IPN Spotlight: Asif Makhani (Head of Engineering, LinkedIn Learning Solutions)
Asif Makhani has been a Sr. Director at LinkedIn, heading technology for their Learning Solutions business, the online learning arm created as a result of acquiring Lynda.com (LinkedIn’s largest acquisition to date for $1.5 billion). Prior to that, Asif was heading up the Search organization at LinkedIn responsible for building the search engine that powers people search, job search and exploration of LinkedIn’s economic graph. Prior to LinkedIn, Asif worked at Amazon.com for 11 years, where he was a founding member of a new subsidiary called A9.com focusing on Amazon’s search engine technology. Asif also led the development of a new Amazon Web Service (AWS) called Amazon Cloud Search and served as the General Manager for this new line of business.
Born in Saudi Arabia, Asif grew up in Karachi, Pakistan and Toronto, Canada. He completed his Bachelors of Mathematics at University of Waterloo and Masters of Computer Science at Stanford University. In his Jamati work, Asif is currently a board member for ITREB USA, a graduate of the International Waezeen Training Program and Managing Director for the 2018 Global Encounters camp in Pakistan. In the past, Asif served as the Chairman for AKEB Western region as well as ITREB faculty member for various youth initiatives.
What skills have helped you in your career?
While I have been fortunate to develop my core engineering and problem-solving skills at school and work, as I look at my career path, what’s really distinguished me in my leadership roles have been the soft skills such as collaboration, empathy, and listening. Listening turns out to be one of the hardest skills to acquire – it’s not easy to listen, to seek to understand, and then acknowledge that you have understood the other – you will be surprised how many people are not able to do this.
Another leadership skill that is critical and still a work-in-progress for me is the ability to articulate a big vision in simple words with a clear roadmap that can inspire your team and galvanize them towards it with concrete sign posts along with way.
What do you wish you had known or done differently throughout your career?
To not be shy in seeking help from others. Many of us are brought up to believe in independence instead of interdependence. The sooner you recognize that the world, which you are a part of, is heavily connected and success requires both hard work and smart networking – the sooner we can accelerate our personal growth and achievements of our goals. Simple things like building an intelligent network before you need them, then tapping into it for job referrals, mentorship or advice on all matters of life continuously go a long way. Think of it as always traveling with a set of advisors and mentors that are always available to guide you through their own successes and failure.
What do you do for continuing education and improvement?
Read. Books instead of short articles when possible to fully immerse myself and deepen my understanding about an idea that I’m intrigued about (generally not related to my professional background). The books I’m currently reading or listening are Quiet (Susan Cain), The Fatimids (Shainool Jiwa), Gandhi (an autobiography), Content Trap (Bharat Anand), Hit Refresh (Satya Nadella) and Ready Player One (Ernest Cline). Yes, I start more books than I finish.
What is next for you in your career?
As of this interview, I have decided to join Google as the Director of Product Management, heading their Image Search initiative. I’m excited to be working back in the search technology domain, which has been a long-term passion for me to help the world access good knowledge from anywhere at any time.
What advice would you offer to others?
Dream big, take intelligent risks, and invest in yourself every day. Believe that you, along with your network, can solve big problems that need to be solved and then set out a long-term career plan to learn the skills and develop the influence to tackle those problems. And along the way, don’t be scared of taking risks, as long as they are informed, intelligent risks where you have evaluated the pros and cons. Finally, the most important question to ask every day is how you are better at the end of the day than the beginning of your day? – so invest in yourself by learning continuously.
Areas where you can help other Ismailis:
•Technology (search engine, data science, online learning)
• Leadership coaching (from setting a vision to values when building a team or starting a company)
• Building an effective network (using platforms like LinkedIn)
• Connecting professionals to the right Jamati service opportunity (that can be a significant growth opportunity)
Please provide the link to your LinkedIn profile:
Asif Makhani
Please provide your preferred email address so interested professionals can network with you:
[email protected]
Region:
West
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