Glenn’s Story

MY BEGINNINGS

Before I Was a CEO

Before becoming a CEO, I earned a degree in Quantitative Management from the University of Florida (Go Gators!).

In my first job out of undergrad, I worked as a software developer at Procter & Gamble.

I then earned my MBA from Harvard.

WORK HISTORY

My Experience as an Executive

I came to Silicon Valley and worked for a start-up that failed. Then I worked in sales and marketing at Oracle.

I then founded Crimson Consulting Group — a highly successful strategy consulting firm, while serving as CEO and Chairman of the Board. We helped Apple, Google, Microsoft, Cisco, Dell, HP, IBM, Intel, Oracle, SAP, Seagate, VMware, and many start-ups become even more successful through strategic consultation.

In addition to being a CEO coach, I serve as a member of the board for Soteria Intelligence. If you’d like to learn more about my work in AI and my Board of Directors work, please visit this page.

COACHING EXPERIENCE

All CEOs Need a Good Coach

While I was a CEO, I had a coach for 17 years. Why? Because that coach consistently helped me become a better CEO. I was, and still am, a continual learner, and I want to get better every day. That attitude made me a great student for my coach.

After my stint as a CEO, I worked in venture capital for five years. During that time, I coached the CEOs of our portfolio companies. Now I coach CEOs worldwide, in both public and private businesses and both large and small companies.

CEO COACHING SERVICES

SUCCESS STORIES

Janice Raises Over $100M for Her Company

ALL SUCCESS STORIES

As one of the founders, Janice had created the perfect solution in an exploding market. As her CEO Coach, we worked very hard to create a scalable business model that significantly accelerated revenue growth. This model included geographic expansion, the addition of new product offerings, and stickiness to create repeat business.

This triple revenue-acceleration model not only worked but it attracted the interest of growth investors.

But a growth model wasn't enough. We needed to help Janice become a better CEO. Specifically, we worked on how to manage her board, so their faith in her as the CEO grew as time went on.

For some CEOs, the board can be intimidating. At first, it was for Janice as well. We worked on how to manage the board and get the most out of the board. Ultimately, we turned the board into a strong set of advisors and advocates for Janice as the CEO.

The support and confidence of the existing board was a critical factor in enabling her to raise well over $100M in the next round, increasing the valuation by more than $600M.

Darren Raises His First $3 Million

ALL SUCCESS STORIES

My CEO client (Darren) was starting a company in a new category. He was focused on raising capital for his business and wanted help crafting his story. Darren is a brilliant CEO, yet he realized he could produce a better story with help from someone who has created successful fundraising stories many times.

When we started working together, his story was overly complex, difficult for investors to understand, and not as strong as it could have been. Together we built a story about the tremendous value the company was creating. We used historical precedent to bolster the vision and mission. We gave investors confidence in the founders. We proved that the company could scale.

Investors are pattern-matchers. They look for the patterns that tell them this opportunity is like other opportunities they’ve seen, giving them a strong belief in the potential ROI. Together, Darren and I constructed a winning story that helped key investors see the patterns of success.

According to Darren, “Glenn gave me the perspective and confidence I needed to succeed.” Darren raised $3 million for his startup company in his first round. Darren has continued to successfully raise money in later rounds as well.

Meilin Creates A Scaling Organization

ALL SUCCESS STORIES

Meilin was always asking, "How can I help my company grow faster?" She was successful by most measures but had higher growth ambitions.

As her CEO Coach, I helped focus her efforts and energies on an often-overlooked area for many CEOs. This area enables scaling and enables the CEO to manage their team more effectively -- values.

Most CEOs have corporate values but don't use them as the ultimate way to install a belief system - a way for every employee to focus on the most critical issues for the company.

Meilin and I worked on making the values core to the thinking and speaking of the management team. Once the management team adopted these values and started speaking about them in their regular communications, we knew that we were on our way to ensuring that every employee “lived” the values.

While values are not the only thing a company needs to grow fast, they are critical to its success. Meilin's company is now growing over 100%.

Sean Gets It All Done

ALL SUCCESS STORIES

As CEO, Sean had no work-life balance, and he was struggling with the overwhelming responsibilities of being a CEO. One of the biggest challenges of any CEO is to get everything done. The list of critical items seems to grow every day.

As his CEO coach (and as a former CEO), I recognized the stress he was under. That level of stress is no fun. To help Sean become a better CEO, I focused him on delegation, talent development, and balance.

First, we focused on developing Sean's delegation skills. Delegation is the "8th wonder of the world." When you make it work, your workload diminishes, and the company performs at a higher level. As Sean became better at delegating, he also began to see strengths and weaknesses in his leadership team from a different perspective.

The next step was to refresh his leadership team. We created a plan to either develop the ones that could step it up and perform better or find new leadership team members for those that couldn't help the company grow.

Finally, we worked on creating a way of living for Sean that provided him some balance. I tell my CEOs to "put their oxygen mask on first." If a CEO wants to perform at the highest level, they need to take care of themselves first.

Now that Sean has a much better leadership team, he has become a master delegator. By delegating many of the activities he had taken on before, he now has much more time to take care of himself.

Sean's company has now entered a new growth phase. More importantly, he is enjoying his work a lot more and his life a lot more.

Viraj Fires His “Best” Employee

ALL SUCCESS STORIES

As a CEO, Viraj was focused on employee retention. He recognized the value of keeping high-performing employees and the high cost of turnover.

One of Viraj's direct reports was one of his "best" employees. This person consistently out-performed against their targets. Within their function, they were a rock star.

However, this same person was toxic to the rest of the organization. They constantly argued with others, and they made most others feel bad about themselves. Viraj found he was spending a great deal of time managing around the toxicity created by this employee.

Viraj valued this person's contributions within their function, and he also really hated the idea of employee turnover. As a result, Viraj put up with this person and continued to work around the toxicity issue.

As Viraj's CEO Coach, I helped him understand that team alignment and team cohesion are critical factors to help the company grow. We agreed that preventing employee turnover is a good goal, but not at the expense of creating a well-functioning team.

Viraj wanted to become a better CEO, and he knew what he had to do. While it was difficult, he decided to fire the person he once thought was his "best" employee.

The first thing he heard from the rest of his direct reports was, "What took you so long?"

Olivia Finds Product-Market Fit

ALL SUCCESS STORIES

Olivia, my CEO client, is a product genius. She is highly creative, an excellent problem-solver, and knows how to get products out the door on time.

Olivia raised a great deal of money based on her product ideas and some early successes. The challenge was that her company wasn't growing fast enough. The pressure from the investors was building, and she was worried.

Raising a lot of money early is a blessing and a curse. The curse is that Olivia delivered her product too quickly. She delivered it, making too many assumptions about the market she was serving. When the product was released, it was a good fit but not a great fit.

Olivia was concerned about the time and dollars it would take to conduct research and test product-market fit in multiple market segments. We created a partnering strategy that enabled us to test multiple new market segments in a short time.

Olivia has found multiple market segments that are a fit for the product. Now that she has achieved product-market fit, the strategy is to "go big" on the go-to-market. And her company is taking off.

Wilson Turns the Board Around

ALL SUCCESS STORIES

Wilson was a first-time CEO. The company was doing well, but not quite as well as the board had hoped. Wilson found himself uncomfortable as a minority shareholder working with a board that could fire him if he didn't perform.

Wilson wanted to know how to manage a Board of Directors. The first step was to acknowledge that a board has different measures of success than the CEO. That means there will naturally be tension. The second step was to dig in to deeply understand what the key drivers are for each board member.

Based on this information, Wilson can now address his needs, the company's needs, and the board's needs. That was the first breakthrough.

Once he knew how to address the needs of the board, we turned to address his needs. As Wilson's CEO Coach, I helped him realize that the board is an incredible asset to leverage.

Wilson began to build relationships with the board members individually to understand better how they could be of service to him and the company.

When Wilson works with the board, he is fully aware of their needs and addresses them appropriately. More importantly, he now tells the board what he is doing and relies on their insight and experience for feedback on how to help the company perform at a higher level.

Wilson is no longer concerned about the board and now gets more out of them than ever before.

Darius Solved His Crisis

ALL SUCCESS STORIES

I got the call at 10 PM on a Thursday. Darius, a CEO client, reached out to me just as I was about to end the day. "Glenn, my Chief Revenue Officer, just resigned, and I'm not sure what to do."

Darius was running a rapidly-growing business that was highly dependent on a well-run sales organization. He had delegated sales responsibility to his Chief Revenue Officer so Darius could focus on engineering and product.

The good news is that Darius didn't relinquish oversight or reporting of sales, just sales execution. It's also true that Darius wasn't in a panic, and we had worked on a plan for the departure of each of his direct reports.

At the moment, though, Darius and I needed to review that plan to ensure it was our best option. We checked whether or not the interim head of sales could genuinely step into the role. We discussed which accounts Darius should immediately nurture relationships with. We agreed that the recruiter we would need was still the right recruiter.

We quickly put together a communication plan on how to bring this news to the leadership team and the rest of the company. We worked on the exact next steps to interact with the interim head of sales, the director of sales operations, and HR.

Darius felt he didn't know what to do, but in actuality, he did. We had prepared for this, and he just needed to talk it through in the heat of the moment so he could execute against the plan immediately.

LEARN FROM ME

Avoid Making Costly Mistakes as a CEO

I made many, many mistakes as a CEO. Today, I help my CEOs to avoid those mistakes. Mistakes in business are costly. While I can’t tell you exactly what’s going to happen next, I can get pretty close. I’ve seen this movie before. I will help you gain confidence in your decisions.

Now, I do what I love. I work with CEOs, enabling them to succeed beyond what could be possible without a coach.

We need to determine if we’re a good fit. If you’d like to explore a coaching relationship, please grab some time on my calendar so we can just get to know each other.

Book an appointment below to see if we’re a good fit, or email me at glenn@glenngow .com.

BOOK AN APPOINTMENT

TESTIMONIALS

Take Their Word For It

ALL TESTIMONIALS

Awards & Recognition

Glenn has been chosen as a top Ceo Coach by coachfoundation.com

WHY WAIT?

Let’s Start Something

We need to determine if we’re a good fit. If you’d like to explore a coaching relationship, please grab some time on my calendar so we can just get to know each other.

Book an appointment below, or email me at glenn@glenngow.com.

You can also call or text me at 650-793-0128.

BOOK AN APPOINTMENT

Glenn’s Story

Before I Was a CEO

My Experience as an Executive

All CEOs Need a Good Coach

Janice Raises Over $100M for Her Company

Darren Raises His First $3 Million

Meilin Creates A Scaling Organization

Sean Gets It All Done

Viraj Fires His “Best” Employee

Olivia Finds Product-Market Fit

Wilson Turns the Board Around

Darius Solved His Crisis

Avoid Making Costly Mistakes as a CEO

Take Their Word For It

AJ Bruno

CEO, QuotaPath

Sameer Ahuja

President, GameChanger

Simon Law

CEO, LoginID

Albert Navarro

CEO, MetricLock

Srinivas Akella

Former CEO, Wootcloud

Jeff Strnad

CEO, Door USA

Darren Marble

Co-CEO, Crush Capital

Liam Nguyen

CEO, Pixel Canvas

Allan Njoroge

CEO, Actriv Healthcare

Cynthia Tusan

CEO, Idea Lab

Olin Hyde

former CEO, LeadCrunch

Rick Jones

CEO, Workreels

Michael Kashida

CEO, Treedom

Awards & Recognition

Let’s Start Something