Warren Tseng is the COO at RPG Commerce, a multi-brand direct-to-consumer (DTC) e-commerce company based in Singapore. Warren grew up in Los Angeles, and since he was young followed his father's laid out plans for him - studied Electrical Engineering at UCLA, and after picking up his Masters in Bioengineering at UCSD and an MBA from MIT Sloan, Warren went into banking in Hong Kong. He joined a hot young startup in Uber in 2014, and helped the company expand and scale rapidly all over Asia, eventually rising through the ranks to become GM of Singapore. After the sale of Uber to Grab, Warren was recruited by Travis Kalanick to oversee APAC expansion for CloudKitchens. Warning from the doctors that serious health issues were taking hold of his body after a decade of putting his career first, Warren finally decided to take a break to work on his physical and mental health. During this time of reflection and healing, Warren was able to reconcile a lot of interpersonal turmoil and angst, while also redefining his priorities and purpose. 

In this episode we discuss:

• Breaking from the instilled values, goals and expectations that Warren's father set for him at a young age
• Why Warren decided to transition from finance to tech and joined Uber as it was breaking into Asia
• How Warren learned to be resourceful and became a jack of all trades at Uber as he navigated local political pressure, being targeted by the taxi mafia, while doing five jobs at once
• The difference between an individual contributor and a manager and why Warren is better suited as the latter
• Experiencing Uber's growth at all costs mandate and the potential human capital debt risks
• Why Warren was able to thrive and rise through the ranks at Uber, becoming GM of Singapore at a critical time for the company
• How Uber ex-CEO Travis Kalanick convinced Warren to join Travis' new upstart CloudKitchens to oversee APAC expansion
• How health issues forced Warren to hit the reset button, work on his physical as well as mental well-being, reconcile familial relationships, and redefine his priorities
• The importance of finding the right life partner to build and grow together
• Warren's decision to join RPG Commerce as COO, how he thinks about building processes and teams