New Tableau leader talks vendor's evolution in era of AI

As Tableau evolves to meet the changing needs of customers in the emerging era of AI, the vendor is doing so under a new leader.

Mark Recher

Mark Recher, who has been with Tableau's parent company Salesforce for more than 12 years, was named executive vice president and general manager of Tableau when Ryan Aytay, who was appointed CEO of Tableau in May 2023, stepped down after nearly three years in the role.

Recher takes over Tableau's leadership during a time of transition, not only for Tableau but for all data and analytics vendors.

Tableau, along with competing vendors such as Qlik and Microsoft with its Power BI platform, was hailed as one of the innovators of the self-service analytics era, enabling users to create dazzling data visualizations that made it easy to digest and understand data. In recent years, in step with technological advances, Tableau evolved to include decision intelligence features and, most recently, AI capabilities including agents.

Now, however, as enterprises make AI the main focus of their development initiatives and agentic AI becomes the new interface for business intelligence, removing analysis and insight generation from reports and dashboards and autonomously delivering actionable information to users in any system, Tableau and its peers must evolve. With their platforms no longer needed the way they were in the past, analytics vendors are trying to find new ways of serving a purpose in data and AI workflows.

Tableau, with the introduction of the Agentic Analytics Platform on Tuesday at the vendor's user conference in San Diego, is attempting to become a knowledge layer for AI, enabling agents and other AI tools to access the trusted, high-quality data they need to have the contextual awareness to perform properly.

In his first public comments since taking over as Tableau's new leader, Recher discussed his vision for the vendor in an exclusive interview. In addition, Recher spoke about goals he has in his new role, the challenges he's hearing about from customers as he meets with them for the first time and how Tableau plans to address them, and the opportunities the pace of innovation presents.

Editor's note: This Q&A has been edited for clarity and conciseness.

In the past when I'd speak with Tableau about product development, the message was always that the vendor's aim was to make data as easy to consume for as many people as possible. As we evolve into a new era of AI, what do you view as Tableau's mission as you become its leader?

Mark Recher: I think this is the most exciting time in data and analytics, and I think the future is very exciting.

For Tableau, the vision and where we're taking it is grounded in the original mission, which was helping everyone to see and understand their data. We're renewing that with a slightly different vision, which is helping everyone see, understand and act on their data. When I think about the future and where we're taking Tableau with the Agentic Analytics Platform and our knowledge engine, it's the same Tableau that our customers and the [Tableau community called the] DataFam love, but it's built for the agentic era.

How does Tableau Desktop, which includes a free version of your platform, play into your vision as you take over as Tableau's leader?

Recher: Our incredible product, customer base, brand and community was built on one other thing [beyond trying to help everyone understand their data], which is the mission to democratize data.

For Tableau, the vision and where we're taking it is grounded in the original mission, which was helping everyone to see and understand their data. We're renewing that with a slightly different vision, which is helping everyone see, understand and act on their data.

Something that we did 45 days ago that I'm not sure people really understand is that we launched Tableau Desktop Premium. The response has been staggering with 115,000 sign-ups. Tableau Desktop is an enormous part of what built Tableau, and we're re-grounding ourselves in that. We're going to bring all [of our] agentic capabilities there. Democratizing access is a core value that Tableau was founded on, and it's an important part of our future. Giving everyone the ability to see, understand and act so they can explore, build and be curious helps us build a better product and serve our customers better.

That's our vision -- it's grounded in where it was founded, but with the extension of giving people the ability to use it for free.

Every leader has their own ideas about what a company should be, so as you take over as Tableau's GM, what are some of your goals for the company?

Recher: A little background on me is that I have been obsessed with data since I can remember. I was the kid looking at box scores on the sports page, trying to understand why the Twins were trying to do something. I was obsessed with Bill James. Moneyball [by Michael Lewis] is my favorite book. In my career, I've been at Salesforce for 12 years and for the last seven have been chief operating officer of our largest businesses, and I ran those businesses on Tableau. My day, every day, starts with coffee and Tableau, so there's a kinship.

When I think of my goals, coming into the role, one is delivering on that mission we just talked about. Second is everything in our culture being customer-obsessed and community-obsessed. It's re-grounding and delivering on our mission and making sure that, as a company, we are … obsessed on delivering on that mission through innovation.

What is one other goal?

Recher: It's a more exciting time to be a data analyst than ever, but those roles are evolving in an empowering way that is going to increase the impact that they make in their organizations. They're going from a data analyst to a knowledge architect to a decisions architect to an agentic analytics architect. Their ability, from Tableau, to drive their company's entire data and analytics strategy, and drive alerts across the organization when things change, is an exciting chapter, and I want to be a steward to the DataFam as they make that transition.

In this time of transition, what are some of the biggest issues you are hearing about from customers as you meet with them for the first time as Tableau's leader?

Recher: Every customer that I've spoken to since I've taken the role, and also in my last year in my previous role, is trying to figure out how to get value from AI. Specifically, since I've been talking to Tableau customers, the discussion we're having is about the difference between data and knowledge, and the importance of having a knowledge layer that has the context of their business so that AI can give accurate responses. There's a statistic that 89% of leaders have seen inaccurate responses from AI, and my response to that is, 'Show me the other 11%,' because when I play around with AI, I see [inaccuracy] all the time. That's one. The second issue is [wondering] how to use the investment they've made as a CIO or CEO in data to actually take action, to drive productivity, speed and value, whether that's for their organizations internally or the way they serve their customers. A lot of that has informed our strategy and evolution with Tableau.

They all want to get value out of AI, they all are trying to translate data into knowledge, and they're all trying to figure out how to take action with that.

Beyond the Agentic Analytics Platform, what are some other ways Tableau is trying to help customers get the value they're looking for from AI?

Recher: Without giving away our roadmap, there will be certain domains that we continue to focus on very intentionally, places like knowledge and ontology, places like decision intelligence, and the action layer. Those are probably the three spaces, as we continue to move forward, that you will see more announcements and very interesting cool new capabilities.

What have been your biggest challenges since taking over as Tableau's leader?

Recher: My biggest challenge has been time. Any time I've gone into an organization or a business or a product, I get as deep as possible with the data, our customers, the community and all of that. The biggest challenge is that there's 24 hours in a day. In my very first meeting [as Tableau's leader], I showed a slide showing that there were 55 days until Tableau Conference and what we needed to focus on in those 55 days. My one ask of the team was pace and speed, because things are moving very fast right now and we're going to move faster than the market.

It's been an amazing first two months, but as you come into a new role and try to understand every dimension of the business, you wish there were more than 24 hours in a day.

How challenging is how fast technology is evolving and the need for organizations, whether data and analytics vendors such as Tableau or any company in any other industry, to keep pace?

Recher: You could think of it as a challenge because of the speed of the market, or you could see it as an opportunity.

Some of the things that are happening in the market should provide inspiration, but you also need to stay convinced of your strategy and your strengths and your advantages and what your customers want. That's how we're balancing it, and that's important for any company -- how to find inspiration and the ability to do things faster but not allow it to distract you from what matters most. I don't think of the speed of the market as a challenge. For me, in two months, it's been a huge opportunity.

Eric Avidon is a senior news writer for Informa TechTarget and a journalist with more than three decades of experience. He covers analytics and data management.