Why We Moved to London, The Elon Musk Book, Should You Get An MBA | Ep. 59

0:00 Intro
0:44 We are back!
1:49 We moved to London
7:35 The Elon Musk Book
11:30 Elon's focus on First Principles
13:20 Elon spends a lot of time with engineers
14:40 Most decisions can be turned back
15:24 Why the best engineers want to work for Elon
19:20 Why Elon attracts the good founders
21:27 Elon taking risks
24:24 Should you get an MBA?
37:00 Leave your comments
We are back after the break and we have big news - we moved to London! In this episode, we discuss our move, the new startup scene in London, our new life across the UK, the Elon Musk book, the value of business school, and more. Leave us questions for our next solo episode!
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📷 Follow Aarthi On Instagram: aarthir?hl=en
🐦Follow Aarthi On Twitter: / aarthir

[@rupaash]

Aarthi's candid perspective on MBA is very natural loved it !

[@rupaash]

We have moved countries India to US- back to India and now in UK and worked across the globe and can totally resonate to this PODCAST ! Honestly my experience working & collaborating across teams in APAC & US has been great after moving to UK as I feel I get good overlap time with both zones . I don't do late night meetings trying to catch up with folks in the US as I was in the past from India. Also happy unlearning - Flats,Toilets,Lifts,City center (No malls), & Barbers are fun for sure .Also love the worklife balance which this region offers and getting used to shopping centers and cafes closing at 5...

[@ZZ-ep1vq]

If you want to stay in Tech, the differential an MBA brings is diminished, but for customer/ckient facing or Leadership/strategy roles, the slight polish you get in presentational skills, public speaking, group discussions can make quite a difference.

[@aapkaash]

liked your perspectives & the whole episode, keep 'em coming...

[@sumanthmurthy1642]

I’ve done something very similar to you guys . India -> Canada (age 20) -> UK (age 28). It’s very interesting but I assume for me it’s less of a culture shock since Canada and the UK share many things, both politically and culturally. For instance, both Canada and The UK have universal healthcare. But as you can imagine, the houses are a lot smaller than Canada (and the US). OTOH I don’t have children nor married so am not familiar with the added responsibilities. In terms of weather it’s a sea change (pun intended) since Toronto has frigid winters while The UK is more moderate. You get a very accurate distance gauge when you move to a very smaller place. The time it takes to traverse the Greater Toronto Area is the same time it takes from London to the Midlands. I can empathize with Aarthi. I took GMAT but never used it. Now MBA seems like such a huge investment, especially in this economy. I believe that MBA gives you a unique advantage if you want to break into Consulting, Investment Banking and Private Equity. To run a tech business such as robots or biotech research (what I work on) MBA isn’t that useful. Even the Project managers at my workplace don’t have MBAs. I read somewhere Elon has a standing meeting every week about “Raptor Engine design” so he’s really focused on the engineering when it comes to leadership

[@AarthiAndSriram]

Love this - thank you for the comment. So many people are relating to my thoughts on getting an MBA, it's awesome. -- Aarthi

[@Anita-ls1sb]

Great Episode! Sriram I think you did better than Walter does on podcasts. Your summary was simple to the point and precise (first principles;) and liked how Aarthi summed it up.

[@karagefanboy]

Welcome to London guys! Hope to meet u some day!

[@theimproooooooover]

Thank you Sriram! "Just do the thing"

[@abhishekori]

I like answers which are nuanced, like most things are always grey. I think Aarthi's answer put things in context about MBA topic. New sub! looking forward to the next one.

[@AarthiAndSriram]

Thank you very much! -- Aarthi

[@jeroldpereira2584]

Good episode! MBAs will have to adapt to newer AI resilient skills as many 'traditional' courses will become increasingly redundant as AI becomes more embedded into the workplace. An interesting space to watch!

[@jaythakkar7518]

This week a background thought in my head has been about doing an MBA. I appreciate your your advice. Thanks!

[@balajiminnaloommudali8483]

Welcome to the London!

[@mariappanthiraviam8433]

Future episode topic suggestion - Can one plan one's career path right up to the summit i.e., the C-Suite? Is it worthwhile to do this planning or just go with the flow with an eye on the ultimate prize?!

[@jaythakkar7518]

I would love to hear about how to deal with feeling like an imposter when trying to even think about starting a company. How do you learn on the fly if you are a founder and this is your first startup? How do you learn and grow quickly to make sure you can keep up with the asks of being a founder?

[@creativemind6282]

Great podcast

[@thebedoi4462]

Feedback on the setup. I would zoom out a little and it feels like you are looking down the whole time instead of straight at the camera. Looking forward to Desi food reviews.

[@AarthiAndSriram]

Yes we are fixing this our next episode ( our thoughts exactly !)

[@thebedoi4462]

Good luck for your next chapter. Looking forward to seeing your future shows. 🙂@@AarthiAndSriram ☘

[@santhoshs7227]

Came to comment this as a suggestion but happy that you folks have noticed it already and going to correct it :)

[@johnpence6957]

Thank you both for the MBA comments.

[@AarthiAndSriram]

Thank you! -- Aarthi

[@Edwin-nl3qu]

Welcome to the UK! Its funny, most of us are trying get to America and you guys just pulled the ultimate contrarian (Kieth Rabois) move. 😂 On the good side, you guys will find the city to be exceptionally managed (relatively speaking) and the tube will definitely be a treat! Also be sure to enjoy the parks and all the walking opportunities. On the other hand, my condolences for the weather and its downstream effects. People vibes wildly fluctuates based on the weather here.

[@sejalrekhan]

Would love for you guys to cover art of networking in an episode

[@rupaash]

Will add my thoughts on the other aspects of the podcast soon !

[@chan90s]

Started a startup, spent time with amazing MBA grads.. I'd say do an MBA but don't make getting top tier MBA your life

[@billyjoe2322]

You must have eaten at Dishoom by now right? Any upcoming event Aarthi is at in London soon to meet him?

[@adamkasprowicz]

a16z? Wow, congratz!

[@bacool]

Good episode: didn’t Uk FCA just insistiré severe crypto marketing restrictions? How will this affect a16z crypto UK office and local portcos? London is awesome and thanks for the MBA comments

[@exploring238]

Can you do an episode on how you both manage your time and schedules? What are your guiding principles? My wife and I are a working couple with an 18 month old in Seattle. My wife, who works for Amazon, needs to be in the office 5 days a week. I on the other hand manage a product line for Salesforce and work from home with teams across time-zones. We’re feeling a serious need for having a rigorous daily schedule. Would love to know how you do it all from cooking, to reading books, managing a beautiful podcast channel, shaping a nice career, networking while also spending quality time with kids.

[@AarthiAndSriram]

First of all, major props to both of you for working so hard to figure it all out between kids and work and life. It’s not easy, and I have a lot of empathy. We’ll definitely do an episode on this to talk through what works for us and what we’ve learned so far. Thanks for leaving a comment! - Aarthi

[@ibuild01]

Is Dishoom still what's up as far as Indian food in London goes? Regency Cafe is great for a full English breakfast and featured in Yelp's 2013 award for the fifth best place to eat in London.

[@AM-ct2ih]

Your podcast is really boring

[@AbhishekNirman-cw2eb]

These guys work diligently very hard while managing their families and work. Hailing from a tier 3 town in India, I can confidently say that I gain valuable exposure by listening to them. It's pretty interesting to me and worthwhile. More power to Sriram and Aarthi!

[@ramkeshverma2664]

@@AbhishekNirman-cw2eb I can't agree more on the same!

[@AM-ct2ih]

Good for you for gaining "valuable exposure", but still the podcast is pretty boring @@AbhishekNirman-cw2eb

[@AarthiAndSriram]

Thank you very much! -- Aarthi

[@AM-ct2ih]

Don't thank me, fix it! Make it entertaining.@@AarthiAndSriram

[@prashanthgurunath1703]

Hey Guys. This is Prashanth Gurunath. I am an entrepreneur and I used to run a startup in Chennai. I moved to the UK in 2021 to pursue my MS and I worked at Google, London and I work at JPMC, Glasgow now. I would love to catch up with you guys sometime. I'm a big fan of the videos and interviews and it has helped me a lot. Would love to have a good conversation about technology, work culture, building companies and products etc. How can I contact you guys?

[@mdny7788]

Just saying hi… “hi”

[@tir0__]

1st comment ☺️👌🏻