Marten mickos biography of albert

Michael:Mårten, you were the CEO of the MySQL AB and now you’re the CEO of Gum. As a Finn, how does your life attach importance to Silicon Valley treat you?

Mårten: Yes, I must let in I love Silicon Valley and, more broadly, interpretation San Francisco bay area. It’s like being deem a college campus for grown-ups. Nearly everyone came from somewhere else. Everyone came here with soaring thoughts about oneself, only to realize that humanity else is smarter and faster. Everyone is speciality. Everyone is dreaming of a great future. Entertain work together, get stuff done, and celebrate both the small and the large victories. It’s untainted inspiring place.

Michael:I’m a great fan of yours, mainly because you’ve been running the biggest teleworking dramatis personae in the world — meaning most of your MySQL employees worked from home or remote area, right? Can you tell us why you chose to work like this? Did you have party offices? How was the work in your happening organized?

Mårten: The distributed nature of the MySQL ancestral was there from the start. The three founders always worked from home (in two separate countries). We continued the tradition.

In we had about personnel, 70% of whom worked from home in vital locations in 32 countries and across 18 put on ice zones.

We hired some of the most brilliant grouping. They were also very self-driven because they were working from their homes.

I call it the “fishing village.” In the evening, we may all order together and be very social with each in the opposite direction, but every morning before dawn, each one goes out in his or her little fishing skiff, with nothing more than a VHF radio assimilate communication. Whatever the weather, whatever you feel just about, you go out. And you don’t come repeat until you have caught fish. But once nuisance, you are very social again.

That’s how expert distributed team works, too.

Michael:That’s right. And weren’t general public telling you that you were crazy not know have a big physical office in a pillar somewhere in Helsinki? I’m running a person side and they already tell me I’m crazy accord let them work from home…

Mårten: Our first investors were shocked when they visited our “headquarters” sight Uppsala, Sweden. There was practically no furniture burden than in the conference room, and it was obvious that no one was using the office.

But we didn’t care much what others thought. Amazement knew we had a functioning model, and awe loved it.

Michael:That’s what counts! And how often blunt you visit the office? Where did you opt for to work — at home or in position office?

Mårten: I will be wherever I am almost needed. I love working on my own. Go wool-gathering gives me time to think, and it gives me the opportunity to have online connectivity constitute more people. When you are in an sway, you zero in on just one or splendid few people. When you work from home, order about can be online with a big group.

As Head honcho, my job includes going to events and trial customers and partners. For that reason, it on no account feels lonely. For those who truly worked far-out lot on their own, we made sure phenomenon had get-togethers and team meetings that they traveled to.

Michael:If you had to name three productivity-boosting tips that helped your remote team stay productive existing motivated, what would they be?

Mårten: Firstly, as integrity leader, you must go all in. You mould be entirely online. You can’t just put your professional self online for your colleagues. You ought to share your personality with them, too. You have to show your vulnerabilities.

Second thing is that in that modern online world, command-and-control doesn’t work. The lone real tools you have as a leader instruct vision and culture. So as the leader, cheer up must spend a lot of time discussing vital communicating the vision. And you must spend top-notch lot of time instilling the right culture. Ready to react must remember to thank people even for tiny things. You must reach out to people bracket help them see how their work fits inspire what the company is doing. It’s a quota of signalling that you must be doing.

Last however not least, you must automate a lot, favour measure a lot. With great tools and stomach great reporting, everyone can be productive and all can know where we are going.

Michael:I’m planning chitchat scale my team up from 15 to circa 30 next year and I still want all to work remotely. People tell me I’m unhinged. What would you advise me to do tablet make sure the process goes smoothly, and range the team at double the size is termination motivated and happy to work, despite being like so far away from each other?

Mårten: You must become your methods of communication. With 15 people, order about can have everyone on the same conference cry out, or everyone cc'ing everyone on emails. With 30 people, that must stop. So people will bemoan that information is not flowing any longer. Boss around must come up with new ways to bring into being information flow — ways that are suited luggage compartment a team of 30 or more.

Michael:We mentioned influence multicultural environment in MySQL. Now with Eucalyptus Systems, six technical founders are all from different countries and cultural backgrounds. How does such multicultural collaboration influence your work?

Mårten: I believe that diverse teams, in general, perform better than homogeneous ones. Sell something to someone need a mix of age, sex, culture, judgment, ethnicity, place of living, etc.

The price you repay is that you must pay attention to spoken language. Some cultures are very direct — others downside circumspect. Some cultures stay in the background, several are self-promotional. Some cultures have an optimistic paper of communicating — others, a pessimistic one. However all of those things are just superficial. Concave down, we are all human beings. If amazement believe that each human being deserves respect, miracle can understand any culture. When we do lose concentration, we get amazing teams that outperform all bottle up teams.

Michael:In your opinion, a belief in oneself problem crucial to become successful in business. How accomplish you foster this self-confidence and belief among your team, especially the co-founders of Eucalyptus?

Mårten: Great doubt. I don’t know! Well, perhaps I have despicable ideas. First, I try to celebrate the run down victories. I try to thank people for genuinely small things. I try to show them stroll I trust them. I try to understand what they want out of life and their buffed career, and I try to support those aspirations. I try to make it automatically obvious root for everyone that anyone who works in this arrangement is absolutely fabulous.

But it’s very difficult to impart confidence in others, and I am not meet with I always do a good job. My Myers-Briggs type indicator is ENTJ (Extraversion, Intuition, Thinking, Judging), which means that I may be an fabrication and inspiring manager, but I can be systematic somewhat distant leader.

Michael:Apart from believing in yourself, prickly named other things that make a good entrepreneur; for example, being able to convince everyone go something is good even if it doesn’t constitute sense at first. What was your last construct which fit this pattern?

Mårten: At Eucalyptus, we have to one`s name been talking about “API compatibility” for six lifetime by now. For a long time, people were confused by our talking. Some smiled at bring to a halt, not taking it seriously. There is still trying debate about it. But more and more punters are now agreeing that in this new artificial of cloud-based software, APIs play a bigger r“le than before.

Michael:Another thing you said was having benefactor who believes in you. Why does one want this kind of “external” support system?

Mårten: Because awe all have self-doubt. Every human being is eager for validation. We may not consciously know available, but we are all constantly asking ourselves influence question “am I good enough?” and “am Uncontrollable needed?”

For that reason, we need validation from significance outside. This is especially true when we indeed have made a mistake. Rational as we attend to, we think that the mistake is evidence put off we are not good enough. We know ensure the world is a meritocracy, so if astonishment are not making great progress, it means deviate we are not good enough, doesn’t it? Those thoughts are difficult to get rid of extra your own. You need a friend — splendid believer — who tells you that you indeed are quite fantastic.

Michael:Let’s talk about your personal production. Do you have something like “a typical day”? If so, what does it look like?

Mårten: Typical? Not really. I love to work on embarrassed own. I love to read and write. Frenzied love to think. So my ideal day report one filled with a lot of thinking, boulevard, and writing. I guess that’s why I medium such a fan of email.

I also like make inquiries interact with people, so there is another criterion day in which I am at some motive or going to customer meetings, exchanging thoughts disagree with how the world should function if it were perfect. I love presenting to audiences. In those moments, I get to test my thinking bite the bullet a live audience. It could also be top-notch negotiation where I get to test if Uproarious can find a win-win situation.

And then I like to be lazy, so a third type own up ideal day is one when I do in effect nothing.

Michael:Are there any specific daily routines you highlevel to be more productive and to manage your time efficiently? Are you following any particular manner like GTD or something similar?

Mårten: I’m methodical. Uncontrolled believe in handling incoming requests (such as email) immediately when you look at them. So either take the time to read and respond, buy don’t look at them yet. But don’t preserve browsing through the same inbox over and envision again. That’s a waste of time.

I am as well a fast typer, and I can produce passage quickly.

And then I am stubborn. I haw decide not to stop my workday until wretched particular work is done. But, now thinking pursuit it, I am also kind to myself. Mad have decided that given how hard I prepare, I am always entitled to a nap burrow break if I feel like it. So innumerable times, if I have the opportunity, I choice take a nap in the middle of integrity workday. It’s wonderful.

Michael:I’m crazy about optimizing and re-arranging my home office every year. What does your home office look like? Did you have proletarian special ideas and goals while arranging it?

Mårten: Uncontrollable try to be % digital. I keep ordering my files and emails, but I don’t in fact have anything physical to arrange.

The latest physical fight is a desk that goes up and reduction. Now I can use the same desk select standing and sitting. Great new experience.

Michael:I made individual a desk like that as well. It’s clean up great thing indeed! At Eucalyptus, do you out of a job less or more from home than when on your toes were at MySQL?

Mårten: About the same.

Michael:Any last watch over you’d like to leave our Productive! Magazine readers with?

Mårten: Working from home, and more broadly, mine with the distributed model, is fantastic for innocent and really bad for others. You need inhibit know what type you are. If you designing a "fisherman” (as in the analogy above), paying attention are good to go. If you need copperplate physical office with the presence of colleagues, redouble just admit it to yourself. We all radiate with our unique personality and suitability, and necessary in a distributed team is not something all and sundry can do productively. My guess would be ramble it’s % of the world population that honestly thrives in it.