At the start of last year, we had a really inspiring conversation with Chris Brown and are excited to reshare it this year, in our “Best Of” series. Originally published 01/25/24.

An exceptional company culture builds when steadfast employee commitment meets deep trust by customers. Chris Brown encountered this when he joined Relativity as Chief Product Officer in 2018. Chris joined the team in the early stages of their transition to SaaS and embraced the moment of disruption and opportunity—a familiar territory in his career, which included ten years at Orbitz Worldwide. From the perspective of CPO, Chris offers unique insights into the transition period from on-prem to SaaS, addressing legacy technology, embracing the customer as a co-innovator by building plentiful touchpoints, and the intricate SaaS sales process. Speaking on what SaaS can inimitably provide, Chris muses on “a continuous stream of innovation at high availability” and customer success.

In this episode, Chris looks ahead to the future to discuss how AI and LLMs will impact the law industry and finding effective uses for the technology. He shares how one of the oldest industries in the world can embrace the best of AI’s capabilities while mitigating the risks by including the law's critical element: human decision-making and validation.

With experience as a CEO and CPO, Chris shares the distinctions between the roles that stem from the needs of a particular company and offers how his arrival at Relativity reflected intentional scaling that led to further success. In discussing the Chicago startup environment and continued growth at Relativity, Chris talks about acquiring the contract review company Heretik and considering an acquisitive approach as one path of innovation and building a strong product portfolio.

(02:24) – Introducing Chris Brown
(04:56) – CPO vs. CEO
(06:30) – Sales in the SaaS world
(08:59) – Relativity
(10:58) – Building an effective SaaS company
(15:43) – Co-innovating with customers
(17:59) – AI and the law industry
(22:18) – Looking ahead
(23:59) – An acquisitive approach

Chris Brown is the Chief Product Officer at Relativity, a cloud review software that helps users “organize data, discover truth, and act on it.” Previously, he served as Senior Vice President and Chief Product Officer at Orbitz Worldwide and CEO and Board Member of Kapow! Chris earned a bachelor's degree in computer engineering from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champagne.

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Podcast episode production by Dante32.

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