#12 – Leading With a Servant’s Heart | Raj Verma

Ventured Growth with Hercules Capital

Raj Verma is the CEO at SingleStore, a database management system that helps modern applications be fast, frictionless, and flexible.
When Raj started at SingleStore, he was Co-CEO with SingleStore’s founder, Nikita Shamgunov. By building a healthy relationship and friendship with Nikita, Raj was able to lead with the company’s founding principles, keeping that essence that makes SingleStore so special. Raj’s transition to Co-CEO and later to CEO has as much to do with his mindset and leadership skills as it does with the CEO job description.
In this episode, Catherine and Raj talk about Raj’s transition from Co-CEO to CEO, why Raj views CEO as a mindset, how Raj leads with “a warrior’s mentality and a servant’s heart,” the importance of adaptation and change, how to build company culture, and more.
Topics Include:
- Relationship between founder and CEO
- How his partnership with Nikita started
- The accountability that comes with being a CEO
- Executive coaching
- Conscious capitalism
- Combining business strategy with culture
- The importance of finding you're why
- What drives Raj toward success
- Adapting to new circumstances
- And other topics…
Raj Verma is the Chief Executive Officer at SingleStore. He has more than 25 years of experience in enterprise software and scaling operations. Before SingleStore, Raj was the CEO, EVP of Global Scales, and COO of TIBCO Software, a company that he helped grow to over $1 billion in revenue. He was also COO at Aptus Software and Hortonworks. Raj holds a BA in computer science from BMS College of Engineering in Bangalore, India.
Resources Mentioned:
Man's Search For Meaning by Viktor E. Frankl: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0807060100/
Bad Blood by John Carreyrou: https://www.amazon.com/Bad-Blood-Secrets-Silicon-Startup/dp/152473165X
Shantaram by Gregory David Roberts: https://www.amazon.com/Shantaram-Novel-Gregory-David-Roberts/dp/0312330537