Claire Hughes Johnson
Claire Hughes Johnson is the former COO at Stripe, which she helped scale from a small startup to the legendary company it is today. She also spent close to 10 years at Google, where she filled several executive roles, including VP of Global Online Sales and Director of Sales and Ops for Gmail, YouTube, Google Apps, and AdWords. Claire shares invaluable insights from her upcoming book, Scaling People, on how to successfully build and scale organizations.
Planning & Prioritization Skills
Maintaining forward momentum is a critical career driver, requiring individuals to take initiative in decision-making when authority is ambiguous.
"If you're not sure who the decision maker is, one, it's probably you. And I'd rather you act that way than not because you're going to like slow the whole company down. Follow a process and get it don..."
Team & Organization Skills
Limiting formal job titles in early growth stages helps maintain organizational optionality and reinforces a culture where expertise matters more than rank.
"The minute you start titling a lot, you're signaling hierarchy and authority. And the culture piece to Stripe still today, which is I think we could use more, at least more overt trappings of structur..."