Build
An Unorthodox Guide to Making Things Worth Making
by Tony Fadell
“Tony Fadell has made more cool stuff than almost anyone else in the history of Silicon Valley, and in Build he tells us how. This is the most fun—and the most fascinating—memoir of curiosity and invention I’ve ever read.”
Forget the Theory: Tony Fadell’s ‘Build’ Is the Mentor You Wish You Had
Have you ever been stuck in a meeting, listening to a debate about product strategy, and thought, "This all sounds great, but has anyone here ever actually built something?" There’s often a massive gap between the clean, abstract frameworks taught in business school and the messy, chaotic, exhilarating reality of making something people genuinely want.
What if you could get brutally honest advice from the guy who was in the trenches for the creation of the iPod, the iPhone, and the Nest Thermostat?
That's the promise of Build: An Unorthodox Guide to Making Things Worth Making by Tony Fadell. This isn't a book of lofty theories or management jargon. It’s a mentor in a book, a collection of hard-won lessons, and a practical field guide for anyone who wants to build a great product, a great team, or a great career. Fadell’s authority doesn't come from a Ph.D.; it comes from the world-changing devices he helped bring to life.
In this article, you’ll learn:
The critical difference between a "painkiller" and a "vitamin"—and why it determines success.
How to manage your career by making your boss look good.
Why the most important feature of any product is its story.
An actionable guide to start applying Fadell’s no-BS wisdom today.
Embrace the Mess: Why ‘Build’ Is an Anti-Business-Book
If you're looking for a simple, five-step framework for guaranteed success, this isn't the book for you. Fadell's core message is that building things is inherently messy, and success comes from navigating that mess, not pretending it doesn't exist. He shares visceral stories from his time at pioneering companies like General Magic, where brilliant people experienced epic failures, and the intense, down-to-the-wire pressure of getting the very first iPod to market for Steve Jobs.
The book is structured to mirror a career, offering advice for every stage—from a young graduate trying to land the right first job, to a manager struggling to build a team, to a CEO grappling with the board. It’s for the doers, the makers, and the problem-solvers.
He tells a story about the early iPod development. The team was getting bogged down by a complex menu interface. Fadell’s insight wasn’t to add more features, but to simplify relentlessly based on the user’s story: get to your music in three clicks or less. That obsessive focus on the user’s real-world experience is what separates good ideas from great products.
Fadell's Product Gospel: Key Concepts to Master
While Fadell eschews rigid formulas, his book is packed with powerful mental models. These core truths are the foundation of his product development philosophy.
Make a Painkiller, Not a Vitamin: This is perhaps Fadell's most famous concept. A vitamin is a "nice-to-have." It might offer incremental improvements or appeal to a future aspiration. A painkiller solves a real, urgent, frustrating problem. As Fadell notes, when you have a splitting headache, you will crawl over broken glass to get a painkiller. People might forget to take their vitamins, but they never forget their painkillers. Your goal is to find an acute pain and create the solution.
Storytelling is the Strategy: A product is not just a bundle of features; it's a story. You need a compelling narrative that explains why it needs to exist. This story guides your team's decisions, persuades investors, and, most importantly, connects with customers on an emotional level. The iPod’s story wasn’t “a 5GB MP3 player”; it was “1,000 songs in your pocket.”
Stay a Student: Fadell emphasizes the need for continuous learning and drawing inspiration from everywhere, especially outside your own industry. He studied old-fashioned jukeboxes and car stereos to understand how people interacted with music, long before the iPod existed. Curiosity and a beginner's mindset are your greatest assets.
Master the Human Element: It's All About People and Problems
A brilliant product idea is worthless without a team that can execute it. A huge portion of Build is dedicated to the human side of making things—managing your career, your team, and your own psychology.
His advice on career management is refreshingly direct: your job is to solve your boss’s problems. Instead of just identifying issues, you should show up with thoughtful analysis and potential solutions. Make your manager’s job easier, and they will give you more responsibility and champion your growth.
This philosophy extends to how he thinks about teams, famously captured in his "No Assholes" rule. He tells stories of brilliant but toxic engineers who demoralized entire teams. Fadell’s math is simple: the productivity gained from one "genius" is never worth the productivity lost from the ten people they alienate. A healthy, collaborative culture is a prerequisite for building anything great and sustainable.
He also encourages aspiring leaders to run toward the fire. The biggest, ugliest, most complex problems that everyone else is avoiding are where the greatest opportunities for growth and impact lie. Volunteering to tackle those challenges is how you prove your worth and accelerate your career.
The Fadell Rules: A Playbook for Your Career
Use this structured advice as a guide for navigating your own professional journey, whether you're an individual contributor or a team leader.
Data-Driven vs. Data-Informed: Use data as a flashlight, not a crutch. Data can help you see the landscape, but it can't tell you where to go. Vision and gut instinct still matter. As Fadell points out, no amount of market research in 2000 would have led to the creation of the iPod.
Worry About the "Why": Before you get lost in the "what" (features) or the "how" (implementation), be absolutely certain you understand "why" you're building it. Whose pain are you solving? Why should they care?
Embrace Prototyping: Don't just talk about ideas; build them. Crude prototypes, whether physical or digital, answer questions and resolve debates far faster than any PowerPoint presentation. Make things tangible as quickly as possible.
Know When to Leave: Fadell is unsentimental about jobs. If you're not learning or growing, and you've tried everything you can to fix the situation, it's time to go. Your career is your responsibility.
Your 'Build' Quick-Start Guide
Feeling inspired? Don't just put the book down. Use these questions to apply Fadell's thinking to your work right now.
[ ] Is my main project a painkiller or a vitamin? Be brutally honest with yourself and your team.
[ ] What is the one-sentence story of this product or feature? Can I tell it in a way that makes people lean in?
[ ] Where is the biggest "fire" in my organization right now? What’s the scariest, most ambiguous problem I could help solve?
[ ] What is my boss's biggest headache this week? How can I show up with a solution, not just another problem?
Build isn't just a memoir or a collection of war stories. It's a generous, direct, and intensely practical guide for anyone who feels the pull to create things of value. It’s the tough-love mentorship you need to turn your ideas into reality.
Final Reflections
Tony Fadell's "Build" offers a brutally honest, no-nonsense guide to creating great products and careers. Drawing from his experiences building the iPod, iPhone, and Nest, Fadell provides a mentor-in-a-book. He skips theoretical frameworks for practical advice on everything from product design (make "painkillers," not "vitamins") to management (enforce a "no-asshole rule"). It's an essential field guide for anyone who wants to make things worth making.
Business Floss is reader-supported. When you use our links we may earn an affiliate commission that helps us keep the site running. Thank you for your support!
