No great success was ever achieved without failure

TIN LIÊN QUAN
	Cleaner Euro 4 fuel, harder to get

Can you describe your working day as a CTO?

I'm not sure whether I have any daily habits or not. For me, every day is another day. I usually leave home at 7am and return at 9:30 pm. I have dinner then spend about one or two hours online.

During the week, I work as much as possible but weekend is the time for my family, especially my daughter. I often take my daughter to drawing and karate classes, be her Uber driver every weekend. When she is in the class, I do my job at a nearby Starbucks coffee shop. These things make me happy. I will not be myself without passion. And for me, the passions are my family and my current job.

Mr. Thuan Pham.

Do you have special working principles?

I enjoy meeting and communicating with people. I want to create an open atmosphere at work where I am not considered hard to approach.

I especially love to receive feedback emails which point out my mistakes. If my colleagues and employees are afraid to say these things, I can not perfect myself. It's a part of improving yourself and strengthening relationships. Thereby, I can understand better the aspirations of the organization as well as it’s individuals to make the best decisions for the company.

When you joined Uber, this company was operating in only 60 cities with 40 technicians. In just four years, you have worked unceasingly to expand the technical unit to over 2,000 technicians, contributing to introduce the service to users in more than 450 cities around the world. Did this work put a lot of pressure on you?

I joined Uber when the company was growing too fast, surpassing our ability to meet. I had to use all my intuition, experiences and resources to make extremely difficult decisions that can affect the opportunity to make the next decisions.

In the early years, I used to wake up at midnight, two or three times a week, because of system collapse or malfunction. Later on, when I was defeated, I often wondered why those failures occurred even though I was still monitoring. In fact, we can not foresee everything. Therefore, what I can not predict put a lot of  pressure on me.

Mr. Thuan Pham (first row, fourth from left) and Vietnamese start-up enterpreneurs. (Photo: H.T)

What is your definition of success?

I suppose, behind any success stands many failures. During the first 18 months of working at Uber, I faced at least one failure every week, but I have never wasted that. If you have paid the price for one mistake, make that mistake become valuable. Surviving a crisis, you should treasure all the experience and knowledge from it.

As a successful Vietnamese in America, what advices do you have for young people regarding Vietnam’s extreme growth in start-up?

After graduating 26 years ago, I absolutely did not expect that I could be in this position (Uber CTO) today. This intention just started four years ago.

What you can do and should do is planning to learn as much as possible. Think about the job you are doing. Does it challenge you, make you learn new things? Do you feel happy learning new things every day, every week? If you feel bored, you should find a new job with more difficult challenges to optimize your abilities.

Having hard time trying to fit in well with American society during childhood then going from zero to success, could you share your experience with Vietnamese youth?

I never allow myself to be self-satisfied and always seek new challenges. I moved from a company of several thousand employees to a company of 1000 ones, then to a company with only 10 employees...

I only feel comfortable when I already understand my job and perform it well. If the job doesn’t challenge me, that's when I shift to a new job.

On the other hand, you should choose the job that you can build expertise. 10-20 years later, when looking back, you will see what you have accumulated are really valuable. Do your best and opportunities will come to you.

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