992 Posts Found

Scott Kupor of Andreessen Horowitz attempts to clear some of the opacity of how the VC industry works, by defining some basic terms, beginning with a bit of history.

Content: Article | Author: Scott Kupor | Source: Andreessen Horowitz | Subjects: Entrepreneurship, Venture Capital

El fracaso de un emprendedor empieza cuando su estrés es mayor que su energía, sus miedos son mayores que su motivación y su interés de regresar a la zona de confort es más importante que ser dueño de su propio éxito.

The failure of an entrepreneur begins when his stress is greater than his energy, his fears are greater than his motivation and his interest in … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Author: Jürgen Klaric | Subject: Entrepreneurship

Every startup is a series of hypotheses — about who’s a customer, what makes your product or service attractive to these customers, and so on. Lean startup provides a rigorous framework that you use to prove or disprove as many of these hypotheses as possible at as low a cost as possible. An interesting question is how do you generate the hypothesis? If you have … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Author: Stefanos Zenios | Source: Stanford University | Subject: Entrepreneurship

There’s a lot of advice on the web about what to do once you’ve raised money, but not when to do it. This is unfortunate, because poor timing can kill a company. This post will describe some common timing issues, as well as a framework for avoiding them.

Content: Article | Author: Leo Polovets | Subjects: Entrepreneurship, Venture Capital

People, essentially, do not create their own fortunes. They inherit them, come to them through the occupation of some state-protected niche, or, if they are very brilliant and very lucky, through infusing a particular group of men and women with the germ of an idea, which, in time and with just the right environment, allows that group to evolve into an organism suited to the … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Author: Ryan Avent | Source: Evonomics | Subjects: Economics, Entrepreneurship

The two fundamental dimensions on which entrepreneurial projects differ are the level of uncertainty – how much is known and how dangerous are the unknowns – and the cost of experimentation. In a recent study, Jackson Nickerson and Robert Wuebker and Nathan Furr used these dimensions of cost and uncertainty to create a 2×2 matrix to identify four zones of development, into which entrepreneurial projects … [ Read more ]

Content: Article | Author: Nathan Furr | Source: INSEAD Knowledge | Subjects: Entrepreneurship, Strategy

Early on, many startups don’t want to show prices — and that’s okay. Most don’t really know what they should charge, so they prefer to get intel by asking inbound customers some pricing questions. However, when you reach a point where you want a touchless sale, then you need to show your pricing. If it’s not a clear number, such as in Wistia’s case, give … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Author: Patrick Campbell | Source: First Round Review | Subjects: Entrepreneurship, Marketing / Sales, Pricing

The article introduces you to the Sean Ellis Test for assessing Product Market Fit. Further, the article explores the benefits and limitations of the Sean Ellis test, and finally discusses in detail how to properly apply the test for a positive outcome in your business.

Content: Article | Author: Martin Luenendonk | Source: Cleverism | Subjects: Entrepreneurship, Marketing / Sales, Strategy

In the beginning stages of hiring key talent for an early stage company, an engaged founder may spend anywhere from 40-50% of his or her time recruiting key hires. Having a clear philosophy around compensation and rewards is essential to do this effectively. Additionally, you can benefit from access to up-to-date compensation tools and resources to help hire and retain the best talent.

Homebrew has put … [ Read more ]

Content: Article | Source: Homebrew | Subjects: Compensation, Entrepreneurship, Human Resources

Rafe Furst of Quantitative VC uses data analysis and poker references to try to understand if VCs are good at investing in startups or if it is all just luck.

Content: Article | Author: Rafe Furst | Source: Medium | Subjects: Entrepreneurship, Venture Capital

There exists no formula for matching co-founders. Sometimes fits that look perfect in all ways don’t work out, and in other instances founders who may seem polar opposites of each other work in relative harmony. For founders, there are few issues that, early on in a company’s rearing, are more important. With that in mind, we’ve tapped our networks and our personal experiences to give … [ Read more ]

Content: Article | Author: Christopher Steiner | Subject: Entrepreneurship

At the core of the hiring criteria for our venture capital firm, and what we see at top tech companies, is of course things like (a) acumen and talent, (b) relevant experience, (c) culture fit and often (d) domain expertise. But if you’re a rapidly growing (or hope to be) tech company or VC firm, there’s a missing element in that list. A lot of … [ Read more ]

Content: Article | Author: Craig Hanson | Source: Medium | Subjects: Entrepreneurship, Human Resources, Organizational Behavior

Startups usually hire someone for their skills (what they can do today) or their potential (what they may be able to do once they ramp up). It’s important to decide ahead of time which of those two routes startups want to explore: Understanding how immediate your need is, and whether you have time/resources to mentor someone to grow into a role is key.

Content: Quotation | Author: Rodolphe Dutel | Subjects: Entrepreneurship, Human Resources

The most painful and counterproductive mistake I see startups make in hiring has to be over-selling and failing to interview the candidate thoroughly. This almost guarantees you end up with a bad team. The weak candidates pass through too easily, but more importantly, the strong ones walk away–they don’t want to work with a mediocre team, and they are estimating the quality of your team … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Author: Jordan Burton | Subjects: Entrepreneurship, Human Resources

In his conversation with YC Partner and COO Qasar Younis, Marc outlined two tests investors run on entrepreneurs before working with them. Later in the conversation Qasar asked Marc who he looks up to.

Content: Multimedia Content | Author: Marc Andreessen | Subjects: Entrepreneurship, Venture Capital

Since many of a startups’ earliest advisers come from the fundraising world, they’re likely to offer advice from one particular perspective. Traditional VCs have a playbook that they run across their companies, and their business model works for them. Their goal is to place strategic bets in a handful of companies. Founders, though, aren’t managing a portfolio. They need to base their decisions on the … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Author: Wade Foster | Source: First Round Review | Subjects: Entrepreneurship, Venture Capital

Do whatever is required to get to product/market fit. Including changing out people, rewriting your product, moving into a different market, telling customers no when you don’t want to, telling customers yes when you don’t want to, raising that fourth round of highly dilutive venture capital — whatever is required.

When you get right down to it, you can ignore almost everything else. I’m not suggesting … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Author: Marc Andreessen | Source: LinkedIn | Subject: Entrepreneurship

You can obviously screw up a great market — and that has been done, and not infrequently — but assuming the team is baseline competent and the product is fundamentally acceptable, a great market will tend to equal success and a poor market will tend to equal failure. Market matters most.

Content: Quotation | Author: Marc Andreessen | Source: LinkedIn | Subjects: Entrepreneurship, Management, Strategy

When a great team meets a lousy market, market wins.
When a lousy team meets a great market, market wins.
When a great team meets a great market, something special happens.

Content: Quotation | Author: Andy Rachleff | Source: LinkedIn | Subjects: Entrepreneurship, Management, Strategy

The caliber of a startup team can be defined as the suitability of the CEO, senior staff, engineers, and other key staff relative to the opportunity in front of them. You look at a startup and ask, will this team be able to optimally execute against their opportunity? I focus on effectiveness as opposed to experience, since the history of the tech industry is full … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Author: Marc Andreessen | Source: LinkedIn | Subject: Entrepreneurship