Both Sides of the Table
FEBRUARY 6, 2013
it’s the most expensive dilution you’ll ever face. Engineering is critical but it is not everything. Your first sales people should be consultative sellers who can fuel evangelical sales. Don’t hire “relationship management” sales people too early. For the wrong reasons.
Both Sides of the Table
MARCH 21, 2013
So when I meet with GRP portfolio companies that do enterprise sales I try to emphasize the following: 1. Often your sales engineers can do the customizations without bugging the core eng team. Integrate PS Work Into Sales & Marketing Processes. Referenceability is the lifeblood of sales.
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Both Sides of the Table
MAY 9, 2018
I also had to negotiate a follow-on round at a portfolio company because new investors were trying to force a bit option-pool top-up that would dilute the founders and existing shareholders and existing investors were fighting over prorata rights. She was one of the lead engineers at Uber. Some were interesting, some weren’t.
Steve Blank
NOVEMBER 13, 2018
I had joined MIPS Computers, my second semiconductor company , as the VP of marketing and also took on the role of the acting VP of Sales. I worked with engineering to try to find product/market fit ( big endian or little endian ?) I worked with engineering to try to find product/market fit ( big endian or little endian ?)
Startup Professionals Musings
JULY 1, 2022
CEO brought in to replace the founder, 5 - 10% CTO, CFO, VP of Marketing or Sales, 1.5 - 3% Chief Engineer or Architect, 1 - 1.5% Advisory Board Member, 1% Senior Engineer,3 -.7% 7% Product Manager,2 -.3% 3% If you are not on this list, just worry about getting whatever your peers are getting.
Startup Professionals Musings
OCTOBER 13, 2021
It’s easy to say “yes” to one more feature request after another, until the potential for real impact gets diluted. Yahoo has been an example of a company which expanded in all directions through 53 acquisitions, to the point where most customers were confused, and it was overtaken by Google as your main search engine.
Both Sides of the Table
SEPTEMBER 17, 2011
Still, I’ll bet that functionally you divide areas of competence like sales & marketing, product, engineering, biz dev, etc. “I need a COO to focus on the business while I focus on M&A and strategic discussions.&# The company that wrote me this told me they were doing $4 million in sales. What will it do?
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