It’s impossible to overstate how destructive one toxic individual can be to a company. While that’s especially true in an early stage startup where just about anyone can have a big influence on team performance and morale, it can happen in any organization of any size if that individual is[…] Read On
The problem I see with today’s entrepreneurial culture is a surprisingly unrealistic if not utopian expectation of the startup process. They have this notion of going straight from founding and funding to fame and fortune. Never mind the whole building a company and growing a business thing. Some of these[…] Read On
You haven’t lived until you’ve spent two weeks locked in a conference room with 20 lawyers and analysts wordsmithing an SEC S-1 prospectus line by line in preparation for an IPO. Colonoscopies, jury duty and listening to Alyssa Milano are fun by comparison. Wait, it gets better. After you submit[…] Read On
Face it, there’s no escaping the realization that you were completely full of shit when you said, “I’m ready to get back to work.” Maybe you were ready to get back home or to have the house back to yourself. That I believe. But back to work? I don’t think[…] Read On
I’m beginning to wonder if I went to bed in 2019 and woke up in a bizarro 2020 world where everything is reversed. I’m not sure if it’s utopian thinking, fake news, poor judgement, guilt or grossly misplaced compassion that makes some people put the lives of terrorists and the[…] Read On
Every year, Santa and I get together at his place, break out the nog, boogey down to some righteous classic rock and talk about corporate America’s naughtiest CEOs. Sure they make a lot of dough but the fat man can’t resist filling their Christmas stockings with big black lumps of[…] Read On
I’ve resisted watching HBO’s Silicon Valley for years. Another cynic’s view of what Silly Valley has become in the latest bubble seemed too depressing to watch. And make no mistake, we are in a bubble. Not just private equity — ideology too. Having gone through the dot-com bubble, way too[…] Read On