If Dev Ittycheria hears a strange knock or ping when driving his car, he's not the kind of guy to ignore it. The MongoDB CEO prefers to get trouble checked out right away.
"Except for wine, nothing gets better over time," said Ittycheria, president and chief executive of MongoDB, a New York City-based cloud database firm.
Similarly, when he hears bad news from his employees, he may assume it's much worse than what they tell him. He doesn't shrug it off or think it'll take care of itself.
"When you hear bad news but don't do anything about it, it doesn't just go away," he said. "Good news will find me anywhere. Bad news travels very slowly up the organization. It's human nature."
Seek Out Bad News
To illustrate the danger of brushing off bad news, Ittycheria poses a hypothetical. A staffer makes a sales forecast based on the best available information. But the staffer's boss knows a major deal that's in the works will fall apart in the coming weeks, ruining the forecast.
"The boss decides not to say anything until near the end of the quarter," Ittycheria said. A better response is to face reality right away and address it head-on rather than let problems fester.
Ittycheria, 56, takes the same decisive approach with personnel decisions. Soon after the company's initial public offering in 2017, he grew concerned with a key executive's poor performance.
"The easy decision would be, 'I can't fire this person right now just after going public,'" Ittycheria said. "But I was worried about how this person's leadership style would drive other employees to leave. It was penalizing all the good people." Ittycheria let the executive go.
He credits a longtime mentor, Steven Walske, with enhancing his leadership skills. A top tech investor and former chief executive, Walske advised Ittycheria to tackle problems sooner, not later.
Ittycheria, who became MongoDB's CEO in 2014, took Walske's advice to heart. When conducting spot checks with his roughly 4,600 employees, Ittycheria doesn't want to hear about what's going well. He's eager to learn what's not working. "Success is evident to everyone," he said.
In staff meetings, he likes to discuss problems. He welcomes people who raise thorny issues and encourages them to share their concerns. He models receptivity so they don't fear a shoot-the-messenger response.
"They leave the room feeling comfortable talking about problems, not successes," he said. "They know we don't kick the can down the road. That's our culture."
Tap Solid Results Like The MongoDB CEO
Ittycheria's method might be a bit unusual. But there's no arguing with the results.
MongoDB's shares have rocketed more than 1,100% since the company's first day of trading in October 2017. That easily tops the S&P 500's gain during that time of 76%.
The company's fundamentals are impressive, too. The company pulled off an adjusted profit of $64.8 million, or 81 cents a share, in fiscal 2023. That reversed a loss in 2018. And revenue hit $1.3 billion in fiscal 2023, up 731% or a blistering 53% annualized from 2018.
Harness Speed And Quality For Best Results
To maintain the company's edge, Ittycheria emphasizes the need for speed and quality work. Yet despite his fondness for speed, Ittycheria avoids rushing to judge what he hears from his team.
If he disagrees, he doesn't interrupt to impose his views. Instead, he poses questions such as, "What do you see that I don't?" or "Why do you think that?"
"My old self might cut them off and think, 'You're wrong,'" he said. "Now I want to encourage different points of view and learn from them. The most important thing a leader can say is, 'I was wrong.'"
In terms of quality, he knows that top performers breed more collective excellence. "Great people want to work with other great people," he said.
He's also keen to distinguish between keeping busy and making an impact. Assembling a workforce that's a beehive of activity doesn't necessarily mean they're delivering superior results.
Instead, Ittycheria prefers to evaluate each person's performance based on impact.
"We establish a clear set of company objectives for the year," he explained. "These may include specific projects we're working on, partnerships we want to build and new customers we want to acquire. Then we work backwards and ask, 'How do we meet those objectives?' and 'Does your work tie to one or more of our objectives?'"
Through ongoing operational reviews, Ittycheria and his leadership team track employees' progress against their specific goals. They analyze to what extent an individual's actions produce the desired impact — and suggest ways they might modify their approach or work habits to make a greater impact.
"The tactics can change," he said. "But the goals don't change."
MongoDB CEO Fosters Trust Through Vulnerability
Some leaders hesitate to admit they're confused or unaware of what's going on at their organization. But Ittycheria doesn't pretend to have all the answers.
After launching his first tech company in 1998, he found himself in the CEO role for the first time. Reflecting on that experience, he admits that he initially felt "a little impostor syndrome."
He soon realized what he calls "the value of being vulnerable." Rather than radiate know-it-all authority, he freely acknowledged what he didn't know.
"I can't know everything about everything," he said. "The more candor there is, the better."
He has harnessed vulnerability to build trust and create a culture of openness at the tech companies he's run. At MongoDB, he's particularly attuned to clarifying what people tell him by expressing his confusion.
In meetings, he might say, "I'm a bit lost. I don't understand the point you're making."
As a result, he gathers valuable information and insight. He may discover that he lacked the proper context to understand an employee's point. Or the staffer may rephrase a point to make it clearer and prevent misunderstanding.
Better yet, he models how he wants others to show vulnerability. They're more comfortable admitting when they don't understand something if they see their CEO do the same.
MongoDB CEO Leads With Intense Focus
Ittycheria's willingness to speak up and seek clarification if he's confused reflects his intellectual curiosity. To stay a step ahead and lead the company in a fast-moving industry, he needs to direct his energy on listening and learning.
"Dev operates with a sense of urgency," said Chip Hazard, general partner at Flybridge, an early-stage venture capital firm. "That comes through the moment you meet him."
Hazard, who met Ittycheria in 2002, has served on MongoDB's board of directors since 2009. He admires Ittycheria's ability to channel his energy in multiple directions.
"His consistency of focus is really impressive," Hazard said. "He can context-switch, focusing on both short-run operational excellence and the long-term vision to build the company. One minute, he'll focus on the company's 10 key initiatives this year. A minute later, he can talk about its long-term vision. He keeps many simultaneous initiatives in his mind at once."
His steady, matter-of-fact demeanor sets the right tone, Hazard adds. He communicates with his team with low-key intensity and clarity.
"He's not a rah-rah guy or a sky-is-falling guy," Hazard said. "He doesn't celebrate too much when things are good and doesn't get too down when things aren't good. He's constantly focused on, 'We're doing great. How do we get better?'"
Dev Ittycheria's Keys:
- President and CEO of MongoDB, a New York City-based cloud database firm.
- Overcame: Employees' tendency to share bad news later, not sooner.
- Lesson: "I can't know everything about everything. The more candor there is, the better."
