Darrell Silver!

Internships are Really Apprenticeships

Mon, 30 Jan 2012 00:00:06 -0500

This sentiment from Mixpanel is spot on. Done right, “internships” are really much more like a productive, paid apprenticeship:

In 2008, I interned at Slide, Inc. and it was one of the most valuable summers of my life. I went from being a college hacker interested in starting a company to learning the intricacies of product design and working with a team.

At Slide, Inc. we stayed up late hacking (because we wanted to), I learned about product from an awesome product manager named Adora, and Max Levchin worked closely on a product that didn’t necessarily have immense amount of business value for Slide.

After my internship, I had huge takeways:

I wanted to start a company.

I knew grad school didn’t matter out in California

I grew a huge network at Slide who became some of my closest friends.

I learned smaller things like: git, python, vim, etc.

I could have never built Mixpanel without having been at Slide first.

Max Levchin ended up investing in our company during the recession - a time when it was hard to raise money.

At Mixpanel, we value our internship program because of this. Last year, we asked our interns to talk about their experiences: http://code.mixpanel.com/2011/11/15/internship-stories/

If you’re looking for similar experience, please apply for an internship by emailing: jobs@mixpanel.com with the subject “Internship”

Sincerely,

Suhail

Founder @ Mixpanel, Inc.

Far too many startups don’t have the resources for an internship program. Mostly, the missing link is a little creativity on what a 20 or 22-year old student can contribute over the course of a single summer. This is a solvable problem. :)

Market forces + jobs + competitiveness + giant corporation = huge win for marriage equality.

Tue, 24 Jan 2012 00:00:06 -0500

Microsoft and others are pushing to legalize gay marriage in Washington, arguing that this inequality makes the state less competitive:

As other states recognize marriage equality, Washington’s employers are at a disadvantage if we cannot offer a similar, inclusive environment to our talented employees, our top recruits and their families.

Win them over with markets – an awesome approach, IMO. While HRC and others are doing their best to push state-by-state adoption of marriage equality, Microsoft may have just found the magic ticket. Can you imagine voting against your state’s largest employers when they tell you how to create more local, high-tech jobs?

I’m excited.

"Every really good, really experienced CEO that I know shares one important characteristic: they tend..."

Thu, 19 Jan 2012 20:02:00 -0500

“Every really good, really experienced CEO that I know shares one important characteristic: they tend to opt for the hard answer to organizational issues. If faced with giving everyone the same bonus to make things easy or sharply rewarding performance and ruffling many feathers, they’ll ruffle the feathers. If given the choice of cutting a popular project today, because it’s not in the long-term plans or you’re keeping it around for morale purposes and to appear consistent, they’ll cut it today. Why? Because they’ve paid the price of management debt and they would rather not do that again.”

- Ben

I’ve definitely made this mistake – and learned from it. At breakfast this morning I just complemented Jack on some tough, decisive and quick decisions he’s made recently at Seat Geek.

brycedotvc: In the book I’m reading,The Talent Code, the author...

Thu, 19 Jan 2012 12:53:04 -0500

brycedotvc:

In the book I’m reading,The Talent Code, the author showcases a 1997 study which asked why some kids make massive performance progress when taking piano lessons and some do not.

After looking at a wide range of variables- IQ, aural sensitivity, math skills, rhythm, sensorimotor skills, income level- the researchers stumbled on an answer in a question they’d asked the children before they ever slid their stool to the keyboard.

The question? How long do you think you’ll play your new instrument?

As you can see in the graph above, the correlation between long-term commitment and pace of improvement were eye opening. From the book:

I couldn’t believe my eyes. Progress was not determined by any measurable aptitude or trait, but by a tiny powerful idea the child had before even starting lessons. The differences were staggering. With the same amount of practice the long-term-commitment group outperformed the short-term-commitment group by 400%. The long-term-commitment group with, with a mere 20 minutes of weekly practice, progressed faster than the short-termers who practiced for an hour and a half. When long-term-commitment combined with high levels of practice, skills skyrocketed.

As in piano, entrepreneurship sees its fair share of tourists. Toe dippers, looking for a thrill, occasionally take the plunge yet continue keeping an eye on that safe and inviting shoreline. Inevitably, they all swim back via quick flips, acqihires or giving up once they figure out that being a founder isn’t nearly as cool as they thought it would be.

And I don’t blame them. This startups stuff is hard on every level.

But there are a group of founders with a long-term commitment to practicing the skill of turning small companies into impactful businesses. And they made the decision, before they ever started or joined a company, that the path of entrepreneurship was for them.

This doesn’t mean they’ll never give up on their current idea. Nor, does it mean they won’t work within a large company. It means that the decisions they make and the experiences they accumulate will be feeding that long-term commitment to honing their craft as entrepreneurs.

PS- you can read the whole chapter this graph comes from here.

"Art history majors are so rare they’re lost in the noise. They account for less than 0.2 percent of..."

Fri, 06 Jan 2012 18:16:28 -0500

“Art history majors are so rare they’re lost in the noise. They account for less than 0.2 percent of working adults with college degrees, a number that is probably about right for recent graduates, too. Yet somehow art history has become the go-to example for people bemoaning the state of higher education.”

- How Art History Majors Power the U.S. Economy: Virginia Postrel - Bloomberg
I’m an art history major, and proud of it.

My parents cellar - they throw a great thanksgiving.

Thu, 24 Nov 2011 12:19:36 -0500

My parents cellar - they throw a great thanksgiving.

Evening commute.

Tue, 01 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0400

Evening commute.

Not Ugly Yak: My experience with Word Lens.

Tue, 08 Feb 2011 10:01:00 -0500

Not Ugly Yak: My experience with Word Lens.

Team Perpetually & loved ones at Startup Xmas!

Sun, 19 Dec 2010 00:00:00 -0500

Team Perpetually & loved ones at Startup Xmas!

A bunch of us are in Iceland for Stephen’s birthday!

Tue, 19 Oct 2010 19:33:00 -0400

A bunch of us are in Iceland for Stephen’s birthday!

This is an amazing time of year to look out my window.

Fri, 17 Sep 2010 18:58:57 -0400

This is an amazing time of year to look out my window.

New York City Demands More New Work City!

Fri, 02 Jul 2010 06:10:54 -0400

Tony, Peter and some of New York’s most dedicated freelancers, startups and small teams are building a thriving community, and it’s time to expand. Literally. New Work City started 18 months ago as a shared office for entrepreneurs, and has grown alongside New York’s tech scene ever since. Today they’re announcing an upgrade and new home in Tribeca. Personally, I’m ecstatic because I’ve been given the opportunity to personally contribute and help Perpetually at the same time.

New Work City 2.0 is already looking great. It’s a 5,000 square foot office space at 412 Broadway designed from the ground up for co-working. The lease has been signed and construction has begun. I’ve seen the raw space, I’ve seen the brick walls, I’ve seen the bay windows, I’ve seen the conference rooms. It’s awesome. Tony and Co. are putting their years of experience and connections to good use.

From Perpetually’s perspective, the deal is a great way to help the community that’s helped us grow, while also saving money. In exchange for a large percentage of the cash necessary to open the new space, I’ll own a few memberships until NWC has enough paying members to buy them back. Basically, Team Perpetually will pay $0 for rent — in Manhattan — for about a year.

New York City needs New Work City. While its success and growth prove the demand, NWC has only become a reality because of the vision and persistence of Tony, Peter and a cast of characters I love calling friends.

Demoing in front of 850 of our closest friends at NYTM was a...

Fri, 11 Jun 2010 20:47:00 -0400

Demoing in front of 850 of our closest friends at NYTM was a great time, and the response has been amazing! Thanks, everyone!

Awesome.

Wed, 09 Jun 2010 20:29:00 -0400

Awesome.

Traffic

Tue, 20 Apr 2010 13:09:57 -0400

Seth Godin’s Flipping The Funnel argues that your company shouldn’t be spending vast sums on advertising, but instead should “Turn your customers into salespeople.” Yeah, well — tell me more, obviously!

He writes,

Here’s a quick example. The chart at right compares Web traffic at Ford.com (which is supported by more than a hundred million dollars’ worth of advertising every year) with Squidoo.com, a brand new community-driven site. Squidoo is in blue.

It took a bit of research, but I found another way to look at this example. Squidoo is in blue:

Look Back (just this once)

Wed, 14 Apr 2010 15:01:00 -0400

I love talking with Kevin Prentiss — He spends as much time thinking about sales as I do thinking about software. I basically want to steal his brain and graft it onto my own.

ANYWAY, we both want to grow our companies more quickly, and we both sometimes think we haven’t achieved most anything just yet. But Kevin pointed out how myopic that perspective can be. While I grabbed a pen he quickly rattled off some startup milestones I’m all too quick to forget:

Had an Idea
Someone Cares
Built Team
Built Prototype
Built Product
Product Works!
Someone is Interested in Product
Someone is Using Your Product
Someone has Paid For Your Product
Team Can Sell Your Product
Multiple People Have Paid For Your Product
~~Predictable Sales~~

Oh, man, it’s been six months and boy do we have a long way to go (we’re nowhere near having predictable sales). I’m afraid to list out steps we have yet to reach: I’d never get back to work!

Prashant’s daughter made me the loveliest present ever!

Wed, 10 Mar 2010 14:48:00 -0500

Prashant’s daughter made me the loveliest present ever!

Stephen, Owen and twelve of our closest friends are just back...

Sun, 07 Mar 2010 10:33:00 -0500

Stephen, Owen and twelve of our closest friends are just back from Les Arcs! As a side note, it was interesting how productive I was with Perpetually because of France’s lack of good internet access.

Me & family on the men’s downhill course in Whistler...

Fri, 12 Feb 2010 00:00:00 -0500

Me & family on the men’s downhill course in Whistler over Christmas. Happy opening games!

Photo

Wed, 27 Jan 2010 08:21:50 -0500