SCOTTSDALE, ARIZONA — Okta President and COO Eric Kelleher criticized internal inefficiencies at the company after an $18-over expense report triggered a multi-step review process and raised concerns about teams defunding intern programs.
A senior vice president at Okta had approved a gratuity that exceeded the company’s threshold by $18 on a $2,000 dinner. The company’s auditing system flagged the overage, prompting a chain of actions: a person wrote it up, an email was sent, and the assistant of the COO processed it after it was routed from the board to Kelleher’s desk. “I’m paying somebody to audit that expense report. I’m paying somebody to flag that, and I’m paying somebody to write up an email and send to me, and I’m paying my assistant to receive the email and process it.” Kelleher called the entire process “waste.”
Kelleher linked this rigidity to a broader organizational problem. “People who build a function over time. It’s hard for them to see where they can be optimized in what they’ve built. They’ve built something the best way they know how, and they have a confirmation bias that things run the right way.” He also expressed concern over teams cutting intern programs, stating, “It’s a red flag for me when I have teams defunding their intern program.” He added that he speaks with those making cuts because he worries “they’re not open to new ideas.”
He advocated for expanding intern hiring, saying, “Just, everyone should be hiring interns. Massive volume. The more you can afford, the better.” Kelleher argued that interns bring unfiltered curiosity and are less likely to accept outdated practices. He also proposed restructuring how managers receive resources, stating, “I very firmly believe we need to be giving [managers] budget for work, not headcount. They’re going to spend some of that on headcount and they’re going to spend some of that on technology. And that is a leap for everyone in industry right now.” He noted that companies “we just don’t think that way” when it comes to empowering new hires to redesign processes.