Orbit - An Hg software leadership podcast

In this enlightening episode of the Hg podcast series Orbit, host Joe Jefferies converses with Nick Mehta, the long-standing CEO of Gainsight, about the intersection of vulnerability and leadership in building a successful software company.

Nick candidly describes his philosophy of "human-first" leadership, which has become a cornerstone of Gainsight's culture. He recounts his journey from childhood ambitions instilled by his father to the challenges he faced fitting in, and how these experiences shaped his transparent and authentic approach to leadership, coining the term "Nick 2.0" to signify his evolution. This transformation involved embracing openness and candidness, not just personally but also at the organisational level with "Gainsight 2.0," fostering a culture where honesty is valued, and employees are encouraged to embrace their own personal growth narratives.

As the CEO of Scandinavian software success story, Visma, this is Merete Hverven's second appearance on Orbit. Last time she pondered the reasons behind the Nordics' outsized contribution to the world of software, this time the same values of openness, competency over hierarchy and willingness to experiment come into play when running a scaled multinational conglomerate.

With the complete opposite of a one-size-fits-all approach, Visma has partnered with companies across 32 different countries, collecting what they do best and disseminating it across the group. The key is to be humble to as you enter each new marketplace: "don't try to be interesting, be interested".

A veteran of the software industry for 25 years, Darren Roos is a disciple of the wisdom that failure breeds success. Battlescars that bring perspective and greater awareness of how to guard against the pitfalls of tough economic environments. He assures Hg's Nic Humphries that his abilities are not a result of intellect but rather hard-won experience; over two decades of seeing the same patterns reappear.

Now the Chairman of enterprise software giant, IFS, he looks back at his arrival as CEO - a South African in a Scandinavian company - and how his work to transform the business required some transformation of his own; before discussing tips around succession planning and the reluctant addition of 'author' to his CV.

As CEO of IRIS Software, Elona Mortimer-Zhika has been a valued part of the Hg Orbit for 8 years and counting. In Orbit 39, she speaks to long-term friend and Hg's Senior Partner, Nic Humphries, about her unusal path to tech leadership:

from Communist Albania to retail jobs in the UK and on to an audit career for Deloitte.

Tracking the stratospheric progress of IRIS over the last decade and considering the effects of private equity investment, Nic and Elona discuss whether or not you need to be a techie to master the constantly moving goalposts of a highly successful software business.

In the final Orbit recorded at Hg's recent 'Software Leadership Gathering', we brought together three perspectives all investigating the AI wave through a business lens.

With the technology in an early phase, it can be viewed as an existential threat for businesses but without a clear path to commercialisation.

Brent Hayward of Salesforce, David Carmona of Microsoft and Nagraj Kashyap of Touring Capital discuss what’s actually working today for businesses, where they should be focusing their attention and what will be the likely opportunities in the future.

Inspired by watching the surge in space exploration during his childhood in 70s India, through the 80s microchip era and on into the internet boom and a 25-year career innovating software at a large enterprise scale - Netscape, Bang Networks and finally VMware – Raghu Raghuram can claim authority and perspective on close to the entirety of our industry. He has seen epochal change before and grown with it.

Speaking at Hg's recent 'Software Leadership Gathering', Raghu tells Hg’s Alan Cline about the similarities and differences between our current shift and those that came before: comparing the economic and technologic circumstances and digging into the business angle from code to pricing to value proposition.

Born of the same crucible as Reid Hoffman, Peter Thiel and Elon Musk, Joe Lonsdale and Eric Poirier have been building and investing in software for over two decades. As the General Partner of 8VC and the CEO of Addepar respectively, they have seen industries evolve and innovate.

Speaking at Hg's recent 'Software Leadership Gathering', Matthew Brockman asked them how - since software has allowed new entrants to compete with the old guard - what areas could AI open up? Applying AI to existing technologies and services is one approach but it is one that comes with a level playing field and broad competition. Ask yourself the question: what's only just become possible now that hasn't been possible over the last few years and invent something new.

Time for a conversation with one of the greats.

As Professor of Finance and Economics at Columbia, former senior banker at both Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs, and currently Senior Advisor at Evercore Partners, Jonathan Knee’s thinking is held in high regard across the business world. His recent book, ‘The Platform Delusion’, dismantles the long-held belief that a platform business which provides connections rather than creating products is inherently valuable.

So how should we assess business quality in this new era of AI & platforms? Mr Knee outlines the fundamental drivers which haven’t changed in the face of new technology and applies them to assessments of Uber vs Airbnb, Etsy vs Amazon and, of course, how does this all relate to vertical software where we at Hg spend our time.

The advances in technology on the clinical side of healthcare were shown convincingly in the speed of our response to Covid and in the new discoveries and improvements we continue to see.

Covid may have also had a part to play on the administrative side - breaking down old habits and prompting the green shoots of innovation - but there is still a long way to go as legacy systems continue to be expensive, opaque and inefficient.

In both cases, there is a huge opportunity for new ideas, new entrants and new investment. This expands from the traditional centre to prevention and lifestyle change too.

Hg’s Nick Crowne speaks to Rod O’Reilly, a new advisor to the Hg team. Rod has been a leading figure in almost every aspect of the healthcare ecosystem for many years and is a strong advocate of change, disruption and the quest for greater affordability, access and outcomes.

After a year when the sudden leap forward of Gen AI and LLMs took almost everyone by surprise, it’s a good time to ignore the hype, take a step back and look at what we have.

Guido Appenzeller is a special advisor to a16z, a former CTO at Intel and VM Ware and a leading voice in the current wave of software and technology.

In part two of our conversation with Guido, we look at the ways the new generation of AI applications will effect the business world. How do you best capture the value of this wave, how to prepare for it and how to enable your teams to experiment from the bottom up.