Gates, Ballmer 'test his conviction': Nadella

In his latest interview with the New York Times, Microsoft's new CEO Satya Nadella talked about his relationships with former company heads Steve Ballmer and Bill Gates and said both "pressure-test you."

The Indian-origin former cloud computing chief at Microsoft said that Gates is the most analytically rigorous person and in the first five seconds of a meeting he would find some logical flaw in something he has shown him.

Nadella admitted that he used to feel intimated with Gates in his early days of meeting him, but he learned that Gates was grounded and one could push back on him during arguments, The Verge reports.

According to the report, he said that both Gates and Ballmer test one's conviction and despite their changed roles at Microsoft, Nadella said that it was no big deal as they had been working together closely for around nine years.

After Ballmer stepped down, Nadella was named as the company's third CEO and Gates assumed an advisory role.

Nadella said that one of the fantastic things that only Gates could do inside this campus was to get everybody energized to bring their 'A' game.

The new CEO has announced 'mobile first, cloud first' strategy on which Microsoft would be now stressing upon under his leadership.