Indonesian Productivity Screens

A story about Shaan's experience working for an eccentric $500M Indonesian business leader who had unusual management practices and later died in jail.

"I worked with this crazy guy in Indonesia - a grade school dropout who was self-made and worth about $500 million at his peak. In Indonesia, that's like $10 billion in America. He had some really insane practices as a boss.

He installed a giant projector in the office that tracked everybody's computer activity. He bought this software from Boeing that would show your productivity - your square would flash red if you weren't being productive enough. I don't even know how it measured that, maybe just how much you were typing.

He had 4 women just to manage his email. If you did well in a meeting, he would walk in the next day and hand you keys to a new Mercedes parked outside, saying 'this is yours.'

I remember being in a meeting where his friend from Singapore came in, and they were openly discussing an insider trading scheme. I was 21 years old, and I knew enough to think 'this is wrong.'

After work, he would take his insider crew to the bar where two escorts would be waiting. This was how he did business - bribing officials and all kinds of stuff. He ended up in jail and actually died there this year. I only worked with him for about 3 months before I left and came back to start a startup here."