Ed Harrison, the recently appointed CEO of Isentia approached Think & Grow for assistance in the search for a Chief Product Officer. As part of the ongoing company-wide transformation, the business required an entrepreneurial and commercially-minded product development leader.

“When I started at Isentia in August 2018, I was given a clean sheet in terms of what my executive team needed to look like. The prevailing view at the time was that product and tech should sit under one exec but my view was that we needed them to have separate, discrete individuals around the executive table”

“Isentia is a large Australian software business that has been around for over 30 years. Given the legacy qualities that existed, we were looking for talent from more contemporary and agile environments. Think & Grow operate deeply in the tech startup space and so could provide us with a network outside of the established and traditional businesses.”

‍The desire of the Board was that this individual had a proven background in building & scaling digital/software market-leading products in an entrepreneurial, agile environment. More specifically the goals of this individual were to:

• Shape a new operating model and rhythm for iSentia’s product management function
• Be the resident thought leader and commercial product evangelist
• Be a key executive and change agent in the next chapter of Isentia’s success
  

“Throughout the process, Think & Grow was able to provide more clarity on the types of people that Isentia needed to do this role. Given their degree of discipline around specialist tech and connection to the startup community, they were able to add a lot of value. The process was smooth and straightforward, with information professionally delivered throughout”

Think & Grow were able to:

• Source a qualified shortlist of candidates from our networks within four weeks of the request.
• The preferred candidate was previously the CEO of a product management consulting startup, having previously held senior product positions in large corporates in the media and telecoms space
  

“We ended up with a unique person who had both traditional and startup experience. Jen (Marshall, the CPO hire) started with us six months ago and has made an enormous difference in a very short space of time. Having fundamentally changed how we approach product development by implementing a more disciplined, systematic and market-validated approach. Working across a large geography with diverse clients, Isentia is now able to respond in an agile manner to customer needs.”