The Role 

Hi, Dave Tucker here 👋

I’m on the look-out for an experienced, world-class Chief Product Officer (CPO) to play an instrumental role in spearheading the next stage of our growth journey and leading both our Product and Engineering teams. Could this be you?

About Glean

Today when individuals around the world want to learn they are rarely able to follow the most effective approaches to obtaining knowledge from information. This is unacceptable because this prevents individuals from reaching their learning potential and many give up on studying. We envision a world where learners from all backgrounds have the confidence, motivation and ability to effectively obtain applicable knowledge from all available information. We’re bringing this world about through a study platform which structures the learning process and addresses key barriers to independent learning.

Our five year goal is to improve learning for over a million users with our learning software. We have a long way to go to achieve our vision, but we’re making strides in our journey of getting there.

We started life as ‘Sonocent’ but in 2021 rebranded our company after our product namesake, ‘Glean’, following its successful launch a year before. Over the last 18 months Glean has gained over 10,000 individual subscriptions and has been adopted by over 400 colleges and universities in North America have adopted Glean as a support for their students with disabilities.

We are proud to be part of the Tech Nation Upscale 7.0 cohort and we have achieved a few accolades along the way too; from being named in the top 100 Northern Tech awards 4 years in a row, to achieving the ‘special recognition Award’ in the Digital Enterprise Top 100 companies list. As a company we have also received a 2* accreditation from Best Companies in recognition of our employee engagement.

The role of the CPO in our next phase of growth 

Our work at Glean may be the best opportunity any of us will have to significantly improve a vast number of lives. This is an opportunity for you to use your skills and experience to play a critical role in ensuring we are successful in our mission of improving learning for over a million people. Through your contributions in the leadership team and leadership of the product and engineering function, you will help us establish ourselves as a major player in the global EdTech market. In a post-pandemic world we believe the greatest opportunity for global impact in a rapidly changing education environment is by empowering individuals to improve their own ability to learn through the use of technology. This truly is an exciting opportunity for us as a company, and for you as an individual.

As CPO you will collaborate with key stakeholders to ensure the Glean vision becomes a reality. This will involve developing and executing a product strategy that achieves our company goals and takes us on the journey of becoming ‘product led’. You will create a culture which integrates continual discovery and learning, balancing quality and scalability, against speed of experimentation and delivery. You will coach, guide and support a Product and Engineering leadership team, enabling them to deliver our Product strategy through effective processes and practices, team leadership and culture, and the personal development of all team members.

Your core areas of accountability are:

1️⃣  Developing and executing a product strategy that achieves our 4 year goals: We have some big ambitions. It’s important that you deeply understand the Glean vision and translate it into a scalable product strategy. Because of this, you’ll ideally have credible experience in defining and successfully executing Product strategy, which aligns to the company’s commercial strategy & ambitions, an understanding of business models, pricing, and how to package & position ideas in ways that uniquely appeal to consumers.

2️⃣  Creating a high performance culture in product and engineering: Great teams can achieve almost anything. We are looking for someone who understands how to leverage culture as the foundation for creating a world-class organization and is excited by the prospect of building, nurturing and leading a high-performing Product & Engineering function. You’ll act as a mentor and coach to create a results-orientated, empowering and collaborative environment, whilst ensuring we have the right structure, process and practices for teams to thrive.

3️⃣  Driving growth and ensuring scalability:  We believe that our commercial success will come from the value and scalability of our product, which is why this is one of the accountabilities of the CPO. To achieve this you will need to ensure team structures will scale and that we have capabilities for continued innovation and learning, especially utilizing product data, in order to capitalize on the market opportunities created by remote learning.

4️⃣  Relationship building and partnerships:  We believe that product integrations, partnerships and being contributors to our community will be a critical component in achieving our potential. You will develop and manage relationships with partner organisations and participate in the wider community to be the voice of our product strategy.

5️⃣  Organisational Leadership: You will be a valued member of the senior leadership team, bringing your experience and perspective to challenge our thinking and be an essential team member. Everything ultimately comes down to people, which is why building high levels of trust with the senior leadership team, the Product and Engineering teams, and across the wider organisation is going to be essential to create alignment and enable us to grow effectively. Finally, a great collaborative relationship with me, the CEO, will enable us to turn the vision into a reality.

Your experience might include; 

Building a successful product; this means you have a thorough understanding of positioning, pricing, optimisation, and enabling Product & Engineering teams to use efficient agile approaches. You will have a strong understanding of how technology teams work and you are able to engage well with engineers, although you may not necessarily have been an engineer yourself.

You’ve been an integral part of the growth journey; this means that you’ve built out a product organisation and are confident in speaking to your leadership and management experience and strategic capabilities in how you’ve built and scaled teams. You’re well versed in implementing a robust product or technology strategy and you can demonstrate an understanding of the power of culture in helping employees make great decisions without onerous processes.

Perhaps you have even built a company!

You may have proven experience of working on a senior leadership team, contributing to the success of the company and nurturing effective working relationships across every function of the business, and crucially, with the CEO. Moreover you will be able to talk to us about overall company strategy and your role in shaping it and executing on it.

What’s next?

If I’ve piqued your interest, our recruitment team will be in-touch to arrange an initial screening call with you. From there, if your experience seems like a good match, I’ll arrange some time for us to discuss how your experience can help shape our future.