At Dojo, we're passionate about our culture of learning and growth, and we know that sometimes the best skills are honed in unexpected places. Meet Rohan Murti, a Head of Product whose career started in a very surprising place.
First things first. What’s your name and what do you do at Dojo?
My name is Rohan Murti. I lead the product team responsible for expanding into international markets for Dojo.
I have the fun role of discovering what will make an amazing product experience for our customers in global markets and collaborating with teams at Dojo to make that a reality.
Summarise your career for us! Give us the highlights...
It’s very much been a squiggly career. I worked as a mechanical engineer in a manufacturing plant, building pipelines for the oil/gas & automotive industry. I then became a project manager at an infrastructure development firm in Canada, where we built oil and gas plants for international clients. I worked in an array of roles around supply chain, commercial, program, and product management across different verticals and industries at Amazon (largely in food tech and e-commerce). I also co-founded two small-scale startups in food tech and music. And now I’m at Dojo!
How did you become interested in Dojo, what drew you to working here?
Dojo was an enticing company to join, given their incredible trajectory and vision for their future. The team was incredibly motivated and enabled by a great culture and purpose, hence seemed like a great fit to contribute and collaboratively build towards their future.
What was your biggest challenge in making the leap into your current role? Your biggest learning?
The biggest challenge I faced was moving from working in large-scale international corporations for most of my professional career, into a scaleup that is about to embark on their international journey, through which I had to navigate the different cultures and ways of working between the two. My biggest learning has been around appreciating how critical having a focus on profitability and unit economics at the start of a company’s journey is, and how it alters decision making at each phase of growth vs. growth driven incentivization that has caused profitability to be less of a focus in the wider tech industry to date.
What skills from your past roles helped you most in your current one?
I believe stakeholder management skills and having an international scaling mindset have really helped to serve me well in the transition, recognizing where I can bring strengths and knowledge directly and equally adapt to better ways of working in a more agile environment.
How was the Dojo approach different or unique to the way you've worked previously?
In a similar way to my past experience, Dojo recognises how essential it is to be customer-obsessed and is very active in keeping that front and centre when deciding how to prioritise initiatives and refine our thought processes. A welcome difference has been around recognising there is a balance between customer obsession and employee-centricity. Finding that harmony between the two is the holy grail, one every company should continue striving for and Dojo does very well.
What advice would you give someone starting a role at Dojo?
Dojoers are an incredibly fun and energetic bunch. Spend time connecting with people through the various communities and activities in your early days, as those social bonds are incredibly fulfilling and enrich your experience working here. If you want to do something and it’s not being done, just start!
Interested in joining the Product team at Dojo?
Find more information and open roles here.