This is a special bonus episode of B2BaCEO featuring one of Foundation Capital’s own CEOs, Max Simkoff. In 2016, Max founded Doma, a real estate transactions startup, out of our San Francisco office and Foundation led his Series A. Just last week, less than five years later, Doma started trading on the New York Stock Exchange.

You can watch the full story of how Doma went from proof-of-concept to public company in our new video series, “Diary of a Startup."

But this episode of the podcast focusses on what Max learned it takes for a FOUNDER-CEO to build a great company. Max walks us through all the critical first steps, even the seemingly trivial ones, for starting a business. He gets into the minds of VC investors and what founders need to do to really impress them. And he lays out, in no uncertain terms, who exactly is and isn’t a real entrepreneur.