Technocratic Podcast

In this episode of Technocratic, I speak with Tracy Edwards , a highly experienced product and technology executive, about the messy reality of aligning product, engineering, and business outcomes in the AI era. The conversation starts with a problem almost every technology organization knows too well: teams are busy, roadmaps are full, JIRA is active, velocity charts look impressive — but the bus...

Chanille Juneau oversees product, engineering, security, DevOps, and QA for Accumulus, a platform that exchanges confidential data between the world’s largest drug makers and regulators in 75+ countries. She’s never written a line of code. It doesn’t matter . The CPTO Role and AI Reward the Same Thing: Systems-Level Thinking A great CPTO doesn’t need dev experience. Chanille Juneau proves that. CP...

Gabi Bufrem has been on every side of product leadership — IC, CPO, and now the person other product leaders call when the job stops making sense. The Shift Nobody Teaches You There’s a version of this conversation that’s comfortable — the one where we talk about leadership development in broad strokes and everybody nods along. Gabi Bufrem doesn’t do that version. She goes straight at something mo...

The Product Leader Who Stopped Blaming Silicon Valley If you’ve spent any time in product management over the last decade, you’ve probably felt it — that slow creep of the role becoming narrower, more reactive, more about managing a backlog than shaping a business. Most people in the field have a villain for that story: the tech-first founder, the engineering-obsessed CTO, Silicon Valley’s build-a...

The Seasoned Tech Leader Who Went Back to School — And What He Learned If you look at Chris Bunk’s résumé, you’ll see an undeniably impressive track record. Current CPTO at FastSpring. SVP of Engineering at WorldPay. Years of leadership across fintech and enterprise technology. His is the kind of career arc that earns you a seat at the table…without having to prove much of anything anymore. But th...

A very Merry Christmas 🎅 to all those who celebrate! Two holiday gifts for you today: 1st 🎁 is an in-depth conversation with Susanna Holt (CTO) who offers us a great set of tips and tricks on effectively leveraging AI in Engineering & the broader organization. 2nd 🎁 is free access to our new Technical Debt Management Tool: Tech Debtonator which uses AI to take the pain out of dealing with Tech...

I met Bethany Lyons by chance and it turns out that she is a semi-genius. You don’t meet too many of those! With a penchant for math + expertise in data & product leadership, Bethany has a unique vantage point on how Data Engineering & Quant Development is impacting Product & Engineering. More on Bethany here: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bethany-lyons-0395aa74/ Bethany’s partner in crime Mayank Mo...

Bob Gilbreath is one of those rare people who is not only a multiple time, successful startup founder, but he also loves to share his knowledge with the world. You can find him at: https://theworkaround.substack.com/ He decided to hang out with us here at Technocratic and we had a great time covering a ton of topics helpful to startup founders, including: * Balancing Work & Life * Impact on Family...

Today, I analyze the topic of a GovTech business that released a new product to much fanfare, only to have it immediately crash due to too much traffic on the app, how they ultimately went about fixing the issue, and the lessons learned. If you’d like to submit a topic for analysis feel free to reach out: bobby@technocratic.io And remember, keep the shark swimming! 🦈 Bobby This is a public episod...

It’s only fitting that a CTO (me) and a CFO (CJ) sit down to tackle the biggest finance challenges CTOs face, and how to solve them through a Private Equity lens. Btw, I’ve been reading CJ Gustafson’s CFO newsletter for years and it’s perfect for CTOs. It’s filled with TON’s of immediate value content for CFO’s, CTO’s and business operators in general. Check it out here: https://www.mostlymetrics....

Claire has a TON of great insights for CTOs who are just starting out in PE-backed organizations. In our conversation, we cover: * What first-time CTOs need to know about operating in a PE-backed company * How PE business models shape technology roadmaps and priorities * The faster pace and higher expectations that come with PE timelines * Governance and reporting expectations CTOs must adapt to *...

Yuying & I hit the big topics: * GPT5: Hype or Big Step Forward * Impact on Productivity * AI Adoption in the Enterprise * AI in HealthCare * Costs Going Up? * AI Research Slowing Down? * And a bunch more topics… This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit newsletter.technocratic.io/subscribe

As you rise in your technology career & decisions get bigger & bigger, there’s one mindset that can really cost you: 👉 Thinking you have to have all the answers & accidentally killing valuable insight from your team. Yes, as CTOs we’re expected to know everything from AI to blockchain to modernizing legacy systems. But when a leader signals they’ve got every project handled, every time, ideas sto...

I had the chance to work closely with Matt Morgan during a critical chapter of his career, and watching his growth and impact was really something special. He’s an exceptionally bright architect & engineering leader, with that rare ability to zoom out to the big picture while still catching edge cases most people miss. Most importantly Matt really cares deeply about everything: his team, the busin...

As a CTO Cesar Goulart stands out as a highly creative technology leader who’s always looking for new & innovative ways to get the job done. In today’s conversation, we deep-dive into AI in the Enterprise and how companies should build a governance structure around their implementations & use-cases. Cesar also talks about how organizations should determine the right use-cases to invest in and how...

I recently discovered Shannon through his insights on building innovative product teams that can scale. In today’s conversation, we deep dive into how to build the right product team for your business, team culture, metrics, distributed decision making and more. For product executives who are involved in creating high-performance teams this conversation is perfect for you. Shannon shares a TON of...

I recently discovered Erika through her insightful post on the transition from Services to Product—an area filled with both challenges and big opportunities. In today’s conversation, we dive deep into that very pivot, as Erika shares candid lessons and sharp insights from her own experience navigating it. For product leaders who are involved in this kind of shift—or considering it—this episode off...

Guest Profile When I first met JT (John Truchel) several years ago it was clear to me that he was much more than “just” a Chief Product Officer. As a CPTO (Chief Product & Technology Officer), JT has not only built great products and product teams he has also developed excellent engineering organizations at the same time. Known for his ability to connect across the aisle and build strong alliances...

Nasser Chanda is a seasoned executive and CEO who has lead companies to double digit growth and through significant exit transactions. As a CEO, Nasser has built Sales, Product and Support organizations from scratch and taken a number of products & services to market successfully in the FinTech space. Known for his ability to connect with anyone in the organization and his “humanized” leadership s...

Joel Hames is a veteran Chief Product Officer (CPO) with decades of experience helping lead and scale product & engineering teams in EdTech. As a CPO, Joel has built and launch many successful products that have positively impacted schools and students across the country. Known for his ability to create multi-disciplinary product teams working closely with engineering to deliver new products, Joel...

Jason Pletcher is a veteran CFO & CEO with decades of experience helping lead and scale businesses across several industry verticals including Banking, EdTech, Analytics and more. As a CFO, he has spent years working closely with CTOs and technology teams to empower them with strong financial controls, strategic direction and guidance. Known for his ability to create strong relationships across de...

Guest Profile Marc Haskelson is a veteran executive and entrepreneur with decades of experience leading and scaling businesses across security compliance, marketing, consulting and more. As a CEO, he has built high-performing teams and helped startups grow into scaled up companies. Known for his ability to spot and develop talent, Marc believes that organizational success comes from building stron...

In this episode of Technocratic, Bobby sits down with Lou Schiavone, a seasoned executive who has led organizations at Xerox, HP, and Digital Equipment Corporation. Lou shares deep insights into leadership, company culture, and why so many modern businesses struggle with short-term thinking. From his days working with legendary CEOs to navigating today’s rapidly changing corporate landscape, Lou b...

Ray and I go way back—we’ve fought battles in the trenches of Cloud Ops and come out victorious, though not without a few battle scars. He’s that rare blend of deep Cloud Ops expertise and strong business acumen—something you don’t often see in engineering leaders, especially in this space! 😂 With AI on the rise, Cloud Ops teams are in the spotlight. After all, the biggest AI providers are also t...

Gabriella has been involved in some really cool projects in her time as CTO & tech leader at some high-flying companies including Skype, American Express, T-Mobile and Sun Microsystems (back in it’s heyday)! At one point Gabriella was in charge of porting Skype to mobile! Which the 80’s and 90’s kids in our audience will remember as one of the most popular global chat / social media apps before th...