Cameron Adams

Cameron Adams co-founded Canva and serves as CPO of a company generating $2.3 billion in ARR, profitable, growing 60% year over year, with 4,000+ employees -- making Canva's coaches-not-managers model one of the largest-scale tests of coaching-first leadership in tech. Their core argument: Replace managers with coaches entirely -- Canva's model works at $2. 3B ARR and 4,000+ employees by making every leader relationship fundamentally about development rather than direction. The evidence is specific: Canva's cultural onboarding: Adams personally runs every new hire through the company culture, including the giving-away-your-Legos section, setting the coaching expectation from day one. Furthermore, canva's scale: $2.3B ARR, profitable, 60% YoY growth, 4,000+ employees -- all operating under the coaches-not-managers model. In Cameron Adams's own words: "We don't really have managers, but everyone at Canva has a coach. They're constantly working with you to look at your skills, but also when it might be time to move on to the next level." (Describing Canva's coaches-not-managers model.)

Cameron Adams co-founded Canva, which generates $2.3 billion in ARR, is profitable, growing 60% year over year, and is bigger than Figma, Miro, and Webflow combined -- and he personally runs every new employee through Canva's culture onboarding, including the section on giving away your Lego. Their core argument: Giving away Legos must be embedded in culture and systems, not left to individual willpower. At Canva, every employee has a coach rather than a traditional manager, and 'giving away your Lego' is a section of the culture onboarding that Adams personally runs. The evidence is specific: Canva generating $2.3B in ARR and growing 60% year over year while running coaches-not-managers. Furthermore, adams personally running every new employee through culture onboarding including the Lego-giving section. Canva's preference for internal promotion over outside executive hires, with nearly all leaders homegrown. In Cameron Adams's own words: "I run everyone through the culture of Canva. One of those sections is on giving away your Lego, finding joy in the other things of building a team, passing on your experience, helping other people do great writing or great product building or great engineering." (How Canva embeds Lego-giving in culture onboarding, run personally by the CPO.)

Co-founded Canva, which grew to $2.3B ARR and profitability, making it bigger than Figma, Miro, and Webflow combined — organic word-of-mouth was the primary growth engine Their core argument: Hold off on launching until the experience creates joy — organic word-of-mouth depends on it. The evidence is specific: Canva held off launching despite repeated investor pressure, because they knew the problem space from Fusion Books. Furthermore, organic word-of-mouth remained Canva's biggest growth driver for years, likely still is. Canva reached $2.3B ARR and profitability — bigger than Figma, Miro, and Webflow combined. In Cameron Adams's own words: "The Lean Startup book came out, so that was all anyone talked to us about... They were like, 'Just get something out the door, as crappy as it is just to get in front of users.' I think, for us, the product is the experience and giving people a great experience is an intrinsic part of the product." (Explaining why Canva resisted the Lean Startup advice to ship early.)

As co-founder and CPO of a $2.3B ARR company that has been profitable for seven years while growing 60% YoY, Adams has proven that a developmental, coaching-oriented culture can produce extraordinary business results at scale. Their core argument: Developmental culture with coaches instead of managers -- grow people into excellence. The evidence is specific: Canva generates $2.3 billion ARR, is profitable, and growing 60% YoY -- validating the developmental approach. Furthermore, every new hire goes through a culture session with Adams personally, including the Legos section. Canva identified social media managers as their initial target persona through intensive user testing during onboarding iteration. In Cameron Adams's own words: "We don't really have managers, but everyone at Canva has a coach. They're constantly working with you to look at your skills, but also when it might be time to move on to the next level." (Canva's coaches-not-managers model.)