Startup CEO: A Field Guide to Scaling Up Your Business (Techstars) - Hardcover

Blumberg, Matt

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1119723663 ISBN 13: 9781119723660

Publisher: Wiley, 2020

Synopsis

You’re only a startup CEO once. Do it well with Startup CEO, a "master class in building a business."
―Dick Costolo, Former CEO, Twitter

Being a startup CEO is a job like no other: it’s difficult, risky, stressful, lonely, and often learned through trial and error.  As a startup CEO seeing things for the first time, you’re likely to make mistakes, fail, get things wrong, and feel like you don’t have any control over outcomes.

Author Matt Blumberg has been there, and in Startup CEO he shares his experience, mistakes, and lessons learned as he guided Return Path from a handful of employees and no revenues to over $100 million in revenues and 500 employees.

Startup CEO is not a memoir of Return Path's 20-year journey but a thoughtful CEO-focused book that provides first-time CEOs with advice, tools, and approaches for the situations that startup CEOs will face.

You'll learn:

• How to tell your story to new hires, investors, and customers for greater alignment
• How to create a values-based culture for speed and engagement
• How to create business and personal operating systems so that you can balance your life and grow your company at the same time
• How to develop, lead, and leverage your board of directors for greater impact
• How to ensure that your company is bought, not sold, when you exit

Startup CEO is the field guide every CEO needs throughout the growth of their company.

About this title

About the Author

Matt Blumberg founded Return Path in 1999, grew it to 500 employees and $100 million in revenues, and sold it to Validity in 2019. Matt is chair of Path Forward, a nonprofit that helps mothers and caregivers reenter the workforce. He is creating his next startup and writing a companion volume to Startup CEO.

From the Back Cover

PRAISE FOR STARTUP CEO

"One of the key principles of the Lean Startup movement is that entrepreneurship is management. In Startup CEO, Matt Blumberg provides a comprehensive guide to every facet of entrepreneurial management. An essential and practical guide for entrepreneurs everywhere."
—Eric Ries, author,The Lean Startup

"There's no silver bullet for building a great company. Startup CEO deciphers the challenging, complex, uncertain, and oftentimes lonely role of a first-time CEO without oversimplifying it."
—Ben Horowitz, cofounder and General Partner, Andreessen Horowitz

"I've been on Matt's board for more than a decade, and I've watched him develop into one of the finest CEOs I've had the pleasure to work with. With Startup CEO, Matt allows other entrepreneurs to profit from his years of experience and emulate his remarkable example."
—Fred Wilson, cofounder, Union Square Ventures

"There is the one-in-a-million company that catches lightning in a bottle and grows like a weed without care and feeding. For the rest of us, there's Startup CEO, the how-to manual for getting there the old-fashioned way. This book will be your coach, mentor, and advisor in any situation you or your company are likely to encounter."
—David Rosenblatt, CEO, 1stdibs

"Startup CEO is the definitive book for any CEO—first time or otherwise—of a high-growth company. While dozens of books have been written about starting businesses, it's time for entrepreneurs to focus on scaling them. Matt shows them how."
—Brad Feld, Managing Director, Foundry Group

From the Inside Flap

Being a startup CEO is a job like no other: it's difficult, risky, stressful and, in venture capitalist and long-time Return Path Board Member Fred Wilson's view, "lonely, heavy duty, and a thankless task." As a startup CEO, seeing things for the first time, you're likely to make mistakes, to fail, to get things wrong, and to feel like you don't have any control over outcomes.

Author Matt Blumberg has been there, and in Startup CEO: A Field Guide to Scaling Up Your Business, Second Edition he shares his experiences, mistakes, and lessons learned as he guided Return Path from a handful of employees and no revenues to over $100 million in revenues and 500 employees in 2019. In the highly volatile internet world, Matt and his team managed the company through the dot-com crisis of 2000, 9/11, the financial meltdown of 2008, and through the successful sale to Validity in May 2019.

Startup CEO is not a memoir of Return Path's 20-year journey, but a thoughtful CEO-focused book that provides first-time CEOs with advice, tools, and approaches for the situations that they will likely face.

Organized into six parts Storytelling, Building Human Capital, Execution, Leading a Board of Directors, Managing Yourself, and Selling Your Company Matt guides you through the thorny, challenging situations you'll face and provides solutions. With this book as your guide, you'll discover:

• How to tell your story to your team, new hires, investors, and customers for better decisions, greater alignment, and speed
• How to balance your life and grow your company at the same time
• How to develop, lead, and leverage your board of directors

A new section covers selling your company. As a first-time CEO you'll probably sell your company only once, but buyers will have done multiple deals. How can you turn that to your advantage so that your company is bought, not sold?

Startup CEO is the field guide every CEO needs throughout the growth of their company.

Edition details

• Publisher: Wiley
• Publication date: 2020
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1119723663
• ISBN 13: 9781119723660
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 2
• Number of pages: 480