We've sat in your chair.
Woodrow Consulting was founded on a simple frustration: the staffing industry is built to create dependency, not capability. We've spent decades on both sides of the hiring table — as C-level executives building teams and as recruiters filling them. That dual perspective is what makes our advisory practice different.
Bill founded Woodrow Consulting in 2008 after two decades as a VP level at leading Silicon Valley technology companies. He's led sales organizations through 20x revenue growth at Finisar, drove a 10x increase at Southwall Technologies, and helped orchestrate major acquisitions including Southwall's acquisition by Eastman Chemical and Hexcel's merger with Ciba-Geigy.
That experience — building, scaling, and transforming companies from the inside — is what shapes Woodrow's advisory philosophy. Bill has been in the hiring seat, gotten frustrated with how staffing was done, and built something better. Over 18 years and hundreds of placements with industry-leading companies including Cisco, Square, and Splunk, Woodrow has refined a methodology that treats hiring as a strategic capability, not a transactional service.
- Princeton University — BSE, Engineering (Cum Laude)
- Harvard Business School — MBA, Finance & Marketing
- Senior Director of Sales, Finisar — 20x revenue growth, key accounts with IBM and Tellabs
- VP & General Manager, Southwall Technologies — 10x sales growth, AR market for CRT screens
- VP Marketing, Hexcel Corporation — led product diversification, assisted $1.3B merger with Ciba-Geigy
- Marketing Director, Raychem (Chemelex) — grew Polyswitch brand to $1B in global sales
- Understands the financial and operational stakes of every leadership hire
- Has managed multi-disciplinary teams across sales, marketing, and engineering
- Brings an executive's perspective to recruiting strategy — not just a recruiter's
Alan is a software engineer who became a recruiter — and that combination is rare. With a BSEE from the University of Nottingham and over 20 years writing production code in Python, Go, JavaScript, C#, C++, and SQL, he evaluates technical talent the way an engineering manager would: by understanding what the work actually requires.
Before joining Woodrow, Alan led Talent Acquisition operations and worldwide technical sourcing at Opendoor, Couchbase, and Splunk — where he built data-driven recruiting systems, real-time analytics dashboards, and AI-augmented sourcing workflows. As CTO and VP of Engineering earlier in his career, he built the teams himself. That's the perspective he brings to every advisory engagement: someone who has hired engineers, managed engineers, and been an engineer.
- University of Nottingham — BSEE, Electronic Engineering & Computer Science
- IEEE Member
- Head of TA Operations & Worldwide Sourcing, Opendoor — built cross-system analytics (Greenhouse, Workday, Gem) and AI-augmented workflows
- Head of Global Talent Acquisition, Couchbase — led recruiting across Santa Clara, London, Manchester, and Bangalore
- Head of Technical BI/Operations & Worldwide Sourcing, Splunk — built entirely internal recruiting team through 6+ years of rapid growth
- CTO/VP of Engineering, NRI/ProNet — architected online career services for 50 top universities including MIT, Stanford, and Yale
- Speaks the language of the engineers you're trying to hire — because he was one
- Builds recruiting systems with an engineer's rigor: data-driven, measurable, scalable
- Has led sourcing and TA at companies from 20-person startups to public enterprises
What we believe — and how it shapes the work.
We advise. You decide.
No long-term contracts. No dependency by design.
AI is a tool, not a strategy. We help you know the difference.
The goal of every engagement is to make the next one unnecessary.
Engineers understand engineers. That context shapes everything we do.
Want to talk through your situation?
We'll respond with a direct, honest perspective — no sales pressure.