KeyHire Podcast

Twill is a global digital freight logistics platform. This high growth startup is part of the Maersk Group - a global corporate leader in supply chain services.

We zoom in with Anne-Sophie, CEO at Twill to discuss her leadership approach in times of the pandemic.

Tune in for specific examples on how to lead people, nurture the culture, manage change and adapt as a high growth, globally distributed startup in today's climate.

We talk with Founders Factory Head of Talent Management Selina Parmar. 

Selina shares how Founders Factory is helping startups navigate their way through the uncertainty we are in.

Tune in for practical tips and ideas on all things people and talent management in times of crisis.

We talk with Sara Bent, People Operations Specialist at Hotjar about the companies 5 years of experience in building and scaling a fully remote Team.

We cover culture with particular focus on values that propel the remote setup, recruitment and onboarding, Team social engagement and well-being, and more.

How to govern, lead, execute and scale  a 100% distributed organisation?

Hotjar is a B2B SaaS for user behaviour analytics, a global market leader in its category . 

The company launched in 2015, bootstrapped to profitability of over €25 mi ARR, with consistent YOY growth, strong employer brand and a strong international Team of circa 100 Hotjarians spread across EMEA and North America.

We're zooming in with David Darmanin, CEO & Founder at Hotjar, on the notion of remote or, as he prefers to call it, distributed leadership.

If you are an executive contemplating leading remotely or a founder building out distributed leadership teams -  tune in to find out the Hotjar take on that.

- at inception or pre-revenue (portfolio includes Doctolib, Malt, Skillup, Ouihelp, ...)

- at Seed stage (up to €3M funding round)

- in France

Kerala Ventures invests in SaaS, marketplaces, AI, data, tech-enabled services, etc. based in France. Their first investment ranges from €100K to €1.5M and our portfolio includes 10 companies (+ 1 successful exit).

Tune in for Kerala's advise on:

- your relationship with and what to expect from your Investor

- types of hiring: Buying Time or Buying Skills?

- building your 18-month Org Chart to aid your recruitment strategy

- scalable recruitment process: how to build a rock-solid candidate Score Card 

- sourcing A-Players - referrals, direct search, engaging your Board, Investors and specialist Headhunters, and more

What makes people stay?

'If it was just the equity in the compensation, I would have been gone a long time ago.' 

Aka Think about the culture from day 1.

In this episode, Gaëtan GACHET, SVP Sales and employee nr 2 at Algolia - sits down with me to comment on Algolia's second consecutive recognition by Battery Ventures as One of Top Cloud Computing Companies to Work For in 2019.

A very genuine talk on what has made Algolia a successful employer brand and work environment not only in their early days but also through a global scaling phase.

We hope you'll find some good insights there as an early-stage startup and scaleup Founder. Share your thoughts!

Vivek Shah is the Senior Director of Product Management at Syncron. 

Vivek's mission is to design, build and launch enterprise software products using AI/ML powered analytics for global manufacturing companies (OEMs = Original Equipment Manufacturers).

The products and services that his teams build support OEMs towards maturity of a Servitization business model.

Vivek lives in Chicago and collaborates with a global Team, spread across the offices in Europe and Asia. 

We discuss the challenges of such a distributed model as well as his best practices and solutions to overcome them.

What is Syncron?

Syncron offers a fully integrated SaaS platform to optimise the performance of the after-sales service supply chain and enable global manufacturers to evolve to subscription-based uptime service models, which is critical on the journey to servitization. 

The Syncron Service Cloud applies machine learning to multi-echelon logistics and IoT data designed to deliver predictive insights and drive enhanced customer experiences, greater efficiency and brand loyalty. 

Headquartered in Stockholm, Sweden, Syncron powers the after-sales service organisations of many of the world’s leading manufacturers, including Electrolux, Hitachi, JCB, Mazda, Siemens and Toyota. 

Syncron has more than 400 employees across 10 global offices and is a recipient of the ‘Great Place to Work’ award.

David Darmanin is the CEO and founder of Hotjar - a leading all-in-one analytics and feedback platform helping you understand your web and mobile site visitors.

Before founding Hotjar, he spent a decade generating hundreds of millions of dollars in growth consulting some of the web’s most sophisticated companies.

Founded in 2014, Hotjar is run fully remotely by 90+ team members spread across EMEA, Americas and Africa and subscribed by over 350,000 companies across 184 countries.

Headquartered on the beautiful island of Malta, in the ‘heart’ of the Mediterranean, Hotjar is a successful, self-funded/bootstrapped, profitable and high-growth B2B SaaS start-up that operates on a fully remote basis from the day of its founding.

Tune in for an insightful, genuine chat full of actionable advice for anyone looking to build and scale remote Teams.

Rodolphe Ardant is the Co-Founder and CEO of Spendesk, a high-growth fin-tech SaaS company from Paris.

Before Spendesk, Rod was a Founder in residence at startup studio eFounders, COO for the car rental startup Drivy, and Founder of Wozaik, a digital advertising startup acquired by Solocal Group in 2013.

Spendesk is an all-in-one corporate expense and spend management service helping businesses spend smarter. It lets you track expenses across your company, empower your employees with a clear approval process and simplify your bookkeeping.

French startup Spendesk has raised another $38.4 million in a Series B round announced in September 2019, with existing investor Index Ventures leading the round. The company has raised $49.4 million (€45 million) to date.

With the recent funding round, the company plans to open offices in Berlin and London, add more currencies and develop new features. 

Over the past year, the company went from 20 employees to 120 employees. There are now over 1,500 companies using Spendesk in Europe.

Tune in for a candid chat with Rod about this journey.