Book Quotes — Let My People Go Surfing
By Yvon Chouinard
July 2020. This book has been recommended to me by a good colleague Ines Azavedo when we finished a recent project together. I loved how Patagonia think about their business and how they embrace change. Their Philosophy and efforts are aligned with many of my personal values which made this an enjoyable and hopeful ready.
Let My People go Surfing — The Education of a Reluctant Businessman.
Penguin Books
foreword
We need to find things to do other than shopping. Like deriving deep pleasure from experiences that are not for sale at any price, whether it’s time in nature or time with our loved ones. Love of nature and the desire to experience the natural world more intensely is worth it.
preface
I’ve had enough near-death experiences that I've accepted the fact that I’m going to die someday. I’m not too bothered by it. There are a beginning and an end of all life and to all human endeavours. Species evolve and die off. Empires rise then break apart. Businesses grow and then fold. There are no exceptions. I’m okay with all that. We appear to be incapable of solving our problems.
introduction
Businessman — I’ve never respected the profession.
My values are a result of living a life close to nature and being passionately involved in doing what some people would call risky sports. Doing the right thing makes for a good and profitable business.
history
From my father, I inherited his love of hard physical work and an appreciation of quality, particularly of fine tools
It’s better to invent your own game then you can always be a winner. I found my games in the ocean, creeks, and hillsides surrounding Los Angeles.
Climbing had taught me to be self-reliant.
Quality control was always foremost in our minds, because if a tool failed, it could kill someone, and since we were our own best customers, there was a good chance it would be us. Our guiding principle of design stemmed from Antoine de Saint Exupery, the French aviator:
Have you ever thought, not only about the airplane but whatever man builds, that all of the mans’ industrial efforts, all his computations and calculations, all the nights spent working overdrafts and blueprints, invariably culminate in the production of a thing whose sole and guiding principle is the ultimate principle of simplicity? It is as if there were a natural law which ordained that to achieve this end, to refine the curve of a piece of furniture, or a ships keel, or the fuselage of an airplane, until gradually it partakes of the elementary purity of the curve of the human breast or shoulder, there must be the experimentation of several generations of craftsmen. In anything at all, perfection is finally attained not when there is no longer anything to add, but when there is no longer anything to take away when a body has been stripped down to its nakedness.
Studying Zen has taught me to simplify, to simplify yields a richer result.
Ours stood out because they had the cleanest lines. They were also the lightest, stronger, and most versatile tools in use. Where other designers would work to improve a tool’s performance by adding on, Tom Frost and I would achieve the same ends by taking away — reducing weight and bulk without sacrificing strength or the level of protection.
Climbing with only nuts and runners for protection is clean climbing. Clean because the rock is left unaltered by the passing climber. Clean because nothing is hammered into the rock and then hammered back out, leaving the rock scarred and the next climbers experience less natural. Clean is claiming the rock without changing it; a step closer to organic climbing for the natural man.
We did know how to make things functional, thought and simple — just as a good blacksmith would.
If you just ask people for help — if you just admit that you don’t know something — they will fall all over themselves trying to help. Work had to be enjoyable on a daily basis. We needed to be surrounded by friends.
importance for research
I don’t jump into things without doing my homework. Over the next few years, I read every book on business, searching for a philosophy that would work for us. I was especially interested in books on Japanese or Scandinavian styles of management because I know the American way of doing business offered only one of many possible routes. I didn’t find any American company we could use as a role model. Either it was too large and conservative for us to relate to or it didn’t have the same values.
I’ve always thought of myself as an 80%. I like to throw myself passionately into a sport or activity until I reach about an 80% proficiency level. To go beyond that requires an obsession and degree of specialization that doesn’t appeal to me. Once I reach that 80% level I like to go off and do something totally different; that probably explains the diversity of the Patagonia product line — and why our versatile, multifaceted clothes are the most successful.
We asked ourselves why we were in business and what kind of business we wanted Patagonia to be.
“The quality of human experience of life”
We must strive to do no harm. Our acts should serve to decrease the problem. Our activities in this area will be under constant evaluation and reassessment as we seek constant improvement. Maximum attention is given to product quality.
Successful communities are part of a sustainable environment. We encourage open communications a collaborative atmosphere, and maximum simplicity, while we simultaneously seek dynamism and innovation.
We need philosophical and inspirational guides to make sure we always asked the right question and found the right answers.
Doing risk sports had taught me another important lesson: never exceed your limits. You push the envelope, and you live for those moments when you’re right on the edge, but you don’t go over. You have to be true to yourself; you have to know your strengths and limitations and live within your means. The same is true for a business. The sooner a company tries to be what it is not, the sooner it tries to have it all, the sooner it will die. It was time to apply a bit of Zen philosophy to our business.
philosophies
We use our design guidelines for making clothing as the basis of our philosophy of architecture and building. Our philosophies aren’t rules; they’re guidelines. They’re the keystones of our approach to any project, and although they are set in stone, their application to a situation isn't.
Product Design Philosophy
We are a product-driven company, and without a tangible product there would obviously be no business and the other goals of our mission statement would thus be irrelevant. Having a high quality, useful products anchor our business in the real world and allows us to expand our mission. It means to make the best period. I think ease of care is an important attribute, I would never own a shirt like that, much less make and sell one.
Every design at Patagonia begins with a functional need. Is this shirt needed for hot, tropical or hot dry weather? What kind of drape or fit does it require? Does it need to be loosely woven to dry quickly or densely enough to blunt a mosquito sharp proboscis? Only after we determine a product functional need do we begin researching fabrics.
It’s becoming easier to buy only products that will last a lifetime. Everything we make should be designed to be repairable. We use three size blocks: slim fit, regular, and relaxed.
Good design is as little design as possible Complexity is often a sure sign that the functional needs have not been solved. The Dalai Lama says too much choice brings unhappiness.
Successful investing requires a tremendous amount of energy, time and money. The big inventions are so rare that even the most brilliant geniuses think up only a few marketable inventions in their lifetimes.
Like creative cooks, we view originals as recipes for inspiration, and then we close the book to do our own thing. The resulting designs are like the fusion recipes of the best chefs.
When we studied the environmental impacts of clothing throughout its life cycle, we were surprised to find that one of the biggest villains was cleaning. We found that the post-sale care of a clothing product causes as much as four times the amount of harm as the entire manufacturing process.
Maintenance of any product is a chore, and for that reason alone, low maintenance becomes a criterion for high quality. At Patagonia, none of us likes to iron or bother with the dry cleaners, and we assume that our customers don’t either. We have practical reasons too. You should be able to wash travel clothes in a sink or a bucket.
Ironing is an inefficient use of electricity, washing in hot water wastes energy, and dry cleaning uses toxic chemicals. Machine drying, far more than actual wear, shortens the life of a garment — just check the lint filter. Laundry creates around 25 % of the carbon footprint of clothing as a result of energy use.
Because of commitment to quality, we run at such a slow pace that we’re the turtles in the fashion race.
We need time to do our homework, showing the potential product to core customers, buyers, retail store employees to see if it will sell or if we should even make it. Buying used clothing and wearing it as long as possible is the most responsible thing you can do. When you give in to fashion trends, you doom used clothes to the trash heap.
Most commonly used in clothes: hemp, linen, rayon, cotton, polyester, nylon and wool.
Of the natural fibres, hemp and linen were probably the least harmful. Even when cotton is grown without toxic chemicals, it still uses an inordinate amount of water and cannot be grown year after year without permanently depleting the soi.
production Philosophy
“Get out of the kitchen if you can't stand the heat”
“I didn’t have the time” I've been too busy. These are dishonest excuses. What the person really means is that the job didn’t get done because it had the lowest priority, and in fact, he may never return your call because he really doesn’t want to. People do what they want to do. Impossible — the lamest of the lame excuses. Difficult maybe, or impractical, or too expensive, but rarely is anything impossible.
you study the problem in your head or on paper until you are sure there is no chance of failure. The entrepreneurial way is to immediately take a forward step and if that feels good, take another, if not, step back. Learn by doing, it is a faster process.
When everyone stays on the job and works as a team until its done. Michael Kami referees to this team approach as concurrent, as opposed to assembly line manufacturing, in which responsibility of one part of the process is handed off in stages to the next in life.
We buy fabric from a mill and trims like zippers and facing from other suppliers, and then we contact out the sewing. Requires a level of mutual commitment much deeper than the traditional business relationship. Mutual commitment requires nurture and trust, and those demand personal time and energy. You have to choose such relationships carefully. The first thing we look for in a supplier or contractor is the quality of its work. If the standards aren’t high already, we don’t delude ourselves into thinking they’ll be raised for us, no matter how attractive the price.
High-quality fabric suppliers and sewing contractors — know that we recognise quality workmanship, skilled employees, and quality working conditions, and we’ll pay a fair price. We’ll do our best to establish a long term relationship to commit to fabric purchases and to keep their sewing lines running at an even clip.
Our production department has the responsibility to see that Patagonia principles and the specific design aims of each product are communicated and understood at the mill or at the needle. Our sourcing managers must be Patagonia reps in every sense of the world. to convey our standards for product quality, environmental and social concerns, business ethics, and even our image as an outdoor company.
We don't want to become martyrs. You can think of martyrs as being victims, or you can think of them as just being people too far ahead of their time. You can minimize risk by doing your research and most of all by testing. Testing is an integral part of the Patagonia industrial design process, and it needs to be included in every part of this process.
“The drive for quality in production in any organisation has to go beyond the products themselves. It extends to how we organise ourselves to get a body of work done, how we beg, borrow, and steal good ideas from other companies and cultures, and how we approach the question of the way things are and how they should be. That begins with an attitude of embracing change rather than resisting it — not just chaining without reflection and weighing the relative merits of the new ideas, but nonetheless assuming that if we only look hard enough, there may be a better way to do things. We should borrow and adapt ideas even from unlikely sources. McDonald’s is as far from Patagonia as you can get in its image and many of its values. But I respect one thing it does. No one at McDonald's ever tells a customer “Sorry we’re all out of iceberg lettuce today”. It successfully organises on-time delivery every day of the week, and I think Patagonia could learn a lesson from McDonald’s’ and the symbiotic relationships it enjoys with its suppliers.”
Distribution Philosophy
My first principle of mail order argues that selling ourselves nad our philosophy is equally important to selling product. Telling the Patagonia story and educating the Patagonia customer on layering systems, on environmental issues, and on the business itself are as much the catalogs mission as is selling the products. How we measure the success of a catalog, how we format the information, and how we allocate space.
Philosophy of Architecture
- don't ‘build a new building unless it's absolutely necessary. The most responsible thing to do is to buy used buildings, construction materials and furniture
- Anything that is built should be repairable and easily maintained
- Bildings should be constructed to last as long as possible, even if this initially involves a higher price.
- Each store must be unique. The heroes, sports, history, and natural features of each area should be reflected and honoured.
Marketing Philosophy
Every individual spends an entire lifetime creating and evolving a person image that others perceive. Our branding efforts are simple: tell people who we are. Writing fiction is so much more difficult than nonfiction. Fiction requires creativity and imagination. Nonfiction deals with simple truths.
Patagonia’s image arises directly from the values, outdoor pursuits and passions of its founders and employees. The only way to sustain an image is to live up to it. Our image is a direct reflection of who we are and what we believe.
Our copy standards have been high. Its been even more important that we tell our own story clearly. We have always used text to argue ideas as well as sell products.
Branding is telling people who we are. Promotion is selling people on our product. Our promotional efforts being with the product. If we come out with a product that is difficult to promote, its probably because its no different that anyone else and we probably shouldn't be making it.
Financial Philosophy
We are a product-driven company. That means the product comes first and the company exists to create and support our products. This is different from a distribution company whose primary concern may be service rather than a product.
A company needs to be profitable in order to stay in business and to accomplish all its other goals, and we do consider profit to be a vote of confidence, that our customers approve of what we are doing. Zen master would say profits happen ‘ when you do everything else right”
Whenever we are faced with a serious business decision, the answer almost always is to increase quality. When we make a decision because it's the right thing to do for the planet, it ends up also being good for the business.
Endless consuming and discarding goods we often don’t need, not only don't we want to be financially leveraged, but our goal is to have no debt, which we have achieved. A company with little debt or with cash in the kitty can take advantage of opportunities as they come up or invest in a start-up without having to go further in dept or find outside investors.
Human Resource Philosophy
A master in the art of living draws no sharp distinction between his work and his play; his labour and his leisure; his mind and his body; his education and his recreation. He hardly knows which is which. He simply purses his vision of excellence through whatever he is doing, and leaves others to determine whether he is doing, and leaves others to determine whether he is working or playing. To himself, he always appears to be doing both.
We don’t want someone who can just do a job. We want the best person for the job. Yet we don’t look for stars seeking special treatment and perks. Our best efforts are collaborative, and the Patagonia culture rewards the ensemble player while it barely tolerates those who need the limelight.
Work has to be fun. We value employees who live rich and rounded lives. We run a flexible workplace, and we have ever since we were a blacksmith shop that shut down whenever the waves were six feet, hot and glassy. Our policy has always allowed employees to work flexible hours, as long as the work gets done with no negative impacts on others.
The flexibility allows us to keep valuable employees who love their freedom and sports too much to settle for the constraints of a more regimented work environment. We have found that rarely has an employee abused that privilege.
Management Philosophy
Its not the strongest species that survives, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change.
We want the kind of employees who will question the wisdom of something they regard as a bad decision. We do want people who, once they buy into a decision and believe in what they are doing, will work like demons to produce something of the highest possible quality. How you get these highly individualistic people to align and work for a common cause is the art of management at Patagonia.
It's important to know the difference between a manager and a true leader. Leaders take risks, have long term visions create the strategic plans and instigate change. The best leadership is by example. We always try to be available. A familial company like ours runs on trust rather than on authoritarian rule.
The most important mandate for a manager in a dynamic company is to instigate change.
Many people don’t understand that how you climb the mountain is more important than reaching the top. The goal of climbing big, dangerous mountains should be to attain some sort of spiritual and personal growth, but this won't happen if you compromise away the entire process.
A wise leader knows that you also move when everything is going too well. Everyone is laid back, lazy, and happy. If you don’t move now then you may not be able to move when the real crisis happens.
Environmental philosophy
- Lead an examined life
- Clean up our own act
- Do our penance
- Support civil democracy
- Do Good
- Influence other companies
Before we are entitled to encourage other companies to act responsibly we have to do so ourselves. There's only one way to lead, and that's by being in front and leading by example. When we act positively on solving problems instead of ignoring them or trying to find a way around them, we are further along the path toward sustainability.
Focus on the cause, not the symptoms
The power of the film to motivate and embolden citizen action against dams around the world has been its greatest achievement.
Our success and longevity lie in our ability to change quickly. Continous change and innovation require maintaining a sense of urgency — a tall order, especially in Patagonia seemingly laid back corporate culture. Nature is constantly evolving, and ecosystems support species that adapt either through catastrophic events or throughout the natural selection. A healthy environment operates with the same need for diversity and variety evident in a successful business, and that diversity evolved out of a commitment to constant change.
Quality.
Simplicity.
We have to get away from thinking that all growth is good. There's a big difference between growing fatter and growing stronger.
The way toward mastery of any endeavor is to work toward simplicity, replace complex technology with knowledge. The more you know, the less you need. Simplify my own life.
