MAD Reads: BUILD by Tony Fadell

MAD Reads! A book Club on design that meets quarterly

Build: An Unorthodox Guide to Making Things Worth Making by Tony Fadell

As a prelude to iPod designer Tony Fadell’s fireside chat with MoMA Senior Curator of Architecture and Design Paola Antonelli on October 22, we will be discussing Fadell's book, Build: An Unorthodox Guide to Making Things Worth Making.

In this candid guide, Fadell outlines a roadmap for starting and managing new ventures, working with hardware, software, and people, navigating failure, and acting decisively in the midst of uncertainty.

As part of the discussion, we will look at some of the book’s key themes:

• Do Fail Learn
• Data Versus Opinion
• Making the Intangible Tangible
• Storytelling
• Marrying F\for Money
• You Can Only Have One Customer
• Building Your Team

A limited supply of complimentary copies are available from MAD; contact mitmad@mit.edu.

MAD Prep

Below are optional activities you can pursue in advance of the meeting to enrich your book club experience:

• Reflect on a time when you moved forward but things didn’t go as expected. What lessons did you learn, and how did those lessons shape your future decisions?
• Fadell states that “college is a time to take risks.” What risks have you taken?
• Fadell asserts, “What you do matters. Where you work matters.” Why does it matter – and to whom?
• Consider what it means to be exacting and expecting great work. In the workplace how does this relate to “micro managing”?
• Choose a product. What story is it telling—and how?
• Think of a user experience that was especially positive. What made it successful?
• Think of a user experience that was frustrating. How could it be improved?

Additional Resources

• Build: An Unorthodox Guide to Making Things Worth Making by Tony Fadell – Reading List
• Tony Fadell TED Talk on Habituation: The first secret of design is … noticing
• Tony Fadell 2015 Reading List on Creativity (blog.ted.com)