Bryk learned to communicate clearly as Exa scaled

Transcript

Transcribed by machine (Whisper) from the episode’s audio, so a word may be off here and there.

1. 38:53

   the last year or so what's the part that you've had to change in your leadership style just in the last year from 10 to 125 people I mean honestly I'm thinking the biggest thing is like I've had to learn how to speak in front of crowds I would say that's one of the biggest skills I've learned is every Monday I give a kind of like a speech in front of like the whole team and now it's getting like quite big and and like it would have made I was I was scared of that kind of thing when I was younger but now I love it and so I think there's an example of just like I was forced to do this every week and what used to be you know really scary is now something i really enjoy i've had to learn how to make decisions really fast uh and so like and this is this is i think an awesome skill that has carried to the rest of my life like oh should i go to that restaurant

2. 39:34

   boom i'm just done i just don't it's like really fast i've had to learn how to communicate extremely clearly um because one thing i i was i was surprised by when we got to like the 20 30 person size was you know like if you're at all unclear in like oh what exactly do we do here it'll just like trickle down to the company i'll have like serious problems so i try to be extremely clear in my messaging certainly when i send a message to the whole company i edit that for like an hour because CEO, like, every word matters. Like, everyone is hanging on. That's also, like, been a surprising thing. I've had to learn to watch a little bit, like, what I say. I might say something like, oh, like, lunch should be at this time. But, like, I'm, like, joking. And then suddenly, it'll be at that time. And so, like, I love brainstorming, right? But sometimes when I'm brainstorming, people interpret that as, like, commands. They're not. So, I have to be, like, extremely explicit. Like, FYI, this is just complete brainstorming. Feel free to just completely contradict me. And that's been helpful.

3. 40:25

   But you've also, maybe on the human side, have become a manager of managers, right? So one goes from an IC to a manager to a manager of managers. How has that evolution hit you or not really much different? It's been sad to be like out of the details of everything. So, you know, when we were five people, 10 people, I could be in the details of literally everything. I used to like pick out what chairs we would have in the office.

4. 40:46

   And I loved that. I love being in the details. And so there's been this thing where I have to increasingly not be in the details of things and only be in details of things that are problematic or the biggest bottleneck for the company. You know, as I manage people who manage, I have to trust that they're going to like get into the details. That's kind of been a thing to learn, like how do you manage people and make sure that they bring that intensity and detail-orientedness to what they're doing.

5. 41:06

   And so I've been learning how to do that well. You came up as an engineer. Have you already made the mental shift from being an engineer to a CEO now?