That would be the very first. One of the most common ways to block change is to challenge, "OK, specifically, what do we do Monday morning?" You really can’t answer with "Oh, read over Patterns of Conflict a dozen times, and then we’ll hold a roundtable on Sun Tzu." It just doesn’t work. Nor does "Monday morning, right after the meeting on the new promotion criteria, we’ll start working on einheit.*" And be suspicious of the commo...

published June 24th, 2019 This week’s essay is on how to prepare for a board meeting, though many of the lessons apply to internal reviews as well. Over the past two years, I’ve attended 100+ board meetings that range from companies that are just a handful of people to companies with over one thousand employees that are preparing to go public. These board meetings vary significantly in quality of discussion and participants, but t...

published February 24th, 2019 This week’s essay is on how to be an effective executive. This is inspired by a talk Keith gives to some of our portfolio companies’ executives. Summary Running yourself Lead, don’t manage: Be proactive rather than reactive. "Lead" your team as opposed to "manage" a situation. Understand your output: Your output is how much your team gets done + how much neighboring teams get done divided by how...

published February 10th, 2019 This week’s essay is on on how to interview an executive, though it may also be helpful to read when preparing to be interviewed. From day 1, one of the most important jobs of a CEO is to hire incredible talent to your team. Hiring the right executive is one of the most leveraged activities a CEO can perform. Hiring the wrong one can set your company back by several quarters or even lead to a death s...

published February 4th, 2019 Over the next few weeks I will be publishing an essay each Monday, covering a variety of different topics that I’ve learned about from working with Keith Rabois. They will focus on investing, management, operations, and hiring. The essays will build upon one another. Venture can be difficult to break into; it’s based on decentralized trust. Partners spend little time together as they’re primarily out ...