How I Operate as a Senior Product Leader
Senior Product & Technology Executive operating at CPO scope
I help B2B SaaS and enterprise software companies move from product ambiguity to market leadership — combining systems thinking, execution discipline, and pragmatic AI product creation.
I work best with Seed — Series C companies that need more than feature delivery: product clarity, scalable systems, and teams that execute consistently under pressure.
What I’m trusted to do
- Achieve product‐market fit and durable differentiation
- Drive market leadership and portfolio scale
- Build high‐performance, high‐trust product organizations
- Translate complexity — technical, organizational, or market — into durable advantage
How I Lead
Systems thinking, execution discipline, and coaching‐first leadership
- Systems thinking — designing products, platforms, and organizations that scale together
- Execution discipline — clear priorities, strong operating models, and measurable outcomes
- Coaching‐first leadership — building trust, accountability, and decision‐making capability across teams
If you’re building a product‐led company and need CPO‐level product leadership that balances judgment, execution, and long‐term leverage, I’m always open to a conversation.
Product Strategy: From Ambiguity to Advantage
Rather than starting with features or technology, I anchor strategy on:
- The highest‐value customer outcomes
- Clear sequencing of bets
- Explicit tradeoffs between speed, scope, and scalability
My focus is not strategy as documentation, but strategy as an execution engine — one that aligns product, engineering, and go‐to‐market around a coherent direction that compounds over time.
When strategy is clear, teams move faster with fewer dependencies and less rework.
Operating Model: Scaling Teams Without Losing Velocity
As companies scale, execution breaks down long before talent does.
I design and evolve product and engineering operating models that support:
- Clear ownership and decision rights
- Predictable delivery at full scope
- Quality and reliability at enterprise scale
- Continuous improvement through disciplined feedback loops
I’ve owned company‐wide process leadership and operating cadence in high‐growth environments, enabling teams to increase velocity while materially reducing defects and delivery risk.
The goal is not process for its own sake — but leverage.
Building High‐Performance Teams at Scale
Culture is not an aspiration — it is an output of how decisions are made and reinforced.
I build high‐performance teams by:
- Making priorities explicit
- Holding leaders accountable for outcomes
- Encouraging productive conflict in service of better decisions
- Coaching individuals to operate effectively under pressure
High trust matters because it enables speed.
High standards matter because they protect results.
The strongest cultures I’ve built are those where teams feel safe to move fast — and responsible for what they ship.
AI Product Leadership: Pragmatic, Durable, Operable
I approach AI as a product capability, not a marketing strategy.
I’ve led the hands‐on design and engineering of agentic, multi‐model AI products, creating entirely new product categories that integrate directly into real customer workflows.
My focus is on ensuring AI products are:
- Architecturally sound
- Holding leaders accountable for outcomes
- Clearly owned
- Measurable in impact
- Operable at enterprise scale
AI delivers the most value when it accelerates execution and differentiation without increasing organizational fragility. That principle guides both product decisions and team design.
Where I Add the Most Value
I do my best work with companies at inflection points — where product strategy, execution, and scale must come together cleanly.
This often includes:
- Achieving or reinforcing product‐market fit
- Scaling from single‐product to portfolio
- Creating durable differentiation, including AI‐enabled categories
- Building leadership systems that hold as the company grows
© 2024 Andrew Sweet
