Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 30, 2022

Perhaps sparked by the recent pandemic, I’m seeing a new era of the entrepreneur, with startups springing up all around. Based on my own mentoring and investing experience, the best entrepreneurs are pragmatic problem solvers. Problems will occur in every startup, simply because you are stepping into uncharted territory.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JUNE 21, 2021

If you are one of the many professionals still trapped between jobs by circumstances outside your control, or are about to dump the loser job you have now, you should be actively defining and starting your own business, in parallel with looking for that ideal job. Have startup efforts to highlight in job interviews.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 4, 2021

After working many years in business, both in large companies as well as startups, I’ve realized that you can learn more from peers and mentors than from any formal education program. Best of all, I find mentoring to be fun and fulfilling for both the giver and the receiver. Mentoring works best one-on-one and person-to-person.

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Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 10, 2023

Even though the color of their money is always green, all startup investors are not the same. Investor due diligence on a startup is not a mysterious black art, but is nothing more than a final integrity check on all aspects of your business model, team, product, customers, and plan. It’s no fun for either side.

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Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 19, 2022

Yet as I mentor entrepreneurs around the country, crowdfunding still seems to be one of the least understood approaches to startup funding, with more myths than accredited angels and professional venture capital investors combined. With this model, a startup pre-sells their product early, at a cheaper price, in exchange for a pledge.

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socalTECH

DECEMBER 27, 2019

Today, we share the thoughts of Greg Monterrosa ,a startup community leader who is currently Startup Weekend organizer, facilitator, and mentor and was a former Founder of MyLLC.com and Hub101. The continued growth of startup communities in Los Angeles. What was the biggest news for you/your company this year?

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Both Sides of the Table

DECEMBER 11, 2022

Something happened in the past 7 years in the startup and venture capital world that I hadn’t experienced since the late 90’s — we all began praying to the God of Valuation. How might our next phase of the journey seem brighter, even with more uncertain days for startups and capital markets? What happened? There was no money train.

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Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 2, 2020

You don’t have to have previous startup problems to show resilience – everyone should have a story of tackling a tough challenge with minimal success, but using the failure to move on and achieve an objective. Evan Williams , for example, before cofounding Twitter, started a podcasting platform named Odeo.

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Startup Professionals Musings

SEPTEMBER 11, 2020

One of the reasons that now is the time to be an entrepreneur is the explosion of startup assistance organizations, usually called incubators or accelerators. Most of these are non-profits, set up by a university to commercialize new technologies, or a municipality to foster business development for the local economy.

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Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 12, 2022

In fact, I believe the majority of true entrepreneurs are not interested in this new role, and jump ship quickly by hiring an experienced CEO or merging with another company, to start their next entrepreneurial effort. With a startup, everything is an experiment. Growing the company means growing people through mentoring and training.

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socalTECH

APRIL 13, 2021

For today's interview, we spoke to Dave Eastman, the Director of the Viterbi Startup Garage, a startup incubator that is run by the University of Southern California, out of its location in Marina Del Rey. What is Viterbi Startup Garage? The Startup Garage is located physically in Marina Del Rey, in the twin tower on Admiralty.

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Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 5, 2023

Many entrepreneurs have a passion and an idea, or even invent a new product, but are never able to execute to the point of creating a startup. Even fewer are able to grow the startup into a viable business. Startup and development stage. Market research and a business plan should be the focus at this stage.

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InfoChachkie

NOVEMBER 18, 2013

Despite what you might think, you are never too old to benefit from the helpful guidance of a mentor. Jason Nazar, Co-Founder and CEO of Docstoc , and a self-professed "Mentee Whore," discusses his secrets to finding and keeping a mentor in this compelling article. and set up meetings with people that you want to be like.

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socalTECH

APRIL 10, 2018

What is Startup Boost , and how is it looking to help early stage startups in Los Angeles? We recently sat down with Matt Stodder , Co-Director of Startup Boost/Los Angeles, and Blake Caldwell , Global Director of Startup Boost, to learn more about the program, what it offers up to startups.

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Startup Professionals Musings

OCTOBER 12, 2020

Some entrepreneurs start polling venture capitalists for that multi-million dollar investment before they even have a business plan. It’s helpful to think of startups as proceeding through several stages, which I have defined a long time ago from a funding perspective. Don’t waste your resources on the wrong ones.

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Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 24, 2020

As a mentor to startups, I see more startups that are really an individual professional, marketing themselves as a consultant or freelancer in this new gig economy. This world changes rapidly, and needs a professional with experience in digital and conventional media to keep up. Software Development Professional.

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Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 21, 2022

In my consulting work, when I ask team members in startups and small businesses how they know whether they are doing a good job, the typical response I get is “Nobody has yelled at me today,” or “No news is good news.” One mistake to avoid in all cases is to dress up praise as a comparison to others , such as “You were the best speaker today.”

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Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 13, 2021

In my role as advisor and mentor to many new entrepreneurs, I often find myself suggesting that they think bigger. A successful startup requires a full understanding of multiple domains, rarely embodied in one person. Collaborate with experts and people with experience.

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Startup Professionals Musings

DECEMBER 29, 2019

If you are like most entrepreneurs I know, there just aren’t enough hours in a day to get all your own work done, as well as run the many one-hour meetings each team member seems to demand for decisions and mentoring. For one-on-one coaching from the startup founder, I call this approach five-minute mentoring.

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Both Sides of the Table

AUGUST 30, 2014

Many startups now go through accelerators and have mentors passing through each day with advice – usually it’s conflicting. There are bootcamps, startup classes, video interviews – the sources are now endless. Because I’ve asked more than 100 VCs similar questions I start to notice patterns in thinking.

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Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 11, 2023

Similarly, it will be very satisfying to see the productivity increases from your leadership and mentoring. Enjoy that first video interview at an industry conference, or the newspaper story which enhances your startup visibility and credibility. Enjoy watching key members of your team grow from followers to leaders.

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Startup Professionals Musings

NOVEMBER 30, 2020

There has long been a big debate about the best approach to starting a new business. Some argue the only way to start is to drop everything and jump in with both feet, while others recommend an overlapped approach to the lifestyle, including not quitting your day job until you have revenue and a proven business model.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 22, 2020

Luckily, not all investors are looking for the same thing, so it pays to know what type of investors are most interested in what your startup brings to the table. The key is understanding how potential investors see you, and especially how they view the maturity stage of your startup. Congratulations!

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 11, 2021

As an angel investor to startups, I’m still surprised to find entrepreneurs who expect investors to give them money, and assume no strings attached. Angel and venture capital money always comes with ownership and management implications, starting with the obvious ones outlined in the term sheet for the deal.

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Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 3, 2015

Every entrepreneur can learn from a mentor, no matter how confident or successful they have been to date. Yet most entrepreneurs simply don’t know how to work with a mentor. Some of the best mentoring relationships don’t involve monetary compensation, but none are free. Agree on specific objectives and time frames.

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Startup Professionals Musings

MAY 1, 2021

I’m fully convinced that both inspiration and perspiration are always required in a startup. Those at the other extreme don’t look up from the grindstone long enough to notice whether all their work is producing sweat equity or just sweat. Starting a business may be fun, but it’s not easy. Start even before the product is ready.

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Startup Professionals Musings

FEBRUARY 5, 2020

As a mentor to entrepreneurs, I tend to see many of the same obstacles appearing in every new startup, and since I don’t want to appear to be a downer , I’m not sure how to properly warn people ahead of time to be on the alert for these challenges. Funding is depleted before customer sales ramp up.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 4, 2021

The last thing they can afford is to waste any of these, but in my mentoring and coaching activities, I see it happening all too often. Waste in a startup is any activity that burns resources, but creates no value or competitive advantage in the eyes of customers. In the startup world, this is often seen as a lack of focus.

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Startup Professionals Musings

JANUARY 23, 2021

Ironically, as a startup investor and mentor, I have seen too many failures caused by just the opposite – too much money spent too soon, taking time to get product perfection, and assuming customers will wait. How many times have you actually made up work to keep an idle person busy? Marty Zwilling.

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Startup Professionals Musings

MARCH 22, 2023

Many business leaders today, including Howard Schultz , didn’t start the businesses they are now known for, but worked their way up the corporate ranks with ownership thinking. You must focus on nurturing a culture of working together, continuous learning, and constant change to keep up with new customer and market changes.

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Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 26, 2020

Almost every entrepreneur starts their journey by developing a solution, based on their idea of a new technology or required service. One answer is for the developer to find a partner, like Steve Jobs, who is a leader to build and run the business, and two heads in a startup are almost always better than one.

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Startup Professionals Musings

APRIL 17, 2023

Luckily, not all investors are looking for the same thing, so it pays to know what type of investors are most interested in what your startup brings to the table. The key is understanding how potential investors see you, and especially how they view the maturity stage of your startup. Congratulations!

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Startup Professionals Musings

JULY 15, 2022

You have to be extra tough mentally to start a new business venture. He spent many years with the SEALs, but has since started and built six multimillion-dollar business ventures. To be an entrepreneur or a Navy SEAL, you must first have vision, focus, and the courage to step up to lead. Are you up to the challenge?

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Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 21, 2020

As a mentor to aspiring entrepreneurs, I often feel the frustration of someone trying to build a startup in the wrong place and time, and wrongly attributing their struggle to personal limitations. I saw these addressed well in a new book, “ The Startup Community Way ,” by Brad Feld and Ian Hathaway.

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Both Sides of the Table

JUNE 8, 2014

I have never been more optimistic about the impact that the tech startup community is having on cities in America or about the role that cities outside of San Francisco / Silicon Valley can play in our future. Changes in the Startup Ecosystem. Open source computing, which reduced costs to start a company by 90%. And on and on.

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Startup Professionals Musings

AUGUST 16, 2020

As an angel investor and a mentor to aspiring entrepreneurs, I’m always disappointed to see founders who seem stressed out most of the time, and more annoyed than energized by the abundance of challenges they see in building their startup. Technology experts tend to have a very deep level of knowledge, but not very wide.

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socalTECH

AUGUST 2, 2013

Are you a startup founder wishing you could find someone more experience to help meet other entrepeneurs, get some advice, and help you figure out the issues you face? According to Diep, the group is now holding one event a month to connect mentors and mentees. mentornight mentor startup angeles help advice incubator accelerator'

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