Phil is currently VP of Product & Engineering at Close.com, building a product people love and growing our SaaS business to be something great. Previously he spent two years leading the Engineering team at Quizlet, building study tools that millions of students relied upon. Phil has also interned at Google and Yahoo! as a software engineer, and did lots of freelance website design while at the University of Florida.
Co-founder of Brainhub, Matt describes himself as a “serial entrepreneur”. Throughout his career, Matt has developed several startups in Germany, wearing many hats- from a marketer to an IT Engineer and customer support specialist. As a host of the Better Tech Leadership podcast, Matt talks about growing successful businesses and the challenges of being a startup founder and investor.
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In this episode, Leszek interviews Oleksandr Taran, CTO of Frienton, who delves into his career journey from a software engineer to a startup co-founder and CTO. Taran emphasizes leveraging his math and computer science background in product development and highlights his current mission to help startups streamline business and financial administration. Oleksandr discusses the challenges of communicating complex technical concepts to business professionals, stressing the importance of translating these ideas into accessible language through analogies and clear explanations.
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In this episode, Matt interviews Alain Denzler, who is pioneering human-centric AI for sales with a focus on cultural nuances. Alain outlines the strategic shift from targeting large corporations to smaller, agile firms to foster creativity and innovation, and reflects on founding the company during a recession, facing financial challenges but still attracting investments from Silicon Valley figures by showing tangible progress.
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In this episode, Leszek and Valeriy Zamaraiev discuss the evolving landscape of Web3 and cryptocurrency networks, underscoring the importance of a results-oriented mindset. The conversation highlights strategies for learning and innovation in technology, such as internal hackathons and informal communications with startups. It discusses the challenges of scaling organizational structures, using YouTube and Google as examples, and addresses the complexities startups face during layoffs, emphasizing the balance between growth and operational stability.
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In this podcast episode, Matt interviews Edward Kruger. Edward shares his career evolution, starting as a young programmer and tech lead, eventually co-founding a startup after his consultancy downsized, and gaining recognition as one of South Africa’s top CTOs. Edward contrasts the tech ecosystems of South Africa and Canada, noting differences in funding access, organizational structures, and engineering priorities.
