What I learned interviewing tech execs at scaling startups
I wasn’t quite prepared for my experience as the COO of a scaling startup, despite more than a decade in technology and my work as an executive coach and organizational strategist. While I’d been in management and had long worked in scaling companies, it was my first executive role and first time serving on an executive team. Some things were as expected while in other ways I was wholly unprepared for the challenge of being an executive. Being the COO of a tech company was one of the hardest and best things I’ve ever done. It was an incredible learning experience. It also got me the closest I’ve ever been to burnout.
As I reflected on my journey, I was curious whether my experience mirrored that of others. I wanted to discover the commonalities in our experiences. I wanted to know how to support more leaders at a bigger scale. There are plenty of leadership books out there. Despite this, I had a feeling there was more we can do to help technology executives make the transition into leadership more easily, making them effective from day one. This feeling drove me to talk with others about their experiences.
Over the next few months, I interviewed executives across tech companies talking with CEOs, CTOs, VPs of Engineering, VPs of People and VPs of product to get an understanding of their challenges. I asked broad…
