Beyond Windows: How Microsoft's CEO revived a fading legend

We're here today and interviewing you at this particular time because you're hosting a hackathon that was your idea. I believe it's the fifth year. And we had an opportunity to walk through and see what was going on. All of us in Silicon Valley know what a hackathon is, a lot of people do. But what does the Hackathon mean to you? What does it represent? You're right this has been five years now that we've done this. It's called the one week, which is in some sense the metaphor for the one week that then informs the rest of the year. In terms of really getting in touch of this company around innovation. Each year I go back, I'm pretty stunned, always with the passion that people have, to be able to take what is Microsoft as a platform, and connect it to their ideas they have. And then a lot of amazing things have come out of this. If you take Learning Tools, that's now part of Word and OneNote, which helps anyone with dyslexia read. Came out of a hackathon four years ago, I gaze which is now in Windows. Anyone with ALS can now type would you have adjust their gaze came out of hackathon. So it's also been inspiration to mainstream products but it's not limited to that. You were quoted as saying that you are a HoloLens user, that you get up every morning and use it, and check your schedule. Can you talk a little bit about the promise, there is a lot of hype around AR and VR has not gotten the uptake in the market. Magically, which is a new startup is about to release their dev, a version which has been compared somewhat to HoloLens although no one has really Seen it, to talk about it, but what is the promise of AR, to you? And there's multiple forms. For example, we are an AR, to me, is one continuum. It's like a dial, whether you've got, it's fully opaque, and it's fully immersive, or you can see the world and you can see the objects, which is digital objects and artifacts on top of it. That's AR HoloLens, for example, has really gotten traction in a lot of enterprise and industrial settings. Remote work, so remote assisted. So say you're a factory worker, And you're trying to fix something hands free. But you need the expert to come tell you what to do. HoloLens is the perfect form factor. Training, it's a perfect form factor for doing simulation. But the most interesting thing is data visualization. The ability to spin around data, to be able to learn about the patterns, in fact, in with all the big data, I always say is the ability to recognize small patterns that still uniquely human. And I think there's a real use case there. And then I think gaming will also have use cases. When you took over and you wrote this in your book. You said that culture and fixing the culture was your top priority. And I was curious and I believe you even said that the scene CEO should stand for culture. You've been at Microsoft for more than two decades. Why was that your number one priority? Why was it so concerning? And that was the first thing you felt they had to in fact they were I would say Connie two things one is the sense of purpose and Mission. And culture to me are the two pillars which I think for any institution, any organization are the enduring pillars. And then of course, you have to express yourself with changing technology in our case technology paradigms every year because that's constantly changing. Okay, but the implication from your book is that Microsoft I won't say the word broken but that there was some serious problems here and that's what I'm trying to get it. What was it that was so concerning to you? It's interesting you say that because in some sense Microsoft is one of these companies that has been super successful. Absolutely. One of the things that happens when you're super successful is you sort of of sometimes lose touch with what made you successful in the firts place. So if anything I wanted to not of sort of talk about what is brokn I wanted o go back to the very genesis of this company. What was that sense of purpose and drive that made us successful? What was the culture that may be have been there in the very beginning or in the times when we were able to achieve that success? How do we recapture it? So that's why I think about it is, you know, it's the Renaissance as much as about sort of just fixing something that's broken. You were very candid in your book talking about how you mis-answered a question at the grashoper. Yeah. And since you, and the question was by Mariah asking you what advice would you give to a woman who wants to astery. So I would like a reset, lets rewind the tape Satya what advise do you give a woman today who needs to ask for a raise or feels that she's been hurt by bias unconscious or other ways? Yeah I mean it's sort of what I said my big learning from there was which I wrote in the book and obviously Maria helped me and many other women subsequently have helped me understand. Because the answer I gave was absolutely nonsensical because it really did not get to the Core context, but basically the question was all about do you as a CEO of a large company understand that women don't need to even ask for a raise. Can you create a system that actually does pay equally? And more importantly than just pay equally is there even the culture and the system of the organization such that they have equal opportunity, but I'm asking what's your advice to women that they should first of all advocate for themselves? And they should find other allies, male or female who can advocate for them. And make sure that they don't accept status co. And I think that that;s definitely the first response and then the responsibility of people like me who are leaders of organisations to be able to listen to women who are advocating for themselves or their allies and make sure we don't even have to out them in that situation. You and many other tech executives have been talking out about the value that immigration and immigrants have brought to this country. That message does not seem to be getting heard. I don't think, but what do you think? I've always said I'm a product of these two amazing American things, both American technology which you knew when I was growing up, as well as the American immigration policy letting me even live the dream. And so I'll always come back to that story still today in spite of all of our challenges. It's only possible in the United States. You know, in some sense every country does need to think through as to what is in their competitive long term Understanding, but at the same time I will always advocate that if you look at what the immigration policies that we've had and what they have led to. Which is not only people like me who have come here, gotten educated, gotten jobs, contributed to our economy, But also the soft for the United States. If you think about being that beacon of hope for people who most need it, has what really made the US attractive in the first place for people. And so I hope that our, you know, lawmakers are always mindful of what really makes America Competitive, I do it. We're trying to look for that very reason as to make sure our negotiation policies continue to be enlightening in the world.