How to find a CPO (Chief Product Officer) for your startup?
This article is the second of a four article series focused on senior product leadership topics most relevant to growth stage startup founders/CEOs. Please email me (eric.steege@gmail.com) if you would like me to want to send you links to future articles in the series.
You are a founder of a growth stage startup who recently raised a Series A or B round with significant revenue growth milestones. You have an established product and a growing set customers. You have made the decision that now is the critical time to hire your first VP of Product of Chief Product Officer (CPO). But how do you find this seemingly unicorn hire? (If you are unsure if it is the right time to hire your first senior product leader read the first article of this series When To Hire A CPO For Your Startup.)
Continue to build an understanding of the CPO role and what makes a strong CPO candidate.
· Numerous CEOs have shared “If I would have known then, what I know now about the profile and benefit of a good CPO I would have hired that role over a year sooner.” Invest time now (not a year from now) to learn more about the CPO role.
· Informally reach out to and meet experienced CPOs that fit the profile of your company to understand the role and the benefit.
· See more details on how to find experienced CPOs in the “Leverage and expand your network” section below.
Get specific on what you need the CPO to do in their first 2–3 years.
· Work with your leadership team and develop a scorecard of the 4–6 most important things you need your CPO do be able to do in the next 2–3 years. For example, this could be expand your product by growing from the US market to an international market, transitioning from a SaaS business model to marketplace business model, growing market share through acquisition and consolidating multi products into one cohesive platform, or unifying a currently disjointed customer experience and value stream.
· A helpful question prompt when developing your CPO scorecard is what do you envision your business model and product will look like in the next 2–3 years and what key growth, product, partnership milestones you will need to get there? Then develop your scorecard based on your answer to this question. This will help you focus your senior product leader search on finding someone who already has experience at the stage of the company you are trying to advance to in the next 2–3 years. Focus your search on the stage of company you want to become not where you are at today. Skate to where the puck is going as they say.
Leverage and expand your network.
· Share the CPO scorecard that you developed with your network. Be focused and specific on what you are looking for and how these specific senior product leader skills and expertise are tied to critical business model and product milestones your company will need to reach over the next 2–3 years. Take a targeted spear fishing versus wide net fishing approach.
· Leverage your investors and ask them to leverage their networks.
· Connect with, share your CPO scorecard, and ask for referrals from well-connected product leaders like Gibson Biddle, Melissa Perri, Dan Olsen, Shelley Perry, and Marty Cagan and product communities like Mind the Product or ScaleUp Edge).
· Reach out to executive recruiters who specialize in VP of Product and CPO level hires. This will cost money compared to the “organic” search tactics listed above but depending on your urgency and specific hiring needs it could be an effective and required option. There aren’t many but several executive recruiting firms that focus on growth stage startups and senior product leadership roles are www.caldwellpartners.com are www.rivierapartners.com.
Author note: I’m currently in a product leadership role at Amazon AWS and previously led product functions at F300 enterprise and seed stage startups. I am passionate about helping large enterprises and growth stage startup companies (and their founders/CEO) exceed their revenue goals by writing and advising on senior product leadership and product strategy topics. Please email me (eric.steege@gmail.com) if you would like me to send you a link to my next article that will provide actionable advice on product strategy.
