Douglas Braun is the CEO of eProductivity Software (ePS), a global software company serving thousands of packaging manufacturers across more than 100 countries. A five-time CEO with a 40-year career in enterprise software, Doug has led teams from Stockholm to São Paulo, promoted internal talent into executive seats, and grown the ePS India office from 60 to 170 people in 18 months. In this episode, he shares the exact frameworks he uses when inheriting a team, promoting from within, running acquisitions as mergers of equals, and deploying AI without cutting headcount.
What you'll learn:
- The 90-day rule Doug uses every time he inherits a company (and why "what you did yesterday is what I want you to do tomorrow" buys him time)
- How to tell the difference between an executive who needs coaching versus one who has hit the ceiling
- Why Doug spends 60-70% of his time on the road and three-quarters of that with employees, not customers
- The 24-hour response promise he makes to all 400 employees (and why he's 98% good at it)
- Why every one of his nine executives personally owns customer accounts, including the CFO and Chief Legal Officer
- The "human in the loop" AI hiring philosophy and why AI is not about cutting 20% of staff
- The M&A rule Doug learned from a Fortune 500 CIO: acquisitions are "slow and painful or fast and painful, pick fast"
- Why he took 17 people from an acquired 28-person company and 11 from his own team (and what that signals)
- The 85/15 to 70/30 tactical-to-strategic shift every founder must make at the $10M mark
Chapters:
00:00 Cold open: coaching vs. hitting the ceiling
01:04 Intro and Doug's 5x CEO journey
02:16 Inheriting a team and managing fear and uncertainty
03:53 When a shared vision is impossible
06:22 The 90-day rule for retaining top talent
07:47 Promoting from within: the UK chief product officer story
10:02 Doug's superpower: getting people on board
11:20 The 24-hour employee response promise
15:49 Leading across Sweden, France, India, and Brazil
17:11 "You won't last": the 5th CEO in 10 years
20:19 Sitting in cubes with the India team
23:09 Hiring in the age of AI
26:51 Why every executive owns customer accounts
33:27 The merger-of-equals M&A hiring framework
40:18 Advice for founders scaling 50 to 150
46:32 Where to find Doug
Where to find Douglas A Braun:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/douglasabraun
ePS (eProductivity Software): https://epssw.com/
Where to find Luiz Cent:
Website: https://latamcent.com/
Who We Hire: https://whowehire.org/
