My life and work
by Ford, Henry, Henry Ford, Samuel Crowther, Mrs Henry Ford, E. Kalita, Ford, Henry, Crowther, Samuel, Henry Henry Ford · first published 1922
42% recommend58% neutral
Why HN recommends it
Henry Ford's autobiography covers his work ethic, business thinking, and engineering-minded approach to building a company. It suits readers interested in management and industrial history.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
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Henry Ford's book is pretty good, too. (My Life and Work. 1922.) http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext05/hnfrd10.txt "Business" in the sense of trading with the people is largely a matter of filling the wants of the people. If you make what they need, and sell…
on “Golden Rules for Making Money by P. T. Barnum (1880)” ↗…time, but rarely pays off. History: mostly crap, but personal memoirs are often insightful. Books that changed me: Orwell's "1984" (role of words), Hunter Thompson (personal courage), Henry Ford's "My Life and Work" (work attitude). Good stuff that should be better known: Eric Hoffer's "True Believer", Jerome K. Jerome's "Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow", Marcus Aurelius.
on “Do you read?” ↗…is a true saying: "he who is faithful in small things, will be entrusted with greater things". Read: Ecclesiastes - http://bit.ly/bFJruK Proverbs - http://bit.ly/aJpmva Henry Ford's autobiography My Life And Work - http://bit.ly/9fZkFG
on “Ask HN: Loosing Faith - the startup killer” ↗Worth reading several times: "My Life and Work" by Henry Ford "Edison As I Know Him" by Henry Ford
on “When Edison, Ford and Friends Went Road-Tripping in Model Ts” ↗Both biography and autobiography Autobiography of a Yogi by Paramahansa Yogananda Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman! by Richard Feynman Elon Musk by Ashlee Vance My Life and Work by Henry Ford My Inventions: The Autobiography of Nikola Tesla by Ben Johnston and Nikola Tesla The Autobiography of Charles Darwin by Charles Darwin Steve Jobs by Walter Isaacson The Autobiography…
on “Ask HN: Biographies recommendations – both Westerner and Non-westerner” ↗My Life and Work - Henry Ford A true engineer at heart. His comeback in life is very similar to that of Steve Jobs. Man was a true genius.
on “Ask HN: Biographies recommendations – both Westerner and Non-westerner” ↗Conquistador: Hernan Cortes by Levy - How Cortes conquered the Aztecs with 400 men and 16 horses. Judgement in Managerial Decision Making by Bazerman - Things which bias your thinking and how to avoid them. My Life and Work by Henry Ford - How Henry Ford thinks. Stories about engineering and building a company. Homage to Catalonia by Orwell - The famous author's experience in the Spanish civil war which colored much of…
on “Ask HN: Books you read in 2022 and recommend for 2023” ↗I love reading biographies of famous people. I especially liked "My Life and Work: An Autobiography of Henry Ford." I also enjoy books by Paul Ekman.
on “Ask HN: Book Recommendations?” ↗Off of the top of my head: Heny Ford -- My Life and Work. The Shape of Design. Ken Segal -- Insanely Simple.
on “Ask HN: Best books you read in 2012” ↗…people could not of course see the advantages that a single model would bring about in production. More than that, they did not particularly care.” Henry Ford in collaboration with Samuel Crowther in My Life and Work. 1922. Page 72 Beside, color is all in your mind. Out of it, it's just electromagnetic waves.
on “Has the world become less colourful?” ↗…drilling down to the metal. First he contributed to existing Ruby web servers, then wrote Ebb in C, then wrote his own HTTP parser, etc. A hundred years back in time, Henry Ford in his autobiography "My Life And Work" (http://www.amazon.com/My-Life-Work-Autobiography-Henry/dp/1442144327/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1277742505&sr=8-1) discussed how he achieved tremendous gains from vertical integration, eventually…
on “Ask HN: Vertical integration examples?” ↗…need for honeypots. To do this, there needs to be a Hacker Credo, and it needs to be at least as radical as the Johnson and Johnson credo, and as definitive and steadfast as Henry Ford's magnum opus "My Life and Work".
on “Hacker News Needs Honeypots” ↗…answered. "I am on a vacation now; I am in no hurry, we do not care much when we get home. That is the reason I am not in the Ford." You know, we also have a line of "Ford stories"!" -- Henry Ford, My Life and Work (http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/7213)
on “Samsung internal document evaluating the iPhone (translated)” ↗I've been reading Henry Ford's autobiography ("My Life and Work"), and it seems like Musk is taking a page directly from Ford's playbook with continuous product (and component) updates that are (mostly) backwards compatible with previously-produced vehicles in the…
on “Tesla’s Model S Gets “Ludicrous” Mode, Will Do 0-60 in 2.8 Seconds” ↗…the First Five-Year Plan, Henry Ford had become an even greater hero to the Soviets than Frederick Taylor. An emotional cult grew up around Ford’s methods and even his person. By 1925 his autobiography, My Life and Work, had had four printings in the Soviet Union, and one American in Russia reported that plant managers were studying Ford with as much enthusiasm as they had had for Lenin." https://www.americanheritage.com/how-america-helped-build-so...
on “How the War Was Won” ↗