In Depth
Welcome to In Depth, a new podcast from First Round Review that’s dedicated to surfacing the tactical advice founders and startup leaders need to grow their teams, their companies and themselves. Hosted by Brett Berson, a partner at First Round, In Depth will cover a lot of ground and a wide range of topics, from hiring executives and becoming a better manager, to the importance of storytelling inside of your organization. But every interview will hit the level of tactical depth where the very best advice is found. We hope you’ll join us. Subscribe to “In Depth” now and learn more at firstround.com
51
How Vanta’s founder bet big on startup security...
Christina Cacioppo is the co-founder and CEO of Vanta. She pulls back the curtain on some of the security company’s more unconventional moves on the path to product-market fit, like waiting until they acquired hundreds of customers before building a website and operating at cash flow break-even for years before raising its Series A.
46 min
52
Lessons from Notion on building a thriving dece...
Ben Lang, Head of Community at Notion, shares his playbook for how to tap into your product evangelists and build a powerful community that grows from dozens to millions.
43 min
53
From a narrow ICP to a wide-open market – Lesso...
Bryant Chou is the co-founder of Webflow. He goes back to the early days of ideating on and building Webflow, walking us through how the co-founders formed their hypothesis around Webflow’s ICP, its viral launch on Hacker News, keeping a startup afloat with dwindling capital and the lessons in customer empathy that stick with him.
55 min
54
How to lead with transparency amidst adversity ...
Before taking over the helm of CrossFit as its new CEO, Don Faul’s leadership experience included an 8-year stint as a U.S. Marine Corps platoon commander and executive roles at Pinterest, Meta and Google. Here, he unpacks the leadership principles that have carried him through vastly different operating environments.
68 min
55
From kickoffs to retros and Slack channels — St...
Former Stripe and Figma leader and founder of The Kool-Aid Factory Brie Wolfson takes us behind the scenes at how company cultures evolve over time, from operating principles to documentation and rituals.
52 min
56
Why comms deserves its own spot on the exec tea...
Former Square exec Aaron Zamost on why comms belongs on the leadership team, why you shouldn’t hire a PR agency, and how to handle internal comms.
64 min
57
What founders need to know about acquisitions: ...
Daniel Debow, VP of Product for Demand at Shopify and a three-time founder. He shares his playbook for how founders should navigate an acquisition.
62 min
58
How to build your culture like a product — Less...
Anna Binder is the Head of People at Asana, joining the company back in 2016 as its first HR executive. She shares her advice from helping weave the culture at Asana, from getting comfortable with feedback to maintaining a healthy exec team.
63 min
59
How to scale your career alongside your startup...
Mike Boufford wrote Greenhouse’s first line of code in 2012 and he’s still CTO today. His advice for growing and getting more strategic as a leader.
60 min
60
Founders: Here’s how to get your sales pitch in...
Peter Kazanjy is the co-founder of Atrium and the author of “Founding Sales: The Early Stage Go-To-Market Handbook.” He shares advice for getting in front of customers and nailing your pitch in the early days.
58 min
61
Deepak Rao on how X1 pivoted, launched, built a...
Deepak Rao shares the dramatic story of how X1 pivoted during the pandemic and found product-market fit with a bold launch strategy.
56 min
62
How to lower barriers to change when building a...
Wharton professor and author Jonah Berger on overcoming barriers to change when building breakthrough products, convincing customers or leading teams.
56 min
63
How Retool reached $2M in ARR before launch by ...
David Hsu is the founder and CEO of Retool, a low-code platform for developers building custom internal tools. He goes back to the early days of ideating on and building Retool, from going against the grain with his product idea, finding language/market fit, and signing on early customers in the Fortune 500.
55 min
64
How to approach GTM with an engineering lens — ...
Rich Rao is the VP, Small Business Group at Meta and former GM at Google. He uses his technical background to explain how leaders can apply an engineer’s playbook to their go-to-market strategy.
58 min
65
What startups can learn from enterprise corpora...
Sara Varni is the CMO of Attentive. She shares her biggest lessons from her marketing leadership career at Salesforce and Twilio, and what startups should know about crafting a corporate message that resonates.
49 min
66
Finding product-market fit twice — Alma’s Harry...
Founder Harry Ritter dives into Alma’s journey to product-market fit, with advice on rallying through tough pivots and building as a solo founder.
47 min
67
Why everything we’ve been taught about quitting...
Annie Duke is First Round’s Special Partner of Decision Science. On the heels of releasing her new book, “Quit: The Power of Knowing When to Walk Away,” she dives into all of our misconceptions about quitting and makes the case that getting better at this skill lays the groundwork for greater success.
72 min
68
How to scale your co-founder relationship along...
Manu Sharma and Brian Rieger are the co-founders of Labelbox and in this conversation, they take a microscope to their co-founder DNA and share tons of advice for other entrepreneurs looking for magic in their founding team.
46 min
69
A crash course on founder-led customer success ...
Sydney Strader shares tips from Catalyst & InVision on founder-led customer success, from structuring customer conversations to making the first hire.
57 min
70
The founder’s guide to making your first few hi...
Gem co-founder Steven Bartel shares tactics for recruiting the first 10 hires, from sourcing and nurturing passive talent, to structuring interviews.
54 min
71
From product roadmapping to sprint planning: Ho...
Snir Kodesh is the Head of Engineering at Retool and former Senior Director of Engineering at Lyft. He unpacks the ins and outs of shipping software, from agreeing on the product roadmap, to setting your course, and getting better at estimating your development cycles.
52 min
72
The 5 phases of Figma’s community-led growth — ...
Claire Butler, Figma’s first business hire, walks us through the different phases of the company’s community-led growth model — from planting the seeds in stealth all the way to org-wide enterprise adoption.
56 min
73
Airtable’s path to product-market fit — co-foun...
Airtable’s co-founder Andrew Ofstad shares Airtable’s early journey to product-market fit — from prototypes and launch, to go-to-market strategy.
45 min
74
Operations vs. Algorithms: Advice for scaling s...
Ian Wong is the co-founder and CTO of Opendoor. He discusses the tricky balance between operations and data science in the early days of the startup, and his advice for other founders looking to make data science core to their business.
65 min
75
Want to go totally asynchronous? Repeat founder...
Subscript founder Sidharth Kakkar shares tactical advice on how to build a totally asynchronous, distributed team with no internal meetings — from increasing transparency and encouraging autonomy, to how hiring and documentation need to change.
63 min