Capitalism, online business, startups, money and my struggles as an Internet entrepreneur. No, I don’t really own a briefcase.
Capitalism, online business, startups, money and my struggles as an Internet entrepreneur. No, I don’t really own a briefcase.
Today is Friday so it’s time for my weekly review and personal development time. I spent it watching some videos from SaaStr YouTube Channel and I found a video by Jason Cohen, the founder of WP Engine where he talked about his journey to $100M. The last part of the video was particularly interesting as he talked about how to find out if you and everyone on your team are working on the right thing. It’s the intersection of JOY, SKILL and NEED of the company and it looks like this:
Before the Elon Musk took over Twitter I held him in pretty high esteem. After all he’s the guy who re-invented car with Tesla and made all the carmakers change the way they operate and forced them to go electric! He’s also the guy who, with SpaceX, made rockets 🚀 go to space and back, and then again! However, now his true colors are shining through as I can see how in less than a month he destroyed a social media company I really like - Twitter - and now I don’t look up to Elon anymore. What he’s doing is really bad! Below are my thoughts (and below that a video by my buddy Rene Ritchie):
Seriously. Just STOP 🛑. Work on day-to-day stuff from Monday to Thursday and on Friday make it a #MightyFriday (formerly known as TGIF). You need this Friday as a space to think, plan, review and focus on yourself. Your own personal development. Just follow these 3 steps:
The day has come. Twitter is now being owned by it’s most prominent shitposter - Elon Musk. He sealed the deal yesterday and as per reports, he fired Twittter’s top executives. OK, I get it, he wants to make changes. However, what’s with all this escorting executives by security stunt? Why do that? For show? To humiliate someone? Aren’t we supposed to treat people we work with as adults? It’s not like these people were criminals. Up until yesterday they were running the thing!
There’s a management technique “old-school office managers” use which is called “management by walking around”. As a “#NoOffice company” I cannot do that, but what I can do and what I recommend you to start doing is this: “meeting by walking around”. Basically, when you’re having a meeting, go out for a walk and have it while walking around:
When the war in Ukraine hit I was shocked and sad. As Russian attacks continued I took a stand personally and as Nozbe and stopped all our business with Russia. I couldn’t with clear conscience continue doing “business as usual” when Russian/Putin regime is killing my Ukrainian sisters and brothers. Yale University is actively updating a comprehensive list of businesses that left Russia where we are also featured. However, this list also shows businesses that seem to not care that they’re supporting a terrorist regime of Putin. Here are the ones that stand out for me personally:
As we celebrated 15 years of Nozbe we made a big announcement that our latest product that we launched less than 2 years ago, became the new Nozbe. In the same time we explained that our Nozbe Personal users are taken care of, and we’ve got options for them. Apart from the birthday announcement, we also improved the “Compare” page that explains the differences between both apps in detail and I recorded a special video for this: More info ℹ️ at nozbe.com/compare
As I’m pondering more on the Basecamp saga, I see that despite me paying so much attention to all of their advice of running a business all these years, there’s one very important thing I did differently. As far as I understand, at Basecamp both David and Jason make all the important decisions. At Nozbe I don’t make these decisions alone - we have a “Braintrust”, or actually two of them. Let me explain:
Recently there was quite a controversy around the tech company Basecamp. Their CEO announced a new policy forbidding employees talk politics and societal issues in the company. As a result 30% of their workforce left. In this post I’ll unpack why this wasn’t really just about politics. Why it was a much bigger deal than it sounds. And ultimately why I took it very personally and this whole situation makes me really sad and disappointed in them.
Pricing is an art. It’s not just slapping a number on a service or product. Pricing conveys what the product stands for. It shows the positioning and the value of what you’re offering and conveys the kind of relationship you want to build with your customers. Here’s me explaining in detail the pricing of Nozbe Teams and why we believe that our prices must be: Affordable, Predictable and Transparent.