February 02, 2025

Tobi Lütke’s leadership playbook: Playing infinite games, operating from first principles, and maximizing human potential (founder and CEO of Shopify)

1 hour 41 minutes

Tobi Lütke is the founder and CEO of Shopify, a $130 billion business that powers over 10% of all U.S. e-commerce. Starting as a snowboard shop in 2004, Shopify has become the leading commerce platform by consistently approaching problems differently. Tobi remains deeply technical, frequently coding alongside his team, and is known for his unique approach to leadership, product development, and company building. In our conversation, we discuss:

• Why complexity kills entrepreneurship

• How to develop and leverage your unique talent stack

• How specifically Tobi approaches thinking from first principles

• The importance of focusing on unquantifiable qualities like joy and delight

• Why Tobi works backward from a 100-year vision

• Why metrics should support decisions, not make them

• The power of following your curiosity

• What Tobi believes it takes to be a great product leader

• Much more

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Find the transcript at: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/tobi-lutkes-leadership-playbook

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Where to find Tobi Lütke:

• X: https://x.com/tobi

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tobiaslutke/

• Website: https://tobi.lutke.com/

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Where to find Lenny:

• Newsletter: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com

• X: https://twitter.com/lennysan

• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lennyrachitsky/

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In this episode, we cover:

(00:00) Welcome and introduction

(04:17) The Tobi tornado

(07:10) Maximizing human potential

(11:05) Education and personal growth

(16:47) Operating without KPIs

(25:00) First-principles thinking

(40:04) Remote work

(45:59) Why Tobi never stopped coding

(54:46) Embracing disagreement

(01:01:27) The 100-year vision

(01:09:29) Balancing tactics and positioning

(01:17:15) Encouraging entrepreneurship

(01:19:34) The power of good UX

(01:28:42) The talent stack and unique opportunities

(01:34:30) The role of passion in product development

(01:36:39) Final thoughts and farewell

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Referenced:

• How Shopify builds a high-intensity culture | Farhan Thawar (VP and Head of Eng): https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/how-shopify-builds-a-high-intensity-culture-farhan-thawar

• Breaking the rules of growth: Why Shopify bans KPIs, optimizes for churn, prioritizes intuition, and builds toward a 100-year vision | Archie Abrams (VP Product, Head of Growth at Shopify): https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/shopifys-growth-archie-abrams

• The ultimate guide to performance marketing | Timothy Davis (Shopify): https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/performance-marketing-timothy-davis

• Brandon Chu on building product at Shopify, how writing changed the trajectory of his career, the habits that make you a great PM, pros and cons of being a platform PM, how Shopify got through Covid: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/brandon-chu-on-what-its-like-to-build

• IRC: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IRC

• Goodhart’s law: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Goodhart%27s_law

• Glen Coates on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/glcoates/

• How Shopify builds product: https://www.lennysnewsletter.com/p/how-shopify-builds-product

• The Last Dance on Netflix: https://www.netflix.com/title/80203144

• Autoregressive Models for Natural Language Processing: https://medium.com/@zaiinn440/autoregressive-models-for-natural-language-processing-b95e5f933e1f

• Archimedean property: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archimedean_property

• Tabula rasa: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tabula_rasa

• Daniel Weinand on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/danielweinand/

• World of Warcraft: https://worldofwarcraft.blizzard.com

• Harley Finkelstein on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/harleyf/

• Monorepo: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monorepo

• The Sarbanes Oxley Act: https://sarbanes-oxley-act.com/

• Shopify builds Shopify Balance with Stripe to give small businesses an easier way to manage money: https://stripe.com/customers/shopify

• Stanford marshmallow experiment: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanford_marshmallow_experiment

• Brian Armstrong on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/barmstrong/

• We are the Web: https://link.wired.com/public/32945405

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Recommended books:

• Finite and Infinite Games: https://www.amazon.com/Finite-Infinite-Games-James-Carse/dp/1476731713

• The Infinite Game: https://www.amazon.com/Infinite-Game-Simon-Sinek/dp/073521350X/

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Production and marketing by https://penname.co/. For inquiries about sponsoring the podcast, email [email protected].

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Lenny may be an investor in the companies discussed.

This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.lennysnewsletter.com/subscribe

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