Great "core" product, niche ancillary products, tragic leadership - Recensione dipendente - Account Executive presso MariaDB

The CEO is probably the worst executive I've ever worked for. That also means, in my opinion, that the board is either strangely unaware of the issues, can't recognise them for some reason, or perhaps just doesn't care enough to replace him. Some observations on this: 1) The CEO appears to be a try-hard CPO and part-time CTO as well, although and clearly not proficient of any of these roles. Having someone generally try to play these multiple hats can serve to hinder the performance of the actual CPO and CTO. 2) He "rules by fear" (he is ex-Oracle, according to his LinkedIn profile), and it appears like most of his CxO's around him either 'tow the line', or risk being fired. This creates an environment of "yes" men/women in the CxO ranks (rather than capable leaders) who simply pander to the CEO's tyrannical behaviour, rants, and tantrums. 3) He doesn't appear to listen, and doesn't appreciate any feedback which is contrary to his pre-existing beliefs. This leads to the leadership and company having horse-blinders, more "yes"-people, and many ill-informed decisions and subsequent actions. 4) He's probably one of the worst public speakers I've seen, both in terms of company meetings (where he reads from a pre-written script and typically has the camera looking at his nose), in person meetings (similar: script, awkward, and uninspiring), or in terms of getting out there to the press, journalists, etc. In fact - he's almost invisible in the press and in sales. 5) He appears un-appreciative of open source, and reasonably incapable of grasping the strategy of how to sell and/or market it. This leads to further eccentric decisions. 6) He doesn't appear to be active at all in sales and public-facing exposure. To me, that's a bit strange for a leader. Unfortunately, that also creates trickle-down effects, such as an environment of secrecy, a lack of transparency, a feeling of non-inclusivity, and an overall sense of malaise. The companies public IPO and public results, unfortunately, reflect the problems of the leadership. Apart from the CEO, this leads to sub-standard CxO presence and performance, in addition (with rare exceptions). Additionally, and despite the company being Finnish based, the company appears to now be quite USA-centric in attitude, which in itself isn't bad, if it weren't for the attitude of overwhelming exceptionalism. Anything originating in Silicon Valley = good. Anything else... completely ignored. This applies to everything from HR practices (which turns out to be a disaster), to legal services, to administrative policies - all USA centric, and completely inappropriate for many EU applications.