
Don't crush it alone
By Irma Mesa
A seasonal podcast sharing the fundamentals of starting a business, freelancing, working in tech and more. Think of it as your personal handbook and guide all in podcast form. The podcast host is Irma Mesa (https://twitter.com/_justirma)

S2: The Founders Handbook: How 3 friends tested, branded, and launched a quirky and profitable soap business
Welcome back to Season 2 of the Don’t Crush It Alone podcast.
This season is all about founders! Take a listen to each episode to get advice, learn from different perspectives and ensure you have your bases covered as you begin to ideate on your startup idea or prepare to launch.
For our third guest of the season, we have Andrew Reiner. Andrew is the co-founder at Grapevine.ai, a voice-activated networking assistant that personalizes your relationships by remembering the details that matter.
Connect with The Mad Optimist: https://www.themadoptimist.com/
Follow us on Twitter, our website or Instagram.
34:53
April 05, 2020

S2: The Founders Handbook: Andrew talks to us all about bootstrapping and seeking funding for your startup
Welcome back to Season 2 of the Don’t Crush It Alone podcast.
This season is all about founders! Take a listen to each episode to get advice, learn from different perspectives and ensure you have your bases covered as you begin to ideate on your startup idea or prepare to launch.
For our third guest of the season, we have Andrew Reiner. Andrew is the co-founder at Grapevine.ai, a voice-activated networking assistant that personalizes your relationships by remembering the details that matter.
Connect with Andrew: https://grapevine.ai/
Follow us on Twitter, our website or Instagram.
33:28
January 24, 2020

S2: The Founders Handbook: Why validating your idea can make all the difference with Justin Potts (2/2)
Welcome back to Season 2 of the Don’t Crush It Alone podcast.
This season is all about founders! Take a listen to each episode to get advice, learn from different perspectives and ensure you have your bases covered as you begin to ideate on your startup idea or prepare to launch.
For our third guest of the season we have Justin Potts. Justin is the co-founder of Avenify, a smart networking tool
Connect with Justin
Avenify https://avenify.com/
Follow us on Twitter, our website or Instagram.
12:31
November 21, 2019

S2: The Founders Handbook: How a background in CS and Business helped Justin Potts launch a startup. (1/2)
Welcome back to Season 2 of the Don’t Crush It Alone podcast.
This season is all about founders! Take a listen to each episode to get advice, learn from different perspectives and ensure you have your bases covered as you begin to ideate on your startup idea or prepare to launch.
For our third guest of the season we have Justin Potts. Justin is the co-founder of Avenify, a platform helping students attend and earn their college degree debt-free through income share agreements.
Connect with Justin
Avenify https://avenify.com/
Follow us on Twitter, our website or Instagram.
12:04
November 19, 2019

S2: The Founders Handbook: What's a typical day like for a digital founder? with Masha (Part 5/5)
Welcome back to Season 2 of the Don’t Crush It Alone podcast.
This season is all about founders! Take a listen to each episode to get advice, learn from different perspectives and ensure you have your bases covered as you begin to ideate on your startup idea or prepare to launch.
On this first episode to kick off the season we have Masha a.k.a Coding Blonde. Masha is an entrepreneur and the founder of Coding Blonde, a brand that empowers women to break into tech.
Connect with Masha
Coding Blonde
Blog https://codingblonde.com/
YouTube https://www.youtube.com/codingblonde
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/codingblonde/
Influencer business https://mashazvereva.com/
This is just part 5 of 5 so keep listening and sign up below to get notified as we release more episodes from Masha and our future guests. Thanks for giving us a listen!
Sign up now
Follow us on Twitter, our website or Instagram.
06:00
October 07, 2019

S2: The Founders Handbook: Using blogging to grow an audience for your product or business with Masha (Part 4/5)
Welcome back to Season 2 of the Don’t Crush It Alone podcast.
This season is all about founders! Take a listen to each episode to get advice, learn from different perspectives and ensure you have your bases covered as you begin to ideate on your startup idea or prepare to launch.
On this first episode to kick off the season we have Masha a.k.a Coding Blonde. Masha is an entrepreneur and the founder of Coding Blonde, a brand that empowers women to break into tech.
Connect with Masha
Coding Blonde
Blog https://codingblonde.com/
YouTube https://www.youtube.com/codingblonde
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/codingblonde/
Influencer business https://mashazvereva.com/
This is just part 4 of 5 so keep listening and sign up below to get notified as we release more episodes from Masha and our future guests. Thanks for giving us a listen!
Follow us on Twitter, our website or Instagram.
05:21
September 30, 2019

S2: The Founders Handbook: How to close that deal with a client or investor with Jaap Vergote (Part 4/4)
Welcome back to Season 2 of the Don’t Crush It Alone podcast.
This season is all about founders! Take a listen to each episode to get advice, learn from different perspectives and ensure you have your bases covered as you begin to ideate on your startup idea or prepare to launch.
On this first episode to kick off the season we have Jaap Vergote. Jaap is the Executive Sales Manager at ViaBill and the founder previous co-founder of CAMPO.
Connect with Jaap
Via his website, here
This is just part 4 of 4 so keep listening and sign up below to get notified as we release more episodes from Jaap and our future guests. Thanks for giving us a listen!
Follow us on Twitter, our website or Instagram.
07:17
September 25, 2019

S2: The Founders Handbook: Discover your "why" before you start your product or business with Masha (Part 3/5)
Welcome back to Season 2 of the Don’t Crush It Alone podcast.
This season is all about founders! Take a listen to each episode to get advice, learn from different perspectives and ensure you have your bases covered as you begin to ideate on your startup idea or prepare to launch.
On this first episode to kick off the season we have Masha a.k.a Coding Blonde. Masha is an entrepreneur and the founder of Coding Blonde, a brand that empowers women to break into tech.
Connect with Masha
Coding Blonde
Blog https://codingblonde.com/
YouTube https://www.youtube.com/codingblonde
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/codingblonde/
Influencer business https://mashazvereva.com/
This is just part 3 of 5 so keep listening and sign up below to get notified as we release more episodes from Masha and our future guests. Thanks for giving us a listen!
Follow us on Twitter, our website or Instagram.
07:17
September 23, 2019

S2: The Founders Handbook: Do founders need to know how to code to launch a startup? with Jaap Vergote (Part 3/4)
Welcome back to Season 2 of the Don’t Crush It Alone podcast.
This season is all about founders! Take a listen to each episode to get advice, learn from different perspectives and ensure you have your bases covered as you begin to ideate on your startup idea or prepare to launch.
On this first episode to kick off the season we have Jaap Vergote. Jaap is the Executive Sales Manager at ViaBill and the founder previous co-founder of CAMPO.
Connect with Jaap
Via his website, here
This is just part 3 of 4 so keep listening and sign up below to get notified as we release more episodes from Jaap and our future guests. Thanks for giving us a listen!
Follow us on Twitter, our website or Instagram.
06:07
September 18, 2019

S2: The Founders Handbook: Meet Masha (Part 2/5)
Welcome back to Season 2 of the Don’t Crush It Alone podcast.
This season is all about founders! Take a listen to each episode to get advice, learn from different perspectives and ensure you have your bases covered as you begin to ideate on your startup idea or prepare to launch.
On this first episode to kick off the season we have Masha a.k.a Coding Blonde. Masha is an entrepreneur and the founder of Coding Blonde, a brand that empowers women to break into tech.
Connect with Masha
Coding Blonde
Blog https://codingblonde.com/
YouTube https://www.youtube.com/codingblonde
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/codingblonde/
Influencer business https://mashazvereva.com/
This is just part 2 of 5 so keep listening and sign up below to get notified as we release more episodes from Masha and our future guests. Thanks for giving us a listen!
Follow us on Twitter, our website or Instagram.
09:27
September 16, 2019

S2: The Founders Handbook: How you can hack social media to leverage your product or brand with Masha (Part 1/5)
Welcome back to Season 2 of the Don’t Crush It Alone podcast.
This season is all about founders! Take a listen to each episode to get advice, learn from different perspectives and ensure you have your bases covered as you begin to ideate on your startup idea or prepare to launch.
On this first episode to kick off the season we have Masha a.k.a Coding Blonde. Masha is an entrepreneur and the founder of Coding Blonde, a brand that empowers women to break into tech.
Connect with Masha
Coding Blonde
Blog https://codingblonde.com/
YouTube https://www.youtube.com/codingblonde
Instagram https://www.instagram.com/codingblonde/
Influencer business https://mashazvereva.com/
This is just part 1 of 5 so keep listening and sign up below to get notified as we release more episodes from Masha and our future guests. Thanks for giving us a listen!
Follow us on Twitter, our website or Instagram.
08:22
September 16, 2019

S2: The Founders Handbook: Meet Jaap Vergote (Part 2/4)
Welcome back to Season 2 of the Don’t Crush It Alone podcast.
This season is all about founders! Take a listen to each episode to get advice, learn from different perspectives and ensure you have your bases covered as you begin to ideate on your startup idea or prepare to launch.
On this first episode to kick off the season we have Jaap Vergote. Jaap is the Executive Sales Manager at ViaBill and the founder previous co-founder of CAMPO.
Connect with Jaap
Via his website, here
This is just part 2 of 4 so keep listening and sign up below to get notified as we release more episodes from Jaap and our future guests. Thanks for giving us a listen!
Follow us on Twitter, our website or Instagram.
04:27
September 12, 2019

S2: The Founders Handbook: Sell it before you make it with Jaap Vergote (Part 1/4)
Welcome back to Season 2 of the Don’t Crush It Alone podcast. We did go through a name change due to the direction the podcast was heading and now we have a way more fitting name.
This season is all about founders! Take a listen to each episode to get advice, learn from different perspectives and ensure you have your bases covered as you begin to ideate on your startup idea or prepare to launch.
On this first episode to kick off the season we have Jaap Vergote. Jaap is the Executive Sales Manager at ViaBill and the founder previous co-founder of CAMPO.
Connect with Jaap
Via his website, here
This is just part 1 of 4 so keep listening and sign up below to get notified as we release more episodes from Jaap and our future guests. Thanks for giving us a listen!
Follow us on Twitter, our website or Instagram.
16:42
September 12, 2019

3 Ways to Become a Better Product Manager in 2019
Our Guest
On episode 7 of Elevatd Life, we have Beau Blinder. I found Beau after his post on Medium titled "3 Practical Ways To Become A Better Product Manager" and we were able to have a really insightful conversation about those 3 core ways he talked about in his post and how he’s proactively started to build a strong system to include Engineers in customer conversations which leads to building better products.
Check out the full show notes here along with links mentioned in the recording! Please subscribe, rate and review this show! Thanks for listening.
Follow us on social media to stay active on latest episodes - Twitter, Instagram
26:07
June 29, 2019

The life of an IBM Watson Product Manager
Our Guest
On episode 6 of Elevatd Life, we have Zia Mohammad. Zia is a talented Product Manager at IBM working with the Watson Premium product.
Check out the full show notes here along with links mentioned in the recording!
Please subscribe, rate and review this show! Thanks for listening.
23:38
May 31, 2019

When Product Meets a Scientific Approach with Holly Hester-Reilly
Our Guest
On episode 5 of Elevatd Life, we have Holly Hester-Reilly. Holly is the Founder & CEO of H2R Product Science where she works with product leaders and teams to develop their product growth strategy.
View full show notes here.
28:07
April 05, 2019

Iteration is key with Brittany Cheng
Our Guest
On episode 4 of Elevatd Life, we have Brittany Cheng - Product Manager at Seesaw Learning (a platform for student engagement). Brittany grew up in the Bay area and has been surrounded by tech from childhood. She previously worked at Yelp focusing on the international product and search. She enjoys how Product Management allows her to connect the dots between people, data, ideas and users to solve challenges in the product.
Our Highlights
How growing up around strong role models affected breaking into tech
Building products that are user-centered
Thriving as a woman in tech
Observing users to learn and iterate on a living and breathing product
How regularly talking to users has a huge impact on the direction of a product
Find Brittany
Personal site http://brittanycheng.com/
Twitter https://twitter.com/bcheng42
Links for clicking
Seesaw Learning
Follow Elevatd Life
Official site elevatdlife.com
Twitter @elevatdlife
Instagram @elevatdlife
Please subscribe, rate and review this show.
23:18
March 29, 2019

Building the 'why' with Zack Naylor
Our Guest
On episode 3 of Elevatd Life, we have Zack Naylor CEO and co-founder of Aurelius Lab a platform for tracking user research insights. He's built a product-driven team from the ground up, comes from a heavy UX background is one of the first CEO's that I've met that consistently interacts with users.
Our Highlights
How Zack started in UX and then went on to starting his own business
Background on how Aurelius Lab got to where it is today after a few versions
Importance of staying focused on what customer problem needs to be solved
Showing empathy towards both your users and your team
Characteristics and skills Zack looks for when hiring PMs
Find Zack
Twitter https://twitter.com/zacknaylor
Aurelius Lab https://www.aureliuslab.com/
Links for clicking
Aurelius Lab, tool for tracking research insights and synthesizing data https://www.aureliuslab.com/
Follow Elevatd Life
Twitter @elevatdlife
Instagram @elevatdlife
30:37
November 05, 2018

Design thinking from a young age with Iiro Isotalo
Our Guest
On episode 2 of Elevatd Life, we have Iiro Isotalo the Director of Product Management at BetterDoctor, which was recently acquired by Quest Analytics.
Iiro has an interesting background in engineering, product design and product management. We chat about his transition from engineering to Product and touch on some important topics tooling, PM characteristics, his Product philosophy and much more. If you’re new to Product or trying to break in - this is definitely an episode for you.
Our Highlights
What is BetterDoctor? And what do they do?
At a very young age, Iiro's mother introduced the importance of keeping the end user in mind when designing and building products
Transitioning and building his skill in programming, design and product.
What Iiro looks for when hiring Product Managers for his team
Find Iiro
LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/iiroisotalo/
Links for clicking
Roadmapping tool, Productboard
Software tool, JIRA for tracking sprints and development work
Follow Elevatd Life
Twitter @elevatdlife
Instagram @elevatdlife
Please subscribe, rate and review this show.
18:32
September 24, 2018

When a rejection turns into a stunning career with Morgan Meredith
Our Guest
On episode 1 of Elevatd Life, we have Morgan Meredith a Senior Release Manager at Jellyvision! This episode really dives in to how careers can take many twists and turns but at the end of the day if you keep working at your craft and constantly apply yourself you can jump and right where you want to be.
Morgan went from studying hearing science and sound acoustics to working at Yello in Chicago, IL and now leading the Release Management team at Jellyvision. She gave awesome thoughts around overcoming imposter syndrome and building up her technical skills.
Our Highlights
How to go from a non-traditional major (Speech Acoustics) to becoming a Release Manager for a team of 2.
Ways to "zoom out" in a new role and find pain points you can work to solve, whether that's through new processes or clearer structure and expectations.
Where do you go after being a Release Manager? For Morgan, that's developing her programming skills to one day land in a Dev Manager role. It's all about initiative.
How 'imposter syndrome' is real pain in the tech industry and ways to overcome it.
Find Morgan
Blog https://www.morgan-made.com/
Twitter @mo_leigh
Links for clicking
Stephanie Hurlburt - find her online
Lara Hogan for posts on how to organize meetings - find her work online
Thoughts on becoming a self-taught engineer by Lexis Hanson - read here
Camille Fournier, The Manager’s Path - buy the book here
FlatIron School (if you’re interested in programming) - check them out here
FlatIron Scholarships to receive aid for tuition - read more here
AWS Learning: A cloud guru solution architect course - course here
Women in Tech chat - join here
Follow Elevatd Life
Twitter @elevatdlife
Instagram @elevatdlife
21:56
July 28, 2018