I led product for a global SaaS brand, built a fintech startup inside a bank, ran a $50M business with full P&L ownership, and led the digital transformation of Canada's Yellow Pages.

This work isn’t about finding product–market fit. It’s about what comes next.

That transition—where intuition fades and complexity breaks the operating model—is where I operate.

Most leadership teams don’t lack ambition. They lack system coherence. Product, distribution, and commercialization often evolve independently. Scaling requires bringing them back into alignment.

That is the gap I close.

My playbook is consistent: step into complexity, realign the roadmap, and design leverage where execution has become the bottleneck.

OPERATING EXPERIENCE

Chief Product Officer – Unbounce 
Recruited by ownership to realign product and go-to-market in a PE-backed environment where growth had stalled. Following a strategic restructuring to restore efficiency, I tightened alignment across Engineering, Product, and PMM—and launched partnerships as a primary growth lever.

Head of Ampli – Royal Bank of Canada 
Built a consumer fintech startup from zero inside Canada’s largest bank. Navigated enterprise stakeholder gravity without diluting product intent.

President – Mediative 
Ran a standalone media business with 110 staff and ~$50M in revenue. Full P&L ownership where strategy only mattered if it showed up in margins.

VP – Yellow Pages Group 
Led distribution for a massive digital transformation. Structured partnerships with Google, Facebook, and Apple that embedded the business into global ecosystems.

HOW I WORK

I don’t operate at arm’s length. I work with a small number of leadership teams because this work requires trust, decision proximity, and real accountability.

My role is to surface the system you’re actually running—and help you make decisions while you still have leverage.

FOCUS AREAS

🚀 Commercialization Aligning product ambition with a business model that scales profitably.

🤝 Distribution & Partnerships Turning opportunistic deals into repeatable systems. Sales captures value; distribution creates it.

📈 Operational Scale Rebuilding structures that quietly break as complexity increases.

Based in Calgary, working globally.

If you’re navigating the transition from momentum to durable scale, let’s talk.

More code shipped in 3-weeks than the decade before. 

When a statement makes you stop scrolling. 

Not one to simply post what I see on other platforms but this is worth a share. 

When it comes from Tobi, you need to pay attention.

Darby Sieben

Aa digital media & technology professional with over 25-years of experiences with a focus on digital marketing (SMB and National), product development and transformation management

Considered an impact leader who was critical in helping transform one of Canada's largest media companies (Yellow Pages Group) from a traditional print to a digital powerhouse by focusing on product innovation, strategic business development deals that elevated YP’s digital presence across Canada and globally and lead the business side of strategic M&A activity. 

Currently the Chief Product Officer for Unbounce leading engineering, product management, product marketing, UX/design and business development focused on using ML/AI throughout its product features to help marketers create and optimize their marketing efforts. 

Prior to Unbounce, Darby was the co-founder and head RBC Ampli Inc., a Royal Bank of Canada Venture business leading the business from ideation to public launch and scale. Built Ampli into one of Canada’s leading cashback mobile apps and started the integration of Ampli into RBC’s Avion Rewards program. 

An active investor and mention in several start-ups as well as an LP for number of early stage focused funds where value is added through advice on strategic business deals, product development, team management and growth. 


Working with C-Level executives to formulate strategy with a clear action plans and measurable KPI's in the areas of user experience, user growth, digital revenue growth and margin growth. 

The ability to work in a fast-changing environment, connecting strategy to actions, motivating, and rallying employees, maximizing resources for growth and a focus on bottom-line profitability have all been key to my success.

Summary of Strengths

* Building and Inspiring High-Performance Teams
* Strategic Planning and Execution
* Full P&L Responsibility, Financial Planning, Compensation Structures
* Partner Negotiation, Management and Development
* M&A experience in evaluating, due diligence and integration/post-transaction
* Private and public company experience as Officer of Yellow Pages
* Digital Product Development from Concept to Decommission
* Ability to communicate strategy and execute plans at all levels of the organization from managers to technical to c-suite/board

Executive Advisor | Product, Partnerships & Commercialization | Ex-CPO Unbounce | Head of Ampli (RBC) | VP YPG & President Mediative

A neat visualization of the where the money is going in this AI boom. 

Created by James Eagle, "The AI money machine! Well, it's almost impossible to map. But someone has got to do it. This is the circular flow of capital through the AI infrastructure economy from 2019 to 2032. A rose-tinted version that's being priced in."

Compounding. 

The one lesson that has paid me dividends. 

Learn this and good things usually happen. 

Knowledge, Investments, relationships, leading teams, growing businesses, doesn't matter - everything compounds, good or bad. 

Recognizing the intersections between these areas can serve as a powerful accelerator.

Additionally, distinguishing between noise, actionable insights, and observable data creates another layer of compounding benefits. 

Doesn't mean you won't fail. You will at times. It's all about affecting the % chance of success. 

This video from Warren Buffet is 70 seconds of gold. 

"I will say this about investing: everything you learn is
cumulative. What I learned at 20 is useful to me now.

What I learned at 25 is useful to me now." "Knowing what to leave out is just as important as knowing what to focus on."

Looking at the latest AI Traffic Share numbers from SimilarWeb, the Google team must be feeling like Stanley Ipkiss.

Google has its mojo back, useful product + distribution + strategic plan to disrupt your self is a winning combination.

If you zoom out far enough, 2026 comes down to a simple question:

Can a historic tech boom outrun structural fragility?

To map that tension, I fed the 2026 projections of the “prophets of boom and doom” — Galloway, Andreessen, Bremmer, Eisman, and the All-In crew — into NotebookLM to see where their narratives converge and where they collide.

The result isn’t a forecast — it’s a battle map:

The Engine: A tech super-cycle (the coiled spring)
The Brake: Structural fragility (the crumbling foundation)
The Stakes: Productivity vs politics

The attached PDF is the synthesis.

The NotebookLM link is in the comments for anyone who wants to interact the sources directly, ask questions or see some of the infographics produced. 

We’ll see how this ages next January. (Hopefully before the grid melts.)

Coiled Spring vs Crumbling Foundation

I continue to be polite to my AI tools. They have memory. Call it a hedge, just in case. 

I posted this 8-years ago when I testing my first AI Assistant. An incredible product at the time. 

Led to an interesting discussion with HR when I put Amy on my Org Chart. 

Really demonstrated to me the power of what was too come.

Thanks Sebastien Provencher for your words. Finally lead to my article. Thanks Dennis R. Mortensen for making such a great product in x.ai. https://lnkd.in/eNrffvv

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