Category

Leadership

Building A Strong Foundation for Growth

The Venture Kills journey continues. After spending three episodes on why you should Never Take Money from a VC, I’ve switched gears to a slightly more serious topic. The focus of the new series is on the building blocks founders should put in place to ensure their companies have a strong foundation for growth. The…

Two Steps Forward, One Step Back

When I took my first business trip as a Gnip team member more than 6 years ago, I accidentally brought home my hotel key in my back pocket. My kids were very young at the time & they thought the credit card sized piece of plastic was amazing. They were actually arguing over who got…

Moody On Management

My good friend Brad Feld is hosting a series of guest posts from yours truly on his world-famous blog: feld.com. The series is entitled Moody on Management. Here are a few of my favorite posts: Trust Can Scale The Work Begins When The Milestone Ends Guidelines For Interviewing At A Startup Getting The Compensation Conversation…

Startup Culture: Values vs. Vibe

I hear some form of the following question a lot from founders that are starting to have early success: “How do we hire a bunch of new people and grow the company quickly without losing the culture we’ve worked so hard to establish?” I’ve been fascinated by different company cultures for as long as I…

News To Startup CEOs: You Can’t Outsource Marketing

Here’s a common scenario I see with some early stage tech startups… Incredibly smart/tech-savvy people start a company around a cool idea. These founders build amazing tools/products that demonstrate their concept and their abilities. At this point they might decide they need to get funding. And, what will they use the money for? Often times,…

What if you built your business around one goal per year?

I’m getting old enough now that I’m measuring the personal milestones of my life in years.For example, 2005 was a great year because my son, Matthew, was born. 2005 is also the year we bought our current home in Boulder and the year I rediscovered my love for cycling. I can recall fewer milestones from…