Today after having class in the morning and discussing the Waze case, we were fortunate to hear from one of the co-founders of Waze, Uri Levine. Seeing him clad in athletic clothing and sneakers, everyone was at first unsure if this was actually one of the co-founders of a more than billion dollar company.
Guest Blogger: Jackson is a sophomore at Washington University in St. Louis
Rest assured, he was. We later learned that Uri biked to IDC to speak to us. In fact, I think this informality, along with his laid-back, almost nonchalant temperament is what most impressed me and what I liked the most about him. This is because, although he definitely does impress, he doesn’t feel the need to do so, often mentioning that everything that he was saying was only his opinion and not to be taken for the final word. That said, I learned much from Uri that I hope to apply to my future work.
With Waze app, you can see other friends also driving to your destination, when you connect to Facebook. Coordinate everyone’s arrival times when you pick up or meet up with friends.
The first lesson relates to the initial steps to a start-up. Specifically, you need to a have a dream or passion about your start-up. Being an entrepreneur is extremely difficult, full of ups and downs, and is never a sure thing. So, it’s very important that you are pursuing your start-up for the right reasons, rather than to chase money. As Uri put it, you need to “fall in love” with your idea.
In addition, you need to find a solution for many users with a problem, and your solution needs to be “big.” In order to determine if your idea is big enough, you should ask yourself: Who will be out of business when I succeed? If you don’t know, the idea is simply not big enough. This notion was very meaningful to me, as my first thought would be that you would want to start small and be realistic. However, he said that when you think big, you have much more drive to accomplish your goals, even if you don’t get there right away.
Next, I learned a great deal about leadership. First, not everyone is best suited to be a leader in a company. Although Uri co-founded Waze, he said that he knew himself well enough to know that he wouldn’t be the right CEO. However, because he told us to reach high, I took some valuable advice away. That is, if you are ever CEO of a company, ego management is critical. As a leader of a company, it’s important not to let your ego get in the way of what is best for your company and its shareholders. In addition, it’s vital to be the type of leader that you would like to follow. This can’t be overlooked, as leaders of companies play huge roles not only in decision-making, but also the overall morale of the workers.
I could go on and on about what I learned from Uri, but these were a couple of the bigger takeaways. Near the end of his visit, I asked him why he decided to sell and leave Waze instead of either continuing to grow it with his team or joining Google once it sold. He responded by saying that he left in order to build a new startup because “this is what entrepreneurs do.” To me, Uri is a role model for any aspiring entrepreneur, and his advice will most certainly be something that I’ll never forget.
*Waze is the world’s largest community-based traffic and navigation app. Join other drivers in your area who share real-time traffic and info, saving everyone time and gas money on their daily commute.
