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Who she is: CEO, Constant Contact Inc., where her mind is on a small army of small-business e-mail marketing software and online survey users.
Education: Bachelor’s degree from the University of Pennsylvania; MBA from the Tuck School at Dartmouth College.
What she’s most proud of: “Knowing that Constant Contact has helped more than 300,000 small organizations build deeper relationships with customers, clients and members is tremendously gratifying.”
What makes her tick: “I am passionate about creating complete solutions for customers. I was always a product geek at heart, but now at Constant Contact I can combine my love of all things ‘product’ with really great ideas about delivery channels, customer service, and support and educations programs to create that total package that customers can use to be successful. I have always been a results-oriented, metrics-driven person, and those attributes have contributed to my success.”
Her advice to other entrepreneurs: Seek advice. “You don’t have to reinvent a lot of things. Other people have done it. Get a lot of advice. You want to be cultivating a set of people who are just one or two steps ahead of you. Once they get three or four steps ahead of you, they forget. They’re on to new challenges.”
On Boston entrepreneurs: “I think the Boston community is immensely generous, but you have to ask the right people. I don’t want to go negative, but there are a lot of people who reach too far for help and guidance. People have been so helpful to me.”
Missing the startup turmoil: “(As leader of a larger company), I have to be very sensitive of exactly who I’m going toe-to-toe with. It was a little more fun when I could just go toe-to-toe with everyone in the company. There’s no question in startup mode you are putting out fires every day. In the early days, we used to meet once a month for one-and-a-half days for a progress report. It’s not like reporting progress to your board. There’s no spin.”
On Gail Goodman, from Shikhar Ghosh:
Harvard Business School professor Ghosh was chairman at Open Market Inc. in the late ’90s, when Goodman joined the e-commerce company.
Steering a company in crisis:
“Internet commerce had moved from being this very narrow thing to being quite a confusing sort of venue. Gail had to balance the needs of a public company with the rapid change in what was happening in the markets. It was very easy to try to be everything to everyone, and she kept us from falling into that trap.”
What are Goodman’s strengths?
“I think of her as being strong, bright and disciplined. In a marketing role when you’re trying to get all the butterflies to go in the same direction, Gail is very good.”
Something others may not know:
“Gail is very much a what-you-see-is-what-you-get kind of person. She hasn’t changed at all. She’s got the same sort of disciplined focus.”
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