Paul Lucas

Commerce & Revenue Optimization ​ Today, recommendations are the default in commerce—guests expect relevant options, not generic offers. Onboard is no different. ​ ​ Ascendion helps cruise lines use AI-driven personalization to make it easy for guests to discover, explore, and buy—whether it’s dining, retail, or excursions. With predictive offers and tailored recommendations, every interaction has the potential to increase spend and satisfaction. ​ ​ When commerce feels natural and helpful, it becomes part of the experience, rather than a distraction. ​ ​ Learn more: https://lnkd.in/guDUnmNc ​ ​ #CruiseLine #Ascendion #FutureOfWork #EngineeringAI #DigitalCommerce ​

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If you’re a CEO/founder or PE operator and your tech org is: ❌ Shipping late ❌ Stuck in reactive mode ❌ Struggling through the Series A/B jump, or post-acquisition integration or after a major release It’s not “a delivery problem.” It’s an operating model problem. At the inflection point, the old playbook breaks: what worked at 10 engineers fails at 40… and breaks again across multiple products/teams. That’s where I come in as a fractional CTO: - Spot platform and delivery risks before they hit revenue and retention - Rebuild execution rituals (prioritization, ownership, release confidence) without derailing the roadmap - Align architecture + team structure to your value-creation plan (growth, margin, or exit timeline) If you’re feeling the strain of growth, I can help you turn “busy and reactive” into predictable shipping, and a platform that scales. #CTO #SaaS #StartupScale #PrivateEquity #TechStrategy

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Finally had time this weekend to dig into "Aligning for Impact: A Shared Definition and Multi-Stakeholder Insights" on BHI in California from Kristina M. and the outstanding California Quality Collaborative team. It was a privilege to contribute to this work on behalf of Meadows Mental Health Policy Institute. This brief clearly reflects what many of us see across the states where we work: • Definitions drive payment and scale. Without a shared definition of behavioral health integration, reimbursement, contracting, and data reporting remain inconsistent. • Multi-stakeholder alignment is the implementation strategy. Convening payers, providers, and purchasers is essential to sustainable financing and system transformation. • Integration is essential, not optional. Embedding behavioral health in primary care improves access, outcomes, and whole-person care. When providers, plans, purchasers, and policymakers operate from a common understanding of BHI, we reduce fragmentation and accelerate adoption of evidence-based models like Collaborative Care. It was also encouraging to see additional “flavors” of integrated care highlighted, including Texas programs such as CPAN, BHIG, and TCHATT. These models show that while Collaborative Care is a strong foundation, states can also benefit from a portfolio approach that includes e-consultation, co-location, and pediatric access programs to meet diverse population needs. Thank you to Kristina and the CQC team for advancing the conversation and offering practical guidance the field can act on. https://lnkd.in/ejf4HpqN #CollaborativeCare #BehavioralHealthIntegration #MentalHealthPolicy #WholePersonCare

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CPTO Revolution: Why SaaS Companies Are Merging Product and Tech Leadership I’ve lived the pain of siloed leadership and the inefficiencies it creates many times. And I’ve also seen how tightly integrated product and tech can transform not just delivery, but outcomes. Traditional org charts are no longer keeping up. The most competitive SaaS companies aren’t hiring separate CTOs and CPOs anymore - they’re bringing both roles under one roof with CPTOs. This isn’t about headcount optimization. It’s about reducing friction and moving faster in a world where complexity is climbing and customer expectations evolve by the week. Here’s the core issue: when product and engineering leadership are separate, you’re always playing a game of telephone. Product defines what’s needed. Engineering estimates and negotiates. Product pushes. Engineering pushes back. Handoffs everywhere. Every step is a delay. A CPTO owns the entire journey - from insight to shipped product. One person accountable. One vision. One continuous flow. And it works. Companies running this model are seeing up to 40% faster go-to-market. Less tech debt. Clearer priorities. Higher team velocity. What Actually Changes 1. Aligned Metrics You stop optimizing for isolated outcomes. Product isn’t chasing adoption while engineering shields uptime. Both roll into shared business goals. 2. AI Gets Strategic With unified leadership, AI isn’t a bolt-on. It becomes core to how you design, build, and validate products - through data, feedback loops, and automation. 3. Developer Experience Matters Platform engineering gets the attention it deserves. Internal tools align with product delivery, and suddenly teams aren’t waiting - they’re shipping. UX maturity, platform architecture, technical scalability - all of it becomes a single continuum. You’re not just improving “process”; you’re aligning every decision to what users need and what’s feasible to build. The CPTO Skillset This isn’t a hybrid role - it’s an integrated one. You need the technical depth to guide architecture and the product judgment to say no to overengineering. You talk to engineers about latency and reliability, and to the board about market traction and differentiation. As AI accelerates software development, what matters is orchestration—of systems, teams, and strategy. You need to see the whole board. Cloud infra spend is growing ~10% yearly, mostly due to AI. That spend needs direction. CPTOs are the ones who can match innovation speed with platform efficiency. Companies clinging to the old CTO/CPO split are playing a slower game. Integration is no longer optional - it’s a competitive advantage. So—what’s keeping your org from making the leap?

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“San Francisco is the global hub of innovation, technology, and venture capital,” Lurie said in a statement. “And with yet another investment from leading institutions of higher education, we are accelerating our city’s recovery and strengthening our city center as a place where people live, work, play, and learn.” 

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Hardcore cultures measure hours. Progressive cultures measure outcomes. Betterworks CEO Doug Dennerline warns that RTO mandates and “996-style” schedules risk pushing top talent away. Instead, continuous performance models keep people engaged and businesses growing. Outcomes > hours. https://gag.gl/Wgtz5C

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I am very excited to share that Salesforce is partnering with Google to support the new Universal Commerce Protocol. We are living through a truly transformative era in commerce. For years, the industry focused on digitizing the transaction. Today, we are shifting toward Agentic Commerce—where the goal isn’t just to provide a platform, but to provide an intelligent partner that acts on behalf of both the consumer and the merchant. Developing at the frontier of commerce requires a dual focus. On one hand, there is a deep, foundational set of customer needs—trust, speed, and seamlessness—that remain as vital as ever. On the other hand, we are facing novel machine learning challenges that require entirely new architectural thinking. One of the biggest realizations we’ve had at Salesforce is that the "traditional" pillars of the digital experience can no longer exist in silos. While it’s natural to think of Search, Personalization, and Agentic Discovery as separate pieces of the puzzle, in reality, they are inextricably linked. It is impossible to solve for one in isolation; each must inform and empower the others. To build a truly agentic experience, these systems must share a common language and a unified understanding of intent. By partnering with Google on the Universal Commerce Protocol, we are establishing a critical baseline for that unified future. While UCP is a vital step toward interoperability, it is not "the solution" but a step. It provides the framework upon which we will build, serving as the foundation for the even more sophisticated, proprietary innovations we are currently developing at Salesforce to fully realize the promise of an agentic world. Check out the full announcement here: https://lnkd.in/gmzyufJS #Salesforce #Google #AgenticCommerce #AI #Ecommerce #MachineLearning #Innovation #FutureOfCommerce

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A new pricing model was born: Credits. It’s rare to witness the emergence of an entirely new pricing model in our industry. I feel fortunate to have helped bring it to life for the world, as part of the Stigg R&D team. The AI disruption didn’t just transform technology, it reshaped how we price and deliver value. Read more about how we built it and the challenges along the way in the technical deep dive blog (link in the comments) #ai #monetization #credits

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Beyond the hype, the true value of GenAI lies in how it can reimagine workflows—within our own organizations and across the industry. Discover how emerging tech transforms operations: https://1blk.co/4oKiYu4

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One of the most inspiring things I’m seeing happen with AI adoption is people really embracing delegation. So many super talented people existed for so long in a state of having unique and hard to scale knowledge. Delegating that context was always so difficult because there were no tools that could interpret and represent context in the decision graph. AI has changed that. A good example is recruiting scorecards. Everyone knows that the final decision is always more than the sum of yeses and nos on interviews.  It requires interpretation of feedback in a way that involves natural language processing. Now you could easily imagine scaling the interpretation of interviewer feedback in a way that was impossible just a couple years ago. But the most inspiring thing is seeing people realize this opportunity and start to figure out scaling themselves really rapidly. It’s a once in a generation opportunity for people to jump to a higher plane of leverage and remove all limits from the scale of their impact.  exciting times. 

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