Flat Organization

Technology is such a rapidly changing industry; how do you stay on top of everything? Are there certain resources you use to stay current on market trends?

I always say that you are as good as the people you have around you. So you have to have some very smart people around you, and be able to take a deep dive in the pool, in the organization, and come up. Because sometimes the ideas are not next to you, they are two, three levels down. So, it’s difficult because you’re now managing a fairly large group of people with different backgrounds.
But I’m a true believer of flat organizations because, normally, you should be one or two steps from the truth, not seven steps down because of the organizational hierarchy. That was one of the things I did as CEO, flatten the organization, remove layers and try to get to the truth because I believe the truth is in the cold face.
But once you get there, it’s having the right people around you. And so how do you bring them together and create a forum where everybody has an opinion, which inclusion matters, right? But in the end, where you play, how you win, and where are you going to really do something unique and differentiated that customers want and that will separate you from the rest.
So yeah, it’s sometimes exhausting. I will say, because you wake up every day, “What happened yesterday? What happened overnight?” It’s always something. The joke I have is like when you are the CEO, it’s like you’re the mayor of a town. You have it all, you have fraud, you have crime, you have drama, and you have to manage it all.