Innovating and Impacting the Education Experience

Hardeep Gulati believes that every child has the right to a quality education. As CEO of PowerSchool, a leading education technology provider, Gulati helps drive the company’s mission to improve the K-12 education experience through innovative software.

Instead of adding digital tools to an educator’s workflow, PowerSchool aims to integrate and streamline diverse classroom technologies, allowing teachers more time to focus on what’s most important: student instruction. The company provides the industry’s first unified classroom experience, bringing together student information systems, learning management and classroom collaboration, assessment, analytics, behavior and special education case management in one platform.

Outside of the classroom, PowerSchool engages families by communicating real-time updates on student progress. The company’s products connect and empower millions of teachers, administrators and parents to improve student outcomes all over the world. In Gulati’s words, PowerSchool is part of the village that it takes to raise a child.

Before joining PowerSchool in 2015, Gulati served as CEO of SumTotal Systems, a former Vista company and market leader in enterprise talent and learning management. His corporate education experience ignited his passion for improving education through technology ­– something he shares with Vista. Coupled with his expertise in enterprise systems, he viewed the opportunity to lead PowerSchool as a perfect fit.

For Gulati, it was important that the company focused not only on business growth but also on creating lasting value for its customers. He wanted to put student success and teacher productivity at the center of PowerSchool’s solutions, and Vista supported his vision and values.

This vision has come to life in the years since PowerSchool partnered with Vista. Gulati has embraced Vista’s approach to growth, which includes people, product and business development. The company implemented strategies that drove value and efficiencies for teachers in the short term, while also investing in technological innovation aimed at making a long-term impact on education systems. Through acquisitions of companies including InfoSnap, Interactive Achievement, TIENET and Chalkable, PowerSchool grew from a student information system to a comprehensive solution for learning, assessments, behavior, analytics and more.

One of Gulati’s goals for PowerSchool is to continuously improve partnerships with school districts and address the specific challenges they face. He worked with the Value Creation Team (VCT) to improve the quality of PowerSchool’s customer service and better serve teachers, administrators and parents. The VCT helped Gulati and his team identify areas for improvement by evaluating the company’s entire customer lifecycle, from sales and implementation to ongoing customer support. They then worked together to establish metrics and measure progress. In addition to the expertise the VCT provided, Gulati received support and guidance from other Vista companies that have successfully executed similar initiatives.

United and fueled by a passion for learning, innovating and winning, PowerSchool and Vista are working toward a future in which every child receives the best possible education experience.

Please see the “Case Studies” section of the Disclosures page for important information about these Case Studies.