John joined Madrona as a Venture Partner in 2021, and his investments include TaxBit, Route, Clozd, and TaskHuman.
Journey to Madrona
Most recently, John was chief ecosystem officer at Qualtrics, where he helped the company define and create an ecosystem of services, consulting, and technology partners for the experience management category, launch the Qualtrics Developer Platform, execute acquisitions in the SMB and industry thought leadership domains, and negotiate the largest sale of a private software company in history.
Before Qualtrics, John was chief corporate development officer at SAP SE, where he was responsible for M&A and strategic business development. He was also the chief strategy officer of the business network & applications group, which housed several of the company’s public cloud acquisitions, including Concur, Ariba, and Fieldglass. John joined SAP when the company acquired Concur.
At Concur, John was EVP of corporate strategy, a broad role focused on extending the footprint of Concur across multiple dimensions. John founded and managed the Concur Perfect Trip Fund, which invested in businesses in and around the travel industry. He also helped extend the company’s operations in India, Brazil, France, the United Kingdom, and Japan and instigated numerous acquisitions, including TripIt and the small business expense management portfolio of ADP. The work he did building the company helped lead to the sale of Concur to SAP for what was, at the time, the largest cloud software acquisition to date.
Lessons learned
- Be transparent: Share information openly with everyone.
- Empower people: Encourage informed decision-making; practice forgiveness, not permission.
- Be accountable: Own decisions and their consequences as a team.
- Speak truth courageously: Give and seek constructive, honest feedback throughout every step of your journey.
When he’s not in the office…
John is an avid runner and sports fan. He and his wife, Juliette, live in Fort Worth, Texas, and are the proud parents of two.
Noteworthy
John has served on numerous corporate boards, and he also serves as a fellow at Sapphire Ventures. He currently serves on the Board of Regents of Santa Clara University, where he is an advisor to SCU’s Black Corporate Board Readiness Program. He was president of the Alumni Association in 2017-18 and a mentor in the Global Social Benefit Institute at the Miller Center for Social Entrepreneurship in 2018. John graduated cum laude from the honors program at Santa Clara University, where he majored in accounting, minored in music, and played on the rugby team.
