69: Sound, Actionable Advice with Jason Cohen
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Derrick is away, so Ben welcomes Jason Cohen, CTO of WP Engine and four-time entrepreneur. Jason knows a thing or two about startups and mentoring them to achieve profitability and growth.
\\n\\nJason is a straight talker and tells it like it is to get to solutions sooner. He encourages bootstrap founders to find an advisor who aligns with their goals. You need to know how to take advice and use advice that is right for you and your business. Even if you get great advice, think for yourself!
\\n\\nToday\\u2019s Topics Include:
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- Advice is not enough; luck, execution, and other pieces are involved \\n
- Be honest and know what qualities investors want \\n
- Jason characterizes a company as a learning machine that\\u2019s constantly failing, not doing the right thing, and has no resources; but has agility to learn and react quickly \\n
- Embrace your humanity and smallness; don\\u2019t lie about being big \\n
- Share the good and bad about your startup journey for others to feel connected to and support it \\n
- When making decisions, apply filters to cut out things; constraints are useful \\n
- Universal Rule of Success: You\\u2019re all in and apply a lot of energy; makes you more productive and fulfilled \\n
- Many paths lead to success and failure; pick ones that naturally fit you \\n
- A good engineer can build features (not risky), but can they do everything else - probably not (risky); identify how a company\\u2019s priorities need to change to address risk \\n
- To be sustainable, get help and became an expert in something - not everything \\n
- Product success depends on use cases and maturity of company (convince customers how good it is now and will get even better); if product isn\\u2019t good, then business won\\u2019t last \\n
- Jason shares ideas and options regarding Ben\\u2019s Tuple product \\n
- When bootstrapping, getting money is challenging because you\\u2019re not on people\\u2019s radar
Links and resources:
\\n\\n\\n\\n\\n\\nCan you bootstrap a company on the side? (Part 1 with Jason Cohen)
\\n\\nJason Cohen - Designing the Ideal Bootstrapped Business
\\n\\n\\n\\n\\n\\n\\n\\n\\n\\n\\n\\n\\n\\n\\n\\n\\n\\nSilicon Valley Successes Podcast
\\n\\n\\n\\nDerrick Reimer Website
\\n\\nDerrick Reimer on Twitter
\\n\\nBen Orenstein Website
\\n\\nBen Orenstein on Twitter
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