Fractional Leaders feat. Andrew Charles

In this blog, we are featuring Andrew Charles, a Fractional Leader with 25+ years in Tech and SaaS, driving growth across start-ups, scale-ups, and global corporations. From scaling revenues to fostering talent success, they share key achievements and expert insights on alignment, customer success, and building competitive advantage.

Can you please introduce yourself and your journey to becoming a Fractional Leader?

I have had a 25+ year career in the Tech and SaaS industry, having worked in large, SME, scale-up growth and start-up businesses.

I am a UK national with strong cultural and emotional intelligence, having lived and worked in Germany, France, Spain & Kenya, led diverse international teams, travelled and done business across Europe, USA, Asia, Middle-East and Africa.

I am a native English speaker, and speak fluent French, strong German, and some Spanish.

I grow B2B and B2C SaaS, AI & tech brands & businesses internationally, across sectors & countries, to increase revenue, margin and EBITDA.

I work with founders / CEOs, other board members / business leaders, cross-functional teams, & PE / VC funds, to drive key strategy, financial modelling, brand, product marketing, creativity, digital, data, people, culture and operations strength, with a focus on customer engagement, experience and long-term preference, monetisation, loyalty and advocacy.

My skills have been honed over 25 years across start-up through scale-up, VC-funded, private-equity owned, and larger businesses – including: fractional CMO, GoReport PropTech Surveying SaaS; fractional CMO, Veremark (SaaS HRTech, series A funding); CMO interim, Wejo (SaaS Connected Vehicle data, SPAC listing); CMO, board member, interim Chair, Cyance SaaS (MarTech); Board adviser, MyFugo.com (AgriTech & MicroFinance, Kenya); CMO interim, Optunli SaaS (HRTech); CMO & board adviser, Aventus Blockchain & Artos SaaS (Live Entertainment); CMO, CPO & board member, Red Box (Financial compliance & call-centre performance SaaS); Vice President, PB software (customer data, location intelligence, logistics & ecommerce SaaS).

Focus on key brand and product partnerships for mutual growth, with examples: Mercedes; Tech Serve Alliance; Tesco; Booking.com; Bloomberg; Amazon; Cap Gemini.

I enjoy human life and dynamics – including guiding my two daughters, travel to and learning about new countries and cultures – and volunteering where I can, investigating new culinary and drinking experiences, being fit and active, watching sport, particularly football & rugby, reading history books, collecting vinyl and seeing live music.

Let’s talk impact, what achievements are you proud of the most?

Consistently delivering the numbers for businesses in which I have worked:

• 400% growth in MRR in B2B MarTech behavior-intent predictive analytics SaaS scale-up business, with 60+ customers across EMEA, USA & Asia. VC funded.
• £12M to £19M (GBP) growth in revenues, and pipeline increased by 40%. New product dev planning and marketing strategy to target Financial Services, for EMEA, USA & Asia markets. PE owned.
• Annual SaaS revenue of $650m (USD). New leadership team hired resulting in award-winning campaigns and 9% increase in app installations. Large cash cow business unit.
• Transformed B2B £1.5M revenues 2021, growing to £4M 2022. Business Development in USA, Europe & Asia, HRTech SaaS scale-up business. Secured VC $8.5M series A funding.
• £10M marketing plan to grow PropTech business. New customer acquisition funnel, operations playbook, data targeting plan, website rebuild for scale-up business. PE owned.
• $1.2Bn (USD) Enterprise revenue quota achievement, with 50% growth in software solutions. Large business.

And focusing on developing talent and stretching the ambitions of people across all the businesses, which resulted in life-long relationships, and excellent professional and life opportunities for many people, across many countries and markets.

Based on your work with start-ups and scale-ups, do you have any pieces of wisdom you could share with businesses in scale-up mode?

• One plan across the business, with team and functional plans and accountabilities cascading.
• Shared objectives for all leaders and talent in the business, to strive for the same numbers and softer goals.
• Board alignment requires working on all the time, to ensure that the exec and non-exec teams work together to deliver the growth required.
• Stakeholder management, with regular communications, to ensure investors and other key stakeholders understand the direction and the timelines for financial returns.
• Churn reduction is vital to avoid decay of the run-rate ARR, which would jeopardise the future worth and prosperity of the business.
• Unique IP product development is a must, in order to ensure competitive advantage, and inherent value for the business and a successful exit.
• Customer Success Counsel, to ensure customers are regularly involved in shaping the success of the business, and their own continued business and satisfaction.
• Humanizing Business with People-centric leadership, to get the very most from talent. And ensuring an emotional human face to the brand and the business is an ever-present.

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If you are a fractional leader and would like to be featured as part of the “Fractional Leaders” series please get in touch.