Seba Kanovich is the CEO @ dlocal, the #1 payments leader with a single solution focused on Latin America and other emerging markets. In June 2021, dlocal raised $617M in their NASDAQ IPO listing valuing the company at nearly $9BN. Before their IPO, dlocal raised from some of the best including General Atlantic, Bond Capital, and Oren Zeev to name a few. Prior to dlocal, Seba was CEO @ AstroPay, a leading payment solution provider in Emerging Markets.
In Todays Episode with Seba Kanovich We Discuss:
1.) The Journey to CEO of an $8BN Company:
- How Seba made his way to the role of CEO of an $8BN company through dinner at his mother-in-law's house?
- What does Seba know now that he wishes he had known when he first became CEO?
2.) Leadership 101:
- What does "high performance" in business and leadership mean?
- How important are velocity and speed of execution in startups? When should one trade speed for quality? Where is the nuance?
- How does Seba approach prioritization? What framework does he use to determine what to focus on?
- How does Seba think through effective delegation? How can leaders determine what only they can do?
3.) Leadership: The Challenges and Lessons:
- What are Seba's biggest insecurities in leadership today? How does he manage them? How have they changed over time?
- What is the single most painful leadership lesson Seba has learned that he is also pleased to have learned?
- What gets easier with scale as a leader? What gets harder?
- In a scaling organization, what is the first thing to break? What can be done to mitigate this?
4.) The Funding and The IPO:
- Why did dlocal bootstrap for 4 years instead of raise funding? How did that process change their mindset toward capital efficiency? What was good about it? What was bad?
- What are the single biggest advantages great investors can bring to the table?
- Why did Seba decide 2021 was the right time to go public?
- What was the biggest surprise about going public? What is better and what is worse about being a public company?
Items Mentioned in Today's Episode:
Seba's Favourite Book: Steppenwolf by Herman Hesse