Author, Investor, Speaker, Mentor
The venerable Dave Winer (a guy I respect a lot) recently wrote about Marissa Mayer and Yahoo’s acquisition of Tumblr. I don’t have a lot of insights to add about that deal, but I did want to comment on what Dave had to say about selling your company in general: “All this is to say … Continue reading When you sell your startup, you can’t expect to retain “ownership”
Bill Belichek is one of the most successful American football coaches of all time. After helping the New York Giants win two Superbowls as an assistant coach, he led the New England Patriots to three more Superbowl victories (along with two other appearances in the big game). Along the way, Belichek has become famous for … Continue reading Mental toughness at your startup
I’m delighted to share that I just had my very first article appear in Harvard Business Review. I can’t take much credit for it; it helps that my co-authors, ReidHoffman and Ben Casnocha are a world-famous billionaire and New York Times-bestselling author respectively. But I still think it’s pretty cool. Thanks to all you loyal … Continue reading Tours of Duty: The Employer-Employee Compact
My friend Ben Casnocha recently published a post about status and power: http://bit.ly/12tq6eb It’s a good post, but what really struck me was one of the comments. The commenter wrote: “Sorry, I have to unsubscribe after reading this… Manipulation, office politics–whatever you want to call it, I don’t like it if it interferes with getting … Continue reading Politics shouldn’t be a dirty word at your startup
A lot of folks seem to have this notion that if they do what they’re “supposed” to do, that’s good enough. That might be true in a big company, but it’s definitely not true in a startup. The employees of a startup need to focus on achieving goals, not simply fulfilling roles. This is even … Continue reading It’s the entrepreneur’s responsibility to get people to do what they need to do
Affirmative action is a highly controversial subject. Its supporters and opponents are dead set in their positions, and it’s nearly impossible to have a productive conversation about the topic. Naturally, I’d like to add my two cents. I hadn’t thought about affirmative action for a long time. Obviously, it might have affected me when I … Continue reading Affirmative action is good, but it’s also a cover for racial discrimination
One of my undergraduate majors at Stanford was Creative Writing. This meant that I sat in many different writing workshops. For those who haven’t taken a creative writing course before, here are the basics: 1. The workshop consists of a small group (~12) of students. 2. Each class session focuses on workshopping one of the … Continue reading What startup entrepreneurs can learn from writer’s workshops
Here in Silicon Valley, we like to throw around words like “awesome,” “killer,” “kickass,” and “rockstar.” In fact, we’ve even made “rockstar” into an all-purpose adjective, as in “rockstar developer” or “rockstar salesperson.” (Can it be long before we start using “rockstar” as a verb? As in, “I really rockstarred that latest release!” Ugh.) Lost … Continue reading You’re not “awesome,” you’re “awesome at”
As an entrepreneur, try to be a subversive, not a rebel. Here’s how I differentiate between the two: 1) A rebel breaks the rules because he or she hates being told what to do. A rebel’s defiance is open, and being identified as a rebel is a feature, not a bug. 2) A subversive breaks … Continue reading Be a subversive, not a rebel
I write a lot about the value of humility, especially in the startup world, but I realized that I needed to add some clarification. Humility is an important trait, but it needs to be paired with realism. Humility isn’t just self-deprecation. Think of all the times some gorgeous supermodel says things like, “I don’t know … Continue reading The relationship between humility and realism