How Did I Get Here?

Robert Hohman

Co-founder and chief executive officer, Glassdoor
from
  • Education
  • Louisville High School, Louisville, Ohio, class of 1989
  • Stanford, class of 1992
  • Stanford School of Engineering, class of 1993
  • Work Experience
  • 1990–94
    Co-founder, Victory Briefs
  • 1993–96
    Development lead, designer/developer, program manager, Microsoft
  • 1996–2003
    Development manager, vice president for hotels and packages, senior VP for store and cruises, SVP for cruises and packages, Expedia
  • 2003–04
    President, Classic Custom Vacations
  • 2004–06
    President, Hotwire
  • 2006–07
    Player, World of Warcraft
  • 2007–Present
    Co-founder and CEO, Glassdoor
  • Life Lessons
  • “Amazing people are normal people who have done amazing things.”
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  • “A balance between family, personal, and work time is mostly an act of will. You have to choose to do that.”
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  • “Don’t optimize career changes to make the most money. The money will come later if you learn.”
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  • “I was a nerd: I started the computer club and was an avid member of chess club.”
  • As one of Louisville High’s Most Likely to Succeed, 1989
  • “In college I started a company with a debating friend of mine. We sold debate briefs, which are books on how to debate. It was supernerdy, but it was pretty successful.”
  • Getting his head shaved in solidarity with Expedia founder Rich Barton, who lost a bet to Hohman, 1998
  • “Back then it was hard to build a website. We had to invent almost anything we needed. I was building one of the world’s largest vacation packagers, and I couldn’t go near a Ritz-Carlton without being invited to stay in the presidential suite. It was so awesome.”
  • “Hotels don’t give presidential suites to the discount outlet guy.”
  • “I took it seriously: I wanted to be an amazing Orc warrior. And I learned what it feels like to be part of an online community. I hit the maximum level, and the next day I went and started Glassdoor.”
  • With a Stanford roommate, 1989
  • “Steve Jobs talked to my computer science class, and he was just this interesting, relatively normal guy in a black turtleneck.”
  • “It was the superluxury-vacation-packaging brand of Expedia. We were the largest tour provider to Hawaii, so I spent a lot of time there, which was fun.”
  • With Hillary Clinton at a roundtable on pay inequality, 2016
  • “People were making a decision about where to work and how much money to take for that work with almost no information. This year, for the first time, we have a rich enough data set to see pay transparency and gender inequality in individual companies. I’m proud of that.”