Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella on Ideas & Empathy

I had been thinking about my life—my parents, my wife and children, my work.

It had been a long journey to this point.

My mind went back to earlier days: as a child in India, as a young man immigrating to this country, as a husband and the father of a child with special needs, as an engineer designing technologies that reach billions of people worldwide, and, yes, even as an obsessed cricket fan who long ago dreamed of being a professional player.

All these parts of me came together in this new role, a role that would call upon all of my passions, skills, and values—just as our challenges would call upon everyone else in the room that day and everyone else who worked at Microsoft.

I told them that we spend far too much time at work for it not to have deep meaning.

If we can connect what we stand for as individuals with what this company is capable of, there is very little we can’t accomplish.

For as long as I can remember, I’ve always had a hunger to learn—whether it be from a line of poetry, from a conversation with a friend, or from a lesson with a teacher.

My personal philosophy and my passion, developed over time and through exposure to many different experiences, is to connect new ideas with a growing sense of empathy for other people. Ideas excite me.

Empathy grounds and centers me.

From Satya Nadella's recent book 'Hit Refresh: The Quest to Rediscover Microsoft’s Soul and Imagine a Better Future for Everyone'
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B06XX4KH4R/ref=cm_sw_r_tw_dp_U_x_aeRkAbFC0THC5