Seeing The Invisible: How Beats By Dre Became Iconic, and How Pioneers Build Businesses That Last

Todd Henry [00:00:02]:

We live in a moment that is obsessed with speed. Faster growth, faster output, faster results. The faster we can get to the end, the better. And yet, when you look at work that really matters, the work that really sticks around over a long period of time, the work that shapes culture or changes lives, it almost never comes from chasing speed. It comes from something slower, something more intentional. It results from synthesis, from intuition. It comes from people who understand who they are, what they care about, what they're willing to stand for, even when it would be easier just to compromise and do something quicker, something more expedient. Today's episode is about that kind of slow, intentional, intuitive work.

Todd Henry [00:00:46]:

The kind of work that's built to last. You're going to hear from two very different thinkers. One is a world renowned designer whose work has shaped how millions of people experience music, technology and everyday objects. The other is a scholar who has spent years studying why certain entrepreneurs build companies that endure across generations while others flame out. Their worlds look different, their research looks different. Their work looks different on the surface. But underneath, they are pointing to the same truth. Longevity.

Todd Henry [00:01:17]:

Work that matters, Work that's built on something substantive. It starts with intuition, with identity, with an understanding of why you're making something, not just how you can get there quickly. It starts with intuition that has been earned. It starts with understanding people deeply. And it starts with the courage to create something that reflects an understanding of who people are, what people want, and the identity of the people who will be using the product and why the product will matter to them. That's what we're going to talk about today. Where does intuition come from? Earned intuition? And how can it influence us in a way that will allow us to make work that lasts? This is Daily Creative. Since 2005, we've served up weekly tips to help you be brave, focused and brilliant every day.

Todd Henry [00:02:08]:

My name is Todd Henry. Welcome to the show.

Robert Brunner [00:02:16]:

When I started, it was how I got into it was interesting. I was introduced by a third party to Jimmy Iovine and Dr. Dre.

Todd Henry [00:02:23]:

Okay, yes, he is talking about the Jimmy iovine and the Dr. Dre because this is Robert Brunner. He's the former head of industrial design at Apple and the founder of Ammunition Design Group. He led the design of Beats by Dre as well as many other iconic products.

Robert Brunner [00:02:40]:

And they had this notion of doing audio products. Jimmy had had a really great experience working with Apple on the U2 iPod. He had this Jimmy brilliant. And he, you know, he had this very early understanding that the way people listen to music was changing right as it was moving to MP3 through different distribution methods, it just was going to change. And so, you know, I met with him down in Universal Music, and it was like nothing I ever experienced. I mean, they're just, you know, first of all, I'm sitting there at Silicon Valley, designer at a table with Dr. Dre and Jimmy Iovine, who's large, arguably the most influential man in music, and wanting to do products, and they're interested in doing headphones. And it was interesting because, you know, we actually clicked as a team.

Robert Brunner [00:03:38]:

And it took me a while to figure out why, because obviously, they're in a different world on a different plane. But I realized over time it was because they saw me as an artist and they viewed themselves as artists. And that was sort of this bond that we had of just focusing on bringing art into the world and helping people feel something. And that was sort of our common ground. When I. We first had this first meeting, and it was wild. And then we went back, and it was classic. You know, we've got two weeks to come up with not just a design for this headphone, but also the brand identity.

Robert Brunner [00:04:17]:

And literally, in that meeting, you know, we said, do you have a name? And Dre said, people come to me for my Beats, so I'm. I want to call it Beats. And. And he said something that we actually be put on the box for years. He said, the problem is, is people aren't hearing my music. I spend a lot of time crafting a song, and it goes out, and people listen to it through those, quote, crappy white earbuds. In retrospect, was a pretty ironic statement, but. But, you know, so when I went back and started to look at it and think about headphones and look at the products that were out there, I realized that they weren't really designed as wearable technology.

Robert Brunner [00:04:58]:

They weren't really designed on the body. There's a lot of headphones are very complicated things to design. Structural issues, reliability, acoustics, comfort, adjustability, all these things that lead to these very sort of mechanical designs, right? You put on their body. And I just thought, well, I remember I had a picture of a psychopanic or Technics headphones, very complicated. And I drew over a single line from ear to ear, and I thought, what if I could just clean all that up and make it very simple and make it something that looked good on the body that people would actually want to wear? And when we were doing our concepts, we were always modeling them on heads, right? To kind of see how it felt. And so that was what really led to the first studio design. And that combined with. Jimmy was very adamant that this product be iconic and be recognizable, largely because the way he was going to go out and promote it was literally to put it in every video coming out of Universal Music and just really create this wave of cultural relevance.

Robert Brunner [00:06:04]:

So you needed to be able to see it at a glance, in a millisecond and recognize it. That sort of led to the first design. And it turned out, I mean, I remember we came back in two weeks and laid a panel, 15 concepts out on the table. And usually, you know, you go through that process with a client and they'll, you know, we'll kind of narrow it down and talk about it, maybe get it to three directions to take forward. We walked around explaining them, and Jimmy stopped and pointed at the studio designs, at that one, and that was it. You know, we just, okay, we're going to do that. Right? Which was refreshing, actually, to have that sort of confidence and directionality. But that's how it started.

Robert Brunner [00:06:48]:

And then it just. It just blossomed and set into a long partnership developing these products.

Todd Henry [00:06:53]:

It's so funny Jimmy Iovine's part of this story, because I've heard several stories recently of, oh, I was meeting with Jimmy Iovine, and he connected me to this other person. You know, there are so many of those stories where he's at the center of all of the. Like you said, he's probably the most influential person in music, but also he's a consummate networker. Like, he's constantly putting people together on these projects. Right. And so when you have multiple artists like this, big personalities, people who have creative perspective, they have a point of view which I know is important in your work. How do you, as a designer, as a design lead for a project like that, how do you help other people understand your intuition while at the same time honoring their intuition and their creative perspective, their point of view? How do all those point of views merge into something that turns into something that's brilliant and simple over time?

Robert Brunner [00:07:50]:

It's challenging, and it's actually something. After a while, I figured out it's apparently a. Some skill or superpower I have, because, yeah, I would work with Jimmy, with Dre, Will, I am Pharrell, you know, and the list went on and on. Lady Gaga, right. And of course, they were very strong willed, very opinionated people with ideas about design, and somehow I was able to work through with them and be able to get them to come around to where I wanted to go with it being respectful of what they were thinking and what they wanted to do, but be able to move it towards something that was actually a product. Right. A good product. That was a challenge.

Robert Brunner [00:08:37]:

People might have these really amazing ideas, but have no concept of what it would take to build that. And there's this thing that happens, it's like, well, Apple does it. Why can't we, right? Apple is a multi, multi billion dollar company with incredible amount of resource at its fingertips. But I actually figured out over time I was actually pretty good. And maybe it's because I'm sort of a calm person and I'm a very kind person, but at the same time I think I know what I'm doing. So somehow that seemed to help me get, navigate through that and get to actually something that we could build and that was good and that they were bought into.

Todd Henry [00:09:15]:

I've not heard anyone describe that as a kind of a soft skill or sort of an invisible superpower before. So many people want to turn that into a. Well, I can teach you how to. But I do think that there's a certain amount of, in some ways a design sensibility, sort of an empathy that enables that kind of kind of collaboration. Because unless you're, you're curious and you really want to understand someone else's perspective, it's easy for some, a designer for a design leader, creative director, anyone, to come in and just say, well, you don't know what you're talking about. But, but there's something, I mean, Lady Gaga doesn't know how to design a product, but there's something in those ideas that is, there's a kernel of it that could be a, a source of inspiration.

Robert Brunner [00:09:59]:

There, there's an energy you want to capture and bring it forth. And don't get me wrong, there were some really stupid ideas that you just say, are you kidding me? But, but at the same time, I was always tempered with, I had a lot of respect and of course, if their name is associated with it, right. They, it has to be something that they're going to be able to buy into and be, be proud of and so forth. So it, yeah, that, but that was at times very challenging, stressful to say the least.

Todd Henry [00:10:27]:

So I would take a couple of steps back and just ask about your experiences in your kind of career track. What was it that drew you to design initially? How did you end up in this field?

Robert Brunner [00:10:38]:

That's a good story. I so going all the way back because we're all influenced by our families quite a bit. My, my father was a Very talented and creative engineer. In fact, he created a lot of the technology for the first hard disk drives at IBM, the mechanical technology, and literally was making prototypes in our garage. My mother was a. She started out when they met, she was a fashion model. But then, you know, she became a homemaker. She was always a craftsperson, an artist, and also be an entrepreneur.

Robert Brunner [00:11:11]:

She was. Whether it was Amway or Mary Kay Cosmetics or there was. She was always doing something like that. Eventually had her own children's clothing business. So that was. That was the environment I grew up in. When I got out of high school, the guidance counselor looks at your transcripts and says, okay, you're good in math and science. Your father's an engineer, you're an engineer.

Robert Brunner [00:11:32]:

So I enrolled in engineering school and spent a semester and a half hating it. And my father loved it, helping me with my calculus homework. But it wasn't connecting with me. It just felt like very formulaic, very technical, not at all sort of intuitive. So I one day said, well, I can't do this. I went over to the art building and thinking I'd heard of this thing called graphic design, which I knew was some form of commercial art. And I thought, well, maybe that would be interesting. And I walked in the door and there was this display case full of industrial design work, models, sketches, renderings, mockups.

Robert Brunner [00:12:19]:

And I realized this is all the stuff I'd been doing right, on my own, I've been doing in the. In the garage, you know, working on my bike, doing paintings, drawings, building models of cars, you know, this. So I just, okay, this is it. And literally went over and changed my major and never looked back. Pissed my father off.

Todd Henry [00:12:37]:

What was that conversation like? Like, how did that conversation go?

Robert Brunner [00:12:40]:

I can give you a quote because I remember it. My father's no longer with us, but he said industrial designers are the guys who specify the paint and it usually peels off. Was what Ian said, okay. That was his view of industrial design. Being an engineer, I was undaunted and eventually he came around. But that was how I got started. And I went to design school, started working at a firm in my third year. And I often say, what if I walked in another door? What would happen? I've been writing a book of my co authors.

Robert Brunner [00:13:16]:

It's when I made that statement, he said, you know what? Apple might not exist if you went in another door. The way the universe works, you never know so well.

Todd Henry [00:13:23]:

And it's interesting that, you know, I mean, I know that we love to just separate things into airtight compartments. You know, hermetically sealed vaults and say, you know, oh, well, the engineering background, the engineering piece, or the influence of your father had nothing to do with the design piece. But that is, as you know, and everybody knows that is completely false because there's so much engineering thinking that goes into great industrial design.

Robert Brunner [00:13:46]:

Right.

Todd Henry [00:13:46]:

Like, you have to. Maybe there's a sensibility that you have in your design work that would never have been there had it not been for that, that influence.

Robert Brunner [00:13:54]:

Well, the way it was taught at San Jose State when I started taking it. And granted, these were early classes, we did not actually line up with what I've experienced, what I experienced today. But also, when I look back, my father was a very creative engineer. He was always out in the garage with a saw, a drill and duct tape trying to figure something out. And the best engineers I work with, though, they're very creative individuals. They're solving problems and being imaginative about how they do it. And, yeah, it's critical to what we do. That relationship with engineering is the primary driving thing.

Robert Brunner [00:14:30]:

It's going to allow us to get what we want out into the world. And it's important that you. You. They're very respectful and you know how to work with the engineering teams.

Todd Henry [00:14:39]:

So we have a lot of listeners who are leading creative teams or creative directors, design directors, VPs of creative for large organizations, they're responsible for not for doing the work, but for leading the work, which is. I mean, they're certainly doing some work, but there may be a couple layers away from the actual tactile, you know, doing of the work, the design work, on a daily basis. Leading and doing are very different skill sets. What advice do you have for leaders of talented designers who want to get the best work out of the people on their team while still having a point of view, but also sort of keeping, you know, bounded autonomy so that people have freedom, but there are some good limits there. What, what have you learned about leading talented people?

Robert Brunner [00:15:25]:

Yeah, it's. Well, I mean, we often say at Ammunition, my business partner and I say, we're not in the design business. We're in the talent business. Right. It's. It's, you know, something I learned early on. I remember another guy I worked with early on in my career made the statement to me that I, I almost think of every week, which is, you're only as strong as the backs of the people who carry you. And I remember that just thinking.

Robert Brunner [00:15:50]:

And as I began to embody that, I realized, you know, a lot of people, when they're building A team are sometimes threatened by the talent. Right. It's like you're going to hire people that, you know, maybe are better than you or. Or have a different viewpoint. You know, where I. I learned pretty quickly. No, I want to find people that are better than me, you know, that. That want to push something and I can actually learn from and grow with.

Robert Brunner [00:16:14]:

Right, yeah, yeah. To answer your question, you know, my role, I often say now, is one of the editor, director and producer. That's if you used a film analogy, I'm. Sometimes I'm behind the camera, but most of the time, or even acting, but most of the time I'm directing or I'm editing or I'm helping something be produced. Right, That's. And so one thing that we found to be really important, we view, again, our team, our talent, and our environment as our biggest assets. And when I say environment, there's the physical environment, but probably more importantly the emotional environment where we allow people to fail, we allow people to push. And for them, it really comes down to them feeling safe.

Robert Brunner [00:17:01]:

Of course, people have to be accountable and have to understand the ramifications of their work and all their commitments around timing and so forth. But ultimately, if we give people the space to explore and actually express who they are and feel safe in that, then the work is much better. And I'm also a believer. I'm giving people enough rope to not really hang themselves, but definitely do that and learn and so forth. So I think it's really a combination of building a safe environment, hiring great talent, providing that direction and editorial, but also letting people do their work. Because I often. Sometimes I used to think that the way to be a successful design director was just to tell everybody what to do. And there's.

Robert Brunner [00:17:52]:

Sometimes you have to do that. But what I found to be much more scalable is being very careful about the team you build and building this environment and this thing now, you know, one of the best teams I've ever had, and things run on autopilot. It's sometimes amazing to me. They just. Things happen and they happen really well. And that's about sort of. That's because of that environment and the level of people we hire and then the freedom that we give them and along with the understanding of the responsibility, treating people with respect and expecting respect in return, I think that's an important dynamic within a creative studio. If my team's not respecting me, it's not going to work.

Robert Brunner [00:18:32]:

And if I'm not respecting them, it's not going to be viable long term. So it's maintaining that and being a verb and understanding that.

Todd Henry [00:18:42]:

What I loved about this conversation with Robert is that he doesn't talk about intuition as something mystical, something ineffable, something that only a few people have. He talks about it as the result of paying attention for a very long time, of being purposeful, paying attention to people, to culture, to emotion, to understanding what it actually feels like to live with the things that we create. And Robert's story and all of what we just talked about reminds us that great design is not about control. It's about creating conditions where people feel something, conditions where people can do their best work, conditions where an idea can become meaningful instead of just efficient. And what is fascinating is that when you zoom out from products and you look at businesses or even entire organizations, the same pattern holds. Which brings us to our second conversation. Neri NarraSuleiman has spent years studying entrepreneurs who consistently build companies that last not just for a few quarters, but across decades. And what she discovered is that longevity is not an accident.

Todd Henry [00:19:45]:

It is the outcome of how people relate to things like rejection, scarcity, community and identity. So if Robert Brunner showed us how intuition shapes objects and design, Nary is going to show us how it shapes enterprises. We'll be back with our conversation with Neri Karra Sillaman right after this. Stick around.

Neri Karra Sillaman [00:20:16]:

The book is not just about immigrant entrepreneurs. I use them as an example because statistics speak for themselves. Close to 50% of Fortune 500 companies are started by immigrants. And 80% of billion dollar startups have a founder or an executive who is from an immigrant background. And statistically, immigrant founded businesses tend to last longer than those founded by natives. So I wanted to understand the link between business longevity and immigrant entrepreneurship.

Todd Henry [00:20:50]:

That's Neri Karra Sillaman. Her new book is called Pioneers: Eight Principles of Business Longevity from Immigrant Entrepreneurs.

Neri Karra Sillaman [00:20:58]:

The way they will look at a problem is informed by their past experience. In the book, for example, I give the example of Jan Kum, who is the founder of WhatsApp. He grew up in Communist Russia, in Ukraine at the time. And he remembers this fear of being monitored on the phone when you know, I remember that fear very well as well because I come from a communist background as well. And when he moves to us, he has the high cost of calling home, but also this annoyance of American advertising culture that is everywhere. So he creates WhatsApp. The way they look at a problem is going to be very different than those who are immersed in that culture. They bring a different perspective and that helps them create A business that is not just looking at a market and saying, there is a need in the market.

Neri Karra Sillaman [00:22:00]:

So that's something that we don't see in the business literature, in the entrepreneurship literature, because they will tell you you need to look outside, find an unmet need, and try to fulfill it. But what I've seen, and I was told by the founder of Numity, which is the largest fair trade tea company in the U.S. she told me, entrepreneurs need to look inside themselves first. And from that, and this can include your past, this can include something that you are bothered about at the moment. This can include your passion, your values, and that's how you create a business. It's not by saying, oh, I think there is an unmet need here. I give the example of the founder of Calendly, Tope Awotona. Before starting Calendly, he really wants to be an entrepreneur.

Neri Karra Sillaman [00:22:55]:

So he will start and fail in three different businesses before calendly. But he will look at it in a very logical way. He will say, there is an unmet need here. So not just. It was a personal annoyance of him because he will sell this software door to door and yet to get people to book with him, it was becoming an annoyance. And he ends up creating Calendly with his own capital without raising any. Any money.

Todd Henry [00:23:26]:

Neri says that it's not just the fact that immigrant entrepreneurs tend to look inward that causes them to be successful over the long term. There's also an element of looking outward, but it's not about looking for felt needs.

Neri Karra Sillaman [00:23:39]:

So there is another aspect that I think is counterintuitive, which is they are very much focused on community, because I would say, I would argue they come from cultures where the collective is very much valued. So when, during the process of immigration, they will lose a lot of the ties that are important for them. When they immigrate, they will very purposefully build these ties. So there's something interesting that happens here. When they are building their network, their community, they don't necessarily look for people who come from their own culture. However, they do something very interesting. They will use strategic storytelling, and they are very deliberate about this. Very purposefully, very strategically, they build these networks with people.

Neri Karra Sillaman [00:24:36]:

They are very focused on involving their employees, their community, the ecosystem they become part of. Hamdi Ulukaya, founder of Chobani, is a very good example of that. How he started Chobani is because he basically took over an abandoned craft factory, and this entire town was dependent on the craft factory. And he remembers when he went into the hamlet, he Says when I walked in, it was as if I walked into someone's funeral. People were devastated because this is their livelihood. Their fathers have worked there, their grandparents have worked there, and now everyone was devastated. And here I was coming and saying I'm going to create a yogurt and basically bring this factory back to life. Something a giant corporation like Crafted failed at.

Neri Karra Sillaman [00:25:35]:

But what he does very deliberately is he starts to involve people who used to work at that previous craft factory and ask them, tell me where I'm making a mistake. Everyone is involved, the whole community. And this remains a big strategic advantage of his business to this day. I would say one of his greatest resources and capability is his ability to bring together a community. So there are many I can go on and on.

Todd Henry [00:26:09]:

What you're describing I think is closely connected to this is what I would love to talk about. Next is the 3i framework that you, that you discuss. Identity, intention, imagined future. Could you give us a little bit of an overview of how that plays into some of what we're. These stories that we're hearing.

Neri Karra Sillaman [00:26:26]:

They almost in the center you have the entrepreneur who has the vision to create the life that he wants to create a business that he wants. And there is a very deliberate process where he starts to ask the question of what if I could create? What if I can bring craft factory back to life? What if I can create a yogurt that is going to be the best selling yogurt. But again, the past very much informs the business idea.

Todd Henry [00:27:00]:

So your grandfather gave you some advice which was to fry in your own oil. Could you elaborate on that advice and why it's important and how this played into some of what you discovered?

Neri Karra Sillaman [00:27:12]:

So frying your own oil, that's a Turkish saying. I directly translate it. I come from a very poor family background. I mean I grew up in communism and I think even growing up there was this self reliance. But it's a paradox because you say you have to be self reliant, you have to work with nature, you have to work with what you have. And I think today we talk a lot about sustainability and I think sustainability to me is also becoming very aware of your own resources and doing the very best using your resources in the most optimal way. Crying in your own oil to me is very much linked to sustainability. It's linked to the health of a business and even raising money or even especially it relates to startups.

Neri Karra Sillaman [00:28:08]:

Because what I have seen is that especially early on, if you start to look out for investment, if you get investment into your business Too early on, this is going to curtail your creativity. I've seen it again and again and something in the book, when I was talking to the immigrant entrepreneurs, they didn't immediately go out there and try to bring in investors into their business. Instead they fry in their own oils. What that means is that they are self sufficient. And it means they really identify what are their own best resources, what is their sustainable competitive advantage, how they can work with their community, who are their suppliers, what is the strongest and best way to build your ecosystem. But what I have seen, I also work with startups at Oxford and I advise them on their strategy. I've seen it again and again. Startups that have gone out there to raise money too quickly, they somehow become blind to their strongest point and it curtails their creativity.

Neri Karra Sillaman [00:29:23]:

So that doesn't mean you will never have an investor, but you have to do get that investment at the right time. And of course another important thing is relationships. What kind of investment you are going to get so frying in your own oil. To me it's about being self sufficient, but it very much relates to especially the early days of your business.

Todd Henry [00:29:50]:

I think that especially creative professionals, people who are listening to this show. Our work feels so personal often because it's the result of our own creative process, our intuition. So we're putting ourselves into the work. We are not our work, but we're definitely putting a part of our, ourselves, our worldview into the work that we do. And so when that work is rejected, it can often feel like a rejection of ourselves. It can feel like, oh, I am, you know, I'm not worthy, I'm, you know, whatever. Can you talk to us about this concept of reframing rejection and what you discovered?

Neri Karra Sillaman [00:30:22]:

Yes. So one of the most powerful things that immigrant entrepreneurs do, they reframe rejection. They are very powerful at reframing. The ones who have built these incredibly successful businesses, I think they reframed their own past as well. Many painful things have happened to them in order to survive almost they had to get very good at this reframing, very, very good at it. So I just think of Isaac Larian. He was born in Iran to a Jewish family and at the age of 17, speaking very little English, he decides to move to us with $700 in his pocket. And that money very quickly runs out.

Neri Karra Sillaman [00:31:12]:

He starts to look for a job. He cannot find anything. He goes to gas station, to restaurant. After days and days pass, he sees a restaurant called Spires and he goes inside to see if there is any availability Any work, he's rejected again. He sits outside of the restaurant and he's basically at the end of his hope when he feels a tap on his shoulder. The chef of the restaurant walked out and says, iranian, are you Iranian? And he says to him, come back after the restaurant closes at 11 in the evening. And when he goes there, he makes him liver with onions. To this day, Isaac Larian, by the way, says that he still goes to the same restaurant to eat that dish.

Neri Karra Sillaman [00:32:07]:

Isaac Larian eventually puts himself to school, starts electronics company with his brother, and when he is in Japan, he sees the kids on their Nintendo and says, I want to bring Nintendo to us. It's going to sell really well. And he wants to meet with the CEO of Sony, I think, but he's rejected. Day after day after day. They tell him, we are not interested. Yet. He goes every single day. And you know, when you ask him, he says, I didn't have any ego.

Neri Karra Sillaman [00:32:43]:

You can't think in this business I am being rejected. No is when the beginning of negotiation starts. They told me no, but I knew I had opened the door. At least they were talking to me. And he goes back to us, opens a line of credit for a million dollars, goes back again. They still reject him. But then eventually he ends up bringing Nintendo to us. I have many entrepreneurs who have gone through many challenging experiences, rejections.

Neri Karra Sillaman [00:33:17]:

It does feel very personal. It doesn't mean, by the way, Todd, I mean, it doesn't mean you don't feel bad. You can allow yourself to feel all those feelings. Yet you say, okay, now I'm done. I have to keep going. There is also that element. It's not that they. Again, this is about reframing rejection.

Neri Karra Sillaman [00:33:39]:

They don't say, this didn't happen to me, or I'm not sad that my distributor left. But you have to keep going. You have to find another way.

Todd Henry [00:33:51]:

So I want to come back to the beginning of our conversation because we used a word that we haven't defined yet. And I wanted to end our conversation with you defining what this means to you. Because really, at the core of your book is building longevity, building businesses with longevity. What does longevity mean to you?

Neri Karra Sillaman [00:34:09]:

I say in the preface of my book, longevity is not about making profit year after year after year, but it's about making a difference, building a legacy, making an impact. Every single entrepreneur I interviewed who have built these businesses that change the world, they didn't set out. And that's another principle in my book. They didn't set out to make a profit. And it doesn't mean profit is not important. But they were driven by solving a problem, by giving value, by creating shared value for everyone who is involved in their business, whether it's suppliers, employees, everyone, even being respectful and mindful of nature because that's also part of the ecosystem.

Todd Henry [00:35:03]:

Neri Karra Sillaman's new book is called Pioneers, and it's available now wherever books are sold. As I listened to Neri describe immigrant founders reframing rejection, building community deliberately, and resisting the pressure to grow at all costs, I kept hearing echoes of what Robert described earlier. Different context, but same discipline. Whether you're designing an iconic pair of headphones or building a company from scratch, the question is the same. Are you reaching to the world as it is, or are you shaping something based on what you believe should exist? There's a quiet through line running through both of these conversations. The work that lasts is deeply human, deeply intuitive. It doesn't begin with trends or tools. It begins with people who understand their own story story and understand the story of others well enough to use it wisely.

Todd Henry [00:35:56]:

Robert Brunner reminds us that intuition is not guesswork, it's memory, experience and empathy brought to bear in the moment of creation. Nerikara Suleiman reminds us that endurance comes from identity, community, and the ability to see rejection not as a verdict, but as information. So in a world that increasingly rewards speed and automation and offloading our intuition, offloading our creative process, the most valuable work you can do may be maybe to be slower, to be more intentional, and to be more personal than ever. So here's the question I want to leave you with this week. What are you building that deserves to last? And are you brave enough to build it from who you are, not just rush to the end? Thanks so much for listening. If you want to learn more about today's guests or you want to hear our full interviews, you can do so for free@dailycreativeplus.com all you have to do is enter your name and email address. We'll send you a private feed where you can listen to the full interview from each of today's guests, as well as all of our previous guests. Again, that's DailyCreativePlus.com My name is Todd Henry.

Todd Henry [00:37:05]:

You can find me my books and my speaking events@toddhenry.com would love to see you there. Until next time, May you be brave, focused and brilliant. We'll see you then.