As CEOs navigate the journey of building and scaling their startups, the role of a product leader and their chosen hire becomes paramount to the company's success.
With such a crucial hire, we sought the advice of Adrian Borys, a Product and Marketing executive with over 25 years of experience and a proven track record scaling SaaS solutions.
This article uncovers invaluable insights on the VP Product hiring journey, tailored to each phase of a tech company’s lifecycle. From the exhilarating ideation stage to the pursuit of maturity and sustained growth, Borys offers nuanced advice on how CEOs can more strategically approach VP Product hiring to drive business growth.
Those in charge of the product, usually the Founders, need to move quickly, fail fast, and validate ideas to capture the imagination of potential investors and early adopter customers.
Hiring Advice: Partner with a product leader who is bold, passionate, and informed—someone who can hustle and truly sell the vision. CEOs need to be focused on the “sizzle” and hire a product leader to focus on the “steak.”
It’s time for product to design and develop a defined product management process as it will allow the organization to validate its market position and define & quantify opportunities. This time and processes also act as the catalyst to shift the company from being technology-led to more customer-led. It is a significant change in how an organization operates and requires a leader who understands how to make that shift.
Hiring Advice: “Ready to have someone else take the reins?” Allowing someone else to take over and potentially overhaul or pivot it can often be tricky, so hiring someone you trust is best. It is also crucial that the company’s values are clear so that the incoming product leader can properly align with those values.
This is all about operational excellence around the product management process. Listening and working with customers is critical because your competition can leapfrog if the company becomes complacent.
Hiring Advice: Find a product leader who can leverage the product management process with a more data-driven approach to understand customer needs, market opportunities, and market fit. With that foundation, aligning the organization and prioritizing the right customers with the right features and experience becomes easier.
Each growth phase has its nuances—the startup phase is fun and exciting, the expand and scale phase is stressful and full of pivots, while the mature and sustained growth phase is about processes, repeatability, and efficiency. A great product leader understands the impact of change and how to shift the organization as it matures.
A CEO needs to trust their product leader and process so they are not biased by their opinions. While the product may be their baby, and no one wants to be told their baby is ugly, a successful CEO will have the humility to let go for the greater good.
Founders need trust that they made a good hire and that having a good product leader in place will help to align sales, development, operations, marketing, investors, and the executive team. This alignment will allow all teams to make the right choices and work together toward success. It takes time; they say it takes years to become an overnight success.
It is also important to note the critical role of marketing and product marketing. Borys has always advocated for tightly integrating those disciplines as a company’s brand is the north star to better navigate the choices a product leader must make because the brand is the promise an organization makes to its customers, partners, and employees. If the messaging is clear and consistent, it makes it easier to navigate the tough times.
The VP Product hiring journey is not merely a task but a pivotal move that will define a company’s future. Adrian’s guidance underscores the importance of aligning product leadership to both the company’s vision and stage of growth to ensure success.
