This week Thom Singer sits down with his longtime friend Sam Decker.  Sam has been active in the Austin tech scene for over 25 years.  He has started and grown several companies and is now an active board member, advisor, and investor.   Sam has always looked three steps ahead in his career, and before making big moves has sought out experienced mentors so that he can learn from those with a proven track record and assess the industry.   In this episode of "Austin Tech Connect" Sam shares his journey and will leave you with a lot of advice on how to succeed in tech.     About Sam Decker   Sam has led diverse and impactful roles throughout his career, beginning with marketing, product, and sales leadership at several early-stage startups in California, covering direct mail catalogs, marketing consulting, online media, and web-based telecommunications. In 1999, he managed Dell’s consumer website operations, redesigning it three times and growing consumer online revenue to over $3.5 billion while launching Dell's Consumer CRM group. As the founding CMO of Bazaarvoice Inc., Sam drove the company's growth to seven products and $50 million in revenue before its IPO in 2012. He then founded and led Mass Relevance, a SaaS leader in social TV and content integration, which grew to 150 employees before merging with Spredfast. Sam also co-founded Clearhead, a data-driven experience optimization firm that sold to Accenture in 2017. Currently, he serves as co-founder and Chairman of Fairworlds, an immersive reality agency, co-owner of Texas Drift Academy, and is involved with Interplay Learning and Axial Commerce. An original co-founder of Capital Factory, Sam is also a published author and active advisor and investor.