Who has inspired you most in your life/career?

When I first became a CEO, I wasn’t very confident, and about two years into Groq, I was struggling as a leader and on the brink of failing everyone.

The CEO of a well-known company offered to let me shadow him for a day, which was super generous. He managed about 2,000 people, and he let me follow him from the time he arrived to the time he left, including in highly confidential meetings, all completely uncensored. It started with his morning brief with his chief of staff, followed by some product decision meetings, offsite planning meetings, one-on-ones with his staff, meetings with his leadership team — it was a little bit of everything. There were two really important things that happened that day that altered my leadership style.

First, in each meeting, when it came time for the CEO to ask a question, to make a decision, or to offer guidance, his response was exactly what I was thinking I’d do. He was certainly more polished about it, but it was the same idea. That meant that I actually knew what to do, and whether I was right or wrong, I at least could make the same calls as this ultra-successful CEO. I left that day with a sense of confidence I’d never had before.

The second thing that shifted my leadership style was that three or four times throughout that day, we stopped so he could debrief and sync with his chief of staff. When that happened, they also asked me for my feedback and observations. Shockingly, I had noticed things of value that they hadn’t. That was when I learned the value of being an outsider to situations. With much less experience, and with much less context, I was noticing things they weren’t, not despite the fact that I didn’t know what was going on but because of it. Since then, I’ve cultivated having the appropriate amount of naivety in the room when making any important decisions.

Now, that’s not the typical “I was inspired by someone” story, and I bet this CEO would be surprised that I picked them as the person who inspired me most in my career. I think there’s a lesson in that too, which is that people are more inspired by the actions of people than by the people themselves. If you want to inspire people, stop worrying about who you are and instead focus on what you do.

What is the biggest threat to society posed by technology today?

Complacency.

What advice would you give to early-career engineers or people wanting to start a company?

I wrote, then deleted, then wrote, then deleted a ton of advice. It’s much easier to say what to do than to actually do it. It’s also context-sensitive. Instead, I’ll just share some signs that you need to watch out for:

• Someone says, “That can’t possibly be right, because if it was, everyone would do it.” When I hear that, I know we’ve either come up with something really good or something really stupid, but it’s certainly not mediocre. Pay attention when you hear this, because all breakthroughs are initially things that no one does until they know about them, and then everyone does them.

• Anxiety, worry, and terror are all the same thing, just to differing degrees. If you’re not feeling fear, then you’re not doing anything important. So when you feel fearless, stop and re-evaluate what you’re doing wrong with your life.
• Your team is the people you’re willing to share rough drafts with. So if you feel the need to withhold information or are worried to share something early with someone, then you’re not working with your team. Fix that situation ASAP — it’s toxic!