Life as a startup CEO: My advice for building the right leadership team

The people make the company. That’s an adage that’s never been more true. When I joined Everee to disrupt the payroll and payments industry, I knew I’d need a strong leadership team to help me get there.

We recently completed hiring our executive team with the addition of Brian Atwood as chief revenue officer and Dana Gagnon as chief marketing officer. Both were early employees at Pluralsight, a Utah company that went public in 2018, who were instrumental in scaling the company’s growth. Brian has spent his career bridging the gap between marketing and sales and developing go-to-market strategies across the entire customer lifecycle. Dana joined the marketing world after spending nearly a decade in digital media, bringing with her a deep understanding of how impactful storytelling can elevate brand and drive revenue.

As they joined Everee last month, I’ve been reflecting on what I learned building out the team. Leadership is a key strategic advantage for a new company, one that can help you weather the rocky world from startup to steady. When building out your executive team, it’s critical to establish the principles of leadership that matter to your business.

For Everee, I’ve been able to boil it down to 4 critical elements. While every business is different, if you’re setting out on your own journey as a startup CEO, I hope what I’ve learned will help you, too.

1. Know what you don’t know. For first-time CEOs, it’s important to accept that you have much to learn. There’s significant value in surrounding yourself with people who are experts at the things that aren’t your strengths. The sooner you identify and get comfortable with what you don’t know, the faster you can begin putting the right people in place who have the answers and expertise to help drive the company forward in the right direction.
2. Define your basic leadership operating principles. Here at Everee, we function with a few simple rules that demonstrate our commitment to creating a healthy working environment — one that’s primed for success.

• Be direct but kind in your interactions
• Avoid drama. We get people together and air things out when needed.
• Be good decision makers. We listen to one another, remain open to differing views, and when we make a decision, we move forward with it wholeheartedly, no lingering.
• Create a place where people want to work.
• Do what you say you’re going to do and others will follow your lead

Together our executive leadership owns and is accountable for our culture. They need to live it and represent our values in each and every interaction with our teams.

3. Bring clarity and transparency. As a CEO, you’re responsible for aligning the organization around common themes and objectives. Your most important role likely entails being the one who removes roadblocks and brings clarity and transparency.

To create a cohesive team, you need to build trust. That starts with strong communicators on your leadership team who can define clear paths for their teams and inspire great performance.

Additionally, it requires empathy. Taking the time to understand the view from someone else’s perspective is important. The ability to credibly show that you can and that you are committed to working through conflict is not unlike a marriage. Just like in your personal relationships, deeper commitment comes from agreeing to figure out conflict in all its forms.

4. Put in the time and effort to grow together. Investors know the value of finding an executive team that’s worked together before in some capacity, who have a track record of collaboration and success together. Whether you create your executive team from scratch from strangers or long-time associates, or inherit a team when you join an existing company, make it a priority to build from a place of trust and commit to continually improving your relationships and ability to collaborate.

Everee co-founder Ron Ross and I have enlisted smart, passionate and optimistic leaders who we’ve worked with in the past, individuals we’ve gone through hard things with and who have a track record of being able to solve problems both small and large. There’s a refreshing humility in this team and a desire to win collectively, and to do what’s right for the business. Our relationships and past experiences mean we can lean on our mutual trust as we work to build a long-standing and successful company.

I’m incredibly proud of the executive team at Everee and am honored to have Brian and Dana join our team. The startup world is challenging but it’s also a ton of fun if you hire leaders who are accountable and who can stay positive and focused even when things get tough. There’s no other group of humans I’d rather be in the trenches with than the team we’ve built at Everee, and I can’t wait to see what’s next for us.