Daniel Ek, Spotify | David Senra

David Senra 0:00 [upbeat music] So I wanna consider this conversation like a continuation of the conversation we had last year-

Daniel Ek 0:08 Right

David Senra 0:08 ... in New York. It was by far the most impactful conversation I had the entire year.

Daniel Ek 0:13 Wow.

David Senra 0:13 It is, in large part, the reason we're sitting down and actually recording this conversation. And what I loved was, I was th- I thought about how the advice you gave and the stories you told, uh, really fundamentally changed my approach to my work, and then also, like, my philosophy of how I'm living my life.

Daniel Ek 0:31 Wow.

David Senra 0:31 And because you- it's, it's very rare, like, this year I'm gonna hit over four hundred biographies, uh, read for the podcast, right? And somebody asked me recently, he's like: "Do you ever u- uncover new ideas?"

Daniel Ek 0:40 Mm.

David Senra 0:40 It's like, no, I feel like I'm telling the same story, the same personality type over, and over, and over again.

Daniel Ek 0:44 Mm.

David Senra 0:44 And you'll get a, a new idea or a novel idea, you know, every once in a while, but certainly not-

Daniel Ek 0:48 Right

David Senra 0:48 ... all the time.

Daniel Ek 0:49 Yeah.

David Senra 0:49 But you shared something at the dinner-

Daniel Ek 0:51 Mm

David Senra 0:51 ... that was a truly novel idea. And then a few months later, I read this interview, and I was like, "Oh, I'm not the only one-

Daniel Ek 0:58 Mm

David Senra 0:58 ... that Daniel's advice changed their career." So I'm gonna read something. There was an interview given by the CEO of Uber-

Daniel Ek 1:05 Mm

David Senra 1:05 ... who's a friend of yours, Dara.

Daniel Ek 1:06 Yeah.

David Senra 1:06 And I'm gonna read this excerpt, which was absolutely perfect, and he was talking about, uh, contemplating, "Should I take this job or not?"

Daniel Ek 1:14 Mm.

David Senra 1:14 Like, this is a huge opportunity, but also, like, kinda

David Senra 1:17 scary. And this is tied to your idea that you should optimize for impact over happiness.

Daniel Ek 1:22 Mm.

David Senra 1:22 Which is very- I haven't heard anybody else, uh, articulate that. And so Dara says, "I was reading about all the issues happening in- with Uber in the news, the various challenges that were coming up there. So when I first got the call to be the CEO, I said, 'Heck, no! I'm not crazy. I'm not up for this.'"

Daniel Ek 1:35 Mm.

David Senra 1:35 "But I had one particular conversation that really shifted me, which was with Daniel Ek, who's a good friend. And I still remember, I was talking to him about my career at Expedia and how happy I was, and he looks at me..." And he did this to me, too. "And he looks at me, and he goes, 'Since when is life about happiness? It's about impact. You can have an impact on Uber, which is a really important company in the world that's shaping the future of cities.' And I thought, thought to myself, 'My God, this is so obvious. I've got to take a shot.' I knew it was going to be uncomfortable." Can you just explain how you think about optimizing for impact over happiness, and why?

Daniel Ek 2:12 Well, [chuckles] it, it- first off, it's, it's incredibly kind of Dara to say that. Um, you know, I, I, I think about this: I think happiness is a trailing indicator of impact.

David Senra 2:23 Mm-hmm.

Daniel Ek 2:24 And, uh, I think it can be, you know, you can feel happiness in small bursts, in small moments, uh, and you can have a lot of variance in your life. So you can choose to have that part, which is the ups, the downs of life, et cetera. So I'm not saying you can't have happiness, but I think truly sustained happiness comes from, uh, impact. And impact is something that's deeply personal to you. Uh, only you can define what impact means for you. Um, so I think it means different things for different people, but I do think it's a trailing, um, indicator. So the way I, I, you know, I, I would put it in this case is, you know, what was obvious for me, uh, with someone like a Dara, uh, was he was content, he wasn't happy. And, um, you know, he had gone through a phase, uh, knowing him for a while, where, uh, he had a lot of ups and downs with Expedia and all that stuff, and, and he'd kind of mostly figured it out, and so he was content. And I think that in his case, you know, where he was at in his life, um, it was such an obvious thing that he didn't even realize that he'd just grown content. And so, for me, um, you know, Uber is a very special company, and to be- even be asked to be the CEO of that, and the impact I knew he could have on that company, just felt to me like an obvious thing.

David Senra 3:50 Mm-hmm.

Daniel Ek 3:51 And so, um, I, I, I sort of advised him to, "Hey, you should go, go for this." Um, uh, "And, and that's a far greater thing, and that's gonna be f- far- will lead to more, much more happiness, not just for you, but also for other people."

David Senra 4:08 Did somebody do that for you? Did somebody tell you to optimize for impact over happiness, or is this just you, the way you, you work?

Daniel Ek 4:15 I think I self-motivate myself that way-

David Senra 4:17 Okay

Daniel Ek 4:18 ... to do the hard things. Um, you know, like many other people, I'm, I'm quite lazy by nature. Uh, I try to take the simple road out, uh, often enough. Um, but what I've learned, um, that has given me the greatest joy is, is overcoming the biggest adversities. And overcoming the biggest adversities usually has been solving, um, a problem of some kind, uh, for someone or something that no one else had been able to figure out. And for me, that's my definition of impact. And, uh, it's not right there at the moment that I feel that. Uh, actually, many cases, I feel it much longer, but it's when I go back and I reflect, um, on accomplishments, uh, or moments of impact, then I feel true happiness. And so, um, I've, I've, I've just grown to kind of like self, uh, motivate myself constantly. And I, I think this, by the way, kind of comes from, like, a much deeper thing, right? Like, I, I came from, like, pretty much what was The Project in Sweden, and I, I was not the normal kid. Um, you know, I was kind of probably a middle-of-the-pack kind of kid, but I certainly stood out. I didn't belong to any social group. There was no social cohesion, et cetera.

David Senra 5:40 So wait, you felt like an outsider, even at that age?

Daniel Ek 5:42 Oh, yeah.

David Senra 5:42 Do you still today?

Daniel Ek 5:43 Yeah. E- e- every moment of my life, uh, even among other fellow entrepreneurs, I sometimes feel like an outsider because, like, right now, for instance, you and I, we're in Silicon Valley.

David Senra 5:54 Yeah.

Daniel Ek 5:54 I'm not American. Um, so there's, um, a, an element of myself where I don't belong to the club.

David Senra 6:00 Mm-hmm.

Daniel Ek 6:00 And I've always felt that way.... and because I've always felt that way, I've had to- I, I, I can't take lessons from other people 100%, because some of my story, some of my conditions, some of the waves, the structures, even how to structure a company, you have to structure differently if you're a European company versus an American company. So you have to go back to sort of first principles and kind of find the sort of principled answer to, to anything, and what works for you. And so I've had to kind of self-motivate myself for most of my life. Um, and, and only I would say in the last maybe five years, I've come to realize that, um, you know, in a way, um, I may be a better coach than I am a player. And so I've kind of understood more and more that actually, that sort of drive, that intensity, um, is, is actually something that can be taught. It's not entirely innate, and it's about almost letting people know that that's okay. Um, and, and so much of that comes from those types of conversations. It's about almost reflecting back. It's not about sort of me projecting onto other people what I think they should do, but in, in listening to Dara, it was just so obvious to me when he kind of explained, because, you know, the conversation started with us talking about Uber, and I said, "I recommended you, uh, to the job." [laughing] And he said, uh, "Oh, really? Yeah, I just didn't take the, the call even."

David Senra 7:25 Mm.

Daniel Ek 7:25 And I was like: "Well, why not?" Uh, and he was like: "Well, I'm really happy about this thing," and, and I was, like, listening, and I actually just let him keep talking. And the more he, he, he spoke, the more obvious it became. He, he was content. He, he lived in- he, he was, he was running on the- d- downshifted down to the easy gear. Life was good-

David Senra 7:45 Yeah

Daniel Ek 7:45 ... it was really easy. But there was an element of him, and you could hear it in his voice, uh, where he's sort of like: "Okay, well, you know, you've always been running on a higher gear. Do you wanna, you know, gear up even more to an extreme level? Why aren't you gonna go for greatness? Why aren't you gonna test yourself? Because if you succeed, this could be huge, and you really don't get many of these chances in your life." And so much of the conversation was really around, around that, but with another person, I might have given a totally different piece of advice. So I don't think it's a universal truth, but I do think the universal truth is that happiness trails impact. But impact is something that's highly unique. It could be something innate in you, it could be having impact on other people, it could be, uh, you know, having impact by being a great father around your kids. I, I don't pretend to know that I think that there's one game to play or one universal truth to life, but I certainly believe from entrepreneurial types that, um, probably more to myself, that, uh, more like myself, that, you know, this is sort of a, one of those sort of key things, is really consider impact.

David Senra 8:58 One of the things I admire most about Daniel Ek is his relentless dedication to improving his craft and to improving his product. It's a mission that he's still on nearly two decades later. It'd be impossible to argue that Spotify isn't one of the most well-crafted products ever created, and Daniel and his team's dedication to constantly improving their product reminds me a lot of my friend Kareem, who's the co-founder and CTO of Ramp. Kareem is one of the greatest technical minds working in finance. I spent a lot of time talking to Kareem, and every single conversation centers around his obsession with crafting a high-quality product and using the latest technology to constantly create better experiences for his customers. Kareem and Daniel both believe that nothing is ever good enough and that everything can always be improved. Kareem is running one of the most talented technical teams in finance, and they use rapid, relentless iteration to make their product better every day. So far this year, Ramp has shipped over three hundred new features. Ramp is completely committed to using AI to make a better experience for their customers and automate as much of your business's finances as possible. In fact, Kareem just wrote this: "AI is all I think about these days. It is our duty to be first movers and push limits so we can make the greatest possible product experience for our customers." Ramp uses a combination of craftsmanship and rapid iteration to invent new products for their customers. Many of the fastest-growing and most innovative companies in the world are running their business on Ramp. Make sure you go to ramp.com to learn how they can help your business save time and money. Let AI chase your receipts and close your books, so you can use your time and energy building great things for your customers, because at the end of the day, that is what this is all about, building a product or service that makes someone else's life better. That is what I'm trying to do, that is what Daniel Ek has dedicated his life to doing, and that is what Ramp has done, too. Get started today by going to ramp.com. You mentioned you thought some people don't go for impact because they're content. When was the last time-- Like, you're definitely not content now, right? So I've gotten to know you once. We've talked for hours and hours and hours, and this is why I wanted you to be the first person I had this conversation with. And, uh, and, like, and I was curious if you could say that. It's like, no, no, I know you have this, like, inner burning desire and fire inside of you-

Daniel Ek 11:10 Mm-hmm

David Senra 11:10 ... which is, to me, your outside i- is like, you're very calm, you're very articulate, and you're very polite-

Daniel Ek 11:15 Yeah

David Senra 11:15 ... but you have that, like-- You, the same thing I read in these books all the time. It's just like, this person was, had a burning desire to achieve mission success [chuckles] -

Daniel Ek 11:22 Yeah, yeah

David Senra 11:23 ... is the way, yeah, is the way I think about it.

Daniel Ek 11:24 Yeah.

David Senra 11:25 Were you content after you sold your first company? You were, like, twenty-two, twenty-three.

Daniel Ek 11:28 Well, uh, content is the right word. I wasn't happy. Uh-

David Senra 11:31 Yeah

Daniel Ek 11:31 ... so I was content for a moment of time. I was twenty-two. Um, I never had much, much success with, with women, uh, because I was a computer geek, and back then, uh, computers was not the coolest thing, uh, in the world. And, um, you know, so I, I was like: "Okay, well, now I've got all this money," and, uh, you know, this, this was my worldview. "I, I can go out in nightclubs, and I'm gonna be the cool guy." [laughing] Um, and I had fun for a while-

David Senra 11:56 Yeah

Daniel Ek 11:56 ... I'll tell you that. But, um, it also was incredibly, um, hollowing because, uh, you know, I realized that these girls, uh, weren't with me because of me. Uh, they were with me because, you know, I had status, and I was able to, uh, use money to buy status, uh, and be a cool guy, and for a small, uh, moment of time. And so, um,... that taught me a lot, right? And, and actually, you know, I kind of walked away for over a year not doing anything at all, um, and just sort of deeply reflecting on life, uh, what I wanted to do, because for me, you know, I had a magic, um, number, which was 10 million. If I got that number, I would retire. That was the goal, and I was thinking to myself-

David Senra 12:42 How old were you when you came up with that number?

Daniel Ek 12:44 Probably 15.

David Senra 12:45 Okay.

Daniel Ek 12:45 Um, you know, someone gave me, like, this book, uh, Rich Dad, Poor Dad, I think. [laughing]

David Senra 12:51 [laughing]

Daniel Ek 12:51 Uh, I read it-

David Senra 12:52 I think everybody gets it at the same age.

Daniel Ek 12:53 Yeah.

David Senra 12:54 [laughing]

Daniel Ek 12:54 I read it. It was, like, really seminal, uh, for me.

David Senra 12:57 Yeah.

Daniel Ek 12:57 So, so I kind of made that number. Um, I figured to myself, if I worked really hard, I could get there when I was 40. Uh-

David Senra 13:04 [laughing]

Daniel Ek 13:04 ... I was 22 when I-

David Senra 13:06 Yeah

Daniel Ek 13:06 ... got there. Um, and so that wasn't really part of the plan, right? And, and so I, I, um, I kind of like, "Okay, well, what's next? What am I gonna do?" Um, because I didn't have to work for money.

David Senra 13:18 Were you depressed? When you don't, you, you don't have your company anymore, you sold it. You have the number you thought it was gonna take you two d- you know, till four decades to reach. You reach it now.

Daniel Ek 13:26 Yeah.

David Senra 13:26 You're going to the clubs. You're realizing these people aren't any my friends.

Daniel Ek 13:29 Yeah.

David Senra 13:29 They don't care about me at all.

Daniel Ek 13:31 Yeah.

David Senra 13:31 I'm-- there's no impact I'm making on the world.

Daniel Ek 13:33 Yeah.

David Senra 13:33 I'm just consuming. I'm not producing anything.

Daniel Ek 13:35 Yeah.

David Senra 13:35 This is something I talk about all the time. Like, I think we've-- sometimes we have a sick culture where, like, people, especially on social media, they glorify, like, consumption.

Daniel Ek 13:41 Mm.

David Senra 13:41 It's like, I don't care, I don't care what you consume.

Daniel Ek 13:43 Yeah.

David Senra 13:43 I care what you produce. You should be proud not that you have the money to buy an expensive thing. What did you make? 'Cause the, the way I think about this all the time, which is always fascinating, how many times this comes up in the biographies, and for hundreds of years. People constantly think like, "Oh, we've reached the end. There's no more opportunity." And just- and every single time humans keep saying it's like, "There, we can't... There's, this is gonna be the last company. This is gonna be the last technological shift-

Daniel Ek 14:04 Yeah

David Senra 14:04 ... This is gonna be the last invention." And the, the best description of a business I've ever heard came from Richard Branson, and he said, "All a business is, is an idea to make somebody else's life better."

Daniel Ek 14:12 Mm-hmm.

David Senra 14:12 And if you look at it like that, it's like then you have infinite possibilities and opportunities all the time-

Daniel Ek 14:16 Hundred percent

David Senra 14:16 ... 'cause there's infinite small and large ways to make other people's lives better.

Daniel Ek 14:20 Hundred percent.

David Senra 14:20 You weren't, at that time, making anybody else's life better.

Daniel Ek 14:23 Yeah.

David Senra 14:23 You were just

David Senra 14:24 kind of consuming.

Daniel Ek 14:24 Yep.

David Senra 14:24 Like, would you consider yourself depressed, or would you consider yourself-

Daniel Ek 14:27 Yeah, I w- it's probably the most depressed I've been in my life, to be honest, because, you know, I, I, I knew from a very young age, uh, what I wanted to do, and it was unlike most other people that I grew up with. Uh, I just knew I wanted to build things. Um-

David Senra 14:41 You were doing that when you were, like, 14, right?

Daniel Ek 14:43 Yeah, but it started, like, even earlier than that. I just didn't know it was called a company.

David Senra 14:47 Yeah.

Daniel Ek 14:47 I had no idea what finances were or VC or any of these things, but I was just building things, and I knew I loved computers, and I knew I wanted to do that, and I, I knew I would make a living, uh, doing that somehow.

David Senra 14:59 This is another thing that, like, drives me insane 'cause I, I hear, like, other people's, um, like, advice to entrepreneurs, which I, I hate.

Daniel Ek 15:07 Yeah.

David Senra 15:07 I think it's, like, terrible.

Daniel Ek 15:08 Yeah.

David Senra 15:08 Like, we shouldn't have an entrepreneurial ecosystem, especially 'cause most of the media that entrepreneurs are consuming are actually from investors, and you have wildly different incentive structure-

Daniel Ek 15:14 Yeah

David Senra 15:14 ... and everything else, and it just conflicts with a lot of stuff that's in the biographies, and I'll just go with those guys-

Daniel Ek 15:18 Yeah

David Senra 15:18 ... over anybody else, right? And they're always just like, yeah, you know, uh, my, my belief is something that I repeat on Murder, and this maxim, that belief comes before ability.

Daniel Ek 15:25 Mm-hmm.

David Senra 15:25 It's in these stories every single time you have somebody... Like, I, I just re- reread the, the biography, the autobiography of the founder of Sony.

Daniel Ek 15:32 Mm.

David Senra 15:33 Akio at the time was, "We're gonna start this company-

Daniel Ek 15:35 Yeah

David Senra 15:36 ... in 1946."

Daniel Ek 15:37 Yeah.

David Senra 15:38 "In Tokyo-

Daniel Ek 15:39 Yeah

David Senra 15:39 ... that's occupied by the Americans, that is completely, has been firebombed."

Daniel Ek 15:44 Yep.

David Senra 15:44 Right? He's passing, he's going to work, and he's passing just burnt-out rubble, millions of homes of Japanese.

Daniel Ek 15:50 Yeah.

David Senra 15:50 More than half the population has left the city. They start what turns out to be Sony, which is one of the, one of the most successful and influential companies of all time, in a burned-out department store. One of my favorite anecdotes in the book is they, they need to have umbrellas on their desks because when it rains, [chuckles] it comes through the roof.

Daniel Ek 16:07 Oh, wow. Yeah.

David Senra 16:07 Right? And yet in his book, he says, "I don't have a problem saying even then I knew I had potential-

Daniel Ek 16:15 Yeah

David Senra 16:15 ... and I could be great, and I could do great things."

Daniel Ek 16:17 Yep.

David Senra 16:17 He had the belief before the ability. You said, "I didn't even know it was called entrepreneurship-

Daniel Ek 16:22 Yeah

David Senra 16:22 ... and I'm starting to build things." And

David Senra 16:24 this is the question I have for you: When did you know you were good?

Daniel Ek 16:28 Uh, [exhales] I, uh, I don't know that I'm good. I know I'm different, and, um, the... um, but I have this sort of insane belief that I can get good i- if I try hard enough.

David Senra 16:44 Mm-hmm.

Daniel Ek 16:45 Um, and I still feel that way, by the way, like, uh, because the, the comparative sets has changed, right? Like, you know, uh, it, it was from everyone in my school, maybe in the early days, to everyone in Stockholm, um, some- somewhat la- uh, later, to everyone in Europe at some point, and now it's like the most brilliant entrepreneurs of our time, uh, that I'm constantly comparing myself to, and obviously I don't believe that I'm as good as them. Um, but I believe I am slightly different than them in some ways, and, um, I believe that, um, if I work really, really hard on something, I can make something really great, and that's the sort of bar that I keep for myself. And, um, uh, for me, it, it really stems also from sort of this notion back to what you were talking about, about, um, sort of the realization that, uh, through computers, right? Steve Jobs has, has the saying, uh, "It's the bicycle of our mind," which was really how I felt about computers, like, growing up. It's just this magic tool that allows me to solve so many other things and create things.

David Senra 17:54 That's how I feel about podcasts. [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 17:57 Yeah. And, um, and, and, and so, you know, I knew I wanted to do that, and I also knew that, um, you know, my co-founder, Martin, he, he has this, uh, thing he keeps saying, "The, the value of a company is the sum of all problems solved." And so wh- what I keep doing is essentially, I've got this toolbox called a computer, um, and I got all these problems around the world. Which problems am, am I passionate about solving?... and which problems can I spend the next decade of my life, um, fixing? Because if, if I'm not interested enough in it to spend a decade fixing it, it's probably not worth pursuing.

David Senra 18:35 This is, like, something I'm super passionate about, because, you know, if you really think about it, like, they don't write biographies about people that, like, start, scale, sell a company, and do it for, like, five years.

Daniel Ek 18:44 Yeah.

David Senra 18:44 I'm not interested in that.

Daniel Ek 18:45 Yeah.

David Senra 18:45 I, I don't- like, I'm, I'm not interested in your startup-

Daniel Ek 18:47 Yeah

David Senra 18:47 ... I'm interested in your last company.

Daniel Ek 18:48 Yeah.

David Senra 18:48 I'm interested in something you're gonna do for the rest of your life.

Daniel Ek 18:51 Yeah.

David Senra 18:52 And this is what I draw inspiration off of, is just, like, going back to what you said earlier about, uh, impact and, and contentment, and how, like, you're willing to go into an area where it's like you know it's difficult.

Daniel Ek 19:02 Mm.

David Senra 19:03 I love what Jeff Bezos said about this. He's just like, he was... He tells the pe- he used to tell people in Amazon at the very beginning, he's like, "We're trying to build something that we can be proud of, something that we can tell our grandkids about."

Daniel Ek 19:14 Mm.

David Senra 19:15 Anything that you're gonna be proud to tell your grandkids about is not going to be easy.

Daniel Ek 19:18 Right.

David Senra 19:18 So we're going into this with, you know, he gave himself, like, a 30% chance-

Daniel Ek 19:22 Yeah

David Senra 19:22 ... of success.

Daniel Ek 19:22 Yeah.

David Senra 19:23 I think at the beginning of Spotify, you know, you guys are like, "Hey, we're gonna- I might have to get a job after this-

Daniel Ek 19:27 Yeah

David Senra 19:27 ... but I have to do this."

Daniel Ek 19:28 Yeah.

David Senra 19:29 Like, it is inside of me.

Daniel Ek 19:30 Yeah.

David Senra 19:31 There's a bunch of people that say the reason they joined Spotify in the early days is because Daniel would teach us and tell us that he's building for the long term.

Daniel Ek 19:38 Yeah.

David Senra 19:39 So there had to be acquisition offers early on.

Daniel Ek 19:41 Sure.

David Senra 19:42 And did you ever consider them, like-

Daniel Ek 19:45 Well, I, I considered them, but not for money. Um, I considered them because I already had, uh, the money that I thought I needed in my life, uh, right? And, and that was an incredibly powerful position to be in. It was freeing me of a lot, a lot of constraints. And, uh, for me, it was more, you know, as, as we got approach, it was always about, can this thing further our mission? And if I truly believed that, that there would have been a company that could further our mission and cared about what we cared about as much as we did, I probably would have sold. Uh, but I never found that. And because I didn't find that, um, I- we just kept going. And, um, it wasn't obvious to me, uh, that this would be, like, um, something I would do for 20 years, I'll tell you that. Um, but what I did, did know is that, you know, I came from doing lots of projects beforehand. Um, and so sort of, um, you know, we talked about the one company I did sell, but I... That was, like, my fourth or fifth one. So I'd been doing a bunch of other things, and I was doing many things in parallel. And-

David Senra 20:48 Which you still do today.

Daniel Ek 20:50 Well, um, I started doing again- [laughs]

David Senra 20:52 [laughs]

Daniel Ek 20:52 ... which is a very different thing.

David Senra 20:54 Okay.

Daniel Ek 20:54 And I still, still think the jury's out, by the way, on whether that's a good idea or a bad idea. Um-

David Senra 20:59 Explain.

Daniel Ek 20:59 Well, you know, I, I, again, I, I, I do believe that, um, focusing all your time and effort, uh, on this one thing, um, and obsess about it, and almost to the point where you're not even aware of the rest of the world that goes on, is what creates greatness. Um, and I know you can relate to this.

David Senra 21:20 Yeah.

Daniel Ek 21:20 But that, that's how Spotify came to be.

David Senra 21:22 Yeah.

Daniel Ek 21:22 I literally couldn't care about anything else, uh, for, at the very least, uh, the first 15 years. Only now am I foolish enough to believe that actually, you know what? I might be able to do multiple things at the same time again, which was sort of my spirit in my twenties.

David Senra 21:40 Is that connected to what you were saying earlier, that you might be a better... You think you might be a better coach than player?

Daniel Ek 21:45 Yeah. Um, I, I, I certainly think so. Um, and, and, uh, because my leadership style is so different than, uh, many of these, these sort of, um, entrepreneurs that most of us sort of look up to, um, and hail, whether it's the Steve Jobses or Elon Musks, et cetera. I just don't feel like, um... There, there's a vague resemblance with them, but it's just not me. It's like I'm a, I'm a very different archetype of entrepreneur.

David Senra 22:14 W- we were texting back and forth about this, so we should just talk about this now-

Daniel Ek 22:18 Yeah

David Senra 22:18 ... so we don't forget. We were talking about, like, maybe we should talk about, like, the archetypes, uh, different archetypes of entrepreneurs-

Daniel Ek 22:24 Yeah

David Senra 22:24 ... because, like, there could be, you know, there could be somebody, like a young- there's undoubtedly a young Daniel Ek out there, right? We just know that that's gonna happen. There's this great thing. I'm, I'm slightly obsessed with Michael Jordan. Uh, he's the [chuckles] he's the, the lock screen on my phone. He's my contact card, so when people, like, they start texting me, it's, like, Michael Jordan with his eyes like this.

Daniel Ek 22:41 [laughs] Yeah.

David Senra 22:42 Like, I'm kind of setting the tone.

Daniel Ek 22:43 Yeah, yeah.

David Senra 22:43 And he said this great thing because, you know, at the end of his career is the rise of Kobe Bryant-

Daniel Ek 22:47 Yeah

David Senra 22:48 ... and everybody's at-- towards the end of his career, they were, like, obsessed.

Daniel Ek 22:51 Yeah.

David Senra 22:51 Like, "Oh, Tracy McGrady is gonna be the next Michael Jordan, and this guy's gonna be the next Michael Jordan, this guy's the next Michael Jordan." And he's like, "First..." He's like, "Uh, you don't have to worry about finding the next Michael Jordan." He goes, "First of all, you didn't find me."

Daniel Ek 23:02 Mm.

David Senra 23:02 "I just happened to come along."

Daniel Ek 23:03 Yeah.

David Senra 23:03 "And that will happen again. You don't have to find the next person-

Daniel Ek 23:06 Yeah

David Senra 23:06 ... they will come along."

Daniel Ek 23:07 Yeah.

David Senra 23:07 And I always say, "They will reveal themselves."

Daniel Ek 23:09 Yep.

David Senra 23:09 So I, I do think this is fascinating, and no one else talks about this. Again, the weird thing about talking to you, and I, I don't mean that in a pejorative, it's like you just say stuff that no one else says.

Daniel Ek 23:19 Mm.

David Senra 23:19 And then I'm like, why isn't, why don't more people understand, like, know about Daniel's very unique ideas?

Daniel Ek 23:24 Mm.

David Senra 23:24 Like, no one's concerned [chuckles] about the archetypes. Everybody's like, "Oh, you just have to be like Steve Jobs. You just have to be like Elon."

Daniel Ek 23:29 Yeah.

David Senra 23:30 And your point is, like, no, there's, like, multiple different archetypes. Obviously, like, I've studied this maybe more than anybody else in the world-

Daniel Ek 23:34 Yeah, yeah

David Senra 23:34 ... and it's very clear-

Daniel Ek 23:35 Yeah

David Senra 23:35 ... that there are.

Daniel Ek 23:36 Yeah.

David Senra 23:37 And yet they're all kind of, like, narrowly focused on this is the one path. And me and you went over this back and forth before, it's just like, it's so ridiculous to say, like, there is- this is the way founders should run their company, because you said it back in two thousand twenty-one in that series, and Spotify, we've had conversations like this. This is something I always say, it's like it's tied to the personality of the founder.

Daniel Ek 23:56 Hundred percent.

David Senra 23:57 Like, the advice is fucking useless-

Daniel Ek 23:59 Yeah

David Senra 23:59 ... unless it's tied to who you are as a person.

Daniel Ek 24:01 Hundred percent.

David Senra 24:01 Spotify is a reflection of you.

Daniel Ek 24:03 Hundred percent.

David Senra 24:03 Now, I do wanna talk also about this other great idea that you gave me, and that now I s- heard, uh, Jeff Bezos echo recently, about the fact that there's similarities between, like, the way your child develops-

Daniel Ek 24:14 Mm-hmm

David Senra 24:14 ... and the way a company develops.

Daniel Ek 24:15 Mm-hmm.

David Senra 24:15 That, that was very fascinating.

Daniel Ek 24:16 Yeah.

David Senra 24:16 But w- where are you, like... Ex- explain why you would even want to broach the subject of, like, talking more about the different founder archetypes.

Daniel Ek 24:24 Well, I, I, I think, you know, again, as a young entrepreneur myself, um, I went through the book, like so many of us, uh, by becoming enamored by, uh,... uh, an entrepreneur and looking up to them, in many cases because they had traits that I didn't have. And so, um, we read all these stories, whether it's biographies or, or articles about how they managed their company and how, uh, how, uh, they lived their lives and the routines that they have. And certainly in my case, like, you know, uh, I certainly tried to mimic Steve Jobs. I certainly tried to mimic Bezos and Gates and all of the great ones. Um, you know, the, the very charismatic ones, like Howard Schultz of Starbucks. And, you know, I've, I've, I've learned from all of them, and in a way, um, I've tried to imitate them, right? Um, because I've thought that they were so great at what they do. Uh, but every single time I've walked away being, um, disillusioned, uh, because I realized obviously that it didn't work for me. And, um, so this, this sort of idea of this archetype, um, is like, I bet you that there's plenty of, um, entrepreneurs out there that, uh, read about currently, uh, whether it's Mark Zuckerberg or Jensen or any of these things, and they're like, "Uh, that's not me, so I guess I'm not as good as them-

David Senra 25:45 Mm.

Daniel Ek 25:46 -and I can't do what they're doing, so clearly, um, I don't have it in me." I think you're- you were spot on when you said it's like the hardest single thing, um, really for a founder and entrepreneur in, in a much different way, I think, than a normal person, but I think every normal person goes through this, is finding yourself.

David Senra 26:06 That's literally what I just wrote down.

Daniel Ek 26:08 Yeah.

David Senra 26:08 So I don't want... Again, this is more of a conversation than an interview, 'cause I'm, I'm a terrible interviewer, and I love to talk. [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 26:13 Yeah, sure.

David Senra 26:13 I do a monologue show-

Daniel Ek 26:14 Yeah

David Senra 26:14 ... for God's sake. But I had this theory, too, because it's obvious in the books, like, there, there's this, like, myth that's like, of, like, the genius young entrepreneur.

Daniel Ek 26:22 Yeah.

David Senra 26:22 And if you go and read all the biographies, they weren't, like, laying about, doing nothing when they were younger.

Daniel Ek 26:27 No.

David Senra 26:27 But I- it's very clear, if you look at all of them, Steve Jobs, Enzo Ferrari, Akio Morita, Sam Walton, Estee Lauder, Coco Chanel, Edwin Land, they do their best work when they're much older.

Daniel Ek 26:40 Mm-hmm.

David Senra 26:40 And so I, I would- I thought a lot about them. I'm like, "Dang, this is, like, a reoccurring theme over and over again." In some cases, they're in their 40s, 50 years old-

Daniel Ek 26:46 Yep

David Senra 26:46 ... and they're at the top of their game.

Daniel Ek 26:47 Yep, yep.

David Senra 26:48 And I, and then, just, you know, I was wondering, like, what is this? Okay, well, obviously, like, it is some, some skill set, so you can, like, practice more.

Daniel Ek 26:55 Mm-hmm.

David Senra 26:55 Uh, you have more experience, so then you can make better decisions. You have a better network. You have resources. You have all that. But one thing that I believe, that I cannot prove, but I believe with every bone in my body-

Daniel Ek 27:05 Yeah

David Senra 27:06 ... it's like, because you know- they knew themselves much more-

Daniel Ek 27:09 Yeah

David Senra 27:09 ... Like, think about the way you know yourself in your early 40s-

Daniel Ek 27:12 Yeah

David Senra 27:12 ... than you did when you were 23.

Daniel Ek 27:13 Oh, yeah.

David Senra 27:13 It's like, we thought when we were 23-

Daniel Ek 27:15 Yeah

David Senra 27:15 ... you don't know anything.

Daniel Ek 27:17 No.

David Senra 27:17 Even the most brilliant 23-year-old-

Daniel Ek 27:18 Yeah

David Senra 27:18 ... does not know themselves.

Daniel Ek 27:19 Yeah.

David Senra 27:19 You need that... That comes through time and experience.

Daniel Ek 27:21 Yeah.

David Senra 27:21 And it's just like, no, no. The- this is something I learned from, um, Michael Dell's autobiography, which, which was excellent. I used to say it's like they build a company that's authentic to them.

Daniel Ek 27:28 Yep, 100%.

David Senra 27:30 He also, he- the way he says it, they build a company that's natural to them.

Daniel Ek 27:33 Right.

David Senra 27:33 And you can't build a company that's natural to you-

Daniel Ek 27:35 Right

David Senra 27:35 ... if you don't know who you are.

Daniel Ek 27:36 100%.

David Senra 27:37 And so I have this belief that's like, you're... And, and I think, like, your, your accomplishments are freaking crazy, and I know you like to downplay them-

Daniel Ek 27:43 [chuckles]

David Senra 27:43 ... and it's just 'cause you're very polite and everything else. I saw- I was watching this funny, uh, interview with you, and, uh, they, they mentioned something like, "You're the most successful person to ever come out of Scandinavia," and your face... Your words were very polite, but your face, oh, it's like somebody poked you. You're like, "Oh-

Daniel Ek 27:57 Yeah

David Senra 27:57 ... I don't want to be, like, described that way." [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 27:59 Yeah, yeah.

David Senra 27:59 But your, but your response is like, I know that face.

Daniel Ek 28:02 Yeah.

David Senra 28:02 I know exactly what you, what you said. But this idea that, like, y- the, the, you are the sum of, like, your accumulated experiences-

Daniel Ek 28:09 Yeah

David Senra 28:10 ... right? That is one form of education, but the form of education is like, I know you- I went to your house. I rummaged through your library, maybe kind of rudely, [chuckles] but I loved-

Daniel Ek 28:18 Go for it

David Senra 28:18 ... how you're obsessed with history and philosophy, too.

Daniel Ek 28:20 Yeah.

David Senra 28:20 And I was like, "Oh, this is a person that's..." He's curious about the external world-

Daniel Ek 28:24 Mm-hmm

David Senra 28:24 ... but he also wants to know, like, who he is, what's important to him-

Daniel Ek 28:27 Oh, yeah

David Senra 28:28 ... and then building a business and a, like, an apparatus around that. So I d- I, I just wanted to get that out because you, you s- you mentioned something like, I don't think... I should probably talk about it more frequently, but something I, I definitely believe. It's just like, you're gonna get better at entrepreneurship when you get better at knowing who you are and what you actually want to do.

Daniel Ek 28:43 100%. Um, and, and, uh, as you, as you say, it's like, um, you know, I, I, I think the, the game I'm playing now is just being the best version of myself. And, uh, the best version of myself is one that w- will have even more impact than the one that, that had before, because it will be even more true to who I am.

David Senra 29:04 So what is your archetype? I mean, do you even know?

Daniel Ek 29:07 No, I, I, I don't know, which is [chuckles] why I was asking you, because-

David Senra 29:10 Yeah

Daniel Ek 29:10 ... I, I, I figured who's, who's the person in the world-

David Senra 29:13 [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 29:13 ... that probably has a better idea-

David Senra 29:15 Yeah

Daniel Ek 29:15 ... um, of, like, all the different archetypes? Um, because you, y- I can still learn how, how to, like, you know, do the game better, if that makes sense. Um-

David Senra 29:25 I, I, I would say there's a very interesting idea, and, um, that I've noticed. You know, obviously, like, there's this maxim I say over and over again, that all history's great entrepreneurs study history's great entrepreneurs. And if you make a podcast on that, you get to meet the, the living versions of that now. And what I'm struck by, and I'm like this myself, I have all kinds of blind spots, which you, like, picked away the first time we had dinner-

Daniel Ek 29:46 Mm

David Senra 29:46 ... and you were just like, "You're doing this wrong."

Daniel Ek 29:48 [chuckles]

David Senra 29:48 And you were very polite, but you're just like, "You're lying to yourself. You're not-

Daniel Ek 29:51 Yeah

David Senra 29:51 ... " Like, you know, "You're, you're obsessed with this, and you're, like, fighting with a hand behi- time behind your back," but I'm so amazed. It's exactly what you said. It's like-

Daniel Ek 29:58 Mm.

David Senra 29:59 It's almost like they need a mirror.

Daniel Ek 30:00 Yeah.

David Senra 30:00 So there, there's another great idea that I've seen a few times. Uh, one of the truly novel idea, it's this idea of hiring a paid critic.

Daniel Ek 30:08 Mm.

David Senra 30:08 So Sony is making, you know, audio equipment.

Daniel Ek 30:11 Yep.

David Senra 30:11 Since, like, the '50s.

Daniel Ek 30:12 Yep.

David Senra 30:12 This is like... And they're very primitive devices-

Daniel Ek 30:15 Yep

David Senra 30:15 ... and what they realized was, they, they hired a young vocal arts student, and I don't know how to pronounce this name. It's Norio Ohga or something like that. And the reason they did that is because he was a fan of early Sony products-

Daniel Ek 30:25 Yeah

David Senra 30:26 ... but he also had very fine, refined taste in everything else.

Daniel Ek 30:29 Great.

David Senra 30:29 And so he would just light them up about-

Daniel Ek 30:30 Yeah

David Senra 30:31 ... Oh, he's like, "I'm a big fan of Sony, but your products aren't good enough. You have all these deficiencies." And Akio, being the genius that he was, he goes, "We hired him as a paid critic."

Daniel Ek 30:39 Right.

David Senra 30:39 His job-... was to attack the deficiencies in our product-

Daniel Ek 30:43 Right

David Senra 30:43 ... because if we don't even see them-

Daniel Ek 30:45 Yeah.

David Senra 30:45 And he, he, the, uh, you know, the, um, the paid critic, his point was that, "Hey, if you're a ballet dancer, you have a mirror," right?

Daniel Ek 30:53 Hundred percent.

David Senra 30:53 Your mirror tells you whether what, what you're doing right-

Daniel Ek 30:56 Yeah

David Senra 30:56 ... what you can fix-

Daniel Ek 30:57 Yep

David Senra 30:57 ... like, your, what you need to do. He's like, "I'm your oral mirror."

Daniel Ek 31:01 Yep.

David Senra 31:01 And then, then fast-forward to when the book is, ah, published in, like, 1986, that paid critic is now the president of Sony.

Daniel Ek 31:08 Mm.

David Senra 31:08 And I feel exact- I, I'm this way. It's like we need a mirror.

Daniel Ek 31:11 Yeah.

David Senra 31:12 And the, the- I think what's, what I'm curious about with you is like, um, I remember I just had dinner with Mike Ovitz, and, you know, he's, he- I think his autobiography is one of the best entrepreneur autobiographies-

Daniel Ek 31:24 Yeah

David Senra 31:24 ... ever written because he tells you about the bad shit.

Daniel Ek 31:26 Mm-hmm.

David Senra 31:27 The fact that he was, didn't like who he was-

Daniel Ek 31:28 Yeah

David Senra 31:29 ... he was depressed. He was doing this making bad decisions based on the opinions of other people, which entrepreneurs cannot do.

Daniel Ek 31:35 Yeah.

David Senra 31:35 And I was struck by, like, the fact that he didn't know himself at, you know, 25 or I think he was 27 when he s- when he started CA. Sure as hell knows himself a- as, like, almost, um, an 80-year-old man. But I asked him about... You know, he's had some people I know have been friends with him for 25 years.

Daniel Ek 31:53 Mm.

David Senra 31:54 And I was just like: Why? What do you think has enabled you to maintain that relationship?

Daniel Ek 32:00 Mm.

David Senra 32:00 And he said, uh, "He tells me the truth."

Daniel Ek 32:03 Yeah.

David Senra 32:03 And he's like, "You get into my position-

Daniel Ek 32:05 Yeah

David Senra 32:05 ... where," you know, he's famous, he's wealthy, most of the people that he interacts with are on his staff.

Daniel Ek 32:10 Yeah.

David Senra 32:11 And he's like, "You... It's very dangerous." And he said, he's like, "There's not many people in my life that tell me the truth."

Daniel Ek 32:18 Yep.

David Senra 32:18 Who tells you the truth?

Daniel Ek 32:19 Many people, which is the good news, uh, for me. Um, you know, it starts with my family, my mom. Um, you know, my mom is the most normal person you would be. She, uh, she's proud of her- my accomplishments, uh, but in, in sort of the standoffish way. She couldn't care anything about the impact o- of it. Uh, it is more like that I've overcome, um, obstacles for myself that she knows matters to me. So oftentimes-

David Senra 32:49 That's, that's great, though.

Daniel Ek 32:50 Uh, yeah. And, and so oftentimes, like, when, when, uh, I may bring an issue home, 'cause she doesn't really know what's going on in the business world, and she doesn't really care, she kind of like gives me this mirror back where most of life [chuckles] actually doesn't revolve around technology or the business world, et cetera. It's like, this is the life. Um, so that's a great one. Um, I have a very dear friend, uh, Shaq, who very similarly plays that part in my life. He's the most realest person there is. Uh, my wife, uh, is another one. Um, Gustav, that you met, is another person. He, uh, will tell me the truth even when I don't w- wanna hear it. Um, and, um, yeah, I, I, I've been incredibly fortunate that, like, many of the people I just talked about are people that have been around me for 20 years. My mom, obviously, my entire life, but, but many of these people have been around for a very, very long

Daniel Ek 33:43 time. Um, and I, I think that's, um, um... You know, I, I, I really believe trust is one of the most, um, under-talked-about things, um, you know, because it's not easy to scale, and it's incredibly hard. It's the number one thing why most organizations break down and why you need processes and all the other bu- bureaucracies, ultimately, because there's no trust. If you had 100% trust, you wouldn't need any of this stuff, and you would move much faster.

David Senra 34:14 It's crazy. Munger, again, like... I, I could literally get emails every week. They're like: "Why do you mention Charlie Munger on every episode?"

Daniel Ek 34:21 Mm.

David Senra 34:21 I'm like, " 'Cause he's the wisest person I've ever come across.

Daniel Ek 34:23 Yeah.

David Senra 34:23 What do you want me to do?"

Daniel Ek 34:24 Yeah.

David Senra 34:24 Like, I'm sorry he has so many good ideas. [laughs]

Daniel Ek 34:27 Yes.

David Senra 34:27 But he said something again, and he's another person where he, like, points things out, that once he says it, it's obvious, but no one else says it.

Daniel Ek 34:32 Yeah.

David Senra 34:32 And he goes, "Trust is one of the greatest economic, uh, forces in the world." And he talked about that, like, your job... When I actually got to have dinner with him, he's like, "Your job is to build a seamless web of deserved trust with great people."

Daniel Ek 34:44 Hundred percent.

David Senra 34:45 And he's like, "That's not..." And he, he, he was telling stories. Like, "Everybody knows that, you know, I met Buffett when I was, when he was 28, and I was 35.

Daniel Ek 34:52 Mm.

David Senra 34:52 They don't understand there was all these other guys around us-

Daniel Ek 34:54 Yep

David Senra 34:54 ... and we built friendships and did deals forever.

Daniel Ek 34:57 Yep.

David Senra 34:57 Most of them had passed away by the time I met him."

Daniel Ek 34:59 Yeah.

David Senra 35:00 But that idea, it's like trust is one of the greatest economic forces in the world.

Daniel Ek 35:03 It truly is, and if you think about it, why is, why is that so rare? It's, it's because it doesn't scale, right? So trust is the, the, this notion that you'll keep doing, um, actions that will ladder up over time. It really compounds. But, um, you're gonna add maybe 1% of trust for each positive interaction you're gonna do, but it takes one interaction that's bad to ruin all of it. The moment where you, where you even start doubting whether you can trust someone or not, you have no trust.

David Senra 35:33 Mm, good point.

Daniel Ek 35:33 So the, the point being is, it's, it's like absolute trust. If you really think about it, there's this sort of final gradient. Most people define it as this binary thing, but it really isn't. It, it's, it's really kind of like, you know, what most people will say is, "Either I trust someone or I don't." But even let's say you do trust someone, there's degrees of trusting someone. Um, how many people do you trust with your life? How many people do you trust with your bank account, just handing it over?

David Senra 36:00 Are you a trusting person, though?

Daniel Ek 36:03 To a certain degree.

David Senra 36:05 I think that's one that, like, from what... People that know me-- So I have, I, I actually had breakfast with a, a good friend of mine, and, you know, he, he's slightly older, but he tell, he tells me the truth, and he is very nice, but he'll point out the problems that, like, are going to stop me from going to where I want to go.

Daniel Ek 36:21 Mm-hmm.

David Senra 36:21 And one of his points, 'cause I would answer, like, if I asked that question myself, I was like: I don't trust anybody.

Daniel Ek 36:26 Yeah.

David Senra 36:26 But I think I'm getting a little better with that, but, uh, I am concerned that, like, I'm gonna be one of my own worst enemies because of this, like, I can't let go.

Daniel Ek 36:34 Yeah, but look, I mean, you, you talked about it yourself. You, it started in your childhood. Um, like i- in my case, I grew up without a father, uh, for sure, but I have the most loving mother.... um, she gave me everything. Uh, and to have that start in my life, I've always felt that whatever I do, whatever the failure is, uh, she will always love me.

David Senra 36:55 Mm.

Daniel Ek 36:56 And to have that in your back pocket, I think it means you automatically come from a different vantage point than what I believe you had in your childhood, right? And, and, and then my approach to life is just like, okay, well, um, you know, by- again, I'm not saying I have absolute trust in every person, um, but I choose to believe that, uh, trusting people makes for a, uh, a much more fun, uh, rich, and rewarding life than one that doesn't. And I believe that, um-

David Senra 37:29 I think, I th- I think you're definitely right about that.

Daniel Ek 37:31 Yeah.

David Senra 37:31 Yeah.

Daniel Ek 37:31 And, and, and I believe that a life is more fun doing the journey with other people around than, than doing it in single-player mode. And that doesn't mean that I'm not also, um, a person that likes, uh, my own spare time, my own comfort, my own solitude. I have that part, and that's the duality in my personality. But, um, I really do believe, and it, it, it'll go back to philosophy, but the more I give away, the more I get back. And, and so I just keep focused on doing that, and for me, the ultimate, uh, impact at this point, why I said, you know, I'd like to be the best coach there ever was, the best entrepreneur coach, maybe that's my archetype, but-

David Senra 38:18 Yeah

Daniel Ek 38:18 ... um, than, than a player, because I've come to see that these people that I've done Spotify with, uh, for the past 15 years, uh, as an example, seeing their success, seeing their impact, seeing their growth, is the thing that gives me the most amount of pride at this point. It really isn't anything else. Like, you know, financially, I couldn't care. Um, not that important. It's great to have a lot of money to have, um, as a currency, to then have more impact. There's more ships on the table to do new, more cool, interesting stuff.

David Senra 38:53 Yeah.

Daniel Ek 38:53 But, um, but the real thing, um, for me will be the friendships that I built, um, you know, the, the trust that other people placed in me to allow me to help them on this journey, help me on my journey, and us doing it together. And, uh, I've just seen it so many times. I've been burned by it for sure, um, sometimes when, when people have broken that trust that I put in them, but I will honestly say that's been, like, one or 2% negative experience relative to all the positive things that have come out of it.

David Senra 39:29 The sad part about this, I can't think of anybody that's, like, betrayed me in, like, two decades [chuckles] .

Daniel Ek 39:33 Yeah.

David Senra 39:33 So it's like, I'm just making up this problem, this imaginary problem that maybe used to exist, but certainly doesn't ex- ex- exist now. And this is where I think it's, it's really, like, uh, helpful to... Again, I don't need a bunch, you know, I don't, I don't believe... Uh, there's a great, um, quote from the founder of Red Bull, who I became slightly obsessed with. Um, and I'm really proud of the episode I made on him because, like, we had to literally translate. There was no biographies in English, and then-

Daniel Ek 39:56 Yeah

David Senra 39:56 ... we had translated a biography from German. Um, and his point was just, like, "I don't need 50 friends." Like, I believe in much, like, s- fewer and better and deeper.

Daniel Ek 40:06 Yeah, yeah.

David Senra 40:07 Um, and as long as you make those, like, choices correctly, you know, again, like, I can't think of a, a single person that I feel is in my life that doesn't want the best for me.

Daniel Ek 40:14 Yeah.

David Senra 40:15 And yet, I still have this like, "Oh, like, I'll just do it all myself."

Daniel Ek 40:19 Yeah.

David Senra 40:19 Um, uh, very q- related to this, y- another thing that, like, you said that really surprised me is, like, when people ask me, they're like, "Obviously, I know who Daniel is. I use Spotify."

Daniel Ek 40:30 Mm-hmm.

David Senra 40:30 "I know everything going on, but, like, why do you talk about him so much?" And I, like, mention you on the podcast and, and, like, I was like, "Oh, because I've learned a lot from you." You're very, very careful what you want in life. Like, and I get to meet pretty crazy people, and most of the times, like, i- it's- they're great. But then you see, like, there's, like, a lot of negativity to them. One, there's a, a shocking amount that have very few, if no, friends-

Daniel Ek 40:57 Yeah

David Senra 40:57 ... which is scary to me. And then they kind of, like, interact with you as if, like, you're like a asset.

Daniel Ek 41:06 Mm-hmm.

David Senra 41:06 And once I suck that asset, like, get everything out of the asset-

Daniel Ek 41:09 Yeah

David Senra 41:09 ... then, like, I, you will, uh, be disposed.

David Senra 41:12 And I feel the same people that do that have almost no intellectual humility, right? Where I always say, it's like every single person I read about is smarter and more productive than I am. The way I look at this, the world in general, is very much in the same way, like, Thomas Edison has this great quote. He's like: "We know o- we don't know one one-thousandth of percent of anything."

Daniel Ek 41:31 Yeah.

David Senra 41:31 And that's the way I feel. It's 'cause every day I learn something new, I'm like-

Daniel Ek 41:33 Yeah

David Senra 41:34 ... I'm gonna be, I was so stupid back then.

Daniel Ek 41:35 Yeah.

David Senra 41:36 You have in- extreme levels of intellectual humility. I don't even know if many people know this, but, like, you would like, go and shadow and spend time... I don't know if you have a term for this. You just, like, call up somebody that's running a company-

Daniel Ek 41:49 Mm

David Senra 41:49 ... and say, "What? I'm gonna come and sit on every single one of your meetings?"

Daniel Ek 41:54 Yeah, pretty much. [chuckles] Uh, like, that, that, that's how it goes. Um, and, and, and look, it comes back to this. I mean, I, I don't believe that I know, um, much.

David Senra 42:03 Let me, let me just set the table for this real quick. The way you put it to me, like, "I'll go get them their coffee."

Daniel Ek 42:08 Yep.

David Senra 42:09 "I don't care."

Daniel Ek 42:10 Yep.

David Senra 42:10 "I'm there to learn from them."

Daniel Ek 42:12 Yep.

David Senra 42:12 "If I need to go get their coffee, I'll go get their coffee."

Daniel Ek 42:14 Yep.

David Senra 42:14 Do you understand? That's insane. [chuckles] Like, I think that's the right, like, f- mindset.

Daniel Ek 42:20 Yeah.

David Senra 42:20 But I don't think anybody would believe, somebody running, you know, a hundred billion dollar company and has d- done the things that you've done, be like, "Yeah, no, I, I'm fine. Like, I'll shadow this guy, and, like, I'll do whatever I need to do."

Daniel Ek 42:31 Yeah. Well, I mean, look, um, I, I just realized, it, it, it sort of started from this thing, right, where, um, you and I have both read all the books, and actually, many of the entrepreneurs have read, um, not as many [chuckles] books about as, as you have-

David Senra 42:45 Yeah

Daniel Ek 42:46 ... uh, around all, all the greatest entrepreneurs, but they've read the big ones-

David Senra 42:49 Yeah

Daniel Ek 42:50 ... certainly of their time, the basisists, the, the, the Steve Jobs, the, the Elon Musks biographies and all that kind of stuff. But, but the-... there's a certain thing around reading it and internalizing it, and seeing the culture up front. And what I realized was building Spotify, obviously, it's the biggest company I've ever built, so I'm learning on the job. And I don't know what I don't know, because I don't- I've never really worked at a company, right? And so in a way, what I realized as we hired people from, um, these other companies is that there were all these things that they were doing, um, that they kept telling us about, and I didn't really understand, like, how it worked. Um, so, um, I'll, I'll mention, like, one. For instance, I do really well in these, like, one-on-one situations. I might even do well in, like, three or four-person groups and maybe six. But, um, 10-person group, like, I don't have the personality where I command the room. Uh, it just

Daniel Ek 43:48 doesn't work. And then you have someone like a Mark Zuckerberg, who literally has this, this thing called Large Group, where he has twenty to twenty-five people that he runs every week. Uh, and for me, it sounded absolutely awful. Like-

David Senra 44:00 [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 44:00 ... how does he get anything done, um, in, in that meeting?

David Senra 44:03 Yeah.

Daniel Ek 44:04 And so lo and behold, I asked him, "Hey, uh, can I come and learn from you?" And, uh, he was incredibly, uh, gracious, uh, and we've obviously been friends for a long time, and, and he said sure. Um, and so I spent, uh, the better part of, what, I believe the first time was, like, a week, um, literally in, uh, pretty much all of his meetings, uh, from start to finish. And the, the big question obviously for me is, like, okay, well, what does he get out of it? And can I make myself useful, uh, while doing it? So hence, I took meeting notes, uh, you know, uh, if I could get him coffee, I would. Um, you know, it, it was literally these types of things. Um, but at the end of it, um, um, it- the most interesting thing was obviously trying to distill down what surprised me about the culture. It wasn't really around, like, Meta, uh, and what was then Facebook, is a world-class company. It wasn't like, you know, I, uh, miraculously thought I could do a lot of things different or better, but, um, there were things that surprised me, uh, around how he managed the company. And, and seeing that and hearing that from another founder, um, hopefully one that he respects too, uh, may, um, sort of lead to insights and breakthroughs. And, um, during that week, it's not just that I, uh, follow people around, I actually meet with their entire executive team, and I interview them, too. Um, so sit down and try to learn from them, to really, truly internalize the culture and try to understand it. And, um, so all of the sudden, you do realize, for instance, how you can make a large group team meeting work. Um, and there were lots of other things, uh, which I shamelessly copied from, for instance, that experience. Um, and, uh, uh, it just turned out for me to be an amazing way to learn, um, by seeing the culture upfront that enables the certain, um, practices to work. It almost comes back to kind of this two things we talked about already, which is this mirror, um, of reflecting it back, and then, um, the, the, the sort of second notion, I think, which is it's gotta be true to you. So, um, you know, there are many things where you can copy a specific, uh, way. For instance, Elon does things, but if it's not truly innate to you and your personality, I promise you, it will not have the same impact as when Elon does this.

David Senra 46:32 I think you're dead right about this. Uh, the thing- the way I would think about, like, your archetype is, I think you nailed it with, like, uh, coach, and then, uh, you'll hear people inside Spotify say it's, like, very c- you have a very collaborative, like, management style, where I don't think anybody is going to describe Steve Jobs as collaborative. [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 46:51 Yeah.

David Senra 46:51 Now, he was able to collaborate-

Daniel Ek 46:53 Yeah

David Senra 46:54 ... but at the end, like, he was, it was kind of like I'm making all the decisions. There's actually, actually interesting story. I'm curious how you think about this.

David Senra 47:02 Like-

Daniel Ek 47:02 Mm.

David Senra 47:02 ... how do you balance, like, the decisions you make, specifically on, like, product, right, um, with, like, your own personal taste and intuition-

Daniel Ek 47:10 Mm-hmm

David Senra 47:11 ... versus, like, being metrics-driven?

Daniel Ek 47:13 Mm-hmm.

David Senra 47:14 Um, there's this hilarious story. It's in two different books. One's in this book called Creative Selection, which is excellent. It's, uh, I've read three times. It's about this guy- from this guy named Ken Kosenda, who was a programmer. He demoed to Steve many, many times in, like, when they were building their best products, right? And then there's another one story in, uh, Jony Ive's, uh, biography, and they, they talked about, they were comparing and contrasting the way, like, Google would make products versus how Apple did when Steve Jobs-

Daniel Ek 47:38 Yep

David Senra 47:38 ... was in charge. And, you know, the guy's like: "Hey, you know, at Google, we have to decide between, like, blue and light blue-

Daniel Ek 47:45 Mm-hmm

David Senra 47:45 ... and we run, like, two hundred tests of, like-

Daniel Ek 47:46 Right

David Senra 47:46 ... all the different shades in between that."

Daniel Ek 47:48 Yep, yep.

David Senra 47:49 And Jony's like: "We would never, ever do that."

Daniel Ek 47:52 Yep, yep.

David Senra 47:52 Do you remember, you, you were old enough to remember this, they create the, the, the, the iMac, but, like, the big, fat, bubble one?

Daniel Ek 47:58 Yep, sure.

David Senra 47:59 You know?

Daniel Ek 47:59 Yeah.

David Senra 47:59 Probably like late '90s.

Daniel Ek 48:00 Yeah, yeah.

David Senra 48:00 And it was the first time there was gonna be all these, like, crazy colors and-

Daniel Ek 48:03 Yeah

David Senra 48:03 ... everything else. Like, and Jony tells a story. He's like: "You know how we chose the colors?" He's like: "Me and Steve went to the design-

Daniel Ek 48:09 Yep

David Senra 48:09 ... like, where the Apple Design Center-

Daniel Ek 48:11 Yep

David Senra 48:11 ... and we talked about it.

Daniel Ek 48:12 Yep.

David Senra 48:12 And thirty minutes later-

Daniel Ek 48:13 Yep

David Senra 48:13 ... the, the, the colors you saw-

Daniel Ek 48:15 Yep

David Senra 48:16 ... we shipped." [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 48:17 Yep, yep.

David Senra 48:17 That was it. [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 48:18 Yep, yep.

David Senra 48:19 Where, where are you on, like, that spectrum?

Daniel Ek 48:21 Yeah, uh, I think the most important thing that, uh, you described is it's a spectrum.

David Senra 48:26 Mm-hmm.

Daniel Ek 48:26 It's not 100%, um, you know, one way or the other way, because a- a- again, sort of like, I remember early on, um, you know, people talking about that sort of dichotomy of how Google does thing and how Apple does thing, and many founders then tended to gravitate, when Apple was at sort of peak Steve Jobs, to, "No, I run the product review-

David Senra 48:46 Mm

Daniel Ek 48:46 ... it's only my opinion that matters, um, and it's my taste, and I've got this articulation-

David Senra 48:51 Yeah

Daniel Ek 48:51 ... all these things." And lo and behold, like, uh, some terrible decisions, uh, ended up, uh, coming out of this, et cetera. And, and I think where people, um, sort of break down on almost all issues is they take it literally.... I don't believe for a second that Apple was a hundred percent in the camp where Steve Jobs just had universally the answer to everything. He didn't listen to anyone else's opinions. He didn't try things out. Sometimes maybe trying it out by testing his ideas on multiple people inside and outside, um, you know, et cetera. But of course, he did that, right? And I, I know one of the ways he did it, which was brilliant, and that don't get talked about. He actually called up journalists sometimes and tested ideas on them.

David Senra 49:33 Yeah.

Daniel Ek 49:34 And, and, like, "We might do this," um, kind of thing, and then hear the journalists react to it, and it's like, "Okay, that was a bad idea,"-

David Senra 49:40 They-

Daniel Ek 49:40 -and then go back.

David Senra 49:41 They describe this as, like, sonar, how dolphins, like, they, like, throw things out and-

Daniel Ek 49:45 Yeah

David Senra 49:45 ... they- it might be a crazy idea, and then it-

Daniel Ek 49:47 Yeah

David Senra 49:47 ... reflects back to them, and they use it as, like, a form of education. But the hilarious one is they couldn't figure out what they were gonna call what turns into the iMac. He was obsessed with Akira and Sony. He goes, "I have the name for this computer. It's gonna be the Mac Man" [chuckles] because of the Walkman. And people around him were like-

Daniel Ek 50:01 "No, no, no."

David Senra 50:02 ... "No, please don't do that.

Daniel Ek 50:02 Yeah.

David Senra 50:02 That can't be that."

Daniel Ek 50:03 Yeah.

David Senra 50:03 And they're like, "This is terrible," and they-

Daniel Ek 50:05 Yeah

David Senra 50:05 ... kept meeting after meeting. He's like, "Steve, this name sucks."

Daniel Ek 50:08 Yeah.

David Senra 50:08 And they, they, they give him a bunch of lists, and then the first time he hears iMac, he's like: "Don't like it at all."

Daniel Ek 50:12 Yeah.

David Senra 50:12 And then they're like: "Well, we really like it, so, like, we'll put it in the next group."

Daniel Ek 50:15 Yeah.

David Senra 50:15 "And then, like, we'll maybe put it, like, the third one down."

Daniel Ek 50:17 Yeah.

David Senra 50:17 And then he goes, "Now I don't hate it."

Daniel Ek 50:19 Yeah.

David Senra 50:19 And then one day he's walking the hall, he's like: "I came up with a name. It's iMac." [laughing]

Daniel Ek 50:22 Yeah. Yeah. And of course, yep, that, that's the way. That's the way, right? And, and so I feel like that's truly the case. I, I, I think the, the, the realization is you, you tend to overgra- gravitate to, to one or the other, and certainly in Spotify's case, we, we did the same. Like, we, we were early on, uh, very much so. I mean, the first user interface was pretty much designed by myself and this guy called Rasmus. So much of that you could describe was my taste. But, uh, sooner or later, what ends up happening is you, you get into, into a space where you don't even know anymore, uh, because your current feedback loop of where the world is and the customer you're designing for starts becoming a little bit different.

David Senra 51:02 Mm-hmm.

Daniel Ek 51:03 And then you need to get to a point where you start incorporating some feedback mechanism. So, like, for me, taste is, is sort of judgment plus curiosity, and the more you can sort of, like, extend the curiosity branch, that improves your judgment, which then builds your taste. And, and so it- it's really a question for me about just, uh, sort of allowing for as much feedback as humanly possible so that you can, uh, you know, um, get yourself or a small team to some level of taste.

David Senra 51:43 The best leaders in business are able to spot patterns, but you can't spot patterns if you can't see your data. And most businesses are only using twenty percent of their data because eighty percent of your customer intelligence is invisible, hidden in emails, transcripts, and conversations, unless you have HubSpot. HubSpot is where all of your data comes together so you can see the patterns that matter, because when you know more, you grow more, and that is a pattern that never fails. Visit hubspot.com today. That is hubspot.com. Are there any product updates that get pushed live that you didn't like?

Daniel Ek 52:20 Oh, plenty.

David Senra 52:21 Yeah.

Daniel Ek 52:21 Um,

Daniel Ek 52:22 plenty, and, and, and this may be a little bit unique, but, you know, uh, coming back to it, so, you know, I, I ended up, um, having, you know... Uh, so, so the typical thing is that the founder needs to be the product person, right? Um, by the way, it's a hundred percent true. I, I totally believe that. I think it's the most important thing in the zero to one stage. But what a lot of people don't talk about is the fact that th- there isn't one stage of this journey. It's like you're oscillating between zero to one, one to a hundred, and then, you know, th- the last stage, which is more like optimization stage. And you have to, like, constantly do that, and you're gonna need different skills at different places. And this, this is why, by the way, I believe it's so important for entrepreneurs to realize when to apply what tools, um, in this journey. So what happened with Spotify i- is sort of against all the common wisdom and wealth, which is, I don't really run product, um, anymore. Um, because what happened was I got this guy called Gustav that you've now met, and he runs product, and he's actually way better than me, uh, at doing it. And so, um, speaking about sort of being truthful, what ended up happening, uh, many years ago was, uh, I was running these product meetings. Um, he was sort of running it, but I, I wanted to run it, so I kind of- [chuckles] ... interjected myself over him. Um, but I didn't have the time to, like, really spend all this time, so he was sort of, like, running it, um, for me, but I still insisted on having product reviews. And, and, um, sort of talking again about the importance of having people who, um, give you candid feedback, um, he took me aside after one of these, um, product sessions, and he's like: "You know, you're not really that good, uh- [laughing] ... uh, in doing these things, and you're not really that helpful. So most of the time, me and the team, we're kind of like looking, and we're trying to basically, you know, appease you in the meeting, but you're not really adding as much value as you think." And, and not surprisingly, my, my first instinct was to be really pissed off. Uh, I sort of went home. I was like: "Man, I'm gonna have to fire this guy. "

David Senra 54:28 [laughing]

Daniel Ek 54:28 "It's, like, horrible. Like, how could he say that, this?" But I also realized that that was an emotional response. So, uh, again, I wasn't fully convinced that this was true, but I sort of went back and said: "Okay, well, you know what? I'm, I'm gonna give you three months, uh, where I don't do the product reviews, and then we evaluate how this worked." And lo and behold, he actually did a great job. [chuckles]

David Senra 54:50 Yeah. [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 54:50 And so the product, uh, p- the team was much happier. Um, you know, he was making more of the decisions without me. I wasn't meddling in. There wasn't two different people deciding what worked, but it was really him. And, and ever since that moment, um, you know-... I don't really run product anymore, uh, in nutrition. I'm involved in the product, and he solicits feedback from me all the time, but I don't run the product meetings. And I say that because what happened for me was a real setback, um, not just in sort of that moment, but it also sort of like, oh, wait a minute, so what am I, I really, you know, what's my value add then in this company? And it took me a while, and I realized that all of a sudden, hmm, actually, you know what? Um, that won't be it, but maybe I can add value in this place. And I, I sort of oscillated to this different place in the company, which was much closer to understanding the creator and spending more time with, with the content, uh, people, et cetera. And so my product feedback ended up being, um, you know, and this is the dynamic s- that's quite unique to Spotify, in that we have these two stakeholders. We have, uh, consumers on the one hand, and we have creators. And so I just, uh, made it my effort to understand and know the creator way better than anyone else in the company, and so my product feedback to them comes from that lens.

David Senra 56:13 Mm.

Daniel Ek 56:14 Um, and that became value add, because again, that's a very different thing. That's an outward-facing thing. You actually have to sit down and meet with creators. It is so much more about innately understanding their needs, um, and talking to them and understanding not just how they use the product, but their business. What problems are they facing that's not just sort of how they leverage the product, but actually holistically around them? And, and so that was just one of those things, and then subsequently, what ended up happening is I got this guy called Alex, and he's now doing that part better than me too. Um, and so I was like: Okay, well, now I need to find a different way to add value. And now it turns out that my value add is the sort of in-between between the two, uh, where, you know, business or creators meets consumers, and where, um, you know, there's maybe a third stakeholder we have to consider, uh, in all of this. Um, and so my whole sort of experience in all of this has really been around kind of figuring out who I am and what, what I'm innately good at, and this has been a learning journey for twenty years.

David Senra 57:20 What you're just describing right now, h- h- this unfolded over how many years?

Daniel Ek 57:24 I would say the first ten years was the zero to one journey.

David Senra 57:29 Mm-hmm.

Daniel Ek 57:30 And the last ten has been that journey, where, uh, we're not zero to one anymore, um, uh, as a company holistically, but there are elements of the company where we're zero to one, where I'm absolutely, a hundred percent involved.

David Senra 57:47 I think this is a good, uh, like, opportunity to talk about another one of your very unique ideas that I also, um, I-- there was this excellent... I just did this episode on Jeff Bezos, 'cause he doesn't give that many interviews, and so I would take a transcript of his interviews, and you treat it like a book and just go through it.

David Senra 58:00 And he said something like, from day one, he knew, like, he wanted to build a company that could outlast him.

Daniel Ek 58:05 Yeah.

David Senra 58:06 Right? And he still loves it. He'll love it forever, and it was very reminiscent of, like, what we're trying to do as parents, where it's like you're shaping your kid, but you're only successful if they can survive without you.

Daniel Ek 58:17 Yeah.

David Senra 58:17 And when I heard him say that, it was a few months after you had beautifully, like, articulated this idea. It's just like, well, I think there's a lot of... You, you're gonna say it better than I did, but essentially, like, there is a very rather clear analogy between the way your child, when they're first born, is essentially like a, a product of you. They're going to mimic their parents, their environment that they're in, but as they grow older and older, I just went through this, and I have a thirteen-year-old. You know, when she was much smaller, she's much like me and her mom.

Daniel Ek 58:49 Yep.

David Senra 58:49 Right? And then now, she's like, she's got traits that I don't even have. [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 58:53 Yep, a hundred percent.

David Senra 58:54 And her own decisions-

Daniel Ek 58:55 Yeah

David Senra 58:55 ... and, like, m- doing things maybe I would do-

Daniel Ek 58:57 Yep

David Senra 58:57 ... or I would not do, and you're like, it's kind of the same for the company.

Daniel Ek 59:00 Yep.

David Senra 59:00 And you had this idea where, like, I think at the time, Spotify was nineteen years old-

Daniel Ek 59:03 Yep

David Senra 59:03 ... or it's nineteen or twenty years old.

Daniel Ek 59:04 Yep.

David Senra 59:05 And it's just like, well, you know, year one or two, it is me.

Daniel Ek 59:08 Yep.

David Senra 59:08 It's like the same way you have a two-year-old.

Daniel Ek 59:09 Yep.

David Senra 59:09 Anybody who knows this.

Daniel Ek 59:10 Yep.

David Senra 59:10 But now it, there's characteristics that emerge from within the company-

Daniel Ek 59:14 Yep

David Senra 59:14 ... that are separate from the founder.

Daniel Ek 59:16 Yep, yep, yep.

David Senra 59:17 That's, like, a fascinating, uh, insight.

Daniel Ek 59:19 Yeah, I mean, look, um, th- there's clearly kind of like three distinct stages of parenthood, right? And, um, the first one is, you're literally the person that keeps them alive, right? Um, and you're a hundred percent there, and every, you pretty much make every decision for them because they can't make it themselves. And then gradually, the next stage is, um, you're there. You're quite involved. You probably step in when they're doing something which, um, uh, would be terrible and would create bad long-term consequences. And then, like, the last stage, you're not even-- you can't even do that. Um, so the job is much more subtly to just be there, um, when they need you. And, um, I'm somewhat simplifying it, um, but, um, I think that the, as, as with everything, don't take it literally, but, but sort of the, the core of the, the gist of the idea is certainly a, a larger company becomes more and more, and an older company becomes more and more of that. And so much of what I do, uh, today is literally that. Um, I, I try to be there for people when they need me, um, in various fields, um, which happens, but it's not as often as every day, all the time. Um, and, um, what I deeply care about, uh, today, and I do spend a lot of my time on, is this notion around, um, this first seed of a n- a new idea and protecting that idea. And, um, I think it's, it's probably the most underreported, talked about, um, uh, way, is how do you do that? Like, how do you consistently find lighting in a bottle? Like, you know, and it's all so theoretical, um, at the point of any strategy book talking about how you do it or even when you go behind, um... I was, um, the other day, I was with, um, uh, the, the, um, uh, guy Hamilton Helmer, who wrote Seven Powers-

David Senra 1:01:24 Yeah

Daniel Ek 1:01:25 ... book.... uh, which is an amazing book on strategy, by the way. Um, but one of the most interesting ideas, um, um, there, that I learned after sort of, again, overfitting the concepts in, in the book and sort of teaching people about it, is you can only tell, uh, that you have power when, when it's there. It doesn't tell you how to get there.

David Senra 1:01:47 This is the, the, the criticism of, like, founders in, uh, the podcast and in the books. Like, "But he's not telling me what to do!" It's like-

Daniel Ek 1:01:54 Yeah.

David Senra 1:01:55 ... this is not a podcast for people that wanna be told-

Daniel Ek 1:01:57 Yeah

David Senra 1:01:57 ... what to do.

Daniel Ek 1:01:58 Yeah.

David Senra 1:01:58 It's, "Here's how this guy or this woman thought about their company. This is what they experienced." You pull out these ideas. I love how you say don't-- you kept saying, "Don't take it literally." I've told this before, like, I drive people crazy 'cause I turn, I tend to turn everything into an abstraction. So, like, when I hear you, I've said this message to you, where like, you kind of remind me of James J. Hill, which is, might be the only person to ever text you this. [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 1:02:18 Mm.

David Senra 1:02:18 And James J. Hill was the most successful railroad baron of all time, and I just thought the way you just said, the way he built... He essentially was laying railroad tracks, right? And he was, his, the goal of the company was obviously, we're gonna have goods and people on the tracks.

Daniel Ek 1:02:34 Right.

David Senra 1:02:35 But this alone is, how do I make what I'm doing more valuable? And he's the only railroad founder ever in American history to not go bankrupt.

Daniel Ek 1:02:43 Mm.

David Senra 1:02:43 They all went bankrupt. It's crazy. What he realizes is, like, he has to spend just as much, if not more time, developing and nurturing the communities that are springing up-

Daniel Ek 1:02:51 Right

David Senra 1:02:51 ... around it.

Daniel Ek 1:02:51 Yeah.

David Senra 1:02:52 And if he builds these communities around it-

Daniel Ek 1:02:54 Yeah

David Senra 1:02:54 ... and that makes the, that makes his railroad more valuable.

Daniel Ek 1:02:57 More valuable. Yep.

David Senra 1:02:57 Um, but I, I, I, I love this criticism, 'cause it's like, oh, you just, you've gotta find a different show, or you've gotta-

Daniel Ek 1:03:02 Yeah

David Senra 1:03:02 ... find a different thing.

Daniel Ek 1:03:03 Yeah.

David Senra 1:03:03 'Cause, like, entrepreneurs don't wanna be told what to do.

Daniel Ek 1:03:05 Right.

David Senra 1:03:06 I've never met an entrepreneur-

Daniel Ek 1:03:06 Yeah

David Senra 1:03:06 ... it's like, "Give me a list."

Daniel Ek 1:03:08 Yeah.

David Senra 1:03:08 [chuckles] It's a, it's a profession for people that don't, [chuckles] don't take direction very well.

Daniel Ek 1:03:13 Exactly. Yeah, exactly. Exactly right.

David Senra 1:03:14 It's, it's hilarious about this. I, I wanna-- I think this is tied to something also that is very fascinating with you, is you have a high... And most people, again, like, the, I think the more control you have over your life, the more success you have. People make the mistake of, like, eliminating any, any people who tell them the truth, any inconvenience, they become, like, really brittle.

Daniel Ek 1:03:31 Mm.

David Senra 1:03:32 You have an insane high tolerance for crazy people.

Daniel Ek 1:03:35 Mm. Yeah.

David Senra 1:03:36 Okay? Um, somebody told me, somebody who works closely with you, that you judge people on their best idea, not their worst.

Daniel Ek 1:03:42 Mm.

David Senra 1:03:42 And I just finished rereading Jim Simons, founder of Renaissance Technologies, uh, really, creator of a magic money machine, is really [chuckles] the way to think about the guy.

Daniel Ek 1:03:51 Yeah. Yeah.

David Senra 1:03:51 Um, and they said something very similar. They're like, "It doesn't matter." He's like, "If there's a single good idea in your pile of horse manure, like, he'll find it."

Daniel Ek 1:03:59 Yeah.

David Senra 1:04:00 Like, he will go through-

Daniel Ek 1:04:01 Yeah.

David Senra 1:04:01 He-- All he cares about is the very best ideas.

Daniel Ek 1:04:04 Yeah.

David Senra 1:04:04 He will, willing to go through ninety-nine shitty ideas-

Daniel Ek 1:04:08 Yeah

David Senra 1:04:08 ... to get the very best-

Daniel Ek 1:04:09 Yeah

David Senra 1:04:09 ... 'cause he understands how powerful those are.

Daniel Ek 1:04:11 Yeah.

David Senra 1:04:11 Can you explain, like, how you develop this tolerance? 'Cause most people, like, especially as companies age, too-

Daniel Ek 1:04:17 Yeah

David Senra 1:04:17 ... you know, you're built, usually you have a lot of variance in the beginning.

Daniel Ek 1:04:20 Yeah.

David Senra 1:04:21 And then they get more successful, and they kinda, they make the-- corporations make the mistake of like, "No, we need, like, to, we need all the edges."

Daniel Ek 1:04:26 Right.

David Senra 1:04:26 "We need the high and the low-

Daniel Ek 1:04:27 Yep, yep

David Senra 1:04:27 ... out of there."

Daniel Ek 1:04:28 Yep, yep.

David Senra 1:04:28 You embrace that. You, you-- The way you put it to me when we were talking about this is, like, high-temperature people?

Daniel Ek 1:04:34 Yeah, yep.

David Senra 1:04:35 In, uh, for like, in, in, like, training AI.

Daniel Ek 1:04:37 Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, yeah, y- y- I, I, I actually think LLMs and, and the latest advancement in AI kind of have, have created an excellent framing on this, um, and, and sort of to talk about this sort of high-temperature notion. So in LLMs, you can basically tune up the temperature, and if you tune up the temperature, um, you know, it, it basically start hallucinating. So, um, you know, the bad thing with the hallucination, of course, is you have no idea what's true or not, but there is spurs of occasional brilliance that comes out of there, and the truly new ideas that come out of there. So the criticism of the, the current generation of LLMs is they're not very creative, and that's ultimately because we've kind of turned down the temperature on them, and we've safety-trained them to the point where we keep them within the guardrails. So there is a way, when you train these things, uh, to be highly creative, but batshit crazy, [chuckles] and that's just turning up the temperature.

David Senra 1:05:33 Yeah.

Daniel Ek 1:05:34 And I believe that, um, you know, one of the, the-- and, and this is, by the way, something that, um, I intend to focus a lot more on in the next decade. Um, you know, I'm, I'm very reflective at the moment because I am in my nineteenth year. Um, and, um, and, and I think it's interesting you sort of talked about big companies because I used to think, when-- before I sort of ran a big company myself, I just think, used to think, they're bad, uh, period. And what... I, I've sort of revised my view, and, and, and now I think they're really good, um, at doing what they're already doing and doing it better. So back to that point, like, um, a large-scale corporation, what they do is they just get better and better and better at doing what they already do. And, um, the way to do that is obviously minimize mistakes. So, um, you know, that also means minimize brilliance, minimize waste, minimize all these other things. So naturally, what you end up having is, uh, more and more capitalism, public markets, all of these things, drives you towards one thing: optimize what you're doing to the point where it's the most efficient thing that it can possibly be. But that is not how conducive to how you get the best ideas. And what I'm greatly, um, you know, satisfied and happy with, and I've been fortunate enough, as I don't anymore run Spotify as much day-to-day as I used to, I'm still very involved, but I'm not involved in all the team meetings and doing all the things that I used to do. So I was, like, ninety percent internally focused on just getting the machine to run, um, is that I've been more and more, um, able not just to have the free time to think, but I've been more, uh, able to meet more people. And part of the beauty of that is that it brought me back to music again, and it brought me back to the creative process of music again. And, um-... It is something remarkable in a studio where you have, um, a bunch of people, um, just throwing ideas at each other. And musicians actually, in many ways, uh, know more about the entrepreneurial process than most people give them credit for.

David Senra 1:07:48 I think it's the same thing. Filmmakers, like athletes-

Daniel Ek 1:07:51 Hundred percent the same thing.

David Senra 1:07:52 Just like... Yeah.

Daniel Ek 1:07:53 Hundred percent. And so, so this point then is that, um, what I truly believe the very best musicians do, um, and the most creative people do, is they are not afraid of throwing out ideas, even terrible ones. And it's in even the most terrible one, there may be a nugget. Uh, you and I, we talked about this over breakfast, where, um, you know, there was a person who sort of gave some bad advice to you. Um, but sometimes even, you know, the, the, the insight behi- be- behind the advice, the sort of the question behind the question, can lead to some really interesting things. And so, um, what I've come to do, realize, is most people want conformity, uh, and they value sort of a reliable consistency of, you know, uh, giving X amount of impact per seconds or minute, or, you know, uh, X, uh, truthfulness, um, you know, over X percent. They have some sort of heuristics for what is valuable person, uh, from a business context or what- whatever sort of context you're judging it on, but certainly in a business con- context, it's conformity. So you wanna sort of put people in about, "This person is good, and they're always good." Um, but, you know, w- what I'm more interested in these days is I'm interested in this idea I've never heard a- about before. Um, and, um, I find it with, with, you know, some people, um, you know, that, um, even in an hours-long conversation, um, with the best people in the world, where I've learned the most, it may be fifty-five minutes of that conversation that honestly was, y- you know, completely worthless, not that interesting for me. Uh, but then there's a, a spur-of-the-moment, two, three minutes of brilliance, which I'd never heard before, which will deeply and profoundly impact my life. Those are my people. That's what I'm interested in. And I, I've come to learn that, um, most people [chuckles] don't like to be around those people. [laughing] Um, but I love it. Um, and I think it's, uh, you know, such a rewarding and interesting thing, and I've, I've, um... I'm looking forward to spending more time with those people in the coming decade. Um, and it's, it's sort of one of those things that I've, I've sort of wanna do more of, um, and learn more from.

David Senra 1:10:28 Th- I think this is related. One of your oldest friends texted me the other day, and it was a screenshot of this episode I did, uh, with Chung Ju-yung, who's the founder of Hyundai. And it's probably the most ins- I think it is the most inspiring autobiography I read because the guy writes the book when he's, like, ninety. And he grows up the son of a poor farmer. You know, they almo- they had to eat tree bark to survive. He dies the richest person in South Korea, builds this huge conglomerate. I thought I was gonna read a book about a guy making cars.

Daniel Ek 1:10:51 [chuckles]

David Senra 1:10:52 I didn't realize that was, like, nothing.

Daniel Ek 1:10:53 Yeah.

David Senra 1:10:53 Like, he was building-- did all the construction, built some of the biggest ships i- in the world. Like, he was just... His nickname was The Bulldozer. And the reason he sent me the screenshot, and it was specific part of the podcast, he's like: "This is just like Daniel." And one thing that Chung would talk about is, as the, the more you progress in your career, the bigger the company gets, the more, like, rigid it gets.

Daniel Ek 1:11:13 Yeah.

David Senra 1:11:13 They go from, like, default optimistic, default risk-taking-

Daniel Ek 1:11:16 Yeah

David Senra 1:11:17 ... to they, any new s- idea? "No, no, no, no, no."

Daniel Ek 1:11:20 Yeah.

David Senra 1:11:20 Like, "Nope, we're not doing that."

Daniel Ek 1:11:21 Yeah.

David Senra 1:11:21 "That's too risky."

Daniel Ek 1:11:22 Yeah.

David Senra 1:11:22 Like, "We can't build a car. Like, we're just a tiny little, you know, island." And he goes, "Daniel Du- gives me the same exact advice, where he will say something, I will say no," and he goes, "But did you even try?"

Daniel Ek 1:11:33 Yeah.

David Senra 1:11:34 And I go, and he- then he goes, "It's related to his ability, if you actually analyze his willingness to go into all these different industries, where he doesn't know [chuckles] anything about the industry."

Daniel Ek 1:11:43 Yeah. Yeah, yeah, and I, I, I think that sort of comes back to, to, uh, the George Bernard sho- Shaw quote, right? The unreasonable man. Um-

David Senra 1:11:56 Let me read the full quote because it's an excellent quote, too. Uh, "The reasonable man adapts himself to the world. The unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore, all progress depends on the unreasonable man."

Daniel Ek 1:12:11 I have it painted on my wall at home.

David Senra 1:12:13 Yeah.

Daniel Ek 1:12:14 And I'm, I'm just reminded of that, um, because I think the reality is, uh, it is really, really tough to not conform, to not be part of a group, and it's so easy. Uh, and there's so many temptations in life that draws us back to that conformity, right? Um, money's another one. When you make a lot of money, you tend to make life more comfortable. Um, so you tend to spend more time golfing, you spend s- some time doing all these other things. Uh, but the reality is you become distracted, and you're not gonna be on your A game anymore. And, um, so the hard thing then is, um, to keep going and keep improving and keep doing these things. But, um, you're gonna have to sacrifice a lot in doing so. You're gonna sacrifice people's birthdays, uh, social commitments, uh, you're not gonna show up, uh, um, you know, for, for a lot of things.

David Senra 1:13:08 You told me a funny story one time about how committed you are to your work, and your friends know this about you, that sometimes you'll be in the middle of a dinner, and then some- like, an idea comes to mind or something you need to pursue-

Daniel Ek 1:13:17 Yeah

David Senra 1:13:17 ... and they just know, "Oh, he, he's gone, and he's not coming back [chuckles] tonight."

Daniel Ek 1:13:21 Yeah. Yeah, yeah. I'm not, I'm not-

David Senra 1:13:23 That is an unreasonable-

Daniel Ek 1:13:24 Yeah

David Senra 1:13:25 ... uh, you know, people are like, "Oh, I can't do that. It's social etiquette."

Daniel Ek 1:13:27 Yeah.

David Senra 1:13:27 Like, I even sometimes I find myself doing this 'cause we're both introverts. We've talked about this before, but, like, um, I, I kept getting invited to group dinners, and I just felt like, "Oh, this is like a prestigious group dinner."

Daniel Ek 1:13:37 Mm.

David Senra 1:13:37 "This person's really successful."

Daniel Ek 1:13:38 Yeah.

David Senra 1:13:38 "People would love this opportunity." And so at the be- beginning, when I first started doing this, I started going, I'm like-... This sucks! I don't- I remember one time, it, they, like, it was in a private room, and they shut the doors. And within, like, five minutes, I knew, I was like, "I gotta get out of here."

Daniel Ek 1:13:51 Oh, wow. Yeah.

David Senra 1:13:51 I was like, "Don't worry, I'm gonna pretend to go to the bathroom and just," [chuckles] "you know, never go back."

Daniel Ek 1:13:55 Just sneak out.

David Senra 1:13:55 And I was like, so I stand up, I go, "Well, where's the restroom?" Like-

Daniel Ek 1:13:57 Yeah

David Senra 1:13:57 ... "It's right in the room." I'm like, "Oh, no!" [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 1:13:59 Oh, no. Oh.

David Senra 1:13:59 And what I did, which I wouldn't do today, is I sat down, and I wasted an hour and a half of my time.

Daniel Ek 1:14:03 Yeah.

David Senra 1:14:03 Instead of just being the unreasonable man.

Daniel Ek 1:14:05 Yeah.

David Senra 1:14:06 Like, I'm now gonna say, like, what would Daniel Ek do? [chuckles] He would get-

Daniel Ek 1:14:10 Yeah, uh-

David Senra 1:14:10 He would get or avoid the dinner in the first place.

Daniel Ek 1:14:12 Yeah, the, uh... Yeah, I would, I would say, uh, you know, I'm not prou- [chuckles] proud of sneaking out, um, sometimes on that. But, but look, I mean, at, at, at, at the end of the day, um, I, I think that, uh, th- that's less about sort of being, um, protecting my time, um, and more sort of about protecting, um, unique and novel ideas and how rare they are. Um, and, and, and, and by the way, we'll, we'll hopefully get into that, but I, I, uh, I think less about sort of... A l- a lot of entrepreneurs seem to be, um, obsessed about time. I'm, I'm really not. I'm, I'm, I'm more obsessed about energy management.

David Senra 1:14:49 Wait, wait, let, let... Yeah, let's get into it now. What do you mean?

Daniel Ek 1:14:53 Well, I, I mean, y- you know, you, you, you constantly hear this thing about all these, um, you know, you're supposed to wake up at 4:00 a.m. in the morning, and you're supposed to do [chuckles] all-

David Senra 1:15:01 Yeah

Daniel Ek 1:15:01 ... these things, et cetera. It's like, first and foremost, there's no rule. Like, um, I know a lot of successful people, and as I'm sure you do, too, it's like some of them wake up at, you know, noon, some of them wake up at 4:00 a.m.

David Senra 1:15:12 Yeah.

Daniel Ek 1:15:12 It's like, you, you can do a lot of different things.

David Senra 1:15:14 The obsession with morning rituals is stupid.

Daniel Ek 1:15:16 Yeah. But the other thing is about s- sort of you're supposed to pack every, like, uh, you're supposed to have meetings every 15 minutes, and, like, 15-minute increments is better than a 30-minute increment, so on and so forth. Look, it might work for you, um, and, and for some people, it might be, like, the absolute best thing. Um, I, I've become more obsessed about sort of managing my energy, um, because, like, if you have time but you have no energy, you're not gonna accomplish anything anyway.

David Senra 1:15:44 So how do you manage your energy, then?

Daniel Ek 1:15:46 Well, it's about finding out, um, what gives you energy, right, to begin with, uh, and what drains energy. And, um, it's about finding out which time during the day, um, you're most productive. Um, and it's, again, innately about understanding yourself. Um, and what the whole world tries to do is get you to conform to their schedule. "Oh, we have an 8:00 a.m. morning meeting because that's when you get into the office," or, "You're supposed to do this and that," and all these other things, again, in a big corporations. Uh, and it's about conformity to, like, the average or to, to an okay standard instead of going for excellence and what truly, truly is unique. And I think the truly, truly unique thi- thing is you've got to just figure out what works for you, and you've got to do more of that. And that's, um, more about energy management, I believe, and it's so much more about... Like, e- even before this thing, uh, I think both you and I, we went and worked out, right?

David Senra 1:16:41 Yeah.

Daniel Ek 1:16:41 You know, that, that gives me energy.

David Senra 1:16:43 Yeah.

Daniel Ek 1:16:43 It's what's gonna sustain the rest of my day. I used to not do workouts at all because I thought, "Uh, I don't have time. Uh, there's no productivity." I used to go for... Uh, the, the worst, uh, productivity thing I did was I was at one point doing these 15-minute naps. I don't know if you've heard about this exercise.

David Senra 1:17:01 No. [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 1:17:01 It's a really bad idea, by the way-

David Senra 1:17:03 [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 1:17:03 ... so don't, don't try this. But I, I, I sort of learned that you can, you can, like, daisy chain sleep together by doing, like, these 15-

David Senra 1:17:10 Oh, it's like polyphasic.

Daniel Ek 1:17:12 Yeah.

David Senra 1:17:12 Yeah, okay.

Daniel Ek 1:17:13 So the basic gist is you're supposed to be able to last, like, on four hours of sleep.

David Senra 1:17:18 Wow.

Daniel Ek 1:17:18 And I was like, "Oh, this is great." So I did that, and actually, the interesting side part is it worked for about three weeks, um, and then I missed one of these-

David Senra 1:17:27 Uh-oh

Daniel Ek 1:17:27 ... uh, 15-minute increments, and holy shit, I was, like, completely suicidal for, like, weeks afterwards.

David Senra 1:17:33 [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 1:17:33 It was, like, not a great thing at all. But the point being is, um, you know, it's about s- sort of finding that energy management, uh, for yourself. I, I think certainly there's common wisdom, uh, around sort of what an average good sleep should look like, et cetera, but the reality is there are some people that will work on six hours of sleep, and they'll do just fine and may even be more productive that way.

David Senra 1:17:57 I wish I was like that.

Daniel Ek 1:17:58 Yeah.

David Senra 1:17:58 Like, if I could have a superpower, I always say, like, I would like to fly. The first thing is I wanna fly like Superman. [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 1:18:02 Yeah.

David Senra 1:18:03 If I can't do that, I just want sustained en- high energy levels 24/7. I- 'cause I need a ton of sleep, and I felt bad about this, 'cause the same exact reason you're describing. It's like people are like, "No, you gotta get up at 4:30, or you gotta-

Daniel Ek 1:18:14 Yeah

David Senra 1:18:14 ... just sleep less or-

Daniel Ek 1:18:15 Yeah

David Senra 1:18:15 ... sleep faster.

Daniel Ek 1:18:16 Yeah.

David Senra 1:18:16 Arnold Schwarzenegger would say, "You gotta sleep faster." And then I'm reading James, uh, James Dyson's first autobiography. And, you know, the guy made one of the most successful career, uh, companies in all- of all time. He's still doing it at 76 years old. And he goes, "I need a hell of a lot of sleep. 10 hours a night-

Daniel Ek 1:18:31 Yeah

David Senra 1:18:31 ... or my entire next day is ruined."

Daniel Ek 1:18:33 Yeah.

David Senra 1:18:33 I'm like, "Wait a minute, this guy built..." He's a single shareholder of a multi, multi, multi-billion dollar company.

Daniel Ek 1:18:38 Yeah.

David Senra 1:18:38 Built some of the best products in the world, and he's sleeping 10 hours a day.

Daniel Ek 1:18:41 Yeah, yeah.

David Senra 1:18:41 There are no... You just said, there are no rules.

Daniel Ek 1:18:42 No, there really, uh, isn't. And, and so, I mean, look, look, you, you just gotta find that thing, right? But, but when you realize that, it's... So, so if you start with that as the, the basic thing, um, like, all the things you and I have been talking about for this time now, um, you know, the reality is, it's like, it's about knowing yourself, which is really hard, and you get to know more, and it's about building a system that works for you.

David Senra 1:19:05 What, what's giving... I know hanging out with crazy people gives you energy.

Daniel Ek 1:19:08 Yeah.

David Senra 1:19:08 Right?

Daniel Ek 1:19:08 Yeah.

David Senra 1:19:09 Uh, I, you know, there's, there's actually something... So, uh, I texted a mutual friend of ours, Patrick O'Shaughnessy, and I was like, "I'm talking to Daniel," and Patrick, I think, asks the best questions in the world. And so obviously, I need to, like, use, like, phone a friend- [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 1:19:22 Right

David Senra 1:19:22 ... for, for, um-

Daniel Ek 1:19:23 That one lifeline.

David Senra 1:19:24 Yeah, exactly.

Daniel Ek 1:19:24 Phone a friend.

David Senra 1:19:24 Yeah. Um, and he's a good mirror, too-

Daniel Ek 1:19:27 That's right

David Senra 1:19:27 ... because, like, he, it's almost like a therapy session. Like, he'll be very quiet, doesn't like attention on himself, and yet he'll, like, hit you with a question. You're like-

Daniel Ek 1:19:34 Mm

David Senra 1:19:34 ... "I didn't even think about that."

Daniel Ek 1:19:35 Yeah.

David Senra 1:19:36 Um, and he has this great way to describe you. 'Cause my guess is that, uh, uh, like, uh, not even a guess, I'm pretty... I think you're obsessive, like, learning and understanding the world around you, and, like, that drives, like, a huge part of what you're doing-

Daniel Ek 1:19:48 Yeah

David Senra 1:19:48 ... and this exploration-

Daniel Ek 1:19:49 Yeah

David Senra 1:19:49 ... and you can build companies around the stuff you're interested in. That's kind of like this compounding learning machine.

Daniel Ek 1:19:54 Yep.

David Senra 1:19:54 But he goes, uh, "Out of everyone I know, [chuckles] Daniel has the ability to apply what he learns the fastest at the highest level."

Daniel Ek 1:20:01 Hmm.

David Senra 1:20:02 ... and this was actually related to a conversation that we had at your house, which was fascinating. Um, because again, y- y- I know you don't like public adulation, I'm still gonna do it 'cause I think it's fascinating, where it's like everybody focuses on Spotify, which is a marvelous achievement that very few people on the planet c- are capable- have, have, ha- been able to experience. And yet they, like, also, 'cause it's not really talked about, it's, like, all this other success that you're having outside of this, too-

Daniel Ek 1:20:26 Mm.

David Senra 1:20:26 - 'cause you have this, like... You're very curious about things.

Daniel Ek 1:20:28 Mm-hmm.

David Senra 1:20:28 And now you have a network, and knowledge, and resources that you can actually impact and try to make the world a better place. And you're not going after easy shit by any means, which I also admire about you. It goes back to the impact over happiness thing.

Daniel Ek 1:20:39 Yeah.

David Senra 1:20:40 And so we're talking about this, and I'm like, "Were you..." 'Cause usually true interests are revealed early.

Daniel Ek 1:20:45 Mm.

David Senra 1:20:45 So if we go and look at your life story, just like, people are like, "Oh, what hobbies do you have?" I'm like-

Daniel Ek 1:20:49 Yeah

David Senra 1:20:49 ... "I like to read."

Daniel Ek 1:20:50 Yeah.

David Senra 1:20:51 And like, "What else?" I'm like-

Daniel Ek 1:20:52 Yeah

David Senra 1:20:52 ... "I like to read." [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 1:20:53 You like to read. [chuckles] Yeah.

David Senra 1:20:53 That's it.

Daniel Ek 1:20:54 Yeah.

David Senra 1:20:54 And it's like, I was like that when I was five.

Daniel Ek 1:20:55 Yeah.

David Senra 1:20:55 I didn't- I wasn't like, at five years old, "What's a good hobby for my s- future-

Daniel Ek 1:20:59 Yeah

David Senra 1:20:59 ... self-development?"

Daniel Ek 1:21:00 Yeah.

David Senra 1:21:00 It's like, "No, I just like reading."

Daniel Ek 1:21:01 Yeah.

David Senra 1:21:01 "I like books better than people in general."

Daniel Ek 1:21:03 Yeah.

David Senra 1:21:03 Um, and so you see that in your early life. Like, you're starting companies-

Daniel Ek 1:21:06 Yeah

David Senra 1:21:06 ... and you didn't even know it was a company.

Daniel Ek 1:21:07 Yeah.

David Senra 1:21:07 You're just, like, trying to do something. So I was like: Oh, you must be, like... Like, you must have been interested in, like, investing forever. And you're like-

Daniel Ek 1:21:14 Mm.

David Senra 1:21:14 "No"-

Daniel Ek 1:21:15 No.

David Senra 1:21:15 " ... I never even thought about it until"-

Daniel Ek 1:21:16 Yeah

David Senra 1:21:16 ... "2018." Then you said the funniest thing. I go, "How did you learn about it?" He goes, "I started listening to [chuckles] Patrick's podcast."

Daniel Ek 1:21:22 Yeah.

David Senra 1:21:22 "And then I'd hear an idea. I'd be like, 'That's a good idea. I would try that.' "

Daniel Ek 1:21:24 Yeah.

David Senra 1:21:24 " 'Oh, I don't like that idea.' "

Daniel Ek 1:21:25 Yeah.

David Senra 1:21:25 And then I start reading books-

Daniel Ek 1:21:26 Yeah

David Senra 1:21:26 ... and then you just literally-

Daniel Ek 1:21:27 Yeah

David Senra 1:21:27 ... taught yourself. You weren't interested at all-

Daniel Ek 1:21:30 Yep

David Senra 1:21:31 ... and now you're essentially world-class at it in a very short amount of time, and this is just the face again.

Daniel Ek 1:21:36 Yeah.

David Senra 1:21:36 You just did the same face. [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 1:21:39 Yeah. Yeah. [chuckles]

David Senra 1:21:39 But, like, explain w- th- how, like, you think about this, where it's like I always say, "Learning is not memorizing information, learning is changing your behaviour."

Daniel Ek 1:21:48 Mm-hmm.

David Senra 1:21:48 And I think if I thought of anybody else I know that personifies that, it's, like, you.

Daniel Ek 1:21:52 Mm.

David Senra 1:21:52 It's like I'm not just, like, listening to this podcast for shits and giggles.

Daniel Ek 1:21:55 Yeah.

David Senra 1:21:55 I'm not reading this book-

Daniel Ek 1:21:57 Yeah

David Senra 1:21:57 ... even if you find it enjoyable.

Daniel Ek 1:21:58 Yeah.

David Senra 1:21:58 Like, I'm looking to, like, apply this.

Daniel Ek 1:22:00 Yeah. Well, I, I, I, I think it's back to that, like, um, sort of these two concepts we talked about. Um, my whole journey is one of self-mastery and, and finding out, uh, how I can become the best version of myself. Um, and meanwhile, what gives me energy is solving problems. Um, you know, and, and as you say, um, I think this is revealed early. Uh, like, I loved... I didn't know it was companies, but I loved, like, sorting out problems for other people. I've been doing my entire life, uh, whether it's a relationship advice, whether it's all these other things, and-

David Senra 1:22:39 This is why I think these conversations are important to have, because, like, you are the personality type that I've read about. It's just, like, now, instead of reading about you when you're 80 or dead, you're, like, in the middle of it. So it's very fascinating to me, 'cause I'm, like, trying to balance, like, my understanding of this through reading-

Daniel Ek 1:22:53 Mm-hmm, mm-hmm

David Senra 1:22:53 ... with, like, an actual person, where it's just, like, most of the people, they're not like, "I'm starting a company for starting a company's sake."

Daniel Ek 1:22:58 Right.

David Senra 1:22:58 They're just like what you said: "I like solving problems."

Daniel Ek 1:23:01 Yeah. That, that's it. That's, that's all. Like, so if you look at, like, the video games, I actually think what kind of video games you like is a, a, a pretty good revealer of your things, too. Like, I wasn't, um, playing any kind of first-person shooter games or any of that. Well, some of it, but not much. Most of what I was playing was, uh, strategy games. [chuckles] Um, you know, Civilization-

David Senra 1:23:24 Yeah

Daniel Ek 1:23:24 ... business strategy game. I played every tycoon game of how to run businesses, uh, [chuckles] better i- in, in-

David Senra 1:23:30 Of course you did.

Daniel Ek 1:23:30 You know. [chuckles]

David Senra 1:23:31 [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 1:23:31 So those were sort of my favourite games-

David Senra 1:23:34 Yeah

Daniel Ek 1:23:34 ... um, you know, growing up. Um-

David Senra 1:23:36 I love SimCity.

Daniel Ek 1:23:37 SimCity was amazing. Uh, it's-

David Senra 1:23:39 This is what I always say about entrepreneurs, is like, y- it's the best job in the world. I don't understand the people that give it up r- like, uh, I hate even saying this, 'cause I, I like... Rule number two in the Senra family, right, it's what I teach my kids, is mind your own business. So it's like, I don't- y- I think you're very similar. It's like, I don't have any suggestions on how you should live your life. Like, if we're friends, we can talk and go back and forth-

Daniel Ek 1:23:58 Yeah

David Senra 1:23:58 ... but, like, I just mind my own business.

Daniel Ek 1:24:00 Yeah.

David Senra 1:24:01 But sometimes, like, I, I just, I've, I don't have any other way... Like, I meet so many entrepreneurs, and, um, they're like: "I sold my company." I'm like: "Sorry to hear that." [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 1:24:11 [chuckles] Yeah.

David Senra 1:24:11 Like, what? [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 1:24:12 Yeah.

David Senra 1:24:13 I'm like: "Why would you get out of the game?" And then they sell their company, and they go be a VC.

Daniel Ek 1:24:16 Yeah.

David Senra 1:24:16 I'm like-

Daniel Ek 1:24:17 Yeah

David Senra 1:24:17 ... "Oh, my God!"

David Senra 1:24:18 [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 1:24:18 Yeah.

David Senra 1:24:18 This is the best game in the world.

Daniel Ek 1:24:20 Yeah.

David Senra 1:24:20 It's never ending.

Daniel Ek 1:24:21 Yeah.

David Senra 1:24:21 It's not like sports, where like-

Daniel Ek 1:24:22 No

David Senra 1:24:23 ... you, you can get better with time.

Daniel Ek 1:24:25 Yeah.

David Senra 1:24:25 You can solve problems.

Daniel Ek 1:24:26 Yeah.

David Senra 1:24:26 You can build your own world. If you think about what we were doing on the computer with SimCity, it's like, "Oh, look, I'll put a highway there."

Daniel Ek 1:24:31 Yeah.

David Senra 1:24:31 "That's... " Like, I'm, I'm- we're world builders.

Daniel Ek 1:24:34 Yeah.

David Senra 1:24:34 You get to control, like, who's around you, what your, what, uh, like, what are the rules in the world that happens?

Daniel Ek 1:24:39 Yeah.

David Senra 1:24:39 What's the outcome of the people

David Senra 1:24:41 in the world?

Daniel Ek 1:24:41 Yeah.

David Senra 1:24:41 And you get to make- and hopefully, you're doing it for, like, benevolent and, and good reasons, where I do think, like, uh, one of my favourite, um, quotes from, or maxims from the history of entrepreneurship comes from Henry Ford, where he's like, "Money comes naturally as a result of service."

Daniel Ek 1:24:53 Yeah.

David Senra 1:24:53 And the crazy thing about Henry Ford is by 1919, he owned 100%, 'cause he bought out his investors, of one of the most valuable companies in the world, and he didn't do it to start a company. He had one idea. I've read 10 books on this guy, and people knew him forever. He's like, he had one idea, it's kind of weird, that we're putting together cars. They're really expensive. He was obsessed with machinery and essentially outsourcing human labour to machines.

Daniel Ek 1:25:14 Mm-hmm.

David Senra 1:25:15 Started on the farm.

Daniel Ek 1:25:16 Yep.

David Senra 1:25:16 Right? And he's just like: "I want to build a car for the everyman."

Daniel Ek 1:25:20 Yep.

David Senra 1:25:20 Y- you said something very ear- in the early days of Spotify, was like, "I have this goal of, you know, this celestial jukebox," or whatever the case is.

Daniel Ek 1:25:27 Yeah.

David Senra 1:25:27 And you said at the very, "I don't know how I'm gonna do it." He said the same thing.

Daniel Ek 1:25:29 Yeah.

David Senra 1:25:30 "But I learned how to do it."

Daniel Ek 1:25:31 Yep.

David Senra 1:25:31 He's like: "Oh, well, how can I make a car cheaper? Sure as hell can't put it-

Daniel Ek 1:25:35 Yeah

David Senra 1:25:35 ... by hand, so we've got to learn how to mass produce something we don't know how to do yet."

Daniel Ek 1:25:38 Yeah.

David Senra 1:25:38 And that took him, you know, a decade and a half of failure or whatever.

Daniel Ek 1:25:40 Yeah.

David Senra 1:25:40 And then what happens is, he didn't start the company to make money, but he made millions of people's lives better. He changed the geography of-

Daniel Ek 1:25:46 Yeah

David Senra 1:25:46 ... you know, the world, for God's sake.

Daniel Ek 1:25:48 Yeah. Yeah.

David Senra 1:25:48 And as a result, money came naturally as a result of service.

Daniel Ek 1:25:51 That's, that's 100% how I think about it, and I think this is the beauty of capitalism,

Daniel Ek 1:25:55 right? Um, because ultimately, uh, at the end, there has to be someone willing to pay for what you're doing, and the, the reason for them to pay is obviously you're solving a problem for them. And the better you're solving that problem or the bigger the problem is that you're solving for people, the more valuable it becomes.

David Senra 1:26:11 ... What, what did you say earlier, too? You're like, I forgot how to- you, y- how you phrased it, but in my mind, when I interpreted what you said, it, uh, it's this idea of not being a go-getter, but being a go-giver.

Daniel Ek 1:26:21 Mm.

David Senra 1:26:21 You said something like, "The more problems you solve-

Daniel Ek 1:26:23 Yep.

David Senra 1:26:24 -the more comes back to you?" Was that the-

Daniel Ek 1:26:25 Well, uh, the, so these are two different ideas-

David Senra 1:26:28 Okay.

Daniel Ek 1:26:28 -but sort of closely related. So, uh, it was actually my co-founder who sort of said, "The value of a company is the sum of all problems solved." And if you really think about it, it is exactly what it is. Um, so, like, I tell this to the team, because when we face very difficult problems, uh, it is great, because, again, if we solve these problems, we will create a lot of value.

David Senra 1:26:51 I keep saying you think like Bezos. So there's a great line, uh, same thing, where, um, he says-- I'm reading, reading his shareholder letters for the fourth time, and it's like, these are so good and so clear and concise, I should read them every year. And I was like: I feel like I just read them. And I w- looked it up. I hadn't read them since end of 2022. But there's all these stories in Bezos's early career where people in Amazon would come to him with a huge problem.

Daniel Ek 1:27:13 Mm.

David Senra 1:27:13 They thought maybe they'd get fired, and they-

Daniel Ek 1:27:14 Yeah

David Senra 1:27:15 ... he got excited.

Daniel Ek 1:27:15 Yeah, yeah.

David Senra 1:27:17 'Cause he's like: Oh, great, like, we had a problem we didn't even know. If we solve this-

Daniel Ek 1:27:20 Yeah

David Senra 1:27:20 ... our company gets even more valuable.

Daniel Ek 1:27:21 Yeah, exactly right.

David Senra 1:27:22 There's this guy named Henry Kaiser, who was as famous in his day as maybe like an Elon is today, and he built a hundred companies. One of them still exists, Kaiser Permanente. He built the Hoover Dam. He built the Liberty Ships in World War II, and he has this great maxim that, like, people would come to him, and they'd be all depressed, and he'd be excited. And they're like: "What the hell's going on here, uh, Henry?"

Daniel Ek 1:27:41 Mm.

David Senra 1:27:41 And he goes: "Problems are just opportunities in work clothes."

Daniel Ek 1:27:44 Right.

David Senra 1:27:45 That's a great way to think about it.

Daniel Ek 1:27:45 Yeah, yeah.

David Senra 1:27:45 It's like y- if I can solve this problem for other people-

Daniel Ek 1:27:48 Yep

David Senra 1:27:48 ... I make other people's lives better.

Daniel Ek 1:27:49 Yep.

David Senra 1:27:49 I make the company more valuable-

Daniel Ek 1:27:50 Yeah

David Senra 1:27:50 ... and, like, and then you also have to feel good about what you're creating into the world.

Daniel Ek 1:27:54 Hundred percent, but I think it comes from, from solving problems, and, and, um, and, and, and, and so yeah. I mean, uh, like, I get excited today... You, you sort of asked to like, uh, about the other stuff that I get focused on. It's, I don't focus so much about the solution; I focus on the problem. I try to find really interesting problems that, um-- and, and figuring out even if, if there's, like, a five or ten percent chance of solving that problem, and I know that would be huge for humanity or society if we figure it out, then it's amazing. Like, the, that gets me fired up, and, and the intricacies of solving that problem, because it's oftentimes very, very complex. Because it's not like other people don't know this problem exists. Uh, there's probably even a lot of people that are- would agree that if we could figure it out, uh, that would be really valuable. Um, but, um, you know, I, I find this all the time, and, and you said it yourself: it's like sometimes they're really small, these problems. Sometimes they're gigantic and, and sort of earth-shatteringly different. Um, it's everything around, you know, life extension to, um, you know, um, uh, just walking into a store, um, and you see things you don't like in the store. Well, those are problems. Uh, if you could do those things better, you could probably build a business. And, and so, um, the, the biggest thing, however, is that people have this misconception about what, what, um, innovation is, and they somehow think that they've got to try to figure out something entirely new. But the history of the world is we build on other people's ideas. Um, so an innovation is actually taking two or more things that were already well-known and putting it together in a new way. It's really what it is. And so for me, the most, uh, interesting thing, it's like laying a puzzle or anything else. It's like I get to sit around, and, um, because of the meeting so many billion people, I get to listen to problems, uh, all a- all around me all the time, and I try to, um, distill and figure out, okay, well, this person said this thing, but what if, what if you actually articulate the problem like this instead? Uh, okay, well, what does that mean, and what does that unlock? And, and that, for me, is just, um, it's so much fun, and I couldn't imagine, you know, not spending every single day doing this. And, you know, we, we, we started this journey by telling my story that I didn't have to work, and that's why I started Spotify, because I love music, and, and I wanted to figure out a way where consumers got what they wanted and creators were able to get paid by doing what they love to do. Um, and that's really the genesis of the story.

Daniel Ek 1:30:29 Um, but, but even today, you know, I'm thinking about this, and I said, "If, even if you remove all the money, even from the beginning, uh, even in the middle and even now, uh, there's no way I wouldn't do this, uh, and spend mu- much of my awakened time thinking about this tha- stuff." Um, just sort of like, for me, this is impact, and this is what leads to happiness, uh, in my life story.

David Senra 1:30:55 I read something Jeff Bezos said that changed my perspective on the importance of high-quality sleep. He said that he makes sure he gets eight hours of sleep a night, and as a result, his mood, his energy, and his decision-making is improved. His point was that you get paid to make high-quality decisions, and you can't do that if you're sleeping terribly. And the product that has made the biggest impact on my quality of sleep for years is Eight Sleep. I'm lucky enough to be friends with the founder of Eight Sleep, Matteo, and we live in the same city. A few months after I started using Eight Sleep, I randomly ran into Matteo at a restaurant, and I was with some friends, so I go over and say hi. When I got back to my table, my friend asked me who was I talking to, and I said, "That's Matteo, the founder of Eight Sleep." And my friend replied, [chuckles] "He looks like he gets good sleep." Matteo is living and breathing his product. I had never had the ability to change the temperature of my bed before I had an Eight Sleep. I had no idea how much that would improve the quality of my sleep. I keep my Eight Sleep ice-cold. It's cold-

Daniel Ek 1:31:51 ... before I get into bed, so I fall asleep faster and wake up less during the night. That feature alone is worth ten times the price. There are very few no-brainer investments in life, and I believe Eight Sleep is one of them. That is why elite founders like Mark Zuckerberg and Elon Musk have all said publicly that they use Eight Sleep. I would recommend getting the Pod 5, which is the newest generation of their signature product. It is a smart mattress cover that you place on top of your existing mattress, and it is next-level sleep tech. It automatically regulates your body temperature throughout the night, independently for each side of the bed. The result is you get up to a full hour of additional quality sleep per night. Make the no-brainer investment in your sleep by going to EightSleep.com/senra, and use the code Senra to get three hundred and fifty dollars off. You can try it for thirty days at home and return it if you don't like it, but I'm confident you will love it. I will never let anyone take my Eight Sleep from me. Make sure you get yours at EightSleep.com/senra.

David Senra 1:32:50 You said something in the early days of Spotify that was very fascinating. You, you wanted to build, like, an enduring and impactful company that did something that no one else did, right?

Daniel Ek 1:32:57 Mm-hmm.

David Senra 1:32:58 It's remarkable also, like, when I'm listening to the series that was, uh, created in two thousand and twenty-one, how much you guys are talking about AI and how early you were, and you understood the impact, which is like you kind of saw clearly, like, where we're going. Uh, but you said something that I didn't actually understand, because the way I think about technology is, like, technology is just a better way to do something, right?

Daniel Ek 1:33:17 Mm-hmm.

David Senra 1:33:18 And you're like, at Spotify, though, like, at the very beginning, it's like, yeah, I think you nailed it. You're like: "The decisions that were made have to do with the DNA of the founder, 'cause we're the only ones there." [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 1:33:27 Yep.

David Senra 1:33:28 But you said, "I like technology for technology's sake."

Daniel Ek 1:33:31 Yeah.

David Senra 1:33:32 What does that mean?

Daniel Ek 1:33:33 Um, I, I like the process of science. I like the process of discovery. I like the process of understanding the-- how things work. Um, you know, I've been wired this way all, all my life. I've been pulling apart computers. I've been trying to understand why a semiconductor works the way it works, all these things. Um, and I'm intrigued about that, y- just this, this thing about understanding everything, understanding life, understand where we come from, understanding all these different things. Uh, but I'm equally interested in solving problems, and when, when you're curious about both of those two angles, you try-- y- you, you can end up finding these sort of, um, sort of, um, connection points where those two things meet, where it's obvious that there is something over there, um, that no one's really kind of applied in this way before. Um, and maybe there's not one idea, but two ideas over there. It's quite interesting. Um, and, and I think you have to love technology in order to go to the depth of understanding what's possible, and, and because it's oft- oftentimes, like, the greatest ideas is truly, innately understanding something and truly, innately breaking constraints around that something, um, by understanding the rules and knowing when, when you can-

David Senra 1:34:52 Yeah, to break them.

Daniel Ek 1:34:54 Yeah. And so, like, what are the greatest entrepreneurs, really? Well, the greatest founders are the people that kind of have this one idea of what, like, what the... They can almost internalize the consumer, uh, right? Like, what is someone willing-- what, what do they need, even if they can't articulate it themselves? And then have this entire field of amazing, brilliant engineers and scientists and mathematicians and all these groups of people that are doing various things, and then sort of figure out the intersection, and then you actually have to make it viable, too, which is you have to have some sort of business model, because if you don't have that, eventually t- this thing won't be sustainable. So, you know, it, it's sort of the trifecta of those three things, and that makes it even more interesting, because now we're talking about, uh, you know, uh, a, a really complex equation, trying to get these things together with multiple unknowns, and you're trying to configure these things by locking down constraints on one side, and then you're trying another side. And the amazing thing about early-stage entrepreneurship is, uh, you know, we, we talked about this Google example of trying two hundred different colors. You can't do that early on.

Daniel Ek 1:36:07 That is the amazing thing. Every decision you make is life or death, and that makes sort of the stakes even higher because you may literally try one thing, and then you run out of money, and so you gotta make sure that is the right thing. Um, and, um, it, it's just such a fascinating process, but it comes back. It's a process of creativity. It's a process of trying things out, and I'm more and more enamored and more and more, um, in love with this idea that, um, creativity itself, uh, is this really, really powerful thing, maybe the thing that's makes us unique as humans relative to everything else that exists in this world, and kind of going deeper and deeper into creativity, um, itself. And, um, a- and it doesn't conform, and it doesn't scale, and it doesn't behave in any of these other things. And then you have this other side, which is all about scale, which is all about conforming, and, and sort of navigat- gating that sort of, um, dynamism between these two things and polarities between these two things is, is, you know, very few people that I think, uh, can do, and it's really, really world-class at doing it.

David Senra 1:37:24 I think most of us, you can't even describe why you're doing what you're doing at the time. And what I mean by that is, like, you, you hinted on this earlier, it's like it's so easy to kill new ideas, right? Uh, the error on the side of, "No, we can't do this," it's, it's amazing to me how many times this comes up in all these biographies, where it's just like: This is a skill you have to learn, and a lot of it is, like, being comfortable with the, the, the messiness of the creative product, process. But it's also, entrepreneurs by definition, impatient-... patient.

Daniel Ek 1:37:53 Yeah.

David Senra 1:37:54 Like they have this, this what looks like a paradox-

Daniel Ek 1:37:56 Yeah

David Senra 1:37:56 - where, like, they want shit done now.

Daniel Ek 1:37:58 Yep.

David Senra 1:37:58 I love-

Daniel Ek 1:37:59 Yep

David Senra 1:37:59 - so, uh, Jeff Bezos says about this, "Step by step, ferociously."

Daniel Ek 1:38:01 Yep.

David Senra 1:38:02 Um, w- like, you know, that's the, "I'm willing to, to plan, you know, to, to if take two decades or three decades to solve the problem that I'm trying to go after."

Daniel Ek 1:38:09 Yep.

David Senra 1:38:09 Maybe in some cases, the stuff that he's working on might even outlive his-

Daniel Ek 1:38:12 Yeah

David Senra 1:38:12 - his lifetime. But it doesn't mean I'm, like, dilly-dallying on a day-to-day basis. I heard you say something one time. You were like: "I, I promise you, I don't think I'm the smartest. I don't think I'm the most talented. If I have one superpower, it's, like, I just have super-- like, I have super patience."

Daniel Ek 1:38:25 Yeah.

David Senra 1:38:26 Um, I think Neko is, like, an example of this.

Daniel Ek 1:38:29 Yeah.

David Senra 1:38:29 I met your co-founder on it-

Daniel Ek 1:38:30 Yep

David Senra 1:38:31 ... and I got to, to see this too, and I was like: "Oh, like, this is cool. Like, who made the machines?"

Daniel Ek 1:38:36 Yeah.

David Senra 1:38:37 He's just like: "We did." [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 1:38:38 Yeah.

David Senra 1:38:39 And then, and then I didn't know it was like... I don't know if stealth is the right word, but-

Daniel Ek 1:38:43 Yeah

David Senra 1:38:43 ... from the idea to the first-

Daniel Ek 1:38:44 Yeah

David Senra 1:38:45 ... time the customer happened, it was what?

Daniel Ek 1:38:46 Yeah.

David Senra 1:38:46 Like, six years or something-

Daniel Ek 1:38:47 Yeah

David Senra 1:38:47 ... or four years.

Daniel Ek 1:38:48 No, it's, uh, the company's eight years old, and we barely began. [chuckles]

David Senra 1:38:52 Yeah, and it's like, okay, that's an insane lev- that's an understanding of, like, we're ta- tackling, one, something that's-

Daniel Ek 1:38:58 Yeah.

David Senra 1:38:59 I like the way you just said, like, uh, innovation and creativity is actually a combination of things that oc- occurred before-

Daniel Ek 1:39:04 Yeah

David Senra 1:39:04 ... that we're combining.

Daniel Ek 1:39:05 Yeah.

David Senra 1:39:05 Right? And, um, uh, when, when you mentioned that, I thought of, like, you know, James Dyson's one of my entrepreneur heroes, and what I love about one of the, the hidden things that people don't know is he wrote a book called The History of Great Inventions. [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 1:39:17 [chuckles] Yeah.

David Senra 1:39:17 [chuckles] And he- it's such a, like- it's not- it's kind of a bland read.

Daniel Ek 1:39:21 Right.

David Senra 1:39:21 Uh, God bless his heart, but, like, it's just him going through, like, little Wikipedia pages-

Daniel Ek 1:39:26 Yeah

David Senra 1:39:26 ... or like, my ver- his version of, like, Wikipedia pages about, like, what this inventor did-

Daniel Ek 1:39:30 Yeah

David Senra 1:39:30 ... how he did it-

Daniel Ek 1:39:31 Yeah

David Senra 1:39:31 ... and what the result was.

Daniel Ek 1:39:32 Yeah.

David Senra 1:39:32 And then you see him take these ideas from, like, 1700 or whatever-

Daniel Ek 1:39:36 Mm-hmm

David Senra 1:39:36 ... and it's like, oh, I'll just take, like, that little piece out here-

Daniel Ek 1:39:38 Mm-hmm

David Senra 1:39:38 ... and I'll combine it with this piece.

Daniel Ek 1:39:39 Yeah.

David Senra 1:39:39 And then, what's, what's the new technology today that enables me to solve this problem that didn't exist a few years ago?

Daniel Ek 1:39:44 Yep.

David Senra 1:39:44 So you have this patience, right?

Daniel Ek 1:39:46 Mm.

David Senra 1:39:46 You have this desire to solve problems. It's almost like, it's sounding like to me, and maybe you could disagree with me, like you're sounding like y- you see a giant puzzle-

Daniel Ek 1:39:53 Yeah

David Senra 1:39:53 ... that you're trying to figure out.

Daniel Ek 1:39:54 Hundred percent.

David Senra 1:39:55 Now you have, uh, like, you can- you have more resources. You can be patient. Like, you couldn't-

Daniel Ek 1:39:59 Mm

David Senra 1:39:59 ... have done Neko twenty, when you were twenty-three.

Daniel Ek 1:40:00 Yep.

David Senra 1:40:01 Right? But y- you have this great quote that I know is important to you, and it says: "Quality is never an accident. It is always a result of intelligent effort."

Daniel Ek 1:40:10 Yeah.

David Senra 1:40:10 We haven't talked about quality at all-

Daniel Ek 1:40:12 Yeah

David Senra 1:40:12 ... even though, like, uh, Spotify is the high- - like, if you compare your competitors-

Daniel Ek 1:40:17 Yeah

David Senra 1:40:17 ... like, it's just in a class by itself.

Daniel Ek 1:40:19 Yeah. Yeah.

David Senra 1:40:20 So it's obviously very important to you.

Daniel Ek 1:40:21 Yeah.

David Senra 1:40:22 Like, we can't- we have to talk about quality.

Daniel Ek 1:40:24 Yeah.

David Senra 1:40:24 So, like, do you wanna, like, just pick up where that quote leaves off?

Daniel Ek 1:40:28 Well, well, there, there's so many strands of quality, right? Um, um, it, it, it is both, um, sort of the distinction of taste, whether taste is subjective or objective. You can go so many ways with this question. But, um, the way I think about quality, um, is, um... I, I think so much of your early life, um, certainly in my case, was the formulation of just trying to go for more. And the further I've gotten, uh, I've realized, um, and, and it's about everything, right? You amass more stuff. Uh, you amass, uh, you try to do, uh, you know, more things at the same time. You, you try to do all of these things, um, at the same time. And the further you go, you realize that, um, it, it, it really is about sort of ultimately th- this very simplistic trite thing: less is more. And, and the older I get, I feel it more and more. Um, you know, we talked about it with friends. Um, I think most people, uh, start out w- thinking having more friends is better, but I think more people are happier with fewer but better friends than many friends. Um, and, and so I think quality is ultimately this sort of notion around, um, focusing, um, distilling, uh, getting to the ess- essence. Uh, we, we can even talk about, like, quality in communication is often trimming things down and saying less things, right? Um, why is it, for instance, that when we're talking about very hard things, most people's instant reaction is just to try to add more complexity to the issue instead of just simplifying it? They're just trying to, um, be courageous and just trying to say the thing right out loud. Uh, the older I get, the more my instinct is towards turning towards that, and I'm reminded, even if we go back to investing, because, like, part of why I sort of liked investing has nothing to do with money. It started with, uh, honestly, this fact that a- all of a sudden, I had more money than I knew what to do with, and I sort of didn't wanna just hand it off to a bank and, and, uh, without understanding anything about it. But what sort of got me deeper curious about it is, uh, I realized that investing is, is actually more about, um, learning about your temperament than it is about the specific action that you're doing. Your temperament, actually, it's, it's more about being in line with your temperaments than, than not, or which game you're picking needs to be suited to you and your circumstances and how you wanna play this than anything else. And so again, we come back to philosophy. Um, and so, uh, one of the concepts, um, uh, is obviously around, um, that Munger talks about, coming back to, uh, Munger, uh, reference again, is, is diversification, right? And, and he calls it somewhat simplified diversification-

David Senra 1:43:35 Yeah

Daniel Ek 1:43:35 ... because the common wisdom, of course, is, in theory, diversification is, is the best thing you can do. But the truly greatest people, um, financially, if that's the only yardstick you use, typically do completely the opposite of that, which is they have oftentimes only one asset. Uh, maybe they'll have two or three, but they certainly don't have more than that, and they just go for that.

David Senra 1:43:59 There's a-... a realization you have, right? 'Cause like I, I read something or you read a line, and you're like, "Okay, let me filter that through like how I would say it." So I, I do this all the time, where like I'll take notes on all the books that I read, and then I'll reread them, and I'll just jot the tone. It's like, what's occurring there? Can I put it into one sentence? And one thing I stumbled upon about this was that sometimes the, uh... Nick Sleep has this great quote, where he's like, "The best investors are not investors at all. They're entrepreneurs who never sold."

Daniel Ek 1:44:24 Mm.

David Senra 1:44:24 And me and you have talked about this, the fact that there's a lot of people that have like sold way too early-

Daniel Ek 1:44:28 Mm.

David Senra 1:44:28 -and they're like lauded, and it's like, what- if you just didn't do that-

Daniel Ek 1:44:31 Yeah

David Senra 1:44:31 ... everything else you did, like you, if you just didn't sell, uh, the- so Nick Sleep talks about this as like, and, and in other books, he's like, "If Sam Walton didn't give away the stock in Walmart to his kids before it appreciated," you know, you have one of the largest fortunes by a single person ever-

Daniel Ek 1:44:47 Yeah

David Senra 1:44:48 ... for their ownership-

Daniel Ek 1:44:48 Yeah

David Senra 1:44:49 ... the, the concentration of ownership in Walmart. And Sam talks about this. He's like, "I didn't really do investing in anything but Walmart," right? And it's like he wasn't waking up saying, "I need to diversify my portfolio."

Daniel Ek 1:44:58 Yeah.

David Senra 1:44:58 "I need to worry about capital allocation."

Daniel Ek 1:44:59 Yeah.

David Senra 1:44:59 He's just like: I believe in what I'm doing. I'm gonna keep doing it.

Daniel Ek 1:45:01 Yeah.

David Senra 1:45:01 I'm gonna throw all my money in there.

Daniel Ek 1:45:03 Yeah.

David Senra 1:45:03 And he's just like, "I'm doing it 'cause I love to do it, and spending time doing anything else would be an absolute distraction." And Nick Sleep talks about this 'cause he's a capital allocator.

Daniel Ek 1:45:11 Mm-hmm.

David Senra 1:45:11 He's not building a product, but he's making capital allocation decisions like, "Do I need to sell this stock, put into another one? I'm weighing my opportunity costs." And he was haunted almost-

Daniel Ek 1:45:20 Mm-hmm

David Senra 1:45:20 ... by this idea. If you look at financial history, it's like he talked about a firm, a financial firm one day, where they're like, "Okay, uh, we owned IBM in the ninteen fifties." And I didn't know till I read Michael Dell's autobiography, right? 'Cause IBM was... it's like they're the most powerful and wealthiest company in the world when me and you were born, okay?

Daniel Ek 1:45:37 Mm-hmm.

David Senra 1:45:38 And Michael Dell's like: You have to understand, like nineteen eighty-seven, for me to, like, yell out to my dad, he's like, "What do you want to do for a living?"

Daniel Ek 1:45:44 Yeah.

David Senra 1:45:44 He's like: "I want to compete with IBM."

Daniel Ek 1:45:45 Yeah.

David Senra 1:45:46 "I'm a, I'm a nineteen-year-old in my dorm room-

Daniel Ek 1:45:47 Yeah

David Senra 1:45:48 ... with a thousand dollars."

Daniel Ek 1:45:48 Yeah.

David Senra 1:45:48 Like, what kind of grandiose ambition-

Daniel Ek 1:45:50 Yeah

David Senra 1:45:50 ... do you have? I went in search. It's like, why is this so crazy? And I started there. It's like, it was the most valuable company in the world by market cap at the time.

Daniel Ek 1:45:57 Yeah.

David Senra 1:45:57 It was the first company to go over a hundred billion dollars in market cap, right?

Daniel Ek 1:45:59 Yeah.

David Senra 1:45:59 And this little nineteen-year-old kid's like, "No, I think I can, like, have a go, have a go at them." But Nick Sleep talks about he came into this firm, and he's reading their, their, how they talk about their investments, and like, "We made a massive mistake. We owned IBM in the nineteen fifties-

Daniel Ek 1:46:14 Mm

David Senra 1:46:14 ... and we sold."

Daniel Ek 1:46:15 Mm.

David Senra 1:46:15 And they're having this conversation in the nineteen seventies.

Daniel Ek 1:46:17 Yep.

David Senra 1:46:17 And the leadership of the financial firm is like, "How do we avoid not doing this?" That one, they, they said, "If we just held that, it would've, uh, the gain would have been more than all the assets we have under management."

Daniel Ek 1:46:27 Yeah.

David Senra 1:46:27 Like, we can't do this.

Daniel Ek 1:46:28 Yep.

David Senra 1:46:29 That same year-

Daniel Ek 1:46:30 Yeah

David Senra 1:46:30 ... they sold Walmart.

Daniel Ek 1:46:31 Yep.

David Senra 1:46:31 They had Walmart in the nineteen seventies.

Daniel Ek 1:46:33 Wow! Wow.

David Senra 1:46:34 So they made the same mistake. And Buffett, obviously greatest investor of all time, he met Walt Disney.

Daniel Ek 1:46:38 Mm-hmm.

David Senra 1:46:38 He went [chuckles] and talked to Walt Disney-

Daniel Ek 1:46:41 Yeah

David Senra 1:46:41 ... in like the sixties, and then he- I think the, he bought the stock at, like, sixty-two cents or something.

Daniel Ek 1:46:46 Right.

David Senra 1:46:46 And he, he had like a two X or four X-

Daniel Ek 1:46:48 Right

David Senra 1:46:48 ... game. He's like-

Daniel Ek 1:46:49 Yeah

David Senra 1:46:50 ... "Well, I sold Disney." [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 1:46:51 Yeah.

David Senra 1:46:52 So it's- uh, that's why I was like, oh, the best financial decisions are not financial decisions at all. You're doing it for another reason, which is exactly what you said. It's like, all Sam had to do was just keep doing Walmart.

Daniel Ek 1:47:01 Yeah.

David Senra 1:47:01 Which is exactly what he did.

Daniel Ek 1:47:02 Yeah.

David Senra 1:47:02 I remember, um, yeah, I obviously live in Miami, uh, on a friend's boat in, uh, the marina there, and there's, like, the- a boat, like, bigger than anything else around there. It's like... And you can Google, like, who owns it. It is like it was Sam Walton's brother's daughter. [laughing]

Daniel Ek 1:47:16 Right, right. Yeah, yeah.

David Senra 1:47:17 [laughing]

Daniel Ek 1:47:19 It's, it's crazy. But, but, but I think you're on to something important, um, whi- which is this notion around just, um, innately focusing, um, and, and solving problems day by day builds quality, right? Um, and, and, and so, uh, quality for me is, is less. Quality for me is, uh, focus. Quality for me is improving day by day. Um, all of these things build quality, and quality is rare. Um, quality in people is rare. Quality in ideas is rare, and we tend to make these things binary. Um, and, um, we talked about it with people. Like, I'd rather have that person that has one good idea in a, um, in an entire hou- hour, and the rest is crap, than someone who has, you know, ten decent ideas, but nothing is amazing. So that sort of differential equation between the one percent versus the rest is, is so important, and it's so important to understand, and I think it's, it's... W- we again take it literally, uh, and we know about it because we can explain it in hindsight, but we don't know when it's happening. So what is that qualitative process? What defines quality as it's happening before you can see it objectively from the outside? Those things are interesting, and, um, I'm more and more drawn towards that, um, it is, um, for me at least, very much looking at the people, um, in it, um, and looking at how they build judgment over time, the sort of feedback loop they create, the curiosity that they have about this, and the obsession they have about trying to achieve the impossible. And for me, the impossible is something that's perfect. It's never gonna exist. The whole universe is this thing where the only thing we've learned, we keep debating all these things about the universe, but the only thing we know is it's not static. It moves. It cannot, by definition, be like this one thing. It's just constantly expanding or contrasting or it's moving. It's, it's, um, so, so perfection just doesn't exist, but the aspiration towards perfection, uh, is a remarkable thing. I mean, I love Japan for this reason, right?

David Senra 1:49:30 Mm.

Daniel Ek 1:49:30 Like, you, you find these amazing individuals that literally spend their entire life... I was, um, in Japan, uh, maybe ten days ago or something, and I, I, I was in one of these temples, uh, with a tea master, who literally all he's done, uh, for the past, uh, I've asked him, for the past thirty-four years, is perfecting how to make tea. That's it. Nothing else. Uh, and yes, the tea is amazing, but it's not just that. It's just seeing that obsession about quality, seeing that obsession about-... and being not even 1%, but like .1% or point- .1% i- in something. And I think, feel like you, you, you sort of asked about AI and all these things, and, and we can talk about art, too, but like, uh, for me, like, that is gonna be even rarer. Like, average is gonna be possible to do. Even better than average is gonna be possible-

David Senra 1:50:27 Yeah

Daniel Ek 1:50:27 ... to do with AI. But, but that sort of thing about this guy doing this for 30 years, just becoming the very, very best about what they do, or even what I find incredibly inspiring about you, is just the relentlessness every single day towards the long term. It's, it's like the- as you say, it's the paradox about the long-term, um, um, m- mindedness, uh, but the obsession on the daily basis. Uh, and against conventional odds, against all these other things, because I, I, I would imagine, I don't know, but I would imagine, like, when you started, uh, Founders, probably not many people knew who you were, right?

David Senra 1:51:08 Nobody.

Daniel Ek 1:51:08 Nobody, right? [chuckles]

David Senra 1:51:09 [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 1:51:09 And so the, the competition for your time, uh, was... There was none, so you could probably sit for six hours-

David Senra 1:51:18 Yeah

Daniel Ek 1:51:18 ... or eight hours, et cetera. But today it's much harder, um, because there's many other things. There's people like myself and other people, and you're like, "Oh, wait a minute, maybe this is a good idea to meet this person," or there's a, uh, you know, um, a business opportunity that shows up, and maybe people are asking, like, "Maybe you should invest," and maybe you're tempted about it even. But it's- this is the thing that happens all the time, and this is how greatness gets evaporated, is you lose focus.

David Senra 1:51:45 That's a great line: Greatness gets evaporated. The- a lot of the stuff, like, when I talk on the podcast or e- ev- everything I say on social media, is like reminders to myself, 'cause I just read, reread past highlights, 'cause, like, we forget that we forget, and so I need a reminder. And I just came across one that's just like, uh... I have them presented to me in a random order, so it's like I never know what I'm gonna read that day. And it said, uh, it was Buffett. It's like, "The difference between successful people and, and really successful people is really successful people say no to everything."

Daniel Ek 1:52:11 Yeah.

David Senra 1:52:11 And this is exactly the constant thing where, like... I do have a question for you. Um, one, uh, uh, going back to that, it's like, I can't even explain why I did what I did, because, like, I had close to no traction for five and a half-

Daniel Ek 1:52:24 Mm-hmm

David Senra 1:52:24 ... years.

Daniel Ek 1:52:25 Mm-hmm.

David Senra 1:52:25 And now I look back, I like, "There's no way I would do that today."

Daniel Ek 1:52:28 Yeah.

David Senra 1:52:29 But somehow, that person-

Daniel Ek 1:52:31 Yeah

David Senra 1:52:31 ... who I now greatly appreciate [chuckles] and love-

Daniel Ek 1:52:33 Yeah

David Senra 1:52:33 ... that he d- it feels like a different person.

Daniel Ek 1:52:35 Yeah.

David Senra 1:52:35 I cannot believe... That is, like, what I'm most proud of, is not, like, trying to make something that's great, which I think is a selfish thing for us-

Daniel Ek 1:52:42 Mm-hmm

David Senra 1:52:42 ... is like, yes, when you release it to the world, you release Spotify, you do all these things, it's an act of service to other people, but you're also doing it because, like, you, it, you have to.

Daniel Ek 1:52:49 Oh, yeah.

David Senra 1:52:49 It has to come out.

Daniel Ek 1:52:51 Oh, yeah. Yeah.

David Senra 1:52:52 But I just cannot believe that I did that, and I'm just like, that's the thing I'm most more- mo- most proud of than anything else, just like, I had to do this. I was willing to, like, drive Uber if I had to, tend bar, do literally-

Daniel Ek 1:53:05 Mm-hmm

David Senra 1:53:05 ... whatever. I was like, "Just, uh, w- give me enough time, I'll figure it out."

Daniel Ek 1:53:08 Yeah.

David Senra 1:53:08 Now, I didn't think it was [chuckles] gonna take half a decade to figure out.

Daniel Ek 1:53:10 Right.

David Senra 1:53:10 You have a ton of stories with Spotify with that. There is no line, I feel, between, like, your work and your life. Like, they're one and the same.

Daniel Ek 1:53:18 Yeah.

David Senra 1:53:19 The issue that I'm having now, and in general, is that I feel a lot of pressure, 'cause, like, I'm trying to change not just my life, but, like, the trajectory of, like, my entire family.

Daniel Ek 1:53:29 Mm.

David Senra 1:53:29 And I feel very guilty when I don't work-

Daniel Ek 1:53:31 Mm-hmm

David Senra 1:53:31 ... to the point where, like, you know, I just got back from a, a, a crazy trip that people would love to go on, and like-

Daniel Ek 1:53:36 Yeah

David Senra 1:53:37 ... I just felt guilty for not- for, like, taking time out and off-

Daniel Ek 1:53:41 Yeah

David Senra 1:53:41 ... and not working.

Daniel Ek 1:53:42 Yeah.

David Senra 1:53:43 And I feel like this is, like, almost like a compulsion, like I don't have control over it.

Daniel Ek 1:53:46 Yeah.

David Senra 1:53:47 Do you have anything like that?

Daniel Ek 1:53:48 Sure. Um, I do feel the same thing, of course. Um, but I'm, I'm back to sort of time versus energy, uh, management.

David Senra 1:53:57 Mm-hmm.

Daniel Ek 1:53:57 And, um, I don't know about you, but I feel like the greatest ideas I've had, uh, comes from the most weird and wonderful places where I expected nothing out of it. So quite often, when I do take some time off, I come back with, like, two or three and, um, some entirely new insights that just wouldn't have come if I just kept grinding at that thing. By just changing a scenery, uh, being in a different frame of mind, uh, pausing, giving, um... You know, it's, it, it's in the creative process. You know, um, the greatest artists talk about some of the greatest songs literally take five minutes to write-

David Senra 1:54:35 Yeah

Daniel Ek 1:54:36 ... which is amazing, right? But some songs are the ones you, like, work on it, um, you put it in a drawer, and six months later, totally unbeknownst to you, it clicks. You're not even working on that thing. It just sort of like, "Oh, that's it," and they go back, and they do the song, and it's, like, the greatest song ever. Um, there's not one path to greatness. Um, there's many. Um, and I feel like the- that's, that's why I'm so obsessively focused on energy.

David Senra 1:55:07 So you mean energy as, like, you just let that guide you?

Daniel Ek 1:55:09 Yeah.

David Senra 1:55:10 It's like, "Hey, if I need a break right now, if I need to go for a walk, or if I need to go spend time with my wife and kids," or, like-

Daniel Ek 1:55:16 Yeah.

David Senra 1:55:17 Is that what you mean?

Daniel Ek 1:55:17 Um, yeah, 100%. Um, and, and I try to, uh, feel that. I feel like so much of our, our, um, life just rips us apart from this thing and tries to get us on a schedule, per se. Um, and it's not like I don't have a schedule. Of course I-

David Senra 1:55:35 Yeah

Daniel Ek 1:55:35 ... do have one, and, um, but, but I feel so much of it should be more guided by trying to understand ourselves more, um, intimately, right? So I, I don't know if you've, you've heard of this, but, um, so going back to sleep, there, there's been this kind of thing around, um, more recently, which I was surprised. One of my- my 10-year-old daughter told me about this, is around, um, um, that, um, actually, you know, um, she, she sort of said, like, we have this idea that, o- of eight hours, and, and she actually mentioned instead that, um, i-... uh, the real notion is, um, that it- we kind of did it almost like fasting. Um, like Ramadan is, you know, how it's based on the sun. Sometimes it could be six hours, or sometimes it could be 12 hours. So it used to be that sleep was actually, uh, in two periods. Uh, so you didn't sleep one consecutive thing. You sort of had a, um, three, four-hour sleep, uh, and then, you know, you woke up, and then you had another three, four-hour sleep again. And so much of that was based on light. Um, and, you know, maybe it was driven by other things that were happening in our life, too. And for Nordic people, what it actually meant, uh, going back as, as late as the, you know, 18th century, before we started having electric lights and candles and all these things-

David Senra 1:56:52 Yeah

Daniel Ek 1:56:53 ... is we actually slept a lot, ah, less on the summers, and we slept a lot more in the winters, guided by light. So we keep thinking it's this static thing, but it's actually, again, driven by the environment around us. And so much, um, of this sort of innate knowledge about listening to ourselves, understanding, um, our, um, innate personality, understanding hunger. Like, I, I can tell you, as someone, I've, I've gained, in periods of my life, like, um, 40 pounds, um, in my worst negotiations, et cetera. And, and one of the problems I have now is that I literally don't know when I'm hungry because I ruined that sort of natural feeling in my body of, of understanding when I'm hungry and when I'm not hungry. Um, so, um, you know, a huge part of losing weight for me over the past few years was just really kind of innately starting to listening to my body again and, like, starting to figure out what satiation means. Because for me, for instance, I don't feel it until 20 minutes after. So, like, i- if, if I didn't, like, sort of eye what I should eat, I would just keep eating way more than I should. Um, and so much of me has just been portion sizing, of, like, understanding, "Okay, well, that's probably gonna be enough." And it doesn't feel like enough at that moment because I ruined my body, but 20 minutes later, I understand it. And so I'm just trying to sort of, again, convey this sort of thing about understanding who you are, choosing the game you're playing, and realizing that there's... Life is not one game, but it's a thousand games. And there's this brilliant quote, um, by this guy called Kwame Appiah, that there's another one of those things, this sort of guy-

David Senra 1:58:35 I just circled it. [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 1:58:36 All right.

David Senra 1:58:36 Perfect timing. We're... No, we're in perfect alignment. Go ahead.

Daniel Ek 1:58:39 Well, I, I'm probably gonna ruin the exact one, so, so maybe you can read it.

David Senra 1:58:43 Okay, I'll read it. It's: "In life, the challenge is not so much to figure out how best to play the game. The challenge is to figure out what game you're playing."

Daniel Ek 1:58:51 Yeah. And, and for me, uh, realizing that, um, it, it, it's just been eye-opening, right? Uh, it's another one that's on my wall. Um, because I feel like quite often when I'm talking to people, um, and, and they're talking and trying to get life advice, they're not playing their

Daniel Ek 1:59:12 game. They're playing someone else's game. Uh, they're certainly not playing the game they want to be playing. But they somehow think that life is just one game, where actually so much is about choosing the right, the right game for you. Um, and so, um, yeah, I keep coming back to that. Like, energy management is the same thing. You've got to, like, uh, create the environment around you that you want to do. You have to choose your game. Um, and when you do that, and you start understanding that, you start becoming superhuman in your ability to get things done.

David Senra 1:59:45 Do you have more or less negative self-talk today than you did 20 years ago?

Daniel Ek 1:59:53 [inhales] I, I was... I'm more comfortable with who I am, um, than I was 20 years ago. I was still very much- my whole life, I've been a searcher. I've been, um, you know, uh, when I was really young, in my teens, I went to every possible religious meetup you could be. Uh, I went to everything. Uh, I went to Hare Krishna centers [chuckles] I went to, to, um, you know, um, uh, Jewish centers, um, you know, mosques. I went to everything, and I tried to learn as much as possible because I, I truly believe not enough people are, are like- I've, I've always been surprised why more people aren't interested in where we come from and what the purpose is of life. For me, those are sort of some of the greatest questions-

David Senra 2:00:42 Mm-hmm

Daniel Ek 2:00:43 ... that I, like many others, don't have any idea, [chuckles] obviously, what, what will happen, but I think they're, they're really important. So I've always been a searcher, and I think that naturally sort of, like, led me to sort of also be a searcher about myself, too, um, and, and trying to find sort of who I am. But the older I've gotten, and the more and more things have started clicking about myself, and the more unapologetic I am about, uh-

David Senra 2:01:08 And so your inner monologue gets less harsh?

Daniel Ek 2:01:11 Yeah, because, like, you know, not only do you stand out quite a lot, um, as an entrepreneur, um, and my interests were wildly different than my social circle growing up and all these things, but the second thing is I'm an introvert. Um, so, um, you know, that doesn't help. Um, so most people like being around a lot of people, and they get energy from it, and I didn't. So that obviously naturally, um, gets you to question yourself. And, you know, against, um, many others, as an entrepreneur, I'm not the most eloquent person. I'm not the smartest.

David Senra 2:01:42 You're pretty damn eloquent. [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 2:01:44 Well, I, I, I had to work on it.

David Senra 2:01:46 Yeah.

Daniel Ek 2:01:47 That's still, like, the hard thing. I've, I've really, really, um, um-

David Senra 2:01:49 Listen, I've listened to all your episode, or all your interviews, and I did this before we were friends, and I- every time something comes out, I was like, "Oh, I gotta watch that." You're, you're very, you're not giving yourself enough credit. Like, you are a very clear communicator. Like-

Daniel Ek 2:02:01 Thank you.

David Senra 2:02:01 Yeah.

Daniel Ek 2:02:02 Um, but, but it's really a work product.

David Senra 2:02:04 Yeah.

Daniel Ek 2:02:04 Like, I, I wish there was more recorded stuff on my- myself when I was, like, um-... 20 and 21, [chuckles] because I tell you-

David Senra 2:02:12 [chuckles] Not me.

Daniel Ek 2:02:12 Uh, I, I was, I was not great. Uh, I was quite terrible. Um, and, and so I've just learned that it's a superpower, uh, and something I have to work on, is getting my message across to other people to believe what I'm believing and see what I'm seeing in order to get them to wanna come and join, uh, whatever thing we- we're trying to will into this world.

David Senra 2:02:34 I have two more questions, uh, that I'm personally curious about. One is gonna be a very weird question, but the first one is, do you feel different? Okay, so, like, most of the people watching this or listening to this, like, so few people are going to be born in the projects in s- a tiny, little... We didn't even- w- we'll have to do, like, s- this every year, if you're fine with it. Uh, because, like, the idea that you even, like, come from this tiny, little island, which I was like, uh, you know, uh, like, got to visit, and then you, like, competing with the biggest companies in the world and you win, it's just doesn't- like, we, we didn't even get there.

Daniel Ek 2:03:09 Yeah.

David Senra 2:03:10 But, like, you grow up, you have a great mom, y- you know, you're single family, not a lot of money, but... And then now, what I'm curious about is, like, your lived experience is so- there's so few people alive that can actually empathize with that as- because they also had it. So I'm very curious, do you feel different?

Daniel Ek 2:03:34 Um-

David Senra 2:03:35 And what I mean by that is, like, as y- you've grown from, you know, a kid in the projects-

Daniel Ek 2:03:39 Yeah

David Senra 2:03:40 ... even if you had early success, to now being, you know, one of the most successful entrepreneurs on the planet, which I know, don't do the face. [chuckles]

Daniel Ek 2:03:46 Yeah.

David Senra 2:03:47 But it's an undeniable fact. Like, do you feel different?

Daniel Ek 2:03:52 I think yes and no. Um, so I, I feel different in, in the same way a 40-year-old would feel different than a 10-year-old would do.

David Senra 2:04:00 Yeah.

Daniel Ek 2:04:00 I feel different in, um, I'm a product of all the experiences of my life, and obviously, I've been incredibly fortunate to, uh... I was counting the other day, I've been to, like, 130 countries or something in my life. I've seen so many cultures, so many people. I have friends all over the world. All of that has shaped me into who I am. Um, I don't feel different because innately, many of the things, the drive, the long-term-ness, the obsession, the, um, uh, this sort of willingness on the paradox of winning on the one hand, but then also trying to truly find a win-win, um, and work with people to try to find a win-win, which is really important to me, um, uh, has always been there. Uh, and it's always been these things. And like you said, you know, you kind of look back, uh, at, uh, yourself a few years back when you started off and say: "Wow, how did I do this?" Um, and, and you're amazed at that. I can feel the same way about young Daniel. I can feel myself about the young Daniel that worked every weekend, um, um, you know, nonstop, 24/7, sacrificed so many things, so many summers, so many other things. Um, you know, I had a blast doing so, but I didn't have a normal upbringing, uh, just because I was so obsessed about learning, so obsessed about, uh, making it. Um, and, and it put me in the position of where I am today. Um, and I actually feel like I owe that guy to keep pushing myself, right? Because there's so many things, there's so many demands of my time, so many things that's- tells me to, to sort of downshift gear, uh, into an easier gear, because life would be a lot more comfortable that way. This is not a comfortable thing-

David Senra 2:05:58 No, it goes back to impact-

Daniel Ek 2:05:59 That none of us are doing

David Senra 2:06:00 ... impact to happiness. This is what... So I think I texted this to you, um, but one, one of the roles you play, and I'm very grateful that you a- allowed us to, like, record this conversation, because essentially, w- what I text you is, like, you seem to have, like, no self-imposed ceiling on what you can learn or achieve, and that spending time with you then transfers that belief to other people. And so, like, every single time, you know, I obviously, like, I take notes of, like, what I learned from the conversation we have after the fact, and I interpret it, it's like, obviously not verbatim, I'm saying, like: "What did I just learn from Daniel? What does apply to me?" It's like, oh, you have all these s- you think you don't... I thought, like, I was ambitious, and I, like, I didn't even realize till you kind of pulled the scales off my eyes. Like, you have this, like, limiting belief that you have no limits.

Daniel Ek 2:06:40 Yeah.

David Senra 2:06:40 There is no limits in life.

Daniel Ek 2:06:41 Yeah.

David Senra 2:06:42 And so, like, you're a hell of inspiring. One other question for you. Um, I'm obsessed with Game of Thrones to an unhealthy degree. [chuckles] Um, I re-watch the series all the time. I've read all the books. I read the encyclopedia. I'll read the family histories. Because I do think, like, like, you can learn a lot from human nature in, in fiction.

Daniel Ek 2:06:59 Yep.

David Senra 2:06:59 And, and my job and my obsession requires me to-- 99% of my reading is non-fiction-

Daniel Ek 2:07:05 Yep

David Senra 2:07:05 ... and I don't- I wanna read more fiction.

Daniel Ek 2:07:07 Yep.

David Senra 2:07:07 And I, I came across something recently, because I'm going through Jeff Bezos' shareholders again, and then I read, like, what was my interpretation of this in the past?

Daniel Ek 2:07:14 Yep.

David Senra 2:07:14 And then I came across something that was fascinating. There's a, there's a story in the prequels of G- Game of Thrones, where, uh, two brothers, um, are fighting in this war. One of the brothers was pulled into the war that did not want to be there-

Daniel Ek 2:07:27 Mm

David Senra 2:07:27 ... and he made the sacrifice-

Daniel Ek 2:07:28 Mm

David Senra 2:07:28 ... because it was for the good of his family.

Daniel Ek 2:07:30 Yep.

David Senra 2:07:30 He wind up dying in the war that he didn't want to-

Daniel Ek 2:07:33 Yep

David Senra 2:07:33 ... to fight in the first place.

Daniel Ek 2:07:35 Yep.

David Senra 2:07:35 And his brother, that survived, got his remains, buried him, and then put him in a grave with only one word on his tombstone, and that one word was "loyal."

Daniel Ek 2:07:46 Mm.

David Senra 2:07:47 So hopefully, you don't- you, a hundred years from now, when you do have a tombstone, if there was only going to be one word on that tombstone, what would you want it to be?

Daniel Ek 2:07:58 [inhales] Um, I, I don't think too much anymore. I used to think a lot about how other people saw me or see me. Um, I don't do that anymore. Um, so I would, I would choose more of a self-reflective, uh, one. Um, um, and I wish, um, only one thing, um, on my tombstone, future one, it feels absurd talking about it, but, [chuckles] uh, would be that, um, "He lived."

David Senra 2:08:38 That's a great one. That's a great way to end it. Daniel, I'm thankful for your time, thankful for your friendship. You're one of the people who I most admire, and, uh, I really appreciate you doing this.

Daniel Ek 2:08:45 Well, well, thank you so much, and it's such a huge honor to be your first guest in this series.

David Senra 2:08:50 Of course.

Daniel Ek 2:08:50 Thank you so much.

David Senra 2:08:51 Wouldn't have it any other way. I hope you enjoyed this episode. Please remember to subscribe wherever you're listening and leave a review, and make sure you listen to my other podcast, Founders. For almost a decade, I've obsessively read over 400 biographies of history's greatest entrepreneurs, searching for ideas that you can use in your work. Most of the guests you hear on this show first found me through Founders.