CMO Airtable, Archana Agrawal: Success Is Not a Formula
Grit16 Touko 2022

CMO Airtable, Archana Agrawal: Success Is Not a Formula

Archana Agrawal started her job as CMO of Airtable on March 18, 2020 — the same week that the US began to “shelter in place” as cases of the novel coronavirus rapidly rose. With kids who would be staying home from school and Airtable’s San Francisco office closed, everything was changing at once, so she switched into what she calls “problem-solving mode.” And, crucially, she discovered how to use family time to de-stress.


In this episode, Archana and Joubin discuss how she made her way from Africa to Asia to America; operating without a full night’s sleep; why her former coworkers made a game of trying to stump her; the secret power under the hood of Airtable; starting her current job right as “shelter in place” kicked in; whether she would stay at Airtable if the founder was no longer CEO; and how she views her responsibility on the boards of MongoDB and Zendesk.


In this episode, we cover:

  • Staying in place & doubling down vs. moving on to bigger things (03:03)
  • Moving from Liberia to India to escape civil war (07:13)
  • Archana’s unusual grad school roommate: Her father (11:33)
  • The value of breadth over depth, and following your passions (17:35)
  • Cold-emailing her way into a job at Atlassian and the ridiculous job title Archana almost received (21:38)
  • Understanding a team’s strengths and weaknesses — and her own (27:05)
  • Her lowest point at Atlassian, the sale of HipChat and exit from the messaging business (34:33)
  • Why it matters that Airtable looks like a spreadsheet, but is powered by a relational database (37:52)
  • Going into “problem-solving mode,” and the most important outlet for escaping from stress (42:42)
  • Working for founder-led companies (49:53)
  • Being heard as a quiet person on advisory boards full of louder people (55:27)


Links:

Jaksot(278)

CRO Zoom, Ryan Azus: It’s Not Zoom Fatigue, It’s Work Fatigue

CRO Zoom, Ryan Azus: It’s Not Zoom Fatigue, It’s Work Fatigue

Ryan Azus, CRO of Zoom, has been selling all his life, from baseball cards as a kid to ads in the school newspaper to — crucially — books every summer in college. Every year, he and and thousands of o...

14 Maalis 20221h 9min

CCO Instabase, Ozge Ozcan: Rising and Falling - Like a Phoenix

CCO Instabase, Ozge Ozcan: Rising and Falling - Like a Phoenix

Instabase’s Ozge Ozcan believes that many women have been fed a false story about motherhood: That it can be seen as a “decelerator” to one’s career. Instead, she’s found that raising two daughters ha...

7 Maalis 202255min

CMO Samsara, Sarah Patterson: What You Do vs. Why It Matters

CMO Samsara, Sarah Patterson: What You Do vs. Why It Matters

Sarah Patterson, CMO of Samsara, doesn’t believe in keeping your armor up around your coworkers: “You’ve got something else on your mind, it’s going to come through,” she says. While working at Salesf...

28 Helmi 202259min

CRO Calendly, Kate Ahlering: Embracing Leadership - On and Off the Basketball Court

CRO Calendly, Kate Ahlering: Embracing Leadership - On and Off the Basketball Court

Kate Ahlering might be the perfect guest for this podcast. She eventually worked her way up to Chief Sales Officer of Glassdoor, but when she joined in 2013, she helped define the company’s leadership...

21 Helmi 202253min

CEO Loom, Joe Thomas: Communication, the Mother of All Skills

CEO Loom, Joe Thomas: Communication, the Mother of All Skills

When Rippling CEO Parker Conrad was raising a massive $250 million round last year, he didn’t start by presenting his deck to venture capitalists in person. Instead, he sent a 39-minute demo of his pr...

14 Helmi 20221h 15min

President at Databricks, Andy Kofoid: Reinvention at Any Stage

President at Databricks, Andy Kofoid: Reinvention at Any Stage

When Andy Kofoid was growing up in the working-class town of Joliet, Illinois, he dreamed of getting to college and — like a lot of his relatives — worked in construction. Today, Andy is laying digita...

7 Helmi 20221h 13min

Former CEO Splunk, Doug Merritt: Creating 360° Order in Chaos

Former CEO Splunk, Doug Merritt: Creating 360° Order in Chaos

Doug Merritt joins this episode on the tail end of his impressive run as Splunk’s CEO. With decades of leadership in what can be described as an “exploratory career,” Doug breaks down his professional...

31 Tammi 20221h 22min

CEO Stord, Sean Henry: Supply Chains... Are Fun?

CEO Stord, Sean Henry: Supply Chains... Are Fun?

Stord, a Kleiner portfolio company, and its co-founder/CEO, Sean Henry, are defying a multitude of limits. While Sean is ranked as the youngest unicorn founder, he refuses to let his age define him. D...

24 Tammi 20221h

Suosittua kategoriassa Liike-elämä ja talous

sijotuskasti
psykopodiaa-podcast
mimmit-sijoittaa
rss-rahapodi
ostan-asuntoja-podcast
rss-rahamania
herrasmieshakkerit
rss-neuvottelija-sami-miettinen
rss-h-asselmoilanen
rss-seuraava-potilas
rss-paasipodi
inderespodi
rahapuhetta
pomojen-suusta
sijoituspodi
rss-markkinointitrippi
syo-nuku-saasta
asuntoasiaa-paivakirjat
rss-laakispodi
rss-bisnesta-bebeja