This is going to be BIG.

APRIL 23, 2012

I have one failed attempt at a startup under my belt as a founder and I don't have any particularly usable skills that anyone would pay for like selling, designing, building, etc. Conferences, startup blogs, meetups--they're all filled with people telling you how to build your company. Most startups fail.

advice 412

advice startup VC strategy 412

Paul G. Silva

FEBRUARY 11, 2025

The Millau Viaduct , consistently ranked as one of the greatest engineering achievements of modern times This post is part of my ongoing series exploring lessons from Jim Collins’s book, BE 2.0 ” At the time, we were running a startup accelerator for 6 companies. Beyond Entrepreneurship 2.0).

innovation 130

innovation accelerator angel investing entrepreneurship 130

Entrepreneurs' Organization

JULY 6, 2020

Like the downturns in 2008 and 2001, this has been a very trying time for entrepreneurs running startups. While some level of stress is inevitable if you are running a startup, times like this can ramp up the stress factor considerably. I interviewed a number of prominent VC’s and entrepreneurs for my recent book.

peer-to-peer 321

peer-to-peer startup advice entrepreneurs 321

Dream It

FEBRUARY 5, 2021

We did a previous dose on 5 things investors wish startups knew. Managing Partner, Steve Barsh , sat down to give us 5 MORE things investors wish startups knew. Keep reading for some more of the most common mistakes startups make when pitching and for Steve’s tips on how to fix them. Go here if you missed it. co-founder).

startup founder 397

startup founder founder startup pitching 397

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 4, 2013

He then brought her to board meetings so nobody could accuse him of not having a business model. He calls this competing with “non consumption” It was the most profound business strategy book I had read and greatly influenced how I thought about company building and certainly how I think about investing. Startup Advice'

strategy 401

strategy startup peer-to-peer advice 401

Paul G. Silva

FEBRUARY 4, 2025

This post is part of my ongoing series exploring lessons from Jim Collinss book, BE 2.0 Culture is Strategy This post is part of my ongoing series exploring lessons from Jim Collins’s book, BE 2.0 But our board chairman asked a simple question: “Is filling out forms fun?” Beyond Entrepreneurship 2.0).

culture 130

culture strategy entrepreneurship mentorship 130

Paul G. Silva

MARCH 11, 2025

This post is part of my ongoing series exploring lessons from Jim Collins’s book, BE 2.0 The Feedback That Made Me Sick to My Stomach Years ago, as president of Click Workspace, a startup coworking space, I received feedback that literally made me feel physically ill. Our board chairman called me in for a conversation.

mentorship 130

mentorship coworking spaces coworking board 130

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 17, 2012

And that person has almost certainly chosen specifically to be a startup lawyer over serving other types of customers because he or she enjoys working with entrepreneurs. She was lamenting that some startups simply see their PR company as merely somebody who corrals the press when you want to get some inches. EXECUTIVE RECRUITERS.

startup 363

startup real estate VC venture capital 363

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 25, 2013

bang on the windows of a board meeting recently and stick his tongue out at all of us. Didn’t I make myself clear about celebrities & startups ? Turns out she’s done this startup thing before. And they’re both full time committed to their startup – Moonfrye. Startup Advice' Kara as CEO.

startup 398

startup creativity advice entrepreneurs 398

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 14, 2017

Nearly every successful tech startup I’ve observed over the past 20 years has gone through a similar growth pattern: Innovate, systematize then scale operations. Innovate In the early years of a startup there is a lot of kinetic energy of enthusiastic innovators looking to launch a product that changes how an industry works.

innovation 286

innovation startup board leadership 286

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 8, 2011

Launchpad LA today announces it will accept applications for its third class of Los Angeles-based tech startups. But the most important metric has been the deep and lasting relationships that have been built with startups and also between senior executives. Cramster – Acquired by Chegg the leading online book rental company.

VC 287

VC mentorship incubation startup 287

Tomasz Tunguz

NOVEMBER 5, 2024

It’s striking that most of them already have a significant number of AI startups pursuing their ambitions to change workflows. Automated book closing & reconciliation ; document ingestion Life, Physical, & Social Science Occupations 1.22 Occupation Employment (in millions) AI Technology Software Developers & IT 2.71

data analysis 95

data analysis construction education creativity 95

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 15, 2017

Many board meetings are bored meetings. This is a shame since the value that the right board could add is immense if you select the right board members and manage them effectively. Yesterday I wrote a blog post about what the role of a board actually is. Some boards are highly functional, many are not.

board 212

board enablement strategy support 212

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 3, 2014

Most technology startups seem to be funded by product people or business people. My first startup was no different. They are the lifeblood of many companies yet they are different than the traditional technology startup DNA so the ways that you hire, motivate, compensate and assess performance of these individuals will be different.

culture 382

culture startup support consulting 382

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 17, 2011

When you hire somebody too early who has already “done it” you often find somebody that is less motivated in tough times, less willing to be scrappy (as many startups need to be), more “needy” and less mentally flexible / willing to change their way of thinking. This post originally ran on TechCrunch. We know the mantra: Team matters.

startup 399

startup culture innovation advice 399

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 12, 2014

If you’re a technology startup you need to excel at product, of course. While many tech startups do this intuitively (say, SnapChat thinking it would be much better if our photos out partying disappeared) it still happens. If you publish a book, how do you get on the NY Times best seller list? Simply write a great book?

peer-to-peer 379

peer-to-peer mix-use consulting advice 379

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 2, 2015

Yet after a seed round of $2 million many are still doing Quickbooks entries, booking hotels & airplane tickets, negotiating offices leases and digging through employment benefits, legal contracts and such. At board meetings Ophir could focus on strategic questions because he knew that Phil could answer to every number in our board pack.

board 338

board energy financing finance 338

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 30, 2011

I’m a very big proponent of the “lean startup movement&# as espoused by Steve Blank & Eric Ries. In the late 90′s I saw a dangerous trend creeping into the startup world, which was that companies were suddenly raising huge amounts of money too early in their existence. This post originally appeared on TechCrunch.

entrepreneurs 374

entrepreneurs incubation board VC 374

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 22, 2014

Most VCs are book smart. In fact, book smart can be a negative. I’ve sat on ad tech boards with board members who clearly knew little about impressions, fill rates, CTRs, RTB, eCPMs or the difficulties & opportunities of embedded mobile SDKs vs. HTML5. Startups are hard. Startup Advice VC Industry'

VC 364

VC advice board leadership 364

Gust

OCTOBER 26, 2014

When someone asks me for the best way to fund a startup, I always say bootstrap it, meaning fund it yourself and grow organically. Despite all the focus you hear on external investors, over 90% of startups today are self-funded. Most startup founders already do this, rather than take a salary, to improve their offering.

startup 176

startup creativity entrepreneurs advice 176

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 14, 2016

” “Mark has a vested interest in talking down valuations of startups.” Most prefer not to say this publicly for two reasons: 1) they have an entire portfolio of startups, many of whom are raising capital and 2) they prefer not to be attacked publicly or seem “anti entrepreneur.” goes into a startup.

startup 285

startup VC entrepreneurs investing 285

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 20, 2012

Board Meetings. Startups Are for Doers. But trust me when I say that my observations across many startups (and other companies, frankly) is that not enough time goes into thinking. Startups are filled with the stresses of the here and now and it’s hard to break out of this mold of focusing two feet in front of you.

creativity 400

creativity venture capital entrepreneurs board 400

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 3, 2015

We we backed Team Grove’s mission (Kevin sourced the deal and joined the board) and just encouraged the team not to ramp up costs like many contemporary startups because we’re going to play the long game. eliminating herbicides & pesticides. ” Enter Grove. ” Enter Grove.

founder 363

founder ecology sustainability culture 363

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 17, 2016

He brings knowledgable experts from varying points of view but never books anybody that engages in yelling matches. I haven’t read the book nor deeply reviewed Project Aristotle but the conversation on this morning’s show really resonated with me. I have a board meeting coming up this week and I just reviewed the agenda.

frameworks 233

frameworks board creativity SaaS 233

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 5, 2014

She told of the teaching of the Talmud – a book which scholars use to debate doctrine and from which Jewish people are reminded to always learn and to debate. But as I rose in my career (and post MBA) I moved into a role in which I was to advise board-level executives on topics where I was expected to rapidly become an expert.

peer-to-peer 337

peer-to-peer entrepreneurs consulting VC 337

David Teten VC

JUNE 9, 2021

You can work as a consultant, an interim executive, a board member, a deal executive partnering to buy a company, an executive in residence, or as an entrepreneur in residence. . connects startups to experts in building new businesses. Board of Directors. (See How to negotiate a partner role at a VC or private equity firm.)

consulting 128

consulting venture capital board capital 128

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 17, 2011

This applies equally to VCs, startups & big company executives. One of the books that first made me aware of the “creative brain&# was “ Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain &# by Betty Edwards. All are known creativity drivers and are covered in the book mentioned above. For others they swear by music.

creativity 356

creativity frameworks media innovation 356

Dream It

MAY 19, 2021

If there is sincere interest on the part of the investor, offer to review a smaller raise and revised plan with your board. On the other hand, maybe you and your board have confidence that the amount being raised is the minimum required to achieve key milestones and a smaller raise simply does not make sense.

pitching 393

pitching board health VC 393

Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 25, 2011

Experiences way beyond any hack-a-thon, startup blog or your current company engagement can enrich your thinking and challenge you to think more broadly about the solutions you offer in the market. He talks about this early in the book as a foreshadowing technique. These topics all feature in the book. Shocking, I know.

entrepreneurship 334

entrepreneurship entrepreneurs culture education 334

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 21, 2014

Startups are hard. We tell startup stories. ” Strangely, the best I’ve ever heard this exemplified is in Anthony Bourdain’s Kitchen Confidential - which is really a book about startups as told through kitchen stories. Our founder, Yves Sisteron, was my mentor and board member at my first startup.

board 320

board VC construction opportunity 320

Both Sides of the Table

JULY 13, 2010

I bought the most popular book on the topic, “ The Mind of the Strategist &# by Kenichi Ohmae, who is ex McKinsey. I found this book very useful but still a little bit hard to implement. The book is expensive but for me personally this helped me enormously. Tags: Startup Advice. I’m glad I read it though.

entrepreneurs 372

entrepreneurs consulting frameworks advice 372

Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 12, 2016

The most common theme of being a startup in today’s world is that the computing environment and platforms change so rapidly that only the best equipped teams survive the transitions (think Facebook’s shift to mobile or Snapchat’s embrace of augmented reality). making the experience “as easy as buying a book on Amazon.”

real estate 244

real estate leadership board investing 244

Revolution

MAY 4, 2022

Pandemic-induced office closures led to nearly impossible circumstances for a startup focused on events and coworking spaces. Many times, optimism would be dashed by another Covid-19 variant that would wipe out bookings for the quarter. As board members, there were many hard conversations and no easy answers.

real estate 264

real estate coworking spaces coworking hospitality 264

This is going to be BIG.

MAY 28, 2013

And yet the number of software developers in NYC who work at startups has probably grown tenfold in the last eight years, leading me to ask the question of whether or not putting code in the classroom will make the biggest impact on innovation in our community.

education 336

education communities collaboration venture capital 336

TechCrunch

JANUARY 22, 2021

Christine Tao and Lori Mazan , the brains behind Sounding Board , want to train any leader within an organization to be a better leader. The San Francisco startup connects anyone from first-time managers to C-suite executives with coaches through a marketplace. Quarterly bookings have increased 3.4

board 106

board mentorship startup venture capital 106

Revolution

FEBRUARY 15, 2024

What we did: Revolution Ventures Managing Partner, Tige Savage , Associate, Anant Pai , and Rise of the Rest VP, James Barlia , were all in attendance at 2023’s Cintrifuse Summit, which focused on “homegrown hustle,” inspiring innovation, and retaining talent in the greater Cincinnati startup ecosystem. Where we went: New York, New York?

venture capital 246

venture capital pitching board ventures 246

A VC: Musings of a VC in NYC

APRIL 21, 2021

So this work to find the right pairing is critical and is a lot of the work that board members do with the founders and their leadership team in startups. Some founders are this rare breed of visionaries who can operate too. Most are not. Operational leadership, fortunately, does not.

leadership 279

leadership VC advice sustainability 279