BYU Marriott School of Business Convocation 26 April 2019 - Ryan Smith, Qualtrics CEO & Co-founder

Thank you, Dean. Thank you, BYU. I am a BYU Marriott School graduate, and it only took me 15 years, so most of you are ahead of me. But look, I am so excited to be here, and thank you, Class of 2019. First of all, congratulations. And I'm grateful to share this amazing day, your day, with all of you. This is a special place. I go to a lot of universities, and there is nowhere on earth like this. I grew up here. My father... oh, when do we get to take the robes off? Is this like a Halloween joke? Alright, I appreciate that though. My father was on this stage for 30 years as part of the Marriott School faculty. I literally grew up in the Tanner Building. There's not one part of the Tanner Building that doesn't have a Smith mark on it somewhere. But 30 years ago on this very stage, my mother, who is here, received her PhD, and she was the only woman receiving that in her class. She had five kids at the time under the age of 12, but that didn't slow her down. Fast forward two decades, and on the same campus, this is where I met my amazing and extremely funny wife, Ashley. I have hundreds of stories from my experiences on this BYU campus. This has always been a constant, safe place for me to come back to. I hope as life gets crazy for all of you, you all feel that and come back often, because it is special. Look, today I would absolutely love to give you some futuristic sermon, but I can't. I can't predict the future. So instead, I thought I'd share one of the most important lessons that I have learned: be all in. Being all in is the lost art of really committing to something, and that's hard. Real commitment is hard because technology and social media have raised our awareness, and we live in a constant state of the grass being greener, or FOMO, fear of missing out. We live in the ultimate on-demand world. There's always a backup plan, there's always an off-ramp, and commitment actually feels binding to a lot of people. But I'm here to testify that the only way to feel success in life is to make decisions wisely and then act on those decisions with 100% commitment. The principle of being all in applies to every role that we have in life. It applies to our marriage and our family, it applies to our faith, it applies to our career. It is absolutely vital that we are all in, because in my experience, nothing great ever happens unless we are willing to fight through the friction. President Eyring's mom used to say to him, 'If you're on the right path, it will always be uphill.' That said, I didn't always understand how crucial this principle is, but in retrospect, if I could look back through my life, I can attribute each and every single success to a time when I was all in. For the first 18 years of my life, I wasn't exactly a model student. Truth be told, I really wasn't a model anything. My parents went through a very disruptive divorce at a critical point in my life. I dropped out of high school my sophomore year entirely, with no plans to go back. The only reason I actually eventually graduated was because I wanted to go to Seoul, Korea to teach English with a couple of friends who were older than me, and my dad said he would only let me go if I finished high school. In Korea, everything changed for me because I first learned what it actually took to be all in. My friends and I left the states for Seoul with this great plan. We had jobs and housing all lined up. We had super high expectations of how this incredible adventure was going to be. Shortly after we arrived, everything started to unravel. Our jobs didn't exist, our housing was no longer available, and our contact who had set everything up was nowhere to be found. And to add insult to injury, we had no money. Just a few days into the trip, we realized the gravity of our situation. We each called our parents to get help, to get out of Seoul and return home as fast as we could. My two buddies phoned their parents, and they rushed to the rescue. They were on the next flight out. When I called my father, he told me, 'I'm not buying you a ticket. I think you should stay.' I will never, ever forget the loneliness that I felt as a 17-year-old kid sitting in a restaurant, watching as my two friends grabbed their bags, hopped into a taxi, and headed off to the airport. I was alone in a country that I didn't know, never been away from home before, with a language that I couldn't speak, with no money and no contacts. On that very lonely first night without friends, I was forced to be all in. My first move was to find somewhere to sleep. My second move was to find a job, any job. Things were rough, they were really rough. I eventually found a job teaching English at a school, and I was able to convince the school to let me sleep there on the couch at night if I could put away my bedding before the kids showed up. I kept all my belongings five miles away in an apartment of an acquaintance I had met on the street. Every morning I would wake up, take the subway to his house, shower, change my clothes, and then get back before school started. I ate ramen noodles three meals a day because it's all I could afford and all I could order in Korean. There was a lot of friction. Feeling alone, lost, hopeless. It was virtually impossible to maintain that attitude of being all in, but somehow, someway, I continued day after day to push through that friction. Finally, after a few months of barely getting by, the first of many miracles occurred. One day in the subway, I randomly ran into two missionaries. I hadn't seen Americans in a long time. I was not active in the church at the time. The missionaries gave me their quick spill. I told them I was from Utah and I knew who they were. Then they switched gears and they invited me to play basketball. So I joined them. That next day, I went to church for the first time in a long time. That evening, I hung around and went to a prayer where I met a ton of other members. But that night, I went back to my couch by taking the subway and woke up the next morning for school to go shower and change my clothes. As I was getting on my subway that Monday morning, I was ready to quit. I felt despair. I wasn't going to last another week. Then I turned around, and as I was going to get on my train, I saw another member of the church sitting right behind me who I'd met the night before. In a city of 10 million people, 45 minutes away, this never happened. It was no coincidence. He recognized me and he invited me to hang out with him. Miracle after miracle followed. Things began to change. A short time later, I moved in with three returned missionaries, and for the first time in months, I didn't feel alone. These guys inspired me. They were living clean lives and enjoying every second of it. They were happy, good people, and they were actually experiencing success. I wanted to be like them. They inspired me to go on a mission, which I did, to New Mexico City. My family likes to say that I found God in Korea, and in some ways it's totally true, but I like to think more accurately that I found out what happens when you're all in. When you fight through doubts or loneliness or despair, we actually push ourselves to the greatness found on the other side. If I had quit during my time in Korea, if I had let that friction stop me, there would be absolutely no chance that I would be standing here today. There would be no chance that I would have the family that I have or any of the success that's come. We have to constantly make the decision to fight through friction in order to create something great. A great marriage, a great family, a solid testimony, a successful career. They're only possible when we decide to be all in. Since being at BYU, I've spent the last two decades building a tech company called Qualtrics. I started it in the business school. It took Qualtrics a long time to take flight. We always joke that it's a 17-year overnight success. Throughout this entire journey, we have faced massive friction, and guess what? We still do today. The entire journey has been uphill. It's been all push and very little pull. Had we walked away year three, year five, year eleven, year fifteen, we would have missed out on experiences and success stories that have changed not only our lives but the lives of thousands of people over the past 17 years. Every single time that we had a bet-the-company decision, we pulled a team together, only the ones that were all in, and we decided that we weren't moving forward unless everyone was committed. Being all in on Qualtrics, for those people who know me, this is all I've done. It's been so important to me, but it's not enough. It's not enough to be all in on one area of your life. In my world, I have seen so many people who are all in on their careers, but the rest of their life is a complete disaster. That's not success. It's not success for them, it's not success for me, and it's not going to be success for any of you. So my call to action today is to be all in on every single area of your life: your career, your family, and your faith. Be all in on your career. We are on this earth to win. You're going to win. Trajectory is important. It's even more important early on in your career. If you're switching jobs like what's going on in Silicon Valley right now every 12 to 18 months, you will never be anywhere long enough to actually make an impact. Find a company that's willing to bet on you for who you are, and bet on yourself, and go all in, and don't look back. It might even take 17 years. You're young. Now's the time to set yourself up. This is a time you should be grinding. Second, be all in on your family. How can you be all in on your family if you're all in on your career? You can do it. Every week, I try to sit down and define what success looks like that week for me when it comes to my family, when it comes to being a good father, a good husband, a good brother, or a good son, whatever the roles you play are, and then plan out activities that week to help me be successful in those areas. There are weeks that I fail miserably. Nobody's perfect, but you got to try. Don't let this part of your life get away from you. Be intentional about your family and work hard at being a good parent, a good spouse, a good sibling, a good child. Be all in on your family. Third, and most importantly, be all in on your faith. We live in a world where it's popular to be on the fence, where doubt and cynicism are fashionable. It's not cool to be all in. But I can promise you this: nothing will bring you more happiness than to be all in on your faith. Your faith is way too important to outsource to something that someone else says or to popular trends. Faith is a daily choice. It needs to be worked on like everything else good in your life. When I was in Korea, I faced some very hard times, but I never gave up. I powered through, and every single thing I have in my life is better because of it. Your faith will hit friction. It will, which is no different than anything else in your life. When that happens, don't freak out. Don't jump ship. Make the decision now to power through the friction and hold fast to what you do know. Make the decision to be all in. I've lived this life without the gospel of Jesus Christ, and I've lived with it. In every way, life is better with it. Look, we've had a lot of success in the eyes of the world, but let me tell you all that success in the world can't compare to the happiness that your faith will bring you. When you're going through friction, which we're all going through and will go through, you're actually going to need your faith. When you're really all in, your faith is the only compass that's driving you. Choose to believe. If you always have one foot in and one foot out the door, the happiness and the fulfillment that you actually could have won't be there. Be all in on your faith. Class of 2019, be all in on your careers. We are on this earth to win. Be all in on your family. It'll bring you happiness. Be all in on your faith, because it will guide you to do the other two. If you do this, I promise you will have an amazing, fulfilling life. Congratulations, and this is just the beginning.