How to Prepare for the Hardest Hard Questions

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You have to know when you're on the record that literally any one sentence in your 30 minute interview can be the only sentence that they use. There's nothing wrong with being punchy up, but the key is don't punch down. The problem is when your startup becomes somewhat successful and then even smaller companies start to pick at you. Those are the ones that I think aren't worth your time addressing.

Our guest today is Aaron Zamost.

After a comms career at Google, Aaron joined Square in 2011 to lead corporate communications. He went on to join the exec team, reporting directly to Jack Dorsey and leading the comms strategy for Square’s IPO in 2015. In an interesting move, he also took on leading the people organization as well, running both orgs up until he left in late 2020. In addition to lecturing at UC Berkeley's School of Law, Aaron now runs Background Partners, a communications consulting firm.

In today’s conversation, we dive deep into what founders need to know about both external and internal comms. Aaron shares more on:

Why comms deserves its own spot on the exec team and why most founders shouldn’t hire PR agencies.
The jobs-to-be-done of the comms function in the early days of a startup — and why it’s not a good customer acquisition strategy.
A 3-question framework for simplifying your company message early on.
How to prep for interviews and deal with difficult lines of questioning.
How to think about commenting on events in the news, or message layoffs to the team.

Given how much the media landscape has changed in recent years, and how many founders are grappling with internal comms issues these days, Aaron’s advice makes for a valuable listen.

We also recommend checking out his two excellent Medium posts:

-What’s Your Hour in ‘Silicon Valley Time’?

No, you don’t need to hire an agency

You can follow Aaron on Twitter at @zamosta. You can email us questions directly at review@firstround.com or follow us on Twitter @firstround and @brettberson.