a16z Podcast: Ben Horowitz and Ali Ghodsi: How to Run a Billion-Dollar Business
Episode Date: October 10, 2025
Guests: Ali Ghodsi (CEO, Databricks), Ben Horowitz (Co-founder, Andreessen Horowitz), Sarah Wang (General Partner, Andreessen Horowitz)

Overview

This “Boss Talk” episode dives inside the journey of Databricks, with CEO Ali Ghodsi and investor Ben Horowitz unpacking pivotal moments: leadership during crisis, the strategic Microsoft partnership that transformed Databricks, building high-intensity cultures, giving effective feedback, navigating acquisition vs. independence, and more. The discussion is both deep and practical, offering candid stories and advice for founders, leaders, and anyone interested in tech company building.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

The 2016 Databricks Crisis and Leadership Transition

[01:12 - 04:44]

• Databricks faced a near-existential crisis in 2016, with the board seeking new leadership.
• Ben recounts being approached about swapping one academic founder for another (Ali). At the time, options for an outside CEO were limited.
• Ben noticed Ali’s clarity in understanding company problems and his self-awareness, leading to recommending Ali as CEO for a one-year trial.
• Ali: “I did know what was kind of wrong with the company because I had been there for two, three years and I had seen from inside what we should change and what the issues were.” [03:38]
• Databricks’ challenge: turning open source success (Apache Spark) into a viable business, while contending with cloud vendors reselling open source for free.
• The leadership change involved aggressive, painful pivots to product and go-to-market strategy.

What Makes a Great CEO (in Ben’s View)

[05:11 – 07:07]

• Ben rates CEOs by whether he’d do a worse job in their role – “With Databricks, I’d do way fucking worse.” [05:25]
• Ali’s “superpowers”:
  • Deep technology and product expertise—“not a pseudo technologist.”
  • Rapid learning in go-to-market and business development.
  • Ability to trust his own judgment and act decisively on strategic pivots, even when risky (e.g., building a data warehouse inside Databricks).

Evolving From Academic to Commercial Leader

[07:20 – 10:12]

• Ali’s journey: from academic scientist → head of engineering/product → CEO.
• Principles for adapting:
  • Admit what you don’t know: “First step of anonymous alcoholics—admit you have a problem.” [07:30]
  • Become a student: learn from the best, ask dumb questions, seek out top experts for brief conversations or dinners to uncover industry playbooks.
• Importance of building and selling a great team: managerial leverage is “standing on the shoulders” of strong reports, a lesson Ali attributes to Ben and Andy Grove’s High Output Management.

Common Mistakes in Scaling Leadership & Building Teams

[10:12 – 14:27]

• Early mistake: Peers with PhDs running everything, including sales—criteria mismatches for the functional roles.
• Memorable moment:
  • Ben relays Ali’s concern: “The sales guy said the customer had $450,000 budget, product only cost $250,000, so he needed to get the rest of the money...that’s a really good sales guy.” [11:15]
  • Ali: “You told me that’s called price to budget.” [11:19]
• Providing feedback:
  • Ben’s tactic: ask pointed questions in meetings, e.g., “Could you help me with the math on this? I don’t understand the math.” [11:46]
  • Ali: Reframes radical candor so feedback is seen as help—not criticism. “If you can get people into the mode of...they’re helping me and I’ll be more successful, please don’t leave, come back and tell me more...” [13:14]
  • Frequency matters: constant, everyday feedback is less offensive than annual performance reviews.

Building a High-Intensity (But Not Burnout) Culture

[14:47 – 18:56]

• Databricks is known for high intensity—sometimes called “996” (9am to 9pm, 6 days a week).
• Importance of tone at the top: “If you’re the hardest working person, everything takes care of itself.” [15:10]
• Vetting for intensity through “backdoor references”—find out from peers how hard someone actually works, not just what they claim in interviews.
• Avoid burnout: regularly intervene when work-life balance is out of whack; sometimes, urge teams to take breaks.
• Ben: High performance is also about organizational design—ensure individuals feel their output has an impact: “If people are feeling like they’re having an impact and they're good, they'll work very hard.” [17:53]

Motivation, Leadership, and “Winning”

[18:56 – 21:03]

• Keeping teams motivated requires making them sense progress—“make your team feel like they’re winning.” [18:56]
• Ben & Ali reflect on the difficulty (and importance) of keeping morale up when not winning: “There is no feeling as good as when you’re not winning and then you get it to win.” [20:44]

Leading as a CEO—Strategic and In-the-Weeds

[21:09 – 26:56]

• Ali is praised for being simultaneously strategic and deeply hands-on—e.g., giving feedback even on small product launches, directly responding to emails.
• “You got to get in the weeds. You got to understand. ... The only way you can [hire great leaders] is by being really excellent at it.” [21:47]
• Databricks’ early culture: aim to treat all as co-founders instead of “just employees.”
• Ben: CEOs get the truth only by diving deep—org chart communication loses fidelity; “All the knowledge...is with the individual contributors doing the work and the customers.”
• Advice: Don’t over-systematize your weekly meetings—spend time where priority and depth demand it.

Mastering Business Development: The Microsoft Deal

[27:35 – 36:18]

• The Databricks-Microsoft partnership (2017) was transformative—unlocking distribution to tens of thousands of sellers.
• Ali struggled initially to break in; a key turning point was Ben’s direct CEO-to-CEO dialogue with Satya Nadella, which “opened doors that weren’t opening for me.” [28:09]
• Tactics:
  • Make sure the deal is big enough so the partner has “skin in the game” (someone must be accountable if it fails).
  • Present your capacity as “exclusive”—e.g., “we’re just a startup with one team, can only afford one deep integration.”
• Ben: "Any big deal of that size, you lose at least three times before you win it. And we lost that deal 10 times, 10 times." [33:57]
• Grit is essential: flying up to Redmond repeatedly, overcoming multiple vetoes, and selling internal stakeholders.
• Microsoft under Satya is lauded as an outstanding partner—unusual for such a large org.

Approach to Acquisitions: Build vs. Buy

[36:21 – 44:51]

• Databricks does not “buy revenue”; instead, they focus on:
  • Team/founder quality—will they stay, build, and have cultural fit?
  • Product integration—is the acquired product and codebase mergeable and additive?
  • Only lastly, financials.
• Ali: “I love to hire people who have seen great at a big company…then they've gone and done their own startup and that's really, really hard. … They end up being actually the perfect employees at Databricks…” [56:40]
• Ben: Mismatched architectures and “financial engineering” doom many corp dev acquisitions long-term—focus is needed on integrated customer experience.
• Reputation matters: how Databricks treats acquired teams makes it more attractive as an acquirer to other great founders.

The Temptation to Sell—And the Value of Independence

[45:28 – 52:41]

• Databricks seriously entertained a massive acquisition offer—six times company valuation at the time.
• Ali: “Everyone's like, stop the work. Stop working. Take your hands off the keyboard. Nobody work anymore. We're done here. Right?” [50:36]
• Ben’s crucial advice: “You can sell, you'll make a lot of money and you’ll be super successful in life. But, you know, if you’re like me, you’re going to look back the rest of your life thinking, you know, I missed that one shot. That was the one thing.” [52:05]
• Ali’s response: “We're never doing this…This is not happening.” [52:23]

Talent Wars and Retaining Exceptional People

[53:19 – 57:55]

• The myth and reality of “95th percentile” pay. In AI, current climate is ultra-competitive.
• The best way to keep talent? Give them learning opportunities, mentorship, and impact—especially for those early in their career.
• FOMO culture—young engineers anxious about “missing out” on the next big AI company.
• Ali encourages patience and relationships: “You can calm them down a little bit and say, hey, you have like a few decades, you know, don't worry about it.” [55:06]

Luck and Timing—"Skill meets Serendipity"

[57:55 – 64:16]

• Databricks’ phenomenal timing: not too early, not too late. Even a one-year difference could have meant missing the cloud/AI inflection points entirely.
• Series C round nearly fell apart—survival often comes down to a single lucky break.
• Key pivot: giving up on PLG (product-led growth) in favor of B2B enterprise sales and adding non-PhD execs (not an easy cultural shift).
• Hiring Ron Gabrisko (sales head) was both uncomfortable and crucial; finding and keeping the original team together over the years is another rare advantage.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Ben Horowitz: “With Databricks, I’d do way fucking worse [as CEO].” [05:25]
• Ali Ghodsi: “First step of anonymous alcoholics—admit you have a problem…be a student and learn everything you can about it…” [07:30]
• Ben (on dealmaking): “Any big deal of that size, you lose at least three times before you win it. And we lost that deal 10 times, 10 times.” [33:57]
• Ali (on acquisition temptation): “Maybe they're right. Maybe we should just sell...But, you know, if you're like me, you're going to look back the rest of your life thinking, you know, I missed that one shot.” [52:05]
• Ben (on pivotal career moments): “You just don't get this good a market opportunity with this good an entrepreneur…that's the rarest of rare things.” [49:46]
• Ali (on timing): “If Databricks started in 2012...those things didn't take off in 2014…if we'd started in 2014, we would have been too late…that's timing.” [58:17]
• Ali (on feedback): “If you can get people into the mode of...they’re helping me and I’ll be more successful, please don’t leave, come back and tell me more…” [13:14]

Timestamps for Major Segments

• Company Crisis & Transition: [01:12 - 04:44]
• Ben on Ali’s Strengths as CEO: [05:11 – 07:07]
• Leadership Growth & Learning: [07:20 – 10:12]
• Team Building & Feedback: [10:12 – 14:27]
• Culture of Intensity & Avoiding Burnout: [14:47 – 18:56]
• Motivation, Winning, & Leadership: [18:56 – 21:03]
• CEO: Strategic & In the Weeds: [21:09 – 26:56]
• The Microsoft Deal: [27:35 – 36:18]
• Approach to Acquisitions: [36:21 – 44:51]
• Acquisition Temptation & Staying Independent: [45:28 – 52:41]
• Talent Strategy & FOMO: [53:19 – 57:55]
• Luck, Timing, & Pivots: [57:55 – 64:16]
• Original Team & Crucial Hires: [64:16 – 66:13]

Final Takeaways

• Building a billion-dollar business is a mix of clarity, courage, adaptability—and relentless, detail-oriented execution.
• Combining high strategic vision with hands-on operational rigor breeds trust, speed, and cultural alignment.
• Deals, talent, and culture all hinge on authenticity, deep relationships, and shared purpose—not just spreadsheets or public perception.
• In the end, luck, timing, and grit are just as important as raw smarts—and knowing when not to sell out may be the boldest move of all.

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