Lessons Learned from Bill Gates
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alok pandey
Jan 21, 2011, 6:02:55 AM1/21/11
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Lessons Learned from Bill Gates
19 JANUARY 2011 17 COMMENTS
“Humanity’s greatest advances are not in its discoveries, but in how
those discoveries are applied to reduce inequity.” – Bill Gates
Passion, intensity, and tenacity. That’s one way to describe Bill
Gates.
When I think back to why I joined Microsoft, a very big reason was
Bill Gates. Here was a guy with all the money in the world, yet he
showed up every day to change the world. Rather than just retire and
play with his money, he focuses his time, energy, and resources on
making a better world.
He fights the good fight to leave the world a better place than he
found it, and he’s a world-wide giver of epic proportions. In fact,
he and Warren Buffet joined forces to drive a campaign to encourage
the wealthiest people to give most of their money to philanthropic
causes (see The Giving Pledge.)
It’s one thing to be smart. It’s another thing to be resourceful.
It’s yet another thing to get results. Bill Gates is a visionary that
makes things happen by creating systems bigger than himself and
inspiring people to join him on epic adventures to change the world.
He’s not a seeker of fame or a seeker of fortune, although he has
both. He’s a maker of impact. Technology is his way, and reducing
inequities in the world is his game.
Who better to learn some lessons for life, than from a master of the
game of life? With that in mind, let’s see what lessons we can borrow
from Bill Gates’ playbook.
25 Lessons Learned from Bill Gates
Bill is full of lessons and insights. Here are 25 plays we can take
from the pages of his playbook:
Change the world, or go home. There is a little sign on many doors at
Microsoft. It features the blue monster and it reads: “Change the
world, or go home.” Not only does that phrase capture the spirit of
thousands of Softies … it speaks to the way Bill Gates drives his
life. He lives to build a better world, whether it’s one version, one
platform, one system, one idea, one cause, one innovation at a time.
The beauty is, he knows how to scale and amplify his impact in
powerful ways – he’s on top of his game.
Blaze the trail. The path isn’t always there. Sometimes you have to
make it. Sometimes people will think you’re crazy. Sometimes you
are just ahead of the curve. it’s a dream for a reason, and sometimes
making your dreams happen takes going out on a limb and giving your
all for what you believe in. Bill Gates believed that the personal
computer was the future and that there should be one on every desktop
and in the living room and it would change the way we work and how we
live in unimaginable ways.
Make an impact. Drive from impact. Bill Gates makes choices based
on impact. Whether it’s following his passion or investing in a
cause, he drives from making impact. He doesn’t just do things
because he can. He does things because they matter and he can make
them scale.
Humanities greatest advances are the ones that level the playing
field. Bill Gates has a strong belief that “All lives have equal
value.” Help those that can’t help themselves. Everybody deserves a
chance at their best life. Lift the underdogs of the world up. In
his speech at Harvard, Bill says, “Taking a look back, one big reqret
is, I left Harvard with no real awareness of the awful inequities in
the world. The appalling disparities of health and wealth and
opportunity that condemned millions of people to the lives of
despair. I learned a lot here at Harvard about new ideas and
economics, and politics. I got great exposure to the advances being
made in the sciences. But humanities greatest advances are not in its
discoveries, but in how those discoveries are applied to reduce
inequity.”
A sense of urgency. The world changes fast. The market changes
faster. Bill says, “In this business, by the time you realize you’re
in trouble, it’s too late to save yourself. Unless you’re running
scared all the time, you’re gone.”
The market doesn’t always drive the right things. In one of his
powerful TED talks, Bill says, “There are some very important problems
that don’t get worked on naturally. That is the market does not drive
the scientists, the communicators, the thinkers, the government to do
the right things. And only by paying attention to these things, and
having brilliant people who care and draw other people in, can we make
as much progress as we need to.” Watch TED – Bill Gates on Mosquitos,
Malaria, and Education.
Live your values. When you let the world know what you’re about, you
become a lightening rod and you attract people with the same values.
At Microsoft, Bill Gates attracted people with a passion for changing
the world and joining him on a journey to help create better lives
through technology and innovation. On the philanthropy side, Gates
connects with U2’s Bono beyond the music when it comes to sharing
their global mission to end poverty, disease, and indifference. In
2005, TIME named Bono, Bill and Melinda Gates, “Persons of the Year”
for their humanitarian work. On Bill Gate’s 54′th birthday, Bono had
this to say before leading the crowd in Happy Birthday: “Without him,
and without his business, we just wouldn’t be where we are today. It’s
his birthday today. Bill Gates is in the house.” Watch Bono Wishes
Bill Gates a Happy Birthday.
Your best gets better with the right people. Don’t go it alone.
You’re better when you’ve got the right people around you. Bill Gates
built a culture of the best and brightest and was good at convincing
his friends, such as Paul Allen and Steve Ballmer to join him on his
adventures. By surrounding himself with smart people, Bill was able
to scale. He also had a sounding board for ideas. More importantly,
ideas could get better from the combined smarts and perspectives.
Bill also knows how to complement his strengths by having the right
people around that make up for his weaknesses.
Innovation is the heart and soul of a business. It’s about bringing
ideas to market and applying research. If you don’t innovate you
die. The world keeps changing. To stay ahead of the game, or even to
stay in the game, you have to keep innovating: innovate in your
products, innovate in your process, innovate in the markets, etc.
Bill Gates uses innovation as a way to drive impact whether it’s
shaping software or saving the planet.
Be the platform. Be the platform people can build on. See the role
that you play in building something that let’s other people build on
what you do best.
Build a better system. Don’t just solve a one-off problem. Make the
solution systematic and make it repeatable. Find, create, or leverage
systems. There is always a system, whether it’s at the micro-level or
the macro level. The system has inputs and outputs, cycles, and
levers. Whether you’re creating the system or leveraging the system,
you’re more effective when you realize that there is a system.
Build an ecosystem. There are systems and ecosystems all around us.
Bill says, “Personal computing today is a rich ecosystem encompassing
massive PC-based data centers, notebook and Tablet PCs, handheld
devices, and smart cell phones. It has expanded from the desktop and
the data center to wherever people need it — at their desks, in a
meeting, on the road or even in the air.” On creating partners for
your ecosystem, Bill says, “Our success has really been based on
partnerships from the very beginning.”
Know how to turn the crank. Take action. Execute. The problem isn’t
a shortage of ideas, it’s execution. Lots of people have ideas.
There is an overload of ideas. The real gap is bringing ideas to
market in a way that matters. The secret sauce is ruthless
prioritization of the ideas that make the most impact.
Take Care of Your People. Bill Gates says, “Great organizations demand
a high level of commitment by the people involved.” He set a powerful
example of taking care of employees, from private offices for
developers to creating a workplace of extreme empowerment, engagement,
and passion.
Divide and conquer the problem. There is always a way to chunk up
the problem and prioritize more effectively. Whether it’s slicing the
problem into versions over time, or simply taking the most meaningful
or highest ROI (Return On Investment) pieces of the problem and
tackling them first, you can make progress on the worst of problems or
the best of opportunities. No problem withstands sustained, focused
effort that learns and improves over time.
Improving your odds doesn’t guarantee success. One of Bill’s stories
during his speech at Harvard is how he learned this lesson: “Radcliff
was a great place to live. There were more women up there and most of
the guys were mad science types. The combination offered me the best
odds if you know what I mean.”
You don’t have to be first to win. Bill says, “Microsoft has had its
success by doing low-cost products and constantly improving those
products and we’ve really redefined the IT industry to be something
that’s about a tool for individuals.”
The toughest feedback to hear, is the feedback you need the most. You
get better by listening to your toughest critics. Your greatest
source of growth can come from the people that will tell you what you
need to hear, not just what you want to hear. Bill says, “Your most
unhappy customers are your greatest source of learning.” Bill also
says, “You’ve got to want to be in this incredible feedback loop where
you get the world-class people to tell you what you’re doing wrong.”
Business and technology go hand in hand. Bill says, “Information
technology and business are becoming inextricably interwoven. I don’t
think anybody can talk meaningfully about one without the talking
about the other.” We’re truly living a knowledge worker world, where
information technology is front and center. Bill says, “It’s pretty
incredible to look back 30 years to when Microsoft was starting and
realize how work has been transformed. We’re finally getting close to
what I call the digital workstyle.”
Frame the problem. Bill says, “I believe that if you show people the
problems and you show them the solutions they will be moved to act.”
Framing a problem is simply how you look at a problem, just like how
you frame a picture. It’s about choosing what to focus on, what’s in
and what’s out. When you frame the problem, you bound it. Framing
also helps you get a better perspective on the problem, as well as
share the problem more effectively with others. Some questions to
help frame a problem include: Who’s the customer? What are their needs
and priorities? What’s happening in the market? What are competitors
doing? What are our options for responding? How do we differentiate?
How is technology changing and what possibilities does it offer our
customers? What are the priorities for our business? See How To
Think Like Bill Gates.
Celebrate success, but learn from failure. Don’t repeat the same
mistakes and don’t wallow in your wins. Bill says, ““It’s fine to
celebrate success but it is more important to heed the lessons of
failure.”
Technology is just a tool. Don’t lose sight of the end in mind or the
difference that makes the difference. Bill says, “Technology is just
a tool. In terms of getting the kids working together and motivating
them, the teacher is the most important.”
Don’t automate inefficiency. Make sure something actually makes sense
to automate, otherwise you compound the problem. Bill says, “The
first rule of any technology used in a business is that automation
applied to an efficient operation will magnify the efficiency. The
second is that automation applied to an inefficient operation will
magnify the inefficiency.”
Empower people. Put the right information into the hands of the
people that can make the most of it. Bill says, ““The vision is
really about empowering workers, giving them all the information about
what’s going on so they can do a lot more than they’ve done in the
past.”
Go digital. Connect people, process, and technology. Create a
digital landscape or a virtual world to reduce friction and to create
new possibilities. Bill says, ““One of the wonderful things about the
information highway is that virtual equity is far easier to achieve
than real-world equity…We are all created equal in the virtual world
and we can use this equality to help address some of the sociological
problems that society has yet to solve in the physical world.”
Top 10 Bill Gates’ Quotes
Here are my top 10 favorite Bill Gates’ quotes:
“As we look ahead into the next century, leaders will be those who
empower others.“
“If you give people tools, and they use their natural ability and
their curiosity, they will develop things in ways that will surprise
you very much beyond what you might have expected.”
“If you show people the problems and you show people the solutions
they will be moved to act.”
“In terms of doing things I take a fairly scientific approach to why
things happen and how they happen.”
“Never before in history has innovation offered promise of so much to
so many in so short a time.”
“Often you have to rely on intuition.”
“Success is a lousy teacher. It seduces smart people into thinking
they can’t lose.”
“It’s fine to celebrate success but it is more important to heed the
lessons of failure.”
“You’ve got to want to be in this incredible feedback loop where you
get the world-class people to tell you what you’re doing wrong.”
“Your most unhappy customers are your greatest source of learning.”
Quotes by Bill Gates
Here is an extended list of useful or interesting quotes by Bill
Gates:
“Analytical software enables you to shift human resources from rote
data collection to value-added customer service and support where the
human touch makes a profound difference.”
“At Microsoft there are lots of brilliant ideas but the image is that
they all come from the top – I’m afraid that’s not quite right.”
“Capitalism is this wonderful thing that motivates people, it causes
wonderful inventions to be done. But in this area of diseases of the
world at large, it’s really let us down.”
“Every day we’re saying, ‘How can we keep this customer happy?’ How
can we get ahead in innovation by doing this’, because if we don’t,
somebody else will.”
“Great organizations demand a high level of commitment by the people
involved.”
“I believe that if you show people the problems and you show them the
solutions they will be moved to act.”
“I do think this next century, hopefully, will be about a more global
view. Where you don’t just think, yes my country is doing well, but
you think about the world at large.”
“I like my job because it involves learning. I like being around smart
people who are trying to figure out new things. I like the fact that
if people really try they can figure out how to invent things that
actually have an impact.”
“I really had a lot of dreams when I was a kid, and I think a great
deal of that grew out of the fact that I had a chance to read a lot.”
“I think it`s fair to say that personal computers have become the most
empowering tool we`ve ever created. They`re tools of communication,
they`re tools of creativity, and they can be shaped by their user.”
“If GM had kept up with technology like the computer industry has, we
would all be driving $25 cars that got 1000 MPG.”
“If I’d had some set idea of a finish line, don’t you think I would
have crossed it years ago?”
“If you can’t make it good, at least make it look good.”
“I’m a great believer that any tool that enhances communication has
profound effects in terms of how people can learn from each other, and
how they can achieve the kind of freedoms that they’re interested in.”
“In this business, by the time you realize you’re in trouble, it’s too
late to save yourself. Unless you’re running scared all the time,
you’re gone.”
“Information technology and business are becoming inextricably
interwoven. I don’t think anybody can talk meaningfully about one
without the talking about the other.”
“Instead of buying airplanes and playing around like some of our
competitors, we’ve rolled almost everything back into the company.”
“Intellectual property has the shelf life of a banana.”
“It’s pretty incredible to look back 30 years to when Microsoft was
starting and realize how work has been transformed. We’re finally
getting close to what I call the digital workstyle.”
“Microsoft has had its success by doing low-cost products and
constantly improving those products and we’ve really redefined the IT
industry to be something that’s about a tool for individuals.“
“Never before in history has innovation offered promise of so much to
so many in so short a time.”
“One of the wonderful things about the information highway is that
virtual equity is far easier to achieve than real-world equity…We are
all created equal in the virtual world and we can use this equality to
help address some of the sociological problems that society has yet to
solve in the physical world.”
“Our success has really been based on partnerships from the very
beginning.”
“Patience is a key element of success.”
“Personal computing today is a rich ecosystem encompassing massive PC-
based data centers, notebook and Tablet PCs, handheld devices, and
smart cell phones. It has expanded from the desktop and the data
center to wherever people need it — at their desks, in a meeting, on
the road or even in the air.”
“Software is a great combination between artistry and engineering.
When you finally get done and get to appreciate what you have done it
is like a part of yourself that you`ve put together. I think a lot of
the people here feel that way.”
“Smart is an elusive concept. There’s a certain sharpness, an ability
to absorb new facts. To ask an insightful question. To relate to
domains that may not seem connected at first. A certain creativity
that allows people to be effective.”
“Step back, build a better system, make sure that the government money
gets to the people who deserve it.”
“Technology is just a tool. In terms of getting the kids working
together and motivating them, the teacher is the most important.”
“The first rule of any technology used in a business is that
automation applied to an efficient operation will magnify the
efficiency. The second is that automation applied to an inefficient
operation will magnify the inefficiency.”
“The great thing about a computer notebook is that no matter how much
you stuff into it, it doesn`t get bigger or heavier.”
“The Internet is becoming the town square for the global village of
tomorrow.”
“The Internet will help achieve “friction free capitalism” by putting
buyer and seller in direct contact and providing more information to
both about each other.”
“The vision is really about empowering workers, giving them all the
information about what’s going on so they can do a lot more than
they’ve done in the past.”
“This is a fantastic time to be entering the business world, because
business is going to change more in the next 10 years than it has in
the last 50.”
“This is a very exciting time in the world of information. It`s not
just that the personal computer has come along as a great tool. The
whole pace of business is moving faster. Globalization is forcing
companies to do things in new ways.”
“Until we’re educating every kid in a fantastic way, until every inner
city is cleaned up, there is no shortage of things to do.”
“Virtually every company will be going out and empowering their
workers with a certain set of tools, and the big difference in how
much value is received from that will be how much the company steps
back and really thinks through their business processes … thinking
through how their business can change, how their project management,
their customer feedback, and their planning cycles can be quite
different than they ever were before.”
“We always overestimate the change that will occur in the next two
years and underestimate the change that will occur in the next ten.
Don’t let yourself be lulled into inaction.”
“We are always saying to ourself, ‘We have to innovate. We got to come
up with that breakthrough.’ In fact, the way software works, so long
as you are using your existing software, you don’t pay us anything at
all. So we’re only paid for breakthroughs.”
“We don’t have the user centricity, until we understand context, which
is way beyond presence. Presence is the most trivial notion, just,
‘am I on this device or not’ — it doesn’t say ‘am I meeting with
something, am I focused on writing something.”
“We’re only at the beginning of what we have to do here.”
“When you want to do your homework, fill out your tax return, or see
all the choices for a trip you want to take, you need a full-size
screen.”
The Opportunity Bill Gave Us at Microsoft
On Bill Gates’ last day at Microsoft, Steve Ballmer reminded us of the
opportunity Bill gave us:
“Every one of us has had an opportunity to realize our own potential:
we’ve had a chance to contribute to society … we’ve had a chance to
develop and grow as professionals … we’ve had a chance to work with
the best and the brightest in the world … we’ve had a chance to
prosper personally … we’ve been given an enormous, enormous
opportunity … and Bill gave us that opportunity.”
Watch the video, Bill Gates’ Last Day at Microsoft.
Values
You can learn a lot about someone or a company by their values. The
values of a company reflect the leadership. Here are the values and
guiding principles that can help you see a little more about Bill.
Microsoft Values
Integrity and honesty.
Passion for customers, partners, and technology.
Open and respectful with others and dedicated to making them better.
Willingness to take on big challenges and see them through.
Self-critical, questioning, and committed to personal excellence and
self-improvement.
Accountable for commitments, results, and quality to customers,
shareholders, partners, and employees.
Guiding Principles of the Gates Foundation
Guiding Principle #1: This is a family foundation driven by the
interests and passions of the Gates family.
Guiding Principle #2: Philanthropy plays an important but limited
role.
Guiding Principle #3: Science and technology have great potential to
improve lives around the world.
Guiding Principle #4: We are funders and shapers—we rely on others to
act and implement.
Guiding Principle #5: Our focus is clear—and limited—and prioritizes
some of the most neglected issues.
Guiding Principle #6: We identify a specific point of intervention and
apply our efforts against a theory of change.
Guiding Principle #7: We take risks, make big bets, and move with
urgency. We are in it for the long haul.
Guiding Principle #8: We advocate—vigorously but responsibly—in our
areas of focus.
Guiding Principle #9: We must be humble and mindful in our actions and
words. We seek and heed the counsel of outside voices.
Guiding Principle #10: We treat our grantees as valued partners, and
we treat the ultimate beneficiaries of our work with respect.
Guiding Principle #11: Delivering results with the resources we have
been given is of the utmost importance—and we seek and share
information about those results.
Guiding Principle #12: We demand ethical behavior of ourselves.
Guiding Principle #13: We treat each other as valued colleagues.
Guiding Principle #14: Meeting our mission—to increase opportunity and
equity for those most in need—requires great stewardship of the money
we have available.
Guiding Principle #15: We leave room for growth and change.
Bill Gates 12 Rules
Bill Gates identified 12 rules for managers to master the digital
universe:
Insist that communication flow through e-mail
Study sales data online to share insights easily
3. Shift knowledge workers into high-level thinking
Use digital tools to create virtual teams
Convert every paper process to a digital process
Use digital tools to eliminate single-task jobs
Create a digital feedback loop
Use digital systems to route customer complaints immediately
Use digital communication to redefine boundaries
Transform every business process into just-in-time delivery
Use digital delivery to eliminate the middle man
Use digital tools to help customers solve problems for themselves
You can read about each of these rules at Bill Gate’s New Rules
(Time.com)
Bill Gates’ 11 Rules of Life
There is a list of rules for life that you don’t learn in school that
often gets attributed to Bill Gates:
Rule 1: Life is not fair
Rule 2: The world won’t care about your self-esteem.
Rule 3: You will NOT make $60,000 a year right out of high school.
Rule 4: If you think your teacher is tough, wait till you get a boss.
Rule 5: Flipping burgers is not beneath your dignity.
Rule 6: If you mess up, it’s not your parents’ fault, so don’t whine
about your mistakes, learn from them.
Rule 7: Before you were born, your parents weren’t as boring as they
are now.
Rule 8: Your school may have done away with winners and losers, but
life HAS NOT.
Rule 9: Life is not divided into semesters.
Rule 10: Television is NOT real life.
Rule 11: Be nice to nerds.
I think it’s worth clearing up that this list of life rules is not
actually by Bill Gates. The rules are actually a pared-down version
from an article by Charles J. Sykes, that appeared in the San Diego
Union-Tribune on September 19, 1996. You can read about this at Bill
Gates’ 11 Rules of Life.
Resources at a Glance
Here is a quick reference table for more information on Bill Gates:
Category Items
Key Links
Bill Gates (Wikipedia)
Gates Notes – The Official Site of Bill Gates
2010 Annual Letter from Bill Gates
Books
The Road Ahead (1995)
Business @ the Speed of Thought (1999)
Videos
Bill Gates’ Best Bits
Last Day at Microsoft
TED – Bill Gates on mosquitos, malaria and education
TED – Bill Gates on energy: Innovating to zero!
More videos …
60 Minutes – Bill Gates on the Gates Foundation
BBC – Bill Gates on Life at the Top
BBC – Bill Gates Part 1
BBC – Bill Gates Part 2
BBC – Bill Gates Part 3
BBC – Bill Gates Part 4
BBC – Bill Gates Part 5
BBC – Bill Gates Part 6
BBC – Bill Gates Part 7
BBC – Gates from the Beginning
BBC – Into Bill’s Shoes
BBC – Secretary: Winning was Key
BBC – Sir Alan on Bill Gates
BBC – Working Life with Gates
Bill Gates Answers Questions from CMU Students
Bono Wishes Bill Gates a Happy Birthday
Carnegie Mellon University – Bill Gates Unplugged
CNET – Bill Gates on the Lesson of His Travels
Coke Commercial
Family Guy Episode
How to Fix Capitalism
Jerry Seinfeld and Bill Gates Buy Discount Shoes Windows
Speech at Harvard
Last Day at Microsoft (CES 2008)
The Birth of Microsoft
The Story of Bill Gates – a Rich Man
XP Launch
Awards and Recognition
2010 – 2010 Bower Award for Business Leadership of The Franklin
Institute
2010 – The Silver Buffalo Award by the Boy Scouts of America (the
highest award for adults)
2008 – Honorary doctorate from Cambridge University, United Kingdom
2008 – Honorary doctorate from the Karolinksa Institute, Stockholm
2007 – Honorary trustee of Peking University, China
2007 – Honorary doctorate from Harvard University
2007 – Honorary doctorate from Tsinghua University, China
2006 – Ranked #8 in “Heroes of Our Time — The Top 50“, by New
Statesment
2006 – Order of the Aztec Eagle (a Mexican order — the highest
decoration awarded to foreigners in the country)
2006 – One of “The 100 Most Influential People”, Time magazine
2005 – “Persons of the Year”, Time magazine
2005 – Honorary Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire
(KBE) (knighted by Queen Elizabeth II)
2005 – Honorary doctorary from Waseda University, Japan
2005 – One of the 100 Most Influential People, Time magazine
2004 – One of the 100 Most Influential People, Time magazine
2002 – Honorary doctorate from The Royal Institute of Technology,
Stockholm
2001 – One of the Top 100 Influential Pople in Media, The Guardian
2000 – Honorary doctorate from Nyenrode Business University, The
Netherlands
1999 – Time 100: The Most Important People of the Century
1999 – Ranked #2 in the Upside Elite 100
1998 – Ranked #1 in the Top 50 Cyber Elite, Time magazine
1994 – 20th Distinguished Fellow of the British Computer Society
1994 – CEO of the Year, Chief Executive Officers magazine
1987 – Declared a billionaire in Forbes’ 400 Richest People in America
issue
19 JANUARY 2011 17 COMMENTS
“Humanity’s greatest advances are not in its discoveries, but in how
those discoveries are applied to reduce inequity.” – Bill Gates
Passion, intensity, and tenacity. That’s one way to describe Bill
Gates.
When I think back to why I joined Microsoft, a very big reason was
Bill Gates. Here was a guy with all the money in the world, yet he
showed up every day to change the world. Rather than just retire and
play with his money, he focuses his time, energy, and resources on
making a better world.
He fights the good fight to leave the world a better place than he
found it, and he’s a world-wide giver of epic proportions. In fact,
he and Warren Buffet joined forces to drive a campaign to encourage
the wealthiest people to give most of their money to philanthropic
causes (see The Giving Pledge.)
It’s one thing to be smart. It’s another thing to be resourceful.
It’s yet another thing to get results. Bill Gates is a visionary that
makes things happen by creating systems bigger than himself and
inspiring people to join him on epic adventures to change the world.
He’s not a seeker of fame or a seeker of fortune, although he has
both. He’s a maker of impact. Technology is his way, and reducing
inequities in the world is his game.
Who better to learn some lessons for life, than from a master of the
game of life? With that in mind, let’s see what lessons we can borrow
from Bill Gates’ playbook.
25 Lessons Learned from Bill Gates
Bill is full of lessons and insights. Here are 25 plays we can take
from the pages of his playbook:
Change the world, or go home. There is a little sign on many doors at
Microsoft. It features the blue monster and it reads: “Change the
world, or go home.” Not only does that phrase capture the spirit of
thousands of Softies … it speaks to the way Bill Gates drives his
life. He lives to build a better world, whether it’s one version, one
platform, one system, one idea, one cause, one innovation at a time.
The beauty is, he knows how to scale and amplify his impact in
powerful ways – he’s on top of his game.
Blaze the trail. The path isn’t always there. Sometimes you have to
make it. Sometimes people will think you’re crazy. Sometimes you
are just ahead of the curve. it’s a dream for a reason, and sometimes
making your dreams happen takes going out on a limb and giving your
all for what you believe in. Bill Gates believed that the personal
computer was the future and that there should be one on every desktop
and in the living room and it would change the way we work and how we
live in unimaginable ways.
Make an impact. Drive from impact. Bill Gates makes choices based
on impact. Whether it’s following his passion or investing in a
cause, he drives from making impact. He doesn’t just do things
because he can. He does things because they matter and he can make
them scale.
Humanities greatest advances are the ones that level the playing
field. Bill Gates has a strong belief that “All lives have equal
value.” Help those that can’t help themselves. Everybody deserves a
chance at their best life. Lift the underdogs of the world up. In
his speech at Harvard, Bill says, “Taking a look back, one big reqret
is, I left Harvard with no real awareness of the awful inequities in
the world. The appalling disparities of health and wealth and
opportunity that condemned millions of people to the lives of
despair. I learned a lot here at Harvard about new ideas and
economics, and politics. I got great exposure to the advances being
made in the sciences. But humanities greatest advances are not in its
discoveries, but in how those discoveries are applied to reduce
inequity.”
A sense of urgency. The world changes fast. The market changes
faster. Bill says, “In this business, by the time you realize you’re
in trouble, it’s too late to save yourself. Unless you’re running
scared all the time, you’re gone.”
The market doesn’t always drive the right things. In one of his
powerful TED talks, Bill says, “There are some very important problems
that don’t get worked on naturally. That is the market does not drive
the scientists, the communicators, the thinkers, the government to do
the right things. And only by paying attention to these things, and
having brilliant people who care and draw other people in, can we make
as much progress as we need to.” Watch TED – Bill Gates on Mosquitos,
Malaria, and Education.
Live your values. When you let the world know what you’re about, you
become a lightening rod and you attract people with the same values.
At Microsoft, Bill Gates attracted people with a passion for changing
the world and joining him on a journey to help create better lives
through technology and innovation. On the philanthropy side, Gates
connects with U2’s Bono beyond the music when it comes to sharing
their global mission to end poverty, disease, and indifference. In
2005, TIME named Bono, Bill and Melinda Gates, “Persons of the Year”
for their humanitarian work. On Bill Gate’s 54′th birthday, Bono had
this to say before leading the crowd in Happy Birthday: “Without him,
and without his business, we just wouldn’t be where we are today. It’s
his birthday today. Bill Gates is in the house.” Watch Bono Wishes
Bill Gates a Happy Birthday.
Your best gets better with the right people. Don’t go it alone.
You’re better when you’ve got the right people around you. Bill Gates
built a culture of the best and brightest and was good at convincing
his friends, such as Paul Allen and Steve Ballmer to join him on his
adventures. By surrounding himself with smart people, Bill was able
to scale. He also had a sounding board for ideas. More importantly,
ideas could get better from the combined smarts and perspectives.
Bill also knows how to complement his strengths by having the right
people around that make up for his weaknesses.
Innovation is the heart and soul of a business. It’s about bringing
ideas to market and applying research. If you don’t innovate you
die. The world keeps changing. To stay ahead of the game, or even to
stay in the game, you have to keep innovating: innovate in your
products, innovate in your process, innovate in the markets, etc.
Bill Gates uses innovation as a way to drive impact whether it’s
shaping software or saving the planet.
Be the platform. Be the platform people can build on. See the role
that you play in building something that let’s other people build on
what you do best.
Build a better system. Don’t just solve a one-off problem. Make the
solution systematic and make it repeatable. Find, create, or leverage
systems. There is always a system, whether it’s at the micro-level or
the macro level. The system has inputs and outputs, cycles, and
levers. Whether you’re creating the system or leveraging the system,
you’re more effective when you realize that there is a system.
Build an ecosystem. There are systems and ecosystems all around us.
Bill says, “Personal computing today is a rich ecosystem encompassing
massive PC-based data centers, notebook and Tablet PCs, handheld
devices, and smart cell phones. It has expanded from the desktop and
the data center to wherever people need it — at their desks, in a
meeting, on the road or even in the air.” On creating partners for
your ecosystem, Bill says, “Our success has really been based on
partnerships from the very beginning.”
Know how to turn the crank. Take action. Execute. The problem isn’t
a shortage of ideas, it’s execution. Lots of people have ideas.
There is an overload of ideas. The real gap is bringing ideas to
market in a way that matters. The secret sauce is ruthless
prioritization of the ideas that make the most impact.
Take Care of Your People. Bill Gates says, “Great organizations demand
a high level of commitment by the people involved.” He set a powerful
example of taking care of employees, from private offices for
developers to creating a workplace of extreme empowerment, engagement,
and passion.
Divide and conquer the problem. There is always a way to chunk up
the problem and prioritize more effectively. Whether it’s slicing the
problem into versions over time, or simply taking the most meaningful
or highest ROI (Return On Investment) pieces of the problem and
tackling them first, you can make progress on the worst of problems or
the best of opportunities. No problem withstands sustained, focused
effort that learns and improves over time.
Improving your odds doesn’t guarantee success. One of Bill’s stories
during his speech at Harvard is how he learned this lesson: “Radcliff
was a great place to live. There were more women up there and most of
the guys were mad science types. The combination offered me the best
odds if you know what I mean.”
You don’t have to be first to win. Bill says, “Microsoft has had its
success by doing low-cost products and constantly improving those
products and we’ve really redefined the IT industry to be something
that’s about a tool for individuals.”
The toughest feedback to hear, is the feedback you need the most. You
get better by listening to your toughest critics. Your greatest
source of growth can come from the people that will tell you what you
need to hear, not just what you want to hear. Bill says, “Your most
unhappy customers are your greatest source of learning.” Bill also
says, “You’ve got to want to be in this incredible feedback loop where
you get the world-class people to tell you what you’re doing wrong.”
Business and technology go hand in hand. Bill says, “Information
technology and business are becoming inextricably interwoven. I don’t
think anybody can talk meaningfully about one without the talking
about the other.” We’re truly living a knowledge worker world, where
information technology is front and center. Bill says, “It’s pretty
incredible to look back 30 years to when Microsoft was starting and
realize how work has been transformed. We’re finally getting close to
what I call the digital workstyle.”
Frame the problem. Bill says, “I believe that if you show people the
problems and you show them the solutions they will be moved to act.”
Framing a problem is simply how you look at a problem, just like how
you frame a picture. It’s about choosing what to focus on, what’s in
and what’s out. When you frame the problem, you bound it. Framing
also helps you get a better perspective on the problem, as well as
share the problem more effectively with others. Some questions to
help frame a problem include: Who’s the customer? What are their needs
and priorities? What’s happening in the market? What are competitors
doing? What are our options for responding? How do we differentiate?
How is technology changing and what possibilities does it offer our
customers? What are the priorities for our business? See How To
Think Like Bill Gates.
Celebrate success, but learn from failure. Don’t repeat the same
mistakes and don’t wallow in your wins. Bill says, ““It’s fine to
celebrate success but it is more important to heed the lessons of
failure.”
Technology is just a tool. Don’t lose sight of the end in mind or the
difference that makes the difference. Bill says, “Technology is just
a tool. In terms of getting the kids working together and motivating
them, the teacher is the most important.”
Don’t automate inefficiency. Make sure something actually makes sense
to automate, otherwise you compound the problem. Bill says, “The
first rule of any technology used in a business is that automation
applied to an efficient operation will magnify the efficiency. The
second is that automation applied to an inefficient operation will
magnify the inefficiency.”
Empower people. Put the right information into the hands of the
people that can make the most of it. Bill says, ““The vision is
really about empowering workers, giving them all the information about
what’s going on so they can do a lot more than they’ve done in the
past.”
Go digital. Connect people, process, and technology. Create a
digital landscape or a virtual world to reduce friction and to create
new possibilities. Bill says, ““One of the wonderful things about the
information highway is that virtual equity is far easier to achieve
than real-world equity…We are all created equal in the virtual world
and we can use this equality to help address some of the sociological
problems that society has yet to solve in the physical world.”
Top 10 Bill Gates’ Quotes
Here are my top 10 favorite Bill Gates’ quotes:
“As we look ahead into the next century, leaders will be those who
empower others.“
“If you give people tools, and they use their natural ability and
their curiosity, they will develop things in ways that will surprise
you very much beyond what you might have expected.”
“If you show people the problems and you show people the solutions
they will be moved to act.”
“In terms of doing things I take a fairly scientific approach to why
things happen and how they happen.”
“Never before in history has innovation offered promise of so much to
so many in so short a time.”
“Often you have to rely on intuition.”
“Success is a lousy teacher. It seduces smart people into thinking
they can’t lose.”
“It’s fine to celebrate success but it is more important to heed the
lessons of failure.”
“You’ve got to want to be in this incredible feedback loop where you
get the world-class people to tell you what you’re doing wrong.”
“Your most unhappy customers are your greatest source of learning.”
Quotes by Bill Gates
Here is an extended list of useful or interesting quotes by Bill
Gates:
“Analytical software enables you to shift human resources from rote
data collection to value-added customer service and support where the
human touch makes a profound difference.”
“At Microsoft there are lots of brilliant ideas but the image is that
they all come from the top – I’m afraid that’s not quite right.”
“Capitalism is this wonderful thing that motivates people, it causes
wonderful inventions to be done. But in this area of diseases of the
world at large, it’s really let us down.”
“Every day we’re saying, ‘How can we keep this customer happy?’ How
can we get ahead in innovation by doing this’, because if we don’t,
somebody else will.”
“Great organizations demand a high level of commitment by the people
involved.”
“I believe that if you show people the problems and you show them the
solutions they will be moved to act.”
“I do think this next century, hopefully, will be about a more global
view. Where you don’t just think, yes my country is doing well, but
you think about the world at large.”
“I like my job because it involves learning. I like being around smart
people who are trying to figure out new things. I like the fact that
if people really try they can figure out how to invent things that
actually have an impact.”
“I really had a lot of dreams when I was a kid, and I think a great
deal of that grew out of the fact that I had a chance to read a lot.”
“I think it`s fair to say that personal computers have become the most
empowering tool we`ve ever created. They`re tools of communication,
they`re tools of creativity, and they can be shaped by their user.”
“If GM had kept up with technology like the computer industry has, we
would all be driving $25 cars that got 1000 MPG.”
“If I’d had some set idea of a finish line, don’t you think I would
have crossed it years ago?”
“If you can’t make it good, at least make it look good.”
“I’m a great believer that any tool that enhances communication has
profound effects in terms of how people can learn from each other, and
how they can achieve the kind of freedoms that they’re interested in.”
“In this business, by the time you realize you’re in trouble, it’s too
late to save yourself. Unless you’re running scared all the time,
you’re gone.”
“Information technology and business are becoming inextricably
interwoven. I don’t think anybody can talk meaningfully about one
without the talking about the other.”
“Instead of buying airplanes and playing around like some of our
competitors, we’ve rolled almost everything back into the company.”
“Intellectual property has the shelf life of a banana.”
“It’s pretty incredible to look back 30 years to when Microsoft was
starting and realize how work has been transformed. We’re finally
getting close to what I call the digital workstyle.”
“Microsoft has had its success by doing low-cost products and
constantly improving those products and we’ve really redefined the IT
industry to be something that’s about a tool for individuals.“
“Never before in history has innovation offered promise of so much to
so many in so short a time.”
“One of the wonderful things about the information highway is that
virtual equity is far easier to achieve than real-world equity…We are
all created equal in the virtual world and we can use this equality to
help address some of the sociological problems that society has yet to
solve in the physical world.”
“Our success has really been based on partnerships from the very
beginning.”
“Patience is a key element of success.”
“Personal computing today is a rich ecosystem encompassing massive PC-
based data centers, notebook and Tablet PCs, handheld devices, and
smart cell phones. It has expanded from the desktop and the data
center to wherever people need it — at their desks, in a meeting, on
the road or even in the air.”
“Software is a great combination between artistry and engineering.
When you finally get done and get to appreciate what you have done it
is like a part of yourself that you`ve put together. I think a lot of
the people here feel that way.”
“Smart is an elusive concept. There’s a certain sharpness, an ability
to absorb new facts. To ask an insightful question. To relate to
domains that may not seem connected at first. A certain creativity
that allows people to be effective.”
“Step back, build a better system, make sure that the government money
gets to the people who deserve it.”
“Technology is just a tool. In terms of getting the kids working
together and motivating them, the teacher is the most important.”
“The first rule of any technology used in a business is that
automation applied to an efficient operation will magnify the
efficiency. The second is that automation applied to an inefficient
operation will magnify the inefficiency.”
“The great thing about a computer notebook is that no matter how much
you stuff into it, it doesn`t get bigger or heavier.”
“The Internet is becoming the town square for the global village of
tomorrow.”
“The Internet will help achieve “friction free capitalism” by putting
buyer and seller in direct contact and providing more information to
both about each other.”
“The vision is really about empowering workers, giving them all the
information about what’s going on so they can do a lot more than
they’ve done in the past.”
“This is a fantastic time to be entering the business world, because
business is going to change more in the next 10 years than it has in
the last 50.”
“This is a very exciting time in the world of information. It`s not
just that the personal computer has come along as a great tool. The
whole pace of business is moving faster. Globalization is forcing
companies to do things in new ways.”
“Until we’re educating every kid in a fantastic way, until every inner
city is cleaned up, there is no shortage of things to do.”
“Virtually every company will be going out and empowering their
workers with a certain set of tools, and the big difference in how
much value is received from that will be how much the company steps
back and really thinks through their business processes … thinking
through how their business can change, how their project management,
their customer feedback, and their planning cycles can be quite
different than they ever were before.”
“We always overestimate the change that will occur in the next two
years and underestimate the change that will occur in the next ten.
Don’t let yourself be lulled into inaction.”
“We are always saying to ourself, ‘We have to innovate. We got to come
up with that breakthrough.’ In fact, the way software works, so long
as you are using your existing software, you don’t pay us anything at
all. So we’re only paid for breakthroughs.”
“We don’t have the user centricity, until we understand context, which
is way beyond presence. Presence is the most trivial notion, just,
‘am I on this device or not’ — it doesn’t say ‘am I meeting with
something, am I focused on writing something.”
“We’re only at the beginning of what we have to do here.”
“When you want to do your homework, fill out your tax return, or see
all the choices for a trip you want to take, you need a full-size
screen.”
The Opportunity Bill Gave Us at Microsoft
On Bill Gates’ last day at Microsoft, Steve Ballmer reminded us of the
opportunity Bill gave us:
“Every one of us has had an opportunity to realize our own potential:
we’ve had a chance to contribute to society … we’ve had a chance to
develop and grow as professionals … we’ve had a chance to work with
the best and the brightest in the world … we’ve had a chance to
prosper personally … we’ve been given an enormous, enormous
opportunity … and Bill gave us that opportunity.”
Watch the video, Bill Gates’ Last Day at Microsoft.
Values
You can learn a lot about someone or a company by their values. The
values of a company reflect the leadership. Here are the values and
guiding principles that can help you see a little more about Bill.
Microsoft Values
Integrity and honesty.
Passion for customers, partners, and technology.
Open and respectful with others and dedicated to making them better.
Willingness to take on big challenges and see them through.
Self-critical, questioning, and committed to personal excellence and
self-improvement.
Accountable for commitments, results, and quality to customers,
shareholders, partners, and employees.
Guiding Principles of the Gates Foundation
Guiding Principle #1: This is a family foundation driven by the
interests and passions of the Gates family.
Guiding Principle #2: Philanthropy plays an important but limited
role.
Guiding Principle #3: Science and technology have great potential to
improve lives around the world.
Guiding Principle #4: We are funders and shapers—we rely on others to
act and implement.
Guiding Principle #5: Our focus is clear—and limited—and prioritizes
some of the most neglected issues.
Guiding Principle #6: We identify a specific point of intervention and
apply our efforts against a theory of change.
Guiding Principle #7: We take risks, make big bets, and move with
urgency. We are in it for the long haul.
Guiding Principle #8: We advocate—vigorously but responsibly—in our
areas of focus.
Guiding Principle #9: We must be humble and mindful in our actions and
words. We seek and heed the counsel of outside voices.
Guiding Principle #10: We treat our grantees as valued partners, and
we treat the ultimate beneficiaries of our work with respect.
Guiding Principle #11: Delivering results with the resources we have
been given is of the utmost importance—and we seek and share
information about those results.
Guiding Principle #12: We demand ethical behavior of ourselves.
Guiding Principle #13: We treat each other as valued colleagues.
Guiding Principle #14: Meeting our mission—to increase opportunity and
equity for those most in need—requires great stewardship of the money
we have available.
Guiding Principle #15: We leave room for growth and change.
Bill Gates 12 Rules
Bill Gates identified 12 rules for managers to master the digital
universe:
Insist that communication flow through e-mail
Study sales data online to share insights easily
3. Shift knowledge workers into high-level thinking
Use digital tools to create virtual teams
Convert every paper process to a digital process
Use digital tools to eliminate single-task jobs
Create a digital feedback loop
Use digital systems to route customer complaints immediately
Use digital communication to redefine boundaries
Transform every business process into just-in-time delivery
Use digital delivery to eliminate the middle man
Use digital tools to help customers solve problems for themselves
You can read about each of these rules at Bill Gate’s New Rules
(Time.com)
Bill Gates’ 11 Rules of Life
There is a list of rules for life that you don’t learn in school that
often gets attributed to Bill Gates:
Rule 1: Life is not fair
Rule 2: The world won’t care about your self-esteem.
Rule 3: You will NOT make $60,000 a year right out of high school.
Rule 4: If you think your teacher is tough, wait till you get a boss.
Rule 5: Flipping burgers is not beneath your dignity.
Rule 6: If you mess up, it’s not your parents’ fault, so don’t whine
about your mistakes, learn from them.
Rule 7: Before you were born, your parents weren’t as boring as they
are now.
Rule 8: Your school may have done away with winners and losers, but
life HAS NOT.
Rule 9: Life is not divided into semesters.
Rule 10: Television is NOT real life.
Rule 11: Be nice to nerds.
I think it’s worth clearing up that this list of life rules is not
actually by Bill Gates. The rules are actually a pared-down version
from an article by Charles J. Sykes, that appeared in the San Diego
Union-Tribune on September 19, 1996. You can read about this at Bill
Gates’ 11 Rules of Life.
Resources at a Glance
Here is a quick reference table for more information on Bill Gates:
Category Items
Key Links
Bill Gates (Wikipedia)
Gates Notes – The Official Site of Bill Gates
2010 Annual Letter from Bill Gates
Books
The Road Ahead (1995)
Business @ the Speed of Thought (1999)
Videos
Bill Gates’ Best Bits
Last Day at Microsoft
TED – Bill Gates on mosquitos, malaria and education
TED – Bill Gates on energy: Innovating to zero!
More videos …
60 Minutes – Bill Gates on the Gates Foundation
BBC – Bill Gates on Life at the Top
BBC – Bill Gates Part 1
BBC – Bill Gates Part 2
BBC – Bill Gates Part 3
BBC – Bill Gates Part 4
BBC – Bill Gates Part 5
BBC – Bill Gates Part 6
BBC – Bill Gates Part 7
BBC – Gates from the Beginning
BBC – Into Bill’s Shoes
BBC – Secretary: Winning was Key
BBC – Sir Alan on Bill Gates
BBC – Working Life with Gates
Bill Gates Answers Questions from CMU Students
Bono Wishes Bill Gates a Happy Birthday
Carnegie Mellon University – Bill Gates Unplugged
CNET – Bill Gates on the Lesson of His Travels
Coke Commercial
Family Guy Episode
How to Fix Capitalism
Jerry Seinfeld and Bill Gates Buy Discount Shoes Windows
Speech at Harvard
Last Day at Microsoft (CES 2008)
The Birth of Microsoft
The Story of Bill Gates – a Rich Man
XP Launch
Awards and Recognition
2010 – 2010 Bower Award for Business Leadership of The Franklin
Institute
2010 – The Silver Buffalo Award by the Boy Scouts of America (the
highest award for adults)
2008 – Honorary doctorate from Cambridge University, United Kingdom
2008 – Honorary doctorate from the Karolinksa Institute, Stockholm
2007 – Honorary trustee of Peking University, China
2007 – Honorary doctorate from Harvard University
2007 – Honorary doctorate from Tsinghua University, China
2006 – Ranked #8 in “Heroes of Our Time — The Top 50“, by New
Statesment
2006 – Order of the Aztec Eagle (a Mexican order — the highest
decoration awarded to foreigners in the country)
2006 – One of “The 100 Most Influential People”, Time magazine
2005 – “Persons of the Year”, Time magazine
2005 – Honorary Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire
(KBE) (knighted by Queen Elizabeth II)
2005 – Honorary doctorary from Waseda University, Japan
2005 – One of the 100 Most Influential People, Time magazine
2004 – One of the 100 Most Influential People, Time magazine
2002 – Honorary doctorate from The Royal Institute of Technology,
Stockholm
2001 – One of the Top 100 Influential Pople in Media, The Guardian
2000 – Honorary doctorate from Nyenrode Business University, The
Netherlands
1999 – Time 100: The Most Important People of the Century
1999 – Ranked #2 in the Upside Elite 100
1998 – Ranked #1 in the Top 50 Cyber Elite, Time magazine
1994 – 20th Distinguished Fellow of the British Computer Society
1994 – CEO of the Year, Chief Executive Officers magazine
1987 – Declared a billionaire in Forbes’ 400 Richest People in America
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