Interview with Crystal Widjaja

Crystal Widjaja's journey from an impatient political science major to a titan of product and growth in Southeast Asia is nothing short of extraordinary. On Lenny's Podcast, she pulls back the curtain on her experiences at Gojek – a company that now dwarfs many Western tech giants in scale – and Kumu, offering a masterclass in scrappy growth, impactful analytics, and building teams that truly move the needle. This isn't just a tale of Silicon Valley success; it's a deep dive into an entirely different, incredibly effective playbook.

From Craigslist to Decacorn: Crystal's Unconventional Path

Crystal's career trajectory is a testament to unconventional thinking. Eschewing the traditional tech pipeline after college, she landed an investment banking research job, where her impatience with manual data led her to teach herself MySQL. Realizing traditional finance wasn't tech-forward enough, she literally cold-emailed Gojek, a fledgling Indonesian startup, asking them to "take a bet" on her. They did, and the rest is history. She describes Gojek's early days as incredibly high-stakes, joining when the company was operating out of "a house," a moment she admits made her wonder if she'd "made a huge mistake." Yet, the underlying problem Gojek solved – horrendous traffic in Indonesia – was undeniable, and the team's willingness to go to extreme lengths was immediately apparent.

Crystal recalls a breathtaking tactic to onboard drivers at scale: "I felt like it was a problem that was very solvable and we ended up renting a stadium to just hire like 60,000 drivers in a couple of weeks." This anecdote perfectly encapsulates the unique, often audacious approach required to thrive in markets like Southeast Asia, where physical infrastructure and consumer behavior present vastly different challenges and opportunities than in the West. This environment also explains the rise of "super apps" like Gojek (now GoTo) and Kumu. In regions where mobile phones are often the only computers households possess, and storage is a premium, consolidating services into one app isn't just convenient; it's a necessity. As Crystal explains, "When your phone is full, are you going to delete a photo of your kid or are you going to delete this app? You're probably going to delete the app." This insight reveals a foundational difference in user needs, making the super app model a powerful solution for an entire continent.

Key Learnings:

• Embrace Unconventional Paths: Sometimes the most impactful opportunities arise from non-standard journeys and bold personal bets.
• Understand Market Physics: Growth strategies must be deeply rooted in the unique cultural, economic, and technological realities of the target market.
• Solve Core Problems: Products that address undeniable pain points (like traffic or phone storage limitations) have the potential for explosive growth, even with early-stage risks.

The Art of Scrappy Growth and "Doing Things That Don't Scale"

At Gojek, Crystal became a master of "doing things that don't scale" – often referred to as the "Wizard of Oz" method – to quickly validate ideas. Faced with the need to test a subscription feature, instead of building it out, they created a manual workaround. They added 100 drivers to a WhatsApp group, instructing them to pitch a subscription to customers, collect $10 cash, and text the team. Crystal's team then manually applied the vouchers and deducted the money. This incredibly manual, yet effective, process allowed them to validate the value proposition and conversion rates without a single line of code.

This philosophy extends beyond just feature testing. Gojek leveraged its most visible asset for growth: its drivers. By incentivizing drivers to act as salespeople for GoPay (the e-wallet service), offering them extra money to get customers to top up their digital wallets, Gojek tapped into a powerful, captive sales channel. "You wouldn't believe how great of a salesperson someone can be when you were literally trapped in a car with them going somewhere," Crystal quips. This program accounted for 60% of GoPay's acquisition once released. For early startups with limited data, Crystal advocates running experiments even with just 30 users. While precision will improve with more data, "what's better than having zero is definitely 30," she states, emphasizing that the underlying trends often emerge quickly, allowing for rapid iteration.

Key Practices:

• Wizard of Oz Testing: Manually simulate new features or experiences to validate demand before investing in development.
• Leverage Existing Assets: Identify and incentivize unique channels for growth that are inherent to your product or service, like Gojek's drivers.
• Experiment Early and Often: Don't wait for massive user numbers; run experiments with small sample sizes (even 30 users) to quickly gather directional data and iterate.
• Solve the "Setup Moment": Instead of directly focusing on conversion, identify and address preceding problems like "trust" or "friction" that prevent users from reaching their "aha moment."

Beyond Vanity Metrics: The Quest for True Insights

Crystal is notoriously critical of how most companies approach analytics, often falling into the trap of gathering "entertainment" rather than "news." As she defines it, "Real news is information that changes what you do in the real world, and if you don't change what you're doing, what you are doing is just getting entertainment." The core issue, she explains, lies in mistaking measurements for insights. An observation like "power users do four times more bookings" is a measurement; it lacks context and doesn't explain why.

True insights emerge from understanding the "why" by instrumenting events with rich properties. For instance, instead of just tracking "map loaded," Gojek would track properties like "how many drivers do they see on the screen," "what city is it in," or "is there surge pricing." This granular context allowed them to discover that users seeing only two drivers were much less likely to convert than those seeing five. This insight prompted action: understanding where and when driver supply was low and then addressing it. Crystal also offers concrete retention benchmarks: 60% week-over-week retention for free products, 20-30% for paid products, and a critical 80% for "friends and family" testing. "If you can't even convince the people who care about you to use the product, it probably isn't going to solve the job for anyone else," she asserts.

Key Insights:

• "News" vs. "Entertainment": Ensure data collection leads to actionable changes in behavior or strategy, not just interesting observations.
• Measurements ≠ Insights: Understand the difference between an observed fact and an insight that provides context and explains the "why."
• Rich Instrumentation: Track events with numerous properties (e.g., location, context, available options) to uncover the causal factors behind user behavior.
• Retention Benchmarks: Aim for high retention rates (e.g., 60% weekly for free products, 80% for early adopters) as a clear signal of product-market fit.

Structuring for Sustainable Growth: The "Cleanup Crew" Approach

Crystal's experience at Gojek shaped her view on how growth teams should operate, especially in the early stages. Initially, they didn't explicitly define "growth," but recognized "obvious gaps to fill." While core product teams focused on fundamental features, the growth team became the "cleanup crew," tackling everything from optimizing SMS delivery rates for new sign-ups to educating first-time users. They connected the dots, ensuring users had a seamless journey even if core features weren't fully polished.

This meant understanding subtle user behaviors, such as a new user not knowing they needed to find the driver versus waiting. The growth team would fill these educational gaps. Crystal emphasizes that the first growth hire shouldn't be expected to come in and "model everything," but rather to "pick some small space to work on that they know is workable." This requires a deep understanding of numbers. "You have to have someone who knows how to run the numbers right," she stresses, highlighting the importance of statistical intuition to avoid making decisions based on faulty interpretations or small sample sizes. A growth team's true value lies in their ability to identify and address the highest-impact opportunities, unlocking future growth.

Key Practices:

• Identify and Fill Gaps: Growth teams excel by addressing user experience shortcomings or operational inefficiencies that core product teams might not prioritize.
• Integrate Growth: Embedding growth product managers into core teams helps synthesize growth objectives directly into product development.
• Hire for Statistical Intuition: Early growth hires should possess a strong understanding of statistics, sampling, and bias to ensure data-driven decisions are sound.
• Focus on Impact: Prioritize efforts that have the highest potential impact and can unlock future growth, even if they aren't the "flashiest" projects.

"The worst possible thing is to have a growth person who thinks they are doing the right thing and is measuring things wrong and then focusing on the wrong areas." - Crystal Widjaja