Engineering

Hiring a VP of Engineering? Use This Framework from Shopify’s VPE to Get it Right

Starting Up

Counterintuitive Lessons on How to Get Better as You Scale, From Twilio’s Jeff Lawson

13 years after Twilio first launched, CEO and co-founder Jeff Lawson opens up about the peaks and valleys to share a set of unconventional company building lessons on how to get better as you scale — from introducing new products and refining go-to-market strategies, to focusing annual planning and making post-mortems more effective.

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Sales

Between Sales and Product: Building Out Self-Serve and Customer Experience at Notion & Dropbox

Pursuing product-led growth? Tactical self-serve lessons from Notion & Dropbox

People & Culture

3 Rules for Building a More Caring Culture — This Chief People Officer Shares Lessons from Lambda School & InVision

Drawing on lessons from Lambda School and InVision, Mark Frein shares the essential elements of a more caring people function.

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The 30 Best Pieces of Advice for Entrepreneurs in 2020

Build Products With This Lightweight JTBD Framework

6 Counterintuitive Rules for Being a Better Manager — Advice from Lambda School, Quip & Facebook

The 40 Best Questions to Ask in an Interview — How to Go Deeper Than “What’s the Culture Like?”

Drive Growth by Picking the Right Lane — A Customer Acquisition Playbook for Consumer Startups

A Founder's Guide to Writing Well

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People & Culture

40 Favorite Interview Questions from Some of the Sharpest Folks We Know

Given the high-stakes nature of every hire, interviewing chops are always in need of sharpening. We’ve spent the past few months reaching out to some of the most thoughtful company builders in our network to pose a simple question: What’s your favorite interview question to ask and why? Here are their answers.

Product

How Superhuman Built an Engine to Find Product/Market Fit

Superhuman founder and CEO Rahul Vohra walks us through the framework his startup used to make product/market fit more actionable, detailing the survey and four-step process that were key to measuring and optimizing it.

People & Culture

How to Become Insanely Well-Connected

Chris Fralic is a world-class super-connector. Here's how the long-time First Round Partner has methodically built bonds spanning years and careers.

Management

Radical Candor — The Surprising Secret to Being a Good Boss

Kim Scott cut her teeth as a manager at Apple and Google, and now helps create great leaders as an author and coach for companies like Twitter. Here's the secret that's made all the difference for her.

Management

‘Give Away Your Legos’ and Other Commandments for Scaling Startups

Molly Graham helped forge a work culture at Facebook that's withstood huge amounts of growth. Today, she's something of a rapid scaling expert. Here's the key to doing it right, she says.

Management

This 90-Day Plan Turns Engineers into Remarkable Managers

Twitter's former Director of Engineering shares the plan he uses to transform engineers into successful and happy managers.

Management

Speed as a Habit

All things being equal, speed will determine whether your company succeeds or not. Here's how to make it core to your culture.

Product

From 0 to $1B - Slack's Founder Shares Their Epic Launch Strategy

“HELL YEAH WE'RE USING @SlackHQ AT WORK I. LOVE. SLACK.”

People & Culture

Joining a Startup for the First Time? 30 Actionable Tips From Folks Who've Been There

Top startup leaders and operators share their best tips for new startup employees, including hitting the ground running, how to prioritize what to work on, and growing your career.

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Engineering

The Engineering Leader’s Guide to Crafting a Personal Brand that Stands Out From the Crowd

Engineering leader Anjuan Simmons unpacks his tips for folks looking to get into public speaking and personal branding.

Photo of Meka Asonye seated with arms crossed against a yellow backdrop

Sales

This GTM-Leader-Turned-Investor Crowdsources Early Lessons From Stripe, Figma & More

First Round's new partner Meka Asonye crowdsources GTM lessons from early leaders at Stripe, Plaid, Figma and other top startups.

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Management

Focus on Your First 10 Systems, Not Just Your First 10 Hires — This Chief of Staff Shares His Playbook

This Chief of Staff shares his playbook for treating your company like a product.

Management

Making Self-Care Tactical — Why You Should Focus on Boundaries, Not Just Bubble Baths

A detailed guide full of practical advice to take on deeper self-care work.

Management

Following “Radical Candor,” Kim Scott is Back with Another Incredible Framework for “Just Work”

Management expert Kim Scott is back with a sequel to "Radical Candor." We summarize five critical lessons from "Just Work."

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If you're thinking about starting a company:

Advice for pressure-testing ideas, finding a co-founder, and all you need to know before taking the founder's leap.

Management

This Founder Built Startups in 2008, 2016 and 2018. Here’s What He’s Learned About Resiliency

Bob Moore's first brush with life as a founder started in 2008—three days before Lehman Brothers collapsed. Since he cut his teeth as a first-time founder in turbulent times, he's gone on to build two other companies. Here, Moore shares the lessons he's learned along the way, from weathering bear markets and losing out to the competition, to finding (and falling out of) product/market fit.

Starting Up

The Founder Dating Playbook – Here’s the Process I Used to Find My Co-Founder

Gloria Lin opens up about her pre-founder journey, from founder dating and early conversations to how she prototyped with potential partners to narrow in on a specific idea. Her playbook is one of the most detailed and intentional processes we’ve ever seen — and the set of 50 questions she used to probe compatibility is an essential tool for any entrepreneur looking to team up on a startup idea.

Management

Navigating the Leap from Big Tech to Startups — Advice from a Former Google and Flipkart Exec

Punit Soni cut his teeth as a product leader at large companies such Google, Motorola and Flipkart before venturing out on his own to found Suki, a healthcare startup. Here, he shares his observations on the differences between the two experiences, noting what surprised him, what he felt unprepared for, and what aspiring entrepreneurs should consider as they look to make a similar leap from big to small.

Starting Up

Future Founders, Here’s How to Spot and Build in Nonobvious Markets

Nonobvious markets can lead to hypergrowth, but they’re hard to spot in the moment. Leaning on his experience as a seasoned investor and operator, Elad Gil shares four principles to help uncover the three types of opportunities that others are overlooking.

Management

Here's the Advice I Give All of Our First Time Founders

According to First Round Partner Rob Hayes, there are only three things new founders need to focus on to succeed.

Starting Up

90% of Feedback is Crap: How to Find the Next Big Startup Idea

Flatiron Health Co-founder Nat Turner on the process he uses to distill, pitch and iterate on new ideas.

Management

From Exec Roles to Board Seats — Lessons for the Startup C-Suite from Zendesk, Guru, eBay, & More

Anne Raimondi has led teams at SurveyMonkey, Zendesk, Guru, and eBay, in addition to sitting on the board for Asana, Patreon and Gusto. Here, she shares her most critical leadership lessons for scaling up as an executive, while also diving into her playbook for building impactful boards.

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Management

How to Build an Invention Machine — 6 Lessons That Powered Amazon’s Success

Former Amazon execs Colin Bryar and Bill Carr helped build the "invention machine" that enabled the company to successfully launch everything from AWS to the Kindle. Here, they share granular advice and concrete takeaways for startups looking to alter their own trajectories.

Engineering

How to Build a Culture of Ownership, and Other Engineering Leadership Tips from Plaid & Dropbox

Plaid's Head of Engineering Jean-Denis Grèze unpacks the 5 biggest challenges engineering leaders face.

Product

Unpacking 5 of Atlassian’s Most Unconventional Company-Building Moves

After a long run as the President of Atlassian, Jay Simons details all the non-consensus moves in the company's story.

Management

The 30 Best Pieces of Advice for Entrepreneurs in 2020

Tackle whatever's to come in this new year with the best startup advice we heard in 2020.

Starting Up

Fresh Off IPO, Upstart’s CEO Shares Why the Startup Isn’t a Typical Success Story

Dave Girouard sketches out the story of how Upstart got built, detailing the bumpy starts, lucky breaks and lessons learned along the journey to IPO.

Management

A Tactical Guide to Managing Up: 30 Tips from the Smartest People We Know

Top startup leaders share their best tips for managing up, including communication tactics, building trust, and goal setting with your manager.

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Management

How This 5X Founder Creates an Internal Culture With a “Crazy Focus” on Storytelling

As David Cancel puts it, they are “obsessed with story internally” at Drift. From the inspiration they’ve taken from the screenplay writing world, to how storytelling training is part of their onboarding, we dig deep into how he created this culture as the CEO.

Design

The Case for Adding DesignOps to Your Org Chart — Lessons From InVision

A detailed guide from a design operations pro for how DesignOps can bring the joy back into design for startups.

Starting Up

The First-Time Founder’s Guide to Learning Everything the Hard Way

Steve El-Hage picks his head up and shares his biggest lessons as a first-time founder from the 8-year, heads-down journey of building Drop.

Product

Build Products That Solve Real Problems With This Lightweight JTBD Framework

An inside look at the streamlined jobs-to-be-done framework (and templates) used by product leaders at Instagram & Facebook.

Product

Finding Startup Ideas and Building in Heavily-Regulated Spaces — Lessons from Cash App & Carbon Health

The best way to pick startup ideas and advice from Cash App & Carbon Health for heavily regulated industries.