Harry Nelis

What do you do when a radical new technology puts your main product right in the crosshairs of disruption? Listen to David Okuniev — co-founder of Typeform | Ask awesomely — discuss the challenges of innovation within existing structures. David shared a game-changing insight: Radical innovation is really, really difficult to do inside your own product. He emphasized the need to break free from the constraints of familiarity and embrace change from outside the box. Henrik Werdelin and I have both seen our fair share of this in our respective careers. What struck us most was how David leveraged structure to overcome the innovator’s dilemma. By creating a culture of experimentation and providing space for bold ideas, he propelled Typeform beyond incremental improvements. What other hacks have you seen or employed to help your organization overcome the innovator’s dilemma? Share your stories below! 👇 And if you want to dive deeper into our conversation, click the link in the comments to catch the full podcast episode!

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Continuing to write down ideas I've been having conversations about to get a wider set of perspectives. This is based on the idea that Western companies' disproportionate access to innovation makes it harder for emerging markets to compete. Looking forward to comments

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Very proud to see the WVC:E dream team - Anisah Osman Britton MBE & Rachel Drapper - alongside long time friend and rockstar Ekaterina Gianelli on stage at TechBBQ discussing "Fixing the Talent Exodus in VC". Key Takeaways: 💰Impact of Consolidation on Culture and Talent: The ongoing consolidation in the VC industry is reshaping company culture, affecting morale, and influencing talent. 🚀Emerging Managers Aren’t Diversifying VC: Despite the rise of emerging managers, the industry remains largely homogenous, with many new managers still coming from the same traditional, non-diverse backgrounds. ⚠️Perceptions of Diversity as High Risk: Many in the VC industry continue to view diverse hires, investments, and business models as "high risk," "too time-consuming," or "too costly," perpetuating a cycle of exclusion. 🚼 Parental Leave Inequality: Inequities in parental leave policies are disproportionately affecting women in venture, creating additional barriers to progression. But there are funds, investors, LPs and organisations (like us!) that are trying to change this!

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Some midweek wisdom from Y Combinator founder, Paul Graham, on why startups shouldn't stress over competitors. According to Graham, based on Y Combinator's extensive data set, few of their startups are actually killed by competitors. He compares the protection a startup has against competitors to the vastness of space, emphasising that the market is large enough for multiple players to thrive. Graham's analogy likens encountering a competitor to suddenly finding another runner in your race lane - the best course of action? “It’s sort of like if you’re running the hundred meters and suddenly a lane appears with another runner in it. What should you do? Run as fast as you can, just like you presumably were.” #Startups #Competition #Entrepreneurship #wearehiring

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After the first deep dive discussion w/ founders I often hear a comment "I wish I had heard about this alternative [to all-in must-become-a-unicorn] way to build a startup earlier as I have wasted years in pursuing the wrong thing". Our mission is that no founder would ever need to say that again as it is such a waste. Us preaching the gospel 1:1 just doesn't scale, hence we use mass media to multiply our efforts - that's how Gorillacast came to be. The 1st episode is out, featuring yours truly. "How can you know what food you like unless you taste everything" said a chef. How can founders make informed choices about the best strategy for them to follow unless they know of all alternatives? This might not be of interest to you but pls spread the word so that the founders who should hear it can find it. I have a dream!

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We know from 20 years in the tech sector, backed up by countless studies over multiple decades including Harvard, McKinsey that 65% of tech-company failure is for avoidance human-centric reasons. What that means is, if you’re a fund manager of a VC firm, if you fail to get your founders coaching in human factors, you are failing your fiduciary duty to maximise investor returns. If you’re a founder, failing to get coaching will optimizing the chance that your company ends up crashing, not exiting

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