I went from 13,000 employees to three

[music] employees in one week. We work

was one of the fastest physical global

growth the world's ever seen. But

everything went wrong. We lost

everything. 2019 you were publicly filed

its S1. Company valued at around [music]

$47 billion. The S1 showed some losses,

3 billion in the past 3 years. Also, the

S1 revealed when you were CEO that you'd

also trademarked the word we [music] and

sold it back to the company. That's not

true. People sometimes think I was fired

because the Wall Street Journal said

[music] so. Not true. I wanted to hear

directly from you. What happened? You

really want to go there? I'm like I'm

I'm happy to the floor is yours. So in

we work the business grew faster than I

could grow and every step I take

suddenly the [music] ego starts coming

up. Oh 20 billion valuation billion

valuation in Japan on top of that 5

billion valuation in China. It suddenly

became about the money. I forgot what we

were all about and when I lost it

everybody lost it. And the next thing is

we found ourselves being forced to go

public when we weren't [music] ready.

Then you resigned as CEO of we work

after the IPO didn't pan out. So I

stepped down out of choice and [music] a

second after I did it, we got stabbed in

the back and the only lesson there,

you're going to stab the king, kill. If

you're not going to kill, I'm going to

come back again.

>> Why did you make that choice to go back

into business again? Cuz you had money

from the reports almost a billion

dollars. You know how hard it is.

>> I now realize [music] that in we work, I

did a lot more things right than wrong.

A lot more. Not like 10% more, like 95%.

Some of what I'm saying is hard for you

to fully hone in on. All these founders

you spoke [music] to, all this I don't

think they shared this paper. So, let's

talk about it. So, first,

you might have seen or you might not

have seen, but this channel is chasing a

big subscriber milestone. So, I have to

ask you for a favor. Roughly 58% of the

people watching right now still haven't

hit the subscribe button despite the

fact that you watch this channel every

single week. So, could I ask you guys a

favor? that 58% of you that for whatever

reason haven't yet hit the subscribe

button. If there was ever a time to

deliver upon a favor for us, it would be

right now. And I promise that I will do

everything in my power to make sure that

this channel gets better and better and

better for you. Do [snorts] we have a

deal?

[music]

Adam Newman, I've had the privilege of

getting to know you briefly over the

last um couple of months, and it struck

me almost immediately that you're unlike

almost any other founder or CEO or

really person I think I've ever met.

There's a depth to you and a and a

philosophy and a perspective that is

just incredibly rare. My question to you

is for you to be an anomaly if we accept

that.

Am I right in thinking that you had some

sort of anomalous

early origin story? What is that that

story that shaped this man that sat in

front of me? You know, for me first when

I get to know someone in the beginning

and they say, "Where is it coming from?

Who are you?" I usually start the same.

First of all, I'm a husband. It's my

first job. what I'm most proud of. Then

I'm a father. I'm a father of six. Then

I'm a friend. Friendships are very

important for me. And after that I'm an

entrepreneur. I think each one of us has

a

phenomenal

soul. I think it's perfect. And I think

what really we see when we look at

people is the distance between where we

think they're holding to where their

potential is. And I think it's that gap

between those two things that actually

defines a person. And for me throughout

my life, sometimes out of my control

when I was young and sometimes with my

control when I got older, I've always

been striving to close that gap.

>> So you talk about not having control.

Your early context is quite unstable

from what I read because your mother

suffered from bipolar. Can you bring me

into that world so I can understand like

the sort of context that Adam was

raised?

>> Happily. So we'll start like every story

it has two sides to it and my mom and my

father are both doctors and growing up I

always saw both of them taking care of

the patients and it would feel sometimes

like the patients came ahead of us. So

for example my sister and I we were

never sick no matter how sick we were

look at my she was an oncologist and she

would say my patients are sicker go to

school and that was sort of the

beginning of it. When I was in the

second grade, my parents got a divorce.

It was very difficult for my mom and she

needed a change of scenery. So, we

actually moved to the United States. You

know this photo here?

>> I do.

>> Um, and this one here, you've got a kid.

This is you as a a child that is beaming

with uh smell sort of ear to ear. Often

when I see photos like that, my my

curiosity is what what you can't see and

what that young kid, that young boy

there is is not saying, but what he's

feeling underneath all of those uh those

emotions. What I could tell you is I

think for me I think the challenge

started in the house. So we talked about

my mother being bipolar. I only observed

my mother's moods when we moved to the

United States. There was no one around.

It was only my mom and my sister and I.

And all day she would work with the

patients and at night at 8 p.m. she

would come home and all hell would break

loose. And I remember there's many

stories but I remember this. She would

tell my sister and I we had to wash the

dishes. That was our one chore. And we

wouldn't no matter what because kids

sometimes rebel by action when they

can't rebel by words. And she would come

home, you didn't wash the dishes. And

she would take the dishes and throw them

on the floor. And then she would cry and

start cleaning the dishes and and

mopping them. And it was every night

ended with some version of action like

that. And for 2 years, I remember how

crazy my sister and I thought the whole

experience was. And we didn't have any

friends who were sharing that experience

until one day she bought this nice set

of dishes. And she comes home again to

throw the dishes. And we notice she's

only throwing the cheap dishes. She's

not throwing the ones that she liked,

which gave us a little hint that maybe

there's a little more control over

what's happening than this out of

control situation. So if I had to guess

what was happening with the kids because

now in hindsight I know my mom and my

dad very well. Probably there was a lot

of arguing in the house. Probably as a

kid cuz I now see my kids that are very

young. I'm sure a child finds it very

confusing when the parents are not

aligned as a team because as a child all

you have to lean on are your parents.

But I think the most important thing to

say

if my mom wasn't the way she was and if

I didn't go through all those challenges

that I went through growing up and I

went through a lot. We're talking about

bipolar. There's a lot that comes with

it and we could go deeper or less. But

almost every single thing if you took a

piece of paper and you had to do a check

mark for every bad thing we think can

happen to a little boy. You get to check

mark with me all almost all of them

including the really bad ones that we

don't like to talk about. As bad as that

was when I was 22 23 I remember being

very angry about my childhood. only when

I met Rebecca, my then girlfriend to

then wife, she very quickly introduced

me to a spiritual practice. The way she

introduced me, by the way, was after a

week of dating, she came to me and she

goes, "Look, you're really nice. You

have a lot of potential, but you're not

the guy for me." I was very surprised at

the time. I was living in New York. My

sister was the supermodel. We were

hanging out. I I thought a lot of

myself. And I said, "What do you mean

I'm not the guy for you?" He said,

"Well, you don't have a spiritual band.

You're very focused on material things.

You want to be successful, but you're

not actually understanding the game of

life. The guy I'm interested in is going

to want true happiness and true

fulfillment. And true happiness and true

fulfillment does not come from material

things. It was so different for anything

anyone has ever told me that instead of

running away or doing this or doing

that, I thought for a second and I said,

"Well, how would one come to explore

this spiritual life that you're talking

about?" And she said, "Well, you need a

practice." And for me that practice

started being cabala. But for all of us

there can be different practices. The

thing I learned very quickly in the

practice is the difference between meant

to be and free choice. And I think a lot

of people don't understand it. But how

can there be? We talk a lot about in

spirituality about it's meant to be and

there's free choice. How could there be

free choice and things be meant to be at

the same time? The way I explain it is

you get to a fork in your life and you

choose left over right and everything

works out meant to be. You get to that

same fork and you choose right and you

crash on your face horribly. Everybody's

watching and you stop and you actually

learn lessons from it and you take

accountability and you say, you know

what, whatever happened to me happened

for a reason and I'm going to learn from

it. I'm going to be stronger. Almost

like a sword that's getting forged. And

the more times you hit it and the more

hit you put on it, the stronger it gets.

And then you learn those lessons and you

go back into the game of life and you

apply that in again, suddenly you take

the catastrophe or the tragedy or the

curse and you make it into a blessing.

You turn it into a made to be. When the

world did crash on me as an adult, it

was nothing compared to what I had to

deal with as a child. I was like, it's

okay. I have a wife. I have kids.

[clears throat] I have close friends.

we'll take a deep breath and we'll start

from scratch again. And that kind of

fortitude, I think regretfully, comes

through going through very difficult

things. So, if you're listening to this

right now and you're going through

something really difficult and it feels

dark, I encourage you to remember that

the darkest moment of the night is a

second before dawn.

>> I feel like there's things in your early

context that you haven't shared before

because you said there's things that we

don't usually share. Not publicly, but

meaning I have in front of So I used to

share everything in front of our

employees that we work. So there's

things I shared in front of 10,000

people. I'm not sure it ever made it to

the press.

>> What is missing? You really want to go

there?

>> I'm I'm happy to.

>> If you're happy to, I'm happy to.

>> I'll share two things that I'm not sure

that maybe could be helpful for other

people that are going through similar

things.

So the the hidding and stuff like so

when someone's bipolar, by the way, they

get very angry or very happy very fast.

When they're happy, they're the

happiest. You have fun and everything's

amazing. And my mom would play games

with us and it was phenomenal. But

also when that I think happens a lot

with bipolar, there's the suicide

threats. And then there's one thing when

you threaten to. So again, if you're two

children and your only parent threatens

to commit suicide,

who is going to take care of you? What

is going to happen if suddenly that

happens? And I have a lot of memories,

but one that just came back to me not

too long ago. We're in the kibuts, which

is where we're living after we came back

from the US. My mom wanted us to have a

special experience. So we went to this

community where everybody shares a lot

of things together. It's also the

beginning of why I love communities. And

we get into this big fight and my mom

basically says she's going to kill

herself and she takes the knife and I

remember she's holding this huge knife.

I'm like, "No, no, don't do it." And I

remember

I just remember feeling that I

[clears throat] have to stop it that it

is up to me and if I don't stop it, then

she's going to kill herself right there

in front of my sister and I. So I

grabbed the knife and we're fighting

left and right. And my sister is sitting

right there and she's crying and she's

crying

and I'm no and she's saying yes. And the

whole thing is so crazy. How old were

you? 12 at that moment.

That's one. There's more if you want to

go deeper, but that was one. I invite

you to go deeper.

When I was in between second grade to

fourth grade, um I was sexually

I think you called molested by an older

uh than a teenager.

So she was at least six or seven years

older than me. This one I didn't

even know that what was happening was

wrong.

And many years later, Rebecca and I are

in the Hamptons and it's somehow the

story comes up and she goes, "Adam,

understand that this is not normal for a

child at that age."

And I didn't even fully understand.

And

that taught me

that explained to me a lot about

children. And again we go back to the

responsibility of parents and the

responsibility of society to take care

of the children and schools to

understand what's happening. And

whenever we see anyone we are so good at

walking into a room seeing someone else

and judging. Oh, they're not acting the

way I would act. They're not acting

right. They're not speaking right.

Everybody's so busy judging everybody. I

want to encourage every single person

next time you're about to judge. You

don't know who that person is. You do

not know where they come from. You do

not know what happened to them as a kid.

God forbid they were molested. God

forbid they dealt with all these things.

You don't know where they started. You

only know where you see them now. And it

could be that if you really got to know

them and you would have known the

distance they went from here to here,

you would have been

extremely impressed with them and you

would have not measured them that way.

And this is why I think it's so

important for all of us when we walk

into rooms to really go after unity. You

and I can say the same sentence in a way

that tears people apart or brings people

together. It takes more effort to speak

in a way that brings us together. But if

we don't start acting like this, if we

keep dividing and keep splitting,

I'm worried.

Sounds like as an adult, you've been

able to understand that early experience

and sort of create a new sort of

perspective or lens on what happened to

you and what it means. And as you said,

you know, you've you've orientated it

around the fact that it's happened for a

reason or at least there's there's

something to have learned from it. Was

that always the case? I I sometimes

reflect on my own experience and think

that for the first season of my life I

was dragged and then at some point I

like got hold of the steering wheel and

I was able to like drive and one of them

was like sort of unconscious and the

other was more in sort of intentional

and thoughtful and I'm wondering through

your early teens and 20ies whether you

had the wisdom and the perspective that

you have now on your early experiences

and how that's evolved over time. I

probably went to sleep crying every

single night for

probably until I was 14 or 15. And I

remember and if you ask my sister did

what what would I say? She I I

completely forgot. She said I told her

that one day I'll become very successful

and we'll take care of I'll take care of

us. That was what I used to say. I I

literally didn't remember this is

something she told me. [sighs and gasps]

I think that's how I interpreted that

control and how I'm going to fix all

these challenges that I had. But we

launched the school, Rebecca and I, more

Rebecca I helped. It's a fifth school.

In the school, we teach kids how to be

connected to themselves, how to be part

of something greater than themselves. If

someone just taught me this as a kid and

I would have understood then that

there's this bigger picture, I think I

would have been able to handle it a lot

better and skip the challenging years

faster, move faster into the point where

I realize that I don't control what

happens, but I can control how I react

to it. So, back to your point of

driving,

are you driving?

>> Don't know. Now, you question it. I'm

questioning. I would question it. You

know, my my follow-up question to you

would be, how do you define success?

>> My definition of success these days,

it's funny. I was thinking about it this

morning when I got on the lift on my way

here. I thought um do you know what it

was? Cuz my my fiance turned to me this

weekend and she went, "Stephen, I think

you have enough now." And then she

paused and then she retracted the

statement. But I but it got me thinking

about what enough is. And actually, I

thought, well, it's the motion forward

in the pursuit of goals that matter to

me that are challenging surrounded by

people that is the that is the success.

And that's like a daily a daily thing.

There's no there's no podium in this

this game that I'm playing.

>> But when she said she thinks you have

enough, was she referring to material

things?

>> Yes. I think society has taught us that

once we gain that success, once we gain

those material things, we get to this

number, suddenly that hole that we all

fill inside of us will be full.

Now, I know it's very hard to hear,

especially for people who haven't gotten

there. Like, oh yeah, you got there

already. So now you're saying it. I'm

only going to share with you what I have

learned and from all the most successful

people that I know and I'm lucky to know

quite a lot of them. I have not seen one

that got happy or fulfilled from

attaining a number or a material thing.

I don't believe that's how the game of

life works. So when your fiance said

which not like her cuz I think she's

more on the spiritual side. Tell her

that I said I'm surprised she said that.

I think she had something deeper to say

and she was holding back. When she said,

"I think you have enough." I would

really go back to redefining success.

So, back to that. I'll tell you how I

define it in a second. But I think if we

can agree on the definition of success,

then we can start having a discussion of

a are we there and are we headed there?

And B, how do we do better to get there?

And if we agree on our definition of

success, then now we can start working

together towards the same goal. If one

of us defines success by making the most

money and the other person defines

success by being the most fulfilled, the

most happy, the most light that they can

be, then playing two different games.

>> What's your definition?

>> When you're at your deathbed and you're

one minute before it's all going to go

and you know you're out of time, all you

have left is the love that surrounds you

at that moment. your children, your

grandchildren, your friends, your

friends, children, all the love that

surrounds you at that moment and all the

love that you have cultivated for your

entire life. And I think it's that love

which then moves on to whatever it is

that happens after. So my definition of

success is in that last moment right

before you go, how do you feel? Do you

feel full and surrounded by love and

like life has been this amazing journey

or is there regret or is there this and

I'll tell you the one thing that happens

right before we pass away the ego goes

away completely. No more secrets. And

and again in the spiritual study you say

what's the definition of hell back to

how we started this. You get to see you

get to glimpse for a second the ultimate

potential that your soul had perfect it

was and how high you could have gone and

where you really got to and the distance

between those two. That's hell.

When you were 31 years old in 2010

and you sat down with your partner

Miguel

>> Miguel McKelie

>> and you you made this sketch on a

whiteboard for we work. If id asked you

then what your definition of success was

would you have turned to me and said

love or would you have said something

else?

>> I believe I would have said something

else. So my big shift is when I met my

wife. So by this point of this picture

that you're showing me I was four years

into Rebecca teaching me about the game

of life. So I'm starting to get

advanced. So I I can tell you what what

I was thinking. It wouldn't have been

love, but it would have been we and the

point above because was called if you

look at that picture, it's going to say

we work, we live, we give, we share. I

don't remember. I haven't seen it for

like 10 years. It was never about desks

and chairs. It was always about creating

a world where people make a life and not

just a living. It was about something

greater than ourselves. If we just jump

sort of backwards in time from that day

by about 10 years, if I had asked you

what you want to be when you're older,

what would you have said?

>> At 21.

>> 21.

>> It's embarrassing. I'll tell you. It's

embarrassing though. I'm embarrassed for

>> I'm embarrassed for my 21-year-old self.

>> What did you want to be?

>> A billionaire.

>> You wanted to be a billionaire at 21.

>> I did regretfully.

>> Why?

>> I thought that making the money is going

to compensate. I thought it was going to

fill that hole for my childhood. What

about at 16 if I'd asked you?

>> I think I said millionaire there. I

don't think I knew the word millionaire

at 16. I think the numbers were cuz the

world changed.

>> But I thought that making money was

going to fill that hole from the

childhood that back then seemed very

difficult and very aggressive and very

with all these negative words that we

can use about difficult and abusive

childhoods. And I thought that making

money would solve it. But then I did

three businesses afterwards who did not

succeed until I met Rebecca. And Rebecca

was like, "You're chasing money. You

will never have it. And even if you get

it, it will never make you happy. You

will never have it." And she said,

"Chasing money is like chasing cool.

You're cool. You're just like that. You

didn't ch I don't think you're working

too hard on doing. Thank you so much.

>> You don't like putting on shoes. I don't

like putting on shoes that please.

>> It's all good."

>> So she said, "You're chasing money. It

doesn't work like that. Also like

chasing a girl. You really want someone.

You have to take a deep breath." But she

said to me, "Even if you were to get

money the way you're chasing it, it not

only will not fulfill you, it will be

negative for you." So I said, "Well,

what should I do?" She said, "Well,

you're a very talented individual. You

should figure out what your superpower

is." It's the first time I've heard

anyone use the word superpower. She

goes, "You need to take your superpower.

You need to connect it to something

that's really meaningful for the world.

Something you're passionate about, but

something that can make a difference.

You need to bring those two things

together. You need to only focus on

making that a reality.

Employees will want to work with a

company that's doing that. Investors

want to invest in a company that's doing

that. And consumers want to buy from a

company that's doing that. The rest will

for then she said success the way you

you define it then that money success

you think is a will fall on you from the

sky more than you can ever imagine. I

was like I want to marry this woman. I

proposed 3 months after we met.

>> And the idea of we was central to this

drawing that I have in front of me,

which is a a drawing you did on a

whiteboard when you were 31 years old,

2010 with your partner Miguel after

selling your company. I think it was

called Green Desk.

>> Green Desk.

>> You sold it for how much? It wasn't like

>> 1.5 million. There were three partners.

So we each got half a million. Half a

million. Half a million. But our partner

didn't want to pay us the whole amount

up front. So he only gave us $300,000.

The rest was installment over four years

for Miguel and I. And I remember telling

Miguel, Miguel, you keep the money cuz

I'll waste it. First time I ever made

money. You keep the money cuz I will

waste it and we'll keep it for our next

business. And the way the universe

works, by the way, the universe speaks

to us. The signs start happening and you

sort of one thing leads to another. It's

almost serendipity. Our first Weiwork

building to get the building, the

landlord wouldn't give it to us unless

we gave a check of exactly $300,000. The

same $300,000 that was sitting in

Miguel's account. It went from there to

there. and my work was created.

So tell me what that is. Okay, we're in

Greenesk. Just to remind everybody what

Greenesk is, Greenesk was created in May

of 2008. The world was the world was

crashing. That was the downturn and

before it started, Miguel and I got to

know each other. He was an architect and

I had a baby clothing company and we're

in the same building. My roommate

introduced us and we would just talk

about doing great things and there was a

landlord there and every day he would

see me goes, "Adam, your baby clothing

company sucks." And I said, "Mr. Gutman,

why do you say that?" He said, "Well, my

wife, we have eight kids. She loves

buying baby clothes. She didn't once buy

from you. I don't know how you pay me

rent. Your baby clothes suck." And I

would say, "Well, Mr. Gutman, you own

all this real estate around here." He

goes, "Yes, I do." Said, "Your real

estate sucks." He goes, "Why do you say

that?" Said, "It's all empty." And we

would do that for four months back and

forth. One day he looks at me goes,

"Adam, if I gave you one of my

buildings, you keep saying that it

sucks. What would you do with it?" So he

takes me upstairs and he shows me this

this beautiful floor plate. And I said

to him, "How much do you get in rent?"

He goes, " $5,000 a month." Said, "Well,

it's empty, but let's say you would get

$5,000." Said, "Look, I'm a small

business. I don't need this much. Let's

divide it to 15 small places spaces.

We'll charge $1,000 each. We'll put a

receptionist. We'll pay the receptionist

2500. We'll get 15,000. That will leave

us with 12,500.

You will get 7,500 and we'll get the

difference. And he was like, "Let me

think about it." He calls me the next

day. He goes, "I love it, but instead of

one floor, take the whole building. It

had five floors. We'll put the

receptionist downstairs so we can share

the expenses. It will be even better."

And we put five ads on Craigslist. We

launched Greenes. It was 92% full within

a week. started cash flowing positive

which was a new thing for me because

this was my fourth business never had

cash flow positive cash flowing positive

within a month and became very

successful very fast after about six

maybe 12 months we started thinking

bigger Miguel and I said we'll take this

national we went to our landlord said

I'm not interested we asked for $20

million we said we'll split the business

50/50 he wasn't interested so we started

and and very soon after he said I'll buy

it from you and we started planning this

and you drew this on a whiteboard.

Miguel drew this on the wall, not even a

whiteboard. The walls were made of

glass. This was drawn on the glass. So

all of our walls in green desk were also

whiteboards and cuz everybody was about

creating and inventing. And what you see

here is that social life, commercial,

friends is here. This proves the fact

Ben Horwitz in the interview that you

saw he did with me in the podcast, he

says to me, Adam, you've always had one

idea. And then at the end, at the end,

he apologized said, Adam, I didn't mean

to say you only have one idea. Of

course, you have all these ideas. I

said, Ben, you're right. This is not

that different from what flow is. This

is all about the friends and all about

the living and all about the working

life essentials. Wow, I haven't seen

this for a long time. Fintech, travel,

everything in between. So, for anyone

that's watching uh listening and can't

see, it's a circle that has lots of

circles in it. Um, and it says all the

little circles are like travel, health,

social life, friends, um, co-work

co-workers, supporters,

uh, life essentials, work

rituals, work rituals. Again, you can

read it better than me, but that makes

sense.

>> And this was the idea for we work.

>> This is the idea for we work. So

sometimes people said, "Oh, you grew out

of desk and chairs. You shouldn't have

gone to all these categories." The idea

started, this was before there was one

desk.

What is the essence of this?

>> We wanted to make a world, at least in

our opinion, that really needed

community. This was to deliver on a

mission of of create a world where

people make a life and not just a

living. This was a full life style, life

circle, and it was very aspirational.

And it's how, by the way, for anyone of

our listeners or your listeners that uh

that is starting a business, start with

a vision. Dream as high as you can. Go

all the way to the stars. Cuz if you

don't shoot for the stars, you're never

going to get to the moon. Go far.

Then take a deep breath and go back to

basics. What do I need to do first? What

I need to do second? What I need to do

third? The secret of life and

entrepreneurship is to be able to be in

both places at the same time. On the one

hand, I'm going to go so far. On the

other hand, I'm just starting, so I

better roll up my sleeves and get the

broom and start brooming. It's both of

them. I need to go knock on doors. I

need to go meet people. I need to do

whatever work needs to be done at the

beginning to get the business started.

>> Let's talk about both then. So the you

got the trenches and then you've got

let's say the clouds or the moon as you

refer to it. Why is it important to

dream big? Why is the scale and the size

of the dream important?

>> So I believe it's the secret of

manifestation. So when people ask me

Adam what is the secret manifestation?

How do you make something out of

nothing? I think the order is first you

have to believe. If you and I have a big

idea, first we have to believe it. Then

that takes time to believe. True belief,

by the way. Do you know when belief is

measured?

>> No. When it's really tough. Belief is

not measured on everything. So I

remember this. This is and I've shared

this story before, but your audience is

so wide that I'm sure a lot of them

haven't heard it.

When right after the whole explosion of

we work occurred and it was like 5 days

in and the whole thing was crashing on

us and there's a million articles and

the whole thing is happening my

spiritual teacher who I haven't spoken

at this point almost for 2 years after I

studied with him for 8 years calls me

said Adam how are you doing I said I'm

not doing so well right now it's crazy

he said oh great that's why I called you

I said why did you call me his name is

Eton I said why didn't you call me said

I called you to make sure that you

remembered the two things we learned for

8 years. Said, "Atan, we didn't learn

two things for 8 years. We study twice a

week. We learned endless things." Goes,

"No, you missed it. We learned two

things."

I said, "Please remind me." Goes, "One

was love thy neighbor as yourself, and

the rest is commentary."

It took a second, Fred. I said, "Let's

talk about this for a second. What does

love thy neighbor as yourself mean to

you?

>> Such a famous saying. We've heard it so

many times. When I think about it, the

way that I understand it is to have

empathy and compassion for

all of the complexities, both the good,

the bad, the indifferent, and that which

you don't understand, which is like how

I would treat myself. like I understand

um all the that I'm a complex person and

that I'm multifaceted and imperfect and

that I have strengths and weaknesses and

I kind of I'm okay with all of it and in

others we're less okay with all of it.

Beautiful. Let's say it a little bit

different words but that was right on.

Love that ins means that you first have

to love yourself. To love yourself you

have to acknowledge not only the great

strength that you have that you love,

you must acknowledge your weaknesses,

your failures, your mistakes. And the

only way you can love yourself after all

of those is if you're able to forgive

yourself. So the true secret of loving

oneself is to forgive yourself, to not

carry guilt, to really be able to know

that all of these are lessons for you to

grow and change and go to your next

level from. Back to the sword analogy

that you're a sword and you're getting

forged and every single time you get

hit, you just get stronger. Once you

feel that and you're able to love

yourself, then you're able to love

everybody else. That was the first thing

he told me we learned. The second thing

he said to me which we said before is I

want to remind you that the darkest

moment of the night is a second before

dawn. Belief is not measured when

everything is going up and everybody's

telling you what a genius you are and

everybody wants to be your friend and

everybody wants to be your investor.

Belief is measured when it's all

crashing. when even your friends are

questioning you, when the phone is not

ringing and if a person is able to have

true belief then then he says to me if

you're going to be able to take this

experience and really hold your belief,

hold your positivity, hold your

happiness, be the person I know you can

be, you can't imagine what the future

stored for you. What did you believe in

in your hardest moment?

in God and in myself, in my wife, in my

kids, and in the fact that even though I

don't know at this moment why this thing

happened,

I am going to be stronger for it. And I

remember that morning, this phone call

was was late at night, the next morning

at 6:00 a.m. I walked down to to my

three I went from 13,000 employees to

three employees in one week. I walked

down to the three employees who were my

partners in the family office, not even

employees, partners. I walk down to them

and I'm smiling and they're stressed

out. We would meet every day at 6:00

a.m. that we're done. We're bankrupt.

It's finished. They only joined me 3

months before they came to manage what

they thought was a 5 to10 billion family

office and they're dealing with negative

400 million compounding interest full

bankruptcy situation. and start and I

thought about them all my not all a lot

of friends that I had that were really

there with me and enjoyed with me and

grew with me and made money with me when

I really needed that one small moment a

lot of them weren't there and these

three almost strangers who I didn't

really know were standing right there by

my side and they see me smiling Adam why

are you smiling you they're like they

thought I really lost my mind it was

done and I said I'm smiling because I

remember that the darkest moment of the

night is a second before dawn and I

remember that belief is actually

measured when things are difficult, not

when everything is working. And I

believe and I know it's going to work

out and I don't know how and I don't

know why, but this is all going to work

out for the best. And we're going to

learn a lot from this and it will

actually prepare us when a real

difficulty happens. So, we're ready to

go and deal with it. And about 10 days

later, we started coming out of it in a

very positive way. I want to go to the

top of the story and I really because I

really want to walk through some of the

key moments, but um I noticed your

energy shift a little bit when you

started describing those three people.

>> Here's another thing that I've learned.

If you know haven't you're facing this

as we speak right now. I bet you have

lots of friends.

>> I I bet you have

>> how you define friends.

>> Exactly. Well, I'll tell you a secret

about them and I'm sorry to say that.

We're only going to know which one of

them are your friend and which ones are

not. where if God god forbid you crash

and you actually need them

and then I can also tell you if you're

going to crash or not if you go big

enough really really big you crash

whenever someone says oh Adam it's never

going to happen to me my ego is never

going to get the best of me I'm never

I'm always going to stay in control

young successful people like to say that

to me and say oh you haven't gone big

enough cuz if you really really that's

part of the definition of going really

really big life is not about if we fall

down. We're supposed to fall down. Life

is about how we get up. And the more

times we fall down, the more times we

get to get up. And if you practice

getting up enough times, then you might

not fall. Then you get very good at it.

And then you can go and really go for

the stars. So with the friends,

the reason I my energy changed about

those three, I didn't know them that

well and they stuck by me. I have a

weakness with loyalty. I'm very loyal.

So, if you were there for me when things

were tough, I'm a sucker for that. I'll

be there for you even if you mess up to

a fault almost. A lot of founders who

start businesses have this thing that

pop culture is called imposter syndrome

where they kind of do doubt themselves

and this sort of sits in contrast to

this idea of having belief because

sometimes they don't believe and they

are plagued with insecurities and doubts

and they kind of go back and forward and

they think really am I the person to do

this? I've never done it before. which

is that that comes with pursuing

something great. You had never done it

before. So what do you say to those

people who are struggling with doubt and

cuz they're hearing listen you have to

believe. Did you have doubt when you

when you drew this? A fascinating

question. My level of certainty was so

high when I was doing way work. I I was

sure it was going to work. It was a lot

of times I think people confused my

certainty as a different word. I was

just I was that sure that the product is

needed for the world. When I started

flow which was different and came after

everything and after also we had a

family. When I started we work I had no

kids. It was just Rebecca and I was very

easy to throw myself into something and

work 18 to 20our days 7 days a week and

love every second. There was nothing

else. We work grew

astronomically quickly, really

atypically quickly, especially for that

like type of company. And I I wanted to

hear directly from you like why? What

what happened? What were the factors

that contributed to this meteoric rise?

I think a couple of years after you

founded the company, I became a customer

of it. Um both in New York, but also in

London. What didn't I see? What was what

was it? So we work started in February

of 2010

and it's for anybody listening I think

this is the way that that it should and

could work. I think from the first day

we were so clear as you pointed out with

the circle on on the fact that this

mission is bigger than us. And when

you're part of a mission that's greater

than yourself urgency doesn't just

become something like oh we have to do

it now because I said so or because we

said so. when you feel that your mission

really needs to come out to the world,

then you have to do it now because

there's no time to waste because it's

really important. And we just started

with our first and part of my energy is

I bring people together. I really like

creating community, but I also I love to

move fast when we're clear on the

direction that we're moving and I don't

believe anything is impossible. So when

you connect that mission of something

being greater than yourself speed and

not accepting a no you put those things

together then real magic happens. I

think that's one too.

>> I want an example of that.

>> I'll give you one many examples but

let's let's start let's start early we

work cuz I think this all started work.

But before the example, one more thing I

was going to say that made we work to

answer a question. It's the team. The

team was so dedicated. The team believed

so much. It was their

it was their essence. It was their

experience of being part of something

greater than themselves. And when you

can bring a group of people together to

all run in the same direction, you

almost can't stop anything. Give you an

example. It's our second we work

building. We need to do we need to do

the floor. We only had a $90,000. We

didn't have any more money. And all the

quotes were $200,000 a floor, whatever

the number was. And I said to Miguel and

to the few people there, we have to do

it for this price. And said, you can't.

We got five quotes. It's not the price.

I said, well, how much is the floor? And

everybody's like the floors between 30

to 45,000 where these wood floors was an

important part of the design. I said

why? Said what do you mean why? These

are the quotes. Said well can you break

down the quote for me? I said what do

you mean? Said well how many pieces of

floor? How many nails? How much glue?

How much rubber? How many hours of work

per person? How much does each person

cost? No one could answer. Said okay I

have an idea of how we can negotiate

this differently. I called the top three

guys and said, "Guy, I would like you to

to earn 15% above the cost. I think

that's a fair margin, 15%. Do you

agree?" So, of course, I agree. It's

like, great. And all three of them, by

the way, said yes. I said, "Great. Well,

I'm going to need to see the cost of

each piece. I'm going to go quote it

myself and we're going to get to 15%."

Very quickly, the cost went down to that

first floor instead of 30 to 45,000 was

12,000. The guy tells me, "Adam, no

one's ever worked with me that way."

before you know it, they joined us and

we had our own internal construction

company and we realized that only by

controlling it could we get the right

price and move fast enough. So it's not

taking no for an answer but also using

logic to really look into it. Now it

could be that if I looked into it I

wouldn't have been able to get a better

price but what I'm describing is a

challenge in construction in general and

globally and it's part of the things

that flow is solving today.

>> Elon would call that like reasoning from

first principles. I had a similar story.

>> He would he would call it like that. And

and from what I know in flow, we look up

to Elen as an entrepreneur. We think

he's unbelievable. And whenever someone

gives Elen as an example, say no one is

Alen, that's not an example we use. We

just we look at him for inspiration.

I happen to know that he can put an

engineer cuz I have a friend whose

daughter works for him in SpaceX. He can

put an engineer to work on one problem

for 6 months. one screw, one connection,

but the result ends up being not twice

as simple as anything NASA has done, but

like 500 times as simple and cheaper and

faster and lighter. So, yes, it's going

back. You can call it first principles.

You can call it asking every question,

but if you're the entrepreneur and

you're going to run or if you're an

employee or a partner, ask why.

People don't because they don't want to

be rude or inconvenience others or

they're too concerned with being liked.

So pushing back on a supplier or you

know conventional status quo in any way

is seen to be inconvenient. I'm going to

try to say a different reason why they

don't cuz they don't ask themsel why.

It's going to go back this discussion

can keep going back to the same basics.

A person who's comfortable asking

himself why is he doing something

questioning himself or herself seeing

negative things seeing problems and then

enjoying the process of growing out of

them will have no problem asking someone

else why. And whenever you ask someone

why and they don't want to answer you,

what are you hiding? This is a

discussion. I usually when I go into

topics like this start by telling the

vendor wherever it is, I want you to

make money. No, no one's trying to make

you lose money. But we're on a mission

and if I'm going to pay even 20% more

than I should, then that's 20% less of

another building, another community,

another neighborhood that Floor is not

going to take part in.

>> This really does uh make a lot of sense

to me. We have this um Slack channel in

our company called Paper Walls. And the

whole idea is that we're trying to

encourage our team to push on paper

walls. A paper wall is something that

looks solid but reveals itself to be

completely made of paper. The minute you

try it, you ask why. You push on it. And

there's a a story of a a kid that worked

for me in one of my companies for 4

years. And um he animates video. I said

to him, "How long is it going to take

you to animate a video for us that's 30

minutes?" He said, "It takes 9 days,

right?" He worked for me for 4 years. It

took him 9 days to animate the video. We

decide we want to launch a weekly

channel. I need him to do it in 3 or 4

days max so that the rest of the team

can do it. I say to him, "How long is it

going to take you?" He says, "9 days."

And then because we had established this

culture in our company of pushing on

paper walls, I said to him, "Why?" And

do you know what he said to me? I think

I said something like, "What would it

take to do it in two?" And he went,

"Stephen, you just need to buy me a new

laptop. I have an old laptop." I

thought, "Fucking hell. I've been paying

him for 4 years and he's been think

about how much time I've lost in those

four years just simply because I didn't

ask that question. But also to your

point, he never mentioned it. He never

knew he was in a paper wall himself.

First year of we work, we opened one

building. Hm. Year nine of we work, we

open two buildings a day in 130 cities,

50 countries, 70 languages, 100,000

square foot per building. So that's

200,000 square foot a day, 20,000 square

meter for your European listeners a day.

A lot of the same people who were only

capable doing the one and two particip

were leaders by that time of of being

able to do one of the fastest physical

global growth the world's ever seen.

Same people as you learn to in your

words go through paper walls as you

learn that anything is possible suddenly

this is the secret of high growth and

momentum whatever you can do today if

your company starts growing fast you'll

be shocked what you'll be able to do in

3 months 9 months and in two years

you're going to look back and not

believe that that was your capacity and

I keep telling people and they tell me

oh I can't do this and this takes 3

months I say guys I've seen this done

before I know we can do it it's easier

now I've already been there now you just

need to believe and goes back to the

belief then we're going to need to put

the systems and the processes and today

with technology and this is where I

think AI is very exciting you could

shortcut a lot of these things and and

do a much better work but back to what

you said about your company I bet when's

the last time you sat with them in a

circle how many employees

>> about 200 in total

>> so 200 is a big number but if you took

30 of them

>> sat in a room

>> and actually asked them what are you

working on personally what is your

internal paper wall what is your

internal challenge what's stopping you?

And they got comfortable talking about

it. And then as a group, first of all,

all their peers would hear and before

you know it, their peers would help

them. Hey, I remember that you said that

this is a child for you're insecure. You

don't talk in public. You're a little

judgmental. You're too hard on yourself.

Every person has another story. Before

you know it, the moment you get them

used to grow internally, it will affect

your business to grow externally.

In we work, the business grew faster

than I could grow.

That's where everything went wrong. I

actually think whenever a company grows

faster than its founder, one of two

things would occur. Either it will crash

because that's what happens. Or if

somehow miraculously that founder is

able to keep it all together, in my

experience, they're not fulfilled and

happy.

And if they're not fulfilled and happy,

why do it? How important for the

founders listening and for the people

that want to build or become is hard

work? Because there's a real debate

around hard work. You know, some people

say, you know, work life balance is is

the ultimate. Some people say if you're

a founder, you got to give 100 hour

weeks. Ah, by the way, new answer to

that question.

It is the most important thing. But we

have to define hard work. Hard work as a

founder is not just limited to how many

hours you put in the office. Hard work

as a founder is how much time do you put

on the business? How much time are you

putting on yourself? As you grow, you

will be a better leader. You will be a

better money raiser. You will be a

better express. You'll express your

business better. So hard work is the

only way to do it. And you can't be 50%.

And here's something else that your

founders know. When I had to decide if

I'm doing flow again or not, the reason

it was so hard is cuz I knew that

there's no such thing as being 80% in or

90% in. Either you're 100% in and you're

all in or it's not going to work. So how

important is hard work? most important

thing. What is hard work? Some of it is

on the business, some of it is on you.

If you're married, it's also on your

relationship. If you have kids, it's

also with your kids. By the way, for

those listeners who have kids, if you're

ever wondering what you need to work on,

just listen to your kids. They know.

There you alluding [clears throat] to

this like sort of magical thing that

happens when one focuses on something.

You were saying if you're like 90% in,

it like doesn't work, but if you're 100%

in, it works. What is the the magic that

isn't obvious with that?

>> When you're 100% in, there's no time for

doubt. There's no time for questions.

There's no time for fear cuz you're so

in it.

When you're, oh, I can find this work

life balance while doing it, you're not

going to do something great. And if you

are, if you were to achieve something,

it's not close to your potential. But

again, I'm redefining what 100% in

meant. We talked about Warren Buffett.

Was he not 100%? And of course he is.

Does he have a full schedule? No way. He

keeps it open so he can have the

important meetings, so he can read, so

he can connect.

There are different ways to be 100% in.

But you must in life, in my opinion, be

100% in. It's why I love surfing. In

surfing, when you're on the board on a

wave, if you're not present and you're

not in flow, you're knocked off that

board.

>> What about founders that are doing two

different businesses, pursuing two

different missions?

>> Remember what I told you? We say in

flow, you're not Elen. I would tell them

you're not Elen. Elen can do two

different very few people. I know I he's

one of the only examples I have. Jack

Dorsey. Some of the best on the planet

can do. But uh it's very hard to do two

businesses at the same time. It's hard

enough to do one. And I guess even in

those cases, they built up tremendous

resources by doing one really, really

well. Again, my question about I don't

know which founder you're thinking, but

you've met people like that. Really,

where I when I've met people doing two

that are somewhat succeeding, they're

spending no time on their own personal

growth. So, the extra time they have

because they did their first business so

well, they're using it to do another

business, which usually in my experience

is an excuse not to actually experience

life for what it is. If you're already

doing one and it's meaningful and it's

fulfilling, why do you need another?

What are you hiding from? What is it

that you're not actually doing would be

my question. Now, if they maybe there's

a maybe they're a miracle. Hello. I

wasn't able to make that finance

meeting. Can you tell me what I missed?

What I have in front of me is Whisper

Flow's new notetaker. And for me, it's

been an absolute game changer. I spend

most of my life sat in very, very long

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sit in podcasts where lots of very

interesting things get said and I need

to focus on the conversation. What

whisper flows notetaker does for me is

it captures the entire context of

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this sort of broader context of

everything that's happening in my life.

And it's an incredible incredible

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We often say, you know, in one end

you're saying go fast. And I hear that

from great founders like yourself and

Elon and those guys. They say go fast,

push on paper walls, go as fast as you

can, but then also there's other areas

where you go, you have to go slow to go

fast, but also know your weaknesses. I

obviously did not succeed in building

great technology in Weiwork. That is a

known fact. So if I'm going to partner

again and I'm going to build a business

larger than we work, put the right

partners.

>> Know what you don't know.

>> Know what you don't know and let them

lead. When we hired our CTO, we had four

different CTOs. I'll let Ben do the

final interview.

>> Okay, this is what I was going to ask

because one of the things I hear from

founders a lot is they know they don't

know X. Let's say it's finance and then

they do an interview with someone and

the person says, "I'm the best at

finance." They have no idea if they're

the best at finance because they don't

know finance, the founder. So, what did

you do to mitigate the trap of

accidentally hiring someone that you

weren't able to assess their competence?

>> I chose partners that say the truth.

when Mark and Ben and I do a board

meeting and Mark is our board member and

Ben joins us.

>> For context, I should say Mark and Ben

are two of the world's most famous

investors and they have backed you with

your new venture flow. Um yeah, just

>> Mark and Ben have invested $470 million

into FL at the series A and series B.

And I, Adam, and my family personally

invested $350 million because part of

when we created the the the business

together, we wanted to be aligned. We

buy together, we sell together, we do

everything together.

>> [sighs and gasps]

>> We have our board meetings. They usually

start at 8:00 a.m. They end at 5:00.

Very long board meeting. We talk about

everything. We love it as a team. We

really respect them. We truly prepare

for these meetings. We don't spend too

much time cuz again, when you're really

busy, you don't have time. So, it's not

like we spend a month, we go a week

before, look, take stock of everything

we did that quarter. It's always

shocking to see how much you did. Cuz

when you're not really measuring, you're

just doing. When you stop for a second

and look what you did, like, wow, we did

quite a lot in 3 months. So, very

useful. We put together our board decks.

We send them to them a few days before

they actually read them. And then they

come for the meeting. So it's like 8:30

to 5. And then when it's done, I go to

dinner with the two of them. And the

dinner starts by me saying, "We sit down

usually wherever it is. Please tell me

what I can do better." And the first

time I asked them, they were a little

bit uncomfortable. The second time I

literally remember Mark going like this.

Mark Andrew like this, like he was

ready. Ben taking out his notes.

That's a true partnership and we do it

every single time. And when you have the

previously you said some of the biggest

investors in my opinion A6Z number one

investor in the planet and if you're an

entrepreneur today and and you can

that's who you want your money from. If

you're an entrepreneur today and you

take it from Benchmark the company that

took me out that took Travis Superstar

out. Jack Dorisy out

>> Travis from Uber Jack

>> Travis from Uber. Jack Dorsey from

Square, Twitter, Block and and many more

and many more. So when you choose your

investors, look at their history. Are

they the kind that support entrepreneurs

like you? Are they going to take you to

the next level or do they have a history

that actually clashes with the

entrepreneur? If they have a history

that clashes with the entrepreneur, park

them. So there was two two key things I

pulled out from there. The first was

around this idea of like knowing when to

go fast and slow and you use technology

as an example. The second thing which

was opened up the story about um A16Z is

the right people and partners.

>> So important more if I had to choose

one. Right investors, right employees,

right partners. Most important thing.

>> What did you learn about employees? Like

what is a great team member?

>> If I have a problem with an employee,

there's only one person to blame and

that's me.

>> And what are the mistakes that you made

in choosing employees? I think it's how

I was leading that I've been learning

more about. Where I used to lead from

top to bottom, I now I'm learning how to

lead bottom to up. What's the

difference?

>> Top to bottom means you think because

someone reports into you, they have to

do what you say. But it's not true. This

is not a dictatorship. They have free

will. They can go work. If they're

talent, if you hired someone, they're

really talented, they'll go work

elsewhere. Especially great leader. The

more talented they are, the more the top

to bottom does not work. They they won't

be willing to do it. They shouldn't.

Great talent is not willing to be

managed like this. Gray talent wants to

be inspired, wants me to see the full

version of themselves even more than

they see it. And they want the room to

make mistakes, but also to grow. But

they also need feedback. If you have

someone amazing and they're [ __ ] up.

Sorry. They're miss

>> You can swear.

>> I can swear. Yeah. My kids are going to

listen. It's all good. They're [ __ ]

up. Are you going to tell them or

because you're not comfortable with

conflict? you're going to wait for 90

days and every time they're going to

make that mistake, you're going to get

so upset that by the time you

communicate to them, it's too late. The

moment they made a mistake, if you

respect them, give them the feedback cuz

that's the best thing for them. By the

way, when you give them the feedback,

give them room to give you feedback. If

you're going to manage these employees

and you want to attract the best talent

in the world,

remember that power comes from

influence, not control. If you think

they need to do what you said because

you're their boss, you've already lost

and it's a matter of time till it

doesn't work out. If they're okay with

it, just because you're the boss, you

have to tell them what they do and they

accept that power, they're not the right

employee for you and you're not the

right boss for them. There's no chance

you're getting the best out of them. One

of the um parts in your journey that I

have reflected on a lot because it's a

fascinating story is the day that you

meet Massa at SoftBank and I'm I'm keen

to understand the context of where the

business was before you met Massa at

SoftBank. That particular story has

always inspired me for a multitude of

different reasons. Um but where was the

business at? Was it It was um 2017. I

want to tell you about the day I met

Mustang. I'm going to connect it to I

think the biggest mistake I ever made in

Weiwork. I'll bring it together. Masa is

one of the best investors in the world.

He's also one of the biggest investors

in the world. In my story, Masa is the

hero even though a lot of people who

didn't know the story correctly might

have misunderstood. So in my story, Masa

took a bet on me and and he did amazing

and he deserved to have become very

successful from it. And he leads

SoftBank.

>> Masa is the leader of SoftBank. So if

you want a little history of Masa, Masa

is the leader of SoftBank. He becomes

very well known to the world where he

buys a tech conference actually in Vegas

and he buys this tech conference for I

think about 880 million and at the same

time he has his own tech businesses and

he owns a phone company and he starts

growing and growing. He's famous to have

gone to Steve Jobs and said I'm going to

take the iPhone. When the iPhone just

came out he knew it was going to be a

hit and I'm going to give it to every

subscriber in Japan. He invents the

leasing model for it and gives an

iPhone. Then everybody signs to his

service cuz everybody wanted the iPhone.

So a lot of things and then he gives

Jackma $20 million that over time I

think becomes 200

>> for Alibaba.

>> For Alibaba which at its peak is worth

about 80 billion.

>> Wow.

>> So at the time when I meet Masa, this is

2016. Let's start with the night before.

The night before I met Masa in New York

City, I have a board meeting the day

before. This is the old board and we're

all sitting together. I just raised at

16 I raised maybe six months before at

16 billion valuation.

>> How big we work?

>> It's about to do that year about 950

million in revenue. And the reason I

know is cuz we were doubled in revenue

every single year. So we work the

business model was working very well and

the four walls were working very well.

>> What's the distinction sorry between the

four walls and everything else. When you

have a retail business, you could have

your stores could be doing really well.

Your state not making money

>> and what's the

>> state the so let's say you're in New

York City. So let's talk high growth for

a second. When you're growing as fast as

we're growing, you're always putting new

buildings on the map.

>> A new building has a ramp up.

>> Usually ramp up of a retail store or a

food or a restaurant could take two

years, three years. And we like to talk

about ROI, return on investment and how

long does it take. A great time to

return your investment would be 24

month, 36 month and then it can grow. We

work at its peak was returning its money

somewhere between 6 month to 9 month and

then afterwards it was going up to 12

month and 18 month. So if you're going

to grow, we we grew in New York City to

130 buildings. So you can have 30

buildings. If the following year you're

adding 30 more buildings, those new 30

have to per definition lose money for at

least the first 6 month if not 9 months.

So you could be very profitable in these

buildings but not profitable in these

because they need time. Which means this

New York City the city doesn't look as a

city profitable or the country if you're

looking at your P&L doesn't look as a

country profitable. Which is why in a

high growth business you got to get very

specific and in the details and you got

to really understand what's working,

what's not. Even in a building you can

have one floor that's profitable cuz you

opened it first and the new floor that

you opened after not profitable yet.

Weiwork's technology was never able to

count this way. Flow's technology, if I

threw it on Weiwork today, I can tell

you which square foot is, I forget which

building is profitable, which floor is

profitable. I can tell you which corner

is. It knows everything cuz it's a

connected system. It's not disconnected.

[gasps]

Back to what we're saying.

I'm sitting with the board and we decide

that we want to turn the business, we're

going to go out and raise money, turn

the business profitable, and take it

public. How are you going to turn it

profitable? All you have to do in a high

growth business that's working to turn

it profitable is stop growing. You just

stop adding new buildings and you give

time to all the buildings to catch up.

Remember I explained that in we work

your problem was not demand, it was

supply. So the moment you don't add more

supply, the demand is greater than the

supply, everything fills up. The moment

everything fills up and you didn't add

anything new, you go cash flow positive.

As simple as that. So, we sit in that

board and we decide that I'm going to go

and raise and the number was 3 to 400

million, stop the growth, meaning stop

signing leases, maybe even move to

management deals, something we'll talk

about in floor in a second. And

and then take it public. This is 2016.

That was the the day before. The same

time at some point Masa's right-hand

guy, his name is Ron Fischer, sends a

email, a text to one of our guys and

says, "Hey, Masa wants to come see

Adam." This is at the same time that

Masa is raising the vision fund. For

those who don't know, the vision fund

was his hundred billion dollar venture

fund, largest venture fund ever raised.

Masa wants to see Adam. Say, "Great."

And we schedule 90 minutes in the

morning, the next morning. And we do we

do the we get ready in the morning. Masa

is coming. Everyone's excited. They're

like, "This is amazing. Maybe that

investment we just talked about

yesterday will come today." His team

says, "Just to let you know, there will

be no discussions of investing." So,

okay, no problem. As it gets closer to

the morning, we keep getting text

messages. He's not going to have 90

minutes. He's going to have 75 minutes.

He's going to have 60 minutes. He's

going to have half an hour.

I'm like, "Okay, whatever it is, sounds

great." The same time, President Trump

wins for the first time. This is the end

of December. And Masa had a meeting with

them. They wanted to talk about the

future of America. Said, "I'm so sorry.

I have a meeting with Trump, President

Trump, and I only have 12 minutes."

Again, we all find ourselves in

situations like this when, "Oh my god, I

had all this plan and I was going to do

this tour and I was going to show these

numbers. I'm going to do all these

things and suddenly it all changes." I

take a deep breath. [snorts]

Let's make it the best 12 minutes we

can, but I can't help myself. I go,

"Tell me something, Masa. If you're

meeting President, future President

Trump, do you have Jared Kushner

introducing you to him first? He goes,

"Adam, it's so funny you're saying that.

Everybody told me that it's better if

Jared introduces me. I don't know him.

We've been trying to get in touch." No.

I said, "Give me a second." I'm very

lucky to to count Jared as as one of my

close friends. Jared's married to Ivanka

Trump.

>> Jar's married Jared married to Ivanka

Trump and he's the adviser, I think, to

the president. But right now he's

helping to peace both in the Middle East

and in Europe. So I text Jared and I was

like, "Masa is here. Ta ta da. We spend

5 minutes on that." Jared says, "No

problem. Send him. I will introduce him

to the future president." Now we have 7

minutes left. I say, "Masa, we only have

7 minutes. We're only going to stay

downstairs, but this is we work." And he

looks at me. He goes like this. Smells

there. He goes, "You know what this

smells like?" And I'm like, "Oh no, what

is he going to say? They were serving

waffles. Is that is he going to say it

smells like waffles? Like what is he

going to say? He goes smells like

dreams. This is a factory rework is not

an office space. It's a factory of

dreams.

And I'm like he's speaking your

language.

>> Oh no. Not my language. One step above

my language. He took he took the dreamer

and went one step above the dreamer. He

out did the he he Adam. [laughter]

He killed it. And I'm like, "Oh yeah, I

love the smell of dreams. This no one's

ever defined the business better than

that." He goes, "Look, Adam, we don't

have time. I'm driving up there to 50th

Street, whatever, wherever it was. Do

you want to come with me to the car?

We'll talk in the car."

>> Did he not go around the building? And

>> couldn't have time 7 minutes. We were

only downstairs in the lobby, the

entrance. But but if you had the

opportunity in 2017, 2016 to walk into

our HQ, the energy was electric. You

could not walk in there and not feel I I

never felt a factory of dreams, but I

felt community and people coming

together. It felt like people are doing

their life's work. It didn't feel like a

work environment. It felt like people

are really connected. And when you make

a connected environment, then it really

takes things to the next level and

everybody wants to be there. So that's

what it was. It's not what it is today,

but that's what it was. So he says,

"Come with me to the car." I said, "No

problem." I get into the car and I

remember the back of my hand, they said,

"No investing." thing. His team said,

"Don't talk about raising money." He

goes, "So I start talking build where we

work." He's like, "Adam,

what's the number?" Said, "What do you

mean?" Goes, "What's your valuation and

how much money are you raising?" Goes,

"I'm I'm here to do business." Said,

"Your team said like, ah,

I am I am the boss. I've done this many

times myself. I'm the boss. Let's talk

about it." [sighs and gasps]

I said, "Well, listen. We have our last

valuation was 16 billion. We have a we

have we just launched China. That's a $2

billion company. We have Latin America

and we're in Europe. We have a global

company and then we have a China entity.

Goes great. How much are you raising? I

said 3 to 400 million. 3 to 400 million.

That's that's that's not going to work.

Don't you want to build a global

business? I was like of course I would

love to build a global business. Goes

don't you have a business in China? I

said of course. Said what about Japan?

Said I don't have a business in Japan

yet. He said I think it's going to work

very well in Japan. I said, "I'm sure

it's going to work well in Japan. It's

working everywhere, but I don't have the

team." Goes, "What about Southeast

Asia?" He said, "Sounds amazing, but

I've never been there." He goes, "Well,

I think it's going to work there." I

said, "Again, I'm sure it's going to

work there, but and before you know it,"

he says,

"I think we should do about 3 billion."

And that was a big number. Remember

three, we were we were I was the night

before with the board 300 to 400

million. Let's take less than number

one. And again, I don't blame myself for

any of this. Every decision I made was

my decision. He's an investor. He saw a

great business and he wanted to go big.

I respect that. I've done it myself. Not

at those numbers, but I've done it

myself. [gasps]

If you decide you have a mission or a

vision and you're going to go raise out

300 million and the next day someone

offers you 3 billion, before you say

yes, take a deep breath and ask yourself

again that question of why and what is

my intention? What is that going to do

to the business? and am I ready to take

that much? And so it says 3 billion. We

then keep talking about all the

different needs and the different stuff.

It ends up after this is now we met for

12 minutes and the ride is um 16

minutes.

So uh if yeah total 28 to 36 minutes the

whole thing and

we agree on the he says 4 billion 4.2 to

be exact.

>> 4.2 2 billion what

>> dollars

>> that he wants to invest in. We work

topco, we work China, we work Japan, and

we work Southeast Asia. Remember, we

were a cash machine. You put cash into

us and we that just to I'll go back to a

second, but we were doing 980 million

that year. We hit our numbers. We

forecasted we're going to do 1.8 billion

next year. We did our 1.8 billion. The

it was working so well. The model, all

you needed was cash to build it. You

needed to build these spaces and you

needed to do if you're going to grow

that big. He had big aspirations and I

had big aspirations.

>> Did you tell him that? Did you tell him

that it was a cash machine?

>> No, you didn't need to.