Episode 6

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Published on:

24th Aug 2023

6. Growth mindset and the COO role

In this episode we discuss the topic of a growth mindset and how that informs the COO role. Our special guest is David Norris, a three time COO for venture-backed organisations. David talks about managing critical feedback, personal growth and the transition to Chief Growth Officer.

  • How has studying theology informed the type of COO you are? 
  • Is there a playbook for COO’s? 
  • What does the transition from COO to Chief Growth Officer look like in an 800-person company? 
  • What does the transition from a 16 person company to an 800 person company look like as COO? 
  • What is the connection between personal growth and organisational growth? 
  • How do you manage critical feedback? 

Biography: David is a seasoned internet leader, having worked in online operational, product, marketing and strategy roles since the turn of the century, mainly in travel and hospitality, including 4 stints as Chief Operating Officer, 3 of which were scaling fast growth venture capital (VC) backed scaleups. He was later a venture capital investor at Forward Partners incubating idea stage startups and now focuses on strategy and marketing in his role as Chief Growth Officer at Holiday Extras. David is also Non-Executive Director at The Sports Trust and mentors startup founders. He is a fellow of the COO roundtable, a community for startup and scaleups to come together and learn. 

He has a degree in Theology and Religious Studies from the University of Manchester and a Diploma in Company Direction from The Institute of Directors.   He lives with his family in Deal, Kent, UK.


Follow David at:


  • Blog https://www.norrisnode.com 
  • LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidnorris 
  • Substack https://norrisnode.substack.com/p/the-size-of-your-team-determines



This podcast uses the following third-party services for analysis:

Chartable - https://chartable.com/privacy
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About the Podcast

The Operations Room: A Podcast for COO’s
We are the COO coaches to help you successfully scale in this new world where efficiency is as important as growth. Remember when valuations were 3-10x ARR and money wasn’t free? We do. Each week we share our experiences and bring in scale up experts and operational leaders to help you navigate both the burning operational issues and the larger existential challenges. Beth Ayers is the former COO of Peak AI, NewVoiceMedia and Codilty and has helped raise over $200m from top funds - Softbank, Bessemer, TCV, MCC, Notion and Oxx. Brandon Mensinga is the former COO of Signal AI and Trint.

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