14Sep

Will AI make us all superhuman?🤖

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Artificial Intelligence, CEO, Diversity, diversity & inclusion, diversity hiring, enterprise software, Hiring, SaaS, scale-up, VC, venture capital

Dennis Kayser is the founding CEO at Forecast who raised $5.5m in 2019 for their SaaS solution which leverages artificial intelligence to transform project management & professional services. We explored: 🤖 Having launched the business in Copenhagen, why Dennis chose London for Forecast’s commercial HQ 🤖 Overcoming Covid’s challenges through flat structures & autonomous teams used to working remotely 🤖 How Forecast, from its inception, was created with a diverse workforce reflecting their diverse target customers - their 60 employees comprise 18 nationalities and a 50-50 gender split 🤖 How and why AI will make all of us superhuman! 🤖 Why Dennis decided to accept funding from a VC who valued Forecast 3x less than other VCs had valued the business 🤖 Why founders should not get starstruck just because a high profile VC reaches out to them

06Sep

Brad Feld: how to overcome the mental challenges entrepreneurs face during the pandemic

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CEO, COVID19, Diversity, diversity & inclusion, entrepreneur, entrepreneurs, leadership, mental health, mentoring, Organisational Culture, Scale-ups, Start-ups, VC, venture capital

Brad Feld has been an early stage investor & entrepreneur for 30 years. He co-founded Foundry Group, Mobius Venture Capital, Intensity Ventures & Techstars. Brad’s also a published author & a long-distance runner who’s completed dozens of marathons! We discussed: ⭐ Brad's new book - "The StartUp Community Way" - and explored why the theory of complex systems is so crucial for startup & scaleup leaders ⭐ The psychological challenges Brad has faced during his career as an entrepreneur and investor ⭐ The importance of regular emotional, physical and intellectual resets ⭐ The steps Brad has taken to help his portfolio CEOs overcome the psychological/emotional challenges they've faced in 2020 ⭐ Brad commitment to getting at least one non-white board member - and preferably at least one female AND one non-white board member - on every board he serves, even if it means giving up his board seat ⭐ The other actions Brad's encouraging to improve diversity within his portfolio

03Sep

The Infinite Era of Marketing: how to outperform your competitors

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marketing

Matthew Sweezey, Director of Market Strategy at Salesforce, has developed a radical view of the Future of Marketing that has huge implications for ambitious tech ventures. We explored: ⭐ the crucial differences between the "Infinite Era of Marketing" & the Digital Era ⭐ why purpose-driven businesses have significant competitive advantages in the Infinite Era ⭐ why B2B ventures who create experiences will outperform those who merely create messages ⭐ the increasing importance of AR, VR & "XR" for B2B marketers ⭐ why companies need to create a new C Suite leadership role, & change their structure, to optimise for customer experience across the entire customer journey

27Aug

The downside of accepting TOO MUCH funding from VCs!

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D&I, diversity & inclusion, diversity hiring, VC, venture capital

Marlon Nichols is Managing General Partner at MaC Venture Capital – a West Coast VC investing in technology companies that create infectious products benefiting from shifts in cultural trends & behaviours in an increasingly diverse global marketplace. We discussed: ⭐ The challenges facing BAME VCs & BAME entrepreneurs trying to raise investment for their funds & their startups ⭐ Why it is a financial as well as a moral imperative to invest in diversity ⭐ The risk that startups who raise too much capital too early will lose focus & struggle to gain traction

19Aug

William McQuillan’s advice: “Don’t Stalk VCs Via Their AirBnb Listings!”

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William McQuillan was the youngest Partner of a European VC fund when he co-founded Frontline Ventures in 2012. An early stage venture capital fund with €110m under management, Frontline has made over 40 investments across Europe. We explored: 🌟 Frontline Ventures “platform” offering - the 1st to be launched by a European VC firm 🌟 How the platform enables Frontline to track everything they do to add value to their portfolio 🌟 The shocking stats Frontline uncovered on gender & ethnicity in dealflow 🌟 The specific steps VCs can take to improve their ability to support diverse businesses 🌟 The criteria Frontline evaluate when investing in companies with no products & no revenues 🌟 How an entrepreneur tracked William down on AirBnb then rented a room so he could pitch him!

18Aug

Faisal Galaria: How to Innovate Your Way Out Of A Crisis!

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Augmented Reality, CEO, innovation, startups

Faisal Galaria is the CEO at Blippar – a high profile augmented reality venture. We explored how: ⭐ Blippar is innovating its way out of the pandemic ⭐ Faisal decided to join Blippar after the formerly high profile AR scaleup was rescued from administration ⭐ Technology adoption trends and covid's impact on society are generating huge opportunities for augmented reality ⭐ Blippar created a truly revolutionary product launch for OnePlus when their Nord 5G smartphone was launched entirely via AR & livestreamed globally to 0.5m people

14Aug

How can a tech venture reduce social inequality AND deliver exceptional ROI?

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Tony Jamous is the CEO at Oyster - a talent platform that enables companies to hire great people anywhere on the planet! Previously Tony co-founded Nexmo – a cloud communications platform – & led them to a $230m exit! We explored: ⭐ How Nexmo grew from 10m to 100m ARR in 6 years & how leadership style & organisational structure evolved at each stage of growth ⭐ Why Nexmo chose to exit via M&A in preference to the IPO route chosen by their US competitor Twilio ⭐ How Oyster reduces inequality by lowering the barrier for companies in any country to hire talent in any country ⭐ How virtual organisations reduce the differentials between extroverts & introverts and improve employees' mental health ⭐ Why Oyster partnered with Connect Ventures as an investor who shared their goals for “Impact 2.0” in preference to other VCs who's interest was purely ROI

10Aug

This is The Perfect Time To Be Bold & Disruptive!

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Pontus Noren pioneered the "cloud-native" approach as CEO at Cloudreach, the scaleup he founded in 2009 – just after Lehman Brothers collapsed - & led to an exit in 2017. By the time Blackstone acquired the business, Cloudreach was a Leader in the Gartner Magic Quadrant, ranked top 25 in The Sunday Times Hiscox Tech 100, & ranked by the FT as one of Europe’s fastest growing companies We explored: ⭐ The huge opportunity for startups to sell to large companies who need to shake everything up due to the pandemic ⭐ The mantra: “What you don’t do is as important as what you do do!” ⭐ The learning: “I’ve often recruited people too fast but I’ve never fired someone too fast!” ⭐ The devastating consequences of senior mis-hires ⭐ To avoid panic hires: how to plan your organisational design based on your expectations of future market opportunities & challenges

02Aug

A model for diversity & inclusion in VC & tech

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diversity & inclusion, diversity hiring, high performance teams, mental health, teams, VC, venture capital

Janneke Niessen is a serial entrepreneur, investor, board member & mentor for startups and the co-founder of CapitalT, a VC fund investing in software startups using proprietary technology to evaluate entrepreneurial teams. She’s also the co-initiator of InspiringFifty - which aims to increase diversity in tech by making female role models more visible. We explored: ⭐ Why VC firms should have more diverse teams & invest in more diverse startups ⭐ The mental health struggles most entrepreneurs experience & the support networks to help them cope ⭐ How the entrepreneurial bug drives us forward despite the pain we all go through! ⭐ CapitalT's proprietary platform "VCVolt" which - based on 5 years of deep research into the performance of a thousand entrepreneurial teams - helps Janneke & her colleagues evaluate leadership teams, select which companies to invest in, & provide ongoing support to help portfolio companies fine-tune their team

26Jul

Don’t hire someone from IBM to ramp your startup revenues!

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Hiring, Organisational Culture, scaleup, startup

Bethany Ayers, CCO at Peak.ai, has a track record leading high-growth SaaS businesses in GTM strategy, rapidly scaling their sales organisations, delivering profitable partnerships & fundraising from VCs. We discussed: ⭐ hiring proven scale-up sales talent to ramp ARR from $1m to $10m! ⭐ changing organisational structures & incentives to align outcomes in sales, marketing & customer success ⭐ implementing ideas from brilliant thinkers like Patrick Lencioni to create high performance organisations ⭐ avoiding vanity metrics & over-engineered KPIs ⭐ overcoming imposter syndrome ⭐ the challenges of diversity hiring - especially in senior roles & key functions like enterprise sales

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