“The Right Way to Run Companies Is for the Long Term” -- Ellie Fields, CEO and Co-Founder of Ridge AI
Ellie Fields - CEO and Co-Founder of Ridge AI
For years, she kept a list of everything she’d do if she ever got fired. She never was. When she left Salesloft, she opened the list anyway, and within a few months she was starting a company.
In this episode of What Fuels You, host Shauna Swerland sits down with Ellie Fields, CEO and co-founder of Ridge AI and former Chief Product and Engineering Officer at Salesloft, for a conversation that covers growing up in Baltimore, more than 12 years at Tableau Software, leading product at Salesloft, and co-founding Ridge AI with University of Washington professor Jeffrey Heer. The throughline: Fields believes companies should be run for the long term, and that the deal between a leader and the people who work for them is one you keep.
📋 Episode Chapters
| 00:00 | Cold open: Ellie Fields on the deal between a leader and the people who work for them |
| 01:00 | Introduction: from Tableau Public and Salesloft to co-founding Ridge AI |
| 02:30 | Rapid fire: morning coffee outside, To the Lighthouse, mountain biking, and a Guns N' Roses first concert |
| 06:00 | Growing up in Baltimore and why school was a way to see the world |
| 08:45 | Choosing Rice University and a dual major in engineering and policy studies |
| 12:30 | Investment banking at Alex. Brown and late-stage VC at Thomas Weisel Partners through the dot-com boom and crash |
| 16:00 | Stanford MBA, gut decisions, discovering product management, and three years at Microsoft |
| 21:00 | Why companies should be run for the long term, and joining Tableau when it had under 100 people |
| 24:00 | How Tableau Public became a free place to share data online, and why Fields is called its godmother |
| 27:30 | Tableau's high-accountability culture and the leadership deal Fields will not compromise on |
| 30:00 | Joining Salesloft and building a revenue orchestration platform that puts data in tight loops with action |
| 36:00 | The fired list, time off, and teaming up with co-founder Jeffrey Heer |
| 41:00 | What Ridge AI does: turning a B2B company's customer data into a value story |
| 46:30 | Versalytics, the $2.6M pre-seed, hiring for autonomy and accountability, and what fuels Ellie Fields |
From Baltimore to Wall Street to Product Management
Fields grew up in Baltimore, studied engineering and policy at Rice University, and started her career in investment banking at Alex. Brown and late-stage venture capital at Thomas Weisel Partners before earning her MBA at Stanford. She tells Shauna Swerland that none of those moves were financially motivated. They were gut decisions, and the clearest one came the first time she heard someone describe product management.
"And I remember sitting in that session and thinking, that's it. That's the name for the job that I want."
-- Ellie Fields
That path led to Microsoft, where she learned how to scale products, and then to a small Seattle software company that would define the next chapter of her career.
What Tableau Taught Her About Running a Company
Fields joined Tableau Software when it had fewer than 100 people and stayed more than 12 years, through its IPO and the Salesforce acquisition. She was on the core team that launched Tableau Public, a free platform for sharing data online, and earned the nickname the Godmother of Tableau Public. In the episode, she explains how she got that name and why she describes Tableau's culture in terms you would hear on the first day of kindergarten.
"I really do believe that the right way to run companies is for the long term."
-- Ellie Fields
She and Shauna also get into the leadership deal Fields will not compromise on: the core contract between a leader and the people who work for them.
Putting Data to Work at Salesloft
As Chief Product and Engineering Officer at Salesloft, Fields led product, engineering, and design and helped build what the company called a revenue orchestration platform. Her bet was that data is most powerful in tight loops with action, and that sellers will use it when it shows up inside their workflow.
"Salespeople are not dumb, and they absolutely will use data. But they're too smart to go spend half the day doing data analysis. They have a whole nother job."
-- Ellie Fields
The Fired List and the Founding of Ridge AI
When Fields left Salesloft, the fired list finally came out, and within a couple of months she was co-founding Ridge AI with Jeffrey Heer, a University of Washington professor and co-founder of Trifacta. She tells Shauna how the two aligned on what kind of company to build, and about the conversation at home that made the leap possible.
"But every time I thought, gosh, I'd like to do that, I went and wrote it down on the fired list."
-- Ellie Fields
How Ridge AI Helps B2B Companies Prove Their Value
Ridge AI turns a B2B company's customer data into a value story: an interactive dashboard paired with an AI data agent that can live inside a product or show up in customer conversations. The company raised a $2.6 million pre-seed round led by Madrona and reached general availability in September. Fields walks through a customer example from agriculture and explains why proving value to the person who signs the check matters so much for renewals.
"Your business partner can come back to you and say, hey, you hired us to do this, and I'm going to show you how much of it we did."
-- Ellie Fields
5 Key Takeaways
Frequently Asked Questions
What does Ridge AI do?
Ridge AI, co-founded by CEO Ellie Fields and University of Washington professor Jeffrey Heer, builds broadly shared analytics for B2B companies. It turns a customer's own data into a value story, a dashboard paired with an AI data agent, that companies can embed in their product or use in customer conversations. Fields says the typical buyer is a product team at a B2B SaaS or vertical AI company, and the product reached general availability in September 2026.
How much funding has Ridge AI raised?
Ridge AI raised a $2.6 million pre-seed round led by Madrona, which it announced in April 2026. Fields told Shauna Swerland the company has a team of five, still has much of that capital, and will likely raise a seed round without rushing it.
Why is Ellie Fields called the Godmother of Tableau Public?
Fields was on the core team that launched Tableau Public, a free platform for sharing data online, and grew it before moving on to lead product and engineering for mobile and other teams. Even with no formal responsibility for Tableau Public, she kept stepping in to help the team with resource issues because she believed it mattered to the company. During COVID, Tableau Public traffic doubled overnight from about 10 million to about 20 million a week.
What did Ellie Fields say about the deal between leaders and employees?
Fields describes leadership as a relationship with a basic deal: employees work hard and deliver, and the leader makes sure they get growth opportunities, appropriate rewards, and feedback so they are never surprised. She says, "You can't force somebody to take opportunity, but you can put them in a position where they have opportunity." That, she says, is what she would not compromise on.
What is Ellie Fields's view on running companies for the long term?
Fields says her years at Tableau convinced her that the right way to run companies is for the long term. She acknowledges that downturns and hard decisions are real, but she believes many short-term decisions made in the name of business reality turn out to be the wrong ones. She credits Tableau founders Christian Chabot and Chris Stolte with a culture built on showing up, working hard, and treating people well.
Ellie Fields - CEO and Co-Founder of Ridge AI
For years, she kept a list of everything she’d do if she ever got fired. She never was. When she left Salesloft, she opened the list anyway, and within a few months she was starting a company.
In this episode of What Fuels You, host Shauna Swerland sits down with Ellie Fields, CEO and co-founder of Ridge AI and former Chief Product and Engineering Officer at Salesloft, for a conversation that covers growing up in Baltimore, more than 12 years at Tableau Software, leading product at Salesloft, and co-founding Ridge AI with University of Washington professor Jeffrey Heer. The throughline: Fields believes companies should be run for the long term, and that the deal between a leader and the people who work for them is one you keep.
📋 Episode Chapters
| 00:00 | Cold open: Ellie Fields on the deal between a leader and the people who work for them |
| 01:00 | Introduction: from Tableau Public and Salesloft to co-founding Ridge AI |
| 02:30 | Rapid fire: morning coffee outside, To the Lighthouse, mountain biking, and a Guns N' Roses first concert |
| 06:00 | Growing up in Baltimore and why school was a way to see the world |
| 08:45 | Choosing Rice University and a dual major in engineering and policy studies |
| 12:30 | Investment banking at Alex. Brown and late-stage VC at Thomas Weisel Partners through the dot-com boom and crash |
| 16:00 | Stanford MBA, gut decisions, discovering product management, and three years at Microsoft |
| 21:00 | Why companies should be run for the long term, and joining Tableau when it had under 100 people |
| 24:00 | How Tableau Public became a free place to share data online, and why Fields is called its godmother |
| 27:30 | Tableau's high-accountability culture and the leadership deal Fields will not compromise on |
| 30:00 | Joining Salesloft and building a revenue orchestration platform that puts data in tight loops with action |
| 36:00 | The fired list, time off, and teaming up with co-founder Jeffrey Heer |
| 41:00 | What Ridge AI does: turning a B2B company's customer data into a value story |
| 46:30 | Versalytics, the $2.6M pre-seed, hiring for autonomy and accountability, and what fuels Ellie Fields |
From Baltimore to Wall Street to Product Management
Fields grew up in Baltimore, studied engineering and policy at Rice University, and started her career in investment banking at Alex. Brown and late-stage venture capital at Thomas Weisel Partners before earning her MBA at Stanford. She tells Shauna Swerland that none of those moves were financially motivated. They were gut decisions, and the clearest one came the first time she heard someone describe product management.
"And I remember sitting in that session and thinking, that's it. That's the name for the job that I want."
-- Ellie Fields
That path led to Microsoft, where she learned how to scale products, and then to a small Seattle software company that would define the next chapter of her career.
What Tableau Taught Her About Running a Company
Fields joined Tableau Software when it had fewer than 100 people and stayed more than 12 years, through its IPO and the Salesforce acquisition. She was on the core team that launched Tableau Public, a free platform for sharing data online, and earned the nickname the Godmother of Tableau Public. In the episode, she explains how she got that name and why she describes Tableau's culture in terms you would hear on the first day of kindergarten.
"I really do believe that the right way to run companies is for the long term."
-- Ellie Fields
She and Shauna also get into the leadership deal Fields will not compromise on: the core contract between a leader and the people who work for them.
Putting Data to Work at Salesloft
As Chief Product and Engineering Officer at Salesloft, Fields led product, engineering, and design and helped build what the company called a revenue orchestration platform. Her bet was that data is most powerful in tight loops with action, and that sellers will use it when it shows up inside their workflow.
"Salespeople are not dumb, and they absolutely will use data. But they're too smart to go spend half the day doing data analysis. They have a whole nother job."
-- Ellie Fields
The Fired List and the Founding of Ridge AI
When Fields left Salesloft, the fired list finally came out, and within a couple of months she was co-founding Ridge AI with Jeffrey Heer, a University of Washington professor and co-founder of Trifacta. She tells Shauna how the two aligned on what kind of company to build, and about the conversation at home that made the leap possible.
"But every time I thought, gosh, I'd like to do that, I went and wrote it down on the fired list."
-- Ellie Fields
How Ridge AI Helps B2B Companies Prove Their Value
Ridge AI turns a B2B company's customer data into a value story: an interactive dashboard paired with an AI data agent that can live inside a product or show up in customer conversations. The company raised a $2.6 million pre-seed round led by Madrona and reached general availability in September. Fields walks through a customer example from agriculture and explains why proving value to the person who signs the check matters so much for renewals.
"Your business partner can come back to you and say, hey, you hired us to do this, and I'm going to show you how much of it we did."
-- Ellie Fields
5 Key Takeaways
Frequently Asked Questions
What does Ridge AI do?
Ridge AI, co-founded by CEO Ellie Fields and University of Washington professor Jeffrey Heer, builds broadly shared analytics for B2B companies. It turns a customer's own data into a value story, a dashboard paired with an AI data agent, that companies can embed in their product or use in customer conversations. Fields says the typical buyer is a product team at a B2B SaaS or vertical AI company, and the product reached general availability in September 2026.
How much funding has Ridge AI raised?
Ridge AI raised a $2.6 million pre-seed round led by Madrona, which it announced in April 2026. Fields told Shauna Swerland the company has a team of five, still has much of that capital, and will likely raise a seed round without rushing it.
Why is Ellie Fields called the Godmother of Tableau Public?
Fields was on the core team that launched Tableau Public, a free platform for sharing data online, and grew it before moving on to lead product and engineering for mobile and other teams. Even with no formal responsibility for Tableau Public, she kept stepping in to help the team with resource issues because she believed it mattered to the company. During COVID, Tableau Public traffic doubled overnight from about 10 million to about 20 million a week.
What did Ellie Fields say about the deal between leaders and employees?
Fields describes leadership as a relationship with a basic deal: employees work hard and deliver, and the leader makes sure they get growth opportunities, appropriate rewards, and feedback so they are never surprised. She says, "You can't force somebody to take opportunity, but you can put them in a position where they have opportunity." That, she says, is what she would not compromise on.
What is Ellie Fields's view on running companies for the long term?
Fields says her years at Tableau convinced her that the right way to run companies is for the long term. She acknowledges that downturns and hard decisions are real, but she believes many short-term decisions made in the name of business reality turn out to be the wrong ones. She credits Tableau founders Christian Chabot and Chris Stolte with a culture built on showing up, working hard, and treating people well.
