The Startup Operator

Kushal is the CEO of First Cheque - a venture capital firm investing in early-stage startups.  He started his career by founding Nayi Disha to build motion-based educational games for kindergartners. Kushal transitioned from a founder to an operator in 2015 and was then a part of upGrad’s early core team building key corporate partnerships.  In this episode, we talk to Kushal on what it's like to...

Marketers have had a rough time in this market. It's an understatement to say things have changed! Joining us today is Ashwin S L, who heads Marketing at MoEngage Inc., about how his team is adapting to this new paradigm, what are the strategies to experiment with to generate new leads, and how internal and external communications are changing. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/startu...

Co-Founder and CEO of Rocketium - Satej Sirur started his career with the likes of Microsoft and Amazon, and then later transitioned to head product & strategy for Taxi for Sure. He was the youngest member of the executive team until TaxiForSure's $200M acquisition in 2015. In this episode, he talks about his journey of transitioning from enterprise to a startup,  modeling consumer behaviors throu...

Nikhil Kumar, Co-Founder and Chief Evangelist of Setu, started his career building the partner ecosystem at Tally. Featured in Forbes 30 under 30, he has been instrumental in building the India stack - UPI payment interface that processes over $19 Billion in a month and e-KYC through Aadhaar. In this episode, he talks about how startups can build direct and indirect distribution channels, and what...

In today's weekend special, we are in conversation with Harish Vaidyanathan, SVP - Product for Vymo. No matter who is in the room, Harish is always the youngest because of his unmatched enthusiasm and wit. In this episode, Harish shares his stories of what it was like transitioning from a tech-giant such Microsoft to a fast-growing startup - Vymo, building a product function from scratch, negotiat...

Welcome to our weekend special, where we interview top startup operators and get first-hand insights on what it takes to execute and innovate, and vice versa! In this weekend special, we have with us Kunaal Majgaonkar, who manages media at Bengaluru FC. In this episode, he takes us behind the scenes at BFC and shares stories of what it was like building a passion-driven community from the scratch,...

Welcome to our weekend special, where we interview top startup operators and get first-hand insights on what it takes to execute and innovate, and vice versa! Joining us today in conversation is Neil Dave, who leads product at TapChief. In this episode, he shares his stories from the founding days of the startup and what was it like building a company from a college dorm room, how the focus kept e...

Most startups bias towards sales and product in the early days. It’s right for leadership to invest most of their time and energy into enabling the first few successful sales reps or working with product teams building product, of course. But, soon enough this isn’t the best use of Leadership time and any additional effort only gives a marginal increase in gains. If you want your sales to extend b...

The perfect employee fallacy goes like this - if a person on the team is fantastic at something, but lacking in other areas, we should enable him/her to improve on his/her weaknesses and measure progress on that basis.  But, only a machine capable of producing reliable, quality work through all of those good characteristics. And humans are not machines. They have their natural proclivities and ten...

Something we should beware of as operators and entrepreneurs is being under-leveraged when this crisis passes over eventually. One of the things that happen during these times is an increased focus on conserving capital. You comb through every line item of expense. But if you don’t continue to invest in your growth now, will you be able to capture the opportunities that'll come tomorrow? --- Send...

Most people become managers like most people become parents - incidentally.  Similarly, as soon as you have a few people reporting to you, you are now a newly minted manager whose responsibility it is to align them into valuable contributors to the enterprise.  It may not be as complicated as parenting, but being a manager does involve well-thought-out, deliberate choices. --- Send in a voice mess...

Welcome to our weekend special, where we interview top startup operators and get first-hand insights on what it takes to execute and innovate, and vice versa! Today, we have a special interview with Devaiah Bopanna, who is the former Head Writer at All India Bakchod (AIB), and Co-founder of All Things Small. In this episode, he shares stories on how he got started with AIB, tips on producing creat...

Welcome to our first weekend special, where we interview top startup operators and get first-hand insights on what it takes to execute and innovate, and vice versa! Pritam is currently leading strategic growth for one of India's most well-known fintech startups - Cred. He has been a part of multiple 0 to 1 journeys in his career, both in B2B and B2C side of things. Today, we'll be talking about th...

The greatest temptation as a leader is to just do it all yourself. And it's an alluring thought - because, you can hold yourself to the expected standards without any dependencies. But, if you have to do something meaningful over a period of time - you have to be the sort of person who can attract the right people and then enable them to do good. In this episode, we talk about how you shouldn’t ha...

There are few things as exhilarating as an upward trending graph. Really, sometimes you could just sit back and watch those metrics soar. But, as much fun as that is, you will have to revisit your metrics ever so often. Especially, if you’re growing fast enough. In this episode, we'll be talking about metrics and why you should revise them as often as possible. --- Send in a voice message: https:/...

Vinod Khosla is quoted as saying who you seek advice from is perhaps the most important thing for an entrepreneur. It also applies to Operators, too. You’re out there executing - you could use some help. But, it’s important you ask the right person and apply it the right way for it to be really helpful. If you’re not careful, it might actually do you harm. Here are some principles in seeking sound...

Emails are important. Your inbox is a repository for recorded communication. But, it's also someone else's to-do list on your plate. How much time you spend in your inbox a day inversely translates to how much of your time you are spending on your own work. In today's episode, we share a few tips on when, and how to prioritize your emails, and more importantly, when not to.  --- Send in a voice me...

We worry too much - even for a lot of things that aren't in our direct control. And if you're a startup operator, it is very easy to get carried away from your goals and start obsessing over what your competitors are doing. But, you shouldn't completely ignore them either. In today’s episode, we’re going to talk about how much you should think about competition. --- Send in a voice message: https:...

A founder’s time is limited. He or she has multiple things to think about. It’s incumbent on you to be as productive as possible and make the most of whatever little time you get. Here are four things you should stop doing right away. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/startup-operator/message

Execution and strategy need to go hand in hand in a high growth startup. And, you cannot have a bias towards one. The rule of thumb is to constantly iterate on your strategy and execution, till your outcome becomes incidental. But how do you drive predictability in your work? In this episode, I talk about the most important attribute one needs to have to succeed at startups. --- Send in a voice me...

Strategy shouldn't be a 4-letter word in a startup. In this episode,  understand how to prioritize strategies and tactics to achieve your short-term, and long-term goals. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/startup-operator/message