Reid: Lots. With LinkedIn, I think the primary thing is helping people understand that being a part of modern professionals- being a connect professional and actually how you work with your network at large will be the thing that makes you successful or not- daily, weekly, monthly, yearly. And then generally, I think that one of the things that you try to do in your life is you try to make the world a nobler place by having being there. So, there is lots of work to do.
Kamla: What have been some of the books that have influenced you the most, thinkers that have influenced you the most?
Reid: A large number. I guess, in the media space I really like Neil Postman’s “Amusing Ourselves To Death”, “ The Age Of Discourse” and “The Era Of The Television” and part of it is you know, thinking about how do we improve civic discourse so that we in fact become healthier as a society.
Kamla: I was thinking of some philosophers.
Reid: Wittgenstein, I find very interesting and appealing. But that was more of “how is it we can possibly understand each other as two different people” and “how does language work.” But there has been a number of you know Amartya Sen. I have read a lot of great philosophy books.
Kamla: What is one word that describes you?
Reid: One word? I’m not sure one word can ever describe anybody but I’ll say “intellectual”.
Kamla: Do you still have aspirations to become a teacher?
Reid: I do some teaching already, and I think it is a noble cause. So, yes, I hope to continue teaching in the future.
Kamla: And are you going to do anything for teachers on LinkedIn?
Reid: We have some design and idea. One of the things that I think for the academy to be successful in future is I think, it has to be more interconnected with business. I n terms of, what it is that you are teaching and I think that there is something really interesting applications there.
Kamla: When does LinkedIn go IPO?
Reid: We have no immediate plans, we are not making plans. What we are committed to is building the strongest business in the next two or three years and I think an IPO just naturally falls out of the other things that we are doing. We talk about but it every so often and the board is curious. We are committed to building a massively valuable company to our members.
Kamla: So IPO is not an exit strategy.
Reid: It can be an exit strategy. We are not planning on an exit right now. We are planning on building a company.
Kamla: Reid, it was a pleasure talking to you.
Reid: Likewise, Kamla.
Kamla: You were listening to Reid Hoffman, chairperson and president of LinkedIn. This is Kamla Bhatt. This interview was brought to you in association with Live Mint Radio. And as always, thank you for tuning in.
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