Embracing change: Making the shift from CEO to CPO & President

Today a new chapter unfolds for both myself and the Projectworks team. I'm excited to share with you my decision to step aside as CEO and embrace the newly created role of Chief Product Officer while also taking on the responsibility of company President. I'd also like to officially welcome Mark Orttung to the Executive team, who will be taking over from me as CEO. This shift marks the beginning of the next phase of Projectworks' journey as we move to becoming a truly global company and continue towards becoming the category-defining platform that empowers the global consulting industry to truly thrive.

Why the change?
As founder and CEO, I've had the privilege of steering our ship through the incredible ups and punishing downs of startup life. When we first spun Projectworks out of Provoke, Jules and I would finish our day jobs around 5, pop over the road to pick up a $10 bottle of wine, and then code away into the wee hours. We had a ton of fun dreaming about what the future looked like, but it was always just that, the future. Then, one day, you wake up, and the future is here. It feels like almost overnight that you're now running an international business, your team of people now all have teams of their own, you've got customers spanning the globe, and dozens of people are relying on you to eat.

The reality is we haven't been that small side-gig for a long time, and the demands on the company, as well as us as individuals have grown significantly. But, while the demands are many, that's not the reason for making this change. The reason is the opportunity; over the past while, I've come to realize that we have the product, the team, the market, and the timing to build the next Salesforce or Atlassian. Mark indicating that he would seriously be interested in taking on the CEO role solidified that realization. I'm acutely aware of what a privilege it is to be in this situation, and I owe it to everybody who's given me that little nugget of advice, given me that hot lead, invested a portion of their life savings, given up a well paying stable job to follow me, and anyone who's simply believed in what we're doing, to do whatever I can to push the odds in our favor of making that possibility a reality. We're incredibly proud of the impact Projectworks has had in the lives and businesses of our customers. With Mark at the helm and myself running the product function, we're one step further towards spreading that impact across the entire global consulting industry.

Who is this Mark guy?
Doug and I met Mark about 18 months ago at the annual Bridgewest conference in Tahoe. After our presentation, we got talking, and it became obvious very quickly that Mark understood the potential of Projectworks and had a ton of ideas of his own on how we could take it to the next level. At the time Mark was CEO of Nexient, a 1,200 person consultancy that he had just taken through to acquisition, so he knew the problem we were solving better than anyone. Prior to that, he had been COO at Bill.com, which he joined when they were pre-revenue, so he also knew a thing or two about high-growth SaaS.

We synced up again a few days later in San Mateo over a few beers, and that conversation reinforced to Doug and I that Mark was not just someone who had the goods business wise, but also passed the Steve Jobs' "beer test". We wanted Mark on the team.

Soon after that conversation Mark formally joined our board, and over the past year Mark's not only levelled up how we operate at a board level, but has acted as a personal advisor to me, helping me navigate the challenges that come with scaling a company like Projectworks.

I should probably say the decision to bring Mark in was made with a long lead up of diligence and planning, but to be honest, as soon as Mark seriously floated the idea of him taking on the role, I could see what the future looked like, and there was no putting that genie back in the bottle.

What will I be doing?
While I will be taking on the role of President and retaining my board seat, the majority of my time will be spent focusing on the product. Primarily strategy, development, innovation, recruitment, and scale. This role both plays to my strengths and allows me to spend more of my time on what I'm most passionate about - building things that solve problems. It's still to be seen if I'll be allowed to install Visual Studio on my laptop so I can actually get my hands dirty, but I live in hope. Practically, I'll be working closely with Jules, our CTO, along with Sales, Customer Success, Partners, and Marketing, to ensure Projectworks continues to deliver the high-quality experience our customers have come to expect.

So why a Chief Product Officer now? Well, as the Projectworks company and Projectworks platform have evolved, so have all the systems and processes that support the Projectworks engine. There are now dozens of software systems that make the machine run. These include the core components such as our web app, API, integrations, and reporting platform, but also include things like our back-end tenant management system (Mission Control), ticketing system, partner portal, data warehouse, web & trial experience, training platform, customer request portal, billing system, integration with finance and CRM systems, and plenty more. We're at the point where a CPO makes sense to not only ensure these systems work together in harmony, but we continue to live up to our values of ease and connectedness. It's common when software platforms grow that usability is sacrificed for feature breadth, often without considering how its customers actually use the product. The CPO role is first and foremost a customer centric role, and me taking on the role while also serving as President and Board Member ensures that the wants of customers are represented at the highest levels within our organization.

There will also be a transition period supporting Mark to ensure he is set up for success in the new role. Mark is primarily based in California while the majority of our team still reside in Wellington. It will take time to adjust to a more globally orientated-culture. This is front of mind for both Mark and I, which will mean a few more trips on the NZ8 up to SFO, as well as Mark spending more time in NZ. Our team culture is a massive contributor to our success, and together with Mark's vision and depth of experience, our team is gearing up to create the ultimate connected platform for consultancies.

Onwards!
Honestly, I'm feeling energized. Probably more than I have for quite some time. My wife and close friends have even been telling me I look relaxed, which, as an "active relaxer", is a little scary. Being a CEO is hard, but also an incredible privilege that not many people get. This creates a weird dichotomy where, despite being under immense pressure and stress most of the time, you can't complain about it. Don't worry, I don't plan to start now, but it is going to be nice having a different type of pressure and a different set of challenges to focus on. 

The future of Projectworks is bright, we've got big plans to take this thing all the way, which for me means scaling up the product side of the business starting with a heap of new open roles coming up, as well as already making a number of key hires. More on that later, but for now, back to work.