Do tech leaders have to be tech experts?: Elona Mortimer-Zhika of IRIS
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How did Elona’s early life in Albania and retail jobs shape her leadership style?
As a leader, what we all have in common, I think, is that we recognize that you've got to play to your strengths and then use your strengths as the the bit that you focus on, and then you've got to be really self-aware of the things that you don't know how to do. Welcome to
Orbit, the HG podcast series, where we speak to leaders from across the tech ecosystem to hear how they've built and scaled some of the most successful software companies in the world.
Welcome to Audit, the HD podcast series where we speak to leaders about building and scaling some of the most successful software businesses in the world. My name's Nick Humphries and I'm a senior partner of HG. I'm delighted to have my friend Elona here today. Alona Mortimer Zika, who is the chief executive of Iris, originally a UK-only software champion, and today a transatlantic kind of software business that Elona has scaled dramatically over the last kind of five plus years. Alana's path from childhood in Albania to scholarships in the UK. to auditing career with Deloitte. books most of the trends for software business leaders, I think it's true to say. Um so I'm really looking forward to finding out how that's affected her approach and her career subsequently.
So thanks for joining us on Orbit, Elena.
Delighted to be here. Thanks for having me.
Great. So I see you as something of a kindred spirit, somebody that's in technology but from a slightly unusual angle. So if you could go all the way back and maybe talk about first job, what do you think can a first job taught you that is relevant today?
Uh definitely uh a very different start to life, absolutely. So I was born in Communist Albania, so I didn't have much access to tech at all. Uh fair to say, so by the age of sixteen when I came to the UK, that was the first time I actually saw a laptop. So I can absolutely say how fascinated I was by that. And the first thing I ever bought with my first jobs money as a student was a laptop. So to own your own laptop at 18 was a big thing for me. So um, but uh, in terms of career, proper, proper job was an accountant job. I was always gonna be an accountant. I loved math, my dad was an accountant, I loved my dad, I was gonna follow in his footsteps. So I joined big four. Um and I did audit and corporate finance, so joined Arthur Anderson, then Deloitte did that for ten years.
Uh but always on software businesses only. So I was in their TMT division, tech, media, telecommunications. I audited Iris as well. That's a fun fact for you. I was making about five million pounds of EP DIE at the time. Um and what it taught me uh at the time was that eighty percent of the businesses are actually the same. It doesn't really matter what industry you're in. I mean every business needs a product that a customer is willing to pay for, a product that is going to solve a pain point for a customer, so they're willing to part with their money. uh it needs great people, it needs to keep an eye on the market and it needs to look after its cash. And Arthur Anderson was a great training ground, I've got to say, because these are the days pre Enron.
Uh so you didn't have a long audit checklist to follow. Instead they set you down, told you about business and then said when you look at this business there's gonna be three things that are gonna let it down. So go and audit those three things and then everything else, don't worry so much about it. And it was always gonna be revenue. It's always gonna be cash, making sure your payroll was reconciled. So I I became a bit of a geek in RevRec. I mean, I I I like auditing. I'm sure you might find auditing exciting. I don't know, I don't know. Uh but RevRec in auditing is as exciting as it gets, Nick. So SOP nine to seven two, US GAAP, all my software clients had to to follow that. And it was really interesting because it was quite intricate at the time.
Uh and I quite like that. I like complex areas and grey areas. So I became a bit of a geek in that. So it uh taught me about business and then. I got poached by one of my uh clients at the time called Decision.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
How did Elona’s early life in Albania and retail jobs shape her leadership style?
0:03–4:52
2
What lessons did Elona learn from auditing at Deloitte that influence her tech business decisions?
4:52–9:44
3
How did the shift from CapEx to recurring revenue models impact IRIS’s growth?
9:44–14:05
4
Why does Elona compare leading a software company to managing a football team?
14:05–19:01
5
What strategies did IRIS use to expand from a UK‑only firm to a trans‑Atlantic business?
19:01–23:22
6
How does IRIS maintain a strong company culture while acquiring businesses globally?
23:22–27:54
7
What role do data‑driven insights and recurring metrics play in IRIS’s product roadmap?
27:54–33:01
8
Do tech leaders need deep technical expertise to run a successful software company?
33:01–36:34
Speakers
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