I went to Silicon Valley last month and had the privilege to meet with so many amazing people. Entrepreneurs, NEDs, Directors at Amazon, Google, Plug & Play (to name a few) I will share my reflections on all these meetings in this blog going forward.
I want to start off by addressing the need for speed. That was the common feature throughout. No need for a digital product to be 100 % perfect, just launch it and polish it with the feedback you get from customers and clients. This brings me back to my MTG days, when Viaplay was about to launch (an online streaming service back in 2010) MTG top management pushed to launch, but many of us further down the corporate ladder didn’t like it at all – it needed to be perfect, right? But off it went, and yes, sometimes a bumpy road, but it worked out nicely in the end. Here I am, in Palo Alto, 13 years later and they say the same thing.
That was not the only time during my stay in the Bay Area that my mind wandered back to my MTG days. I realized that the corporate culture that we had back then was very similar to the mindset of the tech companies in California today. Speed, innovate, no-nonsense, short emails (who has time to say “hello, how was your weekend” anyway, right?) At Amazon, they even have the same request system, where you had to really make a killer argument for any new investments. Which makes sense, because if you can’t really argue for it on paper internally in the organization, is it worthwhile?
However, the only aspect of the old MTG culture that did not match the Silicon Valley mindset was the leadership style. Failing fast, learning, iterating is key. And to accomplish this, all the companies I talked to stress the importance of psychological safety in their teams. To be at the bleeding edge of innovation, you can’t be punished for making mistakes. Google even states “reward for effort, not results.”
A far cry from my MTG days when I wanted to take a chance on new content for the TV-station I was running in Ghana, West Africa. I wanted to launch a breakfast morning show. After pitching it all to top management, the response was “OK fine, but if it doesn’t fly then your ass is on the line” My response was “Absolutely, no problem at all” because I really believed in it. And (at least that time) I was right. The show went on to receive multiple awards, and increased our overall CSOV, yaay!
I have been a CEO for +13 years now, both in Sweden and on the African continent. Hence my leadership and managerial style has been challenged and modified over the years. My experience from different markets, cultures and industries has all lead up to me now starting my own business. Global Heart Leaders is leadership and governance consultancy and support. My aim is to coach and educate compassionate resilient leaders for a better tomorrow.
Watch this space!
Go Charlotte!