Up and Running

NOVEMBER 22, 2017

They understand how to read a profit and loss (P&L) statement , how to budget, hire employees , launch products , and manage cash flow. The challenge for businesses that prioritize P&L statements over organizational purpose is that most employees don’t really care about profits or even understand how a P&L works.

Startup 111

Startup New York City Community Software Review 111

Austin Startup

OCTOBER 19, 2019

delivered inspirational keynotes and led us through workshops, informative chats, and discussion breakout sessions— along with a startup showcase featuring seven women founders. Although she spent her early years studying to become an astronaut, she realized that becoming a founder was her new calling. Foundries North America.

Technical Review 49

Technical Review North America Cleveland Austin 49

YoungUpstarts

NOVEMBER 17, 2020

In my time as a Fractional CFO , I’ve seen the good, the bad, and the ugly of entrepreneurship. Start building your network of support – it may be a co-founder, a mentor, a contractor, an employee, or an investor. Is it crazy to start a business during the Covid-19 pandemic? I say it’s brilliant, and at least 1.1 Ask for help.

Entrepreneur 259

Entrepreneur Cofounder Startup SEO 259

Women Entrepreneurs Can

DECEMBER 7, 2021

Unreasonable scaling could bring forth issues, such as operational inefficiency, cash flow crunch, customer service issues, and overworked employees. You can confront the seemingly ugly truths and put the proper measures in place that will lead to growth. The post 9 Do’s and Don’ts for Startup Founders appeared first on WECAN.

Founder 59

Founder Startup Metrics Reputation 59

This is going to be BIG.

FEBRUARY 27, 2022

Besides, there were a limited number of places where I could do my job in venture capital anyway—and while I might be a go to for a pitch from super early stage pre-seed and seed founders looking for quick answers and decisive term sheets in New York City, the reality is that I would be pretty far down the list in the Valley. Their employees?

Ukraine 128

Ukraine Russia Cap Table New York City 128

Babbling VC

DECEMBER 11, 2011

One of the most annoying things I often hear is founders telling their employees that they need to think like entrepreneurs. Don't fall into this trap thinking it'll motivate your employees in any way. Employees will be passionate about your company and they will work hard if you choose them well. BUT this is a bonus.

Employee 88

Employee Entrepreneur Equity Salary 88

Steve Blank

AUGUST 31, 2009

No newly hired sales and marketing exec is going to tell a founder, “Hey my prior experience and assumptions may not actually be relevant to this new startup.” The Outsourcing of Founders Responsibility The Product Development model separates founders from deeply understanding their customers and market.

Customer Development 241

Customer Development Developer Customer Silicon Valley 241

Austin Startup

MARCH 20, 2018

My co-founder, Jason Novek, and I got into Y Combinator when there were 27 total companies in the batch and only four YC partners in existence. The product was simple, and didn’t work every time, but after three months we had several newspapers cranking and it was enough to let my now co-founder quit his job in the “real world.”

Cofounder 48

Cofounder Texas Video Software Review 48

crowdSPRING Blog

SEPTEMBER 22, 2010

Good short read dispelling productivity myths about employee performance – [link]. Lesser Known Traits of Successful Founders – [link]. Ugly numbers for McDonald’s Foursquare nationwide check-in promo – [link]. Wake Up & Smell the Innovation Mike – [link]. Guess What? – [link].

Social Media 90

Social Media Small Business Design Media 90

Gust

JANUARY 4, 2012

I’d like to take a step back and discuss the significance of IP as a component of the overall value that founders intend to create as they grow the company. Internal org charts , job descriptions, titles, resumes, compensation details and direct contact information for individual employees (trade secret). trade secret).

Intellectual Property 143

Intellectual Property IP Startup United States 143

YoungUpstarts

APRIL 27, 2014

by Mike Matousek, CEO and founder of Flashnotes.com. Your product is your product, and you need to be able to sell it to investors, to customers or users, and to potential employees and get their buy-in first. You will always want a newer, faster, sleeker version of your current product, but you can’t sell what you don’t have.

Startup 200

Startup Employee Hiring Founder 200

YoungUpstarts

FEBRUARY 19, 2017

by Heather Landau, founder of Open A European Company.com. Assuming that a young employee will do a stellar job with your Facebook profile because they ‘know Facebook’ is a bit like casting a famous actor in a musical without checking if they can sing. Employees gone rogue. Your business is doing brilliantly.

Reputation 113

Reputation North America Social Media Europe 113

Steve Blank

JANUARY 10, 2011

In a startup founders and the board need to do exact the opposite of a large company – failures need to be shared, discussed and dissected to extract “lessons learned” so a new direction can be set. As a founder I quickly learned how open I could be with my board. Founders lead by example in sharing Lessons Learned.

Forecast 265

Forecast Agile Revenue Founder 265

YoungUpstarts

MAY 10, 2017

The hard and ugly truth is that 90% of startups fail. As a founder, you need to identify these causes and work towards ensuring that they don’t bring your business to its knees. There are many customer service skills that your employees need to have, including patience, perception, and persuasion. by Lewis Robinson.

Startup 113

Startup Leadership Demand Customer 113

A Smart Bear: Startups and Marketing for Geeks

SEPTEMBER 4, 2012

The way Bitvibe broke in is that the co-founder is the drummer for several really big bands that you’ve heard of from the 80′s and right now he’s in Gregg Rollie Band. But the answer is the co-founder’s been in the industry for 30 years and he’s somebody and so they can get meetings. Interviewee: Right.

Cofounder 199

Cofounder Technical Review Chicago Technical Cofounder 199

ConversionXL

DECEMBER 21, 2015

At Buffer, not only do they release their employees’ salaries , but they openly display all of their revenue numbers and other financial information as well. While Buffer has received some criticism for posting employee salary info (privacy rights, etc), it appears the strategy has worked exceedingly well overall. No Such Thing.

Marketing 48

Marketing Metrics Virginia Salary 48

Duct Tape Marketing

FEBRUARY 2, 2022

Rob is a namer, brand consultant, and principal and founder of Heirloom, an independent brand strategy, and identity firm. He's a name brand consultant and principal and founder of heirloom an independent brand strategy and identity firm. So I just think the combination of ugliness and, and lack of meaning is, is a real failure.

Naming 76

Naming Kansas City Kansas Technical Review 76

Steve Blank

APRIL 30, 2009

Hopefully you and your co-founders are experts in one or two parts (agile development, SEO/SEM, etc.) But the rest; sales, marketing, bus dev is actually customer development that the founder needs to understand. Initially your job is to understand each of the parts of your business model before you hire someone to do it.

Sales 120

Sales Silicon Valley RSS Las Vegas 120

Bryce Dot VC

SEPTEMBER 30, 2015

In the last 10 years, 7 times more founders have been exposed to the good, bad and ugly of starting and growing a venture funded company. Each of those founders had to recruit employees and build teams funded by their venture investors.

Dividend 40

Dividend Angel Investor Cofounder Founder 40

Early Growth Financial Services

JANUARY 20, 2015

Entrepreneurs founding startup companies are often unaware of a potentially significant tax liability that can rear its ugly head with respect to stock issued to founders and employees. Emerging business founders often acquire their stock through a restricted stock purchase arrangement providing for time-based vesting.

Vesting 28

Vesting Management Stock Equity 28

Scalable Startup

JANUARY 27, 2011

If you’re venture funded, things get kind of ugly -unhappy board members, cut off from communications, down- rounds to keep you going, or no more funding. Many early stage founders aren’t sure how to handle this requirement for success. Time for a new CEO? And all those other depressing clichés. What about users? Press Mentions?

Revenue 22

Revenue Early Stage Down Round Software Review 22

A Crowded Space

JUNE 13, 2012

When I was getting started, I was moving from an early-employee-business-generalist type to a VC. There was a pretty major theme I saw from a founder’s perspective: . I know that a startup at the early stages is the founder’s baby. It’s about whether we like or dislike the founder.

Cofounder 108

Cofounder Early Stage Due Diligence Founder 108

Genuine VC

FEBRUARY 3, 2011

On the early side, it's repeat founders coming together again or early runaway traction in an early beta that generates buzz. The good are interspersed with the bad and the ugly. Ask a VC which company in their portfolio is hiring the most people right now and are there openings which fit?

Startup 148

Startup Portfolio Later Stage Hiring 148

crowdSPRING Blog

AUGUST 11, 2011

Online sites supplying templates hardly provide a better option for two reasons: they’re ugly and expensive. Jeremy, founder of AllBusinessCards.com, took some time to answer our small business Proust questionnaire: How would you explain what you do to somebody’s grandmother? However, you can’t please everyone all the time.

Small Business 85

Small Business Design Social Media Employee 85

Hearpreneur

JANUARY 25, 2019

Entrepreneurship comes with freedom, but the freedom is not always free as it comes with the bad side of robbing of your work-life balance and other ugly things that make you dread the whole idea of entrepreneurship. 13- Responsibility towards my employees. It’s not like a boss who hires an employee at a traditional company.

Entrepreneur 63

Entrepreneur Boston SEO PPC 63

infochachkie.com

SEPTEMBER 24, 2011

Unlike employee training costs, which can typically be spread over years of service, the relative return from training a consultant is modest and pricey. This mistake, if left uncorrected, could have resulted in significant negative tax consequences for both our employees and the company. IP) is an ugly thing at a startup.

Equity 40

Equity Silicon Valley Cofounder Technical Review 40

YoungUpstarts

FEBRUARY 16, 2014

No matter how much you scour profit-and-loss statements, analyze your data, tweak your advertising, encourage your employees, or suck up to potential clients, you can’t move the needle. You can’t afford to sit at your desk and stew after an employee quits with no notice. The world needs to know your ugly stepsister story.

Programming 178

Programming Developer Bootstrapping Entrepreneur 178

Small Business Force

FEBRUARY 21, 2016

Having "parachuted into" a number of ugly turnaround situations, I've seen small company culture, from a lot of perspectives, often very bad. I've also built companies that from the get-go reflected and were driven by what I believed and my own value system about how employees, customers and suppliers should be treated.

Employee 27

Employee Operations Founder Government 27

Up and Running

NOVEMBER 23, 2010

Like I said, it’s good the identity is disguised, because Rand lays a whole lot of blame on the unnamed CEO, and his behavior after a co-founder left the company. A CEO, more so than any other employee, needs to live the company’s culture. Second: not even faint praise for this CEO. Third: lessons from failure.

Common Stock 63

Common Stock Stock Options Stock Cofounder 63

Small Business Force

DECEMBER 10, 2012

One day I see one of the employees polishing the logo in the reception area. The founder/CEO goes ballistic, because the company didn't get their bank credit that night, and says, "this takes priority over everything." Don't leave this up to employee interpretation. Or, off-the-cuff remarks that become ugly policy.

Customer 37

Customer Entrepreneur Small Business Stock 37

Startup Lessons Learned

NOVEMBER 26, 2012

And Red Room founder/CEO Ivory Madison on popular metrics that everyone should stop using. Others are new voices in putting Lean Startup techniques to use and have great case studies to share. They include people like GE SVP and CMO Beth Comstock on bringing Lean Startup to a massive corporation.

Lean 159

Lean San Francisco Houston Engineer 159

Seeing Both Sides

AUGUST 3, 2012

With over $1 billion in revenue, 2000 employees and a market capitalization of over $6 billion, Akamai has become a role model for scalable start-ups. Look at the (quite ugly) P&L for Akamai in 1999 and 2000 – costly mistakes were made, but ultimately enabled the company to scale as rapidly as it did: ($'s in millions). . . . .

Distribution 49

Distribution Lean Massachusetts Cofounder 49

The Next Web

JULY 29, 2013

Editor’s note: This is a guest post by Christian Reber, CEO and co-founder of Berlin-based 6Wunderkinder. When I started my first company in Berlin, I lived and worked in my apartment with one of my co-founders. As founders we all have a ton of new product ideas, each and every day. Co-Up , mobilesuite , Raumstation.

San Francisco 125

San Francisco Cofounder Germany Europe 125

abovethecrowd.com

NOVEMBER 28, 2022

With such guardrails in place, the company may have evolved in an entirely different direction, which would have been better for both founder and investor alike (especially vs. absolute failure). Corporate malfeasance is an ugly game that is best avoided. . Some founders unfortunately have an explicit aversion to audits.

Venture Capital 113

Venture Capital Non-Compete Government Delaware 113

Steve Blank

MAY 15, 2009

We need our own cafeteria so employees don’t have to leave the building. The new building telegraphed to our employees, “We’ve arrived. Let this article serve us reminders to founders and boards alike Reply Michael F. Perhaps it is better to shed employees instead, virtualize and outsource?

Silicon Valley 212

Silicon Valley RSS Lean Agile 212

www.chubbybrain.com

SEPTEMBER 28, 2011

After a thorough analysis of those 32 start-up post-mortems, we have determined the common reasons founders gave to compile this list of the top 20 ways to have your startup fail. Work life balance is not something that startup founders often get and so the risk of burning out is high. 13 – Disharmony with Investors/Co-founders.

Cofounder 89

Cofounder Startup Technical Cofounder CTO Hire 89

Hearpreneur

JANUARY 15, 2021

5-My co-founders’ wife came up with it. As much as I would like to take credit for the name it was my co-founders’ wife that thought of it. I named my business, ReCreate—a transformation company focused on optimizing business and leader. performance. Thanks to Jeremy Bedenbaugh, ReCreate Solutions ! #5-My

Naming 126

Naming Entrepreneur Mexico Cofounder 126