我得到过的最佳建议

6. 布莱恩•切斯基和约翰•多纳霍

eBay首席执行官约翰•多纳霍于2012年通过马克•安德森认识了Airbnb的首席执行官布莱恩•切斯基。安德森是位有影响力的风险资本家，目前担任eBay董事，他的公司安德森-霍洛维茨（Andreessen Horowitz）在Airbnb有投资。多纳霍说，他当时想结交“硅谷最好的创始人”，因为他有关于创新和设计的问题要请教，于是安德森安排两位首席执行官碰了面。他俩成了不太可能的朋友——多纳霍 53岁，曾在达特茅斯大学（Dartmouth）主修经济学，获得过斯坦福大学（Stanford）的MBA学位，还在贝恩公司（Bain & Co.）工作了将近20年。切斯基32岁，毕业于罗得岛设计学校（the Rhode Island School of Design），为了支付房租才创办了Airbnb公司。正是他俩跨越年龄、跨越行业、相互依赖的关系促使《财富》杂志开始寻找其他亦师亦友、坦诚直言，但偶尔也互相鼓励的好朋友。——S.N.M.

多纳霍：布莱恩提到（在Airbnb上）享受“七星级体验”，我反过来（去eBay）想：“如果我们是七星级体验，它会是什么样？”在遇到布莱恩这前，我是问不出这个问题的。

切斯基：我确实不知道怎么发展壮大一家公司。我和各种各样的很多人谈过，可当我遇到约翰——神奇的地方在于，一个人能认识很多人，但你想要确定得到的建议跟你挂得上钩，而且就在当下。在我的市场上找到拥有眼下真实经验的当代人，这得多幸运？不久前，约翰给我们的新组织的运营提供了帮助：我该怎么集中运营？怎么给团队瘦身？我需要哪些不同的职能？我怎样管理一支团队？我怎样管理董事会？我甚至从没有考虑过所有这些事情，因为你开公司时不会考虑商业的问题，不会考虑公司的问题，你考虑的是产品。

多纳霍：创始人拥有异常明确的方向；他们通常在产品和设计方面十分出色。他们灵活，知道怎样加快执行的速度。他们有更短的周期。所以我认为，我们对话的一部分内容和硅谷正在发生的事情将最佳小企业与最佳大企业连接了起来。事实是，大公司能从新创企业那里学到很多东西，也能从它们的创始人那里受益。我认为的确存在互惠关系。

6. Brian Chesky & John Donahoe

eBay CEO John Donahoe met Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky in 2012 through Marc Andreessen, the influential venture capitalist who sits on eBay's (EBAY, Fortune 500) board and whose firm, Andreessen Horowitz, is an investor in Airbnb. Donahoe says he was seeking to meet "the best founder in Silicon Valley" because he had some questions on innovation and design, and Andreessen put the two CEOs together. They make an unlikely duo -- Donahoe, 53, was an econ major at Dartmouth, got an MBA at Stanford, and worked at Bain & Co. for nearly 20 years; Chesky, 32, graduated from the Rhode Island School of Design and started Airbnb to help pay his rent. Their intergenerational, intercorporate, interdependent relationship was what inspired Fortune to look for other pairs of non-colleagues who provide each other with good counsel, honest feedback, and the occasional encouraging word. --S.N.M.

Donahoe: Brian talks about having a "seven-star experience" [on Airbnb]. And I went back [to eBay] and said, "If we had a seven-star experience, what would that look like?" I wouldn't have asked that before I met Brian.

Chesky: I didn't really know how to scale a company. I had talked to a number of different people, but when I met John -- the amazing thing is, you can meet a lot of people, but you want to make sure the advice you get is relevant to you, and it's contemporary. How lucky could I be to find somebody in my market, a contemporary, with real lessons for right now? John helped me recently with the new organization we have for operations: How do I centralize operations and lean out the team? What do I need in different functions? How do I run a team? How do I manage a board? All these things I never even thought about because when you start a company, you don't think about the business, you don't think about the company, you think about the product.

Donahoe: Founders have incredible clarity of direction; often they're great at product and design. They're nimble, and they know how to drive execution faster. They have a faster cycle time. So I think part of what's happening both in our conversations and what's happening in the Valley is a bridging between the best of the small companies and the best of the large companies. The reality is big companies can learn a lot from startups and can benefit from founders. And I think the reciprocal is probably true.