Leadership — Foundry
Articles about leadership from the best founders and investors.
145 articles
Palmer Luckey: If Your Boss Says They Don't Care About Money, Run.
— Palmer Luckey
This Billionaire Flies Coach. Here's His Ruthless Logic.
— Palmer Luckey
Marc Andreessen's Trick for Hiring When You're a Nobody Startup
— Marc Andreessen
Reed Hastings Built a Company Before Netflix. Its Biggest Mistake Created Netflix's Culture.
— Reed Hastings
Mark Zuckerberg Would Rather Hire a Brilliant Grad Than a 10-Year Veteran
— Mark Zuckerberg
Zuckerberg Fired His Executive Team Twice. The Second Time Created Facebook's Secret Weapon.
— Mark Zuckerberg
Pinterest's Founder on the Hardest Transition Every CEO Has to Make
— Ben Silbermann
Steve Jobs Paid $100,000 for a Logo. It Was the Smartest Money He Ever Spent.
— Steve Jobs
Jeff Bezos: People Who Are Right a Lot Change Their Mind a Lot
— Jeff Bezos
Jeff Bezos: Most Decisions Are Two-Way Doors. Stop Treating Them Like One-Way Doors.
— Jeff Bezos
Reed Hastings: The Only Leadership Quality That Matters Is Authenticity. Most CEOs Fake It.
— Reed Hastings
Keith Rabois: Throw Away Your Pros and Cons List. Reid Hoffman Taught Me Something Better.
— Keith Rabois
Vinod Khosla: If You Get the Right Team, It Doesn't Even Matter If the Idea Is Wrong
— Vinod Khosla
Netflix's Reed Hastings: Stop Calling Your Company a Family. It's Not.
— Reed Hastings
Sam Altman: Most People Give Up Way Too Early. The Winners Just Stuck Around Longer.
— Sam Altman
Figma's Dylan Field: We Knew We Had Product-Market Fit When a User Sent Us 12 Pages of Feature Requests
— Dylan Field
Jeff Bezos: Focus on the Controllable Inputs, Not the Outputs
— Jeff Bezos
Keith Rabois Says Founders Fund Will Never Back a Remote Company
— Keith Rabois
Keith Rabois on the 3 Things Max Levchin Taught Him That Still Run His Life
— Keith Rabois
Elon Musk Says a Tech CEO Who Can't Do the Tech Is a Cavalry Captain Who Can't Ride
— Elon Musk
Max Levchin Explains Why B-Players Hire C-Players (And It's Not What You Think)
— Max Levchin
Tobi Lutke: It's Impossible to Make Great Products If You Don't Give a Damn
— Tobi Lutke
Shopify Doesn't Use KPIs or OKRs. Tobi Lutke Explains Why.
— Tobi Lutke
Jensen Huang Would Rather Torture You Than Fire You
— Jensen Huang
Keith Rabois: The Three Lessons From Peter Thiel That Changed Everything
— Peter Thiel
Elon Musk's 5-Step Algorithm for Running Every Company He Owns
— Elon Musk
Marc Andreessen Says Zuckerberg's Superpower Is Not What You Think
— Marc Andreessen
Elon Musk Built the Hard Thing at PayPal. Nobody Cared. Then He Built the Easy Thing.
— Elon Musk
Jeff Bezos: It Doesn't Matter If We're a Pure Internet Company. It Matters If We Obsess Over Customers.
— Jeff Bezos
Marc Andreessen Explains Why Nobody Can Compete With Elon Musk
— Marc Andreessen
Zuckerberg Admits Elon's Twitter Takeover Pushed the Entire Industry to Get Lean
— Mark Zuckerberg
Marc Andreessen: There Are No Silver Bullets. Only Lead Bullets.
— Marc Andreessen
Ben Horowitz: Don't Pick a Cofounder Because You're Scared
— Ben Horowitz
Jeff Bezos to a Reporter: 'I Don't Care If We're a Pure Internet Company'
— Jeff Bezos
Drew Houston Watched 5 People Try Dropbox. Zero Could Use It.
— Drew Houston
Reed Hastings: Netflix Laid Off 40 People. Then Got More Done With Fewer People.
— Reed Hastings
Steve Jobs Got Fired From His Own Company. He Called It the Best Thing That Happened to Him.
— Steve Jobs
Brian Chesky's Hiring Trick: Try to Talk Them Out of the Job
— Brian Chesky
Reed Hastings' CEO Washed His Coffee Cups at 5am. Then Led Them Off a Cliff.
— Reed Hastings
Jensen Huang: NVIDIA Never Talks About Market Share. They Make Markets.
— Jensen Huang
Keith Rabois Says PayPal Was the Original 'Founder Mode' Company
— Keith Rabois
Reddit Cofounder: Big Redesigns Are Just Programmer Procrastination
— Alexis Ohanian
Marc Andreessen: Founder-Run Companies Are Harder to Kill for Two Reasons
— Marc Andreessen
Suhail Doshi: Your Dashboard Has 30 Panels and Zero Answers. Pick One Number.
— Suhail Doshi
Facebook's VP of Growth: Startups Should Not Have Growth Teams
— Alex Schultz
Marc Andreessen: IBM's 'Wild Ducks' Problem Explains Why Big Companies Can't Innovate
— Marc Andreessen
Max Levchin: Brilliant People Have Extreme Personalities. Deal With It.
— Max Levchin
Foursquare Founder: Facebook Copied Us and We Had to Give a Pep Talk While the Building Was on Fire
— Dennis Crowley
Keith Rabois Changed His Mind: Why the CEO Should Personally Pick the Office
— Keith Rabois
Eric Schmidt: Google Lost AI Because Employees Went Home Early
— Eric Schmidt
Zuckerberg's Hiring Rule: Only Hire Someone You Would Work For
— Mark Zuckerberg
Aaron Levie: Your Startup Is Dead Without a Technology Tailwind
— Aaron Levie
Reed Hastings Demonstrates How to Fire Someone on Stage. It Takes 90 Seconds.
— Reed Hastings
Jeff Bezos: Be a Missionary, Not a Mercenary. The Missionaries Make More Money Anyway.
— Jeff Bezos
Aaron Levie's Framework for Startups Competing Against Giants
— Aaron Levie
WhatsApp's Jan Koum Ignored Every Competitor. Then He Beat Them All.
— Jan Koum
Peter Thiel: A Professional CEO Would've Sold Facebook for $1 Billion
— Peter Thiel
Joel Spolsky Decoded Amazon's Secret Strategy: Break Everything Into Tiny Businesses
— Joel Spolsky
Elon Musk's Hiring Test: Tell Me Your Story. I'll Know If You're Lying.
— Elon Musk
Reed Hastings: We Laid Off a Third of the Company. Then We Got More Done With Fewer People.
— Reed Hastings
CEO Coach Matt Mochary: Have Someone Shadow You for 3 Months. You'll Clone Yourself.
— Matt Mochary
Jason Fried: If Customers Trust Your Apologies, You Are Doing Everything Right
— Jason Fried
Sam Altman is 9 Traits for Identifying Billion-Dollar Founders
— Sam Altman
Jensen Huang Has 50 Direct Reports and Zero One-on-Ones. Here Is Why.
— Jensen Huang
Ben Horowitz: Board Meetings Are the Most Valuable Thing Most Founders Waste
— Ben Horowitz
Dalton Caldwell: The One Trait Every Successful Founder Shares
— Dalton Caldwell
Dalton Caldwell: Founders Who Hide Behind Their Keyboards Are Lying to Themselves
— Dalton Caldwell
Jack Dorsey: Leaders Are Editors. Edit Your Team Constantly.
— Jack Dorsey
Wozniak Invented Color Computing With a $1 Chip
— Steve Wozniak
Andrej Karpathy's Brutal Hiring Truth
— Andrej Karpathy
Jensen Huang: NVIDIA Is a Market Maker, Not a Share Taker
— Jensen Huang
Eric Schmidt: Most Companies Get Strategy Wrong Because They Think Inward-Out
— Eric Schmidt
Sam Altman's Brutal Hiring Truth
— Sam Altman
Jason Fried: Do the Job Yourself Before You Hire Someone to Do It
— Jason Fried
Tobi Lutke: Everyone Tries to Build a Platform First. That's Really Hard. Extract It Instead.
— Tobi Lutke
Stewart Butterfield: A Third of Slack Teams Are Social. We Still Won't Chase It.
— Stewart Butterfield
Suhail Doshi's Simple Formula for Startup Growth: Five Things That Equal Everything
— Suhail Doshi
Balaji Srinivasan:'s Brutal Hiring Truth
— Balaji Srinivasan
Sam Altman: Your Best People Are About to Leave. Here's How to Keep Them.
— Sam Altman
Mark Zuckerberg to a New Hire: If I Can Build Facebook, You Can Build a Search Engine
— Mark Zuckerberg
Patrick Collison's Brutal Hiring Truth
— Patrick Collison
Patrick Collison: At 10 People, You Need to Stop Being Consensus-Oriented
— Patrick Collison
Sam Altman: Why Copycat Startups Almost Always Fail
— Sam Altman
Palmer Luckey: Being the Best at Everything in Your Company Is a Failure
— Palmer Luckey
Oprah Winfrey: There Was No Difference Between Me and the Audience. Except Better Shoes.
— Oprah Winfrey
Jensen Huang: How First Principles Thinking Changes Everything
— Jensen Huang
Jensen Huang: Why NVIDIA Never Talks About Market Share
— Jensen Huang
Why Jensen Huang Has 50 Direct Reports
— Jensen Huang
Jensen Huang: Why NVIDIA Never Talks About Market Share
— Jensen Huang
Palmer Luckey: The True Believers Were Still in the Office at Midnight
— Palmer Luckey
Elon Musk: Steal Ideas From Other Industries
— Elon Musk
Elon Musk: Starting a Company Is Like Eating Glass
— Elon Musk
The Time Steve Jobs Called Jony Ive Vain — And Why Ive Knew He Was Right
— Steve Jobs
Drew Houston: Nobody Is Born a CEO
— Drew Houston
Reed Hastings: Why Netflix's Minimum Severance Is Four Months — Even After Two Weeks
— Reed Hastings
Peter Thiel: There Is No Wisdom of Crowds
— Peter Thiel
Peter Thiel: If You Are in Favor of Innovation, Founders Have to Stay in Control
— Peter Thiel
Why Larry Page Would Leave His Fortune to Elon Musk
— Elon Musk
Vinod Khosla: I Sometimes Take Positions I Don't Believe In — Just to Make Founders Think From That Angle
— Vinod Khosla
Rick Rubin: Create Something Truly for Yourself
— Rick Rubin
Elon Musk: How First Principles Thinking Changes Everything
— Elon Musk
Jony Ive: What Steve Jobs Taught About Focus
— Jony Ive
Jeff Bezos Called Customer Service Mid-Meeting. They Waited in Silence for 10 Minutes.
— Jeff Bezos
Keith Rabois: Your Company Has Barrels and Ammunition. Most Founders Can Not Tell the Difference.
— Keith Rabois
Peter Thiel: Conflicts Happen When People Want the Same Things, Not Different Things
— Peter Thiel
Keith Rabois Built an Olympian Culture. Here Is the Hiring Test.
— Keith Rabois
Brian Chesky: Only Hire People Who Will Champion the Mission When You Are Not in the Room
— Brian Chesky
Ben Horowitz: Culture Is Not What You Believe. It Is What You Do.
— Ben Horowitz
Marissa Mayer: Google Went From 200 to 50 Hires. Eric Schmidt Created a Black Market to Do It.
— Marissa Mayer
Steve Jobs: A Great Idea Is Only 10% of the Work. The Rock Tumbler Does the Rest.
— Steve Jobs
Facebook's VP of Growth: If Your Retention Curve Does Not Flatten, Stop Everything
— Alex Schultz
Jeff Bezos: Be Skeptical of Proxies. They Will Kill Your Company.
— Jeff Bezos
Keith Rabois: How to Identify Great Talent Before Anyone Else Sees It
— Keith Rabois
Naval Ravikant: How to Build a Recruiting Pipeline That Attracts the Best People
— Naval Ravikant
Ben Horowitz: Culture Is What You Do When Nobody Gives You the Answer
— Ben Horowitz
Jeff Bezos: How to Build a Truth-Telling Culture
— Jeff Bezos
Jeff Bezos: Build Your Strategy Around What Won't Change in 10 Years
— Jeff Bezos
Facebook Cofounder Dustin Moskovitz: You Should Not Start a Startup
— Dustin Moskovitz
Keith Rabois: Peter Thiel Gave Him a Focusing Framework. He Uses It Every Day.
— Keith Rabois
Max Levchin: The Best Co-Founders Are Like the Best Marriages
— Max Levchin
Reed Hastings: I Was Still Coding at Night With 50 People. Someone Told Me to Take a Shower.
— Reed Hastings
Ben Horowitz: How to Design a Culture That Is Actually Yours
— Ben Horowitz
Eric Schmidt: Google Discovered the Optimal Number of Job Interviews Is Four
— Eric Schmidt
Spencer Rascoff: Should Startups Buy Ads? Zillow's Co-Founder Has a Surprising Answer.
— Spencer Rascoff
Reddit Co-Founder Steve Huffman: Launch Early. Even If It Is Embarrassing.
— Steve Huffman
Jeff Bezos: Your Business Strategy Should Be Built on Things That Will NOT Change
— Jeff Bezos
Naval Ravikant: Hire People Who Solve Problems Without Being Asked
— Naval Ravikant
The Dead-Simple Signal That Tells You It's Time to Hire Your First Salesperson
How Tinder, LinkedIn, and Reddit Tricked Their Way Past the Cold Start Problem
— Alexis Ohanian
Stewart Butterfield Reveals the Exact Moment He Knew Slack's Predecessor Was Dead
— Stewart Butterfield
Brian Chesky's 11-Star Framework That Turned Airbnb Into a $100B Company
— Brian Chesky
John Collison: Internal Transparency at Stripe Scales Trust
— John Collison
Drew Houston Found His Dropbox Co-Founder in 3 Hours. He Dropped Out of School the Next Day.
— Drew Houston
Superhuman Founder Rahul Vohra: How to Decide Which Customers to Ignore
— Rahul Vohra
Mark Zuckerberg: Experience Is Overrated. Learning Speed Is Everything.
— Mark Zuckerberg
Jeff Bezos: What Customer Obsession Actually Looks Like
— Jeff Bezos
Minted Founder: The Best Leaders Were Not Hired. They Were Grown.
— Mariam Naficy
Brian Chesky Was So Unpopular He Could Meet Every Single Airbnb User
— Brian Chesky
Linear's Karri Saarinen: What to Look for When Hiring Your First Designer
— Karri Saarinen
The Book That Had the Biggest Impact on Jeff Bezos: Good to Great
— Jeff Bezos
Naval Ravikant: The Most Valuable Advice He Ever Received
— Naval Ravikant
Reid Hoffman: The PayPal Mafia's Hiring Strategy Was Deliberately Unconventional
— Reid Hoffman
Brian Chesky: The Rule He Had With His Co-Founder That Saved Airbnb
— Brian Chesky
Andy Grove: Every Generation Thinks They Invented Technology
— Andy Grove
Kevin Surace: Steve Jobs Got Fired for Being Too Innovative. He Was Right All Along.
— Kevin Surace