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Under him, Microsoft has more cloud computing revenue than Google, more subscribers than Netflix, and the software giant has a market capitalization of nearly $2 trillion. What else do you need to know about Satya Nadella?
Who is Satya Nadella and why is everyone talking about him
Satya Narayana Nadella is the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and Chairman of the Board of Directors of Microsoft.
Nadella has done an amazing job since taking over the aging software giant in 2014. By focusing on growing Microsoft’s enterprise cloud business, he accelerated the company’s growth rate and increased its stock value by more than 500%.
In 2019, he was named Financial Times Person of the Year: “Microsoft was on edge. Nadella has propelled the company back to the technological pinnacle without arousing resentment or anxiety.” That same year, he was ranked sixth in Forbes’ “Innovative Leaders” and Harvard Business Review named him one of the top 10 most effective managers in the world.
In 2020, he won the Global Indian Business Icon and was ranked second in CEOWORLD magazine’s global ranking of the best executives in all industries around the world.
Included in the Top 100 SEO 2021 according to Glassdoor – an American site where current and former employees anonymously leave reviews about companies – and was in 6th place. His approval rating is 97%.
As of August 30, 2021, Satya Nadella’s fortune is at least $813 million. His annual salary as a director and chairman of the board of directors of Microsoft is $42,9 million. There are no executives who are paid more in the company.
Biography Satya Nadella
Satya Nadella was born on August 19, 1967 in the city of Hyderabad, one of the centers of high technology in India.
His father, Bukkapuram Nadella Yugandhar, is a Marxist economist who worked as a civil servant in the Indian administrative service. Prabhavati’s mother Yugandhar is a professor in the Humanities Department and studied Sanskrit.
As the head of Microsoft recalls, he had a happy childhood. And although the school grades of the young Nadella often did not please his father, he taught his son to perceive life as a marathon in which you can always catch up. “My parents let me set my own pace and achieve what I want. They taught me to follow my passions, have enough confidence in what I do, and taught me humility.”
Nadella attended the prestigious Hyderabad Begumpet Public School. He then entered the Manipal Institute of Technology, where he received a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering in 1988. In the US, he graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and received a master’s degree in computer science. While at Microsoft, he earned an MBA from the Booth School of Business at the University of Chicago.
Prior to joining Microsoft, Satya Nadella worked at Sun Microsystems, a company that sold computers, software, and information technology services.
Microsoft work
In 1992, Nadella joined Microsoft. Hiring manager Richard Tate described Nadella in a 2014 Puget Sound Business Journal interview as young, clumsy and insecure, but ambitious, incredibly intelligent and deeply understanding of computer systems. “He was our secret weapon,” Tate said.
The future head of the corporation came to her at a time when Windows NT was being developed – a new operating system for business users, on the development of which a significant part of Microsoft’s business was built in subsequent years. It was with Windows NT that Nadella’s career at Microsoft began.
In 2000, he took over as Vice President of Microsoft’s bCentral Small Business Service, and the Indian engineer hasn’t looked back since.
In 2006, Nadella became corporate vice president of Microsoft Business Solutions.
In 2007, he was named Senior Vice President of Research and Development, Microsoft Online Services. Thus, he stood at the head of not only the Bing search engine, but also the early versions of Microsoft Office and Xbox Live.
In 2011, he became President of the Servers and Tools Division, which oversaw the Azure cloud platform and company data center products such as Windows Server and SQL Server Database. At the time, the server and tools division brought in about $16,6 billion for the company. Nadella increased that to $20,3 billion in two years.
Finding New Meaning for Microsoft
Satya Nadella took over Microsoft on February 4, 2014, making him the third CEO in the company’s nearly 40-year history, following co-founders Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer. One of the reasons Nadella was chosen for the top job was his determination not to miss the next big wave, cloud computing. Because none of the new products that the company released under Ballmer—from the Bing search engine to the Zune, Kin, and Lumia mobile devices—brought significant success to Microsoft.
Nadella began his tenure as CEO by remarking on women in IT at the Grace Hopper Conference in October 2014. Then, answering a question about how a woman can build a career in this area, Nadella said that the main thing is not to “ask for a raise, but to know that the system itself will provide them to you as you work. It’s good karma.” This statement caused massive outrage in the media and social networks.
In his first year in charge, Nadella undertook the largest layoff in the company’s history. He cut about 18 thousand jobs – about 14% of the company’s 125 thousand employees. “We will simplify our work in order to increase accountability, become more flexible and act faster. The overall result of these changes will lead to Microsoft teams becoming more productive and efficient,” Nadella promised and kept his word.
Under the leadership of Satya Nadella, Microsoft has maintained its place as a major technology giant. He took the company away from a failed mobile strategy and focused on cloud computing and augmented reality.
In 2016, he oversaw the $26,2 billion purchase of the professional network LinkedIn, the largest deal in the tech industry.
In June 2021, Microsoft named CEO Satya Nadella as chairman of the board. For the first time in two decades, the same person is the CEO and chairman of a software giant. The last time it was Bill Gates was before he stepped down as CEO of Microsoft in 2000.
During his tenure, Satya Nadella refocused the company on cloud computing, mobile apps and artificial intelligence, got rid of Nokia’s mobile business, buried Windows Mobile, elevated the Xbox gaming business, breathed life into the Office software franchise by moving it more to the cloud and other operating systems. systems.
Microsoft is currently the second most valuable company in the S&P 500 after Apple, having passed the $2021 trillion market capitalization threshold in late June 2 for the first time.
What else is Satya Nadella known for?
- As a student, Satya Nadella had no great ambitions. He planned to stay in Hyderabad, study economics and political science, and then become a bank clerk.
- He is an avid reader of American and Indian poetry and an avid cricket fan.
- Satya Nadella and his wife are co-owners of the Seattle Sounders Major League Soccer club. The family is also among the founding investors of Major League Cricket, American Cricket Enterprises’ new US cricket tournament starting in 2022.
- He has three children. The eldest son suffers from a severe form of cerebral palsy. One of my daughters has learning difficulties. It was the upbringing of children, according to Nadella, that made him a more empathetic person. “In fact, I believe that empathy is not only about your family, friends. This is a vital business priority. Our business is to meet unmet customer needs. Empathy Drives Innovation”
- Nadella launched an artificial intelligence program at Microsoft to help people with disabilities. Among the corporation’s products are Seeing AI and Microsoft Narrator for visually impaired people, and Hearing AI for hearing impaired people.
- He speaks at the annual Microsoft Ability Summit, an event designed to bring together people with disabilities and experts in various fields.
- Nadella is a member of the Board of Directors of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center and a member of the Board of Trustees of the University of Chicago.
- He is a member of the directors of Starbucks Corporation. Nadella was nominated to the position in 2017 for his “invaluable insight into international operations and distribution and for his potential to strengthen the company’s technology focus.”
- In the 2000s, Jeff Bezos tried to lure Nadella to Amazon.
- The head of Microsoft is characterized by curiosity and a thirst for learning. He buys more books than he can finish and enrolls in more online courses than he can take.
- Favorite books are Prosperity by Colins Mayer, The Narrow Corridor by Daron Acemoglu and James Robinson, Way of Mind by Carol Dweck. He is also interested in the work of the Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard.
- Every morning, Nadella uses mindfulness practice: the first thing he does when he gets up in the morning is get out of bed, put his feet down and say what he is grateful for and what he expects.
- He runs on the treadmill for 30 minutes every morning, no matter where he is or what time zone he is in.
- In 2014, he participated in the Ice Bucket Challenge, aimed at raising funds for the fight against amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. In 2020, he supported the charity All in challenge, in which celebrities helped raise money for food for socially disadvantaged groups.
- Actively advocates for racial equality.
- At home, the head of the software giant controls what and for how long his children watch on TV or on the computer.
- In his first month as CEO, Nadella gave each member of his management team a book by Marshall Rosenberg, Nonviolent Communication, a treatise on empathic cooperation.
- He is the author (with Greg Shaw and Jill Tracey Nichols) of Hit Refresh: The Quest to Rediscover the Soul Microsoft and Imagine the Better Future for Every (2017). The book tells the history of culture renewal and Microsoft strategy. Hit Refresh made The New York Times bestseller list in the non-fiction category. Profits from the sale were donated to the Microsoft Philanthropies Foundation.
- A special edition of Hit Refresh was printed for the company’s staff, with highlighted passages and Nadella’s handwritten notes in the margin.
- Named one of the most underrated CEOs by Fortune.