Leadership and Management
What Should You Never Do When You Start A Business?
My wife and I were going through old videos the other day, and we stumbled upon this video of Avery’s fourth birthday party at our house. I invited Nancy and her son Ethan to the party. Nancy used to work for me a couple years before that. [Do you want to grow your business? Maybe…
Read MoreIs There A Right Way For You To Fire Someone?
There’s a great story in Ben Horowitz’s book, “The Hard Thing About Hard Things”, that I can really relate to. In the book, Horowitz’s company, Opsware, was going to IPO. At the same time, they were going to perform a layoff. [Do you want to grow your business? Maybe I can help. Click here.] Horowitz…
Read MoreWhy Your Best Employees Quit And How You Can Fix It
Our company was rapidly growing, and we needed to hire a new customer service person. That’s when we hired “Cyndi.” Do you want to grow your business? Maybe I can help. Click here. And Cyndi was great. She worked hard, her attitude was great, and she consistently left the office at 7PM or later. Suddenly…
Read More5 Fatal Decisions You Don’t Want To Make
I walked into the office space, and there was no one there. It was just a bunch of empty cubicles. The space was dimly lit, and the ceilings were low. Do you want to grow your business? Maybe I can help. Click here. “My god, this space is depressing,” I said to my co-founder, “Randy”.…
Read MoreHow Does A Lack Of Funding Affect Your Company?
“Brett, we’re going to need to shutdown our advertising,” Tina, our controller, said to me. “We need to preserve our cash until we get more funding. Look at the cash flow (statement).” [Do you want to grow your business? Maybe I can help. Click here.] Tina and I were reviewing what we needed to do…
Read MoreWhat Do You Do When Your Engineers Are Failing?
“What are we going to do about the DAC (Digital to Analog Converter) design?” I asked my co-founder and VP Engineering, Jeroen. “It’s floundering.” “I know,” Jeroen said. “I think we need to make a change.” Do you want to grow your business? Maybe I can help. Click here. If you can announce five different…
Read MoreHow Should You Manage Your Startup’s Spending?
“Don’t worry, Brett. We’ll support you,” “Raul”, one of our investors, said to me in our board of directors meeting. Raul wanted us to go faster than I had originally planned for. Do you want to grow your business? Maybe I can help. Click here. And Raul meant what he said. He was, in that…
Read MoreWhat Are The Seven Keys For You To Effectively Delegate?
I read a really great book called, “The Fish That The Whale.” The book is about the life of entrepreneur Sam Zemurray. The book is a great and entertaining read, and it is packed with lessons for entrepreneurs. Do you want to grow your business? Maybe I can help. Click here. Zemurray, also known as…
Read MoreWhat’s The Right Way To Determine Your Team’s Salary?
I’ll never forget one of my investors, “Raul”, asking me how much I was going to pay myself after we closed our $12 million round of funding. I told Raul I was going to pay myself $200,000, well below the market rate of $250,000 at the time. This was significantly more than the zero salary…
Read MoreHow Should You Manage Your Engineering Team?
“How do you plan on managing the design team?” I asked my prospective co-founder and soon to be VP Engineering, Jeroen. Do you want to grow your business? Maybe I can help. Click here. “The same as I have at Maxim (Integrated Products),” Jeroen said. I smiled, and then I said, “I’m sorry, but I…
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