#355 - Maximus Greenwald, Warmly on Mastering the Pivot Journey

This podcast interview focuses on the entrepreneurial journey of persistence and adaptation. My guest is Maximus Greenwald, CEO of Warmly. After working at Google, Max and his co-founders quit their jobs to start a company with what he calls "the world's worst idea" - Tinder for co-founders.  What makes his journey fascinating is how he navigated through six pivots over three years, each time confronting the challenges of product-market fit, customer alignment, and sustainable growth.  Throughout this process, Max grappled with the central question many founders face: when to explore new ideas and when to commit fully to execution. And this inspired me, and hence I invited Max to my podcast. We explore the challenges of finding focus in startup chaos, the tension between vision and execution, and the counterintuitive reality that momentum often precedes perfection. Max's leadership principles cut through typical startup fluff with refreshing directness, challenging conventional wisdom about when to sell, how to pivot, and what metrics truly matter for early-stage companies. Here is one of his quotes  “In any company revenue is oxygen, and you need oxygen to live and to succeed. And so as we were starting to make money and make money fast, [..] we saw a excitement in the company and a devotion to work harder that we had never seen in our earlier six pivots. That's one of the most critical things: having momentum gets everyone excited to keep pushing along.” By listening to this podcast you will learn: The hidden pitfalls of pursuing product-market fit over generating actual revenue Why standard metrics often mislead early-stage founders away from what truly matters The real challenge of knowing when to stay the course versus when to pivot Why some customers might be holding back your company's growth potential For more information about the guest from this week:  Maximus Greenwald  Website: warmly.ai Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices