GigaOM » see founders run

GigaOM » see founders run http://gigaom.com Wed, 19 Jun 2013 04:26:27 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.com/ http://0.gravatar.com/blavatar/0db8f6557d022075dbbf010c54d46d93?s=96&d=http%3A%2F%2Fs2.wp.com%2Fi%2Fbuttonw-com.png GigaOM » see founders run http://gigaom.com What’s it like being a Y Combinator startup? http://gigaom.com/2012/08/30/whats-it-like-being-a-y-combinator-startup/ http://gigaom.com/2012/08/30/whats-it-like-being-a-y-combinator-startup/#comments Thu, 30 Aug 2012 22:30:31 +0000 Chris Albrecht http://gigaom.com/?p=557859 ]]> With just a 2 percent acceptance rate, it’s statistically harder to get your startup into Y Combinator than it is to get accepted into MIT or Stanford undergrad. The hot incubator/accelerator has spawned some of the biggest startups including Reddit, Dropbox and Airbnb. For those on the outside, looking (to get) in — what’s it like being a “YC” company?

Is this episode of See Founders Run, MemSQL founder and CEO, Eric Frenkiel (YC Class winter 2011) talks about how to make a strong application to YC, how YC works and what those dinners are really like.

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]]> http://gigaom.com/2012/08/30/whats-it-like-being-a-y-combinator-startup/feed/ 7 ERIC FRENKIEL Chris Albrecht How to keep friendships long past your startups http://gigaom.com/2012/08/23/554398/ http://gigaom.com/2012/08/23/554398/#comments Thu, 23 Aug 2012 22:00:40 +0000 Chris Albrecht http://gigaom.com/?p=554398 ]]> If The Social Network taught us anything, it’s that startups can ruin friendships. So it was refreshing and fun to interview Satish Dharmaraj, general partner at Redpoint Ventures, and Scott Dietzen, CEO of Pure Storage. The two have been working together, but more importantly have remained friends for more than 15 years. The two take business seriously, but have a genuinely good time with one another. So much so that I almost want to create a sitcom called “Satish and Dietz.”

In this edition of See Founders Run, the two talk about the ways build a lasting business and personal relationship.

On the more buttoned-down business front, Satish and Dietz (see? It’s catchy!) talk about how investors and CEOs should work together.

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]]> http://gigaom.com/2012/08/23/554398/feed/ 0 SATISH AND DIETZ Chris Albrecht Being too clever can be a product killer http://gigaom.com/2012/08/20/being-too-clever-can-be-a-product-killer/ http://gigaom.com/2012/08/20/being-too-clever-can-be-a-product-killer/#comments Mon, 20 Aug 2012 22:00:12 +0000 Chris Albrecht http://gigaom.com/?p=554343 ]]> As Spinal Tap once remarked “It’s such a fine line between stupid and clever.” That’s something Hall.com co-founder and CEO Brett Hellman likes to keep in mind when building products. Hellman warns that if you think you are being really clever in developing a new feature, chances are good it will be confusing to your users.

In this episode of See Founders Run, Hellman talks about the clever conundrum and how contrary to what you might think, small teams should not divide and conquer when tackling a tough problem.

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]]> http://gigaom.com/2012/08/20/being-too-clever-can-be-a-product-killer/feed/ 1 BRETT HELLMAN Chris Albrecht Justin Kan on letting go and staying sane when running a startup http://gigaom.com/2012/08/13/justin-kan-on-letting-go-and-staying-sane-when-running-a-startup/ http://gigaom.com/2012/08/13/justin-kan-on-letting-go-and-staying-sane-when-running-a-startup/#comments Tue, 14 Aug 2012 04:00:22 +0000 Chris Albrecht http://gigaom.com/?p=552408 ]]> Justin Kan is probably best known for strapping on a video camera to livestream his life, which eventually turned into the video platform Justin.tv. He hung up the video camera long ago, but has kept busy as a part-time partner at Y Combinator and founding his latest startup, the errand-running service, Exec. Kan’s grown a lot since those livestreaming days, and says that his key to staying sane in the startup world is letting go.

In this episode of See Founders Run, Kan explains that entrepreneurs who try to do everything at the company are doing it wrong, and how it’s important understand what you can and can’t control.

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]]> http://gigaom.com/2012/08/13/justin-kan-on-letting-go-and-staying-sane-when-running-a-startup/feed/ 0 JUSTIN KAN Chris Albrecht OpenDNS CEO: Security isn’t that hard http://gigaom.com/2012/08/06/opendns-ceo-how-startups-can-create-secure-products/ http://gigaom.com/2012/08/06/opendns-ceo-how-startups-can-create-secure-products/#comments Tue, 07 Aug 2012 03:24:03 +0000 Chris Albrecht http://gigaom.com/?p=550369 ]]> Wired writer, Mat Honan, was the victim of an “epic hacking” over the weekend. Our hearts go out to him and I’ll knock on any available chunk of wood to never experience the same thing. Given that Honan’s hack started with some social engineering on a customer service rep, we thought it was a good idea to show this additional footage from a recent interview with did with OpenDNS‘ CEO, David Ulevitch. In it, Ulevitch warns of social engineering and advises startups to bake security into their products from the ground up. This is especially important as more people bring their own devices to work and use cloud services.

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]]> http://gigaom.com/2012/08/06/opendns-ceo-how-startups-can-create-secure-products/feed/ 1 DAVID ULEVITCH Chris Albrecht How founders can work with incoming CEOs (and vice versa) http://gigaom.com/2012/08/06/how-founders-can-work-with-incoming-ceos-and-vice-versa/ http://gigaom.com/2012/08/06/how-founders-can-work-with-incoming-ceos-and-vice-versa/#comments Mon, 06 Aug 2012 22:30:32 +0000 Chris Albrecht http://gigaom.com/?p=550175 ]]> After years of sacrifice to build a startup, it’s easy to see why a founder might be reluctant to relinquish control to an outsider. But the relationship between a founder and incoming CEO doesn’t have to be a contentious one. Jim Scullion, CEO of gamification company Bunchball, has come in four different times as a new CEO over his career. To him, it’s all about identifying good fit and playing to each other’s strengths.

In this episode of See Founders Run, Scullion talks about scaling a business, aligning a vision, and accepting the best roles for the company’s success.

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]]> http://gigaom.com/2012/08/06/how-founders-can-work-with-incoming-ceos-and-vice-versa/feed/ 0 JIM SCULLION Chris Albrecht Deal with poor performers now [video] http://gigaom.com/2012/08/03/deal-with-poor-performers-now-video/ http://gigaom.com/2012/08/03/deal-with-poor-performers-now-video/#comments Fri, 03 Aug 2012 22:30:10 +0000 Chris Albrecht http://gigaom.com/?p=549793 ]]> OpenDNS is on the verge of crossing over 100 employees. It’s growing is so fast that by the end of 2012, half of the company will have been there for less than a year. But as founder and CEO David Ulevitch discovered, not every employee is suited for the next stage of the company. Through internal satisfaction surveys and his own intuition, he realized OpenDNS was not dealing well with poor performers. Ulevitch points out that poor performance could be a result of a corporate pivot, or managers holding lower standards for their direct reports.

Regardless of why some people are poor performers, on this episode of See Founders Run, Ulevitch talks about the importance of not wasting time on those those who waste time.

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]]> http://gigaom.com/2012/08/03/deal-with-poor-performers-now-video/feed/ 1 DAVID ULEVITCH Chris Albrecht Should your startup have mandatory “Work from home Wednesdays?” http://gigaom.com/2012/08/01/should-your-startup-have-mandatory-work-from-home-wednesdays/ http://gigaom.com/2012/08/01/should-your-startup-have-mandatory-work-from-home-wednesdays/#comments Wed, 01 Aug 2012 22:30:20 +0000 Chris Albrecht http://gigaom.com/?p=549071 ]]> It’s easy to get myopic at a startup and become too focused on results and milestones instead of taking a step back and thinking about the big picture. ThredUP‘s co-founder and CEO, James Reinhart, wanted to give his team a chance to take that breather, so the company initiated mandatory “work from home Wednesdays.” Employees are expected to put in a full day’s work, but they are not allowed to do it at the office. The results, said Reinhart, have been increased productivity and greater employee satisfaction.

In this episode of See Founders Run, Reinhart talks about the benefits of this policy, what to think about if you want to implement something similar, and why “work from home Fridays” is not a good idea.

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]]> http://gigaom.com/2012/08/01/should-your-startup-have-mandatory-work-from-home-wednesdays/feed/ 6 JAMES REINHART Chris Albrecht Want to hire the right team? Exhaust your interviewees http://gigaom.com/2012/07/27/want-to-hire-the-right-team-exhaust-your-interviewees/ http://gigaom.com/2012/07/27/want-to-hire-the-right-team-exhaust-your-interviewees/#comments Fri, 27 Jul 2012 22:30:16 +0000 Chris Albrecht http://gigaom.com/?p=546423 ]]> Every startup wants to hire rock stars, but in a hyper-competitive market like San Francisco, finding — and keeping — top-level talent is daunting. Matt MacInnis, co-founder and CEO of publishing platform Inkling, believes he’s found a way to scale his workforce without sacrificing quality. For MacInnis, it’s about making sure the company’s values are perpetuated with every new employee. That sounds amorphous and touchy-feely, but the process becomes rigid during the interview phase. Only a small number of people conduct interviews, MacInnis still meets every prospective hire, and the interviews are designed to be exhausting for the applicant so the company can see what the person is like when they are tired.

In this episode of See Founders Run, MacInnis talks more about how he scaled his workforce from 10 to 100 employees in two years, and why his startup has an “insanely low” attrition rate.

(I’m sorry about the audible tapping at a few points throughout the video. It’s subtle — but there– and I didn’t hear it during taping.)

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]]> http://gigaom.com/2012/07/27/want-to-hire-the-right-team-exhaust-your-interviewees/feed/ 6 MATT MACINNIS Chris Albrecht Why Crowdtilt sent out 1,000 handwritten thank you notes [video] http://gigaom.com/2012/07/25/little-paper-notes-make-big-impact-for-crowdtilt/ http://gigaom.com/2012/07/25/little-paper-notes-make-big-impact-for-crowdtilt/#comments Wed, 25 Jul 2012 22:30:20 +0000 Chris Albrecht http://gigaom.com/?p=545994 ]]> A little piece of paper can go a long way in this digital world. Just ask James Beshara, co-founder and CEO of Crowdtilt, a crowdfunding platform for small groups of friends. Beshara and his co-founder sent out handwritten notes to the first 1,000 campaign administrators on the site, thanking them for using the service. According to Beshara, this personal touch gave the small startup a lot of goodwill with customers, especially when things on the service went wrong.

In this episode of See Founders Run, Beshara explains why they make real-world interactions a priority, how to succeed with them, and the additional social media bonus of thank-you cards.

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]]> http://gigaom.com/2012/07/25/little-paper-notes-make-big-impact-for-crowdtilt/feed/ 1 JAMES BESHARA Chris Albrecht