Brian Chesky reflects on his company’s triumphant IPO and what’s happened since.
(Bloomberg) — About two years ago, I had a particularly memorable interview with Brian Chesky on the day his company Airbnb Inc. went public. For my new show The Circuit With Emily Chang, Chesky and I rewatched that interview together on his living room couch.
The Airbnb chief executive officer has been listing his home in San Francisco for rent on his site; Chesky said I was the first journalist to set foot inside. The home is beautiful and quaint, meticulously decorated yet casual. This is the only home Chesky says he owns, though he does have the entire Airbnb network at his disposal.
We found ourselves in this very meta situation — of conducting an interview while watching one of our previous interviews — because the IPO conversation was significant. It was December 2020, and Airbnb had just recovered from a punishing start to the Covid-19 pandemic. He had joined me live on Bloomberg Television when the stock started trading, then immediately doubled. Airbnb’s market value reached about $100 billion that day.
When I informed him of the price spike, the normally polished Chesky stammered. “That’s the first time I’ve heard that number. Um that is … that’s a very — that’s a — that’s, that is, yeah. I’m very humbled by it.”
When Chesky watched the IPO clip again, he seemed flooded with complex emotions and took a pause to gather himself. “Wow, I haven’t watched that in a long time. Wow,” he said. “In that moment, it was like my hard drive crashed. My eyebrows went to the top of my head, and um, I didn’t know they went that high. That was one of the most surprising moments in my life. I’m not usually speechless.”
On this episode, Chesky reflected on the ups and downs of the pandemic and its effects on Airbnb. Revenue growth has slowed considerably over the last year, and the stock is currently below where it was on the first day of trading in 2020.
Chesky, 41, said he has taken many lessons from the last three years and has altered his approach to leadership. “I learned to stop apologizing about how I want run the company,” he said. “I didn’t realize until after the crisis that I spent five to 10 years apologizing every step of the way.”
“You hire people, and they come from Google, Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, and they bring their way with them. And what I realized I was doing was trying to find some midpoint between how I wanted to run the company and how they wanted to run the company, which actually made everyone miserable,” Chesky said. “As I took more command, more control, became more decisive — more bossy, so to speak — I think people were happier, because they had clarity and direction.”
This episode of The Circuit With Emily Chang premieres Thursday, June 22, at 8 p.m. in New York on the Bloomberg app and Bloomberg.com and on Bloomberg Television at 10 p.m. Check out The Circuit podcast for extended conversations.
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