#133 CEO Palo Alto Networks, Nikesh Arora: Create Certainty

Show notes

Guest: Nikesh Arora, CEO and Chairman of Palo Alto Networks Nikesh Arora has been in the C-Suite for more than two decades, including a 10-year stint as Google’s chief business officer and — most recently — five years as Palo Alto Networks’ CEO. But the COVID-19 pandemic made him radically reconsider the gap between the executive floor and the rest of the company. “There was a tremendous amount of anxiety and fear and uncertainty,” he says, “and this person I was talking to says, ‘Listen, your job as a leader is to create certainty.’ [...] It’s simple: Tell your employees you have their back.” That’s why, for the past 30 months, Nikesh has been making time to virtually meet thousands of Palo Alto Networks employees on Zoom; he gets candid feedback, communicates company goals, and provides a safe space for everyone to bond. In this episode, Nikesh and Joubin discuss honest CEOs, not having a career plan, process vs. outcomes, remaining independent inside Google, organizational superpowers, understanding your competitors, “evergreen companies,” the ChatGPT disruption, integrating product and sales, blindfolded communication, Evian water, cloud vs. on-prem security, and problem solvers vs. problem representers. In this episode, we cover: Amazing people at Google (02:15) T-Motion and T-Mobile (04:05) “You cannot control the outcome” (07:36) Growing up in India (11:12) 400+ rejection letters (14:38) Loving what you do (18:26) Joining Google (19:55) Sergey Brin and Eric Schmidt (24:16) Relocating to “the mothership” (27:01) “He’s not Googly enough” (28:26) Profit, innovation, and paranoia (31:12) Cybersecurity and AI (34:04) SoftBank CEO Masa Son (38:54) Joining Palo Alto Networks (43:04) Hiring as home-building (47:04) “Nobody comes to work to screw up” (50:25) Product and the power of marketing (53:28) Cybersecurity “swim lanes” (56:36) M&A strategy (01:01:14) The two schools of due diligence (01:05:05) Moving past problems (01:07:42) Creating certainty for employees (01:10:59) Links: Connect with NikeshTwitter LinkedIn Connect with JoubinTwitter LinkedIn Email: grit@kleinerperkins.com  Learn more about Kleiner Perkins This episode was edited by Eric Johnson from LightningPod.fm

Guests

Nikesh Arora

Chairman & CEO, Palo Alto Networks

Palo Alto Networks