Jeff Bezos, who is heading beyond Amazon, the world's leading company, into space.
The past, present, and future heard directly through his voice

Jeff Bezos recently shocked many people by announcing that he would step down as Amazon CEO.
Despite his fame and influence as the head of one of the world's leading companies, he remained somewhat of an enigma.
"Jeff Bezos: Invention and Wandering" is Jeff Bezos' only book, in which he talks about how he founded and succeeded at Amazon, and the core principles and philosophy of his management.
Additionally, the preface to this book was written by Walter Isaacson, the world-renowned bestselling author of Steve Jobs.
In the introduction, Isaacson summarizes Bezos's story in an accessible way, helping readers first understand how his unique and original ideas came to be and what kind of future he envisions.

People often ask this question:
Is there anyone alive today whose biographies I have written that I would consider to be in the same league as Leonardo da Vinci, Benjamin Franklin, Ada Lovelace, Steve Jobs, and Albert Einstein?
They are all very bright people.
But what makes them special isn't their intellectual ability.
There are plenty of bright people.
So clarity is not such a big deal.
What matters is rich creativity and imagination.
That's what makes a person a true innovator.
Here's why my answer to people's questions is 'Jeff Bezos.'

--- p.8

In late 1999, I was an editor at Time magazine, and we made the somewhat unconventional decision to name Bezos, a world-renowned leader and politician, as our Person of the Year.
I've always believed that the people who have the greatest influence on our lives are those in business and technology.
Even if you didn't see it on the front page of the newspaper often in the early days of your career.
For example, we named Intel's Andy Grove our Person of the Year in late 1997.
Because I felt that the explosion of microchips would have a greater impact on our society than any prime minister, president, or treasury secretary.
But the Time issue with Bezos on the cover was published near the end of 1999.
At the time, the dot-com bubble was beginning to burst, and there were concerns that internet stocks like Amazon would begin to collapse, and my prediction turned out to be accurate.
That's why I asked Time's CEO, Don Logan, whether choosing Bezos was a mistake, a decision that will look foolish in a few years when the internet bubble bursts.
Money replied like this.
"no.
Push your choice forward.
Jeff Bezos is in the customer service business, not the internet business.
He'll be around for decades, long after people have forgotten about the dot-com bubble."
--- p.25~26

Ultimately, it is the challenges, failures, and lack of success that you face that make progress.
In times like these, you have to get up and try again.
Every time you experience setbacks, you get up and try again.
You have to be resourceful.
You must be self-reliant.
You have to break out of the box and invent your own unique way.
There are countless examples of Amazon having to do this.
We've had a lot of failures, and I think Amazon is a great place to fail.
We are very good at failing.
Because I've been practicing a lot.

--- p.64~65

Most of the inventions we make at Amazon happen through this process:
First, someone comes up with an idea, and then other people develop that idea.
If other people object here, citing reasons why it won't work, we address those objections.
It's a very interesting process.
We've always wondered what kind of rewards program would be best for our customers.
Then a software engineer came up with an idea.
The idea was to offer customers unlimited, fast, free shipping.
The finance team modeled the idea, and the results were disastrous.
The shipping cost was too high.
But customers love free shipping.
You have to use your heart and intuition.
You have to take risks.
You have to trust your instincts.
All good decisions should be made that way.
And it has to be done by many people.
It also requires a very humble attitude.
Because being wrong isn't such a bad thing.
It's just another incident.
Amazon has made many mistakes too.
I won't list all the failed experiments here, but countless special things we've invented, including the Fire Phone, have failed.
But great successes make up for thousands of failed experiments.

--- p.75~76

Blue Origin is the most important thing I'm doing right now.
I have strong conviction about this.
At its foundation lies a very simple argument.
This is the argument that 'Earth is the best planet'.
There is an important question we must think deeply about.
"Why should we go to space?" My answer differs from the typical "Plan B" argument: that the Earth's environment is being destroyed, so we need to find somewhere else.
This argument doesn't excite me at all.
When I was in high school, I wrote something like this:
“The Earth is finite.
“If the world economy and population continue to expand and grow, space exploration is the only way forward.” I still believe this.

--- p.126~127

We will always focus on our customers, no matter what.
We will always make investment decisions from a long-term market leader's perspective, unswayed by short-term profits or Wall Street reactions.
We will continuously measure and analyze the effectiveness of our programs and investments, eliminating programs that fail to meet acceptable standards and strengthening our investment in those that deliver the best results.
We will continue to learn from our successes and failures.
When there is a strong possibility of gaining an advantage as a market leader, we will make bold investments rather than timid ones.
Some investments will succeed and some will not, but in either case, we will learn valuable lessons.

--- p.169

Inventions come in many forms and on many scales.
Radical and transformative inventions often empower people to unleash their creativity and pursue their dreams.
That's what most of what's happening now is through Amazon Web Services, Fulfillment by Amazon, and KDP.
Building on these services, we are building a powerful self-service platform.
It's a platform that empowers thousands of people to boldly experiment and achieve things that would otherwise be impossible or impractical.
These innovative, large-scale platforms create tremendous value by creating win-win situations for developers, entrepreneurs, customers, writers, and readers, rather than zero-sum situations where everyone wins and everyone loses.

--- p.263

“Jeff, what happens on the second day?”
This is a question I was asked at our most recent general meeting.
For decades, I've been reminding myself, "Today is the first day."
The name of the Amazon building where I work is Day 1.
When we moved the building, we took that name with us.
I spend a lot of time thinking about this topic.
“The second day is stagnation.
Apathy follows, and then a profound and painful decline.
What follows is death.
This is why it should always be the first day.”
Let me be clear: this type of decline happens extremely slowly.
Well-established companies may experience a second day over several decades, but they will eventually meet their end.
My interest lies in the question, “How do we prevent the second day?”
What techniques and strategies are needed to achieve this? How can we maintain the energy of the first day even within a rapidly growing organization?
--- p.334~335

In business, there are times (and quite often times) when it becomes clear which direction is most efficient, and in those cases, you need to plan and execute accordingly to increase efficiency.
Wandering in business is far from efficient.
But the wandering at this time is not just wandering about doing whatever comes to mind, but wandering that is clearly moving in a certain direction.
It's a wandering driven by intuition, instinct, intuition, curiosity, and the conviction that even if it means getting lost and taking a few detours to find your way, it's worth it if the customer is satisfied.
Wandering is like a counterweight to efficiency, so we need both.
Great discoveries, 'nonlinear' discoveries, are very likely to be made through wandering.

--- p.368

During the current COVID-19 pandemic, much of my time and thought has been focused on how Amazon can help.
I am deeply grateful for the determination and ingenuity our Amazon family has shown as we navigate this situation.
Trust that we will gain insights and lessons from the crisis we face today and apply them as we move forward.

--- p.391