Andrzej (aka, Oggy) Ogonowski is Co-founder and Head of Platform at Growsari, a KKR and IFC-backed Philippine startup that helps small neighborhood mom-and-pop shops grow and go online.

👋🏼 How would you explain your job to someone outside tech?

I work with our PMs, designers and engineers to create the "lego blocks" to build and scale more e-commerce and fintech solutions for our sari-sari store owners— and make sure they all fit together.

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🧐 What's something about you or your job that would surprise us?

Even if you're in a tech and data-driven company and role, you don't need perfect tech or data to get started.

Some of our biggest products started as spreadsheets or pen and paper. This an approach we use to innovate quickly, learn fast, and then go all-in on what is really worth scaling out.

🏆 What has been the biggest highlight of your career so far?

Building Growsari from 0 to 1. Always looking forward and never giving up when times were tough.

🔍 What's a startup trend or space you're watching this year?

Celebrating "Rhinos" over "Unicorns". I think the global economy and some challenging IPOs will shift capital and PR buzz to those who have been quietly building rock-solid businesses— expect some new "silent heroes" to emerge!

💼 What advice would you give someone starting out in your industry?

Worry less about the "micro" (specific tools like agile, R, python, scrum certifications etc.) and more about the "macro" (like asking yourself, "how do I consistently solve problems").

I've learned more by seeing how chefs, painters, lawyers and music producers approach their work than any "traditional" product management certification.

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🗣 What's one thing you can keep talking about for hours?

Scaling culture! I see it the same way as scaling our products. It's just that your end-user shifts from a store owner (our customers) to your employees when you're scaling culture.

I love teaching teams (and other founders) about using similar tools, frameworks, analytics and skillsets to tackle it.

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🎥 What's your favorite movie/TV show?

I'm more of a podcast type of guy… I've watched 2 Marvel movies ever 😅. Anything to do with art/business/sports. My favorites:

• Handcrafted by Brian Chesky (Masters of Scale Podcast)
• Toto Wolff on avoiding the doomsday (Nico Rosberg Podcast)
• David Epstein on the power of generalists (Recode Decode Podcast)
• Alexis Ohanian on the future of sports and tech (Bill Simmons Podcast)

🍨 What's your go-to ice cream flavor?

Coconut (Fun fact: Part of the Growsari story involves my previous job distributing ice cream across Africa and SEA, but that's a story for another day!)