#150 CEO Box, Aaron Levie w/ Mamoon Hamid: Open For Business
Grit7 Elo 2023

#150 CEO Box, Aaron Levie w/ Mamoon Hamid: Open For Business

Guest: Aaron Levie, CEO of Box, and Mamoon Hamid, partner at Kleiner Perkins

When he was a newly minted venture capitalist at USVP, Mamoon Hamid got a tip that he should meet a young entrepreneur named Aaron Levie, and fought for the right to invest in his cloud storage startup, Box. For years after that initial investment, the two men say, Box’s fate was precarious: “We could have died any day,” Mamoon says, and Aaron recalled several times he had to be talked “down from a ledge.” Today, they tell us how Box established itself as “open for business” — a concept Mamoon hounded Aaron with in the early years — and grew into success.

In this episode, Aaron, Mamoon, and Joubin discuss Box socks, authenticity at work, Josh Stein, living in the office, over-diligence, Google Platypus, the 2008 crash, nostalgia, everything is personal, the ten-person test, burnout, Dan Levin, ChatGPT, Parker Conrad, and Silicon Valley as “technology town.”

In this episode, we cover:

  • “Make mom proud, unless she’s evil” (01:59)
  • How Mamoon and Aaron met (04:38)
  • Mamoon’s first investment in Box (11:15)
  • Pausing the term sheet (16:08)
  • “We could have died any day” (19:01)
  • What is company-building? (23:23)
  • Open For Business (25:27)
  • Getting to cash flow positive (27:52)
  • Slow growth with no burn vs. fast growth, high burn (31:15)
  • Tough feedback (34:31)
  • Overcoming challenges around the Box IPO (36:31)
  • Growing as CEO (38:35)
  • The Apple Vision Pro and AI (44:15)
  • Investing in cutting-edge companies (49:15)
  • Using AI to re-juice growth (51:48)
  • How Aaron educates himself (54:22)
  • Business as a sport (57:14)
  • Who Box is hiring and what “grit” means to Aaron (01:00:44)

Links:

Jaksot(278)

CMO Square, Lauren Weinberg: Self-made boss

CMO Square, Lauren Weinberg: Self-made boss

As the CMO for Square, Lauren Weinberg spends a lot of her time talking to new and inexperienced small business owners — and she knows that each of them has wisdom that the others could benefit from. ...

9 Touko 20221h

Co-Founder & CEO Handshake, Garrett Lord: The Billion-Dollar Question That Changed College Recruiting

Co-Founder & CEO Handshake, Garrett Lord: The Billion-Dollar Question That Changed College Recruiting

Handshake CEO and co-founder Garrett Lord was amazed when he first learned that Silicon Valley firms like Google recruited on college campuses ... just not his, Michigan Technical University. But afte...

2 Touko 202252min

CMO Thoughtspot, Scott Holden: Tactics, Strategy, and Downhill Skiing

CMO Thoughtspot, Scott Holden: Tactics, Strategy, and Downhill Skiing

ThoughtSpot CMO Scott Holden spent eight years at Salesforce, putting in the time every year behind the scenes at Dreamforce watching the company reach 20,000 employees. And he probably could have thr...

25 Huhti 202256min

Co-founder & CEO ZoomInfo, Henry Schuck: This Job Is Not Supposed to Be Fun

Co-founder & CEO ZoomInfo, Henry Schuck: This Job Is Not Supposed to Be Fun

Every year, ZoomInfo CEO Henry Schuck writes a memo to his executive team, which is made to look like a letter to the board of directors. Even though he founded DiscoverOrg — the company that bought a...

18 Huhti 20221h 6min

CRO Articulate, Jaimie Buss: A Problem Solver That Happens to be Good at Sales

CRO Articulate, Jaimie Buss: A Problem Solver That Happens to be Good at Sales

Jaimie Buss, CRO of the e-learning platform Articulate, had an epiphany several years ago. While trying to simultaneously give her toddler a bath and catch up on work emails, some water splashed on he...

11 Huhti 20221h 1min

CMO Tinder, George Felix: Trusting Your Gut, ‘Smelling Like a Man,’ and Swiping Right

CMO Tinder, George Felix: Trusting Your Gut, ‘Smelling Like a Man,’ and Swiping Right

George Felix, now the CMO of Tinder, was marketing Old Spice body wash at a time when the brand was circling the drain. His team at Procter & Gamble almost let their big break slip away when initially...

4 Huhti 202259min

VP of Sales at Hopin, Javier Ortega Estrada: Ingredients for High Growth and a Good Paella

VP of Sales at Hopin, Javier Ortega Estrada: Ingredients for High Growth and a Good Paella

Global Sales VP at Hopin Javier Ortega Estrada’s father is a counter-terrorism official in the Spanish army — teaching him at a young age that having a bigger purpose can drive you to do great things....

28 Maalis 202254min

President at Confluent, Erica Schultz: Cashing in on Your Currency

President at Confluent, Erica Schultz: Cashing in on Your Currency

When Confluent’s President of Field Ops Erica Schultz was 23, she was working at Oracle and cold-emailed the manager of the Argentina office, asking to work for him. This experience would open the doo...

21 Maalis 20221h 6min

Suosittua kategoriassa Liike-elämä ja talous

sijotuskasti
psykopodiaa-podcast
mimmit-sijoittaa
rss-rahapodi
ostan-asuntoja-podcast
rss-rahamania
inderespodi
herrasmieshakkerit
pomojen-suusta
rss-h-asselmoilanen
rss-paasipodi
taloudellinen-mielenrauha
sijoituspodi
rss-bisnesta-bebeja
syo-nuku-saasta
rahapuhetta
asuntoasiaa-paivakirjat
rss-laakispodi
rss-rikasta-elamaa
rss-seuraava-potilas