Auguste Goldman

1.

Worked at McDonald’s when he was in high school—credits this experience as shaping his focus and determination to get ahead later in life.

2.

Moved to Europe right out of college and ended up living there for 15 years.

3.

When he moved back to the United States, he took an engineering job at Wells Fargo, but quickly realized that even though he loved engineering, he didn’t love working for a financial institution.

4.

He took a position at GoDaddy in information technology where he was in charge of running their data centers and networks; he later became the CIO and led all of their engineering teams.

5.

The way he led his team and the culture he had built for them caught the attention of Blake Irving, the CEO of GoDaddy, who asked him to lead HR and develop that culture for the whole company.

6.

Making the transition from CIO to CPO was challenging, but he found there were commonalities between both fields: “In engineering, things break and, in people operations, people break.”

7.

Believes in finding the “tack” path; just as a sailboat can’t sail straight into the wind, you have to be willing to explore, take chances, and find unique opportunities.

8.

Says there are three things that impact your career: what you’re good at, what you’re passionate about, and what the world needs—finding where those overlap is where you will find your purpose.