Techopia, Insider Only

‘It’s time to take a break’: Luc Levesque on leaving Shopify’s C-suite, his love for Ottawa and more

March 19, 2024
2:16 PM
ET

Organizations: Facebook, Shopify, TravelPod, TripAdvisor

People: Harley Finkelstein, Luc Levesque, Tobias Lütke

After stints as a senior executive at two of the tech industry’s biggest global players, Luc Levesque is pausing to take a well-deserved break for a bit of play himself.

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After stints as a senior executive at two of the tech industry’s biggest global players, Luc Levesque is pausing to take a well-deserved break for a bit of play himself. The 48-year-old Ottawa native originally made his name by founding travel blogging platform TravelPod before selling it to Expedia Group in 2007. Since 2017, Levesque has lived in northern California, where he led a team that launched Facebook’s Messenger Kids parent-controlled messaging app before joining e-commerce powerhouse Shopify in 2020 to spearhead its international growth efforts. Now, after more than two decades of “running hot,” as he puts it, Levesque is stepping back from the daily grind. Last week, he announced on social media that he is leaving his role as chief growth officer at Shopify to become a part-time adviser. In an interview with Techopia this week from his home in Palo Alto, Calif., Levesque said a health scare late last year involving a close family member in Ottawa prompted him to re-evaluate his priorities. “That was a big moment for me, and a good moment to reflect a little bit,” he explained. “I’ve been at Shopify four years and done a lot of work there and built a great team. So given my family situation … I decided it was time to change a little bit. “So I got back (from Ottawa) and decided, ‘You know what? I think it’s time to take a break and focus on family and friends for a bit.’ That's what I decided to do.” It’s quite a shift for Levesque, who earned a diploma in computer engineering from Algonquin College in 1995 and has been in the career fast lane ever since.

Sought-after growth adviser

After selling his blog to Expedia, he stayed on as a senior manager with subsidiary TripAdvisor, which was later spun off into a separate company. As the vice-president in charge of the firm’s search-engine optimization growth, Levesque helped TripAdvisor become the world’s largest travel website. Over the years, he’s advised a number of global tech enterprises, including Twitter (now known as X) and Pinterest, on growth strategies, while serving as a mentor to aspiring entrepreneurs through organizations such as Invest Ottawa and Fresh Founders, a group he helped start. “When I take on a role, I take it really seriously,” he said. “Whether that was at my startup or at TripAdvisor or Meta or Shopify, it's pretty all-consuming for me. Somebody once described me as not having an off switch, which is good in some ways but pretty intense in other ways.” Now, rather than mapping out growth plans, the married father of two teenagers is planning travel itineraries. He embarked on his latest adventure – a heli-skiing trip to Revelstoke, B.C. – on Tuesday. Even in “relaxed” mode, Levesque isn’t one to remain idle for long. His busy docket for 2024 – which he has sketched out on a giant wall calendar – also includes a meditation retreat in Bali, a family vacation in Mexico, and other excursions with his wife Andrea and their kids. “One of the big values that I have – in our family, we talk about it a lot – is I think you need to be deliberate with your time and not just kind of float,” Levesque explained. “It’s a mixture of a lot of fun, a lot of play, a lot of time with people I care about and doing things I normally would not prioritize. I’m looking forward to that.” Not that it was an easy decision to scale back his commitment to Shopify. Levesque is proud of his accomplishments at the Ottawa-based company and will continue to play a role in its evolution as an adviser. “I think it took me three days to hit send,” Levesque said of his resignation notice. “I was just like, ‘Am I really going to do this?’ It really is a great company.”

Shopify CEO 'a fantastic entrepreneur'

His attachment to Shopify is understandable. Levesque has been friends with the software giant’s co-founder and CEO, Tobi Lütke, for more than 15 years, and the two had long sought an opportunity to work together. His admiration for Lütke’s business acumen runs deep. Levesque describes his longtime friend as “very long-term focused, which is very refreshing. Decisions are made for the long-term benefit of the business, not for short-term reasons. More so than many other leaders, I think, he cares a lot about the quality of the product and the craft of the product. I think he’s just a fantastic entrepreneur and founder.” Many would say the same of Levesque, who still feels like he has plenty more to give to the tech industry. Shopify president Harley Finkelstein has been urging him to share his wisdom in a book, and the thought of hatching another startup still gets his juices flowing. But that’s in the future. “I’ve got some ideas, and there are some things I’ve thought about doing for a very long time,” said Levesque. “The tricky part is going to be just giving myself some time to not jump into anything too quick and really just catch my breath. These windows rarely open up in our life where we can take these breaks, and I do plan to enjoy that. “At some point I’ll jump back into something big and heavy, but I’m really enjoying my time until then.” Levesque, who owns a house near Mooney’s Bay as well as a place in Mont Tremblant, still spends a couple of months a year in his hometown and is a staunch supporter of its tech community. “There’s less distraction, and I find that I can focus more when I’m in Ottawa,” he said. “Maybe it’s being in Ottawa, you have a little bit of a chip on your shoulder, you want to prove yourself. It’s easy to get distracted down here (in California) – there’s a lot going on. “Being in Ottawa, it forces you to think first principles and really figure things out yourself. There’s not a lot of people there you can lean on to learn from. There are some, but there are (fewer than in Silicon Valley). You have to figure things out yourself, which is an advantage. I don’t know if Shopify would have thrived in another city because it had to figure a lot of things out itself.” Even though he now spends most of his time in California, Levesque said Canada’s capital will always hold a special place in his heart. “There are a lot of things I miss about Ottawa,” he said. “Ottawa is still and always will feel like home.”