SoCal CTO

MARCH 2, 2015

As the organizer of the LA CTO Forum , I get lots of inquiries by job seekers and people looking for CTO / VP Engineering talent. I’ve written quite a bit about aspects of this topic, especially from the perspective of startup founders looking for talent – you can find these in: Startup CTO.

CTO Hire 150

CTO Hire CTO Coach Los Angeles Angel 150

SoCal CTO

MARCH 12, 2012

I've recently received several emails from people looking for a technical cofounder for their startup. " Typically, this requires quite a bit more information for me to be able to respond and provide real help. Of course, you will want to figure out a bit more about the specifics of what this developer needs to know vs. can learn.

CTO Hire 211

CTO Hire CTO Coach Startup Equity 211

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 20, 2010

I recently did a post for startups on understanding sales people. A few people have asked me to try and define the perfect startup organization chart. But I do have more insight into understanding your startup team. This time I thought I’d try and address engineering talent. Let’s start with the basics.

CTO Hire 400

CTO Hire Fractional VPE Startup Outsource Development 400

SoCal CTO

SEPTEMBER 27, 2011

I was asked by a reader how much equity he should give out to early employees and to service providers in a very early stage startup. Founders vs. Early Employees To help with this discussion, let me start with a definition of "early employee." the better the startup will be. n = (1.2 - 1)/1.2 =.167.

Equity 391

Equity CTO Hire Startup Examples 391

SoCal CTO

JANUARY 18, 2011

I received an inquiry from a reader of my blog and thought I would provide some thoughts, but would definitely welcome input: I am an unpaid CTO of a small startup. I have been working full time with two founders for about 10 months on full time basis. Of course, that doesn’t help here. Was it pre or post?

CTO 167

CTO CTO Hire CTO Coach Equity 167

SoCal CTO

JANUARY 18, 2011

I received an inquiry from a reader of my blog and thought I would provide some thoughts, but would definitely welcome input: I am an unpaid CTO of a small startup. I have been working full time with two founders for about 10 months on full time basis. Of course, that doesn’t help here. Was it pre or post?

CTO 150

CTO CTO Hire CTO Coach Equity 150

SoCal CTO

MAY 13, 2014

A large part of this conversation is what kinds of advisors startups should be looking for. A little while ago, I suggested that Every Web/Mobile Startup Should Have a Technical Advisor. We both felt that most startups are not taking a very systematic approach to defining with they need in terms of advisors.

CTO Coach 241

CTO Coach Startup CTO Hire Template 241

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 16, 2014

One of the vivid memories I have from being a startup CEO is the feeling that most people in your company have a look in their eyes that like they can do your job as well as you. But if you level up , raise capital and grow customers, revenue and staff – life changes. You hire great people. You course correct.

Entrepreneur 385

Entrepreneur CTO Hire Startup Sales 385

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 16, 2015

Fred Wilson also wrote on a similar topic in his usual more succinct manner , with a great quote being: “One thing I know for sure is that those who advise and invest in startups cannot and should not meddle in the day to day decision making. It’s harmful and hurtful to the startup and those that lead it. Startup Lessons'

Startup 150

Startup Sales CTO Coach Course 150

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 5, 2014

Even bigger is the desire to stick one’s middle finger up at all of the people who doubted you all along. Of course the naysayers are out again. Of course backbencher has also become a slang term for “someone who exaggerates their actual power, influence, or importance, usually for nefarious purposes.”

Technical Review 417

Technical Review Startup Software Review Course 417

Both Sides of the Table

OCTOBER 15, 2014

Much has been written about when it is time to hire a “professional CEO” to run a startup company and of course that has long been a norm in Silicon Valley when founders find that their inexperience may be a limiting factor in company growth ( know as the Peter Principle ). and Microsoft had become.

CTO Hire 309

CTO Hire Organization Google Course 309

Both Sides of the Table

SEPTEMBER 22, 2012

I think I’ve read Paul Graham’s post on “ Startup = Growth ” three or four times now. And of course on Twitter I’ve seen the Tweets, ReTweets and superlatives on what a great post it is. Eventually a successful startup will grow into a big company. I talked about some of that here.

Startup 390

Startup Venture Capital Entrepreneur Technical Review 390

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 21, 2014

Startups are hard. You’ve heard that a million times. The truth is you really don’t know how your teammates or your bosses will perform in good times and bad. The truth is you really don’t know how your teammates or your bosses will perform in good times and bad. You hire people who look good on paper.

CTO Hire 320

CTO Hire Startup CTO Coach Venture Capital 320

socalTECH

MARCH 8, 2013

Stuart Frost is head of Frost Venture Partners (www.frostvp.com), and the founder of DatAllegro, which he started in Orange County and eventually sold to Microsoft for $275M in 2008. DatAllegro was one of the first companies in what is now the "big data" industry, and helped to pioneer the entire segment.

Incubator 208

Incubator Startup CTO Hire Ideas 208

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 5, 2010

This is part of my series on what makes an entrepreneur successful. I started the series talking about what I consider the most important attribute of an entrepreneur : Tenacity. They often make great team members such as head of products, CTO, head of sales, CFO, etc. It’s lost salary for a period of time.

Entrepreneur 293

Entrepreneur Startup Venture Capital CTO Hire 293

Both Sides of the Table

MARCH 23, 2014

I spent an hour on the phone working with Sam Rosen, the CEO of MakeSpace on a senior exec he is considering hiring. I will soon announce a few fundings (not yet closed, sorry) and I’m beginning to help them think about how to ramp up their engineering teams. Of course I could go on and on. How did I get here?

Networking 366

Networking Startup CTO Coach Email 366

socalTECH

MAY 2, 2017

Andrew Bermudez , co-founder and CEO of Irvine-based Digsy (www.getdigsy.com) wasn't looking to build software to help commercial real estate brokers close more deals. He was just trying to collect more data for his startup on what was happening on real estate deals that the company had been referring to brokers.

Sales 145

Sales Startup Email Tool 145

SoCal CTO

MARCH 9, 2010

In my post, Technology Roles in Startups , I described some of the different ways I engage with startup companies such as CTO Founder , CTO , Part-Time CTO , Acting CTO , Consultant, Advisor and Advisory Board Member. Now, most often technical advisors are part of a broader advisory board.

CTO Coach 150

CTO Coach Technical Review Technology CTO Hire 150

socalTECH

FEBRUARY 17, 2017

We caught up with Ryan (who calls himself an "anti-VC") to hear more about his investment firm, which has invested in such companies as Heal , Elite Daily , Saucey , and FragMob. Tell us a bit of the story on how you started HashtagOne? We want to have startups we can get productive or generating revenue pretty quickly.

Venture Capital 100

Venture Capital Entrepreneur Technical Review Software Review 100

Both Sides of the Table

FEBRUARY 7, 2013

He had an idea for a startup that would help consumers better book service jobs and would take on Service Magic, which he believed had a business model that could be disrupted. In the same year they won Business Insider’s Startup competition. But Ethan had left by the time of the acquisition. Nice sweep!

CTO Coach 359

CTO Coach Google CTO Hire Yammer 359

Both Sides of the Table

NOVEMBER 19, 2009

This is part of my Startup Advice series. Good entrepreneurs can admit when their course of action was wrong and learn from it. So I was surprised at the sheer volumes of decisions that had to be made when I became a startup CEO. Somebody asks whether you plan to set up 401k’s and do contribution matching.

Entrepreneur 414

Entrepreneur Technical Review Slides CTO Coach 414

SoCal CTO

MAY 19, 2010

On Friday, at the LA CTO Forum , I heard from a couple of CTOs having trouble finding good developers. Update from original - just saw a follow-up post by Ben Kuo - Southern California Technology Jobs Surge. I don’t have specific suggestions for people you can hire. Of course, a lot of people say the same thing.

Develop 175

Develop Development TechEmpower Southern California 175

socalTECH

OCTOBER 4, 2010

The company provides SAT, ACT, and other similar test preparation courses and related software. How did Revolution Prep start? We started in 2000. We started that in 2002, and it's actually our eight year anniversary, on the 20th of September. I had worked as a tutor for Princeton Review, and Jake for Kaplan.

Software Review 178

Software Review Technical Review Education Startup 178

SoCal CTO

JULY 23, 2012

I received a great question via LinkedIn: I'm the founding engineer and working hard to launch my startup. I seem to encounter a lot of people who want to attach a CTO label to me as I'm the only programmer on the founding team of three. What can I do to best equip myself to step up when the need to officially fill this role arises?

CTO Coach 231

CTO Coach CTO Hire Outsource Development Develop 231

SoCal CTO

JUNE 26, 2012

I've done four Free CTO Consulting Sessions in the past month with startup founders who all had run into variations of the same problem. In the fourth case, the founder was getting ready to sign a very large contract, but they didn't feel they had much visibility into what was going to be delivered.

Outsource Development 254

Outsource Development Software Development Develop Development 254

Both Sides of the Table

APRIL 23, 2017

When you run a startup you’re always on borrowed time. I’ve never met a founder who wasn’t acutely aware of his or her ticking time bomb and the sense that failure and humiliation is a real possibility. It’s why so few can really start a business from scratch.

Funding 238

Funding Venture Capital Startup Course 238

SoCal CTO

APRIL 28, 2014

So I promised that I would provide a follow-up after the session. This is that follow-up and hopefully it’s useful to people outside of the session as well. Challenges I started by asking the founders in the room to tell me some of the challenges they have working with developers. Have they considered everything?

Develop 280

Develop Development CTO Coach CTO Hire 280

Both Sides of the Table

MAY 5, 2011

Of course I have. I’m looking to turn dots into lines over time. I’m inspired by the enthusiasm of the young, emerging startup ecosystem that is here. As I gear up to give a keynote at the annual Seattle 2.0 And I think about the “Seattle issue&# as a metaphor for startups and business in general.

Venture Capital 317

Venture Capital Technical Review Startup Press 317

socalTECH

MARCH 12, 2013

What is it about the content delivery network market which has enabled Santa Monica-based EdgeCast to go from startup to over $100M in revenues in only a few, short years? We caught up with James Segil , the firm's President, to hear the story behind that big growth at the company. We've grown really fast.

CTO Hire 248

CTO Hire Content Networking Web 248

Tech Zulu Event

JUNE 16, 2014

We recently sat down with Luc Berlin, co-founder of Miigle, a SoCal startup that has an aggressive global mission to bring entrepreneurs together from around the world. We followed up with Luc to see just how he’s been managing the entrepreneurial waters. The quintessential problem that every startup has is one of visibility.

SoCal 104

SoCal Southern California Startup Platform 104

SoCal CTO

OCTOBER 5, 2010

Great content again in September that meets at the intersection of startups, technology, product and being a Startup CTO. Chris Dixon , September 12, 2010 My most useful career experience was about eight years ago when I was trying to break into the world of VC-backed startups. Why You Should Write. Status / reputation.

Startup 191

Startup Product Technology Venture Capital 191

InfoChachkie

FEBRUARY 17, 2011

Messenger : Thorsten von Eicken , RightScale’s Co-Founder and CTO, Chief Architect at Citrix Online (formerly Expertcity) and Professor of Computer Science at Cornell University and UC Santa Barbara. Does the world really need more servers in more datacenters gobbling up more power to send more tweets and Facebook pages around the world?

Cloud Computing 188

Cloud Computing Santa Barbara EC2 Startup 188

Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 16, 2016

Computer Vison Startup Nanit If you follow me on Snapchat ( msuster ) you might already know that I’ve been looking at and investing in a number of companies in the computer vision space. The objective behind Nanit is to help parent “sleep more and monitor less.” Of course in recent years voice as I/O is becoming mainstream.

Invest 150

Invest Course Startup CTO Hire 150

Both Sides of the Table

JANUARY 28, 2011

Lately the topic of leadership & teams has been coming up a lot in my daily life. You do a startup and decide you want somebody to step in and run the company so you can focus on technical excellence. Nah, of course not. It’s part of my ethos. Leaders are intelligent, for sure. Is it book smarts?

CTO Hire 363

CTO Hire Technical Review Startup Demand 363

Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 23, 2012

One of the first tough decisions that startup founders have to make is how to allocate or split the equity among co-founders. The easy answer of splitting it equally among all co-founders, since there is minimal value at that point, is usually the worst possible answer, and often results in a later startup failure due to an obvious inequity.

Startup 101

Startup Entrepreneur Equity CTO Hire 101

Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 8, 2010

One of the first tough decisions that startup founders have to make is how to allocate or split the equity among co-founders. The easy answer of splitting it equally among all co-founders, since there is minimal value at that point, is usually the worst possible answer, and often results in a later startup failure due to an obvious inequity.

Equity 91

Equity Startup CTO Hire CTO Coach 91