#341 Greg Keller - 3 Archetypes of Entrepreneurial Thinking, & Scaling Without Making a Sales Call
Today we are talking to Greg Keller, the CTO at JumpCloud. And we discuss why Greg places more importance on an employee’s critical thinking and collaboration skills than their aptitude for a specific tool. How JumpCloud has scaled to 300+ employees without ever making an outbound sales call, and the three different archetypes of entrepreneurial thinking.
All of this, right here, right now on the Modern CTO Podcast!
To learn more about JumpCloud, check them out at https://jumpcloud.com
About Greg Keller:
Greg Keller is the Chief Technology Officer at JumpCloud, running the company’s engineering, platform and cloud operations. As a member of JumpCloud’s original team, Keller was responsible for innovating and launching the company’s cloud directory platform in 2014 as its first head of product. Keller is a career product visionary, startup founder, and executive management leader with over two decades of product R&D, product management, product marketing, and corporate development experience in B2B and enterprise market sectors.
A start-up veteran and experienced executive with a proven track record of building new high-scale businesses and strong product teams while delivering profitable growth.
-Software. Teams. Companies.-
From start-ups to great teams to software products, I have enjoyed building lots of things...and often from virtually nothing to start with. True 'barn-raising' experiences should be had by every software professional in their career to understand how it all comes together and grows.
-Product Management and Product Marketing DNA-
I’ve heard a couple of mantras on the concept but to me product management boils down to “supplying customer demands profitably”. For two decades I've enjoyed solving tough problems faced by my customers and rallying teams to get it all done, on time and with super high quality is the rush.
-Technology Evangelism and Speaking-
I’ve been fortunate to have traveled the globe speaking about technology. If I am intellectually curious about a problem, it simply has to be digested, vetted and expressed…and most often this occurs in front of audiences with equally curious technologists.
-Executive and Team Management-
I don’t make it a mission to climb ladders. Never have. I just talk to people the way I would like to be talked to and it seems to end up sending people off in the right directions to execute and get it done. Leadership is empowering those you manage and then you get out of their way. This always ends up helping to steer the company up and to the right.
-Making my 'product users' into 'product champions‘-
The joy of my life. Communing in person with your market and user base to listen and see first hand what they need, how they use your product and what they think could improve their efficiency using it, is the only path to truly building a great solution.
About JumpCloud:
At JumpCloud, our mission is to build a world-class cloud directory. Not just the evolution of Active Directory to the cloud, but a reinvention of how modern IT teams get work done. The JumpCloud Directory Platform is a directory for your users, their IT resources, your fleet of devices, and the secure connections between them with full control, security, and visibility. JumpCloudians seek to redefine how the directory can make work happen for organizations worldwide. We stack our team with people who want to shape our company’s future, reject the confines of a traditional role, and work collectively to solve complex challenges. Shared passion for the success of our customers is the foundation that drives our thinking and efforts.