The Guest – Alexander Safonov, CTO at Visualfabriq
Alexander Safonov is the CTO at Visualfabriq, an innovative company providing revenue forecasting and optimisation software to its customers in the consumer-packaged goods industry. Alexander is an experienced CTO with a proven track record of 20+ years in engineering high-tech solutions within security and fintech domains. He specialises in leading diverse cross-functional teams across product, technology, and innovation fronts.
Scaling A Company and Maturing an AI Product
AI is a pivotal tool in software development, offering automation and efficiency at every stage – from idea generation to user communication. Companies that leverage AI successfully, and incorporate AI functionalities into their products and services stand to benefit from increased customer satisfaction and high growth.
With their innovative approach to revenue forecasting that leverages AI to analyse customer data, sales history, and financial information, Visualfabriq is a great example of such companies.
Some of the main topics covered in this episode include:
- Lessons learned in scaling a tech company
- Strategies for scaling a technology product
- The growing role of AI in software engineering
- Applications of AI in data processing and forecasting
Q: Do you have any advice on how to keep the product and tech roadmap aligned within an organisation, particularly during periods of fast growth?
I would start with saying, there can’t be multiple roadmaps. There should be no standalone technological roadmap, and then another business roadmap. Always have one roadmap with multiple stakeholders, and decision making processes, but one battlefield where you solve all the misalignments.
Secondly, have a clear prioritisation approach. We use RICE, which is, Reach, Impact, Confidence, and Effort prioritisation, and that gives us the field for assessment, so you can prioritise much more easily. It could be any system of prioritisation, but just follow the ground rules, decide what is important for your organisation, and then prioritise your roadmap based on that.
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