Ross Wainwright

Chief Executive Officer Perceptyx

Last Reviewed: September 28, 2026

Executive Summary

Ross Wainwright is Chief Executive Officer of Perceptyx, the Temecula, California company whose employee listening, analytics and behavioural-science platform is used by more than 600 global enterprises, including a third of the Fortune 100. He was brought in from outside in April 2025 to take over from co-founder John Borland, who stayed on the board, with a mandate to accelerate the company’s growth around AI-powered employee listening and action. He arrived with three decades in enterprise software: a long career at SAP culminating in customer and services leadership roles, a spell running the Americas for Dimension Data/NTT, and four years as CEO of Alida, the customer-insights company formerly called Vision Critical.

Career Highlights

• Chief Executive Officer of Perceptyx since April 2025, leading company strategy and day-to-day operations.
• CEO and board member of Vision Critical from December 2019, leading its rebrand to Alida in 2020; he resigned in December 2023.
• Named one of the Top 50 SaaS CEOs of 2020 by The Software Report.
• CEO of the Americas region for Dimension Data/NTT.
• More than 15 years at SAP, including Chief Customer Officer for the S/4HANA Cloud business unit, Global Head of Financial Services, and Chief Operating Officer and EVP of Services for North America, where he led more than 3,400 people.
• More than eight years in leadership positions at PTC early in his career.

Professional Journey

Wainwright graduated from Western University with a degree in English history and a minor in business. His early career included more than eight years in leadership positions at PTC.

He then spent over 15 years at SAP in a sequence of senior roles. He held leadership positions in SAP’s licence business, led the transformation of the services sales team in North America, and served as Chief Operating Officer and Executive Vice President of Services for North America, responsible for more than 3,400 professionals across services sales, consulting delivery and education. He was later Global Head of Financial Services, with end-to-end responsibility for SAP’s financial services industry business, and finally Chief Customer Officer for the S/4HANA Cloud business unit. From SAP he moved to Dimension Data/NTT, the global networking and services provider, as CEO of the Americas region.

In December 2019 the board of Vision Critical appointed him CEO and a director. Vision Critical was a Vancouver-based market research software company; under Wainwright it repositioned itself in customer experience management, brought in a new leadership team including fellow SAP alumni, raised $20 million from Vistara Capital Partners, and on 23 September 2020 renamed itself Alida. Perceptyx’s biography of him credits Alida with more than 20 new products and 190 platform enhancements during his tenure, and The Software Report named him one of its Top 50 SaaS CEOs of 2020. He resigned in December 2023 after four years and was succeeded by chief operating officer Efrem Ainsley.

Perceptyx named him CEO on 10 April 2025. The company, led until then by co-founder John Borland, describes itself as an employee experience transformation company providing enterprise-grade employee listening, analytics and behavioural science. In announcing the appointment Wainwright said most organisations “still struggle to fully harness the potential of their workforce”, and that the chance to help large enterprises do so with AI in employee experience was “one I couldn’t pass up”. His leadership team includes a chief customer officer, chief revenue officer and chief product officer, and the board includes representatives of growth investor TCV.

Education

Western University

Undergraduate degree, English History, minor in business