This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Louise Allen, the chief product officer at Planview, who’s in her 60s and is based in Austin. The following has been edited for length and clarity.
I’m the chief product officer at Planview, an AI-driven portfolio management platform. Planview helps people organize and manage their workloads by providing teams with visibility into tasks in progress, who’s responsible, and how everything connects.
I’ve been the CPO since June 2021. I spent 13 years as the company’s senior vice president of product management and solutions marketing.
Before entering the tech industry, I was a professional tennis player for 11 years.
From the time I picked up a racket, tennis became my entire life
I was a decorated athlete and fortunate to have played in all four Grand Slam tournaments, finishing third at Wimbledon in 1983. I’d ranked 60th in the world and trained alongside some of the fiercest competitors the sport has ever seen. I earned six figures in prize money throughout my career.
I’d also faced significant obstacles — most notably, back-to-back ACL injuries, which put me on medical rest for the better part of two years.
After just over a decade of intense training, global travel, and high-stakes competition, I knew my time on the circuit had to end. I couldn’t tell you why, exactly; I just felt called to try something new.
The competitor in me saw tech as an obvious option
Tech offered me the opportunity to challenge myself and use the skills I’d honed on the court: Vision, planning, adaptation, and relentless commitment to improvement. I was excited by the pace of innovation, the potential to create something new, and the opportunity to solve real problems.
When I hung up my racket, I returned to school and earned my MBA at 34. My first role in tech was secured thanks to a reference from Billie Jean King, which helped me land a product marketing internship at a small startup.
The hardest part of starting a corporate job was my schedule not being my own — working hard and learning were all pretty natural to me, but starting at the bottom of the totem pole and having a lot of my time directed by others was a big adjustment.
I was relatively late to making a career change into tech by most professional standards, but I had come to tennis relatively late, too, and that never stopped me.
I joined Planview in 2008
It was a much smaller company back then, with just one product line. Product management was just getting started, and I was able to get in on the ground floor of that.
As the company grew and evolved, so did my role. I moved from tactical roles to more strategic leadership.
Today, Planview is a very different company with broader offerings and a transformed value proposition. I’m in more C-level conversations in a week than I used to have in a year.
I often joke that I’m the “chief cheerleader” at Planview
I see hyping up teams as a key part of the role; it’s what gets everyone excited about and aligned with the overall vision. People need to walk away being fired up about what we do, and my days are often filled with high-level conversations across teams, customers, and other C-suite leaders.
A typical day includes strategy meetings, product road map reviews, and customer-facing discussions, both in-person and virtual. All of these conversations are focused on steering the ship in the right direction.
I’ve also learned to become more selfish with my time as I’ve risen in the company. Putting in 12-hour days just isn’t what I want to be doing at this point in my career, and I don’t want my teams to feel like they need to, either.
Maintaining the flexibility of a hybrid schedule is a priority for us at Planview, which we prioritize across our teams. I try to lead by example, modeling the work-life balance that’s so critical to preventing burnout and maintaining productivity and creativity.
To anyone considering a new path later in life, don’t let the size of the leap intimidate you
As for older professionals, I’d like to emphasize that businesses do — really — see a lot of value in curating intergenerational teams. With age comes historical knowledge and insight into why certain processes are structured as they are; with youth, fresh eyes, ideas, and insights.
Take it one step at a time, and through the route that feels right to you. That might mean taking an internship or contract role, joining a professional network in your field of interest, or finding a mentor who can vouch for you, as Billie Jean King did for me.
It’s also critical to focus on your skills rather than your work history. All of your experiences, no matter how unrelated they may seem, can add value. Many of the more technical or field-specific details can be taught, but core capabilities such as relationship-building, time management, presentation and communication skills, and teamwork are more challenging to learn.
Tennis taught me risk management, strategic planning, and resilience, all of which I use every day in my work. Those soft skills are often what set you apart, especially in leadership.
