Former CEO of Cloud Sherpas, David Northington, Brings His Track Record of High-Growth Tech Success to Contino Board
Contino is pleased to announce that David Northington has joined the Contino board.
David brings a proven track record of success at high-growth, venture-backed tech firms, firstly as the COO of Adjoined Consulting and later as the CEO of Cloud Sherpas, a cloud consultancy that was sold to Accenture in 2015.
His experience will help Contino to maintain momentum as it grows: “My role is to offer advice, contribute to problem solving and develop the best ideas around how to take advantage of the opportunities and resolve the challenges that come with high-growth companies,” David commented.
“Contino is already a successful operation: in high-growth mode, positioned as a leader and expanding globally. My career has already taken me through a similar journey and I hope to leverage my experiences in a way that helps Contino move even faster."
Why David Decided to Join the Contino Board
David joined Cloud Sherpas in 2011 when the people count stood at 50. Over the next two years, they bought six additional businesses of similar size, eventually forming a global tech powerhouse of over 1,200 employees. Headquartered in Atlanta, the company had offices all across the world: New York, Boston, San Diego and San Francisco in the US; Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne in Australia; as well as London, Mumbai and Manila.
He joined Contino because he sees the same potential for global expansion: “There’s a similar opportunity here for the kind of growth that I have seen in prior companies. The potential growth trajectory is a fantastic opportunity, because with it comes the ability to bring a tremendous amount of innovation and modern thinking to bear for our clients.”
Maintaining the Momentum of Success
How to utilize the momentum that Contino has already built to secure continued success is now the key question.
“With rapid growth and a great culture, you can attract high-quality talent and thought leaders and translate their incredible energy into innovation within the client's business. Do that and typically clients are very pleased with the result.”
“And nothing is more exciting when building a business – particularly a consultancy! – than watching clients who maybe haven’t had the best experiences with prior attempts at improvement being thrilled with the result that you can deliver”.
“Clients are hungry for that fresh thinking. So I say to them, ‘let me work with you to discover what you really need (not necessarily what you first thought you needed), we’ll make it happen and that will make you happy beyond words!’”.
What Makes a Successful Business?
David identified several key success factors from his experiences that he sees as important for Contino.
“Firstly, work very closely with clients to bring an innovative approach to what they are trying to accomplish. Secondly, bring in an energetic team to deliver the work quickly. Thirdly, maintain a collaboration- and learning-based culture. This should be built from the top down, the bottom up, from the sides inwards - every which way! If possible, gameify learning processes. Lastly, build a strong, consistent delivery function that can scale while maintaining energy and quality. This may not sound exciting, but when done well it really fuels growth, innovation and client satisfaction.”
Contino Leadership
Matt Farmer, Contino Co-founder and CEO, praised David’s experience: “David has an impressive track record of success in this industry, so we’re extremely excited to have him on board to help us help our clients to succeed. His experience guiding a high-growth company through the difficulties of scaling globally while maintaining the level of energy, commitment and quality that sparked our success in the first place will no doubt prove invaluable. We look forward to continuing to scale Contino globally together!”
