SaaStr

JULY 2, 2020

or bright line between CTO and VPE, I’d suggest a start-up CTO really only has to do a few things — which are very hard: Assemble a small team (3–9) of very good engineers. So … a “bad” CTO is one that can’t recruit a strong “pizza box” team. Finds a way to increase product velocity when inertia starts to drag you down.

Part-Time VPE

SaaStr

JANUARY 27, 2021

Especially the money part. “Give the VP of Sales More Time” This is always terrible advice. If a VP of Sales can’t improve things in one sales cycle or less — she never will. As CEO, you need to find a way. Find a way. “I don’t need a real VP of Marketing … Yet.”

Part-Time VPE

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 1, 2021

That you absolutely, positively, have to only hire “Rockstars” in your startups. A Rockstar engineer really is 10x better than the next tier. And yet … is it worth waiting 6-9 months to hire a VP that’s a true Rockstar, if you’ve struggled to make the hire? It’s true.

Sales Hiring

SaaStr

MAY 5, 2021

Did you hire a good enough VP? 4 part test: – who great did they hire in the first 60 days? – did they take part of the job off your plate? If they don't pass the 4 part test, they aren't good enough. Hiring your VPs as a founder is tough. – does the team believe?

Part-Time VPE

SaaStr

MARCH 7, 2021

I thought it would be worth drilling down deeper into each of them, and sharing the learnings and mistakes: 1/ Spending less time fixing things, more time recruiting senior folks to own them. No one spends enough time recruiting as it is, after $1m ARR or so. These are all full-time jobs by $1m ARR.

Part-Time VPE

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 11, 2021

Lately I’ve been working with 5+ SaaS companies all hiring their first VP of Product. That means often it’s not entirely clear who the first VP of Product should report to. A few general learnings: A VP of Product that Reports to CTO / Engineering Rarely Meets With That Many Customers.

Part-Time VPE

SaaStr

APRIL 7, 2021

And that means your initial leadership team often takes you faster, and further, than you might ever think. The first type is the kind of management team hired by second+ time founders. Often folks they convince to once again be a VP of Eng or VP of Sales. But most of us are first-time founders, or close to it.

Part-Time VPE

SaaStr

MARCH 24, 2021

But I think the biggest, #1, mistake successful first-time entrepreneurs in SaaS make time and time again these days is they micromanage too long. I think it’s a byproduct, in part, of the fact that founders are just so much better these days. Engineering. Go hire them. In every single function.

Part-Time VPE

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 10, 2021

And he made an observation to me that I’d been thinking about for a very long time, but didn’t know how to express. And for the most part, these were incredibly stressful times, when I was very underpaid, overworked, and worked to the bone. Not just being part of something great — but, Being Great.

Part-Time VPE

SaaStr

AUGUST 23, 2022

My general learnings: By 20-30 employees, you should have 1-2 good managers in place such that at least 50% of the company can run based only on weekly staff meetings, 1-on-1s, and “grab me when you need me-s” E.g., a great first VP of Sales that can just handle sales. You spend all your recruiting time just on VPs and above.

Part-Time VPE

SaaStr

AUGUST 13, 2024

1: Don’t hire a VP (or anyone in the early days) that you aren’t 95% sure is great. Founders between a million and $250M are talking about lowering the bar for hiring because they aren’t sure if the person is great or they’re trying to fill a gap. If you aren’t meeting that many, you aren’t taking hiring seriously.

Sales Hiring

SaaStr

SEPTEMBER 7, 2020

Goodness this is one of the toughest parts of scaling. I remember Aaron Levie, CEO of Box, and I discussed this at one of the SaaStr Annuals, when he lost his VP of Engineering. All I can tell you is this: First, if you hire great VPs, it partially takes care of itself. We’ve all lived it. I still live it myself!

Part-Time VPE

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 10, 2023

Dear SaaStr: What Were Your Toughest Times Before Breaking Out? My toughest times: COO pulling out after signed term sheet — VCs then pulled term sheet. This of course was my fault — I hired the “wrong” COO. Not closing the epic VP of Engineering I really needed. I tried 5 times, maybe 10.

Part-Time VPE

SaaStr

JUNE 11, 2019

And that’s really good when you’re scaling part of the team that looks like yourself. So if you’re an engineer and you need more engineers, having a network of engineers is an awesome thing. You don’t know where to find them. You guys are awesome. You don’t know how to interview them.

Merchant Services

SaaStr

FEBRUARY 12, 2021

Internships have sparked millions of successful careers, and they can be a valuable talent pool from which companies can eventually hire full-time employees. Interns are a pipeline for full-time talent. Your company could be one of them by hiring ambitious interns. Recruitment Tips.

Part-Time VPE

SaaStr

OCTOBER 12, 2020

SaaStr favorite Tomasz Tunguz of Redpoint Ventures was gracious enough to sit down with Nick Caldwell, former CPO of Looker and current VP of Engineering at Twitter. Nick has vast experience when it comes to B2B and B2C, which is why we asked them to share their best tips for growing product and engineering orgs from 0 to IPO.

Engineering

SaaStr

JULY 6, 2020

Just go find the VP you need. Go find the VP you really need. I got the VPs of Sales, Product and Marketing I needed. I got the VPs of Sales, Product and Marketing I needed. But I should have taken a pause and just found our true VP of Engineering. You can miss a quarter if need be.

Part-Time VPE

SaaStr

NOVEMBER 12, 2020

you don't know what to do: 1/ Spend more time w/existing customers. 2/ Hire 1 great VP. Those are good times indeed. But there will be times when almost all of just not only struggle … but are just sort of out of ideas. Spend more time with existing customers. Hire 1 great VP.

Part-Time VPE

Intercom, Inc.

MARCH 15, 2021

That was a shocker for me because I didn’t hear that language growing up and it wasn’t a part of my scope,” she says. As a leader, it’s critical that you make time to listen and learn from others.” Karen recounts an anecdote from when her children were younger and she was struggling to find that balance. “I

Part-Time VPE

Intercom, Inc.

OCTOBER 5, 2022

Even when you reach the perfect team dynamic – a new hire or budget cut can easily throw things off balance. Lara Hogan is an author, public speaker, and coach on management and leadership. If you’re short on time, here are a few quick takeaways: Make a plan for one-on-ones based on the person and the context. Lara: Absolutely.

Leadership

SaaStr

JUNE 23, 2019

And that’s really good when you’re scaling part of the team that looks like yourself. So if you’re an engineer and you need more engineers, having a network of engineers is an awesome thing. You don’t know where to find them. You guys are awesome. You don’t know how to interview them.

Merchant Services

SaaStr

OCTOBER 7, 2019

Though our second day of the event is focused on mythical creatures of all kinds, you’ll find that there are unicorns hiding in our agenda every day this year. Prior to Shopify, Jean-Michel was a VP of Engineering at Atlassian for four years and held several positions at IBM for six years. The Unicorns ??

Part-Time VPE

SaaStr

JUNE 25, 2019

But with it comes immense benefits and competitive advantages such as the diversification of ideas, speedier product development, and representation in important regions and time zones. We got a chance to celebrate our initial public offering on the New York stock exchange back in September, which was a really exciting time for me.

Engineering

BetterCloud

MAY 7, 2021

Lorinda Brandon’s celebrated career in engineering began in 1985 , when she worked as a technical writer. She quickly rose through the ranks and has held leadership roles at some of the world’s largest companies, including Dell EMC and Capital One. I’m a big fan of creating innovation time. Maybe you try a new technology.

Part-Time VPE

SaaStr

JULY 8, 2020

We’ll have some time. It sounds minor or technical, but if you want to due diligence on a human being, I get to do it a few 100 times a year. I used it in kind of my breakfast pre warm-up, the crazy times we’re in. From Satya from Homebrew, we just heard that seed’s at an all time high.

Investment

OpenView Labs

JUNE 23, 2021

It’s a great time to be a founder. Let’s qualify that statement: It’s a great time to be a founder of a revenue-generating, venture-funded company. These are optimistic times. A founder, on the other hand, has deep institutional knowledge, and many times only they know what they know.

Part-Time VPE

Outseta

MAY 8, 2020

I find that refreshing. Beyond just being smart, I’ve routinely come across people in tech that are tenacious, objective, and have high emotional intelligence—so much so that I often find myself thinking, “It’s too bad so many of these smart people are building email marketing software!”

Part-Time VPE

30 Day Leadership

MAY 10, 2022

1:56 - Where it all began - How did Arash land his first leadership position? 4:33 - Surviving tough times - What were the circumstances that pulled Arash through growing pains? 23:06 - Identifying entrepreneurial mindset - How does Arash identify these traits during a hiring process?

Part-Time VPE

30 Day Leadership

MAY 10, 2022

Arash Tadayon, VP of Engineering at Trainual, and I had an interesting conversation about this topic in this week’s episode of the B2B Leadership Podcast…. Find out how Arash has used curiosity to fuel his entrepreneurial and leadership career. Learn more about your own leadership style at: [link].

Part-Time VPE

30 Day Leadership

NOVEMBER 30, 2021

In this episode of the B2B Leadership podcast, best-selling author and leadership coach Nils Vinje speaks with Matt Falk, VP of engineering at Orbital Insight. 4:54 - First leadership position - Matt shares the story of what put him on the path to leadership.

Part-Time VPE

30 Day Leadership

NOVEMBER 30, 2021

In this episode of the B2B Leadership podcast, best-selling author and leadership coach Nils Vinje speaks with Matt Falk, VP of engineering at Orbital Insight. 4:54 - First leadership position - Matt shares the story of what put him on the path to leadership. Learn more about Orbital Insight at [link].

Part-Time VPE

OnStartups

OCTOBER 4, 2017

Today the State of Remote Work 2017 report revealed that 63% of people in product and engineering roles work remotely at least once per week, which is 21% more than the average. When breaking down remote work by company size, the report found that smaller companies are 2X more likely to hire remote workers than larger companies.

Part-Time VPE

OnStartups

OCTOBER 4, 2017

Today the State of Remote Work 2017 report revealed that 63% of people in product and engineering roles work remotely at least once per week, which is 21% more than the average. When breaking down remote work by company size, the report found that smaller companies are 2X more likely to hire remote workers than larger companies.

Part-Time VPE

ChurnZero

NOVEMBER 24, 2020

Because leadership doesn’t value our contribution, or all the behind-the-scenes work that goes into keeping our customers happy – especially when dealing with problems like product bugs or bad-fit customers that were never our fault to begin with; we can’t control the cards we’re dealt. OK, ready for some tough love? Ineffective managing up.

Customer Success

BetterCloud

MAY 17, 2021

I’ve seen what the impact of having good leadership and management can have on me, but also what bad leadership can have on me emotionally, mentally, and my ability to build generational wealth for my family. ” That was the catalyst for me to think about leadership and management. That’s great. Yeah, totally.

New CTO

Frontegg

FEBRUARY 1, 2023

Tanya Reilly, Principal Software Engineer @ Squarespace, Joy Ebertz, Principal Software Engineer @ Split.io, Izar Tarandach, Senior Staff Engineer @ Datadog, and Mike McQuaid, Principal Engineer @ GitHub will be talking about modern strategies that you must consider in 2023.

VP of Engineering

Intercom, Inc.

AUGUST 15, 2018

On day one as Reddit’s new VP of Engineering, Nick Caldwell faced a dilemma. He had just spent 13 years at Microsoft, most recently as the head of 300 engineers. At Reddit, he led a team of 35 – none of whom knew how to manage other engineers. Short on time? Nick Caldwell: I’m VP of engineering at Reddit.

Leadership