UserTesting Adds Silicon Valley Tech Veterans to Leadership Team: Names Laura MacKinnon VP of People & Culture and Chris Abad VP of Product

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., May 2, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- UserTesting, the world's largest user research platform, today announced the appointment of Laura MacKinnon as the company's Vice President of People and Culture and Chris Abad as Vice President of Product. These strategic hires position UserTesting to grow its talent base and continue the success of its market-leading user experience testing services.

Laura MacKinnon brings to this position more than 20 years of Human Resources (HR) experience and leadership in high-growth technology firms, such as Coupa Software, Yahoo!, Electronic Arts (EA) and SGI. In these roles, MacKinnon oversaw the successful design and implementation of numerous initiatives, including building organizations from the ground up and growing talent from 100 to 500+; fostering strong cultures via People programs closely linked to the company's values and business goals; leading global HR teams of 30+ in Asia, Europe, and the U.S.; and developing strong leadership pipelines through training and coaching initiatives. MacKinnon leads UserTesting's People and Work Environment teams of currently 14 members located in the Mountain View, CA, San Francisco, CA, and new Atlanta, GA offices.

"World-class employee engagement yields excellent business results and happy customers," said Laura MacKinnon, VP of People and Culture at UserTesting. "I'm eager to foster and support the company's vibrant culture, as well as attract, retain and develop our talent so that employees can thrive in their work teams and in their careers."

Chris Abad brings to this position more than a decade of experience in SaaS product and design leadership at companies such as Campaign Monitor and Salesforce.com. As VP of Product and Design at Campaign Monitor, Abad led his team in the largest and most successful product launch in the company's history: the "All-New Campaign Monitor." As VP of Product and UX at Salesforce, Abad scaled and led multiple teams to set product strategy and support a customer base that grew more than 10x. Abad leads UserTesting's Product Management and UX teams located in the San Francisco and Mountain View offices.

"Fully aligned with UserTesting's mission, I have a driving passion for creating beautiful, innovative products that customers love," said Chris Abad, VP of Product at UserTesting. "As VP of Product, I plan to apply this passion to define a product vision and scale a high-performing team that will accelerate UserTesting's growth."

"While Laura finds and develops the team needed to execute on UserTesting's big vision for the future, Chris will drive new products to help businesses continuously gather customer feedback into the product development process," said Darrell Benatar, CEO of UserTesting. "We are very pleased to bring on leaders like Laura and Chris who are passionate about creating great experiences – for our employees and customers alike."

About UserTesting
UserTesting is the fastest and most advanced user research platform on the market. The company gives marketers, product managers, and UX designers on-demand access to people in their target audience who deliver audio, video, and written feedback on websites, mobile apps, prototypes, and even physical products and locations.

Headquartered in Mountain View, CA, UserTesting helps over 35,000 customers (including the top 10 web properties in the U.S.) get the user feedback they need to create an excellent customer experience. User panels are currently available in the U.S., Canada, the UK, and India. For more information, visit www.usertesting.com.

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SOURCE UserTesting