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On the Sisäpiiri side we continue with Mårten Mickos. So you were just

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apparently this kind of crazy Finn out there abroad, that is, that is

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a CEO there. So then you've, um, kind of played this game a bit, so that

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have you played it heavy, or what have you done out there, huh?

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Well, in a way when I left for abroad and for Silicon Valley, I

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thought that you shouldn't, like, emphasize too much where you're from or anything. That

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we're just there doing business and need to, like, advance that.

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But every now and then there'd be an opportunity where people would ask, tell me now

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about this, like what is the Nordic leadership style, or like

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people wanted to know, and employees wanted to know, and many came

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to work for us because they valued this kind of Nordic value — value base.

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And a nice example is at MySQL, when I was there

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as CEO, we had employees, 30

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in two countries, and once a month we decided that we'd hold

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a town-hall-type meeting, where everyone takes part and gets to listen to

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the CEO's updates and the latest information. So everyone would call in

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into a kind of call center back then, because there weren't yet

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video conferences. And then, and then they'd listen to me

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for about an hour, as I talked about the business and gave these kinds of updates,

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the latest reports. So, so we gave this thing the name

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Radio Sakila. Sakila was the name of our logo's dolphin, so I thought

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that Radio Sakila was a nice name for this meeting, and when we

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held it for the first time and I'd gone through the whole program, then

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at the end our Bulgarian developer [unclear] wrote in our

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IRC channel. That was the way to communicate back. They put, um, that

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you can't call this radio unless there's music in it. That

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radio must always have music. And then I replied that, well that's true,

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that no, no, it's not radio unless there's music. And then I couldn't think of any

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other music at that moment, as I was sitting at home somewhere in Silicon Valley.

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I didn't have anything else besides what you'd have, like a desk and a microphone.

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So then I thought, okay, that now I'll sing you a song. And

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since I don't know very many songs, but I do know a lot of schnapps songs,

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drinking songs, so I sang the Helan Går song yesterday,

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because it's the first thing that comes to mind. Then I sang it and said this is

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this kind of Nordic-style drinking song, like take it or leave it, and everyone cheered

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and liked it. Then a month passed and it was this same format again, and I again

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gave the business updates, how things had gone and what we were doing. And then

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at the end they were like, Mårten, what are you singing today? And then I thought

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damn, that I've now gotten hooked, or they've hooked me, that

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now I can't, can't back out of this. So then, what the hell do I sing now, and then

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I thought, well but I do know drinking songs, and then I sang the next one

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and then it became a tradition that I never sang the same song, but

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I always sang a drinking song for them. And I sang Norwegian, Danish,

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Swedish, German, Finnish songs, and that lasted probably

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two to three years, once a month, and always the CEO alone sang the song

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and they loved it. Mm. And I didn't realize back then yet

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that in a way it, like, softened this CEO role, and they

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realized that I too am just an ordinary person and can be, like, can

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laugh at myself, be a bit, like, silly, so that it had a very

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significant, um, function in developing the company culture, even though it was, as it were,

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just a coincidence and I just went along with it.

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But that's certainly true. I mean I myself also always, even now there's that so

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I'd play, like, some LAN games with some Quake, and I had this theory that they

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always, like, my subordinates would, like, attack me

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and got, um, psychological satisfaction from killing me first, but yeah, it

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like, probably the work community, and like this kind of, like, the boss's voluntary

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humbling is, I think, like, really a very important skill, in that it, like,

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humanizes the organization and then removes that micromanaging

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from the organization too. Yeah, at Eucalyptus we then had another

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thing, where we just, like, couldn't get the software to work at all, or it

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worked, but it kept crashing, was difficult, stuff like that. And I said, now we

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absolutely need to produce a version that's genuinely easy to use and

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efficient and functional. And then it kept developing, it kept getting pushed back,

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the deadline, and they'd say, no, not now, but in two months. Two

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months from now. Then finally I said, no, this company can't take this anymore, that

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you're not getting it done. So now, now there's a new date. Was it February

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fifth or something, I said if you get it done by then

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then, well, first I said that I'd, I'd run

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naked through Santa Barbara, because that's where our office was, and then, don't

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make me do that, well I wouldn't actually do that, but I said, you can, say, cut my

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hair off my head if you pull it off, and I just threw that out like that, and

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of course that's what happened, they got the software done, it was in top shape, so

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we had an absolutely great version then, and then they came and said, now, we

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did what we, like, promised, and now go out to the backyard, we've got a

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chair for you, and then I went and sat there, and then they got out the electric — what is this

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is this, this is, um, [unclear] anyway, yeah, and they started to

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cut my hair off, and then I had no hair left at all except

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this, this test engineer Kyo, who did it — he was really skilled with his hands

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and then he, like, drew, or left on the back of my head, our

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company's logo — he, like, skillfully left hair uncut in a way that from it

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came out something almost like, like, a tattoo, but an image

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and it was our logo. So, so, so from the front I just looked bald,

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like a bald man, and that was new to me, but from behind I looked like some mafia

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boss, since I had this kind of, some dangerous-looking tattoo, well, if you have

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a big tattoo on the back of your head — but, but that also brought about

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this feeling for everyone that, okay, now we're doing this together. Mm.

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the CEO demanded this, but he also committed himself, and he paid, like,

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with his own, own hair for this great version, and we got a lot of

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like, public attention too from that, as I went around San Francisco and looked totally

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different than before, and people asked what had happened

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and then I'd explain this story, and it became internally and externally just a

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great, great thing. That's by the way, I mean, a public bet

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I'm using that too now. I have a bet this year that I'm almost

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certainly going to lose. My partner, um, colleague Tero Nummenpää, well, um, he

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has to do six pull-ups with 20 kg of extra weight. He can already do that now, um,

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with his 10-year-old son hanging from his legs, and I'm supposed to manage, unassisted, to get Sanna

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Marin matched, that is, six pull-ups, and it's not looking good, that it'll go to

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video, but I've made it public, so, um, but it's, like,

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in a way there's something fun in that, like, in a public bet, if you, you are

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willing to, like, humiliate yourself, so — yeah, I guess we'll then probably do that

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video when I come, or I still have a small, small

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chance here, I haven't given up yet, the year isn't over yet, um

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maybe by then to the Kräftskiva, so, um, I've also been in Nordic

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organizations, and I was maybe a bit of a, like, non-Swedish-speaking Finn, but I've

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like, learned to appreciate it. Even now at Translink we always go, like, in turn

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— last time we were at a Kräftskiva in Stockholm. So

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yeah, I then performed there, in front of the stunned

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Swedes: Det glider in, Det glider in, det glider in i må igen! Vi ska

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kämpa vi ska ge, allt som vi ha, vi ska ta guld igen!

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but it, um, was just fun there, the old Swedes didn't care because

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they have 20 golds, so one, one Finnish, um, championship doesn't mean anything

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but then one younger woman said, was that some hockey song or

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yeah, but I thought, I thought it's, like, there's something great in that, in those traditions, yeah,

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um, and it does resonate, though it's a bit of a shame for those crayfish,

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that we should come up with some, some, um, new festive food for that table, but

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otherwise, well, someone could come up with some

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new one. Yeah, yeah, maybe some vegetarian alternative

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so they eat something, I don't know, some artichokes or something there, but I'm

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still willing to, like, murder those crayfish, but at some point it'll then get

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um, get, um, difficult, and great, thanks for this, and if you came in through

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this way, then check out our main episode on, um, the growth formula

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thanks, thank you