CFO Tyler Sloat hopes recent "company best" performance on lowering churn, new initiatives taking root and enterprise push all augur well for the future
Johanna Jackman (left), Chief people officer, Freshworks and Mika Yamamoto, Chief customer and marketing officer, Freshworks
Even when Freshworks was a much smaller startup, with Girish Mathrubootham just beginning his foray into the US market, one thing reporters always got to hear was about his ability to surround himself with exceptional colleagues and soak up everything he could learn from them.
Mathrubootham, in the past, has described such people as those who’ve “been there done that,” whether it’s someone who’s helped take a software company in the US to its IPO or a senior executive who’s seen what a global technology business looks like with $20 billion in revenue.
The appointment of Mika Yamamoto as the company’s new chief customer and marketing officer looks like another win for Mathrubootham in that tradition. It also comes at a time when the company is decidedly shifting towards enterprise customers from its traditional customer base of SMB buyers, seeking stability and then expansion towards the stated aim of $1 billion 2026 revenues.
Yamamoto, and the recent appointment of Johanna Jackman as chief people officer, seem to more or less complete the top leadership lineup for Mathrubootham, for Freshworks’ next phase of growth, alongside president Dennis Woodside, chief product officer Prakash Ramamurthy, and CFO Tyler R Sloat.
Jackman led people teams at Pure Storage, LinkedIn, Microsoft and most recently served as chief people officer at Airtable “during a hyper growth phase”, according to a Freshworks press release from August 28.