11: Leading oDesk to Market Leader

Execepreneur: From Executive to Entrepreneur

Gary Swart joined oDesk in 2005 as CEO and led the company for over 8 years, turning into the market leader in the online work industry. It was the first workplace to reach $1 billion in work, and has over 5 million freelancers and thousands of jobs posted daily. Gary led the company through a merger with #2 player eLance before leaving to join Polaris. In this Episode he shares with us his path to oDesk and how he was able to grow the company the way he did. In next week's episode (part 2), we dig more into the topic of focus, iterating quickly, why he thinks being an execepreneur is a good idea - and why Gary’s ok being hit by a pitch. This week's questions:

1. Set the stage for us - how did you become the CEO of oDesk?
2. What did you grow it to become the world’s largest online workplace with over 5 million freelancers?

For more information about this episode: www.launchandlead.com/gary.