The Software Leaders Uncensored Podcast

In this episode of Software Leaders Uncensored, host Steve Taplin interviews Guyte McCord, CEO of Graphika, discussing his career journey from CRO to CEO, the challenges of remote work, the impact of AI on product development, and the importance of building trust within technical teams. They explore the complexities of scaling a tech company, addressing technical debt, and navigating the hype surr...

In this episode of Software Leaders Uncensored, host Steve Taplin speaks with Todd Persen, CTO of Hydrolix, about his journey in the observability space, the growth of Hydrolix, and the challenges of managing a global engineering team. They discuss the importance of trust in leadership, the balance between product and engineering, and the role of AI in engineering workflows. Todd shares insights o...

In this episode of Software Leaders Uncensored, host Steve Taplin speaks with Maha Virudhagiri, CTO of Coalition, about the intersection of cyber insurance and technology. They discuss Maha's journey to Coalition, the challenges faced by engineering teams, the adoption of AI tools for productivity, and the importance of a high agency culture in a remote work environment. Maha shares insights o...

In this episode of Software Leaders Uncensored, host Steve Taplin speaks with Michael Cieri, EVP of Software at BILL, about the company's mission to support small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) through innovative financial management solutions. Michael shares insights from his extensive career in technology, emphasizing the importance of understanding customer needs, the challenges of inte...

In this episode of Software Leaders Uncensored, host Steve Taplin speaks with Eric Poff, CTO of Verve Labs, about his journey to becoming a technology leader, the innovative projects at Verve Labs, and the importance of human-centered AI. They discuss the engineering work model, the significance of communication within teams, and the balance between product and technology roles. Eric shares insigh...

In this episode of Software Leaders Uncensored, host Steve Taplin speaks with Brian Bauer, VP of AI Products at Rational Exponent. They discuss the transformative impact of AI on the banking sector, the development of their flagship product re:agent, and the importance of understanding the business needs of banking to create effective AI solutions. Brian shares insights on team dynamics in a remot...

In this episode of Software Leaders Uncensored, host Steve Taplin speaks with Jeff Prince, CTO of XOi, about the evolution of engineering leadership, challenges in field service management, and the integration of AI in software development. They discuss the importance of aligning product and engineering teams, effective onboarding of new engineers, and key metrics for engineering success. Jeff sha...

In this episode of Software Leaders UNCENSORED, host Steve Taplin speaks with Ben Ede, an engineering director at Envoy, about his career transition, leadership philosophy, and the evolving role of AI in software engineering. They discuss the importance of CI/CD processes, breaking down work into manageable tasks, and effectively tracking engineering metrics. Ben shares insights on managing tech d...

In this episode of Software Leaders Uncensored, host Steve Taplin speaks with Ajay Chankramath, a seasoned engineering leader and CEO of Platformetrics. They discuss AJ's unique approach to consulting, focusing on proven solutions rather than bespoke ones, and the importance of enhancing developer experience in tech companies. AJ shares insights on building the ideal developer experience, over...

In this episode of Software Leaders Uncensored, host Steve Taplin speaks with Michael Terry, a seasoned software engineer and co-founder of Sanctuary Software Studio. They discuss Michael's extensive journey in software development, the evolution of his company, and the challenges faced in the current tech landscape, including talent management, onboarding, and the impact of AI on business mod...

In this episode of Software Leaders Uncensored, host Steve Taplin speaks with William Steenbergen, co-founder and CTO of Federato, about the transformative role of AI in the insurance industry. They discuss the challenges of underwriting, the importance of addressing the coverage gap, and how Federato's platform is revolutionizing the insurance lifecycle. William shares insights on team dynami...

In this episode of Software Leaders Uncensored, host Steve Taplin speaks with Matt Ryan, founder and CTO of Kythera Labs, about his journey from the corporate world to the startup landscape. They discuss the evolution of Kythera Labs, innovations in healthcare data solutions, the challenges of managing remote engineering teams, and the importance of clarity in technical communication. Matt shares...

In this episode of Software Leaders Uncensored, host Steve Taplin interviews Nathan Miller, CEO of Rentec Direct, discussing the evolution of property management software, the integration of AI, challenges in the rental industry, and the impact of changing algorithms on customer acquisition. Nathan shares insights on fraud prevention, the importance of market testing ideas, and the dynamics of bui...

In this episode of Software Leaders Uncensored, host Steve Taplin speaks with Matt DeBergalis, CEO and co-founder of Apollo GraphQL. They discuss the evolution of Apollo, the impact of AI on software development, the importance of APIs, and the challenges of hiring in a rapidly changing tech landscape. Matt shares insights on building a culture of accountability, navigating the hype around AI, and...

In this episode of Software Leaders Uncensored, host Steve Taplin speaks with Herb Hogue, CTO of Myriad360, about the evolving landscape of AI infrastructure, the challenges of talent acquisition in tech, and the rapid changes in technology. Herb shares insights from his extensive career, discussing the importance of adaptability, the complexities of data center planning, and the future implicatio...

In this episode of Software Leaders Uncensored, host Steve Taplin speaks with Michael Campbell, CEO of Fusion Risk Management, about the importance of operational resilience in today's unpredictable business environment. They discuss Michael's journey to his current role, the innovative projects at Fusion, and the impact of AI on software development. Michael emphasizes the need for ruthle...

In this episode of Software Leaders Uncensored, host Steve Taplin speaks with Ken Johnson, CTO and co-founder of Dry Run Security. They discuss Ken's journey into the tech world, the innovations in software security that Dry Run is implementing, and the challenges faced by engineering teams in a rapidly evolving landscape. The conversation also touches on the impact of AI on software developme...

In this episode of Software Leaders Uncensored, Steve Taplin sits down with Edward Calvesbert, VP of Product Management for IBM WatsonX, to discuss what’s real, what’s hype, and what’s breaking inside enterprise AI today. Edward explains how Watson evolved into WatsonX, why 95% of enterprise AI projects are failing, and why strong data foundations and semantic layers matter more than the model its...

In this episode of Software Leaders Uncensored, host Steve Taplin sits down with Peter Horadan, CEO of Vouched, and one of the few tech leaders who has helped scale multiple “boring” backend automation companies into multi-billion-dollar giants. Peter walks through his journey from Microsoft in the pre-internet era to leading engineering at Concur, Avalara, and launching Lockstep before its acquis...

In this episode of Software Leaders Uncensored, Steve Taplin talks with Behnam Bastani, CEO and co-founder of OpenInfer, and former AI executive at Meta, Roblox, Google, HP, and Kodak. Behnam breaks down why the future of AI will live at the edge—not the cloud—and how his team is building a fully integrated hardware–software ecosystem that delivers low-cost, private, on-device AI inference. He exp...

In this episode of Software Leaders Uncensored, host Steve Taplin talks with Jimi Li, CTO of ALM, whose career spans startups, GE, L’Oreal, Coach, News Corp, consulting, and now leading a fully digital legal-industry intelligence company. Jimi shares how he evolved from a two-person startup engineer to global technology leader, and why transformation is 80% psychology and communication—not archite...

In this episode of Software Leaders Uncensored, host Steve Taplin speaks with Tanner Hackett, CEO of Counterpart, about his entrepreneurial journey, the pivot to insurance technology, and the innovative approach of agentic insurance. They discuss the challenges of tech adoption in the insurance industry, the importance of building a remote engineering team, and insights on fundraising and capital...

In this episode of Software Leaders Uncensored, host Steve Taplin talks with Mathias Herzog, CEO of Korn Ferry Digital Business and President of Global Technology Industries at Korn Ferry. Mathias shares his journey from consulting in San Francisco to executive roles at Salesforce, Automation Anywhere, and now leading a $400M SaaS division inside a $3B global firm. He breaks down the challenge of...

In this episode of Software Leaders Uncensored, Steve Taplin interviews Jim Sullivan, Founder & CEO of eDiscovery AI, whose rare background as both a technologist and an attorney gives him a unique advantage in transforming the legal industry. Jim shares how AI now outperforms humans in document classification, why 40,000 doc-review attorney roles are at risk, and how blurry scans, handwriting...

In this episode of Software Leaders Uncensored, Steve Taplin sits down with Corey Ercanbrack, Chief Product & Technology Officer at Vasion, to unpack his 30-year journey from Intel → Landesk → InsideSales → Vasion. Corey explains how he scaled Vasion from 3 engineers to 150+, transitioned from on-prem to a cloud-native SaaS platform, and unified product + engineering under the CPTO role. He br...