\n
![](\"https:\/\/fortune.com\/img-assets\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/07\/GettyImages-1928392891-e1720791751142.jpg?w=2048\")
<\/p>\n [ad_1]
\n<\/p>\n
Anjali Sud was just 33 years old and had been working for nearly three years at Vimeo when she was plucked out to lead the company\u2014and she had no idea her boss was even considering her for the top job.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cI never expected to become the CEO of Vimeo,\u201d Sud, who is now 40 and leading Tubi, America\u2019s most-watched free TV service, tells Fortune<\/em>.<\/p>\n After all, Vimeo was only Sud\u2019s fourth-ever employer. Plus, being in middle management as general manager and head of marketing, it wasn\u2019t like Sud was an obvious front-runner for the role\u2014nor did she put her name in the hat when the vacancy came up.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThere was a search. We interviewed many very experienced CEOs. I was not on that list,\u201d she says. \u201cI didn\u2019t raise my hand for that.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n It wasn\u2019t until a year into the CEO search that Sud says, \u201cit became clear that the strategy the company had been pursuing probably wasn\u2019t the right one.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Call it being in the right place at the right time, or as Sud puts it \u201cserendipity\u201d, but that realization put the spotlight firmly on Sud as a credible successor to Vimeo\u2019s helm.<\/p>\n Although Sud was initially hired in 2014 to head up Vimeo\u2019s marketing, she never had any intention of following the path (or job description) that was set before her\u2014instead opting to make her own stamp, no matter the risk.<\/p>\n \u201cI spent over a year at Vimeo not worried at all about my role and what it was going to mean for me, and really working my butt off to try and come up with a strategy for the business and prove that that strategy could work, because I believed in it,\u201d she recalls. \u201cI was willing to bet my career on it.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI thought at the end of the year, I probably wasn\u2019t going to have a job in fairness, because I was like, \u2018Oh, I\u2019m just doing this\u2026\u2019 But I also really believed it was the right thing.\u201d<\/p>\n Her strategy was to steer Vimeo away from being a video-viewing platform and competing with the likes of Netflix<\/a> and YouTube<\/a> for eyeballs into a video software company for businesses.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cBarry Diller was the owner of Vimeo at the time\u2014and he\u2019s a guy who likes to take risks too\u2014and he just said: \u2018Okay, well, if we\u2019re going do this new strategy, this person has been championing it and he\u2019s betting on it, let\u2019s give her a chance to run it.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Diller\u2019s bet on Sud paid off: Vimeo grew so fast in 2020 that it accidentally turned a profit<\/a> in the third quarter, even as the company was trying to reinvest in growth. <\/p>\n By 2021, it had more than 200 million users spanning over 190 countries, of which about 1.5 million were paying subscribers. <\/p>\n Later that year, the company went public in a spinoff from its parent company IAC<\/a> at a $5 billion valuation.<\/a><\/p>\n But in Sud\u2019s eyes, it wasn\u2019t just her winning strategy that made her stand out for the top job, but also her conviction.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThe number one thing that I feel like I did, and I always give this advice to young people who are ambitious and looking to grow in their careers, is recognize that the number one way to accelerate your career is to find a way to make the business successful,\u201d she says. \u201cIt sounds so obvious, but that\u2019s what I did.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cAnd I think what you find is that, even if you don\u2019t have experience, a lot of investors will bet on people who are willing to bet on themselves as if they\u2019re putting the business first,\u201d she adds. <\/p>\n \u201cI know that now, as a CEO, I bet on people all the time. When somebody shows up to me and I can see that they\u2019re thinking about what makes sense for the business\u2014and they\u2019re willing to really<\/em> bet on it\u2014I want to bet on them all day long.\u201d<\/p>\n Sud likens her experience at Vimeo, where she got everyone on board with a new vision, even when the numbers weren\u2019t there yet, to \u201cacting like an entrepreneur\u201d within the video hosting giant.<\/p>\n \u201cYou have to be comfortable not staying in your lane,\u201d she said, with the caveat: \u201cBut the risk of not staying in your lane is you\u2019re gonna piss people off\u2026 So the key is to support, celebrate and recognize the people around you.\u201d \u00a0<\/p>\n For example, despite being in marketing, Sud wanted to develop new products for Vimeo.<\/p>\n \u201cI didn\u2019t stay in my lane, but I also wasn\u2019t like, \u2018let me go show off my cool new product idea and piss off our head product,\u2019\u201d she recalls. \u201cInstead, I would spend a lot of hours just saying, \u2018Hey, what are your problems, let me help you, I\u2019ll put this deck together and give it to you.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI did that pretty consistently for a couple years with my peers and my colleagues and that allowed me to just earn a lot of trust.\u201d<\/p>\n Although she warns that you won\u2019t get instant credit by doing it her way, over time, you\u2019ll build a reputation for creating a wider impact\u2014which is far more valuable if you want to make the leap from individual contributor to leadership.<\/p>\n Plus, that experience is precisely why Sud\u2019s at ease in her current gig as Tubi\u2019s CEO, which she landed just under a year ago.<\/p>\n With nearly 80 million monthly active users, Tubi is the fastest-growing U.S. streaming service. Now, it\u2019s trying to achieve trans-Atlantic success, having just launched in the U.K. with more than 20,000 films and TV episodes. <\/p>\nRipping up her job spec and following her own strategy <\/h2>\n
Want to be a CEO? Act like an entrepreneur\u00a0<\/h2>\n