Automate to Iterate: A Q&A with Chase Robertson, Icon’s New CTO
In our last Q&A, we interviewed Icon’s new VP of Enterprise Accounts, Kelly Grieco, about her 2024 growth strategy.
This month, we spoke with Chase Robertson, our new Chief Technology Officer, to learn more about his experience and his vision for Icon’s technology.
Can you share a bit about your background?
My wife and I live in New York right now, but I have deep roots in the Austin area. I grew up in a suburb about 20 minutes outside of the city. My wife grew up nearby. And my grandparents live in the Sun City senior living community, which is also close to Austin.
I worked at startups for most of my career before pivoting to Ticketech (an established SaaS company) as CTO. I helped overhaul our engineering organization and migrate to cloud services. As a result, we were able to flip the company and sell to a VC-backed startup.
Outside of work, I like to cook, play video games, and play pickleball. I also love to spend time outdoors hiking, backpacking, and biking.
What drew you to Icon?
I have spent time in numerous industries including health care, oil and gas, energy, construction, container shipping, and most recently parking. For the next step in my career I wanted to join a company doing meaningful work where I could actively help make the world a better place.
My dad has Parkinson’s, and many of my friends are placing their parents in senior living facilities. The more I learned about the industry, the more I saw the value of Icon’s technology. Working at Icon seemed like a rare opportunity to do work that could benefit the world.
Working at Icon seemed like a rare opportunity to do work that could benefit the world.
What trends are you seeing in the senior living industry that might impact how Icon and other vendors build their tech?
Wearables, smart appliances, robotics, telehealth, and remote patient monitoring are growing in popularity. Integrations will be key here to collect and manage data.
For senior living tech providers, that means creating an open architecture that can support multiple integrations with minimal customer effort. After all, customers shouldn’t have to make major changes to use your software.
What does that mean for Icon? We don’t have to be a bleeding-edge AI developer to be a bleeding-edge AI integrator. We will be vendor agnostic and embrace and integrate AI where it can be most impactful. We will create an architecture that allows us to have many to many integrations across multiple platforms and verticals.
What lessons have you learned from past work experiences?
I’m really big on speed to market.
In any B2B space – especially B2E – buying cycles are very long. So my focus is on rapid iteration, development, and feedback. And the key is QA automation. You can’t iterate rapidly if you don’t have confidence that your release isn’t going to break.
QA automation lets you shorten your delivery timeline. Customers take note; they value when you can fulfill a request in a day.
I’m really big on speed to market…You can’t iterate rapidly if you don’t have confidence that your release isn’t going to break.
What’s the greatest opportunity in senior living today? And what’s the greatest hurdle in the way?
Steve Jobs once called the computer “a bicycle for our minds” – something that could blow our efficiency off the charts. I think AI and LLMs will do the same for our industry.
Today, though, there’s a feeling that AI is automating the fun and beautiful things in life (such as artwork, design, and music) instead of more mundane tasks (like dishes or laundry). We need to integrate AI in ways that multiply output by automating the mundane, not the things that bring joy and happiness.
The bottom line: AI can give us more ways to add purpose to life. And when you add purpose, you increase longevity.
Don’t Make Automation an Afterthought
Chase highlighted the value of automation for good reason: it’s key to making life easier for staff and residents.
That’s why we designed Icon’s platform with automation top of mind. It’s in the fabric of every tool in our suite. And it’s foundational to every new feature we’re cooking up.If you want to learn more about our approach to senior living technology, let’s talk – we’d love to start a conversation.