David Hoffman built and sold big-data and data analytics company Next Big Sound to Pandora in 2015. He's now building Beam, which helps people create shoppable mood boards for DTC brands.

David reflects on his experience with mentorship and the long arc of the conversation that is being a co-founder and being in community. We unpack the Techstars motto "give first" and discuss the power of the Techstars community and the importance of community relationships in entrepreneurship.

We talk through the complex evolution that is founding and scaling a startup, his experience doing just that with Next Big Sound, and the challenges of becoming a leader inside a growing company.

One challenge is always scaling culture as a company scales, and David outlines some of the routines and structures that helped in defining his startup's culture. David also shares some insights on the post-startup-sale emotional roller coaster and the decision to build another company. Some of my other favorite insights from David:

Living the “Give First” motto requires approaching everything with curiosity.
“Grown ups” is a construct: When it is your idea and your company, you can make the decisions you need to make.
Your Culture is made of your routines, whether it’s Friday bagels or snap-clapping after people share wins.
Your MVP product can be much, much more simple than you think if it creates value for your customers.

David’s nuanced reflections are a gift, and I’m so glad he sat down for this conversation.

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Links

Beam

Words, Words, Words 12: English is a Foreign Language