I’m Shonak

“Nak is one of the most thoughtful, passionate and hard working teammates I've ever had. He is the definition of grit. Nak will roll up his sleeves to get anything done, no matter if it's listed in his job description. He builds diverse, high performing teams, and is exceptional at mentoring and coaching junior teammates to punch above their weight and take on new challenges. Nak is more than just a functional leader—he thinks holistically about the business and cares deeply about every member of the team. He's helped me grow as a CEO.”

— Jackson Noel, co-founder and CEO @ Appcues

“Shonak provided team leadership in a consistent and competent manner, no matter the stresses he was dealing with (which were plentiful in a startup like ours). Despite his unfailingly friendly manner, he was effective at keeping the team on track. Shonak's ability to collect and analyze user feedback was always first-rate. I never felt confused about the purpose of the features I was working on. He is the sort of leader that you always hope to work with - competent, pleasant and consistent.”

— Chris Mortonson, Senior Developer @ Amazon

“Nak is truly a one-of-a-kind leader. From day one I always felt empowered to take risks and take ownership of my work, and I especially appreciated how much he encouraged me to pursue the things that were most important to me. Nak was always there to provide support as a sounding board when I needed help thinking through something, while also providing the space for me to navigate challenges on my own without micromanagement. Some leaders will just tell you the answer or tell you to do it their way and leave it at that, but Nak was really skilled at enabling us to come up with our own solutions and supporting us all to grow as leaders in our own right..”

— Okello Carter, Senior Manager of Customer Success @ Appcues

“Shonak is one of the small circle of people I would hire into any job he thought was worth taking, and accept any job offer from that he deemed worth offering me. He's one the best micro and macro thinkers I've ever worked with. He's one of the highest integrity people I've ever worked with, and he's probably the best human I've ever worked with. I cannot recommend him more highly.”

— Miro Kazakoff, Lecturer @ MIT Sloan School of Management

“Through a calm leadership style that is reflective of his good nature, sharp abrupt changes in the fast-moving startup environment were filtered into manageable tasks that could be acted on and delivered upon quickly.”

— Andrew Varley, VP of Product @ Codility

“Nak has the unique ability to dive into the super granular details of a problem and then lift his head up and inspire a team to work toward a collective vision. His insights came from a place of deep understanding of a product's functionality, customer's needs, and data/analytics. Plus, he's just a gem of a human to work alongside.”

— Margaret Kelsey, Director of Marketing @ Openview VC

“Nak is one of the most caring and thoughtful leaders I've met. Something that I think he does remarkably, which I've found challenging in my own leadership journey, is being hyper-data-driven while also remaining human. He has a way of combining compelling quantitative metrics while still bringing qualitative and supportive insights to his teams. He inspires loyalty and performance in everyone that works with him.”

— Mercer Smith Looper, VP of CX @ Venafi

“Nak's a master of many trades. When it was time for him to move on, I fought hard to keep him and missed him deeply when he was gone. Very reliable, hard worker, with a great attitude. I felt comfortable trusting him with the most sensitive matters, and as a principled person, he could always be relied upon to do the right thing, no matter how difficult. Even though he has been gone for several years, Testive has signs of Nak everywhere.”

— Tom Rose, co-founder @ Testive

If I were to start a new company tomorrow, Nak would be one of the first people I'd try to recruit. He is incredibly thoughtful, diligent, dependable, kind, and perseverant, all the while being an absolute pleasure to work with. When I need feedback/input, Nak is a trusted sounding board. When I need to be absolutely sure something gets done and done well, Nak does just that. There are few, if any, people who truly care about the work that they're doing and the success of the company they work for more than Nak

— Eric Keating, VP of Marketing @ Appcues

“Nak is a natural born leader. He’s thoughtful and authentic while making strategic, data-driven decisions. Nak challenged me more than most, in the most positive way. While giving some direction when needed, Nak allowed me the space to lead projects outside of my comfort zone. He was always clear and consistent with his feedback, and I’ve taken all of his thoughts into my new role and can feel myself applying things he taught me. It’s also easy to maintain things as status quo but Nak would always push our team forward to think in different ways and optimize every process we put in place. Nak is a friend, a teammate, a teacher, and a leader and anyone that can work with him will feel this.”

— Jackie Smith, Director of Customer Onboarding @ Privy (Attentive)