The Early Team

In this episode, I speak with Simran Handa. Simran is a Business Operations Manager at Sequin (YC S21), helping women get better access to credit. She was the second employee of the company and is passionate about feminism, financial freedom and fashion!

In this conversation, we talk about:

• Her transition to a FinTech company and how her role has evolved over time
• How her time at an early stage company is enabling her own project
• And how her mindset shift about sales is empowering her to shoot her shot

In this episode, I speak with Pablo Pinto. Pablo is a talent-oriented founder and product manager with experience in startup recruiting, go-to-market strategy, and ops. Currently, he’s the Director at On Deck First 50, a program helping people get jobs at startups.

In this conversation, we talk about:

• How he sets an over-arching theme for every five-year-segments of his career
• The 3-pillars of risk that he evaluates, before making a move to a new startup
• And how his experience is empowering him to support others making similar transitions

With that, let’s dive in. Enjoy.

In this episode, I speak with Elizabeth Dlha. Elizabeth is the Head of Partnerships & Community at Deepnote, a company building a collaborative workspace for data teams. Before Deepnote, Elizabeth spent her career as an analyst and building analytics tooling, first as a consultant at McKinsey & Company, later as a Product manager at Periscope.

In this conversation, we talk about:

• How working at a global consulting firm enable her to go deep in many industries, quickly
• How her role has grown over the last 2 years at Deepnote, moving from an Individual contributor to a hybrid of both leading a team and continuing doing IC work
• And how setting a north star and being intentional with it, is empowering her and Deepnote to continue their growth and success

In this episode, I speak with Sanjay Krishna. Sanjay leads growth at Quolum, an early stage startup backed by Sequoia. He started his journey in corporate law, and then ran his own Ed-tech venture for a soft exit to a unicorn.

In this conversation, we talk about:

• His career and the force behind wanting to join a smaller company
• How his corporate law experience is empowering his success in his sales role
• And the similarities he sees between playing tennis and working at an early stage company

I speak with Rich Burke. Rich is Head of Growth at Parentaly, an employee benefit startup that helps improve the parental leave experience. Prior to that, he spent time at CEB, Manage by Q, and Vista Equity Partners.

In this conversation, we talk about:

• Similarities, differences and lessons learned between corporate America and startups.
• Playing the long-game and filling in the skill gaps to get there
• And his approach to understanding and executing in a new industry that’s ripe for change.

In this episode, I speak with Mariah Sharp. One notion that I love about this conversation is the ability to feel how mission driven Mariah is, focusing her energy towards making an impact. She is a former 6th grade social studies teacher, turned People Ops lead at an Educational Tech company, to now one of the co-founders of Envision Inclusion.

In this conversation, we talk about:

• How she transitioned from teaching to an early stage tech company and the similarities between the two
• What it was like to define her role and how it evolved during her time at the company RaiseMe
• And how that experience & the pandemic opened up the doors for her to really go deeper within the DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) avenue.

Hey y’all and welcome to another episode of The Early Team. In this episode, I speak with Juraj Pal. Juraj was one of the first hires at Slido, the Q&A and polling platform where built out the partnerships function from scratch and led the product team. Juraj is based in Vancouver, BC and currently in-between things, spending time with his family as a new dad.

In this conversation, we talk about:

• Being able to say yes to opportunities that came his way, enabling him to live globally
• Dealing with imposter syndrome, while joining the exec team at the age of 24
• And how he has been able to navigate through the burnout that came with the responsibilities

Let’s dive in. Enjoy.

Hey y’all and welcome to another episode of The Early Team. I’m excited to introduce you to Melissa Henderson, Head of Community at ApeWorx and Founder of the Violet Summer Exchange.

During our conversation, we talk about:

• How she made the transition from working at traditional large publications to a small, fully remote company
• Her approach to adapting to a new environment and using her journalism experience to establish herself in a new space
• And what it takes to run a community without burning out

Before we get started, I want to point out that in this conversation, you’ll hear terms like web3, crypto, blockchain, DeFi, coins, and NFTs. If you’re not familiar with these terms, don’t worry. Although they come up often, given the nature of the industry Melissa works in, they do not hinder the ability to appreciate her journey and experience at an early stage company.

With that, let’s jump in. Enjoy.

Hey y’all and welcome to another episode of The Early Team, where I speak with Jet Zhou.

Jet is a software engineer with 10 years of industry experience. He has worked across different company sizes and different verticals, including Amazon, ClassDojo, an EdTech company, and Gem, which focuses on recruiting. Currently, he is aiming to hike all the dog friendly trails around the Bay Area.

During our conversation, we talk about:

• What it was like for him, transitioning from a global company to a much smaller one
• How things changed as the team around him grew from 4 people to over 250
• And what it took adapt to those changes

With that, let’s jump in. Enjoy.

Welcome to another conversation on The Early Team, where I speak with Harrison Johnson. Currently, Harrison is a co-founder at Driveway, a powerful tool that helps remote employees ramp up faster. However, the scope of our chat revolves around his time at Managed by Q, an office management platform, where he was employee #1.

In our conversation, we talk about:

• The concept of house of cards and what failing fast means when you’re at an early stage company
• How he had to learn to detach his passion for the company & his line of responsibilities, so that he could make better decisions and implement changes
• And how chasing titles at a startup isn’t necessarily the best approach for your growth

This conversation was full of reflection and insight. Enjoy and let’s jump in.