Name: AMD CEO On Leading a Turnaround: Pragmatism and Patience
Uploaded: 2019-11-13
Duration: 6 min 51 s
Description: CEO Lisa Su turned AMD from a money loser to a tech powerhouse and earned a spot on Fortune’s list of the World’s Greatest Leaders.

[ MUSIC ] Lisa, it's been five years since you became CEO of AMD and this has been your first time holding a CEO job and you've accomplished so much in this past five years. As you look at your leadership accomplishment, what would you say is the most important lesson that you've learned? I started with an engineering background so becoming CEO was different. My focus used to be on products and customers and business. And you know, being CEO has been much more on the softer things like communicating well and being direct and being simple in What we tell people you know what our objectives are, How hard was that for you? It was a transition. I think the hardest part is realizing how personal it is to, you know, be CEO of a company and how I focused on things would translate. You have a fascinating background, you came to the United States from Taiwan when you were two years old. Your father is a mathematician. Your mother is an accountant and entrepreneur. They were big believers in studying the sciences, and steered you into this engineering path. And you eventually Went on to MIT where you got your PhD. How did those growing up years and that educational pathway that you took shape you and lead you to where you are today? Well, I think my parents were always extremely supportive of me with notion that I could do whatever I want. And so when you start with that notion you really start To believe you can do whatever you want. And they also instilled all of the key disciplines like hardwork and humility and really recognizing that if you do the right things, you'll be recognized with them. Was there any special advise that they gave you as you were growing up that still guides you today. Always be more patient education is a great thing, really learning as much as you can and and that's really you know, what I focused on is always trying to learn in any job that I'm in, you know, really trying to continue to learn every day. I want to pick up on something you said a moment ago that when you were tapped a CEO, you were considered more of an engineer and a manager rather than a leader. But here you are now in the elite group of women who are running fortune 500 companies >> Fortune named you as one of the world's 50 greatest leaders. What changed? What did you do differently? My key trait is determination and determination meaning there's no problem that can't be solved. If you really put your mind to it and there's no problem that we can't solve as a team if you really put your mind to it. I think we've been able to translate that to, to our employees, which, you know, contributes to a lot of our success. You turned things around at AMD when you came in. A lot of people didn't think the company was. It's gonna survive, it was losing money, it was losing market share, it was cash strapped. The stock was trading at $ 2, now its $ 32 which is remarkable. As you look back what was the most important thing you did from a leadership point of view, that allowed you to successfully turns things around? When you think about large companies we often do so many different things You really need to be clear on what's most important. We really focused on products first and foremost. Customer second, and then simplifying everything that we do, and that has translated Well. That sounds like what every company says that they're supposed to do. Focus on product. What did you do on a leadership part that. Made this amazing turnaround. You're right, every company might say it but the question is do you really live it, and living it means I would spend a lot of time with the engineers on their products. And having them described to me, where are you? Why are you there? Where should we be? Spending a lot of time with customers? I would say, hey, look, we need to be In that particular customer and I'm gonna personally go see them, you know, every month until they give us, a shot at that particular opportunity. And so it's really living it that I think is important. Turnarounds are hard and what was the hardest part for you and how did you work through it? The first year as CEO was difficult, you go through your three month honeymoon period. And then after another three months, you're like, wow, this is harder than I thought it was going to be. We know what we're good at. And if we play our game, not play somebody else's game, we will get to, sort of the revenue growth product capability you've told me in the past about your 5 % rule. Telling employees do each better each quarter even by just 5 %. And it catually worked, what made you think to take increamental steps so often a new CEO was to make a big bold statement. There are a lot of bold statements that can be made We knew what we had to do, we just needed to execute much much better and one of my other philosophy is do what you say you're gonna do and it's so important to build a track record of execution along with the big you know, I'm gonna change the world, you also have to have that track record of execution and so the next 5 % is just about just Execute a little bit better next time around. People who know you well say that you're very pragmatic, how has that shaped your approach to decision making and also to leadership. When you're in a tech company, there are many decisions that you make in terms of investments, do you invest more ahead of the curve. One of the things that was most important to me when I took over as CEO Was I didn't want to do another layoff. I did one layoff in 2015. And I said, going forward, we're going to make sure that the company is very, very well managed and we will invest as we grow the. The company versus you know, I'm going to change the world tomorrow. And so yes, I'm going to lose money today such that I can make money tomorrow. We know it takes many steps to turn around a company. It takes many steps to build a roadmap. And we follow it you know step by step and when we started our new processor line, we said we know it will take us three steps and we're gonna do the first step we're gonna make significant changes and the next step will make incremental changes and the third step we will be at leadership. And we very much followed that. Here we are at Fortune's most powerful women conference where many women come here to learn from successful people like you on how they too can rise to run a Fortune 500 company. What's the best advice you would give them? Dream big, but take your career and steps, with each step that you take, you will learn more and sometimes you won't be successful. But if you keep your focus on what your big dream is, you will get there. And it's about doing a great job in whatever job you're doing at a given time. [ BLANK_AUDIO ]

AMD CEO On Leading a Turnaround: Pragmatism and Patience

Leadership

CEO Lisa Su turned AMD from a money loser to a tech powerhouse and earned a spot on Fortune’s list of the World’s Greatest Leaders. 