People went to Dell for the computers, but they go to Apple for everything… That’s the difference between a transactional company and a transformational one.

I'm not saying the whole world will work this way, but with Airbnb, people are sleeping in other people's homes and other people's beds. So there's a level of trust necessary to participate that's different from an eBay or Facebook.

I had to learn to get comfortable in a role of ambiguity where I had to seek out advisers and learn quickly.

The stuff that matters in life is no longer stuff. It's other people. It's relationships. It's experience.

[On culture] It's living the core values when you hire; when you write an email; when you are working on a project; when you are walking in the hall.

Customers are willing to try new things, and if you can survive, you will have fewer competitors. It's like entering the eye of the storm. As long as you are strong enough to survive, you can end up in still water by yourself.

Somebody asked me 'what's the job of a CEO', and there's a number of things a CEO does. What you mostly do is articulate the vision, develop the strategy, and you gotta hire people to fit the culture. If you do those three things, you basically have a company. And that company will hopefully be successful, if you have the right vision, the right strategy, and good people.