startup-leadership
(6)
Scale Yourself
Scale Yourself is a coaching and content platform for venture-backed startup founders, built by Amy Buechler - a licensed psychotherapist who spent nearly five years as Y Combinator's first in-house founder coach. It combines one-on-one coaching, a vetted network of ex-founder coaches, and a free framework library called The User Manual for Founder Psychology to help founders scale their psychology, relationships, and leadership alongside their companies.
Michael Mathieu
Michael Mathieu is CEO and board director of Vistify, Inc., a Santa Ana-based restaurant technology company whose vMenu platform lets QSR and fast-casual brands design, schedule, and sync digital menus in under an hour. Montreal-born and a City College of New York economics grad, he previously led video-ad network YuMe through IPO preparation, ran SET Media (later Conversant), presided over Freedom Communications' interactive arm, and founded Mecka in the NIL space. He joined Vistify in October 2024 and closed a Series A led by Craveworthy Brands and Branded Hospitality Ventures in mid-2025.
John Marshall
John Marshall is the President and CEO of Userful, the software company that swapped racks of proprietary AV hardware for a browser and a network cable. Named CEO in October 2018, he pivoted a video-wall vendor into a software-defined platform for enterprise-wide operational awareness, the Userful Infinity Platform, now used by hundreds of enterprises across control rooms, command centers and digital signage. A Northwestern and University of Michigan graduate with 25-plus years leading wireless, IoT and networking startups, he ran Userful to 50% year-over-year enterprise sales growth in 2024 with 80% of revenue flowing through a global channel of roughly 100 partners. Off the clock he is a former backcountry guide and adventure racer turned birder.
Liang Crow
Liang Crow is listed in business-contact directories as Chief Executive Officer of Juicero, the San Francisco cold-press juice company that became a defining parable of Silicon Valley hardware ambition. Juicero built a Wi-Fi-connected countertop press paired with proprietary single-serving produce packs, raised roughly $120 million from marquee investors, and priced its first machine at $699. In April 2017 Bloomberg reporters showed the packs could be squeezed by hand, the company suspended sales that September, and it was defunct by December. Crow's name is attached to the CEO chair in Apollo and similar records; beyond that role listing, little independent public biography is verifiable.
Brent Chudoba
Brent Chudoba is the CEO of Biteable, a remote-first video creation platform that has helped more than seven million people make studio-quality videos. He spent a decade as a senior operator (COO, CFO, CRO and GM roles) at some of the internet's best-known productivity companies including Calendly, Thrive Global, PicMonkey and SurveyMonkey, where he was employee number fourteen. Before operating, he was an investor at Spectrum Equity and an investment banker at Piper Jaffray. Today he also teaches a cohort-based course on Maven, Startup Leadership Unleashed, distilling what he learned scaling teams.
Julie Brinkman
Julie Brinkman is CEO of Beyond, the leading revenue management platform for short-term rental operators. She joined as COO on March 2, 2020 - just 10 days before global COVID travel bans - and navigated the company through the pandemic to emerge stronger, earning her promotion to CEO in February 2021. A University of Michigan Ross School of Business alumna, Brinkman spent a decade at Deloitte before sharpening her growth instincts at Groupon and Hireology. She now leads a global team of ~310 across 30 countries, focused on replacing gut-feel pricing with data-driven revenue optimization for property managers worldwide.