Carl Larson

About

Carl Larson is an experienced business executive in enterprise information technology with career experiences at IBM, Oracle and entrepreneurial ventures.  Over the past 28 years, Mr. Larson’s career experiences can be defined by three differentiating leadership factors:  1) revenue results, 2) team culture and leadership, and 3) customer value.  Mr. Larson has been responsible for building and developing organizations that interact and develop relationships with C-level, functional and information technology executives to improve profits, reduce costs and manage risk.  Mr. Larson works with Illinois-based venture capital and private equity firms to advise them and their portfolio companies.  Mr. Larson is an Edge Advisor to OCA Ventures, an early stage venture capital firm focused on equity investments in technology and highly-scalable service businesses with dramatic growth potential.  As an Edge Advisor, Mr. Larson’s business experiences assist OCA and its portfolio companies evaluate go to market strategies and positioning, product messaging, customer value-creation, sales process effectiveness and measurement, recruiting, talent management and compensation planning.  To support these areas of focus, Mr. Larson has developed and delivers a proprietary workshop entitled Sales Process Excellence in cooperation with a peer OCA Edge Advisor.  Additionally, Mr. Larson is a Board Member for the private equity holding company the GVW Group and its subsidiary Aculocity, LLC.  Mr. Larson assists in developing and implementing plans and strategies that provide successful continuity and growth to Aculocity''s business by providing strategic and industry experience to create competitive advantage.

Degrees

• University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, BA Economics

• The Institute of European Studies, International Business, Vienna, Austria

• Northwestern University, The Kellogg School of Management, MBA, Management Strategy and Policy, Marketing, Organizational Behavior

Research Interests

• Sales

• Marketing

• Big Data

Professional & Community Affiliations

• Board Member, Aculocity, LLC, 2016-Present

• Edge Advisor, OCA Ventures, 2016-Present

• Board Member, St. Ignatius College Prep Board of Regents, 2013-Present

• Executive Board Member, St. Ignatius Rowing Club, 2016-Present

• Communion Assistant, St. James Lutheran church, 2012-Present

• Pastoral Call Committee, St. James Lutheran Church, 2017

• Coach and Mentor, One Million Degrees (previously known as The Illinois Education Foundation), 2015-Present

• Board Member, Chicago Chamber of Commerce, 2005-2014 

•  Awarded CPIM certification by the American Production and Inventory Control Society

Courses Taught

• INFS 247