This conversation was originally published on a16z’s podcast on May 27, 2026.
Speaking with a16z’s David Haber, Marc Rowan reflects on the core principles of the firm’s culture – what makes Apollo Apollo: clean sheet thinking, a principal mindset, flat structure and playing to win.
A lot of firms talk about culture but at Apollo, we live and breathe it. We play to win.
Playing to win means being more desirous of winning than scared of losing. We take measured risk and make decisions without being paralyzed by fear of being wrong. That distinction runs through everything, from how investment decisions are made to how people are hired, developed and supported over the course of their careers.
Playing to win is what we do. Our principles guide how we do it.
Clean sheet thinking means asking what should be, rather than accepting what is. It means being willing to challenge the status quo, not to be difficult, but because the best ideas rarely come from the obvious place.
This all started back in 1990 when Apollo was founded in the middle of a global financial crisis. That origin shaped a fundamental aspect of how Apollo approaches problems.
“All the products that we take for granted today that exist did not exist. This forced you into clean sheet thinking,” Marc, reflected on this time.
Apollo invests across the capital structure because the biggest opportunities often live in the spaces between asset classes.
"You can call anyone in this firm, and they will help you. That generosity is real, and the expectation is reciprocal: give trust, get trust." – Excerpt from What Makes Apollo Apollo
We operate as One Apollo: across teams, asset classes, and geographies, to capture the best opportunities wherever they are. Trust is expected, collaboration is a requirement and firm success comes before individual agendas.
*Well, we do have a few. (1)
Rigor matters. We operate on a minimum effective dose of bureaucracy. We speak up with humility, and challenge thinking in service of the right answer. The best idea wins, without unnecessary meetings or hierarchy.
In his conversation with Haber, Marc consistently returned to the importance of intellectual honesty over hierarchy. As Marc said, "You do not get fired here for making a bad decision. You get fired for not recognizing it, or not owning it, and not fixing it."
We act like owners. We invest alongside our clients, putting our own capital at risk, standing behind every decision we make. That alignment sharpens judgment and reinforces accountability.
Marc shared, “Financial services firms die for one of two causes: heart attacks or cancer. Heart attack is funding risk. If you lend long and borrow short, you have funding risk…It is ingrained in our culture to understand this funding issue is heart attack risk. And then the cancer risk, of course, is the addition of bad assets over a long period of time, which, as a principal mentality firm, we work hard to avoid.”
We don’t chase narratives or consensus views. We focus on facts, sound judgment and long-term responsibility. That means pursuing outcomes that make things better, not worse, even when doing so is unpopular or uncomfortable.
Leadership here requires a strong moral compass.
Apollo is not designed to be a quick stop on the way to somewhere else. We have built this firm into the place where people do their life's work.
"Business ultimately runs on experience and that only lasts if your partners stay with you for their entire career," Marc said. "They're going to have outside their career a bunch of happy things that happen to them and a bunch of sad things. How we deal with people in these moments that matter is really important."
We want Apollo to be the place where extraordinary people can build a whole career.
To learn more about what it means to work at Apollo, read our culture deck: What Makes Apollo Apollo.
“This is a lifetime job for people. Business ultimately runs on experience and that only lasts if your partners stay with you for their entire career.”
Marc Rowan, Chief Executive Officer
Footnotes:
David Haber: If you look out 25 years from now, you're going to be doing this and maybe I'll say 40 years from now, you're going to be doing this for a long time. What’s the part of Apollo's culture that needs to survive you? What is the core piece of the business you want to remain the same?
Marc Rowan, CEO of Apollo Global Management: Okay, there's a bunch of elements to this. Clean sheet thinking. Let's not try simply to improve. Let's ask the question what the right answer is. Informality. Informality in terms of intellectual insubordination which I contrast with real insubordination but an environment where the right answer wins where we can treat each other as humans. Moments that matter. This is a lifetime job for people. Business ultimately runs on experience and that only lasts if your partners stay with you for their entire career. If they're going to stay with you for their entire their career, we have to recognize they're going to have outside their careers, a bunch of happy things that happen to them and a bunch of sad things. How we deal with people in these moments that matter. At 4,000 people, at 6,000 people, 2,000 is really important. It actually is almost more impactful than anything else we do. And so, yeah, let's be really intellectually engaged. Let's have a challenged culture. Let's be really informal. Let's get to the right answer. Let’s accept that the power hierarchy is at risk with technology especially, but let's also be human. Let's deal with people as people. And how you balance those two and how you put them together, I think is the magic. And the team that's around me, I wouldn’t trade for a team anywhere.
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