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Harsh Truths About the VC Culture in San Francisco Learned So Far
Many people view venture capital as the top of Silicon Valley’s career food chain. But the reality is far less glamorous: intensely competitive, performance-driven, and transactional. Happiness, it turns out, is not found at the top of any career hierarchy, but in the present.
The Great Flip: On the Evolution of Passion
My passions keep flipping over time, each one growing out of the wounds left by the last. Here is what that cycle of burnout, doubt, and rebirth has taught me about staying in the game for the long run.
The Reputation Game
So what happens when agentic AI interacts with humans? Your Pokemon represents you, mine represents me, and the bigger one usually wins. Thus begins the reputation game: the measure of reputation is not your follower count, it is who opens your emails. Here is what you can do about it.
Bootstrapping: Essay
I’d dare to say that in every working environment, there is some “great lie.” That one thing they tell you to control you. My feeling is that, in the startup world, the great lie is ”get yourself funded.” Getting funding in itself is often treated as success in itself, and taken as a stamp of quality.
The Runway: How Much Fuel Do You Have?
Business development is a never-ending series of wins and losses, golden shots and crude mistakes, shiny peaks and dark valleys. I made many small mistakes along the way because I was simply green. It’s my first company, after all. However, today, I’d like to talk about one crude mistake that almost killed all my business ventures.
Follow the People or Follow the Money?
We all use heuristics in our professional lives as they help us offset the energy costs associated with decision-making and better navigate our complex world. While some heuristics might be productive, others prove to be a trap (for instance, mind a long list of human cognitive errors). I recently started contemplating one heuristic that always seemed a no-brainer for me: follow the people. Was is a good bet after all?
To Bootstrap or Not To Bootstrap? On The Unbeatable Power of Starting Small and Smart
Question: Is earning ten million dollars a success? Answer: it is, or it is not — depending on the structure of your company. In this article, I’d like to say a few words about why I chose bootstrapping as my business model and why I’d recommend considering this model for anyone who is building a SaaS or consulting / education business.
If You Are Going To San Francisco… My 25 Tips and Tricks on Networking in the City
Twenty-five hard-won lessons on networking in San Francisco: how to find the hubs, adjust to the tribe, net-weave at meetups, make yourself useful, protect your reputation, and play the long game. Plus a few brutal truths about extractors, void communities, and why the city rewards those who stay different.
How To Write Successful Applications For the Top Startup Accelerators? On the Example of Y Combinator
Admission to Y Combinator is a dream for thousands of SaaS founders, but the acceptance rate is under 2%. I analyzed 32 successful YC applications to find out what separates the founders who get in from those who don’t.
Business Verkeerd (Grow Slow)
In the Netherlands, coffee verkeerd means coffee the wrong way. Natalia shares the unorthodox personal rules behind how she runs her business, from rejecting fast growth to embracing emotional openness.
The Temple: How To Survive as a Consultant in the Bay Area?
I am soon departing for my next trip toward the Bay Area. Which is clearly not the most comfortable place to find yourself in as a consultant. For a long time, I wondered why this is so, and finally came to some (perhaps interesting) conclusions.
The Key To Success as a Solopreneur and Bootstrapper: How To Work With Subcontractors?
It is essential for any little bootstrapping business to get the best people for your project and keep them around. I believe that now after the corona crisis, project-based work with subcontractors will become much more common than before. And, I don’t hold my recipe for dealing with subcontractors a secret at all. In this article, I list my 10 golden rules working with subcontractors.
Startup Culture in Bay Area vs Startup Culture in Amsterdam
After weeks in the Bay Area, I compare its startup culture with Amsterdam’s: networking, project execution, wealth, behavior, personal branding, and overall business dynamics — 10 differences that surprised me.
At the Rainbow’s End: On the Phantom Boss
It’s been 5 years since my contract expired, yet I still feel weirdly anxious on Sundays, as if a phantom boss is watching me. On the 40-hour workweek, freelance guilt, and why DAOs might be the antidote.
My Personal Approach To Investing (As Of Today)
I recently had conversations with friends who couldn’t understand some of my investment decisions. So I decided to write down my current, rather unorthodox, personal investment strategy — covering people, skills, and even “random bullshit” as assets.
Good Money, Bad Money. How Many Types of Money Do We Have? Financial Education By My Dad
How many types of money do we have in the world? It is not a discussion about the right and the wrong currencies! It is all about value. I just had a conversation with my Dad, a professional chess player, about what money is and what it is not. His attitude is so much different than mine!
Building Personal Development Skills In the Shadow of The Imposter Syndrome
In the pandemic, I had way more than enough time to think about what I want from life and what kind of mission I would like to accomplish. The concept was baking in the back of my head for a long time. And here it is.
Fundamental Analysis in the Times of Digital Transformation
Do the principles of fundamental analysis as described by Benjamin Graham in his famous book, “The Intelligent Investor” still hold in the XXIst century?
How To Create a Business Development Strategy As a Person Who Never Competes
I have never competed for anything: not at school, not for a house, not in sports. So how does a person like that build a business? By starting with why, choosing new and different over better and bigger, and swimming in a blue ocean rather than a red one. Here is my non-competitive business development strategy.
On The Intrinsic Bitcoin Value
This week, I observed a lot of discussion on the media related to ecology, sustainability, and Bitcoin’s place in the picture. As a person who is now professionally involved in looking for value in people and projects, I would like to refer to the main arguments mentioned in the discussion and explain what I believe is the value of Bitcoin.
Pencils of the Digital Era
While most Millenials and Z-generation are obsessed with building influencial projects that change people’s lives, thousands of people out there become wealthy steadily and silently – by providing simple online services that solve little everyday problems.
5 “Best” Business Models in the World
Can you build an unflappable business model? A perpetuum mobile that always works, no matter what? Oh yes, you can. In this article, I list five such business models. Should you take an example from them? Well…
Poland Fights With COVID
There are lots of stereotypical opinions you can hear about Polish people world-wide. Hard-working, with a tendency to steal, yet traditional and religious. But one undeniable fact about Polish society is that it can be unbelievably creative and solidary — especially in times of crisis. And that shows especially clearly when you take a look at how Polish entrepreneurs deal with the lockdown.
Why You Should Never Buy Bitcoin
You might be watching Bitcoin price charts with interest or even with excitement. Perhaps, you already bought it. Or you are seriously considering it. Just wait a second.
How (Not) to Build a Business
I remember how once upon a time, I was impressed when someone was introducing themselves to me as a “serial entrepreneur.” Well, it’s not the case anymore — and let me tell you why.
Can You Marry Research With Entrepreneurship?
Living a double life between entrepreneurship and academic research is not easy. This blog post reviews the reasons why this is so, and ideas for how you might nevertheless succeed in balancing on the edge of the two worlds.
Things I Learned In Academia, For The Good And For The Bad
Today, I would like to list a few things that I learned while doing science for the last 8 years. Some of these habits are helpful and make my life much easier now, while other things actually make my life harder.
Aptitude Tests — What Went Wrong?
Almost every recruitment process for a large company these days, requires going through a battery of aptitude tests – especially in IT industry. IQ tests, emotional intelligence tests, personality tests, social skill tests. You will get tested inside and out. But there is one very crucial yet chronically overlooked factor of productivity which is typically not tested: the attention span.
How I Became a Business Developer
I always thought that the common beliefs that everything happens for a reason, and that eventually, you will start connecting the dots, is a pseudo-intellectual bullshit sold to the masses for big bucks by Tony Robbins and others alike. And now, I am starting to wonder.
What I Learned past Few Months…
…about entrepreneurship and entrepreneurs. In this time I was attending quite a few conferences in industry, I was informally involved in some projects, and I made many entrepreneurial friends. And, I was observing. As for a researcher who spent her whole youth solving integral equations, this is quite a new and exotic experience. I am on the learning curve now, in this fascinating new world. Hereby, I would like to list a few stereotypes I had about entrepreneurs, and how I feel about these stereotypes right now.
Born to Do It
One insight I remember from all the motivational books and movies I ever consumed is that, entrepreneurs always underscore how difficult it is to go against your relatives and friends when it comes to risking, investing and dropping day jobs on behalf of starting new ventures. In my case, family and friends react completely differently than in most cases I ever heard of – and it gives me goose bumps.
The Hall of Fame
Everything in the world follows some rules – the items move according to classical mechanics, and optimise some trajectory according to some cost function. Apples follow the gravity and fall down from the trees straight towards the ground, and the electric current flows from high towards low electric potential according to the shortest possible trajectory. People also construct their own cost functions, and adjust their behaviour according to the rules present in their environment.
The American Dream
A visit to California is an eye-opener. The Dutch job market could not be any more different from the American one. In the Netherlands, it is way easier to get funding when your project is eco-friendly, employee-friendly and has a societal impact. In Silicon Valley, the thinking is different — and after a week in Mountain View, I finally understand the idea behind the American dream.