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本帖最后由 大力Summer 于 26-10-2018 21:23 编辑
该篇传记逻辑性不强，后面中文部分纯属想到哪写哪。各位随意看一看。但是我依然非常推荐这本书！
鞋狗，你值得拥有。
About the Author
One of the world’s most influential business executives, Phil Knight is the founder of Nike, Inc. He served as CEO of the company from 1964 to 2004, as board chairman through 2016, and he is currently Chairman Emertius. He lives in Oregon with his wife, Penny.
The Summary
Life In Oregon
The story began in 1962. Oregon was the kind of place where nothing significant happened, but it was still a good place to call home, Buck said. He was not sure what he wanted to be but knew he wanted to be successful.
His central fantasy was to become a successful athlete, but, unable to reach it, began to think about how he could make his work feel like an athlete’s. He was convinced that this was possible and decided to pursue that goal, no matter how crazy it might seem to other people.
An Unusual Idea
Buck decided to tell his father about his crazy idea one morning. He had written a text about importing sneakers from Japan.
He planned to travel to Japan to investigate the viability of his idea and experiment with other cultures.
However, he needed his father’s approval and financial aid to cover the costs. To his surprise, his father agreed, though it seemed more open to the tourist part of the journey than to the business idea.
The rest of the family did not support Buck. His grandmother argued that the Japanese were still nervous about the war and that he would risk arrest. His younger sisters did not seem to care much about their trip.
The following weeks were spent planning the trip, and he spent most of his time reading and gathering information about Japan. When he was not reading, he was running, his greatest hobby. Also, he also decided to call his classmate, Carter, to be his partner in the business.
It’s 1962 and Phil Knight is on an after-graduation around-the-world trip. In November 1962, he visits the Onitsuka Company in Kobe, Japan. Fascinated by the quality of their shoes and, moreover, their affordability, he arranges a meeting with Onitsuka’s executives.
They slept at friends’ homes for many days and bought a ticket to Honolulu. Arriving at the first destination of the trip, Hawaii, they were charmed. Life there was much better than they thought, which is why they decided to stay longer than planned.
They got jobs selling encyclopedias and delayed going to Japan a little bit. They decided to rent an apartment, which cost $ 100 a month. Buck’s shyness made it very difficult to sell the encyclopedias, and he decided to leave for Japan.
He tells them that he’s a representative of Blue Ribbon Sports and that he’s interested in buying the exclusive rights for distribution of Onitsuka’s Tiger shoes in the western US.
But, what he doesn’t tell them is the more interesting part and the stuff entrepreneur’s dreams are made of.
You see, Blue Ribbon Sports is not exactly a company. It’s a business operated by Knight in his parents’ house. And he’s not exactly a representative: he is, basically, the company. Many years before “Pre-Suasion,” Knight pulls a trick out of Robert Cialdini’s books on influence. And he does a heck of a good job!
The first two pairs of Onitsuka Tiger shoes are mailed by Knight to Bill Bowerman in an attempt to get an endorsement. He is the second most important person in our story, a legendary track, and field coach at the University of Oregon and trainer of more than 50 Olympians.
He is, also, the co-founder of Nike, Inc.
Because, once he receives the shoe samples Bowerman doesn’t merely want to endorse them – he wants to take a part in selling them!
Soon, business is blooming and Onitsuka Tiger stops looking at Blue Ribbon Sports as an ally, but as a competitor. Cue the long legal struggles, and Knight’s and Bowerman’s attempt at Plan B: if they can’t distribute high-quality low-cost athletic shoes, why shouldn’t they create them themselves?
Fortunately, Plan B turns out to be even better plan than Plan A. And it is all due to Knight’s entrepreneurship skills, and Bowerman’s innovator’s brain. Have you ever heard of the “Waffle Sole”? Well, Bowerman invented it.
And that’s how “Nike” was born.
The First Full-Time Employee
With this growth, Buck received a letter from a man named Jeff Johnson, saying that he had liked the tennis a lot and that some people wanted to know where they could buy similar pairs.
Buck offered him a job as a salesman and Johnson resigned from his job to devote himself full-time to Blue Ribbon. At that time, running was not a very popular sport, and Johnson wanted to make a living selling sneakers, which was not easy.
However, he believed he could do that with Blue Ribbon.
By this time, Buck’s bank was having problems with Blue Ribbon’s accelerated growth.
The bank argued that Buck’s business was expanding rapidly and could no longer be sustained with so little capital.
Buck was determined to expand his business and assured Onitsuka that he would be the best tennis distributor in the West.
Buck did not want to depend on the bank, and Onitsuka’s delays in his deliveries were not helping. He had little time to sell the orders and at the same time paid his loan, so he started looking for another job if Blue Ribbon failed.
Buck got a job at Price Waterhouse and invested a large part of his paycheck into the Blue Ribbon, so the company kept growing.
Being an accountant, he studied the operation of other companies and thus learned about their successes and failures. He learned that the biggest cause of business failure was lack of capital.
Johnson had clients in 37 states. The company kept growing and soon needed a bigger office. Johnson was apprehensive, wondering what Buck’s prospects were for Blue Ribbon.
Buck said Blue Ribbon would likely become a sporting goods company with offices on the West Coast and even Japan.
Buck also gave Johnson a sales target of 3250 pairs of shoes and, if he sold that number, would be allowed to open a new store. Johnson hit his target and Buck allowed him to open a Blue Ribbon store in Santa Monica.
Buck traveled to Japan and renewed his three-year contract with the Japanese and placed an order for 5,000 pairs of sneakers at a price of $ 20,000.
Trying To Capture Resources
As time went on, growing sales of the Blue Ribbon allowed Buck to earn a salary. As he had to sign a new agreement with Onitsuka, he traveled back to Japan and renewed the contract for another three years.
This three-year deal was short and inconsistent, and Buck thought about hiring a lawyer to take a look, but since time was short, he signed the contract.
He was focused on expanding his company despite little capital, and so he needed more money. Buck asked the bank to lend him $ 1.2 million, which it declined.
With that, Buck began looking for other sources of capital, and all he could do was get a friend to lend him $ 80,000.
Oh… we’re running ahead of ourselves.
That’s how a pair of great nameless shoes was designed. But, in order to be registered at the U.S. Patent Office, it had to have a name. It came into a dream of the first Blue Ribbon employee, Jeff Johnson, a day before the paperwork was filed.
The Rise Of Nike
The Japanese company was not impressed with the growth of Blue Ribbon, but a bank offered them a small line of credit.
Buck was unhappy with his supplier and knew that his company needed a long-term solution for the manufacture of sneakers. He was advised to look for other tennis makers, and so he did.
He soon found a replacement for Onitsuka, a Mexican factory called Canada. He signed a new contract with Canada and then asked them for three thousand pairs of sneakers.
The new tennis company had developed a new design and a new name, Nike. As Blue Ribbon needed to increase its capital, then came the idea of making an IPO and sell shares of the company to the general public.
However, Buck thought early for an IPO and preferred to seek more loans, which could be converted into shares by creditors. Undaunted, he worried even more, as Canada’s sneakers were not very good, which caused sales to drop quickly, leaving Buck looking for a better supplier.
Buck then met Nippon Rubber, and his employees agreed to do some samples before Buck made a bigger order.
The samples were of acceptable quality, and Buck ordered thousands of sneakers.
In 1972, the National Association of Chicago Sports Goods exhibition was born, and Buck’s new tennis line needed to do very well.
At the show, the new Nike sneaker line manufactured by Nippon Rubber launched, but regarding quality, they were inferior to the competitors and only sold thanks to Blue Ribbon’s reputation.
Already in the running tests for the 1972 Olympics, Blue Ribbon made Nike jerseys and donated sneakers to the athletes as a way to introduce the new brand. The hope was that athletes would continue to wear their Nike sneakers.
Consolidating The Brand Entering The Chinese Market
Still, in 1976, Buck received the visit of Frank Rudy and Bob Bogert, who brought a new design of running shoes, with an air bubble in the sole.
Buck was skeptical at first, but as soon as he heard that Adidas had turned down the two inventors, he decided to hire them and started using that design in some Nike sneakers.
That year, Buck sent employees to various college basketball and football teams in the country to sign sponsorship deals.
Nike continued to sign contracts with athletes and players, investing heavily in advertising and thus increasing demand for their sneakers.
In the middle of 1977, Nike’s lenders wanted money, so they pushed the directors to make the IPO, the company’s public offering.
As he thought about it, Buck received a letter from the federal government stating that Nike owed $ 25 million to the government, a situation that was resolved because of his connections to the government.
That year, Nike sales reached $70 million.
It was then that Buck met Chang, a man known for bringing American companies to the Chinese market. He advised Buck to write to the Chinese government since being invited was the only way to get a business to China.
The Chinese government then sent his invitation to Buck.
In China, Buck and his team met the old factories in the country.
Before returning to the US, Nike signed agreements with two other Chinese factories, and this made it the first US company to be allowed to do business in China in 25 years.
When they returned, the idea of the IPO resurfaced and was soon accepted. On December 2, 1980, Nike made its public offering of shares. The stock price was $ 22 on the first day.
Buck And Nike Today
Forty years later, Phil Knight became one of the largest billionaires in the United States and is no longer the CEO of Nike.
Nike sales are more than tens of billions. Nike clothes and sneakers are all over the world, and the brand has thousands of sponsored athletes.
Over the years, Nike has received some negative reviews about working conditions in its factories but made major changes to adapt and provide better work environments.
Nike opened factories in Saigon in Vietnam to help rebuild the country after the war.
In his memoirs, Phil learned that luck has a role in success, but hard work, good team, and determination are invaluable.
Takeaways
- “Don’t tell people how to do things, tell them what to do and let them surprise you with their results.”
- “Shoe dogs were people who devoted themselves wholly to the making, selling, buying, or designing of shoes. Lifers used the phrase cheerfully to describe other lifers…they thought and talked about nothing else. The average person takes seventy-five hundred steps a day, 247 million steps over the course of a long life – shoe dogs simply wanted to be part of that journey. Shoes were their way of connecting with humanity. What better way of connecting, shoe dogs thought, than by refining the hinge that joins each person to the world’s surface?”
- “No matter the sport – no matter the human endeavor, really – total effort will win people’s hearts.”
- “How many multimillion-dollar companies can you yell out, ‘Hey Buttface,’ and the entire management team turns around?”
- “Somebody may beat me – but they’re going to have to bleed to do it.” – runner Steve Prefontaine
- "You are remembered for the rules you break."
- "If you showed any weakness, any sentimentality, you were dead."
- "Beating the competition is relatively easy. Beating yourself is a never-ending commitment."
- "Fortune favors the brave, that sort of thing."
- "The coward never started and the weak died along the way."
- “But confidence was cash. You had to have some to get some.”
Thoughts
- "If you can't trust the company your son is working for, then who can you trust?"
这句话，让我在看这本书的过程中，第一次无法控制自己的眼泪。Phil在四处筹钱无门的情况下，Woodell的爸爸妈妈拿出了毕生的积蓄支持Phil和Woodell的公司。
这让我想起自己的经历，我没有在任何一个项目里得到这样的支持。或者换句话，我自己都不会如此支持我自己的项目。这是何种信念、信任与支持。
和他们相比，我们还远没有开始征程。
- “Confidence. More than equity, more than liquidity, that's what a man needs. I wish I had more. I wished I could borrow some. But confidence was cash. You had to have some to get some. And people were loath to give it to you.”
自信是需要积累的。在这些年的创业过程中，信心反而不如一开始的时候。出出牛犊不怕虎，说的就是当年的状态。但是因为遇到了太多的失败，太多的挫折，反而越来越不相信自己，做事越来越瞻前顾后，越来越不信任自己做事的能力。
我很能体会作者当时的心情，我也很迫切的需要更多。
这是一本给我启发非常巨大的传记。
周末在Garden City图书馆看这本书，中午的时候和Cherry吃饭。我们第一次见面，也是因为书的原因见面，很有趣。
我跟她说，我来布里斯班之前，是先在线找到工作，然后才直接移民过来的。她说：“哇，你好厉害，你已经比99.999%的人优秀了。” 这句话极大地启发了我。
在她说这句话的时候，我突然顿悟到，为什么她会仅仅因为我提前找到工作这件事，就觉得我很厉害。本质区别在于自我认知与自我意识。
在我的概念里，移民和提前找到工作，是一件理所当然可以做到的事。换句话说，在我的概念里，并不存在，远程就找不到工作，这件事。也因此，我做的所有努力，都基于这个认知。我准备简历，在线投简历，找在线面试的机会，并准备面试。这一系列，都基于我的信心和我的认知。如果我像其他人一样认为，提前找到工作是很难的，那么，产生的区别会有两点：1）我不会朝着提前找到工作这件事努力并准备；2）在找工作的过程中，如果我遇到了困难，我可能会对自我产生犹疑，比如，“这次面试不顺利，果然我就是找不到工作吧。”但我因为我有自信，所以我的反应会是“嗯，这次只是运气不好，或者他们公司没眼光，我再继续投简历就好了，总能找到。”这就会因此产生巨大的差别。
基于这点认知，我突然意识到，我和成功的人的差别，就在这里。
我看鞋狗的过程中，有无数次感动落泪。多数是因为，我能清晰的意识到，如果是我处在Phil的境地里，我大概率会放弃了，我不会像他一样化险为夷，转危为安。我做不到，我真的做不到。魔法实验室，我放弃了，比Phil遇到的情况难吗？没有。租我吧我放弃了，比Phil遇到的情况难吗？没有。
印象最深的是Phil还年轻的时候，也和我一样，需要一边工作一边养着自己的公司。经济如此拮据，时间需要被分割为工作和创业两部分。在我看来这已经是很难坚持继续创业的状况了。而在此时，日本公司还要停止提供货源，要把代理权给另外一个人。如果是我的话，我大概率会直接放弃了，去工作一段时间，再开始。但是Phil没有这么做，借钱去日本寻求机会。我看完这段之后我一直在反思自己，我为什么没有在过去那些经历里，坚持，或者再争取一下？
在过去的很长时间里，我总是对L说，我们要坚持。但是我们突然意识到，“创业要坚持”这种描述本身就存在一些问题。“坚持”这个词，本身就说明，你不够自信，你认为这事是很难的，你不认为这件事是理所当然可以成功的。如果你用这种心态做事，那放弃或者被困难打败的概率就会增加。对于Lib和Jessiay来说，找投资人很难，所以如果从投资人处得到了负面评价，他们会反过来印证自己不擅长融资或者融资这事很难的观点。
抽象来说，我认为每个人都有一个“域”。在我的“域”里，包含“考试第一，轻松移民，海外找工作”等。我遇到这些事时，都会感觉轻松自在，不会犹豫，不会害怕不会担心。在有些朋友的“域”里，可能这些都没有。在Musk的“域”里，包含更困难的事，不仅包含世界各个国家，甚至包含宇宙。
基于此，我接下来要做的事，有几点：
- 扩大自己的“域”。这里包括： - 读更多的成功案例与传记，扩大自己相关的数据库，能够提高自己在遇到困难时候的心态稳定性与判断力
- 提高自信
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发表于 26-10-2018 11:12:03
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楼主
发表于 26-10-2018 11:47:37
发表于 26-10-2018 14:45:54
发表于 27-10-2018 01:44:26
1
最近也是受了刺激，发现很多英文原版书我都已经听/读不动了，深陷在生词的泥藻里，听起来效果是没听懂在讲什么，看书的话也是要不停地查字典，完全读不下去。而Kindle正好带有词典，有的书甚至于有word-wise功能，所以俺义无反顾得投入了kindle的大坑。周六下午在喜马拉雅里播着有声书，然后kindle上对着书，俺开始尝试Summer同学说的那个双管齐下的方法。这么进行起来发现有声书读得太快，如果要一边看原文，遇到生词还卡顿的情况根本无法实现同步。俺就放一点儿有声书，然后暂停，把卡顿的地方生词查一查，文章看一看。看到某些地方还朗读了出来read out loud，这又是Anna同学说的跟读shadowing了。真的才发现朗读令人心情畅快，想来和唱歌是异曲同工的。周六一下午大概2.5hrs才看了5%的书，kindle的生词本里记录了150个生词，当然这里面水分比较大，因为是自动收录，有时候手点错了也就收录进去了，但是100个生词应该还是有的。如果按照这个比例算的话，看完整本书应该会遇到2千个生词，那么如果真的都能掌握，词汇量就可以过万了~！梦想似乎变得很接近了，不过即便每天都能抽出2.5小时这样阅读的话，我还需要20天才能看完这本书呢，更别提掌握生词需要无数次复习。
