TheBridge profile: Jedidiah Yueh
Name: Jedidiah Yueh
Current city: Newport Coast, CA
Current job: Bestselling Author of Disrupt or Die, Delphix Executive Chairman and Founder
Past job: Delphix Founder and CEO, Avamar Founder and CEO
Q. Favorite spot for a coffee meeting? Philz Coffee off University Ave. in Palo Alto, CA
Q. Describe one way how a skill you learned in a previous job helped you in your new job. All the frameworks I collected and implemented while building multi-billion dollar software products helped me in writing my book, Disrupt or Die, which spills Silicon Valley's magic innovation beans. I think there's too much wealth and know-how concentrated in the hands of too few, so I wrote the book to help people everywhere along their own innovator's journey.
Q. Job advice in three words? Invent the future
Q. How are you (or your company, org, nonprofit) currently bridging the gap between politics and tech? In my book, articles, and speaking engagements, I advocate that the tech titans take responsibility for the polar unintended consequences, externalities, and potential abuses that result from the incredible success of their platforms and companies (e.g. Facebook's Russian ads and fake news). I think one of the greatest challenges we face as a society is what I call the Digital Hand, which simultaneously concentrates wealth in the hands of the few while automating away the jobs of the masses. At the dawn of capitalism, we all benefited from Adam Smith's Invisible Hand, the force that set market prices and improved the wealth and standard of living for the rich and poor. But software's leverage, reach, and scale consumes jobs and opportunities at a faster rate than job creation, creating a global imbalance that needs to be addressed. Unfortunately, many of the tech fat cats disregard the threat as a "Luddite fallacy," when it should be their number one priority.
Q. How many hours of sleep do you get? 8 hours almost every night.
Q. Last time you were completely unplugged? Over twenty years ago. That's a terrible answer but it's true!
Q. How often do you work from home? Most of the time.
Q. What can Silicon Valley teach DC? I wrote a book on that called, Disrupt or Die: What the World Needs to Learn from Silicon Valley to Survive the Digital Era
Enjoy this profile? Our profiles are featured in TheBridge Update on Tues and Thurs. Click below to sign up.