20VC: Evernote CEO on Why You Play For The Front of Your Jersey Not The Back, Why Success Is A Team Sport & Why Leadership Should Accept The Negative Consequences In All Situations
Chris O'Neill is the CEO @ Evernote, the productivity powerhouse allowing millions of users around the world to remember everything. They have raised over $160m in VC funding from some of the best in the business including the likes of Sequoia Capital. As for Chris, prior to Evernote, he spent over 10 years at Google including roles as Managing Director of Google Canada and global business operations at Google X. Whilst at Google Chris saw the hyper growth of the company from startup t a global behemoth. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How Chris made his way into startups and came to be CEO @ Evernote? 2.) Chris has previously said 'the team you build is the culture you build'. How does Chris look to build high-performance teams that can scale differing stages of company growth? Are individuals destined to fit one stage of company growth? 3.) How does Chris look to balance the immediacy of short terms actions and events with the grander vision and longer term in mind? What are the challenges? What strategies can be done to ensure both short and long term goals are addressed? 4.) How does Chris approach product line expansion? When is the right time and reason to expand the product line? How can this be communicated and executed across the broader team? 5.) Chris has previously said he 'learned more from sport than he did from school'. What were Chris major takeaways from sport? How can they be applied to business and his role @ Evernote today? Items Mentioned In Today's Show: Chris' Fave Book: A Prayer For Owen Meaney, Zone to Win Chris' Fave Blog: Benedict Evans As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Chris on Twitter here! Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC. Zoom is the No 1 Video and WebConferencing Service, providing one consistent enterprise experience that allows you to engage in an array of activities including online meetings, video webinars, collaboration-enabled conference rooms and business instant messaging. Plus, it is the easiest solution to use, buy and scale with the most straightforward pricing. Do not take our word for it, Zoom's their partnership with Sequoia in their latest 100m funding round says it all. Zoom is a must for your business. ViewedIt is a free video-recording tool that makes it easy for organizations to embrace the power of video for personalized communications. ViewedIt enables sales professionals, executive leaders and customer support teams to easily record personalized videos and add them to their email conversations. Plus, with built-in tracking powered by the Vidyard platform, video creators will know who is watching what, and which video messages resonate with viewers. They'll receive immediate playback notifications that will eliminate the wondering of whether the recipient received or watched their content. Find out more and download ViewedIt for free at vidyard.com/viewedit.
9 Juni 201726min
20VC: Why Cheque Size & Follow On Decision-Making Does Not Matter, Why Intelligence Is Overrated & Why You Should Do Everything You Can To Make Other People Successful with Anthony Pompliano, Founding Partner @ Full Tilt Capital
Anthony Pompliano is the General Partner @ Full Tilt Capital, the firm that wants to reinvent friends and family investingby democratizing access to opportunity for the thousands of founders who are underserved. They have done 22 deals in just 90 days and shows no signs of pulling back. Prior to VC, Anthony lead the growth team at Snapchat and before that ran product and growth teams @ Facebook. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How Anthony made his way from leading startup exec with Facebook and Snapchat to being General Partner @ Full Tilt Capital? 2.) Anthony has previously said that he likes to 'prioritize the founder over the company', is this any different to the traditional 'founder-friendly VC'? How does Anthony like to stress test the founder's ability to withstand stress *& establish comfort with unpopular decisions? 3.) How does Anthony respond to suggestions that 39 investments in 9 months is 'spray and pray'? Why does Anthony believe that cheque size and follow on allocation does not matter? 4.) How does Anthony differentiate between 'picking' and 'building' investments? Why do most VCs go wrong with their thesis around this and the belief in the 'J Curve'? Is it possible that the traditional J curve does not correspond to outsized returns? 5.) How does Anthony respond to Hunter Walk's thesis around the presence of 'dark deal flow'? With such a growing portfolio, how does Anthony scale his ability to add value with the ever scaling portfolio number? Items Mentioned In Today's Show: Anthony's Fave Book: Rich Dad Poor Dad Anthony's Fave Blog/Podcast: Polina Marinova: The Profile Anthony's Most Recent Investment: Everly Well As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Anthony on Twitter here! Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC. Zoom is the No 1 Video and WebConferencing Service, providing one consistent enterprise experience that allows you to engage in an array of activities including online meetings, video webinars, collaboration-enabled conference rooms and business instant messaging. Plus, it is the easiest solution to use, buy and scale with the most straightforward pricing. Do not take our word for it, Zoom's their partnership with Sequoia in their latest 100m funding round says it all. Zoom is a must for your business. ViewedIt is a free video-recording tool that makes it easy for organizations to embrace the power of video for personalized communications. ViewedIt enables sales professionals, executive leaders and customer support teams to easily record personalized videos and add them to their email conversations. Plus, with built-in tracking powered by the Vidyard platform, video creators will know who is watching what, and which video messages resonate with viewers. They'll receive immediate playback notifications that will eliminate the wondering of whether the recipient received or watched their content. Find out more and download ViewedIt for free at vidyard.com/viewedit.
7 Juni 201726min
20VC: Founders Fund's Brian Singerman on Why VC Is About Upside Maximisation Not Downside Minimisation, Why There Is No Right Way To Do Venture and Why They Do Not Have Monday Morning Partner Meetings At Founders Fund
Brian Singerman is a Partner @ Founders Fund, one of the world's most prestigious and successful VC funds with prior investments in the likes of Facebook, Airbnb, SpaceX, Spotify and many more incredible companies. Prior to Founders Fund, Brian spent 4 years at Google where, among other projects, Brian founded iGoogle. Whilst at Google, Brian also started his career as an investor, founding his own angel fund, XGYC Fund. Brian also currently sits on the board of Affirm, Oscar, AltSchool and Emerald Therapeutics. Due to Brian's immense success he was named No 5 on Forbes Midas List for America's Top VCs. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How Brian made the way from Google, to his own angel fund to being General Partner @ Founders Fund? 2.) How has Brian seen his investment mindset shift over the years from angel investing to his angel fund, XGYC to now being a partner at Founders Fund? 3.) Why does Brian believe that success in VC is purely about upside maximization? What does Brian think downside minimisation is unimportant? 4.) What does the investment decision-making process look like at Founders Fund? How does this change with the scaling cheque size? What are Brian's views on conviction driven vs unanimous team voting structures? 5.) Why is Brian a staunch generalist when it comes to investing? For Brian, why does he believe that being a generalist will deliver outsized returns over being a specialist? Items Mentioned In Today's Show: Brian's Fave Book: Snow Crash Brian's Fave Blog: Dan Primack Brian's Most Recent Investment: Affirm As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Brian on Twitter here! Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC. Zoom is the No 1 Video and WebConferencing Service, providing one consistent enterprise experience that allows you to engage in an array of activities including online meetings, video webinars, collaboration-enabled conference rooms and business instant messaging. Plus, it is the easiest solution to use, buy and scale with the most straightforward pricing. Do not take our word for it, Zoom's their partnership with Sequoia in their latest 100m funding round says it all. Zoom is a must for your business. ViewedIt is a free video-recording tool that makes it easy for organizations to embrace the power of video for personalized communications. ViewedIt enables sales professionals, executive leaders and customer support teams to easily record personalized videos and add them to their email conversations. Plus, with built-in tracking powered by the Vidyard platform, video creators will know who is watching what, and which video messages resonate with viewers. They'll receive immediate playback notifications that will eliminate the wondering of whether the recipient received or watched their content. Find out more and download ViewedIt for free at vidyard.com/viewedit.
5 Juni 201724min
20VC: Trivago Founder on Why Incumbents Have Lost Their Main Business Model, Why You Have To Destroy Everything Ego Related & Why Transparency Is The Key To Capital Flow
Rolf Schrömgens is the Co-Founder and Managing Director @ Trivago, the world's top hotel price comparison site. In 2012, Expedia acquired 62% of Trivago for $531m and in Dec 2016, Trivago raised $287m through their IPO on the NASDAQ. As for Rolf, he has been a serial entrepreneur since 1999 when he founded Amiro.de, later merged with Ciao.com. At Ciao, Rolf successfully led the product launch of the company in his role as Director of Strategy and Product Development. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How Rolf made his way into the world of startups and came to found Trivago? 2.) Having had one of Europe's best-funded startups with Ciao, what is Rolf's take on the number of startups taking large amounts of VC money today? What advice would Rolf give to those contemplating a more lean approach vs attaining large amounts of VC money? 3.) Why does Rolf believe transparency is so key for the flow of capital within a market? What can founders do to engender this basis of trust between the capital sources and them? 4.) Why does Rolf think it is unthinkable that the incumbents of today will survive the wave of disruption? Why does Rolf question their ability to a consolidator market environment? 5.) Why does Rolf think it is so important to destroy everything that is ego related? What are the dangers of ego in the company building process? How does Rolf look to stamp this out without damaging culture and internal morale? Items Mentioned In Today's Show: Rolf's Fave Book: How To Create A Mind by Ray Kurzweil As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Rolf on Twitter here! Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC. Zoom is the No 1 Video and WebConferencing Service, providing one consistent enterprise experience that allows you to engage in an array of activities including online meetings, video webinars, collaboration-enabled conference rooms and business instant messaging. Plus, it is the easiest solution to use, buy and scale with the most straightforward pricing. Do not take our word for it, Zoom's their partnership with Sequoia in their latest 100m funding round says it all. Zoom is a must for your business. ViewedIt is a free video-recording tool that makes it easy for organizations to embrace the power of video for personalized communications. ViewedIt enables sales professionals, executive leaders and customer support teams to easily record personalized videos and add them to their email conversations. Plus, with built-in tracking powered by the Vidyard platform, video creators will know who is watching what, and which video messages resonate with viewers. They'll receive immediate playback notifications that will eliminate the wondering of whether the recipient received or watched their content. Find out more and download ViewedIt for free at vidyard.com/viewedit.
2 Juni 201724min
20VC: How Both Founders & GPs Should Construct Their Pitch, Why VCs Are Eternal Optimists & What Makes The Best Post-Investment VC/Founder Relationship with Brian Ascher, Partner @ Venrock
Brian Ascher is a Partner @ Venrock, a leading fund with prior investments including Nest, Dollar Shave Club, AppNexus and many more. At Venrock, Brian invests broadly across enterprise and consumer markets and has enjoyed no less than 10 of his investments exit successfully. Due to this exit rate,Brian has been named to the Forbes Midas List multiple times, for the VCs who have backed the most profitable winners in the last four years. Prior to Venrock, Brian was a Senior Product Manager at Intuit responsible for Quicken and Quicken.com. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How Brian made his way into the world of VC and came to be a partner at Venrock? 2.) Does Brian believe that in today's world of 'ask for advice and get money', that slide decks are necessary anymore? 3.) How does Brian like pitches to be structured? How should the deck start? Why should the deck not start with the team or the origin story? Should the deck include the amount being raised? 4.) What are the most common mistakes that entrepreneurs make in pitches? How can they turn these into an advantage and show the VC their unparalleled insight? 5.) How does Brian view the post-investment relationship with founders? What makes for the optimal relationship? Is it possible for VC to be both friend and board member? How does Brian look to scale the relationship curve when getting to know a founder? Items Mentioned In Today's Show: Brian's Fave Book: Extreme Ownership Brian's Most Recent Investment: Socrates As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Brian on Twitter here! Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC. Zoom is the No 1 Video and WebConferencing Service, providing one consistent enterprise experience that allows you to engage in an array of activities including online meetings, video webinars, collaboration-enabled conference rooms and business instant messaging. Plus, it is the easiest solution to use, buy and scale with the most straightforward pricing. Do not take our word for it, Zoom's their partnership with Sequoia in their latest 100m funding round says it all. Zoom is a must for your business. ViewedIt is a free video-recording tool that makes it easy for organizations to embrace the power of video for personalized communications. ViewedIt enables sales professionals, executive leaders and customer support teams to easily record personalized videos and add them to their email conversations. Plus, with built-in tracking powered by the Vidyard platform, video creators will know who is watching what, and which video messages resonate with viewers. They'll receive immediate playback notifications that will eliminate the wondering of whether the recipient received or watched their content. Find out more and download ViewedIt for free at vidyard.com/viewedit.
31 Maj 201725min
20VC: Kleiner Perkins' MZ Zaveri on Why Success In Venture Is About The 3 F's, How VCs Can Manage Deal Heat & Is There Too Much Venture Dollars At Seed
MZ Zaveri is a Partner @ Kleiner Perkins, one of the world's most prestigious venture funds with prior investments in the likes of Google, Amazon, Twitter, Square and Airbnb just to name a few. Prior to KPCB, MZ was with Tencent, where he was part of the investment team in Palo Alto, working on investments in companies such as Vurb, Tile, Satellogic, and Weebly to name a few. Prior to Tencent, Muzzammil co-founded Proxino, a Y Combinator (S11) backed startup in the JavaScript error detection space. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How MZ made his way into the world of VC and came to be a partner at Kleiner Perkins? 2.) What were MZ's biggest takeaways from his time with Tencent? How does that inform how he evaluates and analyses startups today with KPCB? 3.) MZ has said before, 'success in venture is all about the 3 F's'. What does he mean by this? Question from Niko Bonatsos @ General Catalyst: How does MZ look ensure the best opportunities are in the pipeline? How does MZ then look to manage and optimise that pipeline? 4.) What are MZ's thoughts on deal heat? How does MZ look to avoid being sucked into echo chambers of Silicon Valley of what is "hot or not"? What does MZ mean when he says "deal heat can be a false positive when there are more seed funds than ever"? 5.) How does MZ evaluate the seed market today? Does he believe it is over financed with the 10x increase in funds we have seen over the last 10 years? What fund model innovations is MZ most excited by and why? Items Mentioned In Today's Show: MZ's Fave Book: Neverwhere by Neil Gaimon MZ's Fave Blog/Podcast: The Twenty Minute VC MZ's Most Recent Investment: UJet As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and MZ on Twitter here! Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC. Zoom is the No 1 Video and WebConferencing Service, providing one consistent enterprise experience that allows you to engage in an array of activities including online meetings, video webinars, collaboration-enabled conference rooms and business instant messaging. Plus, it is the easiest solution to use, buy and scale with the most straightforward pricing. Do not take our word for it, Zoom's their partnership with Sequoia in their latest 100m funding round says it all. Zoom is a must for your business. ViewedIt is a free video-recording tool that makes it easy for organizations to embrace the power of video for personalized communications. ViewedIt enables sales professionals, executive leaders and customer support teams to easily record personalized videos and add them to their email conversations. Plus, with built-in tracking powered by the Vidyard platform, video creators will know who is watching what, and which video messages resonate with viewers. They'll receive immediate playback notifications that will eliminate the wondering of whether the recipient received or watched their content. Find out more and download ViewedIt for free at vidyard.com/viewedit.
29 Maj 201725min
20VC: Tinder's Sean Rad on Why Humility Is The Key Trait For Founders To Have, Why Today's Incumbents Are Stronger Than Any Before Them & How Leaders Need To Scale With The Scaling Of Their Company
Sean Rad is the Founder & Chairman @ Tinder, the world's most popular app for connecting with new and interesting people around you. Every single day there are 26m matches made on Tinder. Alongside his role with Tinder, Sean is the Chairman of Swipe Ventures, the investment vehicle that will continue to grow Tinder's reach through acquisitions, investment opportunities and development of new business. Prior to Tinder, Sean was the Founder and President of both Adly and Orgoo. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How Sean made his way into the world of startups and changed the way people connect with Tinder? 2.) How has Sean seen his startup evaluation process evolve since his time angel investing to now, investing institutionally with Swipe Ventures? 3.) What are the character traits that Sean most looks for when evaluating startup founders? Why is humility key to success as a founder? How can this be balanced with passion and vision? 4.) How has Sean seen his leadership and mentality evolve with the growth of Tinder?What have been the major inflection points in his learning as CEO? 5.) Why does Sean believe that today's incumbents are different than any we have seen before? How does their mentality to startup competition differ from incumbents before them? Items Mentioned In Today's Show: Sean's Fave Book: The Nurture Assumption Sean's Fave Blog: TechCrunch As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Sean on Twitter here! Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC. Zoom is the No 1 Video and WebConferencing Service, providing one consistent enterprise experience that allows you to engage in an array of activities including online meetings, video webinars, collaboration-enabled conference rooms and business instant messaging. Plus, it is the easiest solution to use, buy and scale with the most straightforward pricing. Do not take our word for it, Zoom's their partnership with Sequoia in their latest 100m funding round says it all. Zoom is a must for your business. ViewedIt is a free video-recording tool that makes it easy for organizations to embrace the power of video for personalized communications. ViewedIt enables sales professionals, executive leaders and customer support teams to easily record personalized videos and add them to their email conversations. Plus, with built-in tracking powered by the Vidyard platform, video creators will know who is watching what, and which video messages resonate with viewers. They'll receive immediate playback notifications that will eliminate the wondering of whether the recipient received or watched their content. Find out more and download ViewedIt for free at vidyard.com/viewedit.
26 Maj 201724min
20VC: The Biggest Indicators Of Success In Founding Teams, How To Balance Both Vision and Operations & Taking Money From "The Man At The Rug Store" with Mar Hershenson, Founding Managing Partner @ Pear.vc
Mar Hershenson is a Founding Managing Partner @ Pear.vc alongside Pejman Nozad. After earning a PhD in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University in 1999, Mar had developed a ground-breaking technique for optimizing the design of analog semiconductors. Having combined a hardware/software focus during her studies, she spent the next 13 years co-founding three startups in the mobile/e-commerce, enterprise software, and semiconductor industries, work that led eventually to her registering 14 separate patents. Mar has been recognized by MIT Technology Review as a Top Innovator Under 35 and named a Champion of Innovation by Fast Company. In Today's Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How did Mar make her way from professor @ Stanford to startup founder to founding Pear.vc? 2.) Question from Matin @ Heap: How does Mar decide which founders have the highest potential? What are the seeds that suggest huge potential growth on initial screening? 3.) Question from Nicky @ Nova Credit: How does one look to balance the inherent challenge of vision and operations? What do the best founders do? 4.) How important is it for there to be role segmentation in a VC partnership? Why does it not matter at certain stages of the funding lifecycle? 5.) Why does Mar believe venture is an intensely service based industry? How does Mar look to maintain her scaling board roles with a scaling portfolio? Items Mentioned In Today's Show: Mar's Fave Book: The Four Steps To The Epiphany Mar's Fave Blog: Elad Gil, Dan Primack Mar's Most Recent Investment: Nova Credit As always you can follow Harry, The Twenty Minute VC and Mar on Twitter here! Likewise, you can follow Harry on Snapchat here for mojito madness and all things 20VC. Zoom is the No 1 Video and WebConferencing Service, providing one consistent enterprise experience that allows you to engage in an array of activities including online meetings, video webinars, collaboration-enabled conference rooms and business instant messaging. Plus, it is the easiest solution to use, buy and scale with the most straightforward pricing. Do not take our word for it, Zoom's their partnership with Sequoia in their latest 100m funding round says it all. Zoom is a must for your business. ViewedIt is a free video-recording tool that makes it easy for organizations to embrace the power of video for personalized communications. ViewedIt enables sales professionals, executive leaders and customer support teams to easily record personalized videos and add them to their email conversations. Plus, with built-in tracking powered by the Vidyard platform, video creators will know who is watching what, and which video messages resonate with viewers. They'll receive immediate playback notifications that will eliminate the wondering of whether the recipient received or watched their content. Find out more and download ViewedIt for free at vidyard.com/viewedit.
24 Maj 201726min
