00:00:00
I'm an introvert not amazing academically didn't feel like it belonged anywhere average at best and
00:00:05
yet you created Spotify yeah Daniel P Spotify founder in CUO he's not only
00:00:12
saved the music industry he's created a $50 billion company and he himself is worth more than4 billion I flun high
00:00:19
school and started on my first company and that later got acquired you retired at 23 yeah first month was fun
00:00:26
nightclubs sports car 20 or 30 girls throwing around money 6 months in realized that this thing I thought I
00:00:32
wanted I just didn't want at all and I was just empty just thinking am I ever going to get out of this depression and
00:00:39
what to do in life what if you can work on something you actually care about what would you pick music but the
00:00:45
industry is going down the drain I honestly did not think we would succeed but if we succeed I knew it was going to
00:00:51
be a big thing Spotify is here a One-Stop shop for music you use Spotify I love it I read the journey to that
00:00:58
success had multiple near-death experiences it was awful ran out of money I lost all of the hair gained £30
00:01:04
and the problem was I modeled myself on the Mark Zuckerberg of the world to run every meeting and be the best product
00:01:10
person and it just wasn't me share the burden with someone it is so important we tend to believe the world is more
00:01:16
logical than what it is but it's based on relationships be the easiest person to deal with and you'd be surprised how
00:01:21
many problems it solves one of those problems was Apple what's your opinion on Apple
00:01:33
[Music]
00:01:39
Daniel what is the most important context that I need to know about you to
00:01:44
understand the man that's sit in front of me today and when I ask about context I want to go right back to where you
00:01:50
come from and that earliest environment that I almost I almost see it like an oven I see our early as context as like
00:01:57
an oven that baked us into who we are today what is that context I'm a product
00:02:02
of a very very strong single mom um a woman that probably had a ship on her
00:02:10
shoulder um um against her sibling her brother older brother who kind of said
00:02:17
you can't do this you can't raise uh a child to be productive um and I think uh
00:02:25
she kind of uh just well hellbent on making a Point uh of showing that you
00:02:32
know um I was going to be successful in her definition and successful meant uh
00:02:38
well educated well read uh and be able to handle almost U anything thrown at me
00:02:46
and just to give you an example of that while I was brought up in the suburb of Stockholm very much a workingclass rough
00:02:54
neighborhood one of the big things that my mother did was she had me um doing a
00:03:01
pentathlon and the pentathlon was like the classic pentathlon so that means fencing horseback riding uh shooting uh
00:03:10
running and swimming um doesn't sound like what someone basically from the projects in in Stockholm uh would do uh
00:03:18
but she thought that would be a good sort of uh wide education for me um and
00:03:24
and pretty much my entire life has been around that I I was kind of clumsy as a kid um my my fine motor skills was
00:03:31
pretty good my rough motor skills wasn't very good so she enrolled me in like an all female gymnastics group um you know
00:03:40
I'm an introvert so she enrolled me in a theater group um to have me you know
00:03:46
learn um how um to express myself uh and and so um an Eclectic childhood um but
00:03:55
one where she heavily influenced me uh uh brought me along in almost every
00:04:02
context with adults uh with professors like at a very early age and just had me
00:04:08
sit sit along uh or uh with just the person from next door uh who was
00:04:14
struggling uh getting to the next paycheck and and I really saw all of
00:04:19
those contracts in in life from a very young age did she have any desire for
00:04:25
you to become any specific thing cuz uh I I'm I'm I'm honestly not sure but I
00:04:30
think she wanted me to be broad um just in general um so um and and I I think in
00:04:37
many families you kind of have this maybe educational pressure where you have to be a doctor you have to be a
00:04:42
lawyer like none of that mattered to my mom um the only thing that mattered and she kept repeating us was that you need
00:04:48
to become a good human being um and for her um if I wanted to study sure um she
00:04:56
thought education mattered and was important um but um not like in other
00:05:02
families and the only thing in fact um you know probably influenced Spotify
00:05:07
later on was um I very much come from a music family my my grandfather was an opera singer my grandmother was um an
00:05:15
actress in theater but also um jazz pianist so um like music education was
00:05:22
weirdly enough like the the premier education that was focused on for me and
00:05:28
then all the other stuff she was basically only important that I showed effort um I I had a pretty easy time in
00:05:35
school and so uh she constantly kept pushing me because she felt that I
00:05:41
wasn't uh I wasn't making enough of an effort uh no matter what so it wasn't
00:05:46
about the grade I could come home with a straight A uh she would still be like well did you really make an effort I
00:05:53
don't think so and um and um and and so for her it was kind of always that thing
00:05:59
about like just pushing and making the real effort so she cared more about less
00:06:05
about the outcome and more about how much of your potential you were realizing yeah very much
00:06:11
so so on school then you you referenced that she kind of identified you were an introvert early on but then I think you
00:06:17
said you had a good you had an easy time in school typically people that are introverted that are um an only child at
00:06:24
the time that they go off to school often they struggle a little bit Yeah because you know finding friends
00:06:31
and fitting into social groups and I read somewhere else that you don't love small talk you tend to gravitate towards
00:06:36
the people that you know yeah what would school like for someone for a kid like that well I I think you know um I think
00:06:44
there are many types of introverts let's begin with that and I can switch it on when I have to uh and certainly I think
00:06:51
the theater helped me um you know I can be very project a lot of things if I'd like to uh and and be a force of nature
00:06:59
but it doesn't come easy that requires tons of energy whereas others get energy from like the room and they're like very
00:07:06
excited it's just not me um for me anything with anyone I'm not comfortable
00:07:11
with is really taking a lot of energy um um but but I think the easy time in
00:07:17
school was just uh I loved learning I've always loved learning so um you know put
00:07:23
be putting in an environment where you're constantly being forced to learn new things wasn't a very hard thing for
00:07:30
me and um I have a very good um I used to have a very good memory I don't have
00:07:36
it anymore but I was able to memorize very easily the concepts and the things that we talked about in school and so um
00:07:44
I think in that end it was very easy for me and then again because my mother
00:07:49
tried to make me very broad um the positive and the negative of that aspect
00:07:54
is I could kind of be in any social group I could be with the athletes I was n the best athlete by any stretch of the
00:08:02
imagination but it worked uh I can be in the musicians group as well with any of
00:08:07
the people who were really good at Arts um and I you know I probably wasn't the
00:08:12
best at any of that stuff either but it was pretty decent but I could also be in the math group I probably wasn't the
00:08:20
best of math but I was pretty decent and um that to be honest is kind of the
00:08:27
Story of My Life um you can kind of plug me in anywhere I won't excel at practically anything but I'll hold my
00:08:35
fort and that's I think both a blessing and a curse the blessing is in is that
00:08:41
it's very easy for people to for me to be able to relate to other people enough
00:08:47
where I'm accepted in the group but it's hard in the sense the downside with that
00:08:54
is that I never really belong anywhere mhm because I'm not that one-sided
00:09:00
um as an individual you know I'm not an artist I'm not a technologist um I'm not a business
00:09:07
person I'm all of that and probably a few other things as well um and and you
00:09:14
can see that very clearly with my friend group too you'll have artists on the one side and you have entrepreneurs on the
00:09:20
other end and it's very hard for them to speak to each other most times but I love it I love um seeing very creative
00:09:27
people I love uh you know business people and scientists mixed together
00:09:32
whereas the scientists gets very you know have a hard time found uh speaking
00:09:38
to an artists um and quite often they're talking past each other um for me it's
00:09:44
just I love it um and and that's the blessing and curse when I speak to
00:09:49
people that know you and work with you they describe you as ambitious now ambition and being
00:09:54
ambitious is an interesting word because it's often loaded with this presumption that someone has a desire for a certain
00:10:02
outcome yeah like they're trying to they're ambitious because they want to be really successful or they want gazillion pounds um are you ambitious
00:10:10
and what does that actually mean to you um yeah I'm I'm I'm ambitious um but
00:10:17
I probably am ambitious in the uh the way my mother taught me to be ambitious
00:10:23
which is the inputs right which is um you know if I see someone with Incredible potential that that squanders
00:10:29
that potential um I um I asked myself
00:10:35
why why are you doing this and why not strive for the great thing and in so many cases in life I found that the
00:10:41
difference between you know aiming super high versus um aiming just a little bit
00:10:47
higher than where you are from an effort perspective it's about the same effort um so you might just as well aim higher
00:10:54
you know this saying of you shoot for the stars and you land on the moon um that is very much kind of my life
00:11:00
philosophy why not trying to do it bigger why not try to do it um even more
00:11:06
interesting and maybe you have to settle for something less but isn't it more interesting and more fun to try to do
00:11:12
the really big hairy audacious thing not for everyone maybe maybe not uh but I
00:11:19
know that because you work with so many people that maybe don't lean into ambition yeah that that's true but I I
00:11:27
also wonder if if that's true uh or whether they're just worried
00:11:34
about really testings and understanding where their limits are so many people
00:11:39
are more afraid of failure than they are of success uh and that stops them from
00:11:45
even beginning to try um right and and I find that so many times like the amount
00:11:51
of people I'm sure came to you is like oh it's really good for you but I had the same idea it's like okay well why
00:11:57
didn't you do anything about it and and often times it's like well for this and
00:12:02
that and that reason and and they talk themselves out of it um but at the very core I believe it comes down to that
00:12:08
they're actually more worried about failing than they are about the prospects of succeeding your kids then what would you
00:12:15
advise them to do if they were say they wanted to follow in your Footsteps in particular or start a business at that
00:12:21
juncture where we kind of leave High School yeah and we can either go into like work or university would you do you
00:12:26
think the the university system is a little bit outdated yeah I do um but as
00:12:34
with many things um you know I I don't I I don't think it's bad I don't think it's good either I think it depends
00:12:41
there are certain people that do well in that structure and and need that kind of
00:12:46
rigor of that sort of path to go down and do incredibly well um against um you
00:12:53
know the essays and the as it and they're really good and they're really good with the lectures and then taking the notes and just have that sort of
00:13:01
discipline in that area of their life where they do well in that circumstance and then that education then sets them
00:13:07
up for greater things so I think it depends I mean if your dream is to become a lawyer then I think you have to
00:13:13
go through that path right um because it's impossible otherwise I think if you want to be an
00:13:20
entrepreneur uh the single best thing you can do is to um probably study as many business as you can and get as much
00:13:27
business exposure in that so what do I mean by that well it can come in by
00:13:33
working for businesses uh that are great but more importantly probably working for great individuals um and learning
00:13:39
from them right so if you are fortunate enough to be able to do um you know we're talking about this but um your
00:13:47
behind the scenes version um and and and being able to like work for you and that
00:13:54
and see you up up close it's going to be invaluable for that individual that get to do that um because you get to see
00:14:00
entrepreneurship from the first row you get to see what it's like um what
00:14:06
business aspect What's um you know how do you do that how much admin do you need to carry and even if you're just a
00:14:13
fly on the wall you're going to learn so many skills that are quite diverse and and that's the I think the biggest trick
00:14:19
about entrepreneurship is like the the for me uh everyone when they think about the
00:14:26
word Innovation they think that it's something entirely novel yet for me
00:14:32
Innovation um I don't know of a single thing that just someone came up with uh that had no prior grounds everything is
00:14:40
about putting two or more things in together in a new context um so studying
00:14:46
many different things understanding a little bit about business understanding a little bit about um product and how to
00:14:53
make that product um understanding uh whatever it is that our drivers uh from
00:14:59
that I think is important um and that's not to say that University can't do that
00:15:05
and it can't be helpful to learning sales and the theory of it Etc um but I think that there is many other paths you
00:15:12
could take uh that may even if you're um you know if you have enough grits and
00:15:19
kind of like are able to put yourself in a situation where you can uh get in front of the right person start working
00:15:25
for them um so much is in life is around people believing in you and and giving
00:15:32
you the right place to grow um and and and it's it's really certain dipit is to
00:15:37
be honest um and and and I'm certainly a product of all that so I I I think it is
00:15:43
not right or wrong it's just I I dislike how we're talking about it as it is the
00:15:49
way or um you know it's not the way and it's like no I think it's more like it
00:15:54
works sometimes for certain individuals and then for other individuals not the
00:15:59
best use of their time and there are other paths you can take but educating yourself even if that's outside of a
00:16:07
university and getting a degree concept that I think is invaluable and it's the most important thing you can be doing as
00:16:14
a young individual about anything you're interested in I think that's one of the big misconceptions people have about me
00:16:20
when they hear I dropped out of University they think I don't like education no no no no no yeah I spend all day like all night till 2: a.m.
00:16:26
learning about rockets and Ai and all that stuff a self-educated but the institution of Education that is
00:16:32
University for me I just couldn't stay awake yeah in that experience same here
00:16:38
but for another person it is exactly what they they need because they may not even know what they're interested in and
00:16:44
they feel like I want to have a foundation that gives me a broad base so
00:16:49
again if a master's of Science degree if if you know you want to be an engineer but you're not entirely sure what type
00:16:57
of engineer it's a very broad Foundation that will teach you Elemental skills that um you probably will use at some
00:17:05
point in time um not saying you can't go outside of that realm too but it's great
00:17:10
stuff um and if you're wired that way you do well in that type of environment
00:17:15
uh great um and there's certain types of people that do that when young people
00:17:22
come up to me and ask me this question about what I should be doing with my life at that early stage the advice I've started to give and I want to check how
00:17:29
you how you would change or add or alter this advice is to try and go and join a
00:17:34
startup so just for context I'm talking about people that want to be entrepreneurs here yeah to try and go and join a startup that's doing
00:17:41
something at the very cutting edge of the world or a wave that's currently coming into to shore so I'd say to young
00:17:46
kids like go and join an AI startup and the reason I say startup is because you're going to be closer to the
00:17:52
decision making you're going to learn more you're going have more exposure than like if you went and worked at I don't know a Google or something sure um
00:17:59
and also it's the cheapest way to fail when you're young right like you can observe the company fall into the
00:18:04
graveyard without there being a huge cost to you yeah uh I I would agree I mean I I think that is a tremendous
00:18:13
um uh opportunity uh to do that um but again I've seen the paths work too I've
00:18:20
seen people uh join bigger companies and move around inside of that company and
00:18:27
um get a super valuable skills um and then eventually um kind of break out as
00:18:34
an entrepreneur as well and maybe um you wanted to save up some money and
00:18:39
obviously if you're join a little bit of a bigger company you're able to do that and prioritize doing both and then you
00:18:46
know once you have that kind of Nest Egg of sorts you can then break out and so I
00:18:52
I I don't know I it's like the I used to think um and you and I we were talking
00:18:57
about this before I used to think that you know hey I've got all this advice I'm going to just going to give it and more and more I on a personal basis I'm
00:19:05
not sure I'm in a great position to give advice on many things um and and so I I
00:19:10
try to stay away from it I can't help myself when I feel like people are doing it but I try to not do it as much as I
00:19:19
do um and it's actually something I'm deeply conscious about because I don't think that there's one path in life I
00:19:24
think that there are many paths in life and um of course there are really bad ones um but
00:19:32
but some some of the more amazing life stories aren't the obvious ones uh it is
00:19:37
not the people even doing the sort of hey I joined a startup or I did this and that it may be the person who spent um
00:19:44
start life in a lab to only get so frustrated in the end that they end up
00:19:51
breaking out and then forming a company because no one else wanted to do the idea that they had in mind or maybe the
00:19:58
person who uh was the least likely to solve that problem but had really been
00:20:04
spending all this time thinking about it um and developed this really odd skill
00:20:10
while doing their normal day job that then turned out to be really useful to solving this particular
00:20:16
problem I find it incredibly fascinating that when we look at the back end of spotify and apple and our audio channels
00:20:22
the majority of people that watch this podcast haven't yet hit the follow button or the Subscribe button wherever
00:20:28
you listening to this I would like to make a deal with you if you could do me a huge favor and hit that subscribe button I will work tirelessly from now
00:20:35
until forever to make the show better and better and better and better I can't tell you how much it helps when you hit
00:20:40
that subscribe button the show gets bigger which means we can expand the production bring in all the guests you want to see and continue to doing this
00:20:46
thing we love if you could do me that small favor and hit the follow button whatever you're listening to this that would mean the well to me that is the
00:20:52
only favor I will ever ask you thank you so much for your time back to this episode and going back to that first
00:20:58
company that was acquired at vertigo after that was acquired um I read that you retired at
00:21:05
23 yeah I'm guessing that made you enough money to retire yep and you're 23
00:21:12
which is in 2006 and you're a retired man living what one can only describe
00:21:18
as any 23 year- old's dream yeah lots of money guessing there was some champagne
00:21:24
there I think there was a red Ferrari how was that for you it was
00:21:30
amazing no all all jokes aside I grew up and as I said I was kind of like always
00:21:36
socially accepted but didn't feel like it belonged anywhere and um I um um I
00:21:44
never had an easy time with girls um not a bad time just not as as good as if I
00:21:51
was widely successful in music or wildly successful in sports or any of that stuff and I kind of had odd interest
00:21:58
because I kept as I said kind of moving from group to group um and so I I had
00:22:05
this idea uh in my head um that I wanted to you know be financially
00:22:11
independent um I wanted uh I thought that once I got to that point I would
00:22:17
start living life um and I thought that um you know uh I would be more socially
00:22:24
accepted and I would find my tribe uh and it's embarrassing to talk about it now um but um you know that was really
00:22:31
what I thought so uh I thought that uh if I was lucky and worked really hard I
00:22:37
might be able to retire in my 40s if I worked really hard but you know
00:22:42
50s for sure and and um so you know getting to that point when I was 22
00:22:49
actually not 23 it it was just mindboggling to me and um I had that
00:22:55
Financial Target in mind um and I thought well once I hit that I'm just going to like you know do something else
00:23:03
and and so as you said I kind of like started frequenting all the night clubs uh bought a sports car um tried to get
00:23:10
the girls I could never get before realizing that yes I could get them um
00:23:16
but for all the wrong reasons and they didn't really care about me um and it was kind of a hollowing thing because it
00:23:22
was this kind of oh was this what I worked for for such a long period of time and then
00:23:28
um only to find out that um you know it was quite depressing honestly I had all
00:23:34
these new friends that weren't really great friends at all um luckily I was able to keep my old friends as well um
00:23:41
but I realized that this thing I thought I wanted uh I just didn't want at all and um what was the symptom when we say
00:23:49
realize there's typically symptoms psychological symptoms or um no I I
00:23:54
realized it because I I um you know I started getting all these phone calls
00:24:00
from people um asking me to come out on Friday evenings and Saturday evenings uh
00:24:05
and I just I was just empty I just had no energy to do that um and I thought to
00:24:12
myself oh this is odd because they old me thought this was what life was all about and I had had girls call me and
00:24:20
like hey you should really come out we miss you all that stuff and I realized that I just didn't care and had um I
00:24:27
thought that that was you know this magical moment and in fact um you know
00:24:33
putting on my computer or playing my guitar um was kind of yeah this is more
00:24:39
me and so something on the back of my head started forming around like who am
00:24:44
I what do I care about and it's it's actually in that process I met my co-founder because he was the founder of
00:24:51
trade doubler and who uh bought my uh company and he too kind of the company
00:24:58
had iped he got kicked out of the company he he was like a 100 times more
00:25:04
wealthier than I was like he he had like the biggest success in Tech Sweden at
00:25:10
the time and had everything going for him but he didn't know what to do with life and so that was kind of how we
00:25:16
bonded um and um you know we were watching like old Godfather movies
00:25:22
eating crisps um and talking about what to do in life uh and and that was like a
00:25:28
real friendship moment a real Turning Point uh and he saw um the same thing
00:25:36
that I saw and uh um you know that was when I realized that I've been
00:25:41
approaching this all wrong uh in fact I always LED working it was never about money um I always liked learning um and
00:25:50
I would pay to go learn for someone rather than getting paid for it and but
00:25:56
at the same time I thought work should be hard that was the thing that I had programmed into me so work has to be
00:26:03
clearly something you not don't enjoy doing um so I thought well what if you
00:26:08
change all of these parameters what if you create an environment where you can come in and learn from really smart
00:26:14
people all the time what if you can work on something you actually care about opposed to something that makes money
00:26:21
what if you could have a lot of fun while doing it and not take it too
00:26:26
serious and we started talking and um we were balancing ideas and Martin my
00:26:33
co-founder was like asking me like Well if you really could pick anything like what what would you pick and I I'm I
00:26:40
said to him well um you know uh I'd probably pick music but that's a terrible idea uh and he said well why is
00:26:48
that a terrible idea and I said well it's a terrible idea because you know the industry is going down the drains it
00:26:54
just doesn't work it's piracy it's all of these reasons and he said okay okay
00:26:59
um but but if one would fix it how would one do well kind of stupid they're trying to regulate it clearly you need
00:27:05
to build a better product that's the only thing that's going to work CU they said okay well how are you going to do that and it's like well I don't know but
00:27:12
maybe you could do this or that okay well how would that work I like well I don't know but maybe you could do this
00:27:19
and that and how would you make money well I I think maybe you could pay out
00:27:24
based on how much people were listening I don't know and then literally after going through why not uh 100 time times
00:27:33
I started realizing that yeah why not and why not give this a shot and I told him from the beginning you know uh that
00:27:42
um hey this is probably going to loes a lot of money I have a hard time seeing this ever being a sustainable business
00:27:49
um but I in let's do this and he said great let's do it um and while I was
00:27:55
hesitating for some reason he wasn't uh so he was like this seems fun let's do it and that gave me enough confidence
00:28:03
where I kind of had found a new purpose again and instantly I stopped responding
00:28:08
to all the people who were trying to get me out in the evenings and I was like well I got something to do and then I
00:28:14
went back to work again and it was like pretty much a week from that moment
00:28:20
where I felt like I'm happy again I haven't felt this happy for you know the
00:28:25
better part of a year because it was about a year when I was going through this transition of of just having fun
00:28:31
being retired um first month was fun 6 months in
00:28:36
depressing uh N9 months in am I ever going to get out of this depression to
00:28:41
then kind of a year in finding something else that I truly look forward to that
00:28:48
felt crazy um and I honestly did not think we would succeed but if we succeed
00:28:54
I knew it was going to be a big thing something really interesting there that could relate to a lot was this idea
00:28:59
that you had a hypothesis about your happiness that had to fail you to know
00:29:07
that it was not a valid hypothesis about happiness and there's so many people obviously I mean there's I'd assume it
00:29:14
more than half the population are currently pursuing a hypothesis they have about what will make them happy
00:29:19
that probably and this is the thing I always wonder is does it have to fail them for them to know that that's not
00:29:25
the right pursuit in my case it did it had to fail me yeah I had to fill the anticlimax and then I had to go and buy
00:29:30
the the big house and then was there for nine months and got out of it as quick as I could and bought the car and then
00:29:35
got rid of the car and then just moved as close to the office as I could in a one-bedroom studio apartment yeah yeah
00:29:41
but for a lot of people I'm like is there a way for them not for it for them not have to go all that way and have it fail them well I think that there's
00:29:48
certain life experiences um uh that you can't learn from other people you just
00:29:54
have to live live live it and I think it's not so much about sort of the monetary thing or the status thing um
00:30:02
although I would probably say status whether or not you should really seek it
00:30:07
I think is one of those things that we all have to go through I I think everyone can talk about it don't seek attention don't seek Fame don't seek all
00:30:14
of these things but we're we're human beings we want to be well-liked by other people um and so I think that is
00:30:20
probably one of them but but in general I think the further away it is from anything you know and can relate to I
00:30:27
think um we have to uh experience parts of it so
00:30:32
you know one one of the most amazing thing that I get to do these days for my friends is um from like back when is I
00:30:41
take them on these crazy experiences uh right you know I'm I'm fortunate enough that I get to see some of the coolest
00:30:48
people in the world whether it's musicians but athletes and and so on um
00:30:54
that uh they're able to get a glimpse of my life uh and I love it because um you
00:31:00
know they're looking at it with this kind of sh shlik imagination and wonder about some some things that I'm going
00:31:07
through but I also see the other side when they're like is it really that much work wow I would never want to do this
00:31:13
and it's it's quite helpful um because as we started out saying they have this
00:31:20
idea what the life is so I kind of like bringing them along on the journey where they get to see it and then um you can
00:31:28
see that there are aspects of it that they like and then other aspects that they would never ever want to get into
00:31:33
um so um you know I I think it might be possible to kind of simulate that
00:31:39
experience um but I think you have to experience it very much up close uh
00:31:45
certainly when you're talking about wealth and if you come from having none I think almost everyone then would
00:31:52
instantly need to experience a little bit of it uh to at least kind of understand whether that's important or
00:31:57
not especially if you get it uh like we both did probably in our 20s and so on
00:32:03
had I had I worked up until my 40s I may have kind of realized hey this isn't
00:32:08
life I'm I'm having children I'm having my wife this is amazing I got this
00:32:14
experience being a single guy trying to chase girls um and all I'd seen was on MTV how all of the rappers uh were
00:32:22
throwing around money and uh having 20 or 30 girls at the nightclub and and you
00:32:28
know hey I wanted that too mhm one thing I'm really interested in is you said you got to 9 months and you were depressed
00:32:34
N9 months after the sale there are so many people now and this is why I asked about what the symptoms of that were
00:32:39
it's hard to know when we're drifting down the wrong path because it creeps up on us like a frog in a frying pan I I
00:32:46
remember a time working seven days a week and this feeling in my chest if I would describe it as like a a subtle
00:32:52
growing emptiness and that was for me in hindsight I was lonely yeah and I didn't
00:32:57
know I was yeah so those symptoms that you encountered at 9 months in in a way
00:33:03
that someone might relate to them what were those feelings um I I I think my entire life
00:33:11
as I mentioned I I've been struggling to fit in um and I think it's something we
00:33:16
probably share um and have in common and I somehow thought that this would help
00:33:22
and um when the situation was new um it did feel like I found my new tribe and
00:33:28
it did feel like they um um you know this early excitement everyone's calling
00:33:34
you everyone wants you to be part of something that you before may not have been able to enjoy and may not get those
00:33:42
phone calls and may not get into the hottest nightclubs and and the club promoters like putting you on the list
00:33:49
plus 10 and all that stuff this social currency so it was thrilling it was
00:33:54
absolutely amazing and and it it truly was this kind of like wow I've made it
00:34:00
kind of feeling um but um after you experien the
00:34:06
10th time and I somehow had this idea that it would translate into this
00:34:12
continuous feeling of that thing or translate into something more meaningful
00:34:17
I I sort of realized that no wait a minute it's the same experience again but it's lost a little bit of a charm
00:34:24
and I started now getting the hangarounds that we're trying to get in with me because you know they realized
00:34:30
that maybe I would buy the bottles um I was seeing people at the table come up and grab a glass and then run away um
00:34:38
all of that kind of thing and I I I it's slowly sort of dawn upon me that um you
00:34:45
could replace me by just anyone else that had um the money and the connection
00:34:53
that I had at that time thereby the status and it would really would matter um you know and and um uh you know I I
00:35:02
was I was listening to I think it's his name is Morgan howold um the author who
00:35:08
talks about psychology of money and he kind of talked about it the the the Ferrari syndrome and he basically
00:35:14
describes that uh everyone uh who aspires to buy a Ferrari um thinks of
00:35:20
themselves and saying oh well one day when I'm in this Ferrari everyone's going to look at this Ferrari and
00:35:25
they're going to be amazed with me yeah what we all do is we look at the Ferrari and we want to sit there we actually
00:35:31
don't care about the individual that's currently sitting in there so this kind of um you know Paradox um so to speak
00:35:38
and and that's very much how I felt about my life and as you're right right it uh you push that to a side and you
00:35:45
say well surely this you know this is fun and you have all these other people coming out and then you kind of bury it
00:35:51
and then it keeps coming up and then it comes up again and then it comes up more and more and more and I didn't realize
00:35:57
what it was at first because I was like surely I'm just being foolish this is this is life and everyone was rewarding
00:36:04
me on the outside too saying why the life you live this is amazing how cool
00:36:09
is not to be retired and just not having to do anything um but I wasn't learning
00:36:15
and I wasn't forming genine connections with people um I was just being and uh
00:36:22
yes I got status but I realized I never did anything for status and I actually did didn't care in the end uh from being
00:36:30
status I cared about belonging but not in that group um I wanted to be uh in
00:36:36
another group that cared about um me for being me and you must have learned a lot now in hindsight about what the core
00:36:42
components of you being sufficiently happy are you've used a few of them there like learning was one of them
00:36:50
belonging what are what are the other core components of you think for someone just it's easier to just talk about
00:36:56
ourselves here for you to be stable um I I I realized
00:37:04
um that I also need to be by by be
00:37:10
allowed to be by myself right um so I used to in Prior relationships um before
00:37:17
meeting my wife I used to think you know you're in a relationship you constantly need to do something with the other
00:37:23
party and it was draining me and uh I used to think there was something wrong with me uh because I wanted to be by
00:37:29
myself for most of the time and um and
00:37:35
being comfortable with that I am that way that I I thrive on loneliness uh not
00:37:42
all the time because I can feel lonely um but um for quite a lot of time
00:37:48
perhaps more so than more normal people like being lonely um I'm I'm just
00:37:54
finding myself in that um place where I just pursue whatever um is top of mind
00:38:01
for me I am sort of in my own thoughts uh wandering dreaming uh scheming um you
00:38:09
know um that's been very important too because I used to think there was something wrong with that yeah uh and
00:38:14
then my wife luckily she's kind of the same she does her thing and I do my thing and we love that we can do stuff
00:38:22
with each other but we're also perfectly happy doing things on our own um and um
00:38:27
and that kind of taught me also quite a lot about myself in that because again we are
00:38:34
social animals uh and I am too by the way I love um hanging out with my friends but I also love being by myself
00:38:42
so I think having a positive impact um not just on myself I have to feel good
00:38:47
about what I'm doing and know that it helps someone um being able to learn uh
00:38:53
being able to have fun while doing it and uh then be in an environment where I
00:39:00
can be lonely and then can come back without that being sort of socially awkward uh like one of my favorite
00:39:07
things that I can do with my close friends is I can literally uh let's say
00:39:12
I would host a dinner I could host a dinner uh and I get an idea it's very
00:39:18
uncommon but I'll get an idea and I will walk away and disappear for an hour and I'll come back um and uh that's like
00:39:25
something that's kind of socially acceptable in most situation I do realize that so I I try to not do that
00:39:31
if I'm I'm with um you know strangers because they won't understand they W won't understand but my real friends um
00:39:39
they know that about me and they're like totally cool so they just hang out and then when I come back I love that
00:39:45
they're there and I love that they're hanging out with my kids or hanging out with my wife and doing other stuff and
00:39:51
just being comfortable in in that that for me is like a perfect dinner is one
00:39:57
where I would be social I would get an idea walk away think about it for a moment
00:40:04
get collect my thoughts get energy write it down and come back filled with energy
00:40:09
from that and then you know continue the conversation uh that's a great example
00:40:15
of something I love doing so that's actually happened where you've been at a dinner party with friends and then you've had an idea and you've left you
00:40:21
and then you've my thing there is if I left so the first thing is I'm not sure my girlfriend would be very happy
00:40:28
yeah she understands that I'm like that she understands that I love being alone she understands that I get ideas at
00:40:33
unpredictable times and that idea might suck me away she probably would be that happy um about it probably need to have
00:40:39
a conversation about that um but also if I went away I would need to start working on the idea because I'd get so energized about the thing that I'd then
00:40:47
spend all night like sorry guys I yeah that happens by the way it happens that
00:40:52
I like finish halfway through the dinner and just disappear don't come back to I will say my friends usually uh even my
00:41:00
close friends are like uh hey we came to hang out with you not like to see you for half an hour then you're
00:41:05
disappearing uh but it happens um um but I can obviously equally be there for all
00:41:12
the dinner too um and and yeah I mean it is one of the social Oddities I think
00:41:18
that I do um with my close friends um and I again I I know it's highly
00:41:25
socially unacceptable that most situations but but if you really think about it as an introvert as I said I
00:41:32
usually thrive on I need social elements but I get most of my energy being by
00:41:39
myself all right and and so then from an energy balance uh perspective being with
00:41:46
people it gives me a lot of ideas it's great but it also empties my energy reserved and going away filling them up
00:41:53
again coming back it is probably the ideal way for me if you you asked me like what would a perfect night look
00:41:59
like it would probably be that how do you then balance romance and
00:42:05
relationships and my partner her I think her attachment style and her love language is like quality time so I often
00:42:13
violate that love language because of what you've just described yeah we could be Saturday in a park and then I think
00:42:19
about something or get an email and then I'm off away on my own little world yeah
00:42:24
yeah I mean that's certainly the risk um again I'm I'm fortunate enough that my wife is kind of very similar to me in
00:42:31
that regard so she too leaves uh dinners and has her ideas and and uh you know do
00:42:38
that so I think we're we're more similar we try to make sure that one of us stay
00:42:44
because it gets very awkward otherwise um but but if you're both like that do you have to have rules though for when
00:42:49
you do B yeah well that's the thing that's that's actually the harder thing for us is finding that quality time so I
00:42:57
mean there's two parts you can either have I I like defaults so you can have like the default is we spend time
00:43:03
together or the default is we're in a relationship where we don't spend time together and so you have to make time
00:43:09
where you're actively finding something you both are interested in and you want to spend time on together and I think
00:43:16
we're more that and I think most people probably with kids would recognize that because the kids come first in the
00:43:22
relationship anyway so your relationship to your significant other um is probably
00:43:27
you know um the second priority in that relationship and and your wants kids are
00:43:33
the first so I don't think that's uncommon but I think changing that theault could be really important um and
00:43:39
again if it's something that's really important to my wife of course I'm going to be present uh she's really into horse
00:43:45
riding uh I'm not but I know it's matters to her greatly so not only uh
00:43:51
will I try to speak to her every morning when she wants to talk about that but I
00:43:56
also show up for her competitions or I show up for important practices uh that
00:44:02
she has as well um and um there are aspects of the horsing thing where we
00:44:08
can Bond and and have great quality time as well um as it is she loves hearing
00:44:14
about my entrepreneurial Endeavors uh as well and and we find quality time
00:44:20
through that and then we have date nights like most couples do and uh yeah I mean if you're at the restaurant you
00:44:26
don't just really walk up and get away of course you're going to spend that quality time as
00:44:31
well starting Spotify when I heard the Spotify story I
00:44:38
I really wanted to meet you because I consider myself to be ambitious but there are some challenges
00:44:45
that I would just view as impossible and at the time when you consider how the
00:44:50
music industry was that it's ran by these big record labels predominantly and they own the music to be a young kid
00:44:59
from Sweden and believe that you could change that for me is a special type of
00:45:06
delusion like it's like a it's just an impossible task it's what I just would have thought okay some things are the
00:45:11
way they are they're removable objects that is one of them yeah why didn't you think that was a impossible
00:45:17
task um well I think for several reasons but
00:45:23
I I think that is the beautiful naivity of an entrepreneur as well right uh we
00:45:29
move mountains I'm sure Elon was you know even more insurmountable thing
00:45:35
electric cars and hadn't been a successful car companies for uh I think a century or something um or at least uh
00:45:43
you know many many decades in the US and he managed to do that so I think it's um it it's part
00:45:49
illusion uh delusion sorry um but but the other part I think um also is that
00:45:56
what I realized is before even committing to this idea as the the why
00:46:01
not part I probably spent 500 hours learning about this problem and the
00:46:10
scarcest resource we have in the world today by far is time and when you have
00:46:17
high quality people that spend thousands of hours on a problem you find new
00:46:24
Solutions and so the biggest um thing for Humanity I believe is simply that um
00:46:29
I believe we're capable of doing practically anything but uh there aren't
00:46:35
that many people that um can see these multi-dimensional things with that right
00:46:41
experience that happens to come in at that right time they're spending thousands of hours of trying to needle
00:46:47
in a Hast stack see that opportunity through that very very tiny prism and
00:46:52
and um um even even today when I think about it some of my other businesses it
00:46:58
kind of work the same way so I started a healthc care business about five years ago but I I was spending um I think the
00:47:07
first interview when I mentioned it was in 2009 um and I started the company 5
00:47:13
years ago uh 2018 so I I probably spent a decade thinking about this problem um
00:47:21
and I couldn't figure out a solution 2008 yeah yeah you you started the 2008
00:47:27
but you no no no I started the company the Healthcare company in 2018 18 but I
00:47:32
started thinking about it 2008 oh okay um so I have a notebook with all my crazy ideas most of them amount to
00:47:39
nothing uh quite often someone else comes along and dust them and I'm happy
00:47:44
and it's amazing um but every now and then um nothing happens for a great
00:47:49
period of time and I kind of feel that itch to maybe make a difference myself
00:47:55
and I and I say that because like the realization there was um I had spend up
00:48:01
until that point thousands of hours understanding the Health Care System why it is the way it is the incentive
00:48:07
schemes and the what the NHS is doing and what someone else is doing and the
00:48:12
Public Health Care System Insurance business directed consumer things the the longevity curves of human beings the
00:48:19
disease groups the costs curves like all of those aspects um about it similar to
00:48:24
how you're describing looking at Rockets um but you know imagine you spending a
00:48:29
thousand hours to Rocket not just kind of casually researching it I am sure you will find novel ways of how to attack
00:48:37
the problem it may not be because you know if you're not an physicist you may not come up with a next rocket engine um
00:48:45
but you may find another twist uh to on how to attack this problem and I don't
00:48:51
really think it comes down to that and so uh in the space of music I don't know anything about the music industry going
00:48:58
into it um but I would argue a few years into it I was probably one of the most
00:49:04
foremost experts on copyright in the world around like the dmca and um what
00:49:09
the US copyright regime look like and what what um other regimes look like and
00:49:15
how um you know performance rights societies label rights and what kind of Rights mechanical rights performing
00:49:21
rights uh all of those different aspects all the different Co code is are C
00:49:27
numbers ISBN numbers and how they related and so on and so forth and and
00:49:32
um um you know I I find like people either get too modeled in on the details
00:49:37
and don't see the bigger picture or they stay too top level picture to really see the new ones and the question is how do
00:49:44
you dive deep enough where you see it and figure out which problem to solve in
00:49:49
what order um and and I was at that point um by probably 2007 having spent a
00:49:57
year on Spotify but the team was super small so it it really wasn't a big commit at that time and I wasn't sure at
00:50:04
that time but then I realized that hey this is actually possible uh because we'
00:50:09
built the product that showcased the technology um of what we were doing and
00:50:14
it felt like if you had all the world music on your hard drive so then the real problem ended up being can we get
00:50:21
the music industry to accept this and to that I had no idea but I felt like this
00:50:27
is so obviously if this came out in the marketplace what consumers would ask for
00:50:33
now the only question is is the music industry going to allow this and that took me another year and a half 18
00:50:40
months to learn the answer and it was completely binary we almost died probably four times um in that process
00:50:48
and ran out of money and uh record company saying no no this is never going to happen until eventually one day Stars
00:50:55
aligned and we were able to launch um but that was not a given but it felt
00:51:01
like the right bet to make because you know it was a binary outcome either we'd
00:51:07
fail the price wasn't all too bad if we would succeed it was clearly so that at
00:51:13
least this would resonate very well with consumers was there any moments where
00:51:18
you thought that it wasn't going to happen are you conversations you had with record labels where someone very high up says absolutely no way me many
00:51:25
times uh I would say um probably once every month or two over
00:51:30
a 2-year period I thought that this probably won't pan out uh and it was
00:51:35
incredibly demoralizing I I usually joke but like in the beginning of that process I had hair and then in the end
00:51:41
of it I lost all of the hair I probably gained 30 lbs in weight uh during that
00:51:47
period of time um it was awful um but through it all my co-founder Martin uh
00:51:54
probably a factor of just who he is as an individual but also probably because he didn't participate in these meetings
00:52:02
uh kept being really upbeat kept being um you know an amazing support and said
00:52:08
don't worry about it you're going to figure it out and he just kept believing in me and then he also said a few times
00:52:14
you know when that was in enough he said don't worry about it we'll figure out something else if this doesn't work out it felt to me like I always had that
00:52:20
safety net and it was just the amount the push that I needed to do this um and
00:52:27
again talking about not giving advice but the advice that I do give to other people is to share the burden with
00:52:32
someone uh it is so important um and I know I get most of the credit for
00:52:39
Spotify but it is really a team effort uh from the gustavs and Alex and all those people but then also in the early
00:52:45
days from uh Martin in believing in me uh and and knowing uh with this kind of
00:52:53
Supernatural ability that I'm going to pull it off some that must have told you a story which I
00:52:59
guess has stayed with you about perseverance and the power of perseverance the the double-edged sword to that
00:53:05
is sometimes it's right to quit as well yeah and knowing when to persevere and knowing when you're just wasting your
00:53:11
time which is as you said the most important currency of all yeah you
00:53:16
know that's where you know art meets science um there is no scientific answer
00:53:21
because it depends it's an art to know uh when something is futile and when
00:53:27
something is worth doing but I call it that sort of binary outcome but uh with
00:53:33
uneven distribution right so if you think about it as a curve even if it's
00:53:38
50/50 whether you succeed but on the upside you can win a lot more than you can lose and all you can really lose is
00:53:45
one time and the upside maybe 100 m it's probably worth uh persuading obviously
00:53:51
it's that's the science part the art thing is okay well is it really 100 times is a 10 times and and have I
00:53:58
already lost but I'm just not aware of it um that's the art and also in that I hear an optimism bias from two
00:54:05
co-founders the the constant oh we'll figure it out we'll figure it out we'll figure it out how important do you think
00:54:10
that is especially you know you hire a lot of people is that something you're like looking for and the people that you work with that bias towards will figure
00:54:16
it out um I think again it depends on the role you're Hing for you need a team
00:54:22
uh I think it's really important that you just don't surround yourself with just yes people or Optimist uh you need
00:54:29
the naysayer in the room as well you need the people who will balance it out and be the one who says I'm not sure
00:54:36
this is going to work out um and and so often I think that's the that's the
00:54:41
important part we keep talking about it CFO or sales people but again you can
00:54:47
have a deal making CFO and a sales person that's Happy gol lucky um it may
00:54:53
not be a great uh combo you may want the the CFO to be skeptical about the sales
00:54:58
Pipeline and a happy gol lucky salesperson or the inverse maybe like
00:55:04
really diligent that and the CFO that maybe sort of like don't worry about it we will sort it out um but I but I think
00:55:11
so much about that is the subtleties we we don't have a perfect model of the world um and uh the more experience I
00:55:20
have it's a Cheesy thing to say but the Lesser realize that actually no um and
00:55:25
so much of this are actually down in the nuances and most people are um above the
00:55:30
nuances don't really understand the issues well enough or too bog down into details to understand the bigger picture
00:55:37
and and going that sort of up and down that's sort of super detail oriented um
00:55:43
but also being able to go up and see the big pictures that is um and simplifying
00:55:48
very complex Concepts I think some of the most amazing entrepreneurs in the world are experts at um and that is the
00:55:55
superpower and that is certainly one that I'm trying to hone um uh and work
00:56:01
on uh but when you see it like Steve Jobs when you take very complex things
00:56:06
and people say he didn't understand engineering and Technical problems it's not true yes he may not have been an
00:56:12
engineer he may not have known how to write code but he certainly could empathize with what um made an amazing
00:56:19
engineer tick uh empathize with different Technical Solutions will have different inputs and outputs um and he
00:56:27
understood it and um he was brilliant in taking very complex ideas and
00:56:32
understanding how to make that resonate for the everyday person these Tales I hear of you sort of being outside record
00:56:39
labels and waiting for the CEO to come out so that you could catch them or trying to accost I don't know the the
00:56:44
assistant outside and asking when the CEO was coming outside so that you could get a meeting with them yeah are these
00:56:50
Tales true um as with many they're probably exaggerated a little bit um
00:56:55
where is the truth well the the the truth is that certainly happened but it wasn't you know I've heard people
00:57:01
recounted us that I slept outside of the the record labels kind of in a sleeping bag that that didn't happen uh that
00:57:08
happened another time in my career but it wasn't um it it it didn't happen there but but it certainly happened that
00:57:14
I'd book A Week fly to New York with no meeting booked uh with basically an open
00:57:20
calendar and about 20 phone calls a day just trying to figure out a time to get
00:57:25
on this the schedule of U senior VP or a CEO Etc that certainly happened and that
00:57:33
taught me another thing too which is that these assistants like you better befriend them because they are the keys
00:57:39
to the kingdom um and most people don't care about them at all uh but they're
00:57:44
very influential they're very powerful um and uh and and you know uh that was
00:57:51
hard in the beginning but then I realized that um they got to see me as an individual saw them as an individual
00:57:57
and eventually you know this this is not we tend to believe the world is more
00:58:02
logical than what it is but a lot of it is based on relationship So eventually some of them started taking a liking to
00:58:08
me and so when there was the opportunity and they could prioritize 10 other things for that CEO to do but I was
00:58:16
there I was friendly uh in easy to work with show up at no moments notice even if you know it was 20 minutes before
00:58:23
finding out about it I would show up um and so I was I was easy to deal with so
00:58:28
take away all that complexity in order to achieve the outcome that I wanted to do and sometimes that is as simple as it
00:58:35
is just be consistent be the easiest person to deal with and you'd be surprised how many problems it solves
00:58:42
did you invest your personal Capital into starting Spotify because I I read again that you'd spent pretty much all of your personal wealth to start the
00:58:49
company yeah yeah I did uh so I invested not all of it but quite substantial amounts of it uh and my Cod funer
00:58:56
invested even more but he obviously had a much larger sum of money um from the
00:59:01
beginning um yeah so all in all I think we invested about $10 million uh into
00:59:07
this um by ourselves uh which was also crazy because you know back then today
00:59:14
10 million into a startup just was isn't a big number there many startups that
00:59:19
have done that before but doing that on a seed stage uh back in 2007
00:59:26
that just was unheard of it was usually 500k seed check sums Etc what if it
00:59:32
hadn't worked out what would have been the personal implications for you financially uh the personal implications
00:59:37
that I went from not having to have a job to then probably having to go back to having a job um so I basically took
00:59:44
that security uh that I built up uh that 22 I'm set for life and I gave that up
00:59:51
um in a moment's notice um and um yeah I
00:59:56
mean um I I don't know what to say I think from a purely logical point of
01:00:02
view it was probably terrible decision um but betting on myself and betting on
01:00:07
yourself would probably be again U I say I shouldn't give advice but it is probably the the best advice I could
01:00:15
give many people is is you know because especially those that want to invest in various startups Etc and I but they may
01:00:22
not have a lot of money and then I always say well what what don't you just bet on your yourself instead why don't
01:00:27
you just try to like work for one of these startups like you said and and maybe take a little bit more equity and
01:00:33
a little bit less pay and take out of your cash instead because that way you increase the likelihood hopefully if you
01:00:40
know you're good of the company being a success and it just feels like the more
01:00:46
prudent thing to do and so I had a sneaky feeling that that was the right thing to do uh but investing as much
01:00:52
probably wasn't the smartest thing to do a new po sponsor that I'm super excited to talk about with all of you is
01:00:58
LinkedIn jobs hiring as I would know is one of the most important steps in your business without good people there is no
01:01:05
company trust me I found out along the way that your business is nothing without good people you want to be 100%
01:01:12
certain though that you have access to the best candidates available and that's why you have to check out LinkedIn jobs
01:01:19
LinkedIn jobs helps you to find the right people for your team faster and
01:01:24
for free so when I'm expanding my my team LinkedIn is my first Port of Call I'd highly recommend it on LinkedIn jobs
01:01:30
posting a job is super easy and you can add a purple hash hiring frame around your LinkedIn profile to spread the word
01:01:36
LinkedIn jobs helps you find the qualified candidates you want to talk to faster post your job for free at
01:01:42
linkedin.com doac that's linkedin.com
01:01:47
doac to post your job for free terms and conditions apply as you may know this
01:01:53
podcast is sponsored by hu if you're living under a rock you might have missed that I've come to learn over time not all of the products they have are
01:01:59
for me but the ones that are for me have really really changed my life in a profound way all of the products are designed for different use cases and
01:02:05
different people for me as you'll probably know the ready to drink bottles are a staple of my life at the moment um
01:02:11
and they have been for many many years but for a lot of other people they have the hot and savory which is a 5 minute
01:02:16
hot meal that's nutritionally complete and contains all the good stuff that all heel products contain which is the 23
01:02:22
vitamins and minerals and the wonderful balance of sort of nutritional completeness and then you have the bars
01:02:27
as well if you've heard about hu on this podcast you've heard me talking about it a lot you're aware that I'm an investor in the company you're aware that I'm on
01:02:32
the board of the company and you're not sure where to start I would highly recommend starting with the bestseller
01:02:38
bundle basically we'll send you a package in the pose containing all of the favorite products that people love
01:02:44
and then you try them all and stick with the ones that really really fit you the
01:02:49
link is in the description below to try the best seller bundle Spotify goes on to be I mean success is
01:02:57
probably an understatement and I know the journey to that success had multiple near-death experiences to get there one
01:03:03
of the key things key moments I reflect on as a Spotify customer um is when Apple launched their competing product
01:03:11
Apple music in 2015 I believe it was and there was lots of Articles saying that this would be the death of Spotify yeah
01:03:17
I think I was even concerned as a very loyal Spotify user I thought [ __ ] you know they have all the phones they have
01:03:23
they're kind of like the mafia they could just was you yeah most companies when Apple comes into their territory
01:03:30
shaking their boots yeah what was it like in your office that day when Apple music launched a competing product you
01:03:36
know when you live in the thick of the fire you're not concerned about the things that everyone else is concerned
01:03:42
about um I I usually say public perception lacks about 6 to 12 months what's actually going on and and so in
01:03:49
our case we had known that Apple was going to launch something for probably the better part of a year because they
01:03:55
had the Beats acquisition beforehand and we were hearing all sorts of rumors Etc about what it was so absolutely you have
01:04:02
to be worried when one of the greatest companies on Earth decides to compete with you so we were concerned about it
01:04:08
um uh and we were kind of doubling down on what our positioning was going to be
01:04:14
so you kind of like double and triple checked whether or not um you know you were deluding yourself into believing
01:04:19
things to be true um and and so for instance in our case one of the big things uh we we had a some strategic
01:04:26
pillars that we were focusing on one of them we call ubiquity um because we always knew this would eventually be the
01:04:32
case we we thought that consumers would value the ability to work across all
01:04:38
devices and all ecosystem and our bet would be that um any competitor we might
01:04:45
have had would actually focus on reinforcing their own ecosystem and not
01:04:50
care about all the other stuff so the primary reason they were into a music service would be to make their own
01:04:57
devices better not to make the world's best music service and um and so you
01:05:04
know that's why we made such an effort of integrating into cars integrating into all sorts of uh weird devices smart
01:05:11
fridges whatever you might think um and so so it was kind of like reiterating
01:05:16
that but I felt pretty good about that position um and going back and then
01:05:21
there's always the sort of like what if they figured out something that we just wouldn't have thought about uh and I
01:05:28
remember we were constantly talking to the product teams about this uh and like what what what if they come up with this
01:05:34
and we're literally trying this game theorizing every possible angle um on it
01:05:40
um um but I think at the end of the day we we kind of went through the Thousand scenarios kind of thing we knew we had
01:05:47
prepared as well as we could um we um anticipated a certain type of product
01:05:54
there was this kind of 1% or 10% chance whatever you want to quantify it as where we would just be wrong and they'd
01:06:00
come up with something that widely superseded any of our expectations um but that very day remember we'd been
01:06:08
preparing for that day for so long so the first reaction was kind of them announcing it which we expected them to
01:06:15
do uh and then seeing the walkthrough of the product and realizing that okay well
01:06:20
we prepared for this we thought about this Etc and so weirdly enough as the rest of the world World kind of like
01:06:26
gasped for air um we were thinking about it okay well this was what we expected
01:06:34
um and back to that point distribution was the amazing thing they hadn't come up with something on the product side
01:06:39
that we just didn't anticipate um but it was really just about distribution and there was nothing we could do to guard
01:06:45
ourselves against it um but we felt like we had a superior experience um on the
01:06:53
personalization side the fact that you know if you have a Windows machine and an iPhone um Spotify would work um but
01:07:01
Apple music um wouldn't at that time um so there were many of those things that
01:07:06
we um I thought had a better positioning than they had i' I've long thought that I've tried both I mean I tried it when
01:07:12
it came out and I couldn't stick to it um and I think me and my friends who were in my music group we all concluded
01:07:18
that the personalization how Spotify understands me yeah is really the thing it's hard to know why you do what you do
01:07:24
as a consumer y but from analyzing it a bit more deeply um it just felt like I'd built there was a lot of investment I'd
01:07:30
done to my playlists and all those things but Spotify just knew me better seems to have much more data than um
01:07:36
data on me and understands me and is more of a bespoke solution to me than
01:07:41
Apple was and also the the user experience is not great and I just can't get past that I just so I tried it and I
01:07:47
bounced I I I just stuck with Spotify um Apple are I Ed the word Matthew earlier
01:07:54
on a lot of people don't know this but they take 30% revenues on pretty much every new app in the store they've
01:08:00
rejected your audiobook app multiple times um there's a rumor going around that they even delay how quickly you can
01:08:08
release new updates of your app and delay how that reaches phones what's your opinion on Apple and what they do
01:08:14
and how they conduct themselves well um it it's um as a consumer uh let's start
01:08:20
off with apple is a fantastic company and they make amazing products uh I
01:08:25
really do believe that um I've been a Mac User since I can't even remember
01:08:31
probably late '90s when I could first afford one uh all the way to now and
01:08:37
obviously use the iPhone and Apple watches and all that stuff so let's start with that and I think that's hard to square then that there's this other
01:08:44
company that's fiercely um focused on just um itself
01:08:51
and constantly trying to do things by itself and out working well with others
01:08:57
um and um those are perhaps two different sites
01:09:03
of the same coin um but um you know the
01:09:08
the way that manifests itself um I think that it's a company in many cases that still sees itself as an underdog uh but
01:09:16
don't realize that they become Goliath and so many of the tactics that made it the rebel kind of thing are now stifling
01:09:24
Innovation and it's really hurting consumers to a great extent with the 30% you talked about with the fact that you
01:09:31
know Spotify can't um or any developer if you don't pay the 30% you can't even
01:09:37
speak to your consumers it is kind of absurd um so you know there there's a
01:09:43
ruthlessness um on the business side of Apple um and and perhaps it's always
01:09:49
been so I don't know I never got the opportunity to meet Steve Jobs but um uh
01:09:56
um where just from an ethos point of view it's just not me um and um um I
01:10:03
have a hard time squaring that with me as the consumer and me as the business leader um and needless to say I I I do
01:10:10
believe that Apple can and should play fair and I think it would be way better for the world if they did um and I think
01:10:19
um that it would actually help them in many regards to switch their tactics and realize that they are the Goliath at
01:10:26
this point and not David um and so yeah one of the things I want to close on um
01:10:32
is your philosophy so I guess it's the same answer because spotify's philosophy
01:10:38
towards what's made it successful will probably be in many respects a reflection of your philosophies towards
01:10:44
business and and um more broadly towards life but when I sit here and I think a lot of people will sit here and say um
01:10:52
there's clearly something unique about you about the way you approach problem solving problems life business all of
01:10:58
those things that has been that has defined you and set you apart are you aware of what that is what
01:11:06
those principles are um no I don't think so but I think
01:11:12
you're right in that um you know the the the way I would describe Spotify um to
01:11:18
people you're WR that it is scary sometimes watching Spotify uh trying to
01:11:24
watch it from a distance and not just be in it because sometimes it's doing things where I'm like how did how did
01:11:31
people know that we were supposed to do it this way um and it would be how I would approach solving a problem and
01:11:36
it's kind of how um you know we've internalized certain things but the best
01:11:41
way is it's 17 years old now and it is a teenager that's liberating itself so
01:11:48
it's not 100% me uh in fact it is this much broader uh different being uh there
01:11:54
are aspects of it it that um hasn't taken after me um at all in um product
01:12:01
development you know Gustav is a formidable product leader as an example and Alex is a formidable business leader
01:12:07
and the two of them are now leading more of the day-to-day and they're certainly instilling their personal uh values and
01:12:14
their personal uh perspective of the of the company too which I think they're totally entitled to doing having been
01:12:20
with the company for 12 plus years both of them um but it is interesting see it
01:12:25
because we're approaching things now in a way I wouldn't always do it's not inconsistent with important principles
01:12:31
of mine but but uh it's certainly not directed and the other part is I started this as a 23-year-old and the
01:12:38
23-year-old Daniel while many parts are the same uh The 40-Year-Old Daniel with
01:12:46
um two kids um having seen that have changed perspectives as well uh I have a
01:12:52
different feeling about work and and the importance of that in my life still very
01:12:57
important but may not be the sole most important thing that I do just to mention one and so it has similarities
01:13:05
uh but there's differences to me as an individual too but I think if you compare me the 23y old Daniel the
01:13:13
30-year old Daniel The 40-Year-Old Daniel um I've evolved too and and
01:13:19
candidly I'm in that period at the moment where I'm perhaps trying to figure out who Who The 40-Year-Old
01:13:26
Daniel really is because it's a different one than the 30-year-old one
01:13:31
um maybe it's subtleties but um I think in quite a big
01:13:37
way also and just thinking about something like culture the 23-year-old Daniel um culture was having a pinpoint
01:13:44
table uh 30-year-old Daniel uh would have said yeah culture is important but didn't really understand why and The
01:13:51
40-Year-Old Daniel uh would be um in the 30-year-old Daniel would be more strategy than culture actually and The
01:13:58
40-Year-Old Daniel is all about culture almost to the point where strategy is um
01:14:04
secondary if not even tertiary to that um 40-year-old Daniel is all about culture yeah uh way more so what is the
01:14:13
culture well that's the amazing thing because it is the most scalable thing
01:14:18
done right of a company um and it's the hardest thing right because it is everything and nothing it is every
01:14:25
positive action that's happening in the company it's every negative action of company every person that's joining
01:14:30
every person is leaving is impacting culture and so um in its Essence I
01:14:35
believe culture is about rewarding the positive behaviors you want to see in the company and obviously disuade the
01:14:42
negative what are the positive behaviors you want to see well one of them is taking risks um and failing and how do
01:14:49
you do that when you have eight or 9,000 people inside of a company responsibly
01:14:54
how do you uh when the common status quo is we don't like failure um you don't get
01:15:01
promoted based on failure you get promoted based on being successful um
01:15:07
Annie Duke has this thinking in bets she talks about I love that is thinking about poker ships on the table and and
01:15:14
she said one time when when we spoke she said to me is like um a companies like
01:15:19
um everyone has ships at the table we just don't know how many we have and so the people that have been successful
01:15:25
have way more so they have leniency and allowanc in the culture of any organizations to do more than someone
01:15:32
who just started um and perhaps have a less lesser ones and if you failed
01:15:37
enough times what's naturally going to happen is that you won't have the same agency in a large organization to impact
01:15:44
things too so then the the Counterpoint to that would be well H how do you then
01:15:50
um create an environment with people um are allowed to take risks and then
01:15:56
balance that with say a Spotify at this point where we have a huge amount of
01:16:01
responsibility too we have tens of millions of creators that have their livelihood of them platform so we can
01:16:07
just experiment with how we're paying out and so on and so forth right and 550
01:16:12
million consumers uh we have to be responsible with their data we can't um
01:16:17
you know put new things in front of them without testing them and so on and so forth and so um there there's this
01:16:25
constant tension between uh being Innovative taking risks um and um you know at the same
01:16:33
time obviously being responsible and and that's hard but that's all about culture
01:16:39
I'm absolutely obsessed with the subject of culture because I really think it's an under underappreciated factor in um
01:16:47
in why businesses are the way they are I think you could basically take a person off the street and the culture you drop
01:16:53
them in determines the behavior you'll get from them yeah and so um and having sat here and interviewed like Sir Alex
01:16:59
Ferguson's ex- teammates yeah you just come to learn that sir Alex Ferguson's greatness wasn't strategy they all say
01:17:04
to me I remember Patrice and Evra said to me that he walked in on a we were playing Arsenal yeah on a Sunday in
01:17:10
London yeah and he walked in and just said Lads listen beautiful weather outside don't [ __ ] up my Sunday and walked out because his thing was
01:17:17
management he just had this culture the other thing they said to me which has always stayed with me is Rio Ferdinand said to me how many times do you think
01:17:22
he came into the training ground dressing room yeah 26 years I I don't know he go they said twice really didn't
01:17:27
need to come in there the culture was in there yeah and it was self- policing when it's strong right yeah but you're
01:17:33
right sports teams the ones that do really well um I was being told an Arsenal story that probably can't share
01:17:39
but uh you could see bits and pieces of mikel's um you know how he's pushing
01:17:45
that team culture at the moment too which seems very fascinating uh with some of the almost Antics uh he seems to
01:17:52
be doing this All or Nothing SE that was um I think last season um as well um so
01:17:59
you can see that and I love studying that with sports teams because you know it's 11 players on the pits how do how
01:18:05
do you make these people Jael together um and form a team um hugely important
01:18:12
thing so I agree but but also like imagine if you had 11 new players uh you
01:18:18
know yeah can you even form or Chelsea these days too right um can you even uh
01:18:24
create a culture that way uh or is it something that should be done intentional um I mean if you're growing
01:18:30
a company growing the number of employees by 50% two years in a row most of your employees probably won't have
01:18:36
been here even for a year um it will change things whereas if you make something where it's more of a gradual
01:18:43
change um it will uh it's easier I'm not saying it's trivial but to to kind of
01:18:49
have the same culture um and I think many Founders uh make that mistake when overh high they don't understand the
01:18:56
implication of the culture they just look at sort of more Warm Bodies but it's all these other subtle things that
01:19:02
starts breaking Daniel we've got a closing tradition on this podcast where the last guest leaves a question for the
01:19:07
next guest and I love this question because um you don't like giving advice so this is a perfect one for you um what
01:19:15
is the advice that someone could have but didn't give you at 21 years old that
01:19:22
would have made you more successful at the thing you now
01:19:30
do I
01:19:35
um I think uh we we spoke about it um I've gone through iterations of uh
01:19:42
trying to learn from other people to model that uh huge part of that has been kind of um optimizing for my strengths
01:19:51
and not covering my weaknesses um and I wish um that I um realized much earlier on
01:20:00
that perhaps my superpower is that I'm pretty good allaround her and not
01:20:05
particularly good at anything so I used to think for instance that I had this brilliant um you know model myself on
01:20:11
the Mark Zuckerberg of the world of like I need to run every product meeting I need to be the best product person in
01:20:17
the world just wasn't me and it took me a while to realize that and be comfortable um saying that right um
01:20:25
um but um I I have realized that I do like a lot of different things I love
01:20:31
learning about new things and perhaps that is my superpower uh to realize that
01:20:38
the person who's doing PR that's quite an interesting thing to learn about um there are interesting things about
01:20:44
employment law how that came to be and trying to understand that and you the list goes on and on and on and I love
01:20:51
that um and I wish I would have probably understood that earlier about myself
01:20:58
because that would have allowed myself to uh not model so much on other people but but um somehow U be more
01:21:05
introspective and listen to myself and I think that's really one of the things I I take away from you said
01:21:12
very eloquently is that your proof that entrepreneurs can Buck a number of
01:21:17
different Trends you know and still be wildly successful and that evidence means to someone like me that there's no
01:21:24
such thing as a entrepreneur in terms of how they operate what they're interested
01:21:30
in um and that there's many ways to be a successful entrepreneur and it really
01:21:37
from what you've just said there the most Surefire way of becoming a successful entrepreneur is actually
01:21:42
looking inward versus looking outwards at like oh how does Elon do it or how does Mark do it or how does Daniel do it
01:21:48
yeah um which stays with me a lot because it's really changed my thinking on a few really important things that I
01:21:53
think I've been yeah I've been limit I've been limiting myself on um Daniel thank you so much
01:22:00
thank you so much for having me building such a great business and building a business that that is um I guess it even
01:22:08
though you're number one still embodies the kind of first principal Underdog mentality there's something about
01:22:15
Spotify which is it feels I know you probably don't like this word but I don't know if you do but it feels more
01:22:20
like a family because I've met a lot of the people there and I know a lot of them yeah and they're like really nice
01:22:27
people that are very open books it doesn't feel like a big corporate to me um it's very humble in it in its in its
01:22:33
approach but it's also very ambitious yeah and it strikes that balance really wonder wonderfully well and it's some
01:22:39
it's a company and a brand that I deeply resonate with for that reason it's a wonder wonderful thing and I think um
01:22:45
you know you talked about wanting to do work that brings good to the world the good to the world that Spotify has done
01:22:51
in my view is in quantifiable because I mean music is a is a wonderful thing but
01:22:57
what you're doing now in podcasting as well and how you've really owned and driven that industry forward for people like me to have these longer form more
01:23:03
contextual conversations I think it's hard to measure the good that's done to the world but it's certainly thank you an important one thank you that means a
01:23:10
lot to me and and you're right um you know it's about being humble while doing it but um you know ambition and
01:23:16
humbleness may not seem like they go hand hand in hand and so I think you capture the essence of what we like
01:23:23
Spotify to be at best which is super ambitious but yet hum humble uh with all
01:23:29
of his past success all of that stuff that we're still learning super curious I I've never told the story before but
01:23:34
when I went I went on a trip to Sweden and I was there with some of your colleagues so gustof who's head of product right and Alex who's head of
01:23:42
business everything that makes money and I was there with Shaquille as well who's a good friend and colleague of yours and
01:23:47
has been for a long time Y and they sat me down at a table for for about 30 minutes or an hour yeah and said
01:23:55
you're a podcaster Steve yeah tell us everything we need to know about podcasting how can we make um Spotify
01:24:00
better for you as a podcaster and for the very people at the top of Spotify to sit and listen so intently to me and then to act upon what
01:24:09
I said and then give me feedback weeks later and say okay we're now you know working on this having listened to you it's not something that a big corporate
01:24:17
that was arrogant or very sure of themselves or had lost that mentality whatever do that stayed with me because
01:24:23
it's hard to do that when you get big to really be curious and humble and that's exactly what Spotify is so I wish I wish
01:24:28
you all the luck in the world and I'm sure you won't need it because you've got a wonderful culture of um people and great people around you but just wanted
01:24:34
to say thank you for that well no thank you and I mean again yes we listen but it's also because you are innovating uh
01:24:41
on your side and uh uh with all the aspects even seeing your studio here today it's kind of like bringing it to
01:24:46
the next level so that's that's amazing to see that you're able to do that amazing to bring these conversations to
01:24:52
the world and we all get the benefit to learn from them as well without maybe having the opportunity like you have to
01:24:59
meet all these individuals too and that's going to bring a lot of growth Journeys uh for a lot of people too so
01:25:05
thank you we've got an exciting new sponsor on
01:25:10
this podcast and I couldn't be more excited to announce that we're now working with Shopify and if there's one tool that I use pretty much every single
01:25:17
day in my businesses that is certainly Shopify I'm sure you've all heard about Shopify but for some reason if you
01:25:22
haven't then Shopify is is the Commerce platform that is revolutionizing millions of businesses worldwide whether
01:25:28
you're starting a side hustle a new project with a friend or a global business Shopify has you covered you
01:25:33
guys may know that we recently sold a product on this platform called the davio conversation cards which featured questions from the guests in these
01:25:39
episodes and from start to finish from launching that product we used Shopify a total Game Changer makes life incredibly
01:25:46
incredibly smooth when it relates to business and a tool that my team have absolutely loved using which is not
01:25:51
always the case with technology we couldn't have launched those ation cards without it and if you guys haven't tried Shopify out for yourself then I highly
01:25:58
suggest you do head to shopify.com Bartlet to take your business to the next level today and let me know how you
01:26:05
get on that's shopify.com Bartlet let me know how you get on
01:26:11
[Music]
01:26:24
oh [Music]