Ben Horowitz in his book: “What you do is who you are” talks about the sign of organizations messed up culture. These are the 3 signs according to Ben: Wrong people are quitting too often. You are failing at your top priorities. An employee does something that truly shocks you. I found it worth sharing.
Category Archives: startups
checklist
In the book “What you do is who you” are Ben Horowitz has a shared cultural checklist for founders building companies. Cultural Design: Culture should be the same who you are in real life or professional. Cultural Orientation: Monkey see, monkey do. Ensure the newer employees are mentored well to join your bandwagon. Shocking Rules. …
culture
Ben Horowitz in his book “What you do who you are” about Slack’s culture. Smart Humble Hardworking Collaborative Slack’s founder says every Slack employee should have these virtues. It got me thinking about how most startups are paying 100X salary and taking bullshit from A performers. The toxic culture at many big billion companies is …
C for sales
While reading “What you do is who you are”, the author shares an incident. He talks about the sales philosophy of Mark Cranny at his Loudcloud days. Cranny also talks about the four C’s. Competence: your salesperson should know in and out of the product. Confidence: your salesperson should pitch with it. Courage: your salesperson …
customer success
Growth comes with too many things to handle. If you are catering customers where they are dependent on you for everyday chores, customer success should be paramount. In the book, category creation the author talks about the Customer Success Team. A team dedicated to delighting end-users. As a leader of your organization, it becomes super …
consumption
We consume information, news, content in many ways. As per the author of category creation, these are the common modes. Visual: consists of images, pictures. Musical: sound and music. Verbal: words, speech, and writings. Physical: body, hands, and sense of touch. Logical: requires cognitive capabilities Social: where actions are taken in collaboration Solitary: where actions …
Product
In the book company of one, the author talks about the pillars of a successful product. Security Scalability Reliability Performance Integration Customization I found it worth sharing. As a product developer, these principles should be part of your subconscious brain. Your team should swear by it.
price
I have been told time and again by my friends that Indian customers are stringy to price. Most haggle irrespective of their income or wealth. My friends say we Indians don’t have the desire to progress or willingness to pay. We like to continue doing donkey work rather than paying for automation. I do not …
Buyers Side
In the book “the transparency sale” author talks about what moves buyers towards your product: Trust in your product. How much can your product be trusted in solving the pain points? Is your product going to avoid buyer’s confusion? The buyer gets pitched every day. Is your product the needle in the haystack? Buyers preference. …
pricing levers
While reading the transparency sales, the book I learned about pricing levers. What he means by levers is what drives the pricing of your product. He uses the example with Enterprise B2B SaaS. The 4 levers: The number of seats: How many licenses the team is willing to buy. Upfront: How quickly is the customer …