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In 2006, John Doerr was moved by Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth and a challenge from his teenage daughter: "Dad, your generation created this problem. You better fix it." Since then, Doerr has searched for solutions to this existential problem – as an investor, an advocate and a philanthropist.
Fifteen years later, despite breakthroughs in batteries, electric vehicles, plant-based proteins and solar and wind power, global warming continues to get worse. Its impact is all around us: droughts, floods, wildfires, the melting of the polar ice caps. Our world is squarely in a climate crisis and on the brink of a climate disaster.
Yet despite our state of emergency, climate change has yet to be tackled with the urgency and ambition it demands. More than ever, we need a clear course of action.
Fueled by a powerful tool called Objectives and Key Results (OKRs), Speed & Scale offers an unprecedented global plan to cut greenhouse gas emissions before it's too late. Used by Google, Bono's ONE foundation and thousands of startups the world over, OKRs have scaled ideas into achievements that changed the world. With clear-eyed realism and an engineer's precision, Doerr identifies the measurable OKRs we need to reduce emissions across the board and to arrive by 2050 at net zero-the point where we are no longer adding to the heat-trapping carbon in the atmosphere.
By turns pragmatic and inspiring, Speed & Scale intersperses Doerr's wide-ranging analysis with firsthand accounts from Jeff Bezos, Christiana Figueres, Al Gore, Mary Barra, Bill Gates, and other intrepid policy leaders, entrepreneurs, scientists and activists. This book is a launchpad for leaders of all kind, for anyone anywhere who can move others to act with them. With a definitive action plan, the latest science and a rising climate movement on our side, we can still reach net zero before it is too late. But as Doerr reminds us, there is no more time to waste.
John Doerr is an engineer, venture capitalist, the chairman of Kleiner Perkins, and the author of the best-selling Measure What Matters. He was an original investor and board member at Google and Amazon, helping to create more than half a million jobs. A pioneer of Silicon Valley's clean tech movement, Doerr has invested in zero-emission technologies since 2006. He's passionate about encouraging leaders to reimagine the future, from transforming healthcare to advancing applications of machine learning. Outside Kleiner Perkins, Doerr works with social entrepreneurs who are tackling systemic issues across climate, public health, and education.
Ryan Panchadsaram is an engineer and investor focused on solving systemic, societal challenges. At Kleiner Perkins, Ryan serves as a technical advisor to John Doerr, where he invests in founders and technologies that aim to change the world. Ryan and John collaborated on Speed & Scale and number one bestseller Measure What Matters. Under President Obama, Ryan was Deputy Chief Technology Officer of the United States, where he championed entrepreneurship, innovation, and open data.
"This book is a critical blueprint for anyone looking to take concrete steps to reach net-zero emissions. Unlike many who simply issue ambiguous long-dated pledges to help solve the climate crisis, John Doerr understands the urgent need to ACT quickly and decisively. With Speed & Scale, he combines his extensive experience as a legendary technology expert and investor with his tried-and-true management methods to put forward a clear, detailed, and comprehensive plan for climate action exactly when we need it most."
– Al Gore, former U.S. Vice President
"John Doerr is the world's leading mind on turning truly audacious goals into objectives and key results. In this culminating contribution, he performs an inspired act of world leadership: plying his craft to create a comprehensive plan to tackle one of the most vexing challenges in human history."
– Jim Collins, author of Good to Great and Built to Last
"With personal insight and visionary foresight, Doerr provides us with a practical guide for both public and private sector participation in decarbonizing the global economy, a task as challenging as it is urgent."
– Christiana Figueres, former executive secretary of the UN Climate Change Convention
"Speed & Scale is critical reading for anyone who wants to take action on the most important issue of our time: climate change. It's a challenge that feels impossible to solve, but Doerr outlines a clear path forward and how we can get involved to make an impact."
– Susan Wojcicki, CEO of YouTube
"A practical path inthe fight against climate change [...] Doerr approaches the problem as a hard-nosed businessman who sees an opportunity, creates a plan, and organizes resources before moving ahead. Using this approach and prose that is superior to many similar books, the author crafts a specific, comprehensible description of the elements that contribute to climate change and what needs to be done [...] Throughout, readers are guided by ingenious illustrations and often startling facts."
– Kirkus
"John Doerr is a man with a plan for our planet – and boy do we need one. Keep away if you don't think commerce can play a creative role [...] or don't want deep dive analytics from someone who is always measuring what matters. He matters."
– Bono
"A brilliant, unputdownable treatise to focus attention on the most important problem of our times."
– Business Standard
"Immaculately researched [and] eminently readable."
– Jon Swarz, MarketWatch
"A clear, accessible and actionable plan [...] the single best guide to thinking about climate policy."
– Fareed Zakaria, The Washington Post
