Jonathan Gleason

Based in Palo Alto, Jonathan leads Russell Reynolds Associates’ Hardware & IoT Practice and co-leads the firm’s Venture Talent Group. He supports deep technology companies—from venture-backed startups building at the edge of autonomy and connectivity to large-scale industrial and technology enterprises undergoing transformation.

Jonathan leads board, CEO, and C-suite searches for companies building and scaling complex, hardware-centric systems. He advises organizations as technology moves beyond software into the physical world—where compute, sensing, and connectivity are embedded into machines, infrastructure, and datacenter environments, and leadership requirements become materially different. He has led founder succession, first-time executive team buildouts, and leadership transformations for companies navigating inflection points in growth, scale, and technological change.

Jonathan has an operator-informed perspective to search, grounded in early experience as a product manager in an automotive hardware startup. This experience informs his ability to assess and place leaders who can execute in technically complex, resource-constrained settings where engineering, manufacturing, and go-to-market must operate in sync.

He joined Russell Reynolds from Gunderson Dettmer, where he held senior operating roles and managed the firm’s captive venture fund, working closely with founders, investors, and boards across the innovation economy.