Quarterly Event at Microsoft 

Back in 2009, during a quarterly meet event in my Microsoft's office in Seattle US, I was busy enjoying my donut, which used to be the biggest attraction joining such events, suddenly my attention was grabbed by the opening statement of a senior leader's speech.

Statement was,

You are not defined by your designation at Microsoft, the products you have created, market your product have captured.What defines you is your Family, curiosity and hunger for solving problems.

He continued .

Don’t celebrate technology for technology’s sake.Our success lies in our customers’ success who remembers the experiences not Technology.

His simple words hit me like a ton of bricks, because I was in a vulnerable state at that time and was experiencing an environment at my Microsoft's Office , which was contrasting to this gentleman's words.

My mistake to refer Google at Microsoft

I joined Microsoft with a lot of young energy and enthusiasm in year 2008, and with in a couple of months of joining this organization, I got a great amount of visibility.Not due to any remarkable achievement, but rather as a result of being reprimanded by the head of my business unit.

Because during one of the meetings I had used a sentence that "I'll use Google for research before sharing my report".Simple statement Right?I also imagined it that.

Little did I know that using a word like Google could be considered offending within my team, which was working on a search Engine a direct competitor of Google.

Microsoft had a history of failed relaunching of the same search engine three times.I am sure you would not be aware that Microsoft's search Engine initially was MSN search, then Windows LIVE Search then LIVE search.

And this was the fourth attempt Microsoft's team was rebranding their search Engine by new name BING.

After three failed attempts the team had become extra sensitive that using the name Google in a meeting gave them an opportunity to create hue and cry to an extent that it was escalated to higher management and I was invited for a high level discussion with senior leader.

It was a feeling of court marshal, where I was asked to share all the details of my friends who were working at Google, with a written apology of not promoting something within office of any direct competitor's product, with an intention to harm the reputation of organization's Product.

After that event, I became cautious of my word choices and protecting the perception of my intentions which were misinterpreted earlier.

I turned in to a Rebel

I started to feel the suffocation in that environment.Because of beurocratic environment, where everyone considers them God of Technology.

If you try to give strict control, limited openness, or lack of trust, the likely consequence will be the emergence of rebels and resistance against the closed nature of the environment.

I turned in to rebel And a brand loyal person who will convince her friends to buy Microsoft's Products like Xbox over Sony's PS2.Or use IE over Chrome suddenly started to dislike Microsoft's Products.I started to hate Microsoft's philosophy of keeping everything licensed (CLOSED SOURCE ) vs OPEN source of Google.

During the launch of the BING, the launch meeting started with "Beware it's not Google" - BING is here.

And people like me who were part of rebel group, will interpret BING to But I Need Google.

This was the reason of me enjoying my bagel over listening to repeated words of leaders who boasted their achievements and cheered for their products' sale, Numbers and stats.But this gentleman's speech was unusual.

After a couple of years I returned to my India and joined another organization.

Leadership Change at Microsoft

In year 2014, the news of leadership change at Microsoft took my attention and the gentle man who touched my heart with his words at the All hands meet in year 2009 was declared as CEO of Microsoft.Yes that speech was from none other than Satya Nadella.

When Satya Nadella took over as Microsoft CEO from Steve Ballmer, the company was suffering from a dysfunctional, political culture that had missed every significant high-tech innovation in the past decade, including internet search IE, mobile phones Windows Phone and even collaborating with Nokia could not save them, e-commerce, social media SOCL, and the cloud.

Under Satya's leadership, Microsoft's efforts transformed from merely replicating successful market products to highlighting their unique strengths, especially in the business-to-business sector.And with this simple focus shift they invested in Professional Social Media Network Linked In, VS Code a lightweight Editor vs.their monolithic Visual Studio IDE, Microsoft Teams, Chat Engine Skype and finally collaborating with OpenAI which we all are fond of chatGP.

Since Satya became CEO, Microsoft has grown nine times to a valuation of $2.5 trillion, making Microsoft one of the world's two most valuable companies.

On becoming CEO Satya observes, People would walk around our campus thinking we are God's gift to mankind.Microsoft's culture had become dogmatic, because everyone had to prove they knew it all and were the smartest people in the room.

Satya's leadership's secret ingredient an Extra 'E'

Satya committed to change Microsoft's culture from "know-it-alls" to "learn-it-alls".People surrounding Satya say that Satya's special leadership ingredient is an additional 'E'.The extra 'E' stands for Empowering people, which leads to everyone being their best.

While Satya who is extremely humble with unusually high levels of self-awareness says that Empowering others is the natural side effect of coming with deep level of Empathy the real 'E' of Satya's leadership, learned by his life experiences and his crucibles.

Was Satya born with this deep level of Empathy ?Ironically, a lack of empathy nearly cost him the chance to join Microsoft.

In year 1992 during his campus interview at Microsoft interviewer asked him,

Imagine you see a baby lying on the street, and the baby is crying.What do you do?

Satya immediately responded,

You call 911.

Interviewer put his arm around Satya and said,

You need to get some empathy Boy.If a baby is lying on the street crying, you pick up the baby.

Satya was given a benefit of Doubt and selected for Microsoft, but nature has complex ways to guide us through the path to humanity.

Satya's difficult lesson of Empathy

His first son Zain was born with cerebral palsy, who could not move at all.Satya Nadella wrote about his son in his 2017 book, Hit Refresh, candidly describing how Zain’s birth required him to grow as a person.

I was devastated,

he wrote.

But mostly I was sad for how things turned out for me.Thankfully, I understood  that it was not about what happened to me.It was about deeply understanding what had happened to Zain, and developing empathy for his pain and his circumstances while accepting our responsibility as his parents.

Zain died in February 2022, at the age of 26.According to Nadella, being the father of a child with special needs was a turning point in his life.

How many business leaders can you name who put empathy at the center of their leadership?He used the empathy learned from dealing with his family crucibles to be a more vulnerable and open leader.

Satya recognized that without empathy, Microsoft would never succeed in understanding customer needs and delivering solutions to meet those needs.

He has transformed one of the world's great businesses by refocusing it on the needs of customers, rebuilding the culture, and reinvigorating its mission to make a difference in the world, with a little Extra E, Empowering others through the path rooted from Empathy.