From customer workflows to enterprise responsibility

Mandate

Grow the subscription business while making product and implementation obligations more repeatable.

Outcomes

• Reduced customer-specific product branches from 41 to 9 over thirty months.
• Retained 35 of 38 acquired engineers through eighteen months of integration.
• Limited automated document release to two evidenced classes, deferring US$3.2m planned bookings.
• Maintained 615 enterprise customer relationships at June 2026.

Decisions in context

I became CEO after institutional investment changed the company's board and expectations for growth. My initial priority was to reconcile what our contracts promised with the product estate and the work our teams actually carried. The branch-consolidation programme required commercial negotiation as well as engineering. I accepted four customer departures rather than preserve obligations that no longer fitted the business we intended to build. Later, the acquisition of Ostren Workflow tested our ability to integrate without losing essential operating knowledge. The automated document release has brought another version of the same question: what can we substantiate before asking customers to rely on a promise? I lead the executive team through these choices and take their costs to the board. I do not treat recurring revenue as sufficient evidence that the underlying obligations are understood or economically repeatable.

Reason for the move

Current role; continuing the product and commercial operating programme.

Mandate

Connect implementation acceptance, customer readiness and the economics of ongoing service.

Outcomes

• Reduced disputed acceptance extensions from 27% to 11% in reviewed cohorts.
• Introduced pre-contract acceptance workshops for larger engagements.
• Reconciled recurring-revenue records with product branches and contractual obligations before the ownership change.

Decisions in context

My operating remit brought together functions that had previously described the same customer through different measures. Implementation saw project milestones, customer success saw adoption and finance saw contractual revenue. I wanted a shared account of the work needed for a customer to use the product as intended. We introduced acceptance workshops before larger agreements and made unresolved dependencies visible in commercial approval. The resulting proposals sometimes took longer to sign, but the later disputes became less frequent. I also worked on the operating record required for the company's ownership transition. That review revealed obligations and informal effort that were not obvious in the subscription figures. It prepared me for the chief executive role by showing where enterprise growth would require a change in the way commitments were made, rather than simply more delivery capacity after they were sold.

Reason for the move

Appointed CEO through the board's succession process after institutional investment.

Mandate

Expand enterprise adoption with a credible relationship between contract scope and customer readiness.

Outcomes

• Declined a US$4.8m multi-entity commitment whose scope and timetable were unsupported.
• Completed a US$260,000 discovery engagement identifying six material process differences.
• Raised the share of projects beginning with documented customer dependencies from 44% to 81%.

Decisions in context

I joined Nerivane to carry a regional commercial result alongside the practical consequences of implementation. Customers across the region shared some needs but differed in data quality, procurement process and authority to change operations. I learnt to question assumptions that a common corporate name implied a common deployment. The most consequential decision was declining a large four-business rollout in its proposed form. We retained a smaller discovery engagement and accepted the lost booking. That choice changed how the regional team qualified multi-entity work and when delivery colleagues entered the discussion. My contribution was not to make sales cautious in every situation. It was to make the scope we accepted consistent with the business we could responsibly deliver. The later COO appointment allowed me to apply that discipline across the wider organisation.

Reason for the move

Promoted to enterprise-wide operating responsibility.

Mandate

Translate recurring customer requirements into a supported product roadmap.

Outcomes

• Consolidated fourteen overlapping workflow requests into four supported capabilities.
• Established a review of support obligations before bespoke commitments.
• Reduced the share of planned releases deferred by unrecorded commercial work from 31% to 18%.

Decisions in context

Product leadership gave me a different view of the implementation problems I had been solving for individual customers. Some requirements deserved a reusable capability; others reflected a process the customer had not yet decided whether to change. I worked with engineering and commercial colleagues to distinguish those situations before putting work into the roadmap. I also learnt that the visible product plan did not describe every commitment competing for capacity. Bespoke promises arrived through support, account management and senior relationships. We introduced a review that made those obligations explicit and clarified who would own them after delivery. The role deepened my respect for engineering judgement while reminding me that technical coherence alone does not answer a customer's commercial need. Moving into regional leadership let me carry both sides of that decision in one remit.

Reason for the move

Accepted regional general-management responsibility at Nerivane Systems.

Mandate

Improve the connection between proposal scope, acceptance evidence and delivery planning.

Outcomes

• Introduced representative acceptance scenarios on nine major engagements.
• Reduced unapproved scope additions in the reviewed portfolio from 46 to 19 per quarter.
• Developed four senior analysts into engagement leads.

Decisions in context

Managing engagements forced me to address the commercial origin of delivery difficulties. A team could work diligently and still miss expectations that had never been defined in a usable way. I began participating in proposal reviews, asking what evidence would demonstrate completion and which customer decisions had to precede our work. The conversations were sometimes uncomfortable because they exposed uncertainty when everyone wanted a firm date. I learnt to make that uncertainty specific enough for a decision rather than letting it become a general reason for delay. I also developed senior analysts who could lead customer workshops without relying on me to resolve every disagreement. The move to Arclen reflected a desire to address recurring issues in the product itself, not only manage their consequences one engagement at a time.

Reason for the move

Moved into a software product role to influence decisions before implementation.

Mandate

Document customer workflows, prepare test evidence and support application rollout.

Outcomes

• Completed workflow analysis on seven manufacturing engagements.
• Built an exception library covering 63 recurring order and supplier scenarios.
• Reduced repeated test-data corrections from 21 to 8 in one documented rollout.

Decisions in context

I began by listening to users describe the work that a standard demonstration left out. A purchasing team needed to handle a disputed quantity; a planner needed an order whose components arrived in an unexpected sequence. I translated those situations into workflow notes and test data, then checked whether the configured application supported the intended action. I had no authority to change commercial terms or commit the product team to new features. My contribution was to make the discrepancy visible early enough for the responsible colleagues to decide. The role taught me to distinguish a missing capability from a process question the customer had not resolved. I gradually took larger workstreams and helped newer analysts prepare evidence. Promotion followed when I could coordinate those decisions across several colleagues and explain their implications to a customer sponsor.

Reason for the move

Promoted to consulting manager after taking responsibility for larger workstreams.