#101 CEO Google Cloud, Thomas Kurian: Competitor-Aware and Customer-Obsessed
Grit29 Aug 2022

#101 CEO Google Cloud, Thomas Kurian: Competitor-Aware and Customer-Obsessed

“When I grew up in Bangalore, I’d never seen a computer,” says Thomas Kurian. The former president of Oracle, now the CEO of Google Cloud, remembers learning how to write while sitting outside his childhood home, and doing homework by candlelight during power blackouts. He credits his “trailblazer” mother, who instilled curiosity and discipline in all her children, with helping them understand the value of education beyond doing well on the next test. Something must have stuck, because Thomas is not the only Kurian in a major leadership position in Silicon Valley; his twin brother, George, is the CEO of NetApp.

In this episode, Thomas and Joubin discuss how he accidentally got into computer programming, giving children the freedom to be curious, how to order a sandwich, leading 60 software acquisitions, knowing your own value-add, innovation through experimentation, investing in the future, and being competitor-aware and customer-obsessed.

In this episode, we cover:

  • Thomas’ childhood in India (03:45)
  • His twin brother George — the CEO of NetApp — and their trailblazing mother (07:40)
  • Nostalgia for simpler times without responsibilities (14:03)
  • Working up the ranks at Oracle, from product manager to president (21:40)
  • The Google Cloud opportunity (30:12)
  • How to succeed inside a huge organization (32:38)
  • The big difference between Oracle and Google Cloud in 2019 (39:35)
  • The “mother of God” opportunity of the cloud (42:35)
  • The advice Thomas gives to other CEOs (48:25)

Links:

Episoder(282)

95% Faster Video Production with Synthesia | Victor Riparbelli

95% Faster Video Production with Synthesia | Victor Riparbelli

What’s product-market fit like when you give people the power to do what they never thought was possible?On this rerun of Grit from April 2024, Victor Riparbelli, co-founder and CEO of Synthesia, shar...

20 Okt 20251h 8min

From Idea To Impact: How Gamma Is Redefining Presentations | Grant Lee

From Idea To Impact: How Gamma Is Redefining Presentations | Grant Lee

Make your product irresistible, and everything else will follow.That’s the philosophy of Grant Lee, co-founder and CEO of Gamma, an AI design platform with an 'anti-PowerPoint approach', used by over ...

13 Okt 20251h 10min

Leadership Lessons From Snowflake’s Sales & Marketing Duo | Chris Degnan and Denise Persson

Leadership Lessons From Snowflake’s Sales & Marketing Duo | Chris Degnan and Denise Persson

Scaling a business globally comes down to leaders who align teams and drive them forward together.Snowflake serves over 12,000 customers, and early executives Chris Degnan and Denise Persson share how...

6 Okt 20251h 23min

The Man Who Builds for the Decade Ahead | Founder of Google X, Waymo, and Udacity

The Man Who Builds for the Decade Ahead | Founder of Google X, Waymo, and Udacity

What does it take to reinvent entire industries, over and over again?This week on Grit, Sebastian Thrun, the “godfather” of self-driving cars and massive open online courses, reflects on a career push...

29 Sep 20251h 13min

How WordPress Became a Web Giant | Automattic Founder and CEO Matt Mullenweg

How WordPress Became a Web Giant | Automattic Founder and CEO Matt Mullenweg

What kind of founder builds a billion-dollar company around something anyone can use for free? Matt Mullenweg, co-founder of WordPress and CEO of Automattic, joins Joubin Mirzadegan to reflect on two ...

22 Sep 20251h 10min

The Central Nervous System for Modern Business | Confluent CEO Jay Kreps

The Central Nervous System for Modern Business | Confluent CEO Jay Kreps

The apps and websites we use every day depend on systems most of us never see.Jay Kreps joins Joubin Mirzadegan to share how Confluent became the ‘central nervous system’ for companies like Expedia an...

15 Sep 20251h 17min

Airtable’s AI Reboot with CEO Howie Liu

Airtable’s AI Reboot with CEO Howie Liu

Can a no-code giant reinvent itself in the AI-native era?This week on Grit, Airtable CEO Howie Liu shares what it means to “refound” a company, how speed comes from tearing up old playbooks, and why c...

8 Sep 20251h 7min

Inside the Mind of the World’s Most Optimistic CEO

Inside the Mind of the World’s Most Optimistic CEO

For Bill McDermott, work has never been just a job.On this Labor Day rerun of Grit, first published Jan 9, 2023, the ServiceNow CEO reflects on what he learned from his earliest jobs and how he carrie...

1 Sep 20251h 9min

Populært innen Business og økonomi

lydartikler-fra-aftenposten
stopp-verden
dine-penger-pengeradet
e24-podden
rss-borsmorgen-okonominyhetene
rss-penger-polser-og-politikk
pengepodden-2
finansredaksjonen
livet-pa-veien-med-jan-erik-larssen
utbytte
tid-er-penger-en-podcast-med-peter-warren
stormkast-med-valebrokk-stordalen
morgenkaffen-med-finansavisen
okonomiamatorene
liberal-halvtime
pengesnakk
rss-politisk-preik
lederpodden
rss-pa-konto
rss-markedspuls-2