An Open Letter to my Sons

Every blog should have a target audience. My audience for V1Again.com is my 2 sons. I write about entrepreneurship because I want them to learn about how their father analyzed situations when they are older and can understand. I do not target investors or other entrepreneurs with my blog, but hope they enjoy it too.

Being A Start-up is A Feature..Not a Bug

There is no doubt that starting a company is hard.  I get reminded how hard it is every time I meet a new prospective customer.  The question about our legitimacy has many forms: “How long have you been in business?” “How many employees do you have?” “How much money did you raise?” “How many customers

Seek The Pain

“Don’t tell me what you like…tell me what you don’t like” – Elon Musk Seeking feedback is like seeking a punch in the stomach.  It’s painful.  Entrepreneurs work so hard on their start-up.  They take so much risk.  There is so much riding on the success.  So many promises.  Your reputation is at risk.  You

How a VC Can Add Value

Fred Wilson (one of the elite Venture Capitalists) had a great blog post recently on the price war that is happening in the VC industry.  In response to the post, I mentioned that price pressure from competitors is nothing new to any business person.  His portfolio CEO’s face that all the time.  The answer is differentiation.

Critical Criteria When Hiring A Salesperson

Whenever I analyze a salesperson for a job, I first apply the lens of whether she fits the role.  There are four possible sales roles: 1. Existing products to Existing customers This is the easiest type of sell.  Not saying it is easy.  Just the easiest of the four types.  It is the easiest because

Arguing vs. Testing

Culture is everything. Culture determines who you hire, what products you build, how you build those products, and thus ultimately the value of your business.  If you set up the wrong organizational culture you are doomed to failure, no matter how talented individual employees are or how attractive the market you are attacking. Are Your Winners

How My Start-up Started Over

In my last post I wrote about why I shut down my last product after only 3 months.  At that point, I had a decision to make –   Give the remaining money back to investors (~25 cents on the dollar) or Start the process over.  I gave myself a few weeks to find a pain

Why I Shut Down Irrive After Only 3 Months

In early 2011 I had an idea.  I was planning a trip and thought, wouldn’t it be great if there was an easy way to search all of my friend’s travel content (pictures, itineraries, social data, etc) when planning a trip.  A ton of travel content already existed.  I knew people would gladly share their

Hurt My Feelings…Please

Wouldn’t it be nice if a great wedding meant a great marriage?  Oh…life would be so easy.  You could just hire the best party planner, invest all of your savings and would be assured a lifetime of happiness.  Bummer that’s not true.  As we all know, a good marriage requires a lot of work.  To

“The Struggle”

This blog post from Ben Horowitz is perfect… “Every entrepreneur starts her company with a clear vision for success. You will create an amazing environment and hire the smartest people to join you. Together you will build a beautiful product that delights customers and makes the world just a little bit better. It’s going to