When Alex Norstrom started working at Spotify in 2011, CEO Daniel Ek told him there were three goals: Growth, growth, and growth. But Alex — now the Chief Freemium Business Officer — argued that his team would be better motivated by an “impossible goal,” something like reaching 100 million users. To which Daniel replied: “Let’s do it. Your goal is to get us to 100 million users. Please begin.”
In this episode, Alex and Joubin convene at Spotify’s brand-new Stockholm studio to discuss his first job, the “shadow” mentorship program Alex runs, how Facebook changed everything for the gaming company King, thinking about the “bigger picture,” the tremendous effort happening behind the scenes before Spotify launched in each new country, “optimizing for surprises,” Joubin’s embarrassing Spotify playlists, why we’re still in the early innings of podcasting, Alex’s lowest point at Spotify, partnering with FC Barcelona, and culture as currency.
In this episode, we cover:
Links:
#192 CTO and Co-Founder Discord, Stanislav Vishnevskiy: Ship It
#191 CEO and Co-Founder Intercom, Eoghan McCabe: Second Beginning
#190 Co-Founder Cost Plus Drugs, Mark Cuban: Mavs to Meds
#189 Co-Founder Watershed, Taylor Francis: Worthy Missions
#188 CEO and Co-Founder Synthesia, Victor Riparbelli w/ Josh Coyne: Gorilla in the Room
#187 President & COO of AG1, Kat Cole: Wings to Supplements
#186 COO Asana, Anne Raimondi: Recovering Perfectionist
#185 CEO and Founder Netskope, Sanjay Beri: The Trenches
#184 Former CEO and Co-Founder Sun, Scott McNealy: In the Piñata
#183 CEO and Co-Founder Harness, Jyoti Bansal: Three-Layered Cake
#182 CEO and Co-Founder Cribl, Clint Sharp: Finding Traction
#181 CEO Transcarent, Glen Tullman: Problem Solving
#180 CEO and Co-Founder Verkada, Filip Kaliszan: Outlier
#179 CEO and Co-Founder Zapier, Wade Foster: Missouri’s Connector
#178 Author of “Radical Candor,” Kim Scott: Uncommon Sense
#177 President and Co-Founder Anthropic, Daniela Amodei: AI Hurricane
#176 CEO MongoDB, Dev Ittycheria: Edge
#175 CEO Snowflake, Frank Slootman: Amped
#174 CEO and Co-Founder Ginkgo Bioworks, Jason Kelly: Life Finds a Way
#173 Author of “The Qualified Sales Leader,” John McMahon: The Five-Time CRO
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