Building High-Impact Sales Teams | Dan Lee and Nooks

Guest: Sanjay Beri, CEO and Founder of Netskope“You can be waiting your whole life to do something, and then your life’s over,” says Sanjay Beri. After nine years at Juniper Networks, he left his comfortable job, moved his family to a house with a pricier mortgage, and launched the cloud security firm Netskope. His entrepreneurial story would make anyone stressed, he acknowledges, but “at some level, you have to be wired to enjoy it… that's why I tell everybody who joins, ‘It's not for the faint of heart.’”In this episode, Sanjay and Joubin discuss Reddit, banker friends, professional legacies, the wrong way to raise capital, authenticity, Ponzi schemes, “fool’s gold,” high-risk hiring, hitting pause, your “other family,” and changing roles.Chapters:(00:54) - 2024 IPOs (05:43) - Long on cybersecurity (07:59) - Netskope’s mission (10:22) - Sanjay’s first company, Ingrian (12:07) - The writing on the wall (15:02) - Mamoon Hamid (20:21) - Stress and perspective (24:53) - Sanjay’s mother (28:41) - The trenches vs. the clouds (30:53) - Guts, Resolve, Integrity, Tenacity (32:10) - Hiring for grit (38:06) - The lowest point (41:18) - “Always on” (43:49) - The hot desk office (46:13) - Scaling people (49:30) - Politics and integrity (53:03) - Who Netskope is hiring Links:Connect with SanjayLinkedInConnect with JoubinTwitterLinkedInEmail: grit@kleinerperkins.com Learn more about Kleiner PerkinsThis episode was edited by Eric Johnson from LightningPod.fm

8 Huhti 202454min

Guest: Scott McNealy, former CEO and co-founder of Sun Microsystems & co-founder of CurrikiScott McNealy never wanted to be CEO of Sun, and in his 22-year tenure before selling to Oracle, he knows there were times he failed to execute, or to rein in the once-iconic Silicon Valley firm’s worst impulses. But like his pro golfer son, Maverick, Scott doesn’t like to look back: “Golfers will always look back and blame the wind, a divot that wasn't repaired, a bad rake job, a mower cut that wasn't done properly, a gust of wind,” he explains. “If you blame yourself for all of the mistakes you make. You will hate yourself ... I look forward.”In this episode, Scott and Joubin discuss Scott Cook, Maverick McNealy, why big companies are riskier than startups, Al Gore, Marc Andreessen, Mark Zuckerberg, Kodak, Dick Kleinhans, Harvard University, “bozo invasions,” Myers-Briggs, making an example, Motorola car phones, the Moscone Center, Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, NVIDIA’s valuation, farewell letters, “you have no privacy,” open-source education, and toothpaste.com.In this episode, we cover:(01:00) - John Doerr (02:47) - Fathers, sons, and sports (07:29) - Living in the piñata (10:48) - Why Scott left Sun (13:49) - The heyday of Sun Microsystems (18:24) - Vinod Khosla and founding Sun (21:24) - How Scott became CEO (27:21) - Profitable in three months (30:02) - Inferiority complex (32:20) - Executive exits and fun at work (35:49) - Managers and recognition (38:18) - “HR hero” Crawford Beveridge (40:35) - How Carol Bartz became VP of marketing (43:07) - Sharing in success (45:25) - Scott’s love life & meeting Susan (50:54) - The dotcom boom and crash (53:45) - Unicorn CEOs and IBM’s offer (55:49) - Competitors and hindsight (58:20) - “The planet system” (01:00:13) - Too many employees (01:04:06) - Larry Ellison and selling to Oracle (01:07:01) - Blaming yourself and looking forward (01:10:11) - Curriki (01:12:12) - The AI boom (01:14:42) - “Grit” and insecurity Links:Connect with ScottTwitterLinkedInConnect with JoubinTwitterLinkedInEmail: grit@kleinerperkins.com Learn more about Kleiner PerkinsThis episode was edited by Eric Johnson from LightningPod.fm

1 Huhti 20241h 18min

Guest: Jyoti Bansal, CEO and co-founder of HarnessCisco bought Jyoti Bansal’s first company AppDynamics for $3.7 billion, making him a very wealthy man. But after two African safaris, a week of Michelin-starred meals in Tokyo, and more adventures all around the world, he realized that spending his money didn’t truly make him happy. After some soul-searching, he realized what he really enjoyed: “I liked to build companies. That is my craft ... If someone enjoys playing gold for six hours, I would enjoy working on a startup for six hours.”In this episode, Jyoti and Joubin discuss the evolution of Grit, Carlos Delatorre, Tom Mendoza, Glean, growing up in India, traveling the world, three-star restaurants, soul-searching, automating gruntwork, paying for nice hotels, red-eye flights, product-market fit, Jeff Bezos, the “three-layered cake,” Frank Slootman, raising the bar for distribution, technical debt, structural efficiency, and taking pride in your work. In this episode, we cover:(00:59) - Top-tier CROs (04:18) - The video game levels of startups (07:24) - Selling AppDynamics to Cisco (09:16) - Keeping up with high-growth companies (12:10) - The chip on Jyoti’s shoulder (16:15) - How he thinks about money (18:02) - Do what you enjoy every day (22:32) - “What would make me happy?” (24:56) - Starting BIG Labs and Harness (29:16) - Adjusting to a new reality (34:13) - Work-life balance (36:30) - What gets easier — and harder — over time (41:44) - Product vs. distribution (46:46) - Paying it forward (48:29) - The next level (50:24) - The four lists (53:45) - Assigning clear responsibilities (56:06) - Jyoti’s favorite interview question (57:41) - Who Harness is hiring Links:Connect with JyotiLinkedInConnect with JoubinTwitterLinkedInEmail: grit@kleinerperkins.com Learn more about Kleiner PerkinsThis episode was edited by Eric Johnson from LightningPod.fm

25 Maalis 202459min

Guest: Clint Sharp, CEO and co-founder of CriblNew employees are joining the remote data platform Cribl every week, and as the staff grows, CEO Clint Sharp has noticed a problem: He can’t file a bug report without a lot of caveats. When there were a handful of users, no one would bat an eye at the CEO posting a bug on Slack, but now he has had to learn how to phrase things because people assume he’s “irate and we should change everything we’re doing,” Clint says. “I’ll post something and there’s a flurry of DMs that are happening in the background, like ‘Oh my God.’” Unless the tone of his bug report is clear, workers with more experience at Cribl then have to reassure the newbies: “Calm down. When he does this, he’s not upset. He’s one of the power users of the product.” In this episode, Clint and Joubin discuss being on the road, niche audiences, top-of-funnel problems, “come to Jesus” meetings, moving the goalposts, building for building’s sake, “down and to the right,” mediating re-orgs, flat organizations, filing bugs as the CEO, setting the example, Henry Schuck, Baldur’s Gate III, legal narratives, Hacker News, Cisco, Doug Merritt, Gary Steele, Rippling, and dead trends.In this episode, we cover:(01:08) - Running a remote company (02:57) - Cribl’s management meetings (05:56) - Looking back and recognition (08:08) - Growing quickly and what Cribl does (11:21) - Traction (14:53) - Solving a new problem (17:56) - Friends and family funding (21:45) - Why not shut it all down? (24:36) - Healthy arrogance and control (31:02) - Serial entrepreneurs and founder-CEOs (33:38) - What Clint loves about the job (35:31) - The hardest parts (38:41) - Core values (41:43) - Favorite interview questions (44:26) - Drawing boundaries (47:18) - Vacation and work-life balance (52:53) - Splunk’s lawsuit against Clint (56:26) - “Their brand is synonymous with expensive” (58:41) - Who owns the data? (01:01:59) - Building platforms (01:07:35) - “I’m so sick of AI” (01:11:25) - Who Cribl is hiring Links:Connect with ClintTwitterLinkedInConnect with JoubinTwitterLinkedInEmail: grit@kleinerperkins.com Learn more about Kleiner PerkinsThis episode was edited by Eric Johnson from LightningPod.fm

18 Maalis 20241h 12min

Guest: Glen Tullman, CEO of TranscarentBefore he was CEO of Transcarent, Glen Tullman presided over the biggest digital health merger of all time: His previous company Livongo was acquired in 2020 by Teledoc for $18.5 billion. Over his decades of experience in health tech, he has developed saying: Hire low, fire high. When one of his friends was offered a job and said he wanted to consider another offer, Glen withdrew Transcarent’s offer because he didn’t want to be the highest bidder — in other words, hire low. But whenever he has to let someone go, he sees it as his responsibility to “help them go off and do something else that’s great, and be successful.” Firing and replacing executives, he said, is “just part of growing ... it doesn’t have to be ugly.”In this episode, Glen and Joubin discuss conservative values, John Doerr, Teledoc, failures of leadership, Steve Case, Bill Gates, changing expectations, Travis Kalanick, incentive bonuses, Bucknell University, massive layoffs, criticizing in public, anonymous charity, cycling events, Michael Jordan, Bill McDermott, Barack Obama, private jets, and hiring without titles.In this episode, we cover:(01:11) - How Glen splits his time (03:55) - Looking back and leaving Livongo (09:03) - Would he do it again differently? (13:42) - Energy at work (18:00) - Failure and starting over (21:16) - What Transcarent does (25:29) - Taking on the system and stress (30:33) - Turning Allscripts around (33:48) - “We educated you to make a difference” (38:06) - The birth of electronic prescriptions (42:52) - Hire low, fire high (47:47) - Radical honesty (53:04) - Charitable efforts (57:55) - Glen’s competitive childhood (01:00:55) - His family and priorities (01:08:24) - Would Glen go into politics? (01:12:32) - “I hate to sleep” (01:15:06) - Peloton meetings (01:17:32) - Trading money for time (01:24:11) - Sharing credit (01:25:54) - Who Transcarent is hiring (01:28:05) - What “grit” means to Glen Links:Connect with GlenLinkedInConnect with JoubinTwitterLinkedInEmail: grit@kleinerperkins.com Learn more about Kleiner PerkinsThis episode was edited by Eric Johnson from LightningPod.fm

11 Maalis 20241h 30min

Guest: Filip Kaliszan, CEO and co-founder of VerkadaGreat founders try to grow personally at least as fast as their companies do — but sometimes, says Verkada CEO Filip Kaliszan, that’s just not possible. By the time the company had about 200 employees, he says, “the scale of the business and the rate of the growth of the business ... outpaced my rate of learning, or my ability to consult the right people.” But over time, he has worked to fix past errors and earn everyone’s trust: “I can be only as good as the rate at which I fix my mistakes,” Filip says.In this episode, Filip and Joubin discuss “the good old days,” first principle thinking, the business impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Bay Area bubble, going public, Aaron Levie, going down rabbit holes, power dynamics, idea validation, Brian Long, Hans Robertson, DIY entrepreneurship, commercial kitchens, cash efficiency, VR headsets, zeitgeist-y platform shifts, Mark Zuckerberg, and John Doerr.In this episode, we cover:(00:50) - Verkada’s office culture (04:37) - The loss of community (10:37) - Not going remote during COVID (16:37) - Palo Alto Networks (22:15) - Does Filip like being CEO? (26:02) - Time management and flow state (29:47) - The problem with huge meetings (31:59) - Fundraising for Verkada (34:02) - Building a “camera company” (37:29) - Zero to one (41:17) - The first 10 people (42:48) - Allocating capital wisely (46:19) - Hiring in-house (51:17) - Biggest screw-ups (54:00) - The feeling of failure (55:05) - Customer therapy (56:39) - Divide and conquer (01:00:47) - The Apple Vision Pro (01:05:05) - Mark Zuckerberg’s response (01:09:25) - Who Verkada is hiring and what “grit” means to Filip Links:Connect with FilipLinkedInConnect with JoubinTwitterLinkedInEmail: grit@kleinerperkins.com Learn more about Kleiner PerkinsThis episode was edited by Eric Johnson from LightningPod.fm

4 Maalis 20241h 12min

Guest: Wade Foster, CEO and co-founder of ZapierWhen Wade Foster and his co-founders launched Zapier, he was 24, and doubted himself constantly. He consulted mentors like Paul Graham and Jay Simons, studied entrepreneurs like Jeff Bezos and Steve Jobs, and also took inspiration from an unlikely source: Actor and martial artist Bruce Lee. “[He] had this fighting style, ‘The Way of No Way,’” Wade says. “He would study all the different fighting styles, and he would say, ‘None of them is the best or the worst ... My job was to take the best of each and then discard the rest, and make it my own.’”In this episode, Wade and Joubin discuss fully remote companies, long-term thinking, hyperscaling, product-market fit, broken products, secondary offerings, “delocation packages,” interview questions, mind-breaking growth, doubting yourself, LLMs, hackathons, and adding a sales team (eventually).In this episode, we cover:(01:10) - Living in central Missouri (04:15) - Will Wade do this forever? (10:23) - Startup envy (13:09) - “Do people actually want this?” (18:44) - What Zapier does (20:15) - Taking outside capital (22:43) - Why Zapier is fully remote (28:01) - The pace of hiring (30:35) - Why résumés can be a trap (37:09) - When to promote from within (41:06) - Scaling problems (43:47) - Self-confidence and mentors (47:37) - Reacting to ChatGPT (53:43) - How Zapier’s team uses AI (58:12) - Who Zapier is hiring Links:Connect with WadeTwitterLinkedInConnect with JoubinTwitterLinkedInEmail: grit@kleinerperkins.com Learn more about Kleiner PerkinsThis episode was edited by Eric Johnson from LightningPod.fm

26 Helmi 202459min

Guest: Kim Scott, author of Radical Candor: Be a Kickass Boss Without Losing Your Humanity and Radical Respect: How To Work Together BetterAfter her first management book Radical Candor became a worldwide bestseller, Kim Scott found herself giving talks to all kinds of companies about how they could apply her advice and build a stronger, kinder culture. But then, after one such talk, the CEO — a longtime friend and former coworker — came up to Kim with an asterisk. As a Black woman, she explained, “as soon as I offer anyone even the most compassionate, gentle criticism, I get assigned the ‘angry Black woman’ stereotype.” Kim realized in that moment that her book needed a prequel of sorts, explaining what you need to have before you can create radical candor: “You're not going to care about people who you don't respect,” she says.In this episode, Kim and Joubin discuss regret minimization, Juice Software, Sheryl Sandberg, saying “um,” moments of connection, Dick Costolo, negative truths, James March, snobbery, Charles Ferguson, Shona Brown, Fred Kofman, Christa Quarles, Jason Rosoff, Andy Grove, founders as outliers, Jack Dorsey, Steve Jobs, glows and grows, the Post Ranch Inn, failing your colleagues, sexual harassment, DEI, and intellectual honesty.In this episode, we cover:(01:04) - Loud voices (03:59) - Writing a bestseller (07:48) - Why Kim wrote Radical Candor (14:21) - How to show you care (18:04) - Coaching tech CEOs (21:24) - Ruinous empathy and obnoxious aggression (25:40) - Leaving things unsaid (30:30) - Not an academic (35:21) - Learning from failed startups (38:55) - Performance reviews (42:30) - Why feedback feels risky (49:21) - How to reject feedback (53:11) - Creating space for feedback at home (56:08) - Running and sleeping (59:45) - Radical Respect and Kim’s other books (01:04:27) - The hardest story to share (01:06:44) - Optimism about the future Links:Connect with KimBuy Radical Candor: Be a Kickass Boss Without Losing Your HumanityPre-order Radical Respect: How To Work Together BetterTwitterLinkedInConnect with JoubinTwitterLinkedInEmail: grit@kleinerperkins.com Learn more about Kleiner PerkinsThis episode was edited by Eric Johnson from LightningPod.fm

19 Helmi 20241h 9min