The Exchanges

Q consultants, they do do good reports. Uh, and there was a recent McKinsey statement that said, So I want to dive on automation with you before we dive into the quickfire round, uh, and discuss kind of the future of automation, but more particularly, to what extent do you think automation will pervade into the investment scene and robo-advisors will really overtake the needs, uh, for humans on Wall Street?

A You know, I think it's a good question, and I appreciate the point. I don't think it's unique to financial services. I think that we're going to see over the next decade, you know, a combination of automation, artificial intelligence, real impressive services and systems take over more and more of the capabilities that previously we had to trust people with. So while I don't think that's unique to financial services or to investing, I also don't think that financial services or investing is immune to that. I think we're going to see it across the economy in almost every sector. Obviously, at Wealthfront, we're huge believers in it in terms of the benefits it brings to investing, largely because there's a fundamental truth that has been documented for decades, which is that, on average, humans are terrible at investing. You know, with a few notable exceptions, I mean, Burt Malkiel, who's our chief investment officer, right, the noted Princeton economist, I mean, he wrote a random walk down Wall Street over 40 years ago. And it was shocking at the time to imagine this idea that most professionals underperform the market, that just owning a little bit of everything and keeping costs low can actually beat the concerted efforts of so many brilliant people working full time. And by the way, it's not like investors and bankers work, you know, short hours, right? These are, these are p…

AI assessment note: “I don't think that financial services or investing is immune to that.”

Q consultants, they do do good reports. Uh, and there was a recent McKinsey statement that said, So I want to dive on automation with you before we dive into the quickfire round, uh, and discuss kind of the future of automation, but more particularly, to what extent do you think automation will pervade into the investment scene and robo-advisors will really overtake the needs, uh, for humans on Wall Street?

A You know, I think it's a good question, and I appreciate the point. I don't think it's unique to financial services. I think that we're going to see over the next decade, you know, a combination of automation, artificial intelligence, real impressive services and systems take over more and more of the capabilities that previously we had to trust people with. So while I don't think that's unique to financial services or to investing, I also don't think that financial services or investing is immune to that. I think we're going to see it across the economy in almost every sector. Obviously, at Wealthfront, we're huge believers in it in terms of the benefits it brings to investing, largely because there's a fundamental truth that has been documented for decades, which is that, on average, humans are terrible at investing. You know, with a few notable exceptions, I mean, Burt Malkiel, who's our chief investment officer, right, the noted Princeton economist, I mean, he wrote a random walk down Wall Street over 40 years ago. And it was shocking at the time to imagine this idea that most professionals underperform the market, that just owning a little bit of everything and keeping costs low can actually beat the concerted efforts of so many brilliant people working full time. And by the way, it's not like investors and bankers work, you know, short hours, right? These are, these are p…

AI assessment note: “I also don't think that financial services or investing is immune to that.”

Q So would you say you're democratizing, uh, the investment advisory scene to a subsector of society where We've never had the ability to access financial advisors who, even though, as we said, do perform below market, still perform significantly better than the average consumer. Is that it? Is the democratization?

A I think that's a big part of it. At Wealthfront, you know, when I joined, we, you know, instead of a mission statement at the company, we have a core belief, and it's, it's, it's, it's very simple. We believe that everyone deserves sophisticated financial advice, um, and there's no question that That the traditional industry of financial advisors, because of their cost structure, have a combination of both high minimums and high fees that really exclude most savers and investors, right? Most people don't have the huge account balances, half a million, a million dollars or more, that are the minimums for most quality financial advisors. Um, and that's not because the industry is elitist. It's actually because their economics cannot provide the service they provide To people with smaller accounts. And so I definitely think that democratization is a big piece of this trend, you know, by taking the investment strategies and the advice that previously was only available to the ultra wealthy and automating in software, we make it inexpensive enough that we can deliver it to, to anyone. Um, and I, I think that Wealthfront has already in its short history proven that we can take strategies like tax loss harvesting that used to be the, the province of people like Mitt Romney and others, um, Um, and actually bring it, um, literally to every Wealthfront client who has 500 dollars, and the…

AI assessment note: “I think that's a big part of it.”

Q What are your productivity tips, tricks? Do you have any apps that you use, to-do lists, anything you use to stay on top?

A I think the biggest productivity, uh, tip that I actually have is making sure that you clearly can tell the difference between things that are urgent, where you might be blocking the team versus items where it deserves a little bit of thought. And giving a better answer, um, a few hours later is more valuable than giving a quick answer that might be incorrect. You know, when you're in a position where your decisions matter or people looking for you for guidance, that quick decision about whether it's more important to unblock people or, or give a more thoughtful answer, I think is one of the most important productivity tips. Cause it lets you divide kind of that inbox, that inflow, um, into things that really matter to get done today versus things that you'll get done either tomorrow or next week or in the future or, or better yet. Delegate to someone who's better qualified to actually answer that question and unlock the team.

AI assessment note: “the biggest productivity, uh, tip that I actually have is making sure”

Q So would you say you're democratizing, uh, the investment advisory scene to a subsector of society where We've never had the ability to access financial advisors who, even though, as we said, do perform below market, still perform significantly better than the average consumer. Is that it? Is the democratization?

A I think that's a big part of it. At Wealthfront, you know, when I joined, we, you know, instead of a mission statement at the company, we have a core belief, and it's, it's, it's, it's very simple. We believe that everyone deserves sophisticated financial advice, um, and there's no question that That the traditional industry of financial advisors, because of their cost structure, have a combination of both high minimums and high fees that really exclude most savers and investors, right? Most people don't have the huge account balances, half a million, a million dollars or more, that are the minimums for most quality financial advisors. Um, and that's not because the industry is elitist. It's actually because their economics cannot provide the service they provide To people with smaller accounts. And so I definitely think that democratization is a big piece of this trend, you know, by taking the investment strategies and the advice that previously was only available to the ultra wealthy and automating in software, we make it inexpensive enough that we can deliver it to, to anyone. Um, and I, I think that Wealthfront has already in its short history proven that we can take strategies like tax loss harvesting that used to be the, the province of people like Mitt Romney and others, um, Um, and actually bring it, um, literally to every Wealthfront client who has 500 dollars, and the…

AI assessment note: “I think that's a big part of it.”

Q What are your productivity tips, tricks? Do you have any apps that you use, to-do lists, anything you use to stay on top?

A I think the biggest productivity, uh, tip that I actually have is making sure that you clearly can tell the difference between things that are urgent, where you might be blocking the team versus items where it deserves a little bit of thought. And giving a better answer, um, a few hours later is more valuable than giving a quick answer that might be incorrect. You know, when you're in a position where your decisions matter or people looking for you for guidance, that quick decision about whether it's more important to unblock people or, or give a more thoughtful answer, I think is one of the most important productivity tips. Cause it lets you divide kind of that inbox, that inflow, um, into things that really matter to get done today versus things that you'll get done either tomorrow or next week or in the future or, or better yet. Delegate to someone who's better qualified to actually answer that question and unlock the team.

AI assessment note: “the biggest productivity, uh, tip that I actually have is making sure”

Q there's all sorts of sub-specialities within the design role, and it's about getting the best work you can from them. So I want, I'd love to hear about the hyper-growth mode, and how you look to approach kind of personalization and getting the most out of your employers, whilst retaining that startup culture that everyone is part of the ownership culture at Wealthfront. How do you look to do that?

A Culture is, is one of those ephemeral things a lot of people like to talk about, um, but really turns out, in my opinion, to be the sum of a lot of dedicated efforts that you make over time as you build the company, and, and companies go through different phases in terms of how they scale. Um, I mean, when I joined Wealthfront, um, there were 17 people at the company, um, and, and now we're, we're just about a 140. In some ways, the growth is phenomenal, um, in, in other ways, you know, compared to, You know, the technology giants out there, it's an incredibly small team. Um, and you feel that way at the company. Like, even though we have over a hundred people now, there's no excess. There's no one not pulling their weight. There's so many things that need to get done that fall on the shoulders of just one person. Um, and more often than not, um, there's 12 things that are falling on the shoulders of that one person. You know, so for me, you know, the real issue with scaling, I think, what differentiates Silicon Valley is it's not based on hierarchy. Uh, you know, in my opinion, It's been well proven that, you know, building software through some giant military-like hierarchy of, of engineers just isn't nearly as effective as empowering small cross-functional teams to really own the features and services they're building and drive the strategy, and so a lot of my effort here at…

AI assessment note: “empowering small cross-functional teams to really own the features and services they're building”

Q You said that you miss it. How was the transition for you? What were the kind of big challenges and, and surprises for you? What have you really enjoyed that you maybe potentially didn't expect to?

A The most rewarding part about being the CEO of Wealthfront is, you know, one of the things I love about Silicon Valley and the equity culture is, is companies are naturally built for everyone to think like an owner, right? I've always loved this idea that, you know, everyone at the company, regardless of role owns equity in the company. Right. And there's this alignment that comes that you're all trying to build the company together. And probably the most rewarding part, I always felt like at the companies I worked at, an amazing amount of responsibility, um, and ownership for, for what happened at those companies, right? Even go back to early days, um, as an engineer at Apple, or, you know, as a product manager at eBay, certainly at LinkedIn, I felt a lot of responsibility and pride in the work we were doing and the products we were building and the services we were building. Um, at Wealthfront, I, you know, as CEO, uh, You really get to not just take responsibility for, um, but represent the company, what it's trying to build, who, who the company is, what it stands for, what it believes in the longterm. Um, and so for me, um, that's probably been the biggest transition, but the most rewarding is, you know, the chance to represent a company like Wealthfront for me is a, is a dream come true. I mean, this is, this is everything that I believe in, in personal finance and helpin…

AI assessment note: “that's probably been the biggest transition, but the most rewarding is”

Q you mentioned LinkedIn there and your, your expertise in product and you spent four and a half years at LinkedIn. Uh, and why do you consider one of the best in product? So talk to me about what you think makes a great product person first, uh, And then how does that compare to role now being the great CEO and what it takes to be a great CEO now?

A The product management role, um, has really evolved in my career the last 20 years in software, partially because the businesses and the products and services themselves keep evolving. And product is one of these roles where actually everything has to come together, right? The strategy, the technology, the design, and customer focus all have to come together Into something that really captures all the elements you need to be successful in the market. In a world where you make hardware products, it's pretty obvious what the product is, right? You look at the iPhone and you have a really good idea of what the iPhone is. Um, but in a modern world of the cloud and software, it's, and the web, um, it's not always obvious where those lines are. What makes the product is a, is a website, a collection of pages. If you do focus on the customer experience, um, Um, so I love the role because actually it's multivariate. It depends on the situation, but overall the best product manager, I think, um, exhibit the traits that you see in great leader. You know, I've, I've spoken in the past where I think that the best product managers do a good job for their cross-functional teams of leading them by, by defining what game they're playing. And then second, how do you keep score? Um, and it sounds simple. Um, but actually if you're going to lead a group of incredibly talented people who have spec…

AI assessment note: “defining what game they're playing. And then second, how do you keep score?”

Q You said that you miss it. How was the transition for you? What were the kind of big challenges and, and surprises for you? What have you really enjoyed that you maybe potentially didn't expect to?

A The most rewarding part about being the CEO of Wealthfront is, you know, one of the things I love about Silicon Valley and the equity culture is, is companies are naturally built for everyone to think like an owner, right? I've always loved this idea that, you know, everyone at the company, regardless of role owns equity in the company. Right. And there's this alignment that comes that you're all trying to build the company together. And probably the most rewarding part, I always felt like at the companies I worked at, an amazing amount of responsibility, um, and ownership for, for what happened at those companies, right? Even go back to early days, um, as an engineer at Apple, or, you know, as a product manager at eBay, certainly at LinkedIn, I felt a lot of responsibility and pride in the work we were doing and the products we were building and the services we were building. Um, at Wealthfront, I, you know, as CEO, uh, You really get to not just take responsibility for, um, but represent the company, what it's trying to build, who, who the company is, what it stands for, what it believes in the longterm. Um, and so for me, um, that's probably been the biggest transition, but the most rewarding is, you know, the chance to represent a company like Wealthfront for me is a, is a dream come true. I mean, this is, this is everything that I believe in, in personal finance and helpin…

AI assessment note: “that's probably been the biggest transition, but the most rewarding”

Q there's all sorts of sub-specialities within the design role, and it's about getting the best work you can from them. So I want, I'd love to hear about the hyper-growth mode, and how you look to approach kind of personalization and getting the most out of your employers, whilst retaining that startup culture that everyone is part of the ownership culture at Wealthfront. How do you look to do that?

A Culture is, is one of those ephemeral things a lot of people like to talk about, um, but really turns out, in my opinion, to be the sum of a lot of dedicated efforts that you make over time as you build the company, and, and companies go through different phases in terms of how they scale. Um, I mean, when I joined Wealthfront, um, there were 17 people at the company, um, and, and now we're, we're just about a 140. In some ways, the growth is phenomenal, um, in, in other ways, you know, compared to, You know, the technology giants out there, it's an incredibly small team. Um, and you feel that way at the company. Like, even though we have over a hundred people now, there's no excess. There's no one not pulling their weight. There's so many things that need to get done that fall on the shoulders of just one person. Um, and more often than not, um, there's 12 things that are falling on the shoulders of that one person. You know, so for me, you know, the real issue with scaling, I think, what differentiates Silicon Valley is it's not based on hierarchy. Uh, you know, in my opinion, It's been well proven that, you know, building software through some giant military-like hierarchy of, of engineers just isn't nearly as effective as empowering small cross-functional teams to really own the features and services they're building and drive the strategy, and so a lot of my effort here at…

AI assessment note: “empowering small cross-functional teams to really own the features and services they're building”

Q you mentioned LinkedIn there and your, your expertise in product and you spent four and a half years at LinkedIn. Uh, and why do you consider one of the best in product? So talk to me about what you think makes a great product person first, uh, And then how does that compare to role now being the great CEO and what it takes to be a great CEO now?

A The product management role, um, has really evolved in my career the last 20 years in software, partially because the businesses and the products and services themselves keep evolving. And product is one of these roles where actually everything has to come together, right? The strategy, the technology, the design, and customer focus all have to come together Into something that really captures all the elements you need to be successful in the market. In a world where you make hardware products, it's pretty obvious what the product is, right? You look at the iPhone and you have a really good idea of what the iPhone is. Um, but in a modern world of the cloud and software, it's, and the web, um, it's not always obvious where those lines are. What makes the product is a, is a website, a collection of pages. If you do focus on the customer experience, um, Um, so I love the role because actually it's multivariate. It depends on the situation, but overall the best product manager, I think, um, exhibit the traits that you see in great leader. You know, I've, I've spoken in the past where I think that the best product managers do a good job for their cross-functional teams of leading them by, by defining what game they're playing. And then second, how do you keep score? Um, and it sounds simple. Um, but actually if you're going to lead a group of incredibly talented people who have spec…

AI assessment note: “the best product managers do a good job for their cross-functional teams”