.<\/em><\/p>\nAsheesh Birla is the general manager of Ripple\u2019s RippleNet, a decentralized global network of banks and payment providers that allows financial institutions to send money around the world using Ripple technology. He first joined Ripple in 2013 to lead development of its product suite. He started his career as a founder of a content management company that he later sold to Thomson Reuters, where he became the media company\u2019s VP of Global Technology in 2005. In between Reuters and Ripple, he advised and led product design at a number of startups across Silicon Valley. <\/p>\n
Birla and I got together over Zoom last month to talk about what was on his calendar on March 24. <\/p>\n
His schedule has been edited for brevity and clarity.<\/em><\/p>\n6:30-7:30 a.m. | Workout w\/ Nisha<\/strong><\/p>\nI have two young boys, 9 and 11. And the one thing that has really helped me conserve time is having a trainer come to our house. Nisha is my wife. We start early because that\u2019s before my kids get up. By the time I\u2019m done training, I can help get my kids ready for school. They need to be out the door by 8 a.m. <\/p>\n
8-9 a.m. | RippleNet leads meeting<\/strong><\/p>\nThis is my team meeting that we do once a week. It\u2019s at 8 a.m. because we\u2019re trying to balance a global organization. There isn\u2019t a time that works for everyone in San Francisco, New York, London and Singapore, but this was the only time that wasn\u2019t in the middle of the night for one group. <\/p>\n
We try not to do status updates. I feel like it\u2019s more efficient to just do that over email and send a doc out. These are usually meaty discussions. For example, this morning we talked about customer feedback and go-to-market, and that was the full hour. Then product marketing and really going through, \u201cWhat is the field saying about what\u2019s resonating with our products? What\u2019s not resonating? What adjustments do we want to make to our go-to-market?\u201d That was this week\u2019s theme. <\/p>\n
Next week, it will be crypto deep dives. Someone will bring something new that they\u2019ve researched. That\u2019s the first half hour, and the second half hour is usually a professor or an entrepreneur who is doing something in crypto who does a product demo. We had a professor from Australia who was doing DeFi research. We have the founder of Panther Protocol coming in to talk about zero-knowledge proofs, which is a new type of cryptography that allows you to keep data private, even though it\u2019s on the blockchain. The cool thing about working in crypto is that a lot of things are out in the open, and some folks are more open to sharing because they\u2019ve already started building in public anyway. <\/p>\n
9-9:45 a.m. | Product + engineering all-hands<\/strong><\/p>\nThis is a quarterly all-hands. We do team awards for the engineers around a couple of themes. And then folks do demos on product features. And then we talk about our roadmap update. That\u2019s on Zoom and is going to start moving to hybrid in the next couple of months. [To make everyone feel like they\u2019re on an equal playing field in hybrid meetings], everything needs to be written in narrative form that is sent out ahead of time. And with presenters, we start with the folks that are remote and have them present first. <\/p>\n
10-11 a.m. | Leadership staff meeting<\/strong><\/p>\nThis is our CEO\u2019s leadership meeting. We go through pressing items that are impacting our company across the board. We start the meeting with a stand-up where we each talk about a big issue that we\u2019re facing as well as a big win. It doesn\u2019t even have to be work related. A lot of times it\u2019s like, \u201cI got two kids at home, and they\u2019re sick. And it\u2019s been challenging for me this week.\u201d To develop a little bit of empathy for everyone and everything that\u2019s going on. That is usually 15 minutes. <\/p>\n
An example of a win I\u2019ve shared is that we closed our numbers really strong for the quarter. I was able to give an update on how well we\u2019re doing in terms of our volume goals for the quarter, and then I also announced that I made a big hire as well. <\/p>\n
We also did spend a section of the meeting talking about how we can ship faster. What are the blockers? Is it resourcing? Is it a technical tool? Crypto is moving so fast that if you\u2019re not keeping up to speed in terms of how you\u2019re responding to customers, it\u2019s a big issue. <\/p>\n
11:30 a.m.-12 p.m. | ODL eng 1:1 (Conner)<\/strong><\/p>\nConner is our engineering lead for our flagship product called On-Demand Liquidity. Conner\u2019s been here for six or seven years. I\u2019ve been working at Ripple for nine, so we go way back. I like to keep really close to engineering even though my role encompasses sales and business development, things outside of engineering and product. But I spend more than 60% of my time with product and engineering to make sure that things are moving efficiently. <\/p>\n
12-12:30 p.m. | Candidate sell call – VP of Payments<\/strong><\/p>\nThat was a position that\u2019s been open for a couple of months. And we\u2019re calling a candidate and closing that candidate, which I did. It\u2019s a very competitive market out there. So, it\u2019s getting out there and hustling and trying to close as much as possible. Given where we are with COVID, I\u2019ve been doing more of these in person as coffee chats. In this particular case, I took this candidate out to dinner last week with a couple of others as well. I think that people like that sort of personal connection, so I\u2019ve been doing a little bit more of that as things have been getting better on the pandemic front.<\/p>\n
12:30-1 p.m. | Stablecoin strategy<\/strong><\/p>\nWith the product team and, in particular, the engineering team, [we like] looking at potentially new types of technologies that could help provide a better experience for our customers. And so looking more and more at stablecoins as a potential offering that would help improve the customer experience and scale faster. If this were in the office, it would be on the whiteboard brainstorming: What would the benefit be to the customer? What would the flow look like? What are the risks?<\/p>\n
1-1:30 p.m. | Asheesh\/Brad<\/strong><\/p>\nI have a 1:1 with [Ripple CEO] Brad [Garlinghouse] at least once a week and then catch up at least one other time per week. I create an agenda ahead of time, send that over to him over email to go through in a structured format, and then I also just catch up with him on a personal front as well. I\u2019ve been working for Brad for seven out of my nine years here.<\/p>\n
Today, it\u2019s going to be in person. But it\u2019s been pretty much over Zoom for the most part during the pandemic. <\/p>\n
1:30-2 p.m. | Candidate sell call<\/strong><\/p>\nI like to talk to folks a little bit about Ripple, about how I think their career is going to jumpstart by coming. I specifically talk to them about existing people that have joined Ripple and what they\u2019ve done at Ripple, their career trajectory at Ripple, and those who have left Ripple and how well they have done. <\/p>\n
I\u2019ll show them examples of people like Conner that have been here for seven years. And every year, they\u2019re taking on bigger and bigger roles, now leading our flagship product, but then other people that have been here for six, seven years that are running their own company, that are venture partners now, you name it. <\/p>\n
2-2:45 p.m. | Customer call w\/ Nium<\/strong><\/p>\nThis is one of our largest partners and customers. I get text feedback from [the CEO] about issues he\u2019s having, new ideas. I like to keep in touch with what they’re seeing in the market. Most of their customers are in Asia, a customer type that I am not as familiar with, given the geography, and so they\u2019ve helped me connect with them as well.<\/p>\n
3-4 p.m. | Work block<\/strong><\/p>\nI like to write either strategy or thoughts that I want to clarify, or I\u2019m researching something in crypto. So this is where I would read a white paper about, like, a new crypto project but really trying to go deep. This combination of reading something new on a topic in crypto and then writing about it is super useful for me. That\u2019s how I digest information. Sometimes I work with people to turn that into a blog or a tweet. Sometimes it doesn\u2019t go anywhere. But it helps me refine my thinking. <\/p>\n
4-4:30 p.m. | Carpool<\/strong><\/p>\nMy sons play basketball and baseball. Thursdays, I run the carpool. So I\u2019ll pick them up from school, and then I\u2019ll take them to basketball practice. And then I sort of wait. With COVID, you can\u2019t go into the gym, but it\u2019s a good time for me to organize my thoughts. I bring my laptop in the car and work a little bit in the car while they\u2019re at practice. But yeah, that\u2019s balancing life as a dad. <\/p>\n
5-6:30 p.m. | Basketball practice<\/strong><\/p>\nIt\u2019s good to have a good community of other parents to do carpool for practices, but I don\u2019t like missing games. I try to make as many games as possible. This weekend, there happened to be eight games between my two sons because they were playing in tournaments. So that was pretty crazy. But it really meant a lot to them that I made all their games. I can definitely see them looking in the stands for me. <\/p>\n
8-8:30 p.m. | Brooks\/Asheesh 1:1<\/strong><\/p>\nBrooks is our SVP of Customer Success. He runs our global customer success team, and he\u2019s in Singapore. So that\u2019s a time that works for him. I\u2019m trying to be more accommodating to other folks\u2019 schedules. Brooks is part of that a.m. meeting which is really late for him. This is sort of a trade-off.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Thoughts, questions, tips? Send them to <\/em>workplace@protocol.com<\/em>. Have a great day, see you Sunday.<\/em><\/em><\/p>\nwindow.REBELMOUSE_ACTIVE_TASKS_QUEUE.push(function(){<\/p>\n
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