Guy Kawasaki | From Hawaii to Apple, to Canva and Beyond
Guy Kawasaki

Most people would not be brave enough to speak their mind in front of Steve Jobs.

Guy Kawasaki is not most people.

Guy is an entrepreneur and prolific author, as well as the Chief Evangelist for Canva. He has written fifteen books, and is the brand ambassador for Mercedes-Benz. 

This week John is joined by Guy Kawasaki for the second time, this time to share stories in his new book Wise Guy: Lessons from a Life, including stories about growing up in Hawaii, his time at Apple, and why he is proud to work with Canva. 

In this episode, we also talk about:

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Here’s a Glimpse of What You’ll Hear:

  • How Guy Grew Up in Hawaii, and His Education
  • The Racial Demographics are Different in Hawaii
  • The Influence of Books on Guy’s Life
  • Guy’s Two Weeks of Law School
  • How Guy Came to Work at Apple
  • What Guy Learned From His Time in the Jewelry Business
  • What is Was Like Working for Steve Jobs
  • How He Passed the Steve Jobs Test
  • Where Apple Can Go From Here
  • How Guy Came to Work With Canva
  • Who Guy Thanks for His Success

Resources Mentioned:

Sponsor: Rise25

Today’s episode is sponsored by Rise25 Media, where our mission is to connect you with your best referral partners, clients, and strategic partners. We do this through our done for you business podcast solution and content marketing. 

Along with my business partner Dr. Jeremy Weisz, we have over 18 years of experience with B2B podcasting, which is one of the best things you can do for your business and you personally. 

If you do it right, a podcast is like a “Swiss Army Knife” – it is a tool that accomplishes many things at once. It can and will lead to great ROI, great clients, referrals, strategic partnerships, and more. It is networking and business development; and it is personal and professional development which doubles as content marketing

A podcast is the highest and best use of your time and will save you time by connecting you to higher caliber people to uplevel your network. 

To learn more, go to Rise25.com or email us at [email protected]

To learn more, book a call with us here

Check out Rise25 to learn more about our done-for-you lead generation and done-for-you podcast services. 

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Episode Transcript

John Corcoran  0:40  

Alright, welcome everyone my guests in this show is Jonathan Duchesne. He’s the CEO of solo agent, which is the nation’s largest solar distributors a 40 year old company, hundred employees, we’re going to talk about the movement towards the clean energy economy, its implication for other businesses, some of the challenges that he’s experienced, growing, and really growing this business and some of the, you know, different, you know, issues you have to deal with with that. And, you know, I have not yet interviewed anyone on the topic of solar energy on this podcast. However, earlier in my career, I worked on environment, environmental initiatives. And I do believe that this is really a important issue to talk about as climate change becomes more and more urgent. And as there’s really a big movement towards clean energy economy, and how it will have wide ranging impacts on society and other businesses and really opportunities for other businesses. That’s really what I’m most excited about. So I wanted to give Jonathan a platform to talk about some of these issues. But first, if you’re new to the show, we don’t charge for this podcast, I published hundreds of episodes, every single one of them. We talked to top thought leaders, CEOs, founders, experts, we asked them to break down how they built key relationships with clients, with peers with strategic partners, and how you can do it too. And you know, spending time and building relationships with the right people is one of the best things you can do for your business. So if you find value in this podcast, and will we ask you to subscribe. That’s the easiest way to make sure that you get the updates directly to your phone. And before we started this podcast brought to you by rise 25 media which is our done for you agency focused on helping b2b businesses to get more clients referral partners and strategic partners through a done for you podcasts and done for you content marketing, our company has over 20 years of experience with podcasting, we believe starting podcast is one of the best things you can do for your business and you personally. And if you do it, right, it’s many things in one, its business development, networking, client acquisition, referral, marketing, all of that. And so if you want to learn more, go to rise 25 calm, and you can learn how using a tool like a podcast and help make the world a smaller place by creating great connections for you and your business. And as I mentioned, my guess is Jonathan dejan now, Jonathan, you’re the CEO of solo agent, you know, the nation’s largest solar distributor. And so, you know, naturally, you started your career working for a company that brokered high end sports cars. Right, what is true California looking over your background, you’ve got like deep experience and energy and a bunch of different areas, except for brokering high end sports cars. So but i’m i’m curious, though, because I do believe there’s always nuggets that we get from different career experiences that we bring to the work that we do today. So I’ll bet even today, you look back on that experience. And there’s something there’s something you learn from that experience that you apply today is there or nothing at all?

Jonathan Doochin  3:24  

Oh, I think 100%. So, I mean, technically, I actually dropped out of out of Harvard, that was after my freshman year to start selling high end cars online through eBay and auto trader. And for me, I was going to be a doctor. So you could say definitely switch my trajectories. And I’m definitely not a doctor. But what it taught me was that I could apply that same skill skill set and that same desire to make an impact through business, and really kind of have a scale that I might not have been able to have in other roles that I was thinking about. And that got me pretty psyched up, which was, say the least exciting. And I think when I think about the lessons I took from it, at a very high level. It was my first real time doing marketing online. It was my first real time building a six person team who I got to work with. And as a 19 year old, I had 18 phone numbers coming into my phone, from different advertisements talking to people whose who would have just remember the line, do you know who I am? Like, in other words, that person was super important. And I wanted to be like, I’m a 19 year old sitting in my bedroom selling you a Ferrari. I don’t think you know who I am. I mean, it’s it’s, in other words, like, you know, it’s pretty funny, if you knew you probably would not be talking to me. And so it was just an experience, and pretty much everything. And I just remember even coming down to the legal aspects. I mean, there were people selling fake cars, and even dealing with the legal aspects of thinking about how you put how you actually do that, and don’t get put in jail and put somebody else in jail for stealing money. It was literally you could you the car businesses, everything is every you could imagine.

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