Speed & Scale

Venture capitalist John Doerr reveals a sweeping-and actionable-plan to conquer humanity's greatest challenge: climate change.

In 2006, acclaimed investor John Doerr and his partners at Kleiner Perkins launched their first clean technology fund. They've backed more climate entrepreneurs than anyone else and have invested in a broad range of solutions, absorbing hard-earned lessons along the way. Fifteen years later, despite breakthroughs in batteries, electric vehicles, 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 consistency and urgency it requires. More than ever, we need a clear course of action.

What if the goal-setting techniques that powered the rise of today's most innovative organizations were brought to bear on humanity's greatest challenge? Fueled by a powerful tool called Objectives and Key Results (OKRs), SPEED & SCALE offers an unprecedented global plan for cutting greenhouse gas emissions and preserving a habitable planet. Used by Google, Bono's ONE foundation, and startups the world over, OKRs have scaled ideas into achievements that changed the world. With clear-eyed realism and science-backed precision, Doerr identifies the OKRs we need to reduce emissions across every sector of the economy 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. A launchpad for those who want to act now, this book is geared to ambitious leaders of every kind. With a definitive plan, 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.