Declan Williams

About

I’m a customer-focused operator, founder, and strategist working at the intersection of education, technology, growth, and human behaviour. By day, I’ve worked across customer success, product feedback, partnerships, go-to-market thinking, and commercial strategy in fast-moving environments. By nature, I’m someone who likes solving messy problems, building strong relationships, and turning scattered ideas into practical action. I’m especially energised by work that sits between people and product, where empathy, structure, and execution all matter. I’m the founder of Let’s Yak, an education technology venture built to improve communication, engagement, and operational flow in learning environments. The mission is simple: make learning communication better, more human, more organised, and far less dependent on chaotic WhatsApp groups and tool overload. Alongside building in edtech, I’ve worked in customer success and strategic growth roles, helping onboard customers, strengthen partnerships, improve retention, support product direction, and connect what customers actually need with what businesses actually build. I enjoy being close enough to the customer to hear the real story, and close enough to strategy to do something useful with it. My background also includes teaching, mentoring, pitching, producing creative projects, and helping ideas move from “this could be interesting” to “this is happening.” I care deeply about education, entrepreneurship, thoughtful innovation, and building things that are commercially sharp but still genuinely useful to real people. People who work with me usually get a mix of curiosity, energy, honesty, commercial thinking, and the occasional joke at exactly the wrong moment. I’m particularly interested in: - EdTech and future-of-learning models - SaaS, customer success, and go-to-market strategy - Product thinking grounded in real user behaviour - Partnerships, storytelling, and business building - AI in education, communication, and decision-making I’m always keen to connect with thoughtful people building meaningful things, especially in education, technology, startups, and growth.

Company history

1. 
   University of JohannesburgTutor2017-08 – 2018-01 · 5 mo
2. 
   Hilton CollegeEconomics Teacher2020-01 – 2021-12 · 1y 11mo
3. 
   UP.Ed LearnProduct Manager and Business Strategist2022-02 – 2023-05 · 1y 3mo
4. 
   RanMarine TechnologyBusiness Analyst2023-05 – 2026-03 · 2y 10mo
5. 
   Let's YakCo-Founder2020-04 – present · 6y 4mo
6. 
   Newchip AcceleratorStartup Mentor2022-12 – 2023-09 · 9 mo
7. 
   GoMeddoGTM Engineer2026-03 – present · 5 mo
8. 
   St Stithians College, South AfricaIntern teacher and coach2011-08 – 2019-12 · 8y 4mo
9. 
   St Stithians College, South AfricaMIC of Cross Country2019-03 – 2019-12 · 9 mo
10. 
    St Stithians College, South AfricaGrade 8/9 EMS and Grade 10 Business Studies Teacher2019-01 – 2019-12 · 11 mo
11. 
    Hilton CollegeMiC of Rowing2020-01 – 2021-12 · 1y 11mo

Skills

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