Sat.Aug 19, 2017 - Fri.Aug 25, 2017

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I hate MVPs. So do your customers. Make it SLC instead.

A Smart Bear

Product teams have been repeating the MVP (Minimum Viable Product) mantra for a decade now, without re-evaluating whether it’s the right way to maximize learning while pleasing the customer. Well, it’s not the best system. It’s selfish and it hurts customers. We don’t build MVPs at WP Engine. The motivation behind the MVP is still valid: Build something small, because small things are predictable and inexpensive to test.

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7 Benefits of Taking a Company Retreat

Entrepreneurs' Organization

Company retreats come in all shapes and sizes. Whether you opt for luxury accommodations or woodsy lodgings, what’s most important is organizing a variety of activities and workshops that bring out the best in your team. Research retreat ideas and come up with an environment that will work for your organization. Consider consulting with a professional retreat planner.

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Has SaaS Become Commodified?

Tomasz Tunguz

A founder asked me if we had reached the point that SaaS is commodified. “Can you build a venture scale SaaS company anymore?” He made three key points to support the argument. First, the technology barriers to starting a SaaS company continue to fall. Amazon, Google and Microsoft provide sophisticated, scalable, and easy to use infrastructure as a service.

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Not Interested: How to know whether you've actually got an investor on the hook.

This is going to be BIG.

I don't think there's ever a time when I feel more like I'm raining on parades as when founders tell me how interested other VC firms are in investing. I've seen it time and time again where founders, understandably apprehensive about fundraising, read too much into their engagement with investors--especially non-partners at firms. The founders will say things like the following--and then comes my splash of cold water, which is honest, but also makes me feel like the bad guy, or not enthusiastic

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From Curiosity to Competitive Edge: How Mid-Market CEOs Are Using AI to Scale Smarter

Speaker: Lee Andrews, Founder at LJA New Media & Tony Karrer, Founder and CTO at Aggregage

This session will walk you through how one CEO used generative AI, workflow automation, and sales personalization to transform an entire security company—then built the Zero to Strategy framework that other mid-market leaders are now using to unlock 3.5x ROI. As a business executive, you’ll learn how to assess AI opportunities in your business, drive adoption across teams, and overcome internal resource constraints—without hiring a single data scientist.

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There’s no second chance to create first quality.

Berkonomics

Close. Let me illustrate this insight with a personal story. As my enterprise computer software company which produced innovative lodging systems for hotels and resorts grew quickly, we found ourselves straining to keep up with the hiring and training of good customer support representatives, a critical part of the equation then and still so today in the 24-hour environment of hotel front desk operations.

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More Trending

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The Volatility of Multiples in the Public SaaS Market

Tomasz Tunguz

We’ve seen quite a bit of volatility in the valuations of publicly traded software companies over the last 5 years. In 2014, the average software company traded at 7.7x forward revenues - the sum of projected revenues over the next 12 months. Two years later, that multiple dropped 57% to 3.3x. Today, we’re exactly where we were in 2013, at 5.4x, which is coincidentally, is the average over this time period.

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On No Sides.

This is going to be BIG.

On no sides is genocide an ok thing to promote with your free speech or to organize a group around. On no sides is the Confederacy, the sole purpose of which was to defend the institution of slavery, a thing to be admired. On no sides is the eradication of Nazis and the KKK a slippery slope to the end of free speech in our country. It is perfectly right and acceptable for a society to draw lines--to point to levels of despicable behavior and say "No--in no uncertain terms.

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Hiring: What’s an “Ideal Fit”?

Entrepreneurs' Organization

By Kristen Harris, EO Columbus member and Co-Founder of Portfolio Creative. . In hiring it’s important to remember people are not commodities, individuals are not interchangeable. Even with equal skills or experience, every person is unique, and so is every company and role. It’s important to find the right person for the right position—that’s an Ideal Fit.