About this episode
How far would you travel for a good conversation? For hosts Tyler Hogge and Sterling Snow it was a no brainer to fly 2000 miles to talk with Kaz Nejatian, the COO of Shopify in their Toronto HQ. Kaz is a fascinating mind in tech and an unconventional thinker shaping the the product culture of Shopify. He shares his story of growing up in Iran, experiencing the Iran-Iraq war, and eventually immigrating to Canada at age 12. In Canada, Kaz gets even deeper into his fascination with computers and goes onto found a YC company, run a product line at Meta and now acts as the COO and Product Evangelist at multi-billion dollar company Shopify. Tyler and Sterling find out why Shopify employees have no meetings, how big tech companies are doing product wrong, and why Shopify's unique culture will create a 100 year company that just keeps getting bigger. Chapters: 01:50 - Kaz's Childhood in Iran and Fleeing to Canada06:49 - Hot Takes on Current Protests on College Campuses 07:55 - Early Exposure To Computers and Path To Tech11:17 - The Best Product Managers Are Weird People13:30 - "I Cannot Take An Average Person And Train Them To Be A PM" 21:25 - How Shopify Is Different Than Other Big Companies31:00 - How Kaz Killed Meetings At Shopify37:30 - Write Code And Talk To Users, Do That Over And Over Again43:39 - Why Getting Married Will Be Your Best Career Accelerant50:00 - Wrap Up questions57:25 - Tyler & Sterling's Recap_________________________Connect With Kazhttps://x.com/canadakazKaz@shopify.com Connect With Tyler & Sterlinghttps://x.com/thoggehttps://x.com/sterlingmsnowFollow The I/O Podcast (New Episodes Monthly) https://x.com/IO__podcasthttps://www.youtube.com/channel/UCayuY0VO95kQTUXJvh9T0oQhttps://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-investor-operator-io-podcast/id1678642609https://open.spotify.com/show/0J92LTLgpHe8C0CzEaCBDG
