Splinter Business Stories
By Anita A.
Splinter Business Stories is about you, the millennial tech community. Here you will find real-life business cases, practical pieces of advice and fun facts about your daily office routine which will blow your mind. Everyone is welcome and everyone is accepted.
Your A,
Bisou bisou XO
Splinter Business StoriesDec 10, 2019
What was first, product or marketing? A post-corona conversation with Ish Verduzco
The guest of today's episode of Splinter Business Stories is Ish Verduzco: Diversity lead, DJ, author and awesome tech marketer
Your fellow IT comrade does her best in bringing resourceful and insightful, smart, and exceptional guests to this podcast. I am happy to share today's episode with a great fellow tech marketer, and a person who has is all done in his way! And he knows how to get you back on track if there's are things which do not work out as expected. Today's episode is a great journey, full of interesting findings.
In this episode:
- Corona hustles and bustles
- Marketing and DJing, what is common?
- Spotify party
- Shame, shame, shame
- Diversity and Inclusion
- Chicken-egg question and the journey to the philosophical realization of the equal importance of marketing and product.
- Sales vs Marketing
- How to get things Ish done?
- More on books and people who write them
- We are the Uber of ... - and other ways to ruin your first impression
- One more failure story to add to our collection
***
Special thanks to Ish Verduzco for coming to this show and sharing his perspective on marketing, diversity, and life.
Check out Ish Verduzco book "How Successful People Get Ish Done" https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08B33T3S5?ref_=pe_3052080_397514860
Get to know Ish by visiting his LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/ishverduzco/
If your startup builds a product, Cadoret is ready to support you with full-cycle marketing and branding: starting from strategy and visuals, and ending with pitching and public speaking boot camp.
Visit https://www.cadoret.io/ for more information.
Have a story? Feel free to add me on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/alkhimovichanita/
Bisou Bisou
Yours,
A.
Start-Up 101 with Greg Shepard: From idea to business exit
This is the second Episode of Splinter Business Stories with angel investor and entrepreneur Greg Shepard.
Probably this is the most insightful conversation in the entire show. If you always wanted to realize your idea, plan investment, and learn about the "backstage" of start-ups and finance, you are at the right place here and now.
Together with Greg, we follow a typical start-up journey, following all the hustles and bustles, bumps and falls, we pass through the main Start-up problems, we talk about failing stages and ways to overcome them. We discuss when it worth retaining your business and when it's better to exit and think about something new, we discuss some tricks to hook investors and reveal the places to look for investors.
In this episode:
- Start-Up fails. Statistics or continuous process misunderstanding?
- North Star
- Starting with the end in mind: how to plan your business exit properly
- Start-Up destiny: acquisition or lifestyle company?
- Investment lesson #1: Plan on paying back
- IPO: yesterday, today and tomorrow
- Private Equity World: Lessons, changes and current situation
- Investment betting strategy: horse or jockey?
- When partnership becomes an acquisition
- Hook and Barb: how to make sure you will get acquired?
- Angel Investor or Venture Firm: dilemma or obvious choice?
- Where does smart money live?
***
Special thanks to Greg Shepard for coming to this show for the second time and sharing the practical knowledge. It's always a pleasure to meet a real ace who knows his craft and who is not afraid of sharing his knowledge.
For the investment, partnership and event booking, please visit: https://www.gregoryshepard.com/
If your start-up builds a product, Cadoret is ready to support you with full-cycle marketing and branding: starting from strategy and visuals, and ending with pitching and public speaking boot camp.
Visit https://www.cadoret.io/ for more information.
Have a story? Feel free to add me on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/alkhimovichanita/
Bisou Bisou
Yours,
A.
A big conversation with angel investor Greg Shepard: How to quit businesses, survive the crisis, and follow your principles
The guest of today's episode of Splinter Business Stories is Greg Shepard, entrepreneur, author, and angel investor. His investment firm, BOSS Capital Partners, helps startups on their seed stage.
Today's episode is a profound, funny, and insightful conversation with a person who had multiple businesses and who has seen many companies rise and fall. We did our best to cover numerous areas of interest: from business habits to working approach, from dramatic to funny fails, from business execution to mentorship. In this episode, you will find some practical tips on building your product, seeking an investment, and using the right principles when choosing your future team.
Your fellow IT comrade does her best in bringing resourceful and insightful, smart, and exceptional guests to this podcast, today's episode has a special place in Splinter Business Stories show. This episode is full of useful information and the right messages; it also clearly shows that it's possible to achieve a lot while staying approachable and open-minded.
In this episode:
- The image of a modern Angle Investor
- Quitting businesses: necessity or wish?
- Middle Management: business driving force or ultimate stopper
- Experts vs. Fresh Blood: the principles of building a "dream team."
- Punctuality and its importance
- Seeking investment: two types of young (and not that young) start-uppers
- Investment and Relationship: The story of raising 1M within 1 hour
- Believing your own bulls*it and how it opens all the doors
- Consistent Persistency in business, sport, yoga, and personality
- Is a good entrepreneur a good speaker?
- Steve Jobs and Elon Musk: what's common? A tale about different approaches to public speaking
- Why sometimes not getting investment is more valuable than getting it?
- How to remove a video from the internet: the story of one speaking event
- Staying alive: how to survive a crisis 101 ( and reflecting on past crisis experiences)
- Founders: visionaries and executors and why it's important to have both
- Education and adrenaline: does degree matter
- Mentorship lessons and "magical kick."
- Delegating and criticizing: how to motivate and stay sane
- Greg Shepard's new book and what it takes to write it all down
- How to find an investor for your business? Coordinates, websites, and intelligence you need!
***
Special thanks to Greg Shepard for coming to this show and sharing his stories, his tips, and his thoughts, it's always a pleasure to meet a real ace who knows his craft and who is not afraid of sharing his knowledge.
For the investment, partnership and event booking, please visit: https://www.gregoryshepard.com/
If your startup builds a product, Cadoret is ready to support you with full-cycle marketing and branding: starting from strategy and visuals, and ending with pitching and public speaking boot camp.
Visit https://www.cadoret.io/ for more information.
Have a story? Feel free to add me on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/alkhimovichanita/
Bisou Bisou
Yours,
A.
For the sake of bygone days: Office tales
In this Episode of Splinter Business Stories, your fellow IT comrade talks about hustles and bustles of working from home. No worries, you can find useful tips for remote employees in your LinkedIn feeds, I am not going to give you this information because:
a. It's boring
b. you perfectly know how to work from home ;) and if you don't, you'll learn.
In this episode, I gathered some funny office stories to brighten your day and distract you from the outside news. In this episode:
- Office underwear, the story of a very inattentive person
- Dos and Donts of 1B+ negotiations
- The email that makes you believe in humanity
I hope you all are safe and healthy. I truly believe we can overcome this crisis together and come back to normal life as stronger people, professionals, and employees ( and maybe entrepreneurs!)
Always yours,
A.
Bisou Bisou
Epic Job Interview Stories You Will Not Believe
In this episode of Splinter Business Stories, I tell you the job interview stories of my friends and LinkedIn connections who were generous enough to share their experiences.
A job interview is never a usual routine, it’s always a nerve breaking process of gathering all the possible achievements you ever had in one successful image of yourself, and this can be tough. So. The stories I received were so epic that at first, I could not believe they could actually happen in reality but knowing how life turns sometimes, I was not surprised at all!
In this Episode:
- A nervous chap who tried to find the entrance to Narnia
- "Chinese present" from the office "Pale King"
- Blame is on Stars
- Bloody chair and the price of first impressions
- Snazzy suit and sleepy leg
I enjoyed working on this episode! I hope to receive more stories about your epic fails, as usual, my LI DM is always open for new collaborations and your experiences, I'll be glad to connect!
LI: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alkhimovichanita/
Email: anita@cadoret.io
The Tale of the "Boys' Club"
Hello-hello from your fellow IT comrade who had quite a winter: flu, cold, bronchitis, winter melancholy...I am finally back with a new episode.
In this episode of Splinter Business Stories, I talk about the "Boys' Club" and the reasons we do not see enough females among key decision-makers, managers, and stakeholders. This is my personal manifesto to all the female professionals who are paving ways to success, and to those who are just starting careers.
In this episode:
- The Story of N and her hustles and bustles of being an office "girl"
- Different experiences matter. Self-perception matters even more.
- Small talk on the importance of mentorship
- Post-feminism vs feminism vs reality
- Message for leaders and decision-makers
This was a very emotional podcast of mine. Just something personal to share. Some experience. Because that is who we are. We all are people. Males, females, we face so much crap in our lives that sometimes it's astonishing: how do we manage to keep up with everything?
And no matter how much we doubt, we still do what we are supposed to. We deliver. We make things work. We solve. We resolve. We become examples. We fail and become bad examples! And we live. Once I have heard that a person lives as long as his or her name is remembered. It's not about leaving a trace. It's about creating memories. So let's make this world suitable for everyone's memories and achievements; otherwise, someday, this world will be an empty cold cave with a sad name "Boys Club."
Automation: the end of our careers or new beginning? A big conversation with automation expert Danilo McGarry
What do we know about automation? It's efficient. It helps in accomplishing goals faster and with fewer resources. And we know for sure that deep inside, we are all a bit afraid that automation of the workflow will take away our jobs and kill ambitions of career growth.
We might be against it. We might support the implementation of automation in the work processes. Still, we all agree, automation is real, and whether we want it or not, it will become the driving force of the businesses in the next decade.
Today I have a guest. He is a man of many roles, but all are related to one ubiquitous field: automation. Danilo McGarry will be our guide to the world of automation, will share some exciting stories on automation fails and will share his perspective on why often automation fails.
DISCLAIMER: It's a long one! Enjoy 1 hour of our great conversation. We wanted to make sure we cover the topic thoroughly and share some insights about the future of automation.
In this episode, we talked about:
1. Epic automation failures: why expressing concerns when you can go on strike ;)
2. People and Automation and Perception of Automation by different generations
3. Boomers vs. Millennials, who will win when automation comes
4. Who makes decisions (SPOILER: decision-makers :P )
5. We will answer the question of the decade: Will I lose my job? ( your girl will live in harmony with any automated machines, they do not have her charm, but how about other less fortunate IT folks?)
6. Andrew Yang and his approach towards automation and how he explains automation to his supporters
7. Mr. Trump and his Twitter. Can automation help? ( Can anything help at all?!)
8. Teachers and teaching. Best and worst school experiences during pre-automation times ( Sharing some of the most radical school stories)
9. What makes a great leader? What is more important, asking questions, or knowing the answers?
10. Staying alive at the workforce: what professions cant be replaced by automation? ( SPOILER ALERT: if you are not managing anyone or anything...you better start doing it! )
For more information on automation, automation strategies and AI implementation to the workflow, please reach out to Danilo McGarry on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/in/danilomcgarry/ and visit his website https://www.danilomcgarry.com/ to learn more about his work
For full-cycle marketing services and podcast inquiries feel free to reach out to the host, Anita A: anita@cadoret.io or message me directly on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alkhimovichanita/
What happens when you get the most epic client of your life and other IT tales of 2019
Hello and welcome. This is the first episode of 2020 and the last episode talking about 2019. We have entered a new decade and I wanted to dedicate this episode to some interesting facts and stories that happened to me back in 2019.
It was a fruitful year, full of ups and downs. I have started many new projects including Splinter Business Stories Podcast. Its been a couple of months but I definitely have fun preparing stories for you and having this open discussion with everyone and anyone.
One of my good friends said that there is a "grace period" for saying Happy New Year and this is my chance to wish you all the best for 2020. May this year bring new challenges, new prospects, and new great experiences.
In this Episode:
Lesson 1: You really can handle more than one job.
Lesson 2: Burnout is real
Lesson 3: Sometimes they come back. But for good or bad?
Lesson 4: Always trust your guts!
Lesson 5: Always take 100%Payment in Advance
Lesson 6: Confidence opens all the doors and saves your burning butt
Lesson 7: Always deliver
Lesson 8: Make a choice which is better for you
Lesson 9: Stay honest
Lesson 10: Stay healthy
In 2020 I want to wish you all health. No matter how great your plans are. If you have a severe cold, you won't be able to accomplish anything until you recover. Sometimes small details such as the sore throat or a cough can jeopardize the lifetime opportunity. I am not even talking about serious diseases many people struggle with every day.
I want you to stay healthy. I want you to be obsessed with your ideas. I want you to have a dream of your own. I want you to try a new dish and discover a new country. I want you to fall in love, it might be the worst or the best thing that happened to in your life, I want you to fall in love again if you already have your significant one, I want you to speak up when you see injustice happening, I want you to find and return somebody’s phone, and see this sparkle of hope in their eyes, I want you to stay honest with yourselves. Don't do something you don't want or don't like. Don't meet people whom you can't stand, don't waste time reading a boring book.
Start learning a new language...But as one my old old old Turkish friend said once, you can't learn English without knowing the taste of a tongue of a lovely English girl...Soo be open for adventures!
Happy New Year. Merry Christmas if you celebrate it on 7th and oh Happy Happy Old New Year!
Remote employee tales
In this episode, I uncover some of the most contradictory working approaches existing at the moment. Remote vs onsite. What is better for productivity and business efficiency, especially when it comes to tech? Even though there are so many contradictions and endless discussions, the remote is slowly becoming a new standard of work. Whether you like it or not, people need the flexibility of working from where they feel comfortable. In this episode you will hear about:
- A stereotypical employee working from home
- Commuting as a new way of getting stuck in life
- Remote employee self-reflexion
- A story about Florida Larry and his DC colleagues
- What do you sell to your company? Your body or brain?
- The right people or the army of white collars?
- The company which does not have any office doorbusters
- Why remote is great for everyone?
Bisou-bisou
Anita A.
Meetings in Tech: Time-consuming Nightmares or Productivity Boosters?
This episode is fully dedicated to the meetings. The inevitable part of our working life which eats hours of our time and sometimes gets on our nerves. Why do people like to attend meetings? For some, it’s a perfect opportunity to train their bullshitting skills and make their empty talks perfect. For others, it’s a great way of spending a couple of hours hibernating and entering dead brain mode. Currently, the entire meeting concept has been weakened by Millenials. So what types of meetings are there? How to stay productive at the meetings? How to make sure a meeting is necessary? In today's episode, we are talking about everything: from crazy Breakfast Meetings (Job Interviews) to Innovation Meetings which Elon Musk doesn't dare to dream of!
In today's episode:
- Breakfast Interview as another way of torturing professionals
- Back to sheep or Welcome to Quebec
- Status Update/Stand-up Meetings and where to find the truth
- Information Sharing Meetings as the most boring type of meetings in our life
- Decision-Making Meetings (as if they exist)
- Problem Solving Meetings and why Slacking is better
- Innovation Meetings as the ultimate goal of Elon Musk
- Team building Meetings or "What animal are you?"
Stay tuned for the next episodes and have a wonderful Holiday Season!
Bisou Bisou
Anita A.
The dream of Everyone in Tech
The first episode of Splinter Business Stories reveals the dream of everyone in tech: founding a start-up and dominating the world of tech with the next mind-blowing idea.
In this episode you will hear:
- Why no one talks about business fails
- What is Hotwash meeting and why your brain will get grilled at the end of the working day
- What is the biggest craving of the guy across the table
- What is the biggest tech community dream multiplied by years in a consulting company
- Why 28 years is scary enough to become someone's nightmare
- How to waste a year of your life
- And how to stop comparing yourself with others.
- You will also hear what to do if you feel you are ready for a big step in your tech career: Startup
And of course, you will hear a great Bisou Bisou by faithfully yours A ;)