Olivia Nottebohm
COO, Box. On 2 shows, 1 appearance, plus 1 compilation re-air not counted. The Shows tab opens the full record on each.
executiveoperatorLinkedIn ↗box.com ↗
Olivia Nottebohm serves as the Chief Operating Officer at Box, leading global go-to-market strategy across sales, marketing, and customer success. She previously served as Chief Revenue Officer at Notion, Chief Operating Officer at Dropbox, Vice President at Google Cloud, and Partner at McKinsey & Company.
2shows
1appearances
33statements
2resolved
1supported
0contradicted
50%fully supported
10said about them ↓ Everything Olivia Nottebohm said on any show that made the record, most notable first. Each card names its show and opens the statement there.
Nottebohm: Offer slow-growing product lines for free instead of reviving them
“It's almost better to just cut off the branch and say, you know, that was a great entry. That gives us a great halo. We'll actually just offer that for free now, but we're not going to try to resuscitate this piece of the business back up to a 110% growth when…”
Nottebohm: Companies should not make building decisions solely to optimize revenue
“You never want to make decisions as you're Building to optimize for revenue. You really, really have to be careful not to do that. In fact, I would almost recommend that you take away things that pull you in the direction of something that would make you optim…”
Nottebohm: Job interviews are highly likely to yield false positives
“I view interviews as Highly, highly likely to get a false positive. Less likely to get a false negative.”
Notion CEO Ivan Zhao still personally interviews every candidate hired
“Ivan still interviews everyone, which I deeply, deeply respect.”
Nottebohm: Only 15% of SaaS companies sustain 60% growth past $100M ARR
“Only 15% of those companies who are growing at over 60% as they reach a hundred million ARR Are able to maintain that growth.”
Nottebohm: SaaS companies must acquire digital natives for future enterprise growth
“You're not only acquiring SMBs, but you're trying to be very thoughtful about acquiring digital natives because they will be your future enterprise players”
Nottebohm: GTM teams must operate cohesively while isolating team outcomes
“You operate as a cohesive engine, but actually you do isolate out who is driving what outcome.”
Nottebohm: Executive span of control of eight direct reports is optimal
“I do believe in more of a flat structure, so a span of control of eight I feel is very comfortable, especially in my role where I'm really not trying to do the job of any one of the functional leaders on my team, right?”
Nottebohm: Executive leaders must not directly own individual work streams
“At a certain point, you're never owning a piece of work yourself, because that then takes away from your ability to coordinate and look forward and think strategically.”
Nottebohm: Keeping your role in a hyperscale startup equals an annual promotion
“One thing I think about in these hyperscale companies is by definition, you're almost getting promoted once a year anyway, if you just continue to keep the scope you have, because, you know, you continue to double your function, you're responsible for double t…”
Nottebohm: Executive leaders must absorb pressure rather than pass down anxiety
“And I think part of as you decide that you want to try to help a company grow and be in a leadership position, part of what you're signing up to is absorbing the pressure. That is part of your function. If you just take the pressure and pass down the anxiety, …”
Nottebohm: Leaders who constantly question their standing operate at half speed
“And a leader who is constantly questioning what their leadership, their own leadership thinks of them is operating at half speed, right?”
Nottebohm: Positive reference checks lack credibility if they cannot name a weakness
“People know that all of the good things they said about the person aren't credible if they really can't note a weakness.”
Nottebohm: Delay hiring rather than make compromised hires
“Do not make that higher out of deep necessity, and think that you're just going to solve it. It's actually better to go a little longer and wait for the right talent, even though it's hard to operate in that environment. But in the long run, it's the right dec…”
Nottebohm: Startup leaders must make defensible decisions rather than pleasing everyone
“When you make decisions, you always have to have a rationale that you can stand up in front of an entire company and explain. The reason I feel really strongly about that is no matter what decision you make, someone's going to be unhappy. So if you find yourse…”
Nottebohm: 60%+ growth at $100M ARR yields 5x higher valuation
“Companies who are growing at over 60% as they hit a hundred million in ARR are valued five times more than companies that are growing just a little less than that. Say at 20 to 60% as they hit a hundred million ARR.”
Nottebohm: 60% growth at $100M ARR makes $1B ARR 8x more likely
“Companies who are growing over 60% as they hit a hundred million ARR are eight times more likely to ever make it to a billion in ARR.”
Nottebohm: Only 15% of fast-growing $100M ARR SaaS firms sustain pace to $1B
“Those companies that were pacing at 60% growth as they hit a hundred million in ARR, only 15% of them were able to maintain that growth as they punch through to a billion dollars.”
Nottebohm: Software growth spans three waves: top-down, bottom-up, community-led
“Alright, so I would posit that there are three types of growth. One is top-down, the other is bottom-up, and wave three is community-led.”
Nottebohm: Top-down sales drove most software companies to $5B revenue
“By the way, this is how SAP and Salesforce made it all the way up and over to the five billion mark, and if you remember that list, the majority of the companies who got to five billion actually got there this way.”
Nottebohm: Community must power every SaaS funnel stage, not just top-of-funnel
“Ok, so I would also like to posit that community is a force that should power every stage of the funnel. Not just the top of the funnel, as one would think, but actually should really shine in the middle of the funnel, and really also have real impact in the b…”
Nottebohm: Notion localized in South Korea with zero full-time staff on ground
“Last year, we, ah, announced that we were localizing in Korea, And we had no one full-time on the ground, and yet people from this group hosted media interviews, did sessions, answered Q&A, and there were even a couple people that led a session that had 8000 a…”
Notion reserves its internal customer success team exclusively for enterprise customers
“We still use our customer success team, but we really keep it quite small, and we've been using it only for enterprise customers,”
The other half of the tape: Olivia Nottebohm's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 10 times in 1 episode across the shows. every mention, with the transcript →
Who brings them up most Aaron Levie 10
Every mention by year
tap a year for its mentions
the Official SaaStr Podcast 10
One line per show, most statements first. The link opens Olivia's full record on that show: the calibration, argument clarity, speaking style and every statement made there.
| Show | Role there | Eps | Statements | Record | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 20VCLEDGER | COO, Box | 1 | 19 | 50% 1/2 | full record on 20VC → |
| SAASTRLEDGER | COO, Box | 0 +1 | 14 | — | full record on the Official SaaStr Podcast → |