Ann Hiatt - Organising Google
Ann Hiatt spent the past 15 years as the right hand and organising force of the number one people at Amazon and Google. Today she’s a board member and advisor to Silicon Valley tech companies, sharing the invaluable business insight she accrued working closely with the likes of Jeff Bezos, Eric Schmidt and Marissa Mayer.
She spoke with MTF Director Andrew Dubber about success, ethics in big tech, creating an environment that fosters innovation and creativity, global expansion strategy for startups - and what it takes to be an organisational expert.
AI Transcription
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
people, jeff bezos, impact, job, task, passion, big, ceo, tech, work, lessons, company, helping, world, opportunity, mtf, person, question, music, enjoyed
SPEAKERS
Andrew Dubber, Ann Hiatt
Andrew Dubber
Hi, I’m Dubber. I’m the director of Music Tech Fest, and this is the MTF podcast. Now, if you wanted to know what’s in the minds of the people at the very top of the biggest tech companies, the Googles, Amazons and Yahoo’s of the world, you could read everything in the press and on social media, make some sort of analysis based on that reporting, and try and second guess what the motivations are behind those decisions that get made. Or you could ask Ann Hiatt. Ann’s been the executive assistant to not just one or two, but three of the top CEOs in the biggest tech giants on the planet. She’s now a consultant to Silicon Valley tech startups, and has one or two stories to tell, and probably a lot more that she can add. Joining me for the MTF podcast, Ann Hiatt. Ann Hiatt, thanks so much for joining us. pleasure. Thanks for inviting me, it’s really lovely, you’ve got such an amazing career and so many stories from it. I don’t even know where to start, but tell me first what you’re known for. And then kind of explain how you arrived there.
Ann Hiatt
I think my claim to fame at the moment is having worked with three of the major giants of technology over the last 15 years. My first job out of university was executive assistant to Jeff Bezos, the founder and CEO of Amazon. After that I left to do a PhD at Berkeley in California. And from there, Google recruited me two years into my programme to come work at Google. My first three years there, I worked for Marissa Mayer, before she left to become the CEO of Yahoo. And then I was recruited into Eric Schmidt’s office while he was still CEO, and then as executive chairman. So that’s kind of my unusual headline. And people were asked me all the time, how did you design that? How did you work out working for those three major giants? And the honest truth is it just it was not my master plan of taking over the world, it just kind of naturally evolved in through unexpected series of events,
Andrew Dubber
you must have been really good at helping people Oh, where did that come from?
Ann Hiatt
I’m the oldest of seven children. So I think my organisational skills come naturally as a survival skill. And I just really enjoy people, it comes naturally to me to try and help bring out the best in them. And so to be paired with people who think differently and think so big about their, their impact in the world, was just a real pleasure to work with them to help them break that moonshot down into 100, manageable steps and get them from A to Z.
Andrew Dubber
And I think, for me, even though it has been an enormous amount of work, it was so fulfilling in the process, that it didn’t feel stressful, that my mom used to ask me all the time, you know, how do you manage the stress isn’t it wearing on you, and I just told her, I don’t perceive it that way. It’s just everyday is so exciting to watch the future being made. And that it was just really fulfilling in the process. These people that you’ve mentioned that you worked for, a kind of not not just legendary, but but they kind of mythical, and a lot of ways we have this kind of imagination of them, either as being kind of Super Villains or being you know, heroes or, you know, pioneers or whatever it might be. But I’m kind of interested because you got to see them as people and you got to see sort of the humanity of it. So without sort of asking you to reveal partly because, you know, it’s not a polite thing to do, but also because I imagine you’ve signed all these nondisclosure agreements about what people have been up to, but but tell me about the first person of Jeff Bezos, what drives him?
Ann Hiatt
I love the insight behind that question, because it is true, like the biggest revelation for most people is the fact that these giants of technology really are human. And they I think the unique quality is they’ve channelled their uniqueness and their personalities, both strengths and weaknesses for their benefit. So Jeff Bezos, to start is an insanely insightful and visionary person just naturally, I read the biography on him recently, and it was giving me interesting insights to things that I personally had observed. For example, Jeff Bezos was the valedictorian of his high school class. And in his address to the student body on graduation, he told them that he was going to go to space. And now Jeff Bezos did not go into the military was not a fighter pilot. So his way of doing that is building his private space tourism company, Blue Origin. So Jeff is a man of vision, even at a very early age, he sets enormous goals for himself and doesn’t get in intimidated by the enormity of the task, you just focus on the result. And that makes him very special. It also makes him a very intense person, just in casual conversation, he really gets to the heart of something really quickly, and he’s very, very curious. So that those are some of the characteristics that make him special. And he’s very determined to accomplish it. And he really harnesses the power of everyone around him to accomplish those goals. Do you
Andrew Dubber
ever look at these biographies and think Hang on, where’s my name and
Ann Hiatt
sometimes, it is true behind any successful person. There’s an army of support That is very much outside the spotlight and standing in the wings, it takes a village to accomplish these enormous tasks. So there are a lot of unsung heroes behind each of them. But the thing that endears me to all three of the people I’ve already mentioned is that they, they acknowledge it, the people around them have to work insanely hard. And Jeff, and Marissa and Eric are all really good at acknowledging the contributions of those around them, which is motivating and acknowledges the longevity of those relationships,
Andrew Dubber
doesn’t fall on you a great deal when those things don’t go well.
Ann Hiatt
Yes, that has been a big part of my responsibilities, which with each three is to be what I call the head on the octopus. All of these arms are powerful and tasked with very intricate deliverables. And my job has been to coordinate all these supremely talented people into a single task. So a lot of times that involves the tricky nature of speaking truth to power, when I see a particular project not going well, or anticipate some pain points, you have to handle that delicately. And also the multiple demands on their time, that thing, there are very real requests that are all important coming at them at all times. And helping prioritise those is a risky task, because sometimes you get it wrong. But really anticipating needs before they’re they’re anticipating pain points, what the different members of the team are going to need in order to be successful, is kind of the secret sauce. And then the less fun side of it is really needing to say no for a living, and helping people feel good about it. So there, there’s more requests on their time than they could possibly say yes to. And so helping these very valuable contacts and resources of theirs, be successful in accomplishing their task without needing the CEOs attention, is an essential part of being that chief of staff are represented for them is helping delegate on their behalf. And one thing I’ve really tried to do is kind of be their brain double, which is a huge task, because these are some of the smartest people in the world. But I have really tried to train myself to think like they do to know what questions they will ask what they will like, what they want, like, anticipate needs, so that I as a filter screening process can help those who do get in front of them be more successful and prepared for their time. So it’s, it’s a big job, but I really enjoyed the challenge those that’s
Andrew Dubber
speaking truth to power have an ethical dimension to it. I mean, obviously, if you have that much power, and that much of a resource, that your responsibility from an ethical perspective is enormous. Do you ever get the opportunity to say, Hey, you know, you shouldn’t be behaving like that, or is that we you sort of draw the line,
Ann Hiatt
I do consider that a big part of my role. They’re making real time decisions. I mean, the internet does not sleep. And so they do have to move really, really quickly. And it’s a big responsibility of mine to help guide them into making those right decisions when, when they’re being influenced by other powers or pressures, and helping them do the right thing. And the truth is, I’ve chosen to work with people who take that ethical responsibility in the same way, they take it very, very seriously as well. I have had job offers from people trying to steal me away from people that I didn’t feel like my my values aligned with theirs. And so I’ve always declined that. And the reason I’ve had a 15 year career with these three people, is because I felt that alignment and priorities. And I felt their sincere desire to make the right impact in the world and to be thoughtful about how they’re affecting communities and people, especially my last role with Eric, I worked for him for nine years, nine of the 12 years, I was at Google. And I stayed with him that long one because I was learning a lot, his role transitioned a lot. And so so did my responsibilities and ability to learn. But mostly because I felt very aligned with what he was trying to accomplish and his deliverables, and particularly the way in which he was thoughtful about his impact on the world,
Andrew Dubber
you’ve had a lot of exposure to a lot of people who’ve had a lot of success. Have you looked at that and thought, right, it’s my turn now.
Ann Hiatt
I am in a big period of transition at the moment. And I just left Google six months ago. And so now I’ve tried to consciously hit the pause button before I jump into my next big venture to see what resonates. So right now I’m doing consulting work. And what I’m trying to do now is take the lessons that I’ve learned from these amazing business leaders and apply it to different industries or different company types or growth stages. and see which of these lessons are universal truths. I have some consulting clients that are young startups in Silicon Valley, looking to expand into Europe or the Middle East, or have European companies that are trying to expand globally and understand what they’re getting into in the US market, or helping them on all sides with like investment structures or growth at scale or strategies of hiring or doing your first board of directors. And it’s been interesting to see the way in which the principles are Apply with Amazon Google into these different scenarios and different growth stages. So that’s something I’m exploring now. And I’m looking to have be able to have that impact. I don’t expect to be the next Jeff Bezos or Eric Schmidt. But I do think I can be a proponent of these truths that I’ve gleaned from watching them. In fact, I like to say that it’s been better than Business School, like having these jobs. It’s been my, yeah, my own personal business school to be trained at the side of them. And it would be extremely rewarding for me to be able to give back to the tech community in order to translate these lessons into applicable things that would help founders of all stages and industries. I’m hoping that’s my next impact, we’ll see where it leads.
Andrew Dubber
Well, speaking of applicable skills, I we work a lot with musicians and a while I’m not somebody who has any particular musical talent myself, I do share some characteristics with a lot of musicians that I know. So with that in mind, can you give us one tip from an organisational perspective, that would absolutely revolutionise how we manage our lives?
Ann Hiatt
Well, if I knew the answer to that I would be a billionaire myself. But I do think in terms of organisation, there are some tried and true ways of creating an environment that invites creativity and innovation. So I come at it from the tech perspective, of course, but I do think a universal truth is, in order to be creative, you need to create a space of authenticity and vulnerability in authenticity comes from a place in your gut that you don’t censor, you’re not afraid of how you’re being perceived or reviewed. And vulnerability gives you the opportunity to try things that just don’t work and iterate from there. You can’t always predict what the end result of your work is going to be. The only part you can control is what you do today. And so I call it putting in your reps, right building up your muscle strength. And I find in Creative Industries, whether it’s tech, or music or film or anything in between, you need to have the freedom to iterate and to explore without fear of judgement at the early stages. So I think that might be a tech lesson that’s applicable in that space.
Andrew Dubber
Yeah, absolutely. I mean, having worked with these people, too, you must recognise those qualities and other people coming up. Are there any sort of new businesses that really excite you or people you think are doing some really interesting things? Yeah,
Ann Hiatt
I am very privileged to have some really exciting consulting clients right now. In fact, just this afternoon, I met up with the CEO of a very exciting company called plenty, based in South San Francisco, and Matt Barnard is leading that effort. And what he’s doing is doing vertical indoor farming. that serves several purposes. One it with indoor farming, you don’t need as much land space, it’s a, you know, indoor warehouse environment where all of the conditions are very controlled. So you can produce predictable yield and quality of product. And this is a great opportunity, for example, in underserved communities, maybe in inner city, Detroit, or places that don’t have natural access to fresh fruits and vegetables, to insert healthy diet, we know directly has as more effect on the health of a person than pharma can possibly do through medicines. So getting access, but then also they’re looking into international applications of farming, for national security, for example. So we’ve looked into expanding into countries like UAE and Dubai, where food is an issue of national security. Right now, they’re very reliant on their neighbours who aren’t always friendly to supply the food for their own people. So with vertical farming, you would be able to grow your own food supply in a safe, predictable manner. And then the third applications are in natural medicines where you want to grow a plant to an exact chemical specification. And at the moment, when you’re have a farm outdoors, and you’re at the will of weather patterns, you’re not able to predict that. But if it’s indoors, and you can control the exact acidity level of the soil or exact moisture absorption or light exposure, you can develop a predictable crop with the exact chemical specifications you need for medical treatment, for example, so that one company alone could answer a lot of issues around the world and have a huge impact. I’m really excited about what they’re doing. Just one example,
Andrew Dubber
fantastic if somebody wanted their own, and hired if, for instance, let’s say I wanted somebody to help me with the day to day running of what we do at Music Tech Fest, have a personal assistant, one, how do I find that kind of person and to what can I get them to do? What is how does that work?
Ann Hiatt
So the number one thing I would look for someone who is insatiably curious, you want someone who’s excited about what you’re doing, but doesn’t necessarily need to have expertise in that space. I would just in an interview process as first step I would focus on what questions they ask you. Do they have that next level of curiosity? Do they go beyond just they get to know you? Are they getting into the details? Have they researched articles before they arrive to do that? Did they put in the work? So that would be the first thing I look forward to, I would look for a good personality chemistry. If you really want to partner with someone on a deep level, you need to treat it like one of the most important relationships in your life, like just the way you will consider life partner, you would want to consider your business partners in the same way. So look for that good chemistry and back and forth, someone with whom you can be vulnerable or open or have real conversations about ways in which you both can improve, because that opens up a dialogue and gives an opportunity for growth you wouldn’t have otherwise. So I think that’s more important than maybe educational background. But you do want a track record of someone who’s curious and smart catches on quickly asked the right questions. Those are my top three. The truth is when I started in this career, I had no experience whatsoever. I do think that’s one of Jeff’s, you know, things I admire most about him is he saw something in me that I didn’t know I had and took a chance on me and changed my life that that first job.
Andrew Dubber
And in terms of what things you do I mean, is it a case of you know, answering emails, taking phone calls making appointments? Is there more to it than that? How does it work? Yeah,
Ann Hiatt
it’s been an evolution for sure. I mean, when I first had the job, it was very reactionary. So I was given specific tasks that work very challenging and requires me to get very uncomfortable and make some mistakes. I learned a lot of lessons often the hard way in the beginning. But as my experience and confidence level grew, and as my relationships with my executives evolved, it transitioned into a different role entirely. I was managing their staff, I was in charge of the deliverables, action items responsibility to the Board of Directors, I was keeping them on task. And really, I took it very, very seriously to double their output. And that meant I needed to be on par with what they were doing. In the early stages. I did that by reading everything they read. For example, Jeff Bezos, every morning came in with three newspapers, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and the Seattle Times. So I started reading all three of those every morning cover to cover, I read every briefing document that came across his desk, every single email, listen to every phone call, I leaned in, I googled every term I didn’t know every person’s name, who I didn’t know. And so going on to that next level allowed me to be more proactive in my relationship with him instead of reactive, I could come to him with ideas, opportunities, and even share some of my talents he didn’t know I had or areas of interest, where I would volunteer for a project that would normally be outside my role. And that gave me an amazing opportunity to really grow. And the job was so much more fun to I mean, nobody wakes up excited about calendaring or putting together you know, research documents, things like that. But so my role with Eric Schmidt was very much that it was extremely proactive, it was very high risk, because my job was to aggregate all of the requests across the company, evaluate those for where Eric could have a deep impact, and rank those and make a recommendation to him on how he was going to spend his time or focus or maybe a weakness that we had in an area of expertise we hadn’t yet developed and come with a proactive plan of how we could get that knowledge or those relationships that we needed. And so very much became a business partner relationship with Him. And that’s where it’s really fun, also terrifying, because sometimes you get it wrong, and it’s a billion dollar company. So the impact is large, in successes and failures. But that was a risk. I enjoyed
Andrew Dubber
these kinds of people tough to organise.
Ann Hiatt
Yes and no. It within tech you you have very analytical data driven minds. So I developed a way to easily help them make decisions that broke it down in the way that their mind specifically thought. I’m curious, I don’t know personally, but I imagine the formula would be different maybe in a creative industry, where people go more from a gut feeling or an exposure or, or something more in the moment. But with tech companies, things are a little bit. It takes a lot of intuition. But it’s a little bit more formulaic in the way that you present decisions. I would never come with just a question. Anytime I went to an executive, I would always come to him or her with a recommendation. And kind of I’d already done the math. I already knew how to prove my, my results and the factors I was considering. So that makes it easier. With that said, the internet does not sleep. And sometimes things are happening in real time. Or there’s an impact of of a launch that you hadn’t anticipated. And it’s kind of all hands on deck. So that part is really challenging, but the people themselves are successful because they are very organised and reliable decision makers.
Andrew Dubber
Right, right. All of these people are really important in the world of music, and particularly in music, tech, music distribution and those sorts of things. Like music.
Ann Hiatt
Jeff Bezos is open with the fact that he missed this opportunity early on, because he wasn’t really plugged into music. In Where’s Steve Jobs we know famously that was a passion of his. And so he really revolutionised it because of that passion driven interest. And that became the intersection of tech and music and the way it’s distributed now. So I think passion is an essential part of that formula of how you innovate. Whenever I talk to young entrepreneurs, I always back them up to what was the original passion, which then informs your purpose, passion is something that evolves over time. So it’s a question you need to ask yourself regularly. And then the purpose is something that’s longer term. And it’s the externally focused application of your passion, the impact you want to have. So I find whenever entrepreneurs are having a struggle with how to evolve their business, or in a pain point, it usually comes back to that, like, what is your purpose in this? What are you impact you’re trying to have? And then the questions kind of answered themselves. So those in tech that have been really disruptive or helpful, whichever word you want to use in, in the music industry, I found have that passion just inherent in them, it’s been a big part of their life or journey.
Andrew Dubber
And that really comes through in their work wins the big tell all expose coming out.
Ann Hiatt
I wish I knew the answer to that. I don’t know if it’ll be so much to tell. But the great position I’m in is the fact that is my honest opinion. These are wonderful people who are really, truly trying to change the world for the better, and are very thoughtful about the way in which they use to their impact. So I am lucky that I’m not trying to sneak anything under
Andrew Dubber
blink twice if that wasn’t you
Ann Hiatt
know, but I am, I am flattered by a lot of people do ask me when I’m going to write a book and, and to assemble this like private business school that I had for the larger public. And that’s a project I’m currently working on. Now that I’ve stepped away from Google and have time to kind of think and be reflective on these lessons and seeing what resonates over time. And it’s something I’m working on. And I just this week, had actually started talking with a major Publishing House about a possible deal in the future. So I’m hoping watch this space. I’m hoping I have something to report
Andrew Dubber
soon. If it wasn’t this, if you hadn’t fallen into these roles, what do you think you’d be doing now?
Ann Hiatt
I think I’d be a professor. That was always my plan. In fact, in my job interview with Jeff Bezos, he asked my five year plan. And I told him that I wanted a few years experience working before graduate school, and then I was going to do a PhD and become a professor. So when I left Amazon, after three years, it was four that Jeff Bezos kindly wrote letters of recommendation, I got into a Ph. D. programme and my my dream school job at UC Berkeley in California. And I had every intention of finishing that, in fact, when Google started recruiting me, I said no for a long time, which I think nobody else had ever done at that stage in the company. And it took them a long time into to talk me into even interviewing. But once they got me on campus, she asked me what my largest concern was in leaving grad school. And I said, honestly, I just really enjoy being surrounded by the smartest people in the world every day and having deep discussions. And she literally laughed at me and said, I think you’d be really comfortable here. And it turns out, she was right. So that that’s the path I was on. And I think I would have enjoyed it. But I’m glad that life had other plans for me, because my academic interests have been applied in really unexpected ways. So I feel like I’ve kind of filled that goal in in a different way than I had envisioned originally.
Andrew Dubber
So now, what’s the five year plan?
Ann Hiatt
Yeah, good question. I would like to do the book, I am really enjoying the consulting and looking for ways to have impact on on companies that could use this, these lessons learned. And I also think it would be a really good CSO like, chief strategy officer to apply this at a company that serves my inner passions. So identifying that as part of my five year plan and sinking my teeth into something exciting.
Andrew Dubber
Fantastic. Ann Hiatt, thanks so much for your time. My pleasure. Thanks so much. And that’s the MTF podcast. We’re in Germany next week for MTF Frankfurt at Musikmesse. If you’re going to be joining us for that look forward to seeing you there. We have an amazing group of people there, inventing the future of vocal AI and the MTF Labs, a 24 hour track athon featuring samples of sounds that have literally been bounced off the surface of the moon by Martine-Nicole Rojina, and we’re going to be running the MTF pro labs and innovation masterclass for business leaders from the music and musical instrument industries. That’s fourth to fifth of April at Musikmesse in Frankfurt. And in the meantime, if you enjoyed the podcast, please remember that you can subscribe, share, like rate and review. Have a great week and we’ll talk soon Cheers.
