Designing the future

WHILE growing up, Andrew Anagnost, president and CEO of Autodesk, didn't read the most important Silicon Valley memo. So, instead of dropping out of college to become a storied tech guru like Steve Jobs or Mark Zuckerberg, he quit high school. Despite that, he still became a leading light in the tech field.

Mr Anagnost, who is a qualified rocket scientist, declares that he was a "problem child" in his youth. "I'll blame it on traditional education which was not working for me... I won't blame it on the fact that my parents didn't provide me much structure when I was young. They didn't know what to do with me because I was hyper and a little more intelligent than average."

When he dropped out of high school, he hadn't yet heard of Steve Jobs. Fortunately, a lot of people saw his potential. And so he got back on track with his education and earned degrees in engineering and, to cap it all, he did a PhD in Aero/Astro and Computer Science at…