Episode 243: Matt Johnston - CEO, GitKraken

As with most entrepreneurs, you never forget the people who supported you from the early days of the company. I first met Matt towards the end of 2009. VentureFizz had recently launched and I was looking for advertising sponsors to help fund future development of the site. At that point in time, Matt was heading up marketing for a company called uTest (now called Applause) and they were looking to increase exposure for the company. It ended up being a great match and they were the first company to sponsor VentureFizz. Without that check… who knows what would have happened. So grateful. Matt has been involved in lots of venture backed tech companies that have scaled. His career progressed through the marketing ranks into leadership positions to the point of becoming a CEO for startups. Thus, I was excited to hear about his professional journey and all the stories of scaling companies, plus the lessons learned along the way. Matt recently joined GitKraken, the maker of some of the most popular developer tools in the entire Git ecosystem, as their CEO. In this episode of our podcast, we cover: * Advice on transitioning through the leadership ranks to a CEO position. * Matt’s backgroundl in terms of growing up in Michigan and what he learned from his early experience at Herman Miller. * The story behind the fast track of his career to the point of leading marketing at startups and the details on scaling Applause. * How he transitioned into a CEO position at Mautic and their acquisition by Acquia. * All the details on GitKraken and their growth plans ahead. * And so much more. If you like the show, please remember to subscribe and review us on iTunes, Soundcloud, Spotify, Stitcher, or Google Play.