Zain’s birth was a turning point in Satya Nadella's life; tech boss says his son taught him empathy, influenced Microsoft's vision of 'accessibility'

Nadella describes his wife, Anupama, as "an amazing woman, mother and partner". In a 2017 LinkedIn post, he had described that empathy for others runs deep in his wife, who he lovingly calls Anu. He credits her for teaching him infuse empathy into his everyday actions. As a father or a CEO, showing empathy can be powerful. He said that Anu inspires him with her willingness to share more about her journey as a mom in the hope it can help others.

Becoming a father of a son with special needs was a turning point in his life that has shaped who he is today. "It has helped me better understand the journey of people with disabilities. It has shaped my personal passion for and philosophy of connecting new ideas to empathy for others. And it is why I am deeply committed to pushing the bounds on what love and compassion combined with human ingenuity and passion to have impact can accomplish with my colleagues at Microsoft," his note read.

In 1996, the then 29-year-old Nadella and his 25-year-old wife, Anu, were building their careers as an engineer and architect, respectively, in the Seattle area. The couple were expecting their first child, and were busy decorating the nursery in their rented apartment near the Microsoft campus. But then their plans changed.

During the thirty-sixth week of her pregnancy, Anu noticed that the baby was not moving as much as she was accustomed to. They planned a visit to the emergency room of a local hospital in Bellevue. What the anxious new parents expected to be a routine check-up turned out to be an emergency cesarean section. The alarmed doctors delivered Zain, all of three pounds, who did not cry.

Zain was transported from the hospital in Bellevue across Lake Washington to Seattle Children’s Hospital with its state-of-the-art Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. Anu began her recovery from the difficult birth. Nadella spent the night with her in the hospital, and immediately went to see Zain the next morning.

Over the course of the next couple of years, they learnt that the utero asphyxiation had caused damage to Zain, and that he would require a wheelchair and be reliant on his parents because of severe cerebral palsy.

'Devastated' Nadella said that calling that time difficult was an understatement.

In 2015, Nadella decided to turn author and started working on his book 'Hit Refresh'.

With this book, Nadella wanted to inspire people to discover more empathy in their own lives. He said that his wife, Anu, helped him learn this quality when their son was born with severe disabilities 24 years ago.

He said that Anu's reaction to Zain’s birth was different. She never asked 'why us'. It was always about what it meant for Zain and how they could best care for him. "Watching her in those first few days, weeks and beyond taught me a lot," he wrote in this book.

Over time, she helped Nadella understand that nothing had happened to either of them, but it was Zain who was suffering. As his parents, it was up to them to do everything they could to improve his life.

For people wondering where the name came from - When you 'hit refresh' in your web browser by clicking the little arrow, it updates. It doesn’t wipe everything away and start new, as Bill Gates wrote in his Foreword for the book — it actually keeps some things and replaces others.

He believed hit refresh was the perfect metaphor for all three storylines of the book — his personal journey so far, the company’s ongoing transformation, and the coming wave of technological and economic change.

Nadella's earliest memories of his father, B.N. Yugandhar (Yugi to his friends and grandkids), was seeing him sitting in his bed, reading a thick hardback book. This memory captures his father – his passions, values, and life’s work.

His father’s work was more than just a job for him. To him, it was not a professional career choice, but a calling. What gave him deep satisfaction was not the abstract, but the people he was working for and the impact that his work was having in their lives. The way he combined his work with his life’s passions, the deep meaning he derived from it, has been instrumental in shaping Nadella's views of work and life.

The Microsoft CEO said that the most-enduring life lessons was the need to keep an open mind and to keep curiosity alive throughout one’s life. In his 2020 LinkedIn post, Nadella said that his father would say that if there is one thing history has taught us, it’s that doctrinaire thinking and dogma in general were what got people and societies into trouble.

Nadella's father passed away last year after struggling with an illness in the last few years of his life. Yugi described life as a terminal condition, and that no one makes it out alive. But one’s life can speak to us by passing on what is most important about being human and how to live.

And, Nadella tries to live his life guided by the lessons his father taught him.

In pic (Left to right, clockwise): Nadella's son Zain with father in 1988; Nadella with parents in 1970; and his parents at the National Academy of Administration during his father's tenure as director.

Nadella has been very close to his mother, Prabhavati Yugandhar who was a lecturer in Tirupati's Padmavathi College.

From her college classes to fulfilling civic duties as the wife of an IAS officer, the tech top boss accompanied his mother everywhere when he was 3 in 1970. Decades later, he realised how his mother efficiently balanced work and family, her professional ambitions and her role as wife and mother, and her passions and routine despite barriers and challenges at workplace.

He said that the mother-son duo shared great sense of humour and mindfulness of practising things that nourishes the soul and intellect.

After spending years playing with a wooden train at his mother’s feet as she delivered lectures, Nadella said that his mother's devotion to work and family made him a man who looks up to a woman — his mother, wife, daughters, Microsoft colleagues and so many others — for the lessons in life.

In pic: Nadella with mother, Prabhavati Yugandhar around 1970 in India