Shoe Dog: A Memoir by the Creator of Nike

Fear of failure, I thought, will never be our downfall as a company.

The cowards never started and the weak died along the way. That leaves us, ladies and gentlemen. Us.

still didn’t know exactly what winning meant, other than not losing,

Woodell and I were very different, and yet our friendship was based on a selfsame approach to work. Each of us found pleasure, whenever possible, in focusing on one small task. One task, we often said, clears the mind. And each of us recognized that this small task of finding a bigger office meant we were succeeding.

Fight not to win, but to avoid losing. A surefire losing strategy.

“Next year… when you come… they will be one foot higher.” I stared. I understood. When I returned to Oregon I tried hard to cultivate and grow the management team we had, slowly, with more patience, with an eye toward more training and more long-term planning. I took the wider, longer view. It worked. The next time I saw Hayami, I told him.

Greece, I thought. No question. Greece.

Anything was preferable to not bringing product to market on time.

There were many ways down Mount Fuji, according to my guidebook, but only one way up. Life lesson in that, I thought.