Thoughtful. Adaptable. Practical. A CEO with a track record of succeeding, surviving, and thriving in the most complex environments. Exploring ways to help companies survive, reboot, and succeed.

I’m a turnaround, figure-it-out, and make-it-happen exec-for-hire. I work with investors and founders whose startups are at a critical inflection point, like a revenue plateau or a changing market. I get startups unstuck and ignite growth in tough circumstances with a steady hand and good humor. I also know and work with the best people and can spin up fractional startup SWAT teams in days, not weeks.

Companies seek me out for expertise in implementing strategic vision, tapping into untapped markets, launching disruptive BD & go-to-market strategies in B2B SaaS, MarTech, tech-enabled services, marketplace-based platforms, and off-the-beaten path industries. 

I’ve also taken over for founders multiple times, know the patterns, and know how to build successful relationships in tense environments. 

I am currently working as a GTM consultant to a handful of high-potential companies with many of my former executive team members who scaled my last company to a successful exit. I’m opportunistically also pursuing the right fit for my next CEO & board advisory roles as I continue to help companies survive, reboot, & succeed.

Career Highlights: 
As CEO of Verblio, I grew a stalled, bootstrapped SMB platform from $2M/year to $12MM ARR and to a successful exit, leading all aspects of pivoting, scaling, & leading an investment process with a focus on branding, product-led growth, product development, & implementing industry-leading freelancer opportunities. Scaled employee headcount from 10 to 60 employees, with 1000+ contractors. Earned 3 Inc. 5000 placements, a Top 20 Fastest Growing Bootstrapped SaaS & a Colorado Company to Watch Award. Successfully exited in 2024.

As a VP at LiveOps, I built 5+ new businesses, including a $35M/year partnership marketing business. I have deep experience scaling startups, serving on the LiveOps management team to scale the company from $8M to $150M, growing from 35 to 450 people. 

As a VP of a SaaS energy startup and Head of Data Ventures at Western Union, I brought core products into emerging markets, expanded new sales & marketing channels, & seized new product development opportunities to achieve impressive growth.

Created & co-developed 10+ product lines earning $350M+ in aggregate revenue

As a consultant to the Brazilian Development Bank in Rio de Janeiro and a reporter in Santiago, Chile, I have experience working internationally in Portuguese and Spanish.

Hobbies:

Ultimate Frisbee, history, telemark skiing, mountain biking, squash, guitar playing, hosting house concerts & spending time with my teenage boys.

Turning setbacks into scale-ups and plateaus into pivots.
That’s the work I do now — and the focus of this week’s episode of Practical Pivots, where I flip the mic and let my friend and purpose-guide Suneet Bhatt interview me on my show.
We lept into the quagmires founders face when growth slows, like:
*What to do when your ideal customer profile no longer feels the same about you
*When your go-to-market strategy feels like a greatest hits album from 2021
*How to diagnose if your problem is your messaging, product, channel, or market - or e) all of the above

Over the past year, I’ve worked quietly with founders and investors as a growth acceleration consultant and fractional Chief Growth Officer — helping $3M–$15M companies reignite growth.
This episode shares my own startup experiences that shaped this work, along with real-life reignition examples from my recent engagements.

Please check out the full episode in the comments below. If you’re a founder or investor facing a “what now?” moment — please check it out.
And if it sparks some ideas, let’s talk.

Here's a short clip where I break down the three areas of core growth challenges.

Steve Pockross

I’m a post-exit CEO who works with founders and their investors to spark growth through the $5M–$15M revenue plateau, and to evolve through the startup scramble

A CFO of mine once told me – When you say “strategic”, I hear “we’re going to lose money”.

This is the crux of the divide between the growth side of the company that is tasked with innovating, creating, and scaling in an ambiguous environment with no clear paths, but very clear needs. Versus the side of the company tasked first with the black and white decisions of remaining solvent and applying precious resources as prudently as possible.

Where Hopium meets skepticism.

How do we navigate through this divide to find the growth levers that boths sides desire?

Having lead strategic initiatives, sales and marketing campaigns, and new products for most of my career, I’ve spent two decades thinking about the challenge of how growth leaders gain buy-in from our other internal partners.

Here are my thoughts on how to keep both sides working together more like peanut butter and chocolate, and less like oil and vinegar. 

Big thanks to Bill Slakey for being so darn quotable all these years later.

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