Akshay Gupta

About Akshay Gupta

Early in my career, my thinking was profoundly shaped by two people who opened my eyes to concepts that formed the bedrock of how I operate. The first is Tom Johnson, a professor in my MBA program who introduced me to the world of “systems thinking.” This is a philosophy that views business as a collection of living beings operating together as one whole living system. The second person to transform my thinking was Candace Petersen — a former boss and also a professor during my MBA program. She reinforced the concept of pattern recognition/systems thinking. She showed me how to pair this way of thinking with analytics. If you can see a pattern, you should be able to quantify it. Then, beyond and within the data, lies the gold. What is it in the pattern and the systemic view, beyond the obvious, that allows us to make decisions, shape strategies and effectively execute in a way that sets us up to succeed? Applying this lens to the workplace, had me deliberately seeking out different roles to gain insight, experience and perspective across many disciplines. Throughout my career I have held roles and gained expertise in sales, product management, product marketing, running a P&L, R&D and branding. Such a diversity of experience, responsibilities and objectives has allowed me to truly see business as a living system, as opposed to an organization of independent functional areas. Approaching business this way has enabled my problem solving to be systemic in nature, as well as asymmetric. I look at the root of an issue, as opposed to only the symptoms. I have discovered that living systems are inherently creative and rich in ideas. This enables new answers to business projects, problems and tasks — creative ideas, new initiatives and exciting/invigorating solutions that make the work fun and fulfilling. Layered on all of this is the fact that I have had the unique opportunity to apply my thinking across three distinct products (projection, network attached storage and mobile consumer handset), from inception to maturation. The most fascinating part was watching these technologies go through their lifecycles, while participating in different roles, business models and companies, including building an ingredient brand from scratch and being part of a team that worked on a private equity deal raising more than $100M. In each role and position, I’ve operated under the same premise: How will I solve problems systemically and creatively, in order to generate the most positive impact on the business or the organization?

Experience

1. Founder Managing Partner

   Asvita Group

   May 2023 — Present · Beaverton, OR, US

Education

• Whitman College

  BA

  1988 — 1992

• Portland State University - School of Business

  MBA

  1997 — 1999