The Exchanges

Q So if we think about those eight, what does the communication cadence and channels look like between you and them? Is it a week, sorry, I do go quite granular, but is it like, yeah, is it a weekly phone call? Is it like just messages throughout the week on Slack and on WhatsApp? What does that communication pathway look like?

A So what it looks like today is that we have a weekly go-to-market leadership meeting. We call it the business leadership meeting. I really love that meeting. It's held early in the morning so that Europe can join. The only downside is that our JPAC leader is not available to make it, so he listens to the recordings. And we do try to alternate. So once a month, we try to have it at a time that's friendly to JPAC, but not so friendly to Europe. And so trying to be thoughtful about that, that's just the reality of operating in a global environment. And then we also have a shared Slack channel. Which we use a lot. And it's just us, right? So it's just that leadership team. So we're able to talk about sensitive things. We're able to throw out whatever issues, concerns we have. We're just trying to tag team things. And then I also have one-on-ones with each of the leaders every week. Often that's just grabbing a coffee, going on a walk, but really try to make sure that we, that we have that time. We have standing one-on-one documents in Notion. They're amazing. Everyone should try it. It's very structured. You can pull in whatever content you want, and I always start with whatever they want to talk about. Then I can be a sounding board. I can be a clearinghouse. I can be there to note action items that I need to take to unblock things. Inevitably, I have one or two things that I've b…

AI assessment note: “what it looks like today is that we have a weekly go-to-market leadership meeting.”

Q Are you as directors saying, hey, where does Olivia suck, or where is she really weak? We had this fun chat before this interview, but like, you know, do you literally say, hey, where are their biggest weaknesses, or is there a more graceful, specific

A You're asking me to give away all my secrets, Harry. Next time I'm going to run a reference, people are going to say, oh, wait, I know this question. No, I'm happy to answer the question. I start with really getting to know the context in which the person, first of all, it's a good half hour, right? Like, it's a real-time investment to do these. It's not like five minutes, like, hey, what's their weaknesses, right? And I know you know that, but just to state the obvious, you know, what's the context in which you know this person? What are their strengths? Where have you seen them really shine? And then diving in deeper on, okay, well, no one's perfect. I myself am not perfect. What would be the one thing that exhibits as something that you're like, no one's perfect. This is the thing I just need to navigate around with this person. People know that all of the good things they said about the person aren't credible if they really can't note a weakness.

AI assessment note: “What would be the one thing that exhibits as something that you're like, no one's perfect.”

Q So if we think about those eight, what does the communication cadence and channels look like between you and them? Is it a week, sorry, I do go quite granular, but is it like, yeah, is it a weekly phone call? Is it like just messages throughout the week on Slack and on WhatsApp? What does that communication pathway look like?

A So what it looks like today is that we have a weekly go-to-market leadership meeting. We call it the business leadership meeting. I really love that meeting. It's held early in the morning so that Europe can join. The only downside is that our JPAC leader is not available to make it, so he listens to the recordings. And we do try to alternate. So once a month, we try to have it at a time that's friendly to JPAC, but not so friendly to Europe. And so trying to be thoughtful about that, that's just the reality of operating in a global environment. And then we also have a shared Slack channel. Which we use a lot. And it's just us, right? So it's just that leadership team. So we're able to talk about sensitive things. We're able to throw out whatever issues, concerns we have. We're just trying to tag team things. And then I also have one-on-ones with each of the leaders every week. Often that's just grabbing a coffee, going on a walk, but really try to make sure that we, that we have that time. We have standing one-on-one documents in Notion. They're amazing. Everyone should try it. It's very structured. You can pull in whatever content you want, and I always start with whatever they want to talk about. Then I can be a sounding board. I can be a clearinghouse. I can be there to note action items that I need to take to unblock things. Inevitably, I have one or two things that I've b…

AI assessment note: “we have a weekly go-to-market leadership meeting... we also have a shared Slack channel”

Q Final one before we do a quick fiber. I'm just too intrigued. But my question to you is you mentioned like, you know, the very rare misfire that you make. When you think about that very rare misfire, What were some of the lessons for you from the mishire, or the mishires that you've made in the past?

A It's a great question. I would say that you realize that you did the reference, and you heard a flag, and you were just so eager to get that role filled, that you noted it as, oh, I'm sure it's coachable, and you moved on. And that, I think, is where I've had the most learning, where I was Frankly, too believing in myself that I could coach that person through it, because we just needed to serve this role. And I would say, twenty-twenty-two will be a very challenging year, globally, in the world of talent, right? Because you saw this kind of great resignation that occurred, then you saw a great shift in talent across different roles in twenty-twenty-one. Like, actually, a lot of people took new jobs. And so, as you look out into twenty-twenty-two, as operators, I think we all need to be comfortable That we are going to be not playing with a full deck of cards. Like, you will not have the perfect person in each of the roles that you need to get the job done. I really have been thinking about that learning. Do not make that higher out of deep necessity, and think that you're just going to solve it. It's actually better to go a little longer and wait for the right talent, even though it's hard to operate in that environment. But in the long run, it's It's the right decision. So I actually am constantly telling myself that at the back of my head, because at Notion, we have a very h…

AI assessment note: “Do not make that higher out of deep necessity, and think that you're just going to solve it.”

Q How do you communicate a concern with a functional lead, a direct report, without really kind of ruining their confidence even more if they probably already know that they're struggling? How do you do it?

A The very, very tough conversation kind of of, hey, you've Kind of really hit a wall. Comes from me in the form of checking in on them and seeing how they think they're doing. Like, how are you feeling right now? Where do you feel the most challenged? For the most part, people are self-aware, and they actually welcome the time to openly just be able to talk, and frankly, positioning yourself is there to help, to say, okay, where are the areas that you feel like you need some coaching on, or perhaps you need to hire someone on your team who can supplement that Skill set, because maybe you yourself don't have it, and that's okay. Coming in it from a helping perspective, and that's also, frankly, how I handle the even, like, glitches, right? Like, how can I help get this person hired? It seems to be a struggle. This is a key part of your team. You need this leverage. How can I help? Of course, people understand that I'm not offering to help for no reason, but it is important that they know that I truly am still Spirit-wise, there to help, and there to make them successful.

AI assessment note: “Comes from me in the form of checking in on them and seeing how they think”

Q marketing leads to sales, and there's such an overlap and convergence now of the different parts of the funnel where traditionally, you know, sales and marketing were quite split, but as we both know, buyers are so much more educated, and actually marketing's eaten so much into the sales funnel. So I guess it's like, how does one think about an attribution today in a world where it's so intermingled?

A Well, I mean, this part is like what I love, so. For me, it's really fun too. You operate as a cohesive engine, but actually you do isolate out who is driving what outcome. The brand team, the top of the funnel team is owning net new visitors. They are obviously working in concert with product to drive signup flow, right? And we have to make sure that the quality of those visitors stays consistent and they offer a counterforce With each other, right? So yes, you are monitoring that net new visitor traffic, and that can come from many, many areas, right? And then you are monitoring that signup. And what you want to be able to do is over time, obviously, improve that signup. And you are seeing when you're doing tests about what is it that's improving that signup rate, right? Is it you're sending different quality of traffic, and nothing has changed in terms of the interaction on the website at Self and the product, and you get better signup, then, okay, we attribute that to marketing. They're driving better quality. If, in fact, they've just been driving the same quality, but the product team and the web team have just been doing great work in terms of getting those conversions and signups, well, then we attribute it to them, and each of those teams have targets, but we also talk about it openly, right? So, okay, we see that web traffic coming in. We've been able to hold our sign…

AI assessment note: “you operate as a cohesive engine, but actually you do isolate out who is driving what outcome”

Q How do you communicate a concern with a functional lead, a direct report, without really kind of ruining their confidence even more if they probably already know that they're struggling? How do you do it?

A The very, very tough conversation kind of of, hey, you've Kind of really hit a wall. Comes from me in the form of checking in on them and seeing how they think they're doing. Like, how are you feeling right now? Where do you feel the most challenged? For the most part, people are self-aware, and they actually welcome the time to openly just be able to talk, and frankly, positioning yourself is there to help, to say, okay, where are the areas that you feel like you need some coaching on, or perhaps you need to hire someone on your team who can supplement that Skill set, because maybe you yourself don't have it, and that's okay. Coming in it from a helping perspective, and that's also, frankly, how I handle the even, like, glitches, right? Like, how can I help get this person hired? It seems to be a struggle. This is a key part of your team. You need this leverage. How can I help? Of course, people understand that I'm not offering to help for no reason, but it is important that they know that I truly am still Spirit-wise, there to help, and there to make them successful.

AI assessment note: “Comes from me in the form of checking in on them and seeing how they think”

Q Can I ask, how did Notion come about?

A Yes, Well, it's one of those classic stories of you happen to be talking to someone who happens to talk to someone here in Silicon Valley. I was talking to David Schneider. He was over at ServiceNow, and he's now at KOTU. He had been chatting with Ivan and Akshay over at Notion, and they were thinking through some things, and he connected us, and so we were just chatting about the business. I had led the SMB sales business And broad SMB business over it at Google Cloud and had a number of tremendous leaders over there. But we had learned a lot in the world of SaaS. It was, you know, an interesting space where you're not only acquiring SMBs, but you're trying to be very thoughtful about acquiring digital natives because they will be your future enterprise players and how to navigate that and how to keep up the pace of growth in a space that's very competitive. And so we were problem solving on that topic. And at one Ivan and Akshay said, hey, do you want to come join the team? So that's how it happened.

AI assessment note: “Ivan and Akshay said, hey, do you want to come join the team?”

Q So is it a challenge though? Cause you know, you've got revenue optimization, but then you've got a lot of other things that you have to be very aware of. How do you balance?

A You never want to make decisions as you're Building to optimize for revenue. You really, really have to be careful not to do that. In fact, I would almost recommend that you take away things that pull you in the direction of something that would make you optimize for revenue decisions. So let me give you an example. Some businesses have portions of them that, you know, were there at the origin and were an early entry, but over time it's It's clear that there's just not enough TAM there. There's not enough opportunity there to actually sustain that being the business driver for the company. And especially in a world where you're trying to double and then double and then double, right? Because growth is paramount because really what we're trying to do is reach as many users as possible, right? You want to make sure that you don't have these distractions. So I much prefer to actually sunset that and not have it be a Parts of their time thinking about, well, how do I get this piece of the business from 10% growth up to, you know, a hundred to 10% growth, which is what the rest of our business is pacing at. It's almost better to just cut off the branch and say, you know, that was a great entry. That gives us a great halo. We'll actually just offer that for free now, but we're not going to try to resuscitate this piece of the business back up to a 110% growth when it really just does…

AI assessment note: “You never want to make decisions as you're Building to optimize for revenue.”

Q Final one before we do a quick fiber. I'm just too intrigued. But my question to you is you mentioned like, you know, the very rare misfire that you make. When you think about that very rare misfire, What were some of the lessons for you from the mishire, or the mishires that you've made in the past?

A It's a great question. I would say that you realize that you did the reference, and you heard a flag, and you were just so eager to get that role filled, that you noted it as, oh, I'm sure it's coachable, and you moved on. And that, I think, is where I've had the most learning, where I was Frankly, too believing in myself that I could coach that person through it, because we just needed to serve this role. And I would say, twenty-twenty-two will be a very challenging year, globally, in the world of talent, right? Because you saw this kind of great resignation that occurred, then you saw a great shift in talent across different roles in twenty-twenty-one. Like, actually, a lot of people took new jobs. And so, as you look out into twenty-twenty-two, as operators, I think we all need to be comfortable That we are going to be not playing with a full deck of cards. Like, you will not have the perfect person in each of the roles that you need to get the job done. I really have been thinking about that learning. Do not make that higher out of deep necessity, and think that you're just going to solve it. It's actually better to go a little longer and wait for the right talent, even though it's hard to operate in that environment. But in the long run, it's It's the right decision. So I actually am constantly telling myself that at the back of my head, because at Notion, we have a very h…

AI assessment note: “Do not make that higher out of deep necessity, and think that you're just going to solve it.”

Q such great things. I do want to ask, you mentioned there about kind of learnings from Google, didn't it? You were six years at Google, almost, and then obviously your time at Dropbox. I really intrigued both such iconic institutions. When you think about, like, a core takeaway that's really impacted your mindset from each, is there one or two things that really comes to mind from Google and Dropbox?

A From Google, there were two things that I took away. One is that outside in, it looks like this beautiful business model, and it is. The auction model that Hal Varian introduced into the ads world was truly genius as an economics major by training, something that I have deep respect for. What really wowed me at Google was the operating rigor. It is not an accident that they perform as well as they perform, and it's a high bar that's And then the second takeaway, I would say after two years, I went over and joined Diane green over at Google cloud. And she was just this amazing, amazing person that always put the customer in the center of it all. And when you're building a business where you have to convince the world that Google is ready to serve enterprises, because you know, it's perceived as an ads business. And here we are wanting to provide infrastructure as a service and platform as a service and software as a service. By putting customers in the middle, really was just this unifying force that gave us the escape velocity that we needed. Diane Green ran her staff meetings that way. Every Monday we were problem solving how we could help a certain customer, and a certain type of customer, and what we needed to do to get them truly just loving the product, and that was very special.

AI assessment note: “From Google, there were two things that I took away.”

Q Can I ask you, Olivia, a bit of a weird one before we do a quick fire, but you seem incredibly calm, serene, thoughtful, unflappable. Do you feel pressure? And when you do feel pressure, how does that show?

A Honestly, I think you just understand the Pressure over time. I would say early in my career, I would feel the pressure, and I would transfer the pressure. And I think part of as you decide that you want to try to help a company grow and be in a leadership position, part of what you're signing up to is absorbing the pressure. That is part of your function. If you just take the pressure and pass down the anxiety, that doesn't provide your team with the space they need to operate. And a leader who is constantly questioning what their leadership, their own leadership thinks of them is operating at half speed, right? Like you really need your leaders to know that the wind is behind their back and they have open waters ahead of them. The seas are rough, but you're there supporting them. So I would say that I go on runs every day. I've been told that it helps me. Then I'm in my Zen state. Like before we chatted, I went on a run.

AI assessment note: “part of what you're signing up to is absorbing the pressure.”

Q Can I ask, how did Notion come about?

A Yes, Well, it's one of those classic stories of you happen to be talking to someone who happens to talk to someone here in Silicon Valley. I was talking to David Schneider. He was over at ServiceNow, and he's now at KOTU. He had been chatting with Ivan and Akshay over at Notion, and they were thinking through some things, and he connected us, and so we were just chatting about the business. I had led the SMB sales business And broad SMB business over it at Google Cloud and had a number of tremendous leaders over there. But we had learned a lot in the world of SaaS. It was, you know, an interesting space where you're not only acquiring SMBs, but you're trying to be very thoughtful about acquiring digital natives because they will be your future enterprise players and how to navigate that and how to keep up the pace of growth in a space that's very competitive. And so we were problem solving on that topic. And at one Ivan and Akshay said, hey, do you want to come join the team? So that's how it happened.

AI assessment note: “Ivan and Akshay said, hey, do you want to come join the team?”

Q such great things. I do want to ask, you mentioned there about kind of learnings from Google, didn't it? You were six years at Google, almost, and then obviously your time at Dropbox. I really intrigued both such iconic institutions. When you think about, like, a core takeaway that's really impacted your mindset from each, is there one or two things that really comes to mind from Google and Dropbox?

A From Google, there were two things that I took away. One is that outside in, it looks like this beautiful business model, and it is. The auction model that Hal Varian introduced into the ads world was truly genius as an economics major by training, something that I have deep respect for. What really wowed me at Google was the operating rigor. It is not an accident that they perform as well as they perform, and it's a high bar that's And then the second takeaway, I would say after two years, I went over and joined Diane green over at Google cloud. And she was just this amazing, amazing person that always put the customer in the center of it all. And when you're building a business where you have to convince the world that Google is ready to serve enterprises, because you know, it's perceived as an ads business. And here we are wanting to provide infrastructure as a service and platform as a service and software as a service. By putting customers in the middle, really was just this unifying force that gave us the escape velocity that we needed. Diane Green ran her staff meetings that way. Every Monday we were problem solving how we could help a certain customer, and a certain type of customer, and what we needed to do to get them truly just loving the product, and that was very special.

AI assessment note: “From Google, there were two things that I took away.”

Q So is it a challenge though? Cause you know, you've got revenue optimization, but then you've got a lot of other things that you have to be very aware of. How do you balance?

A You never want to make decisions as you're Building to optimize for revenue. You really, really have to be careful not to do that. In fact, I would almost recommend that you take away things that pull you in the direction of something that would make you optimize for revenue decisions. So let me give you an example. Some businesses have portions of them that, you know, were there at the origin and were an early entry, but over time it's It's clear that there's just not enough TAM there. There's not enough opportunity there to actually sustain that being the business driver for the company. And especially in a world where you're trying to double and then double and then double, right? Because growth is paramount because really what we're trying to do is reach as many users as possible, right? You want to make sure that you don't have these distractions. So I much prefer to actually sunset that and not have it be a Parts of their time thinking about, well, how do I get this piece of the business from 10% growth up to, you know, a hundred to 10% growth, which is what the rest of our business is pacing at. It's almost better to just cut off the branch and say, you know, that was a great entry. That gives us a great halo. We'll actually just offer that for free now, but we're not going to try to resuscitate this piece of the business back up to a 110% growth when it really just does…

AI assessment note: “You never want to make decisions as you're Building to optimize for revenue.”

Q Can I ask, when you think about making these core decisions, I always struggle with the head versus heart. Being, you know, a romantic European, I tend to go with my heart most of the time. Sometimes it's right, sometimes it's not. How do you think about head versus heart in decision making, and where you most often go?

A So we have a value at Notion that I've Feel very, very resonant with, and it's be kind and direct. If you pair the two, you are better off. So you understand person, you deeply care about the person, you have empathy for the journey that they are on, because you yourself have, I myself have had many times where I thought I should get a role, I didn't get a role, I wanted to be promoted, I didn't get promoted, you know, whatever it may be. Right? So in the sense of like, gosh, I've been there too. It's not what you expected. So let's talk about the human element of this, and then let's talk about the right answer for the business, and let's just openly have that conversation.

AI assessment note: “let's talk about the human element of this, and then let's talk about the right answer”

Q Can I ask, when you think about making these core decisions, I always struggle with the head versus heart. Being, you know, a romantic European, I tend to go with my heart most of the time. Sometimes it's right, sometimes it's not. How do you think about head versus heart in decision making, and where you most often go?

A So we have a value at Notion that I've Feel very, very resonant with, and it's be kind and direct. If you pair the two, you are better off. So you understand person, you deeply care about the person, you have empathy for the journey that they are on, because you yourself have, I myself have had many times where I thought I should get a role, I didn't get a role, I wanted to be promoted, I didn't get promoted, you know, whatever it may be. Right? So in the sense of like, gosh, I've been there too. It's not what you expected. So let's talk about the human element of this, and then let's talk about the right answer for the business, and let's just openly have that conversation.

AI assessment note: “let's talk about the human element of this, and then let's talk about the right answer”

Q Can I ask you, Olivia, a bit of a weird one before we do a quick fire, but you seem incredibly calm, serene, thoughtful, unflappable. Do you feel pressure? And when you do feel pressure, how does that show?

A Honestly, I think you just understand the Pressure over time. I would say early in my career, I would feel the pressure, and I would transfer the pressure. And I think part of as you decide that you want to try to help a company grow and be in a leadership position, part of what you're signing up to is absorbing the pressure. That is part of your function. If you just take the pressure and pass down the anxiety, that doesn't provide your team with the space they need to operate. And a leader who is constantly questioning what their leadership, their own leadership thinks of them is operating at half speed, right? Like you really need your leaders to know that the wind is behind their back and they have open waters ahead of them. The seas are rough, but you're there supporting them. So I would say that I go on runs every day. I've been told that it helps me. Then I'm in my Zen state. Like before we chatted, I went on a run.

AI assessment note: “part of what you're signing up to is absorbing the pressure.”

Q I have no idea about that. That is a great stat. You should put that on Twitter. Yeah, this is a very tweetable thing. Tell me, I spoke to many mutual friends, as you know, none of them provided me with one single weakness, not one. So I'm intrigued, self-reflectively. What do you think you're world-class at, and what do you think you really are quite weak at?

A I do think I'm a world-class operator. I do love bringing teams together and making sure that we are just knocking it out of the park. In terms of my weakness, the part where I want to make sure that I'm always cognizant of is as you're scaling and as you're in hyperscale, you don't try to be overly analytical. And again, I have worked on this a lot, so I wouldn't say this is a, you know, something that, that I'm, I just want to be careful of, right? Because the tendency is always like, okay, let's have it. There's got to be a data answer to this. And sometimes you just have to go with your gut. And that's something that I've grown into, I feel like, as an operator. Especially when you're operating in hyperscale, you only have so much longitudinal analysis to go on, and so you just have to start also making some decisions on your gut.

AI assessment note: “I do think I'm a world-class operator... In terms of my weakness”

Q I have no idea about that. That is a great stat. You should put that on Twitter. Yeah, this is a very tweetable thing. Tell me, I spoke to many mutual friends, as you know, none of them provided me with one single weakness, not one. So I'm intrigued, self-reflectively. What do you think you're world-class at, and what do you think you really are quite weak at?

A I do think I'm a world-class operator. I do love bringing teams together and making sure that we are just knocking it out of the park. In terms of my weakness, the part where I want to make sure that I'm always cognizant of is as you're scaling and as you're in hyperscale, you don't try to be overly analytical. And again, I have worked on this a lot, so I wouldn't say this is a, you know, something that, that I'm, I just want to be careful of, right? Because the tendency is always like, okay, let's have it. There's got to be a data answer to this. And sometimes you just have to go with your gut. And that's something that I've grown into, I feel like, as an operator. Especially when you're operating in hyperscale, you only have so much longitudinal analysis to go on, and so you just have to start also making some decisions on your gut.

AI assessment note: “I do think I'm a world-class operator. In terms of my weakness”

Q Are you as directors saying, hey, where does Olivia suck, or where is she really weak? We had this fun chat before this interview, but like, you know, do you literally say, hey, where are their biggest weaknesses, or is there a more graceful, specific

A You're asking me to give away all my secrets, Harry. Next time I'm going to run a reference, people are going to say, oh, wait, I know this question. No, I'm happy to answer the question. I start with really getting to know the context in which the person, first of all, it's a good half hour, right? Like, it's a real-time investment to do these. It's not like five minutes, like, hey, what's their weaknesses, right? And I know you know that, but just to state the obvious, you know, what's the context in which you know this person? What are their strengths? Where have you seen them really shine? And then diving in deeper on, okay, well, no one's perfect. I myself am not perfect. What would be the one thing that exhibits as something that you're like, no one's perfect. This is the thing I just need to navigate around with this person. People know that all of the good things they said about the person aren't credible if they really can't note a weakness.

AI assessment note: “What would be the one thing that exhibits as something that you're like, no one's perfect.”

Q marketing leads to sales, and there's such an overlap and convergence now of the different parts of the funnel where traditionally, you know, sales and marketing were quite split, but as we both know, buyers are so much more educated, and actually marketing's eaten so much into the sales funnel. So I guess it's like, how does one think about an attribution today in a world where it's so intermingled?

A Well, I mean, this part is like what I love, so. For me, it's really fun too. You operate as a cohesive engine, but actually you do isolate out who is driving what outcome. The brand team, the top of the funnel team is owning net new visitors. They are obviously working in concert with product to drive signup flow, right? And we have to make sure that the quality of those visitors stays consistent and they offer a counterforce With each other, right? So yes, you are monitoring that net new visitor traffic, and that can come from many, many areas, right? And then you are monitoring that signup. And what you want to be able to do is over time, obviously, improve that signup. And you are seeing when you're doing tests about what is it that's improving that signup rate, right? Is it you're sending different quality of traffic, and nothing has changed in terms of the interaction on the website at Self and the product, and you get better signup, then, okay, we attribute that to marketing. They're driving better quality. If, in fact, they've just been driving the same quality, but the product team and the web team have just been doing great work in terms of getting those conversions and signups, well, then we attribute it to them, and each of those teams have targets, but we also talk about it openly, right? So, okay, we see that web traffic coming in. We've been able to hold our sign…

AI assessment note: “isolate out who is driving what outcome... we attribute that to marketing”

Q Olivia, I could chat to you all day, but I do want to move into a quick fire round. So I want to start with what makes a great relationship between CRO and CEO? Trust. How do you approach trust? Do you start a relationship with full trust and it's yours to be lost? Or do you start with none and it's yours to be built over time?

A I actually believe in the trust equation. The trust equation, again, it's algorithmic, so not surprising based on my analytical background, but so at the top, the numerator is credibility. So do you know what you're talking about when you are talking about something? Accessibility. So if I need to reach you, because it's really important, am I able to reach you? And dependability. So if you say you're going to do something, do you do it? And then the numerator, which is the element that takes away trust, Is level of self-interest. If someone engages with you, and they're highly credible, they're highly accessible, and they do what they say they're going to do, but it's very clear that they're always in it for themselves and only in themselves, you do tend to have a lower trust of that individual. They're not a team player, they're not aligned with kind of the greater good and the greater goal. And so I really do believe in that. Like, it's very important that people, if they say they're going to do something, that they do it. That if They're claiming to be an expert on a topic that, you know, when you poke once or twice, they actually know what they're talking about. And if you need to reach them because you're working together and it's urgent, you need to be able to call them. You do that, right? It's not to say everyone needs to be, you know, on call nights and weekends, but …

AI assessment note: “I actually believe in the trust equation.”

Q Olivia, I could chat to you all day, but I do want to move into a quick fire round. So I want to start with what makes a great relationship between CRO and CEO? Trust. How do you approach trust? Do you start a relationship with full trust and it's yours to be lost? Or do you start with none and it's yours to be built over time?

A I actually believe in the trust equation. The trust equation, again, it's algorithmic, so not surprising based on my analytical background, but so at the top, the numerator is credibility. So do you know what you're talking about when you are talking about something? Accessibility. So if I need to reach you, because it's really important, am I able to reach you? And dependability. So if you say you're going to do something, do you do it? And then the numerator, which is the element that takes away trust, Is level of self-interest. If someone engages with you, and they're highly credible, they're highly accessible, and they do what they say they're going to do, but it's very clear that they're always in it for themselves and only in themselves, you do tend to have a lower trust of that individual. They're not a team player, they're not aligned with kind of the greater good and the greater goal. And so I really do believe in that. Like, it's very important that people, if they say they're going to do something, that they do it. That if They're claiming to be an expert on a topic that, you know, when you poke once or twice, they actually know what they're talking about. And if you need to reach them because you're working together and it's urgent, you need to be able to call them. You do that, right? It's not to say everyone needs to be, you know, on call nights and weekends, but …

AI assessment note: “I actually believe in the trust equation.”