The Way I Work: Yvon Chouinard, Patagonia
Patagonia's founder still loves to blaze a trail. He takes copious time off, lets employees manage themselves, and tells customers not to buy his products.
Sam Comen
Chief Tinkerer: Here's where Yvon Chouinard's side projects come to life. His latest: an energy-efficient camping stove.
It has been more than 40 years since Yvon Chouinard founded Patagonia out of his little blacksmith shop in Ventura, California. Back then, Chouinard developed clothing and gear inspired by his love of the outdoors. Over the years, the company has swelled to 1,350 employees and $540 million in annual revenue, but Chouinard, 74, is the same plucky entrepreneur. Though he manages to avoid using email or most modern gadgets, Chouinard continues to push Patagonia to be an innovator in the areas of corporate responsibility and environmental sustainability. He still tinkers in his blacksmith shop. And he frequently disappears to climb mountains in Europe or to enjoy good surf near the company's headquarters--and calls it work. --as told to Liz Welch
I hate the idea of managing people. I don't like people telling me what to do, so I can't stand to tell other people what to do. I purposely try to hire people who are really self-motivated and good at what they do, and then I just leave them alone.
I have two homes: one in Ventura, California, and the other in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. I split my time between them. If I'm in California, and the waves are good, I'm surfing by 7 a.m. If the surfing is good, I might stay out all day. I like being able to see the horizon. When I am sitting in the water facing Antarctica, waiting for a wave, it opens up my mind.
When I'm in Ventura, I usually come to the office every day. I usually start by taking care of correspondence. My assistant, Mike Dunn, helps me with that. I don't have a computer, so I don't respond to email. Also, I think email is impersonal. I prefer to handwrite letters and speak to people on the phone.
I mostly correspond with entrepreneurs or customers who have read one of my books. I wrote my first book, Let My People Go Surfing, for my employees. It's about the history of the company and our philosophy. We used to do five-day courses with 15 employees at a time, and I would talk about why we do things the way we do. It got too time-consuming as we grew. So people get a copy when they start working here.
I spend very little time working on the clothing lines these days. They are totally set up and running smoothly. But if I'm not creating something, I feel stagnant. I'm always working on odd side projects. My old blacksmith shop is here on campus--that's where I made the rock-climbing pitons back when we first created the company. It's still where I spend a lot of my time, tinkering.
Right now, I'm developing a superefficient camp stove that weighs a few ounces and burns little sticks. Usually, when you heat a pot on a camp stove, only 20 percent of the heat is actually being used. I want to get that to 80 percent efficiency. I've been working on a prototype with a machinist. I want it to be something that could be used by a backpacker as well as a woman in Mali who has to walk five miles a day to find wood for her open fire. Before that, I created a fly-fishing boot with aluminum bars on the sole that works well on slippery rocks.
I am the entrepreneur who comes up with the wild and crazy idea and then dumps it on people to let them figure it out. I often pop into the sewing room downstairs, which we call the forge. This is where some of our garments are prototyped. They can make anything there. The other day, I asked them to make me a surfing hat. I don't have much hair on the top of my head, and I always forget sunscreen. I think many people need a surf hat that won't fall off. They made two of them, both of which will become Patagonia products. Once the prototype is done, I get to try it out. That's the best part of the job. I do that with most of our outerwear and gear. So when I go to Europe to climb or South America to fish, it's business.
If I'm not in my blacksmith shop or in my office, I'm walking around. The worst managers try to manage behind a desk. The only way to manage is to walk around and talk to people. But I don't just walk around asking, "How are things going?" I have some specific thing in mind that I want to talk to that person about. I meet most often with Casey Sheahan, our CEO, and Rose Marcario, our CFO and COO. I also get monthly reports from the heads of marketing, e-commerce, and other divisions. I always want to know what is not going well, so we can fix it.
