Post by Paul Marcombes

I "demoted" myself from managing 100+ engineers to a team of 4. 𝗔𝗻𝗱 𝘄𝗲’𝘃𝗲 𝗻𝗲𝘃𝗲𝗿 𝗯𝘂𝗶𝗹𝘁 𝗳𝗮𝘀𝘁𝗲𝗿. People often view moving from an executive leadership role back to a hands-on position as a step backward. For me, it was the only way forward. Here is why I made the switch to launch Unytics: 1️⃣ 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗟𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗲𝗿𝘀𝗵𝗶𝗽 𝗗𝗶𝗹𝗲𝗺𝗺𝗮 I loved the strategic leverage of being Head of Data at Nickel. But I realized I deeply missed being in the trenches. 2️⃣ 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗦𝘁𝗮𝗿𝘁𝘂𝗽 𝗜𝗹𝗹𝘂𝘀𝗶𝗼𝗻 I thought about founding a VC-backed company. Then I talked to founders. I didn't want to trade one boss for a board of investors, and I didn't want to chase random ideas. I wanted to solve real data problems. 3️⃣ 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗦𝘄𝗲𝗲𝘁 𝗦𝗽𝗼𝘁 I got the opportunity of a hands-on, freelance Head of Data Platform role at Optic 2000 to rebuild their ecosystem from scratch. I said GO! And I'm amazed with our 𝟭𝟬𝘅 𝗯𝘂𝗶𝗹𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗽𝗮𝗰𝗲 at the Claude Code era... Massive thanks to Stephane Jeannin and Yoann Boudon for trusting me with the vision. 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗾𝘂𝗲𝘀𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗳𝗼𝗿 𝗺𝘆 𝗳𝗲𝗹𝗹𝗼𝘄 𝗹𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗲𝗿𝘀: If you could delete your meetings and go back to building today, would you? Or is the title too hard to let go? 👇 Full story on the transition in the comments.