1 00:00:00,120 --> 00:00:03,120 But a lot of CT OS they usually do not struggle with technical 2 00:00:03,120 --> 00:00:05,520 issues. When I struggle otherwise is 3 00:00:05,600 --> 00:00:08,520 sometimes holding people accountable, leadership and 4 00:00:08,520 --> 00:00:11,680 strategy and vision and also being executive. 5 00:00:11,920 --> 00:00:16,320 Most of the CT OS I work with are swamped with work from their 6 00:00:16,320 --> 00:00:18,920 day-to-day job. The CEO wants them saying 7 00:00:18,920 --> 00:00:21,720 marketing on something, product wants new features, sales wants 8 00:00:21,720 --> 00:00:25,000 new features. There has been an incident and 9 00:00:25,240 --> 00:00:28,840 too many CT OS, in my opinion, are just reactive and they are 10 00:00:28,840 --> 00:00:31,760 not proactive. They don't build a vision and a 11 00:00:31,760 --> 00:00:36,720 strategy, and the leadership strategy helps people make 12 00:00:36,720 --> 00:00:39,800 decisions. If a tech strategy does not help 13 00:00:40,120 --> 00:00:43,640 people in your department make the right decisions, then the 14 00:00:43,640 --> 00:00:48,000 strategy is not useful. A lot of CT OS I meet are not 15 00:00:48,000 --> 00:00:50,760 thinking about scaling. And then when there's some money 16 00:00:50,760 --> 00:00:54,680 on your customers, they fail. And the other part, the other 17 00:00:54,680 --> 00:00:58,520 type of CTO, they scale by a million times, you know, they 18 00:00:58,520 --> 00:01:01,960 have 10 customers, but they build infrastructure that could 19 00:01:01,960 --> 00:01:03,800 be used for 100 million customers. 20 00:01:17,050 --> 00:01:19,850 Hello everyone, welcome back to another new episode of the Tech 21 00:01:19,850 --> 00:01:22,720 Regional Podcast. Today I have with me Stefan 22 00:01:22,720 --> 00:01:25,640 Schmidt. So he's the author of this book 23 00:01:25,640 --> 00:01:29,520 titled Amazing CTO. This book is actually in the top 24 00:01:29,520 --> 00:01:32,040 best selling book in the Lean pub. 25 00:01:32,320 --> 00:01:34,120 So if you want to check it out, go to Lean Pub. 26 00:01:34,320 --> 00:01:37,120 So today we'll be talking about what does it take to actually 27 00:01:37,120 --> 00:01:40,160 become an amazing CTO, right? So I think the title itself 28 00:01:40,160 --> 00:01:42,800 might intrigue some of us. So welcome to the show, Stefan. 29 00:01:43,400 --> 00:01:45,840 Hi, Henry, welcome. Happy to be here. 30 00:01:46,440 --> 00:01:48,840 Right, Stefan, in the beginning, I always love to invite my 31 00:01:48,840 --> 00:01:50,920 guests, maybe to talk more about yourself, right? 32 00:01:50,920 --> 00:01:53,160 Sharing any highlights or turning points that you think we 33 00:01:53,160 --> 00:01:57,320 can learn from that? Well above my career started 40 34 00:01:57,320 --> 00:02:00,320 years ago as a kid playing video games. 35 00:02:00,320 --> 00:02:02,680 Wanted to write some code, wanted to write some video 36 00:02:02,680 --> 00:02:05,520 games, wrote some video games. So that was a turning point 37 00:02:05,520 --> 00:02:11,120 getting into all of this. And sometimes later, I'm at my 38 00:02:11,240 --> 00:02:16,320 first job in a start up in the 1990s doing Internet stuff, HTML 39 00:02:16,320 --> 00:02:19,600 and and web database things. I became the head of development 40 00:02:19,760 --> 00:02:23,520 because my boss told me to choose a title for myself. 41 00:02:23,680 --> 00:02:26,440 So I thought, oh, why not become head of development? 42 00:02:26,880 --> 00:02:29,600 I would have become ACTO back then, but I didn't know what CTO 43 00:02:29,600 --> 00:02:31,520 means. So that was the last opportunity 44 00:02:31,520 --> 00:02:33,880 kind of. So yeah, that was the second, I 45 00:02:33,880 --> 00:02:37,480 think second turning point. My third turning point of career 46 00:02:37,480 --> 00:02:41,200 highlight is I think when I was working for eBay because the 47 00:02:41,200 --> 00:02:44,000 start up I worked for was bought by eBay. 48 00:02:44,160 --> 00:02:48,480 And so I worked for some years at eBay as the CTO of eBay 49 00:02:48,720 --> 00:02:52,840 subsidiary in Germany and I learned a lot about professional 50 00:02:52,840 --> 00:02:55,320 management and engineering management there. 51 00:02:55,680 --> 00:02:58,720 So that I think made me a a different manager. 52 00:02:58,880 --> 00:03:02,040 I've been on a long journey at that point already and made a 53 00:03:02,040 --> 00:03:05,840 lot of changes. But I think the final thing was 54 00:03:05,840 --> 00:03:09,320 it eBay to become a good manager, perhaps a very good 55 00:03:09,320 --> 00:03:11,360 manager, I don't know, but at least a good manager. 56 00:03:11,680 --> 00:03:15,160 And the last turning point was when my wife sold her startup 57 00:03:15,360 --> 00:03:18,000 and I decided to become a CTO coach. 58 00:03:18,000 --> 00:03:20,560 So that was the last one I think career wise. 59 00:03:21,000 --> 00:03:24,320 And so for some years now, I've been a CTO coach, helping others 60 00:03:24,320 --> 00:03:26,440 with the problems that I had on my own. 61 00:03:27,280 --> 00:03:29,720 Well, 40 years of career, I think that's pretty long. 62 00:03:29,720 --> 00:03:33,040 So I myself probably not half of that, right? 63 00:03:33,040 --> 00:03:35,840 So I think we can learn a lot of things from you, right, Being 64 00:03:35,840 --> 00:03:38,080 there in the industry and I think it's very interesting. 65 00:03:38,080 --> 00:03:41,520 Many of us actually started our computer science kind of thing 66 00:03:41,520 --> 00:03:44,240 from video games, right? I think in your book you also 67 00:03:44,400 --> 00:03:47,280 mentioned your story, you know, playing the computer at the 68 00:03:47,280 --> 00:03:49,520 computer store or some video game store, right? 69 00:03:49,600 --> 00:03:52,800 And then it pick, you know, interest, yeah, yeah, department 70 00:03:52,800 --> 00:03:56,520 store and that's what brought you here now becoming ACTO 71 00:03:56,520 --> 00:03:59,440 coach. So your subtitle of the book is 72 00:03:59,440 --> 00:04:02,120 called the missing manual for managing. 73 00:04:02,240 --> 00:04:05,640 So CTO itself, right? I think depending on which 74 00:04:05,640 --> 00:04:09,000 companies or which part of the world may have different 75 00:04:09,000 --> 00:04:12,560 responsibilities, right. So maybe in the first set here, 76 00:04:12,880 --> 00:04:16,480 let's maybe elaborate, what do you think is the CTO role and 77 00:04:16,480 --> 00:04:19,920 how does it differ with, I don't know, CIO and maybe other type 78 00:04:19,920 --> 00:04:24,040 of CXO kind of role? I think one of the challenges 79 00:04:24,040 --> 00:04:27,600 especially that my clients have is that there is no clear 80 00:04:27,600 --> 00:04:29,880 understanding what the CTO role means. 81 00:04:29,880 --> 00:04:33,040 And it's can be everything and that's something I tell my 82 00:04:33,040 --> 00:04:36,000 clients. You need to make up essentially 83 00:04:36,000 --> 00:04:39,320 what the role means and you need to come up with a definition of 84 00:04:39,320 --> 00:04:42,440 what the role means with covering everything that the 85 00:04:42,440 --> 00:04:45,360 people in your department need, the CEO needs, the company 86 00:04:45,360 --> 00:04:48,960 needs, product needs. And that is essentially defining 87 00:04:48,960 --> 00:04:53,000 what the CTO role in this company for this person looks 88 00:04:53,000 --> 00:04:54,120 like. And it's very different. 89 00:04:54,480 --> 00:05:00,000 My coaches are from I'd say from 5 engineers to 100 engineers and 90 00:05:00,000 --> 00:05:02,600 that is a very different, the role is very different. 91 00:05:02,600 --> 00:05:07,280 It's very hands on and I think that's what's also defining for 92 00:05:07,280 --> 00:05:11,080 the CTO role, at least where I have some expertise in which is 93 00:05:11,080 --> 00:05:13,640 fast growing startup. So I don't have a lot of 94 00:05:13,680 --> 00:05:17,800 expertise in large enterprises or something, but in fast 95 00:05:17,800 --> 00:05:20,000 growing startups. And what's defines the CT role 96 00:05:20,000 --> 00:05:22,680 there is that it changes so much. 97 00:05:22,800 --> 00:05:26,640 So you're the might be the first coder, then you you need to hire 98 00:05:26,640 --> 00:05:28,600 other coders, then you need to manage them. 99 00:05:28,600 --> 00:05:33,000 You need to become a people manager, tech leader, then you 100 00:05:33,000 --> 00:05:36,760 manage other managers, you're a manager of managers, and then 101 00:05:36,760 --> 00:05:40,800 you come become ACTO with more strategic focus, enabling 102 00:05:40,800 --> 00:05:44,000 business to do their thing and to support business. 103 00:05:44,360 --> 00:05:48,760 And this is over this amount of some years, you have a very 104 00:05:48,760 --> 00:05:52,880 rapid change in the role. And that's also sometimes where 105 00:05:52,880 --> 00:05:56,160 people struggle with. For me personally, I have two 106 00:05:56,160 --> 00:05:59,720 defining characteristics of the CTO role and he does not have to 107 00:05:59,720 --> 00:06:03,040 add to anything with the title. The one first characteristic is 108 00:06:03,320 --> 00:06:07,000 if you can't bubble up tech problems, then you're the CTO. 109 00:06:07,240 --> 00:06:09,800 So if your boss is not interested in tech problems, 110 00:06:10,200 --> 00:06:12,280 then you're the CTO. If you're a senior developer and 111 00:06:12,280 --> 00:06:15,080 your boss has no clue about tech, essentially you're the 112 00:06:15,080 --> 00:06:17,360 CTO. And the other thing is that the 113 00:06:17,360 --> 00:06:21,840 CTO is the person or the role or the person standing between 114 00:06:21,840 --> 00:06:24,720 business and tech. So the CTO explains tech to 115 00:06:24,720 --> 00:06:28,640 business, and so why is tech working the way they are 116 00:06:28,640 --> 00:06:34,120 working, why it takes some time or why this needs to be done, or 117 00:06:34,120 --> 00:06:37,960 why developers do some things? And on the other hand, explain 118 00:06:37,960 --> 00:06:41,200 business to technology, which means why marketing is doing the 119 00:06:41,200 --> 00:06:44,320 things they're doing, why it's a good idea what the CEO is going 120 00:06:44,320 --> 00:06:47,160 to do, and all of that. So you're between business and 121 00:06:47,160 --> 00:06:50,680 tech, you're connecting these two parts a foot in each of the 122 00:06:50,680 --> 00:06:53,920 parts, and you need to explain the other ones to each other. 123 00:06:54,640 --> 00:06:56,040 I like your first definition, right? 124 00:06:56,040 --> 00:06:59,320 If you can't bubble up tech kind of issues, problems, right? 125 00:06:59,320 --> 00:07:01,400 So you're the CTO. So I think in many of the 126 00:07:01,400 --> 00:07:04,560 start-ups we can see it could be the Co founders, right? 127 00:07:04,560 --> 00:07:08,200 So the one who handles most of the technology or even IT part, 128 00:07:08,200 --> 00:07:12,000 right, ended up becoming ACTO. So you mentioned in the book 129 00:07:12,000 --> 00:07:15,200 it's about the missing manual. I think maybe some of us 130 00:07:15,280 --> 00:07:18,480 actually do get it, especially if some of us are the CTO, 131 00:07:18,480 --> 00:07:21,040 right? So why do you think you need to 132 00:07:21,040 --> 00:07:23,520 come up with this manual for the CTOS? 133 00:07:24,320 --> 00:07:27,280 So the menu is from my experience or the book is from 134 00:07:27,280 --> 00:07:29,720 my experience and from the experience of my clients. 135 00:07:30,080 --> 00:07:33,880 What they struggle with is they read a lot of tech books and 136 00:07:33,880 --> 00:07:38,240 they are usually very good at coding, architecture, processes, 137 00:07:38,240 --> 00:07:41,360 all of the technical things because that's what brought them 138 00:07:41,360 --> 00:07:44,040 into the position. Like they are probably the best 139 00:07:44,040 --> 00:07:46,760 in the group. They might have been promoted or 140 00:07:46,760 --> 00:07:51,000 they might have been chosen as a Co founder and stayed on through 141 00:07:51,000 --> 00:07:53,360 changes. And their only way to do this is 142 00:07:53,360 --> 00:07:56,800 by being excellent in the technology field. 143 00:07:57,120 --> 00:07:59,680 So this is what they can do where they're good at when they 144 00:07:59,680 --> 00:08:02,040 come into the CTO role. But then there's a lot of other 145 00:08:02,040 --> 00:08:06,160 stuff that they're not good at because perhaps their boss has 146 00:08:06,160 --> 00:08:09,680 mentored them or because they're they had trainings. 147 00:08:10,080 --> 00:08:13,920 And that is the day-to-day operations like holding people 148 00:08:13,920 --> 00:08:18,520 accountable, but having a vision, leadership, laying off 149 00:08:18,520 --> 00:08:22,400 people, firing people, promoting people. 150 00:08:22,680 --> 00:08:26,160 So all of these things or how to do proper meetings and all of 151 00:08:26,160 --> 00:08:30,280 this stuff that no one talks about, but that's essential to 152 00:08:30,280 --> 00:08:33,200 being a good or an excellent CTO or an excellent manager. 153 00:08:34,000 --> 00:08:35,520 Yeah. So I think in your book you also 154 00:08:35,520 --> 00:08:38,760 mentioned the hard skills get you the position or at least the 155 00:08:38,760 --> 00:08:42,159 kind of role. So you know IT better than maybe 156 00:08:42,159 --> 00:08:43,960 most of the people in the companies, right? 157 00:08:43,960 --> 00:08:45,960 So you become CTO. So I think the hard skills bring 158 00:08:45,960 --> 00:08:49,320 you there, but also actually the soft skills that make you 159 00:08:49,320 --> 00:08:52,760 succeed in this role. So I myself personally have 160 00:08:52,760 --> 00:08:54,920 assumed like head of engineering, VP of engineering, 161 00:08:54,920 --> 00:08:57,560 things like that. And I could definitely relate to 162 00:08:57,560 --> 00:09:00,480 what you're saying, right? So nobody gives us a manual, 163 00:09:00,480 --> 00:09:02,840 especially in the startups. If you're working in a big 164 00:09:02,840 --> 00:09:06,080 corporates, probably you can see so many other peers or mentors 165 00:09:06,080 --> 00:09:08,680 that you can actually learn from simply because they have 166 00:09:08,680 --> 00:09:10,760 seniority. But in the startups, especially 167 00:09:10,760 --> 00:09:13,720 fast growing one, right? So you probably need to catch up 168 00:09:13,720 --> 00:09:16,080 yourself or maybe find other mentors externally. 169 00:09:16,080 --> 00:09:19,080 But most of the times it's a luxury to find a good mentors. 170 00:09:19,400 --> 00:09:22,360 So I think I get the sense like we need this missing manual. 171 00:09:22,520 --> 00:09:26,280 But in your book you have 140 kind of like advice or roles. 172 00:09:26,560 --> 00:09:29,560 That seems quite a lot. How did you come up with all 173 00:09:29,560 --> 00:09:33,680 these rules actually? So why is the book structured 174 00:09:33,680 --> 00:09:36,720 the way it is structured? I see too many people buying a 175 00:09:36,720 --> 00:09:39,760 book, starting the book and then dropping the book and not 176 00:09:39,760 --> 00:09:42,560 finishing it. I myself have too many books 177 00:09:42,560 --> 00:09:45,760 that I haven't started. So what I wanted to do is have a 178 00:09:45,760 --> 00:09:50,440 book that's snackable, that's easy to digest, that you can 179 00:09:50,440 --> 00:09:54,480 open, read something and then read a page and then close it 180 00:09:54,480 --> 00:09:56,920 again, or read 5 pages and close it again. 181 00:09:57,120 --> 00:10:00,320 And you don't feel any regret, any pressure to read the book. 182 00:10:00,320 --> 00:10:02,760 Or you don't get bad feelings because you're not reading the 183 00:10:02,760 --> 00:10:04,560 book. So the book should be something 184 00:10:04,560 --> 00:10:07,960 that's easy to scan and easy to get into and easy to get out of. 185 00:10:08,320 --> 00:10:12,720 And so that was for that reason I chose the format of these 140 186 00:10:12,760 --> 00:10:14,800 rules. So you can read one and then 187 00:10:14,800 --> 00:10:18,400 stop, or read two and then stop. So that's how the format came. 188 00:10:18,560 --> 00:10:20,960 And then I started with a lot less. 189 00:10:21,360 --> 00:10:23,840 But then when writing about it, I thought, well, that's also 190 00:10:23,840 --> 00:10:25,400 important. It's also important. 191 00:10:25,760 --> 00:10:29,000 And in the end I dropped some but stayed in the book. 192 00:10:29,800 --> 00:10:32,640 Right, So I think I agree, I like reading your book, right? 193 00:10:32,640 --> 00:10:34,600 It's very concise bite size, right? 194 00:10:34,600 --> 00:10:37,440 You can even like spend just a few seconds to read just one 195 00:10:37,440 --> 00:10:39,440 chapter, right? Or one rule, so to speak, right? 196 00:10:39,720 --> 00:10:42,520 And I think it's really kind of like insightful and dense. 197 00:10:42,600 --> 00:10:45,200 Obviously there will be a lot of details if you want to pursue 198 00:10:45,200 --> 00:10:47,640 much further, right? But I think those rules itself 199 00:10:47,640 --> 00:10:50,600 is kind of like useful especially if you want to know 200 00:10:50,600 --> 00:10:51,960 some particular the topic, right? 201 00:10:52,360 --> 00:10:56,120 So one thing also you mentioned you have become ACTO coach. 202 00:10:56,360 --> 00:11:00,200 Maybe throughout your coaching experience if you can maybe 203 00:11:00,200 --> 00:11:04,000 summarize what areas typically many CT OS are struggling with. 204 00:11:04,840 --> 00:11:10,480 I think what a lot of CT OS struggle with is is there some 205 00:11:10,480 --> 00:11:13,560 areas they usually do not struggle with technical issues. 206 00:11:13,560 --> 00:11:16,680 The one thing they might struggle with technical issues 207 00:11:16,680 --> 00:11:19,160 is it is not technical by definition. 208 00:11:19,600 --> 00:11:23,680 But when they have too much technology, like for some time 209 00:11:23,680 --> 00:11:26,280 developers, every developer brings in a framework, every 210 00:11:26,280 --> 00:11:28,280 developer brings in some technology. 211 00:11:28,680 --> 00:11:31,480 And then after some years you have a a big tech zoo. 212 00:11:31,800 --> 00:11:34,440 And then it gets, sometimes it gets difficult to manage the 213 00:11:34,440 --> 00:11:37,480 tech zoo because all of these things need to maintained. 214 00:11:37,480 --> 00:11:39,960 If you want to hire new developers, they need to know 215 00:11:39,960 --> 00:11:41,960 about the stuff. So it gets hiring, it's more 216 00:11:41,960 --> 00:11:44,080 complicated, maintaining, it's more complicated. 217 00:11:44,520 --> 00:11:48,520 So this is where a lot of CTOS struggle, especially then if 218 00:11:48,520 --> 00:11:51,920 they want to reduce the tech stack to something manageable, 219 00:11:52,120 --> 00:11:54,120 they get a lot of resistance from developers. 220 00:11:54,440 --> 00:11:56,480 And so that's the most technical thing. 221 00:11:56,480 --> 00:12:00,080 I think where they struggle, where they struggle otherwise is 222 00:12:00,160 --> 00:12:04,280 sometimes holding people accountable because a lot of 223 00:12:04,600 --> 00:12:07,760 where they come from, from the engineering culture, a lot of 224 00:12:07,760 --> 00:12:10,760 things are discussed and then people do the things, you know, 225 00:12:10,760 --> 00:12:14,760 And so they are not used to tell people what to do and hold them 226 00:12:14,760 --> 00:12:18,160 accountable for the results, like because that's not a thing 227 00:12:18,160 --> 00:12:19,640 I think in the engineering culture. 228 00:12:19,640 --> 00:12:21,920 So when they become a manager and the CTO, that's sometimes 229 00:12:21,920 --> 00:12:24,120 where they struggle. And I think the third thing 230 00:12:24,120 --> 00:12:28,920 where CTO struggle is leadership and strategy and vision and also 231 00:12:28,920 --> 00:12:31,840 being executive, which ties I think into the theme. 232 00:12:32,280 --> 00:12:36,720 Most of the CT OS I worked with are swamped with work from their 233 00:12:36,720 --> 00:12:39,320 day-to-day job. The CEO wants them saying 234 00:12:39,320 --> 00:12:42,080 marketing on something, product wants new features, sales wants 235 00:12:42,080 --> 00:12:44,680 new features. There has been an incident. 236 00:12:44,960 --> 00:12:48,280 So there's a lot of pressure on CT OS. 237 00:12:48,320 --> 00:12:52,200 And too many CT OS in my opinion are just reactive. 238 00:12:52,200 --> 00:12:54,600 They react to everything that's happening and they are not 239 00:12:54,600 --> 00:12:57,320 proactive. They don't build a vision and a 240 00:12:57,320 --> 00:12:59,480 strategy. And the leadership for me, 241 00:12:59,480 --> 00:13:03,120 vision is very simple. It's like being as at an office 242 00:13:03,640 --> 00:13:08,560 of a company off site hiking and then the vision is having BBQ at 243 00:13:08,560 --> 00:13:10,840 the lake in the evening. So that's the vision. 244 00:13:10,840 --> 00:13:13,920 Everyone wants to go there. The vision is self-evident. 245 00:13:13,920 --> 00:13:15,720 The vision is golden. So that's the vision. 246 00:13:16,080 --> 00:13:17,960 And the strategy is how to get there. 247 00:13:18,080 --> 00:13:21,080 Left of the mountain, right of the mountain or at the river. 248 00:13:21,400 --> 00:13:23,920 And you as a leader with input from everyone, you choose a 249 00:13:23,920 --> 00:13:27,160 strategy to get there. And leadership essentially is 250 00:13:27,680 --> 00:13:30,680 then leading people there will often it's talk about 251 00:13:30,680 --> 00:13:32,520 leadership. And I think it's very 252 00:13:32,520 --> 00:13:34,120 complicated. People make it much more 253 00:13:34,120 --> 00:13:38,040 complicated than it is. I think a leader is saying this 254 00:13:38,040 --> 00:13:40,880 is where we need to go there and where we need to go to. 255 00:13:41,440 --> 00:13:43,080 And I will help you there getting there. 256 00:13:43,080 --> 00:13:46,800 So I think that's leadership. And because in the engineering 257 00:13:46,800 --> 00:13:51,800 culture, people are more accustomed to deciding by merit 258 00:13:51,800 --> 00:13:58,400 or by facts and then executing on this agreed upon decision, I 259 00:13:58,400 --> 00:14:00,600 think they struggle when becoming a leader, becoming 260 00:14:00,600 --> 00:14:04,560 ACTO, to say, OK, this is my vision, this is my strategy with 261 00:14:04,560 --> 00:14:07,360 input from everyone and this is where we go to. 262 00:14:08,240 --> 00:14:09,880 Right. I like the trifecta that you 263 00:14:09,880 --> 00:14:12,320 just mentioned, right? The vision, the strategy, and 264 00:14:12,320 --> 00:14:15,520 also the leadership, especially if you're a young CTO, right? 265 00:14:15,520 --> 00:14:18,240 Definitely you are not exposed to all these problems, right? 266 00:14:18,520 --> 00:14:20,960 So you definitely have to learn by doing. 267 00:14:21,160 --> 00:14:23,200 Maybe again, finding a coach, right, like yourself. 268 00:14:23,720 --> 00:14:26,920 But I think setting a vision and setting strategy and leading 269 00:14:26,920 --> 00:14:29,600 people is not something that is easy, right? 270 00:14:29,760 --> 00:14:31,960 Especially if you have so many things like you mentioned, 271 00:14:31,960 --> 00:14:33,480 right? So many things to take care of. 272 00:14:33,880 --> 00:14:37,000 So incidents, for example, or even sometimes like a big 273 00:14:37,000 --> 00:14:40,120 hiring, promoting. And when you grow fast, right? 274 00:14:40,240 --> 00:14:41,720 You seem to have plenty of things. 275 00:14:42,080 --> 00:14:45,080 I think the struggle is real. So in the 1st place, maybe we 276 00:14:45,080 --> 00:14:48,360 can learn from you yourself in your career as ACTO before back 277 00:14:48,360 --> 00:14:50,480 then, right? Is there any kind of like 278 00:14:50,600 --> 00:14:54,040 failure story that you think is very, very good for us to learn 279 00:14:54,040 --> 00:14:55,880 from? And maybe if you can share that 280 00:14:55,880 --> 00:14:57,480 personal anecdote, that will be great. 281 00:14:58,280 --> 00:15:01,640 Yeah, I had several failures. One failure essentially was at 282 00:15:01,640 --> 00:15:04,760 the company when there was a lot of pressure to deliver some 283 00:15:04,760 --> 00:15:08,120 feature. It was labeled as the company 284 00:15:08,120 --> 00:15:10,200 saving feature. It was very important for the 285 00:15:10,200 --> 00:15:13,000 strategy of the company. So there was a lot of pressure 286 00:15:13,000 --> 00:15:14,720 put on me. I was not the CTO, but I was an 287 00:15:14,720 --> 00:15:18,120 engineering leader responsible for one area of the company 288 00:15:18,120 --> 00:15:20,840 essentially. And a lot of pressure was put on 289 00:15:21,360 --> 00:15:25,400 on me and the team. And my mistake obviously was not 290 00:15:25,400 --> 00:15:28,120 giving enough push back. I should have given much more 291 00:15:28,120 --> 00:15:30,480 push back to that pressure. I didn't. 292 00:15:30,840 --> 00:15:35,000 So team was sitting around at night writing code and I 293 00:15:35,000 --> 00:15:36,520 thought, well, I could do something too. 294 00:15:36,640 --> 00:15:39,440 Like I want to help. I'm not just sitting here at 295 00:15:39,640 --> 00:15:41,720 11:00 PM, I want to do something too. 296 00:15:41,720 --> 00:15:45,400 And so someone suggested, OK, you can write some JavaScript 297 00:15:45,400 --> 00:15:48,200 code here to see senior developer thought, well, if we 298 00:15:48,240 --> 00:15:50,880 have some simple JavaScript, Stefan will not screw up. 299 00:15:51,400 --> 00:15:53,560 And well, what happened is I screwed up. 300 00:15:53,760 --> 00:15:56,560 I wrote some JavaScript code which after release brought the 301 00:15:56,560 --> 00:15:59,960 website down. And it was a large website, lot 302 00:15:59,960 --> 00:16:02,600 of customers. And I brought the website down 303 00:16:02,600 --> 00:16:06,600 because on one hand I might have been the best programmer in the 304 00:16:06,600 --> 00:16:08,320 room, the most experienced at least. 305 00:16:08,600 --> 00:16:11,800 But on the other hand, I didn't know about the all the intricate 306 00:16:11,800 --> 00:16:14,840 details of the domain and the side effects and what you need 307 00:16:14,840 --> 00:16:17,880 to be be aware of. So I wasn't aware of some 308 00:16:17,880 --> 00:16:21,400 subtleties of the custom web framework and that brought 309 00:16:21,400 --> 00:16:25,360 essentially the website down. So I think just because you're 310 00:16:25,360 --> 00:16:29,120 the most experienced developer does not mean you should write 311 00:16:29,120 --> 00:16:32,680 code as ACTO. And if you fall below some 312 00:16:32,760 --> 00:16:36,080 percentage of your time, like let's say if you fall below 50% 313 00:16:36,080 --> 00:16:39,560 of your time coding, you will miss too many things that are 314 00:16:39,560 --> 00:16:42,520 going on in the code, even if when you're the most experienced 315 00:16:42,520 --> 00:16:44,840 one in the context of the company and the features, you're 316 00:16:44,840 --> 00:16:48,680 not a very good coder. So if you're actoi encourage you 317 00:16:48,680 --> 00:16:53,160 to code, but more of the harder problems, spikes, prototype 318 00:16:53,160 --> 00:16:57,240 research, things that you might want to pitch to the CEO more 319 00:16:57,240 --> 00:17:01,040 that kind of stuff, then day-to-day deep in the woods 320 00:17:01,120 --> 00:17:03,320 feature stuff. So that was my one of my 321 00:17:03,320 --> 00:17:05,560 failures. Thanks for sharing that. 322 00:17:05,560 --> 00:17:07,560 I think coming from the engineering background, right, 323 00:17:07,560 --> 00:17:10,000 sometimes we feel itchy, you know, like we want to code, 324 00:17:10,000 --> 00:17:12,480 especially if you dealt a lot with people problems, right? 325 00:17:12,480 --> 00:17:14,599 Sometimes it gets really stressful. 326 00:17:14,599 --> 00:17:16,119 So you just want to work with the code. 327 00:17:16,400 --> 00:17:19,119 But sometimes it's not wise to actually work on like features, 328 00:17:19,119 --> 00:17:20,760 right? Deliver features, just like what 329 00:17:20,760 --> 00:17:22,240 you mentioned. Maybe you missed the context, 330 00:17:22,240 --> 00:17:25,280 maybe you cannot keep up with the pace or sometimes you become 331 00:17:25,280 --> 00:17:27,800 a bottleneck simply because maybe you have too many meetings 332 00:17:27,800 --> 00:17:29,240 and other things to take care about. 333 00:17:29,560 --> 00:17:32,920 So yeah, so I think scoping it down to like what you say, maybe 334 00:17:32,920 --> 00:17:35,840 a spike or maybe POC, the research will be something that 335 00:17:35,840 --> 00:17:39,200 is more relevant and useful so that you can give guidance to 336 00:17:39,200 --> 00:17:41,960 people. So coding definitely is 1 337 00:17:41,960 --> 00:17:44,640 aspect, right? So there could be other plenty 338 00:17:44,640 --> 00:17:46,160 of areas that you need to think of. 339 00:17:46,440 --> 00:17:48,880 You just mentioned just now like efficient strategy, leadership. 340 00:17:49,160 --> 00:17:51,440 I also think that you can, you should also think about the 341 00:17:51,440 --> 00:17:54,360 people, definitely the execution, right? 342 00:17:54,600 --> 00:17:57,520 Maybe also thinking about the external branding, right? 343 00:17:57,640 --> 00:18:01,160 And also yourself. So we'll try to cover all these 344 00:18:01,160 --> 00:18:03,880 various different aspects, not to mention also the process that 345 00:18:03,880 --> 00:18:07,360 you need to set up, right? So maybe if we can start the 346 00:18:07,360 --> 00:18:09,520 first thing about strategy. I think you mentioned about 347 00:18:09,520 --> 00:18:11,400 strategy. Sometimes when you're dealing 348 00:18:11,400 --> 00:18:14,840 with too many things, you seem to lose focus and do not have a 349 00:18:14,840 --> 00:18:17,160 clear strategy. And you mentioned in your book 350 00:18:17,160 --> 00:18:19,640 that strategy is actually for the people. 351 00:18:20,000 --> 00:18:23,160 So tell us why we should think strategy in that particular 352 00:18:23,400 --> 00:18:27,680 perspective? Strategy helps people make 353 00:18:27,680 --> 00:18:32,480 decisions. So from my former example of the 354 00:18:32,480 --> 00:18:36,200 hiking and the strategy is to go left of the mountain. 355 00:18:36,680 --> 00:18:39,560 What can people make from that? So that's a strategy. 356 00:18:39,760 --> 00:18:43,480 Someone comes to a fork in the road, right or left because we 357 00:18:43,480 --> 00:18:45,880 want to go left of the mountain. The person goes left. 358 00:18:46,360 --> 00:18:49,800 The person will also bring with them some hiking shoes because 359 00:18:49,800 --> 00:18:51,960 it's a hike and because it's going into the mountains. 360 00:18:52,240 --> 00:18:55,040 So what does it mean for your day-to-day job? 361 00:18:55,400 --> 00:18:59,600 The strategy helps people make decisions whatever they decide 362 00:18:59,600 --> 00:19:02,400 about a feature or should we do this or should we do that? 363 00:19:02,760 --> 00:19:06,120 They should be able to look at the strategy and the strategy 364 00:19:06,120 --> 00:19:09,360 helps them make a decision, a right decision that fits with 365 00:19:09,360 --> 00:19:12,320 the future of the company explained in the strategy. 366 00:19:12,680 --> 00:19:14,920 And if the strategy does not help. 367 00:19:14,920 --> 00:19:18,160 On the other hand, if a tech strategy does not help people in 368 00:19:18,160 --> 00:19:22,080 your department make the right decisions, then the strategy is 369 00:19:22,080 --> 00:19:25,040 not It's useful. The strategy is not for you. 370 00:19:25,520 --> 00:19:28,520 The strategy is for everyone else to support them in their 371 00:19:28,520 --> 00:19:30,520 decisions, essentially. Yeah. 372 00:19:30,520 --> 00:19:33,200 So I find what you mentioned just now, right, strategy is to 373 00:19:33,200 --> 00:19:34,720 help people make decision, right? 374 00:19:34,720 --> 00:19:37,200 Because I think in technology, especially with the current 375 00:19:37,200 --> 00:19:40,320 rapid pace, there are simply too many alternatives that you can 376 00:19:40,320 --> 00:19:42,320 choose to actually execute something, right? 377 00:19:42,560 --> 00:19:45,040 And also not to mention there are so many tech stack 378 00:19:45,040 --> 00:19:48,000 programming language or maybe even cloud providers and things 379 00:19:48,000 --> 00:19:49,880 like that. So definitely we can't leave it 380 00:19:49,880 --> 00:19:53,520 up to people to decide, right? And hence probably the the the 381 00:19:53,520 --> 00:19:55,880 CEO will decide for the business, but for the tech, 382 00:19:55,880 --> 00:19:58,560 maybe the CTO will be the one who set up the strategy. 383 00:19:59,000 --> 00:20:00,800 So setting up the direction, right? 384 00:20:00,800 --> 00:20:04,000 So how to help people making decision is one thing, but you 385 00:20:04,000 --> 00:20:06,360 also say that we need to set up people for success. 386 00:20:06,720 --> 00:20:10,440 So how can ACTO do that to set up people for success? 387 00:20:11,120 --> 00:20:16,080 I have quite some code, had some coaches in the past that hired 388 00:20:16,280 --> 00:20:19,960 persons for a role and then after some time came to me and 389 00:20:19,960 --> 00:20:22,640 said, oh, I hired the person, but that's a failure. 390 00:20:23,040 --> 00:20:26,120 I need to let the person go. And we talked about that and I 391 00:20:26,120 --> 00:20:29,920 said, well, from my perspective, the person is not a failure. 392 00:20:30,360 --> 00:20:34,000 You made a mistake. And the mistake you made is you 393 00:20:34,000 --> 00:20:37,160 didn't set up the person for success, but you set up the 394 00:20:37,160 --> 00:20:39,960 person for failure. And I think that's a very 395 00:20:39,960 --> 00:20:44,200 important concept of if you delegate something or you hire 396 00:20:44,200 --> 00:20:47,520 someone, or you give a project to someone, or you make someone 397 00:20:47,520 --> 00:20:51,920 responsible for something, then you need to make sure that the 398 00:20:51,920 --> 00:20:56,800 person will be successful. So instead of doing the minimal 399 00:20:56,800 --> 00:21:00,280 work to get the person started on your side, you should do the 400 00:21:00,280 --> 00:21:03,200 maximum of work that you can do to support the person. 401 00:21:03,520 --> 00:21:06,160 It's often the case that perhaps you have a project, you don't 402 00:21:06,160 --> 00:21:08,880 have enough time, you're under time pressure, you give this 403 00:21:08,880 --> 00:21:12,040 project to someone and you're happy that you don't need to 404 00:21:12,040 --> 00:21:13,880 work on it anymore because you don't have time. 405 00:21:14,160 --> 00:21:18,520 So you also do not invest in the person and you set up the person 406 00:21:18,640 --> 00:21:23,040 to fail because setting up them for success takes time and 407 00:21:23,040 --> 00:21:25,640 that's something people don't do because they don't have time. 408 00:21:25,840 --> 00:21:29,080 But you need to really take your time to make a person successful 409 00:21:29,080 --> 00:21:30,920 and think what does a person need? 410 00:21:30,920 --> 00:21:33,160 Do I need to person connect to other person? 411 00:21:33,240 --> 00:21:35,040 Do I need to give the person a budget? 412 00:21:35,400 --> 00:21:39,400 What can I do to make that person successful when hiring 413 00:21:39,400 --> 00:21:42,120 someone? For example, people often make 414 00:21:42,120 --> 00:21:45,000 the mistake when they hire someone for security. 415 00:21:45,360 --> 00:21:48,200 They hire a hacker. That happened several times and 416 00:21:48,200 --> 00:21:50,320 then the challenge. But the challenge is not for the 417 00:21:50,320 --> 00:21:52,400 person. It's not to find the security 418 00:21:52,400 --> 00:21:56,080 problems in your code. The challenge is to convince all 419 00:21:56,080 --> 00:22:00,040 the other developers to follow security guidelines or to follow 420 00:22:00,040 --> 00:22:04,880 a security model, or to write good code, or to do security 421 00:22:05,240 --> 00:22:08,160 check UPS during code reviews. That's the hard part. 422 00:22:08,360 --> 00:22:11,080 And for that, you need to be a good manager to convince them. 423 00:22:11,440 --> 00:22:14,600 And if you're just a good hacker, you might not be able 424 00:22:14,800 --> 00:22:16,800 that. Obviously very good managers are 425 00:22:16,800 --> 00:22:20,280 there also very good hackers. But there's a probability that 426 00:22:20,280 --> 00:22:23,160 if you're just a good hacker, then you can't convince the 427 00:22:23,320 --> 00:22:26,880 people. So you as a boss, as a CTO, 428 00:22:26,880 --> 00:22:30,960 hiring this person and setting them up for failure because you 429 00:22:30,960 --> 00:22:34,600 hired them with a skill set that will not make them succeed in 430 00:22:34,600 --> 00:22:36,640 that job, and then it's your mistake. 431 00:22:36,640 --> 00:22:38,480 It isn't a mistake of the person you hired. 432 00:22:39,280 --> 00:22:40,840 I think it typically happens a lot, right? 433 00:22:40,840 --> 00:22:43,600 So when you hire people, you think that you have set the bar 434 00:22:43,600 --> 00:22:46,560 high or maybe you have seen this person can do a certain skills, 435 00:22:46,560 --> 00:22:48,080 right? But then don't forget the 436 00:22:48,080 --> 00:22:49,880 context when they join your company, right? 437 00:22:49,880 --> 00:22:51,960 Your company is probably one-of-a-kind with all this 438 00:22:51,960 --> 00:22:54,440 culture, the set of people and process inside. 439 00:22:54,760 --> 00:22:57,400 And sometimes we just think that they can be independent and 440 00:22:57,560 --> 00:23:00,480 solve the things by themselves. So you mentioned in your book 441 00:23:00,480 --> 00:23:02,120 you advocate a lot about one on ones. 442 00:23:02,120 --> 00:23:05,200 So probably this is one area where we can give support and 443 00:23:05,200 --> 00:23:06,920 set up the person for success, right? 444 00:23:06,920 --> 00:23:09,200 So tell us why one-on-one is actually very important 445 00:23:09,280 --> 00:23:13,120 important as ACTO role? I think one on ones are one of 446 00:23:13,120 --> 00:23:15,440 the most important things, perhaps the most important thing 447 00:23:15,440 --> 00:23:19,600 overall, for me at least as a manager, I use one on ones for 448 00:23:19,600 --> 00:23:23,280 many things. The main focus of one on ones 449 00:23:23,280 --> 00:23:27,800 for me is people development. How can I support my direct 450 00:23:27,800 --> 00:23:30,080 report? Where do they want to go? 451 00:23:30,080 --> 00:23:32,400 How do they want to develop? What do they want to do in the 452 00:23:32,400 --> 00:23:35,320 future and how can I support them doing this? 453 00:23:35,440 --> 00:23:38,320 How can I grow them or how can I help them grow? 454 00:23:38,640 --> 00:23:41,320 How can I support them grow? That's the most important thing. 455 00:23:41,320 --> 00:23:44,320 And if you do this and everyone in your department does this, 456 00:23:44,680 --> 00:23:47,480 then that's the biggest level you have because everyone in the 457 00:23:47,480 --> 00:23:50,280 department will become better and better and everything will 458 00:23:50,280 --> 00:23:53,280 get easier and easier. Because if you have 50 people 459 00:23:53,280 --> 00:23:57,080 and everyone is developed at the same time by their manager or 460 00:23:57,360 --> 00:24:00,840 help to develop themselves by their manager, that that's the 461 00:24:00,840 --> 00:24:02,960 biggest lever I think that you have. 462 00:24:03,200 --> 00:24:05,520 So that's important. It's also important if you do 463 00:24:05,520 --> 00:24:08,480 people develop people that people can see themselves in the 464 00:24:08,480 --> 00:24:11,440 future in the company. If they can see themselves in a 465 00:24:11,440 --> 00:24:14,240 year in the company, then they will stay. 466 00:24:14,240 --> 00:24:16,720 And if they can't see themselves in a year in the company, they 467 00:24:16,720 --> 00:24:18,360 will leave. So this is part of my 468 00:24:18,360 --> 00:24:20,840 one-on-one. What I don't do in one-on-one is 469 00:24:20,840 --> 00:24:23,880 status updates only if the person really wants to do this, 470 00:24:23,880 --> 00:24:27,440 but usually no, they can send me an e-mail and it's best. 471 00:24:27,440 --> 00:24:29,960 I don't know about status because everything should work 472 00:24:29,960 --> 00:24:33,600 and if something fails and I can help, yeah, send me an e-mail. 473 00:24:33,800 --> 00:24:35,720 But I don't need a status every week. 474 00:24:35,760 --> 00:24:38,080 This is fine, this is fine. I'm doing this, I'm doing this, 475 00:24:38,080 --> 00:24:39,760 I'm doing this. I don't need to watch people 476 00:24:39,760 --> 00:24:42,200 working. I assume they're doing their 477 00:24:42,200 --> 00:24:43,680 best. They don't need to tell me every 478 00:24:43,680 --> 00:24:46,240 week to do their best. So a big anti pattern is status 479 00:24:46,240 --> 00:24:50,120 in one-on-one and the other half of the one-on-one is my half. 480 00:24:50,360 --> 00:24:55,600 And I use it to align people. I explain what's going on, why 481 00:24:55,600 --> 00:24:57,840 this is relevant, why this makes sense. 482 00:24:58,320 --> 00:25:02,200 Like in the last 50,000 years in human history, there was always 483 00:25:02,200 --> 00:25:05,680 some people who explained the world to explain why the sun is 484 00:25:05,680 --> 00:25:07,720 rising and the moon is going down. 485 00:25:08,120 --> 00:25:09,960 And then people said, Oh yeah, that makes sense. 486 00:25:09,960 --> 00:25:13,120 So I'm no longer frightened because the sun is going up 487 00:25:13,120 --> 00:25:16,680 because of the sun goddess or whatever is behind is an 488 00:25:16,680 --> 00:25:19,760 explanation for the sun rising and the moon going down. 489 00:25:19,760 --> 00:25:22,920 And that's also something I think that's important for today 490 00:25:22,920 --> 00:25:24,960 for a manager to do to explain the world. 491 00:25:24,960 --> 00:25:29,000 So in one on once I explained the world why, what's the vision 492 00:25:29,000 --> 00:25:32,720 of the CEO means for tech, what this new customer means and all 493 00:25:32,720 --> 00:25:35,520 of these things. And lastly, in one on ones, I 494 00:25:35,520 --> 00:25:39,880 also prepare decisions and discuss decisions after they 495 00:25:39,880 --> 00:25:42,560 have been announced. So if I want to do something or 496 00:25:42,560 --> 00:25:44,560 this, I know the CEO wants to do something. 497 00:25:44,640 --> 00:25:47,440 I talked to the person, the one-on-one say the CEO wants to 498 00:25:47,440 --> 00:25:50,640 do, go to a new market. What are you thinking about 499 00:25:50,640 --> 00:25:52,400 this? And then people tell me what 500 00:25:52,400 --> 00:25:54,280 they are thinking about. It's a good idea, it's a bad 501 00:25:54,280 --> 00:25:57,400 idea, but people are not surprised when two weeks later 502 00:25:57,400 --> 00:25:59,720 the CEO announces this in an old hand. 503 00:26:00,200 --> 00:26:03,040 If it can be talked about before, sometimes you can't talk 504 00:26:03,040 --> 00:26:05,240 about things before. But if you're allowed to talk 505 00:26:05,240 --> 00:26:08,240 things, then I talk about these things before and after. 506 00:26:08,240 --> 00:26:12,000 The CEO explained to everyone, we're going to a new market. 507 00:26:12,320 --> 00:26:15,560 And when, when I ask people, so you heard the CEO, does this 508 00:26:15,560 --> 00:26:17,800 make sense to you? This is a good idea. 509 00:26:17,800 --> 00:26:20,080 And then say, no, I didn't understand what he said. 510 00:26:20,080 --> 00:26:22,360 And then then explain why it's happening. 511 00:26:22,680 --> 00:26:26,800 So for alignment and for making sense and giving context and all 512 00:26:26,800 --> 00:26:28,760 of these things, I think it's very, very important. 513 00:26:29,160 --> 00:26:33,640 And this also last point ties into my idea of automatic 514 00:26:33,640 --> 00:26:36,240 management. What do I mean with automatic 515 00:26:36,240 --> 00:26:38,160 management? Automatic management is 516 00:26:38,160 --> 00:26:40,920 management where I don't have to do anything As a manager. 517 00:26:41,440 --> 00:26:44,480 If I explain things to people, they make the right decisions. 518 00:26:44,840 --> 00:26:47,320 So I don't need to make the decisions or they don't need. 519 00:26:47,400 --> 00:26:49,600 If they come to me, for example, and say, Stephan, what would you 520 00:26:49,600 --> 00:26:51,760 do? The first thing I asked them, 521 00:26:51,760 --> 00:26:55,240 yeah, what would you do? I try to always empower people 522 00:26:55,240 --> 00:26:57,400 and give ownership and explaining things in the 523 00:26:57,400 --> 00:27:00,400 one-on-one does this, as does the strategy and division. 524 00:27:00,560 --> 00:27:03,040 Strategy and division is also automatic management. 525 00:27:03,400 --> 00:27:04,920 People make the right decisions on their own. 526 00:27:05,240 --> 00:27:07,720 I don't need to make them or help them with their decision. 527 00:27:08,080 --> 00:27:10,360 And the last thing is culture, for example is also. 528 00:27:10,480 --> 00:27:12,280 I consider also automatic management. 529 00:27:13,160 --> 00:27:14,120 Yeah. So I like the automatic 530 00:27:14,120 --> 00:27:16,960 management, right? Definitely if you can let people 531 00:27:16,960 --> 00:27:19,400 be independent as much as possible, definitely that that 532 00:27:19,400 --> 00:27:21,600 will be great. But that also relies a lot with 533 00:27:21,680 --> 00:27:24,600 your strategy, right, to help people make decision, maybe 534 00:27:24,600 --> 00:27:26,160 setting up the right culture as well. 535 00:27:26,440 --> 00:27:29,080 And also maybe encourage people to take responsibility, right? 536 00:27:29,080 --> 00:27:31,080 So you mentioned it's one chapter of the book as well. 537 00:27:31,080 --> 00:27:32,720 Encourage people to take responsibility. 538 00:27:32,720 --> 00:27:34,560 Not everything has to go through you, right? 539 00:27:34,560 --> 00:27:36,680 So enhance the automatic management. 540 00:27:37,200 --> 00:27:40,840 And I think you also advocate a lot about delegating stuff, 541 00:27:40,840 --> 00:27:43,440 right? In fact, delegate everything you 542 00:27:43,440 --> 00:27:46,640 mentioned in your book, delegate everything and also trust your 543 00:27:46,640 --> 00:27:49,000 people. Why is it so important to 544 00:27:49,000 --> 00:27:52,520 delegate everything for a CTO? Because I think most of the CT 545 00:27:52,600 --> 00:27:55,480 OS, especially the one who comes from a very strong technical 546 00:27:55,480 --> 00:27:58,840 background, they want to have a say in many, many things, 547 00:27:58,840 --> 00:28:00,720 especially if it's a tech decision, right? 548 00:28:00,960 --> 00:28:04,800 So why we need to delegate more? So the first thing why to 549 00:28:04,800 --> 00:28:06,640 delegate more is just a practical thing. 550 00:28:06,640 --> 00:28:10,880 All the Ctos I meet have not enough time and from those I 551 00:28:10,880 --> 00:28:13,040 meet are working in growing startups. 552 00:28:13,200 --> 00:28:16,760 So they have some set of responsibility and then the 553 00:28:16,760 --> 00:28:21,680 company grows and the responsibilities they have are 554 00:28:21,680 --> 00:28:24,600 also growing to a point that it's just too much. 555 00:28:24,680 --> 00:28:28,120 Like it might be possible with 10 people, but it's no longer 556 00:28:28,160 --> 00:28:31,800 possible with 20 people. So you need to start delegating 557 00:28:31,800 --> 00:28:36,120 things that could be your job when the company was small, but 558 00:28:36,120 --> 00:28:39,040 can no longer be your job when the company grows. 559 00:28:39,280 --> 00:28:43,240 And at that point, a lot of CTOS struggle because they do not 560 00:28:43,240 --> 00:28:45,800 delegate early enough. And then they end up with a 561 00:28:46,200 --> 00:28:49,440 calendar that's totally full. They are totally reactive. 562 00:28:49,440 --> 00:28:51,240 They can't do the things they want to do. 563 00:28:51,240 --> 00:28:55,400 So from a very practical point of view, you should delegate 564 00:28:56,040 --> 00:28:59,160 everything that you can delegate and it make just a conscious 565 00:28:59,160 --> 00:29:02,040 decision, say, OK, this is something I can't delegate, but 566 00:29:02,040 --> 00:29:04,160 everything else is up for delegation. 567 00:29:04,640 --> 00:29:08,560 And then there's also the point that you mentioned that was me 568 00:29:08,640 --> 00:29:11,120 20 years ago. So I thought, well, I need to 569 00:29:11,120 --> 00:29:13,280 make the technical decisions. You know, I'm the most 570 00:29:13,280 --> 00:29:16,560 experienced developer in the room, so I need to make the 571 00:29:16,560 --> 00:29:18,360 decisions. But after some years, looking 572 00:29:18,360 --> 00:29:21,720 back at these decisions, I thought they were not as great 573 00:29:21,720 --> 00:29:24,200 as I thought they would be. They were not bad. 574 00:29:24,520 --> 00:29:26,400 So most of my decisions were good. 575 00:29:26,760 --> 00:29:28,760 I made some bad ones, but most of them are good. 576 00:29:29,160 --> 00:29:31,280 But I thought someone else could make them too. 577 00:29:31,680 --> 00:29:36,640 And so I changed myself. I pushed technical decisions to 578 00:29:36,640 --> 00:29:40,280 people who are very competent and could make decisions on 579 00:29:40,280 --> 00:29:42,320 their own. And I no longer became a 580 00:29:42,320 --> 00:29:45,640 bottleneck. And also people owned those 581 00:29:45,640 --> 00:29:47,960 decisions like they owned the architecture decision. 582 00:29:48,440 --> 00:29:49,960 It's not something that Stephen says. 583 00:29:49,960 --> 00:29:52,680 It's not something you do this and then people don't own it, 584 00:29:52,880 --> 00:29:55,800 but they make a decision that they own the decision down the 585 00:29:55,800 --> 00:29:57,680 road. It's makes things a lot easier 586 00:29:57,680 --> 00:30:00,640 if people own the stuff or own the decisions they're making 587 00:30:00,640 --> 00:30:04,520 instead of me making decisions. So I find that delegation 588 00:30:04,520 --> 00:30:07,920 probably is also an art, right? Especially there's so many 589 00:30:07,920 --> 00:30:10,200 different variables, like for example, you delegate something 590 00:30:10,200 --> 00:30:12,920 to a person, right? Whether that person also has the 591 00:30:13,120 --> 00:30:15,800 skill set, that's the best thing, skill set and experience 592 00:30:15,800 --> 00:30:18,160 and they want to take responsibility to actually own 593 00:30:18,160 --> 00:30:20,200 the thing. The other thing is, of course, 594 00:30:20,200 --> 00:30:22,760 when you are small startup, maybe there are only a few 595 00:30:22,760 --> 00:30:24,800 people, right? As you grow and grow more 596 00:30:24,800 --> 00:30:27,000 responsibility, you also need to hire fast, right? 597 00:30:27,320 --> 00:30:31,360 So hiring also takes a different set of challenge and also hiring 598 00:30:31,360 --> 00:30:34,440 will take some time for the new people to get themselves on 599 00:30:34,440 --> 00:30:37,040 boarded, right? Is there any trick from you? 600 00:30:37,040 --> 00:30:39,400 How can we actually delegate better, right? 601 00:30:39,400 --> 00:30:41,840 You can't just, for example, a new person joined, you just 602 00:30:41,840 --> 00:30:43,240 delegate everything to the person. 603 00:30:43,520 --> 00:30:46,640 Is there a way, maybe some kind of strategy, for you to actually 604 00:30:46,640 --> 00:30:51,000 delegate smoothly so that people can also succeed with the task 605 00:30:51,000 --> 00:30:54,080 that you're given to them? So everything I said about 606 00:30:54,160 --> 00:30:57,760 setting up a success applies here and I think there are some 607 00:30:57,760 --> 00:30:59,760 mistakes that people make when delegating. 608 00:31:00,120 --> 00:31:03,800 So I think a lot of success in delegation is by not making a 609 00:31:03,800 --> 00:31:06,520 mistakes. And one mistake is that people 610 00:31:06,520 --> 00:31:09,640 delegate the wrong level. Like if the person is senior, 611 00:31:09,640 --> 00:31:14,120 you should delegate goals and numbers, When the person is not 612 00:31:14,120 --> 00:31:16,920 so senior, you delegate projects or features. 613 00:31:17,000 --> 00:31:21,200 And if the person is even less experienced, you're delegating 614 00:31:21,200 --> 00:31:24,200 tasks. And my mistake was I wanted to 615 00:31:24,200 --> 00:31:28,000 be delegated by goals or something like Stefan Solstice 616 00:31:28,360 --> 00:31:32,240 code coverage or quality or, you know, so I wanted to be managed 617 00:31:32,240 --> 00:31:34,680 by goals. And then this is how I managed 618 00:31:34,680 --> 00:31:36,680 people in the past and like 20 years ago. 619 00:31:36,680 --> 00:31:39,800 That's how I delegated things. But like, if a person very 620 00:31:39,800 --> 00:31:43,000 junior, you need to tell the person do this, then do this, 621 00:31:43,000 --> 00:31:45,560 then do that and come to me like every day. 622 00:31:46,080 --> 00:31:48,240 But if the person senior, that's also a mistake. 623 00:31:48,240 --> 00:31:51,120 They're telling people where some very senior do this, then 624 00:31:51,120 --> 00:31:55,720 do that and then do this again. They get annoyed by you being to 625 00:31:55,880 --> 00:31:58,240 be being a micromanager. So you need to delegate 626 00:31:58,800 --> 00:32:03,080 according not how you want to be managed, but how about the 627 00:32:03,080 --> 00:32:06,360 person needs to be managed and have the right level of what 628 00:32:06,360 --> 00:32:09,080 you're delegating to the person and to the experience in 629 00:32:09,080 --> 00:32:11,200 seniority level. I think that's very important. 630 00:32:11,680 --> 00:32:14,560 And the other thing, the biggest mistake I think is in delegation 631 00:32:14,560 --> 00:32:16,560 is I would have found it differently. 632 00:32:16,760 --> 00:32:19,640 So you delegate something, someone comes back and you say I 633 00:32:19,640 --> 00:32:22,160 would have done it differently and therefore it's bad. 634 00:32:22,800 --> 00:32:24,920 You need to really judge what people are doing. 635 00:32:24,920 --> 00:32:27,360 If you delegate something, you need to judge what they have 636 00:32:27,360 --> 00:32:31,600 been the result of the work by the success criteria and that 637 00:32:31,600 --> 00:32:33,760 not by the solution that you have in your head. 638 00:32:34,000 --> 00:32:37,560 And a lot of people make the mistake of judging the result of 639 00:32:37,560 --> 00:32:41,840 the delegation by comparing it to their ideal solution they had 640 00:32:41,840 --> 00:32:44,000 in their head, and then they're unhappy. 641 00:32:44,400 --> 00:32:46,320 But don't do that. Yeah. 642 00:32:46,320 --> 00:32:48,640 So I think you brought up a very good point, right? 643 00:32:48,640 --> 00:32:52,280 So because CTO mostly are very experienced in the technology, 644 00:32:52,280 --> 00:32:54,200 right? They have a very strong opinion 645 00:32:54,200 --> 00:32:56,720 about something, right? So I think setting up a 646 00:32:56,720 --> 00:32:59,160 delegation with the success criteria is really important, 647 00:32:59,160 --> 00:33:00,520 right? And the success criteria should 648 00:33:00,520 --> 00:33:03,880 not be probably the how, but it's like the why or the what 649 00:33:03,880 --> 00:33:06,320 metrics that people have to achieve, right? 650 00:33:06,320 --> 00:33:08,800 Not necessarily how the things are done. 651 00:33:09,200 --> 00:33:12,440 So I think, yeah, not criticizing the way people that 652 00:33:12,440 --> 00:33:14,880 you delegate to, right? Like not criticizing the way 653 00:33:14,880 --> 00:33:17,160 they do stuff. I think it's really important. 654 00:33:17,520 --> 00:33:21,200 So I think the other thing when we talk about delegation and 655 00:33:21,360 --> 00:33:23,960 building the team, right, So you mentioned in your book that a 656 00:33:23,960 --> 00:33:28,080 CTO needs to be able to scale the team 10X and also scale the 657 00:33:28,080 --> 00:33:31,160 systems 10X. When we talk about 10X, right, 658 00:33:31,160 --> 00:33:33,200 it's something like the big multipliers. 659 00:33:33,480 --> 00:33:38,000 So how can ACTO always think ahead thinking about the 10X 660 00:33:38,080 --> 00:33:41,320 capacity? 1010 X needs 10X, maybe speed or 661 00:33:41,440 --> 00:33:44,280 whatever that is, right? The 10X scaling is just a 662 00:33:44,280 --> 00:33:46,520 number, it could be 8 or 12 or 50 years. 663 00:33:46,840 --> 00:33:50,200 The main point is that I think a lot of CT OS fall into two camps 664 00:33:50,320 --> 00:33:53,160 and they don't camp which is not thinking about scaling. 665 00:33:53,480 --> 00:33:56,960 And then the companies gets more customers and they fail because 666 00:33:56,960 --> 00:33:58,920 they have not invested in scaling. 667 00:33:59,400 --> 00:34:02,240 And it doesn't only mean systems, but it also means like 668 00:34:02,440 --> 00:34:05,320 people and processes organization. 669 00:34:05,520 --> 00:34:09,239 You might get an investment of 10 million, how do I spend it? 670 00:34:09,239 --> 00:34:12,120 And you should have some plan on how you're scaling your 671 00:34:12,120 --> 00:34:14,600 department by 10 or at least by 5, you know. 672 00:34:14,600 --> 00:34:18,520 So do I need AVP of engineering? Don't I need AVP of engineering? 673 00:34:18,560 --> 00:34:21,960 Do I have development? Do I have self organized teams 674 00:34:21,960 --> 00:34:25,480 or how are this team structured and this kind of things? 675 00:34:25,480 --> 00:34:28,840 And also does your current tech setup, your cloud setup, does 676 00:34:28,840 --> 00:34:32,560 this scale easily scale to 10 times the customers? 677 00:34:32,960 --> 00:34:37,480 So a lot of CT OS I meet, I'm not thinking about scaling. 678 00:34:37,480 --> 00:34:40,440 And then when there's some money on your customers, they fail. 679 00:34:40,840 --> 00:34:44,920 And the other part, the other type of CTO, they scale by a 680 00:34:44,920 --> 00:34:46,800 million times. You know, they have 10 681 00:34:46,800 --> 00:34:49,960 customers, but they build infrastructure that could be 682 00:34:49,960 --> 00:34:53,360 used for 100 million customers. So they look into a future that 683 00:34:53,360 --> 00:34:56,760 will probably never come and scale their team. 684 00:34:56,840 --> 00:35:01,280 They hire AVP of engineering too early or they have too 685 00:35:01,280 --> 00:35:04,480 complicated processes or they have a cloud set up that's very 686 00:35:04,480 --> 00:35:07,080 complicated. That includes Kafka and that 687 00:35:07,080 --> 00:35:10,000 includes a lot of things. And then they're proud of 688 00:35:10,000 --> 00:35:12,040 saying, yeah, we could scale a million times. 689 00:35:12,680 --> 00:35:15,120 But I, I think, well, then if you scale a million time you 690 00:35:15,360 --> 00:35:17,840 that's not happening and you build something that's more 691 00:35:17,840 --> 00:35:20,120 complicated for future that will not come. 692 00:35:20,120 --> 00:35:24,320 So don't proud of that. So the 10X is more about a 693 00:35:24,320 --> 00:35:28,680 scaling amount that makes sense. It's not too less, but it's also 694 00:35:28,680 --> 00:35:32,040 not like don't think about scaling, but it's also not 695 00:35:32,040 --> 00:35:34,360 scaling a million times. Yeah. 696 00:35:34,360 --> 00:35:36,880 So I think many people would have this linear thinking, 697 00:35:36,880 --> 00:35:38,680 right? So as the time progressed, they 698 00:35:38,680 --> 00:35:41,320 just think of maybe what's the next feature, what's the next 699 00:35:41,320 --> 00:35:43,960 set of customers, right? But they forgot to think about 700 00:35:43,960 --> 00:35:46,960 what happened if let's say suddenly you become viral or so 701 00:35:46,960 --> 00:35:48,600 many traffic suddenly comes, right. 702 00:35:48,920 --> 00:35:52,600 And that's where probably a lot of maybe service disruption or 703 00:35:52,600 --> 00:35:55,320 maybe challenges in terms of people, number of people that 704 00:35:55,320 --> 00:35:56,560 you need to hire suddenly, right? 705 00:35:56,560 --> 00:35:59,760 So I think thinking tenets for me, definitely it's quite a 706 00:35:59,760 --> 00:36:02,440 challenge to always think ahead in terms of techniques. 707 00:36:02,560 --> 00:36:05,440 But definitely as a CTO you need to always think far beyond 708 00:36:05,440 --> 00:36:07,080 right. Far beyond what is really 709 00:36:07,080 --> 00:36:09,080 required. But not too far. 710 00:36:09,360 --> 00:36:12,600 You will not get a million times customers next year. 711 00:36:12,680 --> 00:36:15,280 That's not going to happen. You can't go that viral. 712 00:36:16,240 --> 00:36:18,360 Yeah, I was about to add on on this point, right. 713 00:36:18,360 --> 00:36:20,600 So you mentioned also we should not think too far ahead. 714 00:36:20,840 --> 00:36:23,880 And in your chapter, one of your chapter, you promotes radical 715 00:36:23,880 --> 00:36:26,760 simplicity. So I think this is also probably 716 00:36:26,760 --> 00:36:29,480 something that we need to always reflect, right? 717 00:36:29,480 --> 00:36:32,560 Because there are so many architecture patterns or maybe 718 00:36:32,560 --> 00:36:35,520 fancy technologies that people want to use, right? 719 00:36:35,640 --> 00:36:39,600 But you advise us to actually choose simplicity, like even be 720 00:36:39,680 --> 00:36:42,480 radically simple. So why is that important? 721 00:36:43,160 --> 00:36:46,720 It's important for two reasons. The first reason is that it's 722 00:36:46,720 --> 00:36:49,440 much easier to operate. Something simple is much easier 723 00:36:49,440 --> 00:36:51,280 to operate than something complicated. 724 00:36:51,640 --> 00:36:54,240 If you have too much of A tech stack, too much different 725 00:36:54,240 --> 00:36:57,880 frameworks, you need to update them to stay secure. 726 00:36:57,880 --> 00:37:00,480 You need to it's, it's difficult if you have a lot of stuff, it's 727 00:37:00,480 --> 00:37:03,000 difficult to manage. So it's difficult for people to 728 00:37:03,000 --> 00:37:06,720 get in and during on boarding. So that's one, one reason. 729 00:37:07,000 --> 00:37:11,880 The other reason is if developer think too much where I'm coming 730 00:37:11,880 --> 00:37:15,880 from, I'm coming from the 1980s, so I'm not back to the future, 731 00:37:16,480 --> 00:37:19,320 back from the past. So I'm from the 1980s and there 732 00:37:19,320 --> 00:37:22,600 were a lot of single developers like today in the, in the, the 733 00:37:22,600 --> 00:37:25,400 group of indie developers in the games, in the App Store with 734 00:37:25,400 --> 00:37:27,960 games. And it was in the 80s and a lot 735 00:37:27,960 --> 00:37:30,440 of people did great things on their own. 736 00:37:30,800 --> 00:37:34,960 And I want, I think developers should become more creative 737 00:37:34,960 --> 00:37:39,040 again instead of developing features for product, but do 738 00:37:39,040 --> 00:37:43,520 creative stuff themselves and create deep technical features 739 00:37:43,520 --> 00:37:46,400 that are challenging by themselves and not develop 740 00:37:46,400 --> 00:37:50,240 shallow features that are only get interesting if you do them 741 00:37:50,240 --> 00:37:52,360 in Angular or React or something, you know. 742 00:37:52,600 --> 00:37:55,440 So a lot of developers I think are bored by the features they 743 00:37:55,440 --> 00:37:58,960 need to create because they are not intellectually stimulated 744 00:37:58,960 --> 00:38:01,560 enough. And that's the reason they add 745 00:38:01,560 --> 00:38:05,120 so many frameworks or want to go from, I don't know, from 746 00:38:05,160 --> 00:38:09,080 JavaScript to M or from M to Odin or from switching some of 747 00:38:09,080 --> 00:38:11,080 the stuff around with programming languages. 748 00:38:11,600 --> 00:38:14,840 A very simple example would be, and that's something a feature I 749 00:38:14,840 --> 00:38:17,680 have seen in the past and I think I put it in my newsletter 750 00:38:17,680 --> 00:38:20,240 also. You go by bus or you go by train 751 00:38:20,240 --> 00:38:23,720 from one city to another city. And the feature this, the 752 00:38:23,720 --> 00:38:26,760 website asks you, do you want to sit in the sun or not in the 753 00:38:26,760 --> 00:38:28,760 sun? And then you say, OK, I don't 754 00:38:28,760 --> 00:38:31,880 want to sit in the sun. And then the code, the 755 00:38:31,880 --> 00:38:35,280 application looks at how the train will go and how the sun 756 00:38:35,280 --> 00:38:39,560 will move and then decide if you should sit on the right side or 757 00:38:39,560 --> 00:38:42,720 of the left side of the train, you know, and if this feature is 758 00:38:42,720 --> 00:38:46,280 something that that's not easy to write code for, you need to 759 00:38:46,280 --> 00:38:48,640 think a little about it. And that's, I think it's 760 00:38:48,640 --> 00:38:52,560 intellectually stimulating. So if you have a search, suppose 761 00:38:52,560 --> 00:38:56,400 you can book tickets and this feature would make it 762 00:38:56,400 --> 00:38:59,280 interesting for a developer adding such things like this, 763 00:38:59,600 --> 00:39:01,880 then ticket. And then you can have a check 764 00:39:01,880 --> 00:39:04,720 box want to sit in the sun or don't want to sit as our two 765 00:39:04,720 --> 00:39:07,240 radio buttons. And that would be interesting 766 00:39:07,240 --> 00:39:08,600 and that would keep people interested. 767 00:39:08,760 --> 00:39:11,840 I think the most interesting feature I ever did was as a kid, 768 00:39:12,040 --> 00:39:14,680 there is this, I don't know how it's really no, but there is 769 00:39:14,680 --> 00:39:17,240 this puzzle kind of that it's called Towers of Hanoi. 770 00:39:17,960 --> 00:39:21,440 It's a little bit of a puzzle where you need to move items or 771 00:39:21,440 --> 00:39:24,680 pieces around. And I came up as a kid, I came 772 00:39:24,680 --> 00:39:27,920 up with an algorithm how to solve this, like you have 773 00:39:28,120 --> 00:39:30,880 whatever situation you had. And then it's very simple. 774 00:39:30,880 --> 00:39:35,280 But I mean, I was AI don't know, 11 year old old old kid. 775 00:39:35,600 --> 00:39:39,080 And that made me proud, coming up with this solution to this 776 00:39:39,840 --> 00:39:43,880 problem, to this puzzle. You know, I've found that one of 777 00:39:43,880 --> 00:39:47,480 the most intriguing and most satisfying things, and this is I 778 00:39:47,480 --> 00:39:50,840 think what people, what developers need to do, focus on 779 00:39:50,840 --> 00:39:54,040 deep features that are intellectual stimulating. 780 00:39:54,640 --> 00:39:59,080 And Long story short, if you practice radical simplicity, you 781 00:39:59,080 --> 00:40:03,520 have a minimal text stack and you are enabled to focus on deep 782 00:40:03,520 --> 00:40:06,280 features. Otherwise, most of your effort 783 00:40:06,280 --> 00:40:10,600 just goes into how do I make React Native work with a 784 00:40:10,600 --> 00:40:12,760 polygraph, QL and all of these stuff. 785 00:40:12,760 --> 00:40:14,480 You know, that's where the effort goes. 786 00:40:14,480 --> 00:40:18,520 We're not into how do I find out if the person should sit on the 787 00:40:18,520 --> 00:40:20,560 right or the left side? Where's the sun on this trip? 788 00:40:21,600 --> 00:40:24,040 Yeah, I think simplicity, definitely many techies would 789 00:40:24,040 --> 00:40:25,800 probably fall into the trap, right? 790 00:40:25,800 --> 00:40:28,840 So they first probably think, oh, this is simple, but turns 791 00:40:28,840 --> 00:40:30,600 out it's not. And I think you brought up the 792 00:40:30,600 --> 00:40:32,880 main gist, right? So easy to operate. 793 00:40:32,920 --> 00:40:35,040 So it's not necessarily easy to develop. 794 00:40:35,040 --> 00:40:37,200 Easy to operate is something also that is definitely 795 00:40:37,200 --> 00:40:39,640 important, right? So you don't want to have to 796 00:40:39,640 --> 00:40:43,120 spend so many resources, skill set to actually operate the 797 00:40:43,120 --> 00:40:45,880 things that you do, right? And I think focusing on the core 798 00:40:45,880 --> 00:40:49,640 things like the core aspects of your business, building deeply 799 00:40:49,640 --> 00:40:53,440 intellectual solutions, that that is probably OK, right? 800 00:40:53,440 --> 00:40:55,920 But the rest of that should be radically simple. 801 00:40:56,560 --> 00:41:00,240 So one aspect that I find when I used to be a engineering leader 802 00:41:00,240 --> 00:41:02,080 as well is actually to manage yourself. 803 00:41:02,240 --> 00:41:05,080 This position can be really stressful, right? 804 00:41:05,080 --> 00:41:08,560 So many people challenges, not to mention you also on the hook, 805 00:41:08,560 --> 00:41:10,160 right? So you are responsible for many, 806 00:41:10,160 --> 00:41:13,640 many different things, including maybe incidents or maybe wrong 807 00:41:13,800 --> 00:41:16,720 box, things like that, right? So definitely managing yourself 808 00:41:16,720 --> 00:41:18,840 is something that a lot of us can learn from. 809 00:41:19,040 --> 00:41:21,480 So maybe from you, what are some of the tips that you? 810 00:41:21,600 --> 00:41:24,440 I think it's very important for ACTO role because sometimes the 811 00:41:24,440 --> 00:41:27,280 job can be very lonely. You are at the top, but you 812 00:41:27,280 --> 00:41:29,720 cannot trust too much of the people, right? 813 00:41:29,720 --> 00:41:32,560 To tell all the challenges. But you also don't have PS to 814 00:41:32,560 --> 00:41:34,800 talk to. So maybe some of your tips how 815 00:41:34,800 --> 00:41:38,680 we can actually be mentally healthy kind of ACTO. 816 00:41:39,440 --> 00:41:42,800 What do we talk about, Delegate? I think it's very important to 817 00:41:42,800 --> 00:41:46,240 get to a sustainable work level, so that's important. 818 00:41:46,360 --> 00:41:48,640 Second, you might want to get a coach. 819 00:41:49,240 --> 00:41:52,680 A lot of the stuff sometimes I'm, I'm, I feel a little bit 820 00:41:52,680 --> 00:41:55,280 like a therapist. I'm not in any way qualified. 821 00:41:55,280 --> 00:41:59,040 But a lot of the stuff we're talking about is how people feel 822 00:41:59,040 --> 00:42:03,520 and the opportunity to vent off. And so a lot of stuff in 823 00:42:03,520 --> 00:42:06,480 coaching is going beyond technical details. 824 00:42:07,000 --> 00:42:09,440 I think it's important to network more. 825 00:42:09,680 --> 00:42:12,960 I feel other executives in the company are better at 826 00:42:12,960 --> 00:42:15,400 networking. You know the head of sales might 827 00:42:15,400 --> 00:42:18,920 or the VPF sales might go to lunch with the VPF marketing 828 00:42:18,920 --> 00:42:21,120 every week or something. You know that's what they are 829 00:42:21,120 --> 00:42:24,080 doing and in no way derogatory when I say they. 830 00:42:24,280 --> 00:42:28,360 But CT OS don't do this enough. They stay too much in their tech 831 00:42:28,360 --> 00:42:32,400 bubble and do not connect to other people enough to other 832 00:42:32,400 --> 00:42:35,680 people in the company. So I would urge everyone to have 833 00:42:35,680 --> 00:42:38,600 a one-on-one lunch. One-on-one with AVPF marketing 834 00:42:38,600 --> 00:42:42,040 or with the VPF sale or the VPF customer support of customer 835 00:42:42,040 --> 00:42:45,760 success, that makes it easier. You talk about what you want to 836 00:42:45,760 --> 00:42:49,080 achieve and you learn about them and you build a relationship. 837 00:42:49,360 --> 00:42:52,840 And that makes a lot of meetings and lot of things less stressful 838 00:42:53,240 --> 00:42:56,720 and also often puts a lot of pressure into context into more 839 00:42:56,800 --> 00:42:58,640 context. So that makes it easier. 840 00:42:59,120 --> 00:43:02,160 And the last thing I, I think it's what a lot of stress comes 841 00:43:02,160 --> 00:43:06,480 from, I feel is like the CTO does not talk enough about 842 00:43:06,480 --> 00:43:11,880 expectations with the CEO. So I urge every CTO to talk to 843 00:43:11,880 --> 00:43:15,640 the CEO about expectations. What are their expectations to 844 00:43:15,640 --> 00:43:19,600 the CEO and what are the CEO's expectations towards them. 845 00:43:20,080 --> 00:43:23,840 And talking about expectations and clearing them up also makes 846 00:43:23,840 --> 00:43:27,200 everything much clearer. And you might feel pressure 847 00:43:27,200 --> 00:43:30,680 where it's unnecessary. You know, it's the CEO thinks 848 00:43:30,680 --> 00:43:33,760 it's not that important, but you put the pressure on yourself. 849 00:43:34,080 --> 00:43:37,640 So a lot of pressure that comes your way is something you put on 850 00:43:37,640 --> 00:43:40,200 yourself. And by clearing expectation, 851 00:43:40,200 --> 00:43:43,440 this can go away. That's actually a very golden 852 00:43:43,440 --> 00:43:45,600 tip, right? So manage the expectation from 853 00:43:45,600 --> 00:43:47,240 the CEO. First of all, understand the 854 00:43:47,240 --> 00:43:49,280 expectation and manage it properly, right? 855 00:43:49,600 --> 00:43:52,320 And I saw sometimes I think the CTO because they are like the 856 00:43:52,360 --> 00:43:56,000 main person who are responsible for tech and many of the 857 00:43:56,000 --> 00:43:58,280 start-ups actually, it's a tech driven kind of a company, right? 858 00:43:58,520 --> 00:44:01,240 Sometimes they take failures too seriously, you know, like if 859 00:44:01,240 --> 00:44:04,120 something that's a bug or service is down, maybe because 860 00:44:04,120 --> 00:44:05,760 of a good heart of an engineer, right? 861 00:44:05,760 --> 00:44:07,720 They take failures really seriously. 862 00:44:07,920 --> 00:44:10,840 And the other aspect which is quite common for any engineers 863 00:44:10,840 --> 00:44:13,320 in poster syndrome, right? Simply because there are so many 864 00:44:13,320 --> 00:44:16,400 things that they cannot keep up, so they feel that they are not 865 00:44:16,400 --> 00:44:19,400 the right person for this. Any kind of tips about handling 866 00:44:19,400 --> 00:44:21,360 failures and imposter syndrome? Probably. 867 00:44:22,120 --> 00:44:24,720 I think the best thing about imposter syndrome, I think is 868 00:44:24,720 --> 00:44:27,320 just talking to other people and accepting their few. 869 00:44:27,400 --> 00:44:31,080 And I think you might be Whenever people talk to other 870 00:44:31,400 --> 00:44:34,960 people in the company, they are often surprised how positively 871 00:44:34,960 --> 00:44:38,280 people are seeing them. And then you should just, you 872 00:44:38,280 --> 00:44:42,960 just accept what they are saying and not doubting what they say. 873 00:44:42,960 --> 00:44:44,240 And they, well, they don't have a clue. 874 00:44:44,240 --> 00:44:46,480 I don't know anything. So they have the wrong image. 875 00:44:46,480 --> 00:44:50,320 No, if they have this image, look more into what people think 876 00:44:50,320 --> 00:44:53,280 of you in a positive way, not a negative way, but in a positive 877 00:44:53,280 --> 00:44:56,080 way and take this positivity away from it. 878 00:44:56,320 --> 00:44:59,920 So I think that's important to for this imposter syndrome. 879 00:45:00,520 --> 00:45:04,280 So talking is very important. And the second thing, I think 880 00:45:04,280 --> 00:45:06,760 the most important thing about failure is be transparent. 881 00:45:07,360 --> 00:45:10,880 Yeah, I see too many CT OS, and this goes down to the senior 882 00:45:10,880 --> 00:45:13,800 developer, probably to the junior developer. 883 00:45:14,200 --> 00:45:18,440 They want to keep keep failures a secret. 884 00:45:18,760 --> 00:45:21,000 And that also feeds into the imposter syndrome. 885 00:45:21,000 --> 00:45:24,520 If you keep failures a secret, it always is like, OK, if they 886 00:45:24,520 --> 00:45:28,360 would really know how often I make mistakes, that they would 887 00:45:28,360 --> 00:45:31,520 not like me that much. So I'm kind of an imposter. 888 00:45:32,080 --> 00:45:34,840 So if you transparent around your failure, especially as the 889 00:45:34,840 --> 00:45:37,760 CTO, that's a good thing. I mean, if you have too many 890 00:45:37,760 --> 00:45:41,400 failure, you might get fired. But usually being transparent is 891 00:45:41,400 --> 00:45:43,480 a good thing. And I made the mistake myself. 892 00:45:43,520 --> 00:45:46,880 I tried to keep everything in tech, not talk about failures, 893 00:45:47,080 --> 00:45:50,800 and that became became very difficult and unmanageable. 894 00:45:51,160 --> 00:45:53,760 Hopefully no one sees the website has a problem. 895 00:45:53,880 --> 00:45:57,720 This kind of things, if you can fix it in a minute, maybe no one 896 00:45:57,720 --> 00:46:01,080 has seen it and stuff like that. That was a huge mistake. 897 00:46:01,080 --> 00:46:04,280 And when I became more transparent, for example, in the 898 00:46:04,280 --> 00:46:08,240 company where I was CTO and I came in to fix all the problems 899 00:46:08,240 --> 00:46:12,040 because they had huge problems. I set up a mailing list with the 900 00:46:12,160 --> 00:46:15,200 head of marketing and the CEO and the CFO and the head of 901 00:46:15,200 --> 00:46:17,640 sales and everyone. And whenever we had a problem, I 902 00:46:17,640 --> 00:46:19,080 sent to the e-mail. We have currently have a 903 00:46:19,080 --> 00:46:21,880 problem, we're working on it. And then when the problem was 904 00:46:21,880 --> 00:46:24,240 solved, sent out an e-mail and said it's solved. 905 00:46:24,720 --> 00:46:28,480 So being transparent about incidents, about failures, like 906 00:46:28,760 --> 00:46:33,280 there was this critical back, we lost €50,000 or $100,000 or 907 00:46:33,280 --> 00:46:35,400 something. Be transparent about it. 908 00:46:35,400 --> 00:46:39,280 That will help you be more relaxed because you don't need 909 00:46:39,280 --> 00:46:41,920 to keep things everything under lid. 910 00:46:42,120 --> 00:46:45,640 On one hand, it also helps with the imposter syndrome and it 911 00:46:45,640 --> 00:46:48,240 builds trust with people. If you're transparent about your 912 00:46:48,240 --> 00:46:50,840 failure, it builds trust with the CEO and everyone else in the 913 00:46:50,840 --> 00:46:52,920 company. Yeah, that's a good point, 914 00:46:52,920 --> 00:46:54,680 right. So if you are more transparent 915 00:46:54,680 --> 00:46:56,160 and you just share as it is, right? 916 00:46:56,160 --> 00:46:58,720 So I think the trust can be built, especially if you are 917 00:46:58,720 --> 00:47:00,640 reliable, right? So you understand that there's a 918 00:47:00,640 --> 00:47:03,440 failure or there's a mistake, but you take responsibility to 919 00:47:03,440 --> 00:47:05,600 actually solve it. I think that also builds a lot 920 00:47:05,600 --> 00:47:08,400 of trust with other people. So the last few chapters in your 921 00:47:08,400 --> 00:47:12,040 book, you mentioned about the future of this CTO role. 922 00:47:12,040 --> 00:47:14,640 I think one thing that I find really interesting, you touch on 923 00:47:14,640 --> 00:47:18,560 also about AI and how it can become an opportunity as the 924 00:47:18,560 --> 00:47:21,960 next evolution for the CTO role. So maybe if you can elaborate a 925 00:47:21,960 --> 00:47:24,200 little bit of your thought process here, how can AI 926 00:47:24,200 --> 00:47:26,440 actually help the CTO role evolves? 927 00:47:27,080 --> 00:47:30,600 I think the main thing would be what I think is very important, 928 00:47:30,600 --> 00:47:34,040 at least what's very important to me is what I mentioned before 929 00:47:34,320 --> 00:47:38,160 is getting techies back into a more of a creative driver's 930 00:47:38,160 --> 00:47:41,000 seat. Because a lot of people I know 931 00:47:41,000 --> 00:47:43,680 who came to the tech world came to the tech world because of 932 00:47:43,680 --> 00:47:46,000 creativity. You mentioned video games before 933 00:47:46,000 --> 00:47:48,520 and people wanting to write video games perhaps. 934 00:47:48,520 --> 00:47:52,400 And because of the creative energy there is in creating 935 00:47:52,400 --> 00:47:54,640 something out of nothing. There is nothing in the computer 936 00:47:54,640 --> 00:47:56,520 and then you do something and then there is something. 937 00:47:56,920 --> 00:48:01,000 And I feel like CT OS have been coming very good at executing 938 00:48:01,000 --> 00:48:05,240 other people ideas. And so on one hand, I see AI as 939 00:48:05,240 --> 00:48:09,960 an opportunity to become, to get again to connect with the 940 00:48:09,960 --> 00:48:14,040 creative inside you, the creativity inside you and become 941 00:48:14,040 --> 00:48:16,960 more creative again and own creativity in the company more. 942 00:48:17,320 --> 00:48:20,360 So that's what I see as a very positive thing. 943 00:48:20,800 --> 00:48:24,640 The challenging thing is that I think currently no one knows how 944 00:48:25,040 --> 00:48:27,320 AI will affect software development. 945 00:48:27,360 --> 00:48:29,360 Will this replace all developers? 946 00:48:29,360 --> 00:48:31,760 Will this replace product management? 947 00:48:31,840 --> 00:48:33,960 Will there be software? Will there only be AI? 948 00:48:33,960 --> 00:48:36,840 How this is all like? We're currently in uncharted 949 00:48:36,840 --> 00:48:40,360 water, uncharted territory. It's unclear what the future 950 00:48:40,360 --> 00:48:42,120 will bring. Everything is possible I think. 951 00:48:42,480 --> 00:48:46,720 Which means again, if everything is possible, I urge CT OS to 952 00:48:47,040 --> 00:48:51,200 grab AI to see how AI can positively impact their 953 00:48:51,200 --> 00:48:53,320 business. Own it and drive it. 954 00:48:53,640 --> 00:48:56,520 If you don't drive it as ACTO, someone else in the company will 955 00:48:56,520 --> 00:48:59,240 drive it. So don't fall in that trap. 956 00:49:00,160 --> 00:49:01,400 Yeah. So I think you also mentioned in 957 00:49:01,400 --> 00:49:04,160 one of the chapters that CTO needs to think about the future 958 00:49:04,160 --> 00:49:05,400 of the software development, right. 959 00:49:05,400 --> 00:49:08,720 So always knows where the future kind of like you know the 960 00:49:08,720 --> 00:49:11,240 direction, right, so that you can bring people along maybe 961 00:49:11,240 --> 00:49:13,080 with the vision and the prediction, right. 962 00:49:13,440 --> 00:49:16,240 And I think you brought up a good point to become a creator 963 00:49:16,240 --> 00:49:19,280 again. Many CTO probably have become 964 00:49:19,320 --> 00:49:22,440 less hands on and maybe they are afraid of learning new 965 00:49:22,440 --> 00:49:25,280 technologies as well because the pace is really so fast. 966 00:49:25,760 --> 00:49:28,600 And just by having AI probably is also a good companion, right 967 00:49:28,600 --> 00:49:31,520 for you to, I don't know, like maybe learn new technology, try 968 00:49:31,520 --> 00:49:34,840 to understand existing codebase or even ask about things that 969 00:49:34,840 --> 00:49:36,280 probably you are not familiar with. 970 00:49:36,440 --> 00:49:39,040 Could be like security, could be so many other aspects that 971 00:49:39,040 --> 00:49:40,760 probably are required for the role. 972 00:49:41,040 --> 00:49:45,280 So I think definitely do take a grabs of this AI technology and 973 00:49:45,280 --> 00:49:48,280 make it useful for the role. So thank you so much for this 974 00:49:48,280 --> 00:49:50,200 time. Stefan, I have only one last 975 00:49:50,200 --> 00:49:53,200 question from you. I know that we have talked a lot 976 00:49:53,200 --> 00:49:56,600 about insights and things like that, but I normally have one 977 00:49:56,600 --> 00:49:59,720 last question that I always ask my guest, which is to come up 978 00:49:59,720 --> 00:50:02,560 with this thing called the three technical leadership wisdom. 979 00:50:03,000 --> 00:50:06,200 So if you can think of it like an advice or just summary of all 980 00:50:06,200 --> 00:50:08,520 the insights that you have shared with us, what would these 981 00:50:08,560 --> 00:50:11,840 three will be? Well, the summary is essentially 982 00:50:12,080 --> 00:50:15,480 for me, be creative again, that brings happiness. 983 00:50:16,160 --> 00:50:18,760 Be a leader. That makes things much easier. 984 00:50:19,520 --> 00:50:22,120 I only have these two. I think that would be the most 985 00:50:22,240 --> 00:50:25,080 important. Be creative again on one hand, 986 00:50:25,080 --> 00:50:28,200 and really be a leader. All right, so thank you so much 987 00:50:28,280 --> 00:50:31,040 for the wisdom. So Stefan, if people wants to 988 00:50:31,040 --> 00:50:34,080 buy your book, right, or maybe they want to connect or even get 989 00:50:34,200 --> 00:50:38,320 in touch with you for the CDO coach so when they can find you 990 00:50:38,320 --> 00:50:39,920 online. They can find me online on 991 00:50:39,920 --> 00:50:43,600 LinkedIn and if you want to talk to me and just share something 992 00:50:43,600 --> 00:50:46,320 then just share it then it doesn't need to be acdo 993 00:50:46,320 --> 00:50:47,920 relationship. We just can have a call or 994 00:50:47,920 --> 00:50:51,920 something on one hand and the book is founded CTO book dot 995 00:50:51,920 --> 00:50:53,040 dev. Right. 996 00:50:53,040 --> 00:50:55,480 So it's one of the best selling book on Lean Pub. 997 00:50:55,480 --> 00:50:59,000 So I think most of you can check out there as well. 998 00:50:59,880 --> 00:51:01,320 And I've personally read the book. 999 00:51:01,320 --> 00:51:05,440 It's really fun, insightful, and I think it's the most important 1000 00:51:05,440 --> 00:51:08,520 thing is bite size for those CT OS who don't seem to have enough 1001 00:51:08,520 --> 00:51:11,160 time to actually read a book. So thank you again for your 1002 00:51:11,160 --> 00:51:13,000 time, Stefan. So I hope people learn a lot 1003 00:51:13,000 --> 00:51:16,040 today about the CDO role or maybe engineering, leadership 1004 00:51:16,040 --> 00:51:17,640 and management in general. So thanks again. 1005 00:51:17,640 --> 00:51:18,040 My. Pleasure. 1006 00:51:18,080 --> 00:51:18,400 Thank you.