The CPO Code

Martin Rover-Parkes stood in front of 400 people at a signature business and told them he didn’t care about signatures. Weeks into his first CPO role, he made the point that what the company sold was about to be commoditised. In this episode, he explains why that moment is the real difference between VP and CPO, and why he thinks most CPO roles never get advertised.

Martin Rover-Parkes fell into product marketing on a graduate scheme and spent the next 15 years moving through corporates, scale-ups and PE-backed SaaS. In this episode, he covers what product leaders can learn from marketing, why he thinks PE is the special forces of product, and what changes when you move from VP to CPO. He also shares the three things he hires for, what he scans for on a CV in the first ten seconds, and how he used Claude to build himself an 18-month mini MBA. If you want to be a CPO, his advice is practical and blunt.

Martin Rover-Parkes is the former Chief Product Officer at 5 Arrows-backed Solvares Group. He started in product marketing on a graduate scheme, then spent the last decade in B2B PE-backed SaaS, fixing, scaling and consolidating complex product portfolios. He has held senior product roles at Royal Mail, Edenred, Questback, Scrive and he writes publicly about product leadership, AI and personal growth.

There is no standard route to Chief Product Officer. David Gummer, ex-CPO at Red Gate, went from consulting and venture capital to BT, then into product. He talks about why breadth beats a linear career, what makes a CV stand out, and how to get commercial ownership before you have the title. If you want to be a CPO, or hire one, listen in.

One check before you publish: the company David joined after BT is spelled three ways in the transcript (Lumis, Lumetz, LEMS), so I left it out of the description. If you want to name it, confirm the spelling first. Also check "ex-CPO at Red Gate Software" against how he describes his own title on LinkedIn.

This is Damon Macklin's journey from UX designer to Chief Product Officer. He didn't plan to become a CPO.

His career was a series of harder problems, and every step up forced him to rethink what the job actually is. First he thought it was writing good requirements. Then running a good roadmap. Then building great teams.

Now, as CPO at Radar Healthcare, he thinks it's about making good bets with what you've got, and finding out quickly when you're wrong.