Grit26 Feb 2024

#179 CEO & Co-Founder Zapier, Wade Foster: Missouri’s Connector

Guest: Wade Foster, CEO and co-founder of Zapier

When 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 Wade
- Twitter
- LinkedIn
Connect with Joubin
- Twitter
- LinkedIn
- Email: grit@kleinerperkins.com
Learn more about Kleiner Perkins
This episode was edited by Eric Johnson from LightningPod.fm

Det här avsnittet är hämtat från ett öppet RSS-flöde och publiceras inte av Podme. Det kan innehålla reklam.

Avsnitt(286)

#149 Co-CEO Workday, Carl Eschenbach: A Life of Significance

Guest: Carl Eschenbach, co-CEO of WorkdayWhen Carl Eschenbach decided to leave VMWare after more than 14 years as COO, no one believed it: Not chairman Joe Tucci, not CEO Pat Gelsinger, and maybe not ...

31 Juli 20231h 22min

#148 Former Snowflake CEO, Bob Muglia: The Datapreneurs

Guest: Bob Muglia, “The Datapreneurs” Co-Author and Former Snowflake CEOLongtime Microsoft executive and former Snowflake CEO Bob Muglia was done with his book about using data to drive the digital ec...

24 Juli 20231h 21min

#147 Ex-Waze CEO & Founder of Post News, Noam Bardin: Hockey Sticks and Plateaus

Guest: Noam Bardin, founder of Post NewsOne of the “aha” moments that could sway a dubious Waze user, recalls former CEO Noam Bardin, was navigating around “all those idiots sitting in traffic... and ...

17 Juli 20231h 29min

#146 Co-founder & CEO Rubrik, Bipul Sinha: Authenticity Reigns

Guest: Bipul Sinha, co-founder and CEO of RubrikWhen Bipul Sinha graduated from the Indian Insitute of Technology and came to America to work in tech, his mother told him: Don’t start a company. His a...

10 Juli 20231h 9min

#145 CRO Tealium, Ted Purcell: Snap Into It

Guest: Ted Purcell, CRO of TealiumThe biggest difference between small companies and big companies, says Tealium CRO Ted Purcell, is that at untested early-stage firms, you have to convince workers “t...

3 Juli 20231h 7min

#144 CEO Lacework, Jay Parikh: Quiet Intensity

Guest: Jay Parikh, CEO of LaceworkJay Parikh describes himself as a “stickler” for meetings that start and end on time, and holds himself to the same expectations as his workers. “It’s just really imp...

26 Juni 20231h 10min

#143 CEO HashiCorp, Dave McJannet: Phase Shifts

Guest: Dave McJannet, CEO of HashiCorpTo scale a company effectively, says HashiCorp CEO Dave McJannet, you will have to make something like 10 decisions every single day. “There’s generally one that ...

19 Juni 20231h 14min

#142 President of DocuSign, Robert Chatwani: Get Uncomfortable

Guest: Robert Chatwani, President and General Manager of Growth at DocuSignRobert Chatwani’s first reinvention was in his early 20s, when he left McKinsey & Company to start a people-powered commerce ...

12 Juni 20231h 17min