Is Notion CEO Ivan Zhao Designing The Future of Software? Full Interview!

have nothing in your home that's not beautiful nor useful notion today I like to use the metaphor is kind of like Lego for software there's a piles of bricks everywhere but there's no boxes tell you

what to do with that not completely true a few box we're doing a lot better right you're doing great and if I was being provocative is notion for Builders first or users first yeah it's definitely

provocative so this is every customer query every customer query talk to me about I don't read all of them sure but you get a Vibe I so we think 2025 is the

year to invest in hi it's Simon welcome back to bet creating and today something different Ivan Z is founder and CEO of notion the block-based productivity

software continuing to disrupt the industry he was just named entrepreneur of 2024 and from humble beginnings back

in 2013 notion recently hit over 100 million users and a valuation over $10 billion this year so I figured Ivan is doing something right and that there is

a lot that we can all learn from him so from exciting New Directions in Notions future to designing tools for everyone and building a successful business in this one-on-one Cafe conversation at the

make with notion London event Ivan revealed to me his plans for notion into 2025 how he continues to learn how to serve Builders and users Enterprises and individuals and the New Vision notion

holes for our digital lives now like many others notion now sits at the very heart of my business and they are riding the new wave of people wanting to simplify their digital systems and apps

right down into more Consolidated options from big companies to a lot of genz who are ditching old systems and flocking to notion we also discussed the power of good design to disrupt the

software space what's coming next for our notion Works spaces and how this self-proclaimed Lego of software company wants to help us run our lives and businesses with less but more beautiful

tools this should be a really great listen he's a humble and thoughtful chap so grab a coffee and I hope like I did that you get a lot from it let's start

with some Lego we JB Amy and Lou and I meeting up these guys have come to the UK so there are Lego stores in London there's a massive Lego store and I didn't it's quite a kind of tourist trap

but it's great but we queued up and we got a picture in front of the Lego Big Ben which is quite impressive sure right so anyway we they' got you know they have the bits where you can kind of play and make stuff so we started messing around and we got really excited and

then we thought we kind of spent about 40 minutes hanging out and we just got on something so we got your present and we've also got a video that we'll show you later on that we took

with a load of the ambassadors so they've all been attached to this uh so here you go we made you a notion oh that's so kind thank you there you go so

like you know sometimes you got to get it's it's like the rap bricks it's like it's uh it's more thoughtful because they around the corner it took a bit of work it's not bad like I feel I feel

like we're slightly too long but it's quite Square you know what I have a Lego piece from my pocket nobody told me

about we were joking about you'll probably have you'll probably leg this is from um laundry vanent we have Lego pieces that happened to have do I have a more it's everywhere we've been given Lego today you're the you're the Lego of

software so anyway there are back it in the bag if you like put it back but um yeah we just it's really to say thanks for building the thing we've built our businesses around it's a big deal thank

you yeah so thank you so Ivan let's talk about notion and actually what I wanted to do because my first discovery of notion was when was it end of

2019 pretty early yeah before I had 1 million users yeah yeah it was it was early and I don't think I'd realized and then kind of got addicted it's like a computer game or a you know you know

anything that you could can start playing with and I think what drew me in was this the design the the S the awareness of design and and as I then

come to get to no notion your team like particularly like your offices and then I walked in and went the they love the chairs New York office or SF office we

went to Dublin okay and then we came to uh make with notion and saw all the stuff in in there and and just that awareness and love of design was just it just felt at home so I kind of wanted to talk to

you about design and software okay you know and I guess my first question is like you've obviously given real thought to both the form and the function of notion and you talk about beautiful

tools so to what extent is is that kind of is there a personal love of design or a kind of awareness of what good design is that you feel gives you an advantage

in the software space what does it bring to productivity to soft uh since we're in London one of my biggest

inspiration was um this guy William Morris and the one of the guy star arts and craft movement and he has a quote I

really like um have nothing in your home that's not beautiful nor useful so I think you when you think about design you can think about the beauty of it you

can think about the utility of it and the best of both is are the one that can do both well and uh um you mentioned Notions Lego for software that's how we call notion

internally Lego is both beautiful to whoever the beholder who creates it but also creative useful right so um we try to make notion in the same way so it's

both beautiful and useful and to us that means good design um across chairs Arts like William Morris interior wallpapers

like William Morris or did Ram the one phone you show me or software in terms of no notion yeah and and is has it informed are there any good examples of

kind of choices you've made about the about the software you've built that are kind of really specifically inform how it functions or have they kind of just you just been trying to balance the way

maybe let's let me find let's take some cut uh couple examples that's both beautiful and functional um for example the left side bar in

notion right um we try to make as we call dumb as possible yeah just like don't have to think right this is literally many how many hard their

software use work this way um we're wanted to push that into a you know online SAS product but the left side part has been there forever so let's just take advantage of that and use that

to workan ASE not just one page but multiple pages and so it can become combining a document tool and knowledge based two in one right so that's more in my opinion the functional part and but

then let's not just create a very lame lify bar let's try to be attach a little bit of humanity into it so if you pay attention to the color it's actually not

just straight up gray it's a very light very light shades of um you know cream in it yeah a little bit warmer so even though we're try to be as functional as

possible we'll try to inject some Humanity to it right the Rams um Broms utilities yes it's very utility very clean but Corners are well rounded the

color it's not just the cold shades of blue or gray it's the warm Shades of Gray and how can we do that for software that's what we're trying to do it's it's

so lovely to hear that I think that the there's something about that awareness of we are people just trying to do the things we've always done and and as the world is Advanced there's that and I

think that it that's what's really lovely to hear about that design like I feel that the other thing that notion did for me which I found other software didn't is it made me feel calm the kind

of Simplicity of that is that something that you've aimed at you know I know you've talked about the pen and paper being the beginning of it but um you mentioned visiting our San or visiting

our Dublin office and we try to make the office feel calm too yeah if you visit it again the wall is not white colors it's not very

precise Cloud something what is it um cream fro more cream Frost there's a CO I forgot the name of Co but the name of the paint is cream froth so

warmer and the light if you pay attention to the light we're using an office we try to go as warm as possible so she feels like home or feels like your art studio do not feels like office or

hospitals um so then you just relax right you think better you feel at home um you feels like you can put same for writing in notion it feels like you can

just go there's no little distraction you're familiar with most things but it does not feel C at the same time you a do yeah it's good it's great and I love that that then you're you're shipping

that into Enterprises uh because people have to look at their screen five eight hours a day yeah right if we can make a little bit better it's like William Morris make

your home nice you can contribute a little bit back to humanity if we make the software better even for Enterprise customers we add a little bit back to the thing that people experience every day I think it comes across Maybe that's

why I found it at the time I was clean I was doing a Marie condo on my house okay it was L you know particularly when we went into lockdown it kind of gave that and I think this feels like simplifying

your digital spaces giving you space to have ideas you know something I've done for a long time is build templates around that kind of idea of you know the second brain David Allen those things

and it really lends itself to that so we're all very grateful for it thank you now before we carry on and talk about what's coming next for notion the upgrades we can expect in 25 and Ivan's perspective on the challenge of making

notion accessible for new users if you're enjoying this make sure to hit that subscribe button and maybe even the like button and I'll send you more great ideas tools and Tech to help you build

your best life here soon okay so we've talked about Lego for software it gives us so much flexibility customization all of this stuff is fantastic about notion what I love about

it is it's a place where you can create whatever you want it's simple on the other end of the scale users people that in my audience that will often come to notion can see its potential to be that and then get

overwhelmed really quickly with possibilities potential and there is real scope to make incredible complex systems we've got individuals using it for personal knowledge businesses

running massive teams how do you approach that as a as a developer building something for people and if I was being provocative is notion for

Builders first or users first that's yeah it's definitely provocative um I think Lego actually did it it's doing an excellent job of it if anything

we need to notion need to do a lot better and borrow pages from Lego notion today I like to use the metaphor is kind of like Lego for software by missing

many of the boxes okay you're going to imagine you're walking to a Notions Lego Store there's a piles of bricks everywhere but there's no boxes tell you what to do with that right few boxes

completely true not completely true but a few bucks we're doing a lot better right you're doing great we have template we have Marketplace um but it could still have give people a lot more handholding if you are not a builder um

we're getting a lot better like you mentioned Marketplace templates but for not everybody are Lego minded from the GetGo they need to feel inspired they maybe they prefer have a ready to make

solution from for them then if they feel like Tinker then they can Tinker later right uh Notions St uh we can do a much better job for the

people who are don't want to build um but who people who does want to Bild Sky your limit you can we were constantly introducing more advanced bricks for

Builders like automation like AI yeah they're truly tailor for no in the Lego term Master Builders and we do a good job for Builders they can set up the

boxes and templates back to people who doesn't want to build as much I think we feel like there's a really good symbiosis between Builders and nonb Builders I agree and I'm being provocative and I do actually think that

notion does a brilliant job of catering to boat and because you're taking that on I also think it's the community that has really struck me about this which is amazing and actually because you

properly talk to us you properly sit down with the users and the you know the builders we're then able to provide those outof the-box solutions to people

and that I think things like layouts buttons these things have been incredible as a templ Builder I've kind of done the same well I think we're following you cuz as a template Builder I've been doing the same thing we've

like built something and gone oh I've it's great but you had to be around when I built it to know what it was and now we're focusing on user experience and and it's all there you can clean things

up simp so is there a sense of like a kind of a mode which can be simplified for you and then one for you looking toward you mentioned the feature layout

right layout is kind of like this it's great yeah well it's like you as a builder set up not in certain ways and your customer your users or your the people who buy your template they don't

have to go into the layout mode they can enjoy whatever workflow is set up for them they don't have to shoot their foot right um like we need to make permission better so you can power even more use

cases we need to make formula more powerful so they don't have to go into formuls you can set it up for them automation same reasons um yeah like there's a

layers of curiosity or desire to build we need to tailor for for Builders like you we need to give more fancy brecks for non-b Builders we need to make Notions simpler

next I had to ask Ivan what Notions planning for 2025 and we get a pretty clear answer and some pretty wild Revelations about how Ivan deals with customer feedback it's pretty impressive

to be honest before that though if you are interested to learn more about how my notion templates and complete life systems can help you FastTrack to your perfect custom organization system in

notion do jump over to better creating.

comom and join the 15,000 plus other users already playing with my templates and digital tools back to the interview I spoke with AE a month or so ago I

don't know if you would Echo this but um what's been really great is the speed that the approach to making it quick to use is that still a big Focus for still

yeah in fact the 2025 one of our top Focus it's speed for larger and larger databases like you have you know tens of thousand things notion can get slow for

you okay and speed especially on your phone right um because many people probably your customers of buying your templates might just use it on their phone right they need to work really

well there and relate to that is can you work in a low connectivity offline mode so those are primary and when we do a good investment here it's essentially a

tech investment in our technical Foundation of the prod and Company allow notion to continue building prod in a fast velocity for many years to come so

we think 2025 is the year to invest in performance offline mode reliability and scale and mobile I think so many of viers and the community are going to be so excited about that the basics now

yeah right that's interesting yeah coming back to building a tool that allows us to build what we want and do what we want with it that's that's a tricky balance so it's good to hear well should we talk finally about the

customer a little bit more of course I I love find I loved finding the Sesame Street characters everywhere are they are they like your avatar for the

customer yeah they are in their office yeah yeah I think notion gets it right compared to a lot of companies there really does feel like a dialogue and you can see it am I the first little

question is am I writing reading I think I read that you you get all of the all of the um query reports to your phone uh

yeah my let me see my phone stute here so if you swipe up all the Zen desk tickets coming into my phone so this is

every customer query every customer query there's not many CEOs are doing that talk to me about I don't read all of them sure but you get a Vibe I get a

Vibe um a lot of it's building related right um but at the same time there's a lot of product features requests so I get a sense what's going on um when I'm

have urge to go on Twitter or Instagram open this up a little bit and get a sense of what customer asking for and how is that informed can you give some examples of how that might have informed Central principles or or decisions that

you've made in in just in seeing that picture of the users um this tend to more translate into the vibe like you're talking about the and in order to make proper decisions when you to tally up

into okay uh what kind of keyword what kind of product surface area has up in feedback then that we use a more systematic way to translate into prod Ro

map uh I I think you were interview Atkin earlier so yeah um he's on a product team we do a lot of translation product team product operation team and translate that into room and a lot of

it's like you all um can message our team directly right a lot of feedbacks and you talk with Engineers on the team I know that some engineer talk this community really closely that's like

another channel for feedback but that's more for Builders yeah well we quite enjoy that cuz we can sometimes go we've created a problem oh wow that's a new one we're testing it you know we're

testing up up to us to balance this out right sometimes you all might push the product too far into the power feature power user features and we need to make it sure it's also simple for the vast

majority notion user who might not be power user so but that's our craft it's great and yeah craft being right back to the idea of design and building right

that it comes across I think so we have to do the obligatory quickfire round finish off this okay one piece of advice to a from scratch firsttime notion

user oh wow It's Tricky question first time notion uh Watch YouTube Watch YouTube thanks for the recommendation the matter answer it's the matter answer yeah yeah get yeah speak to people yeah

actually ekin had a good one which was just pick one use case and and then just start building with as many different b as that's a good one actually you probably if you get stuck watch YouTube

watch our tutorials then you probably can build most things you want to build at this point know play yeah and then you will be having fun with that you probably learn how to relation relational database works if you're not

a computer science degree yeah totally yeah I'm I'm I'm a theater director that got drawn in and so now you know how relational database works yeah it took me an hour and a half to build one when

I first did it and now it's like you have an engineer degree now so yeah it's coming thanks um okay early bird or night hour

uh I'm probably I sleep at 12:00 12 at night yeah so middle probably yeah middle yeah e or Wagner Oh

e uh if you had to for more function oh no I know it's cruel uh I think my bone structure is

forms no my bone structure is function so naturally I do something very functional and I need to remind myself to inject the delay Beauty to it and

suffer sort of lack most suffer lack Beauty so it can do better there yeah Mak space to play a bit right okay yeah be okay uh pourover or

espresso um I like drip coffee so it's kind of like easy no F version of pourover no nice okay quicker one book

everyone should read one book everyone maybe that's influenced you really strongly a lot of books um yeah that's a a tough

one I'm in the middle of reading this book a land and sea by kmid I believe okay talking about actually related to

uh UK okay yeah yeah yeah um Britain is a land of sea people so compared to contrast with Germany and France they're land of land people yeah we have to have

a conversation about the sound of language by the way as a theater person it's amazing you talk about all of that you know like the Welsh accent and then the Dutch accent it's really good okay

last one uh one designer everyone should study one designer um this more probably more on the beauty

front uh Joseph Hoffman okay yeah a vien Ain designer turn off the century I need to look them up beautiful so diverse

more people to look up Amazing well look it's been an absolute pleasure I just want to get into more conversation about design and building but we've run out of time so thank you thank you for having

me so nice to meet you well I had a great time meeting Ivan and I hope that you did too let me know your thoughts and comments and where you want to see notion go next down below and how do you

use it what is stopping you if you don't use notion I'd love to hear from you and while I was at the notion event I also spoke with ekin Notions head of product C and AI so get subscribed to see that

interview soon and in the meantime listen I know that notion can seem overwhelming until you actually learn how to really make it work personally for you so if you want to level up your

notion workspace I recommend you watch this video next for some tips and ways in or watch this one if you're more interested in just some other well-designed Tech that I'm loving outside of software it would be great if

you hit the like button below and I'll see you soon bye