# Unleashing Potential with Rajesh Sharma

Page: https://stenobird.com/podcast/software-people-stories-812587/unleashing-potential-with-rajesh-sharma
Text version: https://stenobird.com/podcast/software-people-stories-812587/unleashing-potential-with-rajesh-sharma.md
Podcast: [Software People Stories](https://stenobird.com/podcast/software-people-stories-812587)
Published: 2026-04-24T00:01:03+00:00
Episode link: https://listen.hubhopper.com/episode/unleashing-potential-with-rajesh-sharma/33001427
Audio file: https://play.hubhopper.com/e421d9ad5d6489807b08c41a00ebcb8b.mp3?s=rss-feed&v=d511cd41b844
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JSON: https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/software-people-stories-812587/episodes/unleashing-potential-with-rajesh-sharma
Duration seconds: 3247

## Resource

In this episode, I am in conversation with Rajesh Sharma, co-founder and chief product officer of ProHance. Rajesh covers a lot of ground starting from his move from Public Sector to SaaS Founder. Rajesh describes his path from a modest middle-class upbringing in Shimla and a mechanical engineering degree to a stable career at HPCL, then a major career reset into software after quitting his public-sector job to take an IBM course and restarting as a trainee. He later co-founded JaMocha Tech (now ProHance) in 2009 with co-founder Kishore Reddy, backed early by angel investor Sudhir Sharma, aiming to build a world-class software product from India. After experimenting with multiple products and learning that market feedback matters more than expert opinions, they focused on ProHance, a horizontal work visibility and effectiveness platform, now with 250+ customers in 23 countries, ~200+ employees, and a private equity majority investor. He emphasizes the importance of complementary co-founders, supportive family, direct founder-customer feedback loops, profitability and frugality, outcome ownership, and adopting AI internally and in-product. 00:00 Welcome and Setup 01:00 Origin Story and Courage 02:10 From Shimla to Bangalore 04:22 Quitting HPCL for IT 07:06 Starting the Company 11:06 Why Team Matters 14:02 Family Support System 16:56 Finding Product Market Fit 18:45 Choosing the Winning Product 23:18 Selling a Horizontal SaaS 24:31 Business Meets Tech 25:48 Customer Value Mindset 27:36 Product Decisions and Risk 30:36 Start Small MVP 33:01 Founder Led Feedback Loop 35:28 Scaling Global Teams 36:05 Leaders From Customers 39:16 AI Adoption and Roadmap 46:03 Staying Grounded Values 50:21 Parting Advice Start Now Rajesh Sharma is a first-generation entrepreneur and the co-fo…

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## Transcript

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