Growth vs innovation, scale vs stability, founders vs CEOs? High-performing scale-ups from around the world ask Reid their urgent strategic questions. This episode features Endeavor’s Outliers – the fastest-growing, highest-performing entrepreneurs from this global incubator.
When’s the right time for hypergrowth? Should you take investment when you don’t need the money? How do you deal with an exhausted team? A global panel of entrepreneurs from Endeavor ask Reid Hoffman their questions about raising capital, pivoting their product, bootstrapping vs. blitzscaling and more.
When Drew Houston founded Dropbox, he knew he faced some fierce competition (hello, Google, Apple, and Microsoft). But he didn’t back down from the fight. Why? Because he believed in his product, and he knew he had an advantage those big, cumbersome competitors could never exploit: Dropbox was lean, focused, and fast. Hear how he outmaneuvered the big guys – and what’s next for Dropbox. Cameo appearances: Mark Pincus of Zynga, Shellye Archambeau of MetricStream.
You can bootstrap your business to scale, but you’ll have to make your own luck. Nobody knows this better than Mailchimp’s Ben Chestnut. He used a DIY ethos to grow a $600M company without ever raising a dollar of outside funding. The Mailchimp story is the exception to Reid’s rule (Generally: Raise more money than you think you need!). The episode explores a range of options for those who don’t fit the VC-funding mold for any set of reasons. Cameo appearances: LeVar Burton (Star Trek, Reading Rainbow, LeVar Burton Reads), Don MacKinnon (Milq), Karen Cahn (iFundWomen).
You need a great story to build a great company. No one embodies this principle more fully than Scott Harrison, founder of Charity: Water. A master storyteller, Scott built his nonprofit on 3 radical principles: (1) 100% of donations would go to water projects (2) Progress reports would be transparent, sharing victories and defeats (3) The brand’s storytelling would lead with hope instead of guilt, inspiring joyful participation without sacrificing honesty.
The best business ideas often seem laughable at first glance. So if you’re hearing a chorus of “No’s” — it may actually be a good sign. So don’t be discouraged by rejection. Instead, learn the different kinds of “no.” That’s what Tristan Walker did. After stints at successful startups, he launched Walker & Company, makers of the Bevel razor, and learned the secret of how to talk with investors who may or may not share your vision.
Think you’ve raised enough money for your startup? Think again. You’ll face a minefield of unexpected expenses — and opportunities. So raise more money than you think you need — possibly a lot more. MInted founder & CEO Mariam Naficy shares her white-knuckle experiences founding startups that survived two financial crashes – online cosmetic company Eve.com in the ’90s, and the design boutique Minted.com today.