to customers. Not only is it not useful, his advice is, its harmful because it can infiltrate your subconscious and it just doesn't lead to great things. What's your perspective on that?…

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