Microsoft Corp has named chief executive officer Satya Nadella as chairman of the company. Under Nadella’s watch, the software giant has become one of the most valuable companies in the world. Indian-origin CEO has now been “unanimously elected" chairman of the Microsoft Board. Show For the first time in two decades the Microsoft CEO and chairman will be the same person. The last time that happened was with Bill Gates around. Gates stepped down as CEO of Mircosioft in 2000. The corporate structure varies from one company to another, based on a range of factors company policy, shareholder status and others. All companies usually have a board of directors who keep an eye on corporate activities. The board of directors are entrusted with the responsibility to protect the interest of company’s shareholders. The directors elect an executive as a chair who is responsible for presiding over board or committee meetings. A chair often sets the agenda and has significant sway as to how the board votes, says Investopedia. Advertisement A chief executive officer (CEO) is the highest-ranking executive in a company. The key responsibilities of a CEO include managing the overall operations and making major corporate decisions, the Investopedia notes. The CEO often acts as the main point of communication between the board of directors and corporate operations. The chair is a different position than a CEO. In some companies, the CEO and chair of the company is the same person. Satya Nadella’s Journey to become CEO and Chair of Microsoft AdvertisementNadella, the company’s third CEO, will also be the third chairman in Microsoft’s history, following Gates and Thompson. He took over as a CEO of Microsoft in 2014 from Steve Ballmer. He has focused the company around cloud computing, mobile applications and artificial intelligence while breathing new life into the Office software franchise. Microsoft’s shares have soared more than sevenfold under his leadership and its market value is approaching $2 trillion. In 2020 amid coronavirus, the Microsoft delivered strong results for our shareholders, including a return of $35 billion in the form of share repurchases and dividends. “The board credits Mr. Nadella for his tremendous progress driving cultural change across the organization, especially given the unprecedented impact of Covid-19 on our business and our people," Microsoft earlier said in a proxy statement. “Mr. Nadella has enthusiastically fostered a culture of stewardship," it added. Advertisement “In this role, Nadella will lead the work to set the agenda for the board, leveraging his deep understanding of the business to elevate the right strategic opportunities and identify key risks and mitigation approaches for the board’s review," the tech giant said in a statement. Advertisement Thompson, who took over as chairman from Bill Gates in 2014, will serve as lead independent director, Microsoft said. Thompson will retain significant authority including providing input on behalf of the independent directors on board agendas, calling meetings of the independent directors, setting agendas for executive sessions, and leading performance evaluations of the CEO, the technology giant added. With agency inputs Read all the Latest News, Breaking News and Coronavirus News here first published: June 17, 2021, 15:05 IST last updated: June 17, 2021, 15:22 IST
“Believe me, my journey has not been a simple journey of progress. There have been many ups and downs, and it is the choices that I made at each of those times that have helped shape what I have achieved.” -Satya Nadella The journey to the top and bringing one of those rare companies like Microsoft to have truly revolutionized the world through technology was not an easy task. It would be of great honor for Satya Nadella to have been chosen to lead the company. But, it is not as easy as it looks like. Satya Nadella has also had his own fair share of struggles before making it so big. Born on 19 August, 1967 in Hyderabad, India in a Telugu household, Satya Narayan Nadella (Satya Nadella) is an engineer and Indian American Business Executive. His father Bukkapuram Nadella Yugandher was a civil servant who worked for the Indian Administrative Service of the Government of India. His mother Prabhavati Yugandher was a scholar in Sanskrit. Satya Nadella went to Hyderabad Public School in Begumpet, Hyderabad and holds a degree of Bachelors in Electrical Engineering from the Manipal Institute of Technology in Karnataka in 1988. For his higher studies, Satya traveled to the United States to study for an MS in computer science at the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee and received his degree in 1990. Satya Nadella also went ahead to the University of Chicago Booth School of Business to do Masters in Business Administration. Satya Nadella got married to his childhood girlfriend, Anupama Priya Nadella in 1992 and has three children, a son and two daughters. The family resides in Bellevue in Washington State. JOURNEY TO THE TOPSatya Nadella belongs from a very humble background and is a son of an IAS. Hence, has some qualities imbibed in himself given by his father. He currently serves as the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Microsoft, succeeding Steve Ballmer in 2014. Before becoming Chief Executive, he was the Executive Vice President of Microsoft’s Cloud and Enterprise Group. Satya Nadella is responsible for building and running the company’s computing platforms. He was appointed as the CEO of Microsoft in 2014 and began his tenure from there. By the year 1992, Satya had already joined Microsoft but was working just as an employee or a worker there. He worked on many projects of Microsoft such as online service, advertisement, software, gaming, etc. When Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella was 25 years old and was giving interviews for a job, he failed to show his interviewer the trait he now says has been crucial to his success: Empathy. He even failed to answer the most basic questions asked by the interviewers and eventually got thrown out in the middle of the interview for which he asked why he is being thrown out. To which the interviewer said that you need to build empathy in yourself first. Now, Satya Nadella says that this attribute has stuck with him and now he always endorses the fact in his workspace as well to be empathetic first. When Satya Nadella was giving interviews for his job in the 1990s at Microsoft Corp. He stood at a whiteboard, working through streams of algorithms, one after the other, going through quick sorts and bubble sorts, using minimum data structures and minimum memory, showing off his computer science acuity. It was an arduous interview. But, before leaving, Nadella had a question to ask and it was the same question that caught him off-guard in his first interview. He, obviously, did get hired and now is the third CEO of Microsoft succeeding Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer. Satya Nadella was always mother’s son. When his mother passed away in 2015, it was a very crucial time for Nadella as it had just been 1 year of his tenure as a CEO and the time was definitely not easy for him emotionally. He always says that his mother was his pillar of strength and that he has learned a lot from her. The time after that was difficult but Satya had to make a comeback emotionally and this time it was stronger than ever. Slowly and steadily, Satya Nadella with his passion, hard work and dedication started getting fame. Satya then even became an important stakeholder in the firm and also owned some stocks which were worth millions of dollars. According to the reports, presently, the monthly salary of Satya Nadella is over 100 million rupees. Satya has also got invited many times as the guest speaker for many events across the United States. Working at such an auspicious position needs a whole amount of sheer talent, hard work and dedication to bring excellence in the craft. His brilliance can be detected from his educational background. Satya Nadella’s education played a great role in his successful professional career not leaving behind his hard work and dedication, of course. GROWTH OF SATYA NADELLA & MICROSOFTThe journey to the top is never a piece of cake. It was difficult for Satya Nadella as well as it would be for anybody. But, it was not impossible. Satya Nadella worked as a member of its technology staff prior to joining Microsoft in 1992. Some previous positions held by Nadella before appointed as a CEO of Microsoft includes Vice President of Business Division, Corporate Vice President of Business Solutions and Search & Advertising Platform Group and Executive Vice President of Microsoft’s Cloud and Enterprise Group. On 4 February 2014, Nadella was announced as the new CEO of Microsoft, the third chief executive in the company’s history, following Bill Gates and Steve Ballmer. He served as a President in Server & Tools Division from 9 February 2011 to February 2014. Satya Nadella was also a Senior Vice President of Research and Development for Online Services Division from March 2007 to February 2011. Later he was made the president of Microsoft’s $19 Billion Server and Tools Business and led the transformation of the company’s business and technology culture from client services to cloud infrastructure and services. He has been credited for helping bring Microsoft’s database windows server and developer tools to its Azure Cloud. The revenue from cloud services grew to $203 billion when he took over in 2011. Nadella changed the company’s direction after becoming CEO. His tenure has emphasized openness to working with companies and technologies with which Microsoft also competes, including Apple Inc., Salesforce, IBM, and Dropbox. In contrast to previous Microsoft campaigns against the Linux Operating System, Nadella proclaimed that Microsoft joined the Linux Foundation as a platinum member. Nadella also revised its mission statement to ‘empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more.’ Nadella says that this is an enduring mission, rather than a temporary goal. Nadella’s key goal has been transforming Microsoft’s corporate culture into the one that values continuous improvement and growth. Nadella’s leadership of Microsoft included a series of high profile acquisition of other companies, to redirect Microsoft’s focus. In October 2014, Nadella courted controversy when he made a statement that women should not ask for a raise and should trust the system. The statement was made while he was attending an event on Women in Computing in Phoenix, AZ. Nadella was roundly criticized for the statement and he apologized later on Twitter. He latrer sent an email to the employees at Microsoft admitting that he was completely wrong. In the years since becoming a CEO, Microsoft’s stock have tripled by September 2018, with a 27% annual growth. In December 2018, comparably called him the best CEO of a large company in the United States, citing anonymous Nadella employee reviews. THE RISE OF SATYA NADELLA“If you could understand impermanence deeply, you would develop more equanimity. You would not get too excited about either the ups and downs of life.” In February 2014, when Satya Nadella was appointed as the CEO of Microsoft, the company was losing exceptionally fast. Microsoft Windows 8 had been a disaster. Microsoft’s employees were constantly behind the scenes for supremacy. And all that while, consumers as well as developers were losing the faith. THEN, TIME CHANGED! Now, in 2019, Microsoft has found its groove again as a company that provides software and services to everyone. There’s still a lot that Microsoft needs to do. But, take a look back at the life and career of Satya Nadella, the CEO who is making it happen. THE GAME CHANGING CEO OF MICROSOFTSatya Nadella has always been clear with his vision and targets. The software maker’s new official goal is to empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more. Nadella’s philosophy builds on a few other Microsoft marketing mantras he’s touted since taking charge in February 2014. For Instance, “more personal computing” is still very much alive. That’s Microsoft’s way of admitting that people use all sorts of devices connected together over the internet. Microsoft’s executives, who are looking to the company’s fast-growing cloud services division to help all software got really impressed by Nadella’s major play in the ‘Mobile-first, Cloud-first’ world. Microsoft has recently released windows 10 operating system which powers more than 90% of the world’s PCs. Recently, Microsoft has also announced an organizational shakeup that included the exit of Former Nokia CEO Stephen Elop. The goal was to make Windows 10 the common thread among every device, product and service. “We will be open to learning our own biases and changing our behaviors so we can tap into the collective power of everyone at Microsoft”, says Nadella in the new mission statement. Under the previous CEO Steve Ballmer, Microsoft failed to compete with Apple with portable music players and smartphones and also largely missed out on the shift to Internet Services like Search and File Storage, ceding ground to Google and other upstarts. But, the game changed in early 2014 when Microsoft brought on current CEO Satya Nadella and took a more disciplined approach. Nadella boosted Microsoft’s investment in Azure which powers web operations for big names like Airbnb and Reddit. Azure helped Microsoft grow its overall cloud revenue 80% to $6.4 billion in the most recent quarters. Microsoft is doing more cloud services business and taking in a greater percentage of profits as it grows. Microsoft has also made a strategic push to move away from office software that comes in a box originally designed for PCs. It now also offers Office 365, a cloud version of Microsoft’s iconic services, which works across devices and charges a subscription fee. Office 365 revenue surged 51% in the most recent quarter from the same period a year earlier, showing the promise of this subscription based approach. Satya Nadella has committed to Xbox and pledged to grow the gaming brand’s fan base. In May, Nadella countered the suggestion from investors and analysts that its Xbox division should be sold. At the code conference, Nadella was asked whether he would spin off Xbox. For which, Nadella said, ‘we will continue to innovate and grow our fan base with Xbox while also creating addictive business value for Microsoft.’ VISION FOR MICROSOFTIn these 5 years when Nadella was appointed as a CEO, Microsoft has lived, worked and developed around his ‘Mobile-first, Cloud-first’ strategy. But, during his keynote at Microsoft’s Build Developer Conference, in Seattle, Nadella said “It’s no longer just mobile-first, the user experience itself is going to spam all your devices. When Nadella introduced ‘Cloud-first-Mobile-first’ it was a major step away from Microsoft’s then struggling windows focus, which aimed to establish company as a provider of cloud services. Just over 3 years later, the technology has changed and the new motto is designed to reflect that. The goal is to connect the data between the online portfolio of Microsoft’s products, which would make the exchange of data between LinkedIn, Office365 and Cortana. For example, easier and seamless. “In a world of near infinite compute power and an exponential growth in data, we are focused on empowering every developer to build applications for this new era of intelligent cloud and intelligent edge”, Satya Nadella said. FROM THE HIGHEST PAID CEO TO THE AUTHOR“It’s our own ability to have an idea and go after the idea and make it happen. That’s what at the end of the day defines us”, says Satya Nadella. Satya Nadella is an avid reader of American and Indian poetry. Even his profile on Microsoft’s official website lists reading poetry as one of his hobbies. His absolute love for reading and writing is pretty much evident by the fact that he also has published his own book called ‘Hit Refresh’ in the year 2017. Satya Nadella is a huge fan of cricket and has also played in his school team. In an interview, he said that playing cricket taught him about teamwork and leadership and how he derives inspiration from the sport. His favorite form of the game is test cricket. Satya Nadella is a huge fan of Seahawks, a professional American Football team based in Seattle and has gone on record to say that he doesn’t miss any match of his favorite team. “Be passionate and bold. Always keep learning. You stop doing useful things if you don't learn. So the last part to me is the key, especially if you have had some initial success. It becomes even more critical that you have the learning 'bit' always switched on”, says Satya Nadella who calls himself a lifelong learner and takes online classes in his spare time. When Nadella took on the role of CEO of Microsoft, Bill Gates re-joined the company to become his personal mentor. Satya Nadella is a fitness enthusiast and is very passionate about running. But, does that mean he doesn’t cheat on his diet? Well, No! He has a sweet tooth and loves pastries. BOTTOM LINEThere is no second thought about what Satya Nadella has achieved. It is pure brilliance and sheer excellence. To become a third CEO of a company to higher levels of success, Satya Nadella has come a long way. Every individual can only sustain with innovative thinking, whatever we have learned in the past is just a history. What we are going to prove to the universe is to show our innovative thinking and solutions, that is what really matters. The life story of Satya Nadella is extremely inspiring and there is a lot to learn from him. Journey to become a CEO of one of the biggest companies was never easy and will never be for anybody taking the legacy ahead but one thing is for sure that the traits like hard work, dedication, empathy that Satya Nadella has taught us will definitely mark a presence in every individual’s life. |