The Team

Operators who have been there.

Every partner on your engagement has founded, scaled, or exited a company. No consultants. No junior staff. Principals only — embedded directly in your business, moving with urgency.

Managing Partners

The people accountable to your outcome.

Jim Barnish, Jr.
Managing Partner

Tampa, FL

Jim co-founded Dragonfly Operating Partners with a singular belief: that great companies are built through execution, not advice. As Managing Partner, he leads fundraising strategy and serves as executive sponsor on key portfolio engagements — bringing VC network access, capital market relationships, and growth equity expertise to every client relationship.

Jim has spent his career at the intersection of technology, venture capital, and operational leadership — building and advising companies from pre-revenue through exit. He brings the founder’s perspective and the operator’s discipline to every engagement.

James W. Burnes
Managing Partner

Tampa, FL

James co-leads DragonflyOP’s firm strategy, client relationships, and operating partner network. With deep experience scaling B2B technology companies through critical inflection points, he brings a combination of strategic clarity and operational rigor to every engagement.

His background spans GTM strategy, revenue operations, and company building across multiple industries — with a track record of helping founders navigate the transition from founder-led growth to institutional-grade operating companies ready for scale or exit.

Operating Partners

Your embedded leadership team.

Operating Partners are assigned based on your specific needs. Each brings deep functional expertise and has operated — not consulted — at companies in your stage and sector.

John F. Blake
Lead Operating Partner
Sarasota, FL

John is a four-time President & CEO with more than 25 years of global corporate and entrepreneurial experience. He specializes in driving growth for companies from $1M to $100M in revenue — navigating early-stage challenges, market shifts, and business transformations with a proven track record of generating over $200M in new enterprise value.

His expertise spans information services, software, marketing, and media sectors. John also serves as CEO of Authorio Digital, LLC. He leads DragonflyOP’s most complex engagements as the primary operating partner — sitting inside client companies and making executive decisions alongside founders and boards.

Matt Kemp
Operating Partner

Tampa, FL

Matt has built and led high-performing marketing and technology teams for over 20 years — across venture capital and private equity-backed growth investments in B2B SaaS and B2C e-commerce. He has held the CMO role on virtually every engagement, but has also dually served as CTO, fractional CRO, and COO — giving him rare cross-functional depth.

Matt has raised venture capital at seed and pre-seed stages, worked on PE investments with family offices, and led across industries including retail, logistics, and healthcare. He launched and scaled multiple startups leading to several successful exits — including participation in a NASDAQ IPO. His focus is driving profitable growth by optimizing marketing channels, sales processes, and technology strategy.

Phoebe Noce
Operator in Residence
Chicago, IL

Phoebe is an embedded execution specialist who works directly within active client engagements — supporting GTM execution, operations management, and client-facing deliverables across DragonflyOP’s portfolio. She brings exceptional organizational acuity and a bias for action that keeps Sprint deliverables moving at the pace founders need.

As an Operator in Residence, Phoebe bridges the gap between strategic direction and daily execution — ensuring that the work gets done, not just planned.

The Supporting Cast

Every function covered.

Your lead operating partner is supported by specialists across every domain your company needs — sourced from DragonflyOP’s network of trusted, long-term operators and vendor relationships.

Revenue Operations

Pipeline, forecasting, CRM, and sales infrastructure

Pricing & Packaging

SaaS pricing strategy, packaging design, and billing transformati

PR & Storytelling

Brand narrative, press strategy, and investor communications

Channel & Partners

Partner programs, reseller channels, and strategic alliances

MarTech & Analytics

Marketing technology stack, attribution, and reporting infrastructure

Product Management

Roadmap prioritization, user research, and PMF validation

Finance & Planning

Financial modeling, reporting, and fundraising preparation

Software Architecture

Technical strategy, vendor selection, and dev team management

HR & Talent

Executive recruiting, org design, and compensation modeling

UX / UI Design

Product design, brand identity, and conversion optimization

DevOps

Infrastructure, CI/CD pipelines, and engineering operations

Customer Success

Retention playbooks, expansion revenue, and health scoring

Our Philosophy

Why we work the way we do.

Four principles that govern how we engage, how we operate, and how we measure our own success.

01
Principals only — no associates.

The person who pitches you is the person who does the work. Every engagement is run by experienced operators who have held the role they’re filling for you. There are no handoffs to junior staff.

02
Urgency is non-negotiable.

Startups don’t have time for slow-moving engagements. We operate with the same urgency as the founders we work with — making decisions quickly, executing immediately, and holding ourselves accountable to weekly progress.

03
Aligned on the outcome, not the invoice.

We structure every engagement to maximize your enterprise value — not to extend our billing cycle. Our goal is to build the team and systems you need so that you no longer need us.

 
04
Trust is the foundation.

We are selective about who we work with because we operate as co-founders, not vendors. We want to be in a long-term relationship with people we trust — founders and investors who share our values and our drive.

Work with us

Meet the team behind the results.

We take on a limited number of engagements at a time. If you’re building something worth fighting for, we’d like to be part of it.