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When Will Ahmed launched his wearable technology company WHOOP, the odds were not in his favor. The iconic company Nike had just entered the space with their own wearable product, FuelBand. How could Ahmed’s startup compete with an international powerhouse whose name literally comes from the Greek goddess of victory?
It turns out quite well. Nike discontinued FuelBand in 2014, while WHOOP has grown into a $4 billion company. How did Ahmed defeat the swoosh, not to mention other competitors in the industry, such as Microsoft, Google, Fitbit and Jawbone? He attributes his success to the combination of a well-defined strategy and a healthy dose of ingenuity.
“I had an idea for a product that I thought should exist in the world. And it didn’t make sense to me why that product didn’t exist. I thought it should be there,” he said on my podcast A Day with Jon Bier.
Here are four key takeaways from our lively conversation.
Learn from the greats
Ironically, Ahmed’s strategy for WHOOP took a page from Nike’s old playbook. Back in the days of Air Jordans and “Bo Knows,” Nike had “a deep obsession with creating a shoe that could make athletes run faster,” Ahmed recalls. However, Nike did not use the same strategy for FuelBand, which it launched on the market without consulting athletes.
“If I were Nike, I would do it [asked] how to start from the tip of the pyramid? We need this to be something that LeBron wears, Serena wears, and Tiger wears. Then we’ll tell that story and bring it to the masses,” he says. They just skipped the whole step… They didn’t validate it with their athletes.”
On the contrary, Ahmed carried out extensive market research before its launch, which gave it an edge over the competition.
Related: The Remarkable Career of Nike Founder Phil Knight – Biography
Making technology servant and not master
Sometimes, you want a product that whispers instead of shouts. Ahmed rejects the idea that wearables need to be a constant companion, always vying for our attention.
“Technology should enhance your life, not invade it,” he says.
That’s why WHOOP silently collects data without requiring the wearer’s constant effort.
“We wanted to gather this information in the background and then say the right things at the right time,” he says. “There is a certain principle behind this, which is to make the product disappear into the background on your behalf.”
Don’t fear failure, but don’t idealize it either
Ahmed believes that the fear of failure has killed many great ideas before they have had a chance to become reality. But he also thinks that in today’s tech culture, “failure has been romanticized as some kind of appropriate end state. There are a lot of these weird phrases in the tech industry, like ‘test, iterate, fail.'”
Instead of focusing on our failures, he says we should embrace our successes.
In building a WHOOP, there were a number of moments where we were on the edge of failure, and what it took to overcome those moments was a deep level of focus, pain management, overcoming stress,” Ahmed recalls. “I have a very proud of that. I feel a connection to that younger self and the team around me that was able to overcome that darkness when the company was almost failing.”
Related: 10 Lessons About Failure Every Entrepreneur Needs To Know
Lean into gratitude
Ahmed says many entrepreneurs chase dopamine by setting goals and achieving them. The problem is that success is never as good as we think, so we keep moving the goalposts until we are numb to true happiness.
His solution is to inject some gratitude into his life.
“I know this will sound a little woo-woo to some people, but gratitude releases serotonin. This is another way to make you feel happy,” he says. “Gratitude means appreciating where you are and the team you are on, and that is the kind of happiness that unlocks the enterprising entrepreneur.”
How do you practice gratitude? “I meditate first thing in the morning, and as part of that, I actively think about the things I’m grateful for,” she says. “I also have a journaling practice where I write down three things I’m grateful for.”
It could be a simple morning cup of coffee, a loving look from his wife, or maybe even beating Nike in 2014.
Related: Why Gratitude Makes More Effective Leaders