A Slice on Mark Lenhard, CEO of Invoice2go
As a self-proclaimed east coast guy Mark Lenhard was fascinated by what he saw happening over on the West Coast. In the early days of Silicon Valley, technology was catching on and changing the landscape of the world as we knew it. Lenhard started his career in consulting and got to travel around the world while having some fun, as he simultaneously gained knowledge in the online banking and financial services industry. He was fascinated by the differing and widespread adaptation of online financial services, and products and how they were revolutionizing regions like Asia, South America and Europe. Lenhard would later try his hand at investing with a few startups before landing at PayPal. PayPal, for those who may not know, had a huge impact in helping customers (particularly small businesses) take payments from their customers online. He went on to spend many years with PayPal and continued his career after with small business lending, development, deals and acquisitions. He scaled up to eventually work at JP Morgan, primarily in the digital banking, payments and small business lending space.
However, the tides changed for Lenhard when he received a phone call from an old mentor. “An old mentor of mine went and was spinning Magento out of eBay, at the time, and took that business (almost like a big late-stage startup) and built a lot of the infrastructure and organization around it and really reinvigorated the platform.” Ultimately, after three or so years of growing that business, he sold it to Adobe. He had spent a lot of time on the Magento platform, very focused on small business customers and helping them get online, driving commerce for them, whether they were existing or new businesses.
Upon the sale of Magento, Lenhard was approached by Invoice2go for the CEO position. He accepted the position and started helping to improve the processes which ultimately helped customers run their businesses, get paid, and get paid quickly. Lenhard has been CEO of Invoice2go since April 2020. In July 2021, Invoice2go was acquired by Bill.com for $625 million.
Lenhard has been fortunate to have more than one mentor in his life, he’s actually had a few that have helped him along his journey. “Certainly they [his mentors] have been at the forefront of helping me think about my career and think about what kind of leader I want to be. Ultimately, helping me navigate what I want to do in life and where I want to focus.” Focus is important to Lenhard, and he shared he feels it’s imperative for those looking to achieve big things to always take on new challenges. “Never get comfortable. It’s important in life to always be taking on new challenges and opportunities that you feel are going to stretch you beyond what you think you’re capable of doing. I think the important thing in any opportunity or role that you’re looking at is, am I going to grow and learn as a leader, as an individual both in my professional and personal life.” Lenhard shared that often he feels people make decisions using the rational side of their brains when evaluating a new opportunity, weighing success and monetary gain over where they can best grow and learn as a leader.
Growth, however, is not without its difficulties. Lenhard cautions that it’s key to focus on two main things, the employees of the business and your customers. “Are you adding value to your customers and are you doing it in a way that is, building long-term value for them? It’s always very easy to do some short-term things to drive the success of the business but not necessarily success for employees, and for customers. Very often if you’re focused on your employees, and on your customers, and doing right by them, good things happen to investors and stockholders of the company.”
Success for Lenhard is ultimately based on the success of those around him, his team, and having fun. He learned the hard way (many times) that it’s easy to focus on ‘what’s next’ while losing sight of the little victories along the way.
Founder Bio
Mark Lenhard received his Bachelor’s Degree from Yale and MBA from Stanford. Prior to his current role as CEO of Invoice2go, Lenhard was Head of Global Strategy at PayPal, MD in Consumer & Community Banking with JP Morgan, and VP of Commerce Strategy and Growth at Adobe. Lenhard led Invoice2go through a multi-million dollar acquisition in July of 2021 and resides in the San Francisco Bay Area. Connect with Lenhard on LinkedIn.
