 Brian Balfour is the Founder and CEO of Reforge. Previously, he was the VP of Growth @ HubSpot. Prior to HubSpot, he was an EIR @ Trinity Ventures and founder of Boundless Learning and Viximo. He advises companies including Blue Bottle Coffee, Gametime, Lumoid, GrabCAD, and Help Scout on growth and customer acquisition.    In Today's Episode with Brian Balfour We Discuss:   1. Entry into Growth and Lessons from Hubspot:    How did Brian make his entry into the world of growth? What does Brian know now about growth that he wishes he had known when he started in growth? What are 1-2 of his single biggest takeaways from his time at Hubspot that impacted his mindset?    2. The Foundations:    What is growth? What is it not? What does Brian mean when he says "all growth can be boiled down to 4 things"? When is the right time to bring in your first growth person? Should the first growth person be senior or junior? Should the growth team be standalone or sit within an existing function?    3. The Importance of Product Channel Fit:    What is product channel fit? How should founders approach it? How do you know when you have it? What are the single biggest mistakes founders make with regards to PCF?    4. Next Comes Channel Model Fit:    What is channel model fit? How should founders approach it? What are clear indicators that you have or do not have channel model fit? What are the biggest mistakes founders make with CMF?    5. Finally, Model Market Fit:    What is model market fit? How should founders approach it? What are clear indicators that you have or do not have model market fit? What are the biggest mistakes founders make with MMF?    6. Brian Balfour: AMA:    Why is product market fit not enough? What does Brian mean when he says "revenue does not create usage"? What are the biggest dangers of mixing customers and users? What do Hubspot do better than anyone else to know when an existing product/strategy is dying? Is it always better to diversify marketing channels?  

20Growth: Why Product-Market Fit is Not Enough, Revenue Does Not Create Usage, Metrics Must Be Before Strategy, Why it is Always Better to Concentrate than Diversify Marketing Channels and Secrets fro

The Twenty Minute VC (20VC) interviews the world's greatest venture capitalists with prior guests including Sequoia's Doug Leone and Benchmark's Bill Gurley. Once per week, 20VC Host, Harry Stebbings is also joined by one of the great founders of our time with prior founder episodes from Spotify's Daniel Ek, Linkedin's Reid Hoffman, and Snowflake's Frank Slootman. 

If you would like to see more of The Twenty Minute VC (20VC), head to www.20vc.com for more information on the podcast, show notes, resources and more.

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 Janie Lee is the Head of Product and the owner of the Self-Serve business at Loom. Janie previously worked at Rippling, leading the Identity Management and Hardware teams. Prior to that, she worked at Opendoor launching markets and developing pricing algorithms. During this time, Opendoor scaled from 2 to 20+ markets, $5B+ revenue, and 1500+ employees.    In Today's Episode with Janie Lee We Discuss:   1. Inside the Product Building Machine of Rippling and Opendoor:    What are Janie's single biggest product lessons from Rippling? How do they build so much product so fast? Can you have breadth and high quality?  What are Janie's biggest lessons from Opendoor on talent and pricing?  What does Janie know now that she wishes she had known when she started her product career?    2. What Makes a Truly Great PM:    What core skills do the best PMs have? What is the difference between good vs great?  Writing: What are Janie's biggest pieces of advice to PMs who want to write better?  Communicate: How do the best PMs and product leaders communicate with their teams?  Question Asking: How do the best PMs ask questions of their team and other orgs?    3. How to Find and Pick the Best PMs:    How does Janie structure the interview process when hiring new PMs?  What questions should one ask in every interview with a PM?  Does Janie do a case study? What is she looking to achieve from it? How do the best do?  What are Janie's biggest mistakes in hiring PMs? How did she change from it?    4. Onboarding PMs and Crushing Product Reviews:    What do the first 30 days look like for new PMs?  What are the biggest signs that a new PM is not going to work out?  How does the product review process work at Loom?  How does Janie prioritise when there is so much volume and data?  How has AI changed the way Loom builds products today?    

20Product: Loom CPO Janie Lee on Three Core Skills that Make the Best PMs, How to Find, Pick and Train the Best PM Talent and Lessons from OpenDoor and Rippling on Product Breadth, Pricing and Talent 

 Alex Wang is the Founder and CEO @ Scale.ai, the company that allows you to make the best models with the best data. To date, Alex has raised $1.6BN for the company with a last reported valuation of $14BN earlier this year. Scale tripled their ARR in 2023 and is expected to hit $1.4BN in ARR by the end of 2024. Their investors include Accel, Index, Thrive, Founders Fund, Meta and Nvidia to name a few.    In Today's Show with Alex Wang We Discuss:   1. Foundation Models: Diminishing Returns:    What are the three core pillars that can meaningfully improve foundation models performance?  Why is data the single largest bottleneck to the performance of models today?  What data do we need to capture that we do not currently, that will have the biggest impact on model performance moving forward?  Will we see the largest companies in the world revert back to on-prem with the increasing security challenges of migrating all customer data to foundation models?    2. AI: A Military Asset in Global Conflict: China + Russia    Why does Alex believe that AI has the potential to be an even more powerful military asset than nuclear weapons?  If this is the case, should we have open systems? Do we not have to have closed systems?  Why does Alex believe that the CCP's approach to industrial policy is better than anyone else's?  How does Alex evaluate the rise of Chinese EV car manufacturers in the last few years?  Does Alex really believe that China is two years behind the US in the AI race?    3. "I Get Fairer Treatment in Congress than in the Press":    Why does Alex believe that the best PR is no PR?  Why does Alex believe that he got fairer treatment in congress than he does in the media?  Why does Alex believe that all founders should look to own their own distribution channels today?    4. Alex Wang: AMA:    What are some of Alex's biggest lessons from Patrick Collison on the impact that a hot company brand has on the ability for that company to hire the best?  Does Alex think Trump is going to win? What would be the impact if he were to?  Why does Alex believe that enterprise software will be changed forever in the next few years?  What question is Alex never asked that he thinks he should be asked?    

20VC: Scale's Alex Wang on Why Data Not Compute is the Bottleneck to Foundation Model Performance, Why AI is the Greatest Military Asset Ever, Is China Really Two Years Behind the US in AI and Why the

 Reid Hoffman has been one of the most impactful people in technology over the last two decades. He is the Co-Founder of Linkedin (acq by Microsoft for $26BN) and Co-Founder of Inflection.ai. As an investor, Reid has backed the likes of Facebook, Airbnb, Zynga and more. Reid is also a Board Member @ Microsoft and was on the board of OpenAI.    In Today's Show with Reid Hoffman We Discuss:   1. Foundation Models: Commoditisation, Business Models, Incumbents:    Does Reid believe we are seeing the commoditization of foundation models?  Is it too late for new foundation models to be born today? Are they VC backable?  How will foundation models eventually make money? What will be the sustainable business model?  Does Reid believe that foundation models will be acquired by large cloud providers? Who goes first?    2. Inflection & Microsoft: What Went Down:    How did the Microsoft and Inflection deal go down? Did Satya call up one day and make it happen?  With the decay rate of models, Microsoft did not do it for the models, so why did they do it?  Was Inflection a sustainable business in it's own right?  Does this not prove that to win at this game, you have to be an incumbent with incumbent cash?    3. OpenAI: Board, Lessons and Management:    What are 1-2 of Reid's biggest lessons from being on the OpenAI board with Sam?  Why did Sam ask Reid in front of the whole company if Reid would fire him if he did not perform?  Scarlett Johannsen, super alignment team quitting, NDAs tied to equity, this is a lot in a short amount of time, how does Reid analyse this?    4. Trump is the Biggest Threat to Democracy: What Lies Ahead?    Why does Reid believe that Trump is a threat to democracy and evil?  What were Reid's biggest takeaways from a two hour lunch with Joe Biden?  How does a Trump administration change the world of AI, technology and startups?    5. The Future of TikTok:    Is TikTok a threat to US democracy? Should it be banned?  What will be the outcome of the current judicial process? Will they sell to a US entity?  How could Trump impact the future of TikTok in the US?    6. Reid Hoffman: AMA:    What are Peter Thiel's biggest strengths and weaknesses?  I believe Mark Zuckerberg is one of the most unappreciated public market CEOs, what are the core components that Reid believes makes Mark so special?  How did Reid miss out on investing in SpaceX's first round? What did he not see that he should have seen?  What do we think is crazy today but will be a no brainer and very normal in 10 years?    

20VC: Reid Hoffman on Foundation Models: Who Wins & How Do Incumbents Respond | The Inflection AI Deal: How it Went Down | Why Trump is a Threat to Democracy | The Future of TikTok | Lessons from Sam 

Ashley Kelly is the VP of Global Sales Development at Rippling, the all-in-one platform for HR, IT, and finance. Before Rippling, Ashley played a crucial role in scaling Brex’s outbound sales from $2M to over $300M in ARR, and has hired over 800 SDRs during her time in some of the best tech companies in Silicon Valley, including Lever and Zenefits.  In Today’s Episode with Ashley Kelly We Discuss:   From NASCAR to Silicon Valley SDR     How did Ashley make her way into the world of sales?   Why does Ashley think the best AEs and leaders start off as SDRs?   What is Ashley’s advice to new SDRs starting their jobs today?     Age of AI: Is SDR Outbound Dead?     Does Ashley agree that outbound is dead today? Is SDR dead?   How will AI change SDR? Why is Ashley hesitant to adopt AI?   Why does Ashley think founders should always build the first sales playbook?   What did Ashley mean by SDR is the 3rd pillar between sales and marketing?    What does Ashley think most companies get wrong about outbound?     SDR Hiring: Who, What, When & How     When does Ashley think founders should hire their first SDR?   How does Ashley structure the hiring process? What questions does she ask?   What profile does Ashley look for when hiring for an SDR?   How does Ashley structure the finance package? How is it different for each team?   Why did Ashley avoid hiring SDRs with SDR experience? Why has she changed her mind?   What was Ashley’s biggest hiring mistake? What were her takeaways?     Onboarding New SDR Hires     How does Ashley onboard new SDR hires? What is her onboarding timeline?   How does Ashley set targets for new hires? When should they be fully productive?    When does Ashley know if a new hire isn’t working?   What are common traits among Ashley’s most successful hires?    

20Sales: How Rippling Built Their Sales Machine: How to Hire, Train and Manage the Best SDRs, What is the Right Comp Package for Sales Teams & The Playbook to Start and Scale Your SDR Team

Aravind Srinivas is the Co-Founder & CEO of Perplexity, the conversational "answer engine" that provides precise, user-focused answers to queries. Aravind co-founded the company in 2022 after working as a research scientist at OpenAI, Google, and DeepMind. To date, Perplexity has raised over $100 million from investors including Jeff Bezos, Nat Friedman, Elad Gil, and Susan Wojciki. In Today’s Episode with Aravind Srinivas We Discuss:   Biggest Lessons from DeepMind & OpenAI     What was the best career advice Sam Altman @ OpenAI gave Aravind?   What were Aravind’s biggest takeaways at DeepMind?   How did DeepMind shape how Aravind built Perplexity?   What did Aravind mean by “competition is for losers?” What did he learn about talent assembly at DeepMind?     The Next AI Breakthrough: Reasoning     Does Aravind think we are experiencing diminishing returns on compute & model performance?   Does Aravind agree reasoning will be the next big breakthrough for models?   What are the reasons Aravind thinks models suck at reasoning today?   What is the timeline for reasoning improvement according to Aravind?   What does Aravind think are the biggest misconceptions about AI today?     Will Foundation Models Commoditise?     Does Aravind think foundation models will commoditise? What will the end state of foundation models look like?   Why does Aravind think the second tier models will get commoditised?   Why does Aravind think the subscription model will not work for AI models with true reasoning?    Why does Aravind think the application layer companies will benefit from foundation models commoditising?   Why does Aravind think foundation models will not verticalize?   When does Aravind think is the right time to go enterprise? What is his strategy to differentiate Perplexity from its competitors?     AI Arms Race: Who Will Win?     Who does Aravind think will be the winners of foundation models?   What do AI companies need to do to win the model arms race?   How does Aravind think startups can compete against incumbents' infinite cash flow?   What are the reasons Aravind thinks Perplexity’s browsing is better than ChatGPT?   What is Aravind’s biggest challenge at Perplexity today?      

20VC: Perplexity's Aravind Srinivas on Will Foundation Models Commoditise, Diminishing Returns in Model Performance, OpenAI vs Anthropic: Who Wins & Why the Next Breakthrough in Model Performance will

20Growth: Why Product-Market Fit is Not Enough, Revenue Does Not Create Usage, Metrics Must Be Before Strategy, Why it is Always Better to Concentrate than Diversify Marketing Channels and Secrets fro

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