Audiobooks by Brad Feld

Startup Opportunities: Know When to Quit Your Day Job, 2nd Edition

Start strong with essential early-stage guidance from the VC perspective Startup Opportunities is the go-to guide for anyone with a great business idea. Whether it's your first business or your fifth, realistic assessment from the outset can save you a lot of time and money; why pour your heart and soul into a venture that is doomed to fail? Instead, position yourself to win from the very beginning. In this book, accomplished venture capitalists share their insight on startups and entrepreneurs: who will fail, who will succeed and why, and what you should do to give your business the very best shot at becoming a global success story. You'll learn how to evaluate your business with a critical eye, and how early customer development can be key in turning a good idea into a great opportunity. If you're serious about building a business that lasts, this book provides invaluable guidance that you really cannot miss. More than five million people will launch a business this year, and many of them will be great ideas—yet few will be around in five years, and even fewer in ten years. A great idea is not enough to build a successful business. You need to fortify your idea with the proper foundation, and a scaffolding of good planning and early action. This book shows you how.

Brad Feld, Sean Wise (Author), Kyle Tait (Narrator)

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Startup Boards: A Field Guide to Building and Leading an Effective Board of Directors

A comprehensive guide on creating, growing, and leveraging a board of directors for CEOs, board members, and people seeking board roles. The first time many founders see the inside of a board room is when they step in to lead their board. But how do boards work? How should they be structured, managed, and leveraged so that startups can grow, avoid pitfalls, and get the best out of their boards? Authors Brad Feld, Mahendra Ramsinghani, and Matt Blumberg have collectively served on hundreds of startup and scaleup boards over the past 30 years, attended thousands of board meetings, encountered multiple personalities and situations, and seen the good, bad, and ugly of boards. In Startup Boards: A Field Guide to Building and Leading an Effective Board of Directors, the authors provide seasoned advice and guidance to CEOs, board members, investors, and anyone aspiring to serve on a board. This comprehensive audiobook covers a wide range of topics with relevant tips, tactics, and best practices, including: - Board fundamentals such as the board's purpose, legal characteristics, and roles and functions of board members. - Creating a board including size, composition, roles of VCs and independent directors, what to look for in a director, and how to recruit directors. - Compensating, onboarding, removing directors, and suggestions on building a diverse board. - Preparing for and running board meetings. - The board's role in transactions including selling a company, buying a company, going public, and going out of business. - Advice for independent and aspiring directors. Startup Boards draws on the authors' experience and includes stories from board members, startup founders, executives, and investors. Any CEO, board member, investor, or executive interested in creating an active, involved, and engaged board should listen to this audiobook—and keep it handy for reference. Produced and published by Echo Point Books & Media, an independent bookseller in Brattleboro, Vermont. ©2022 Brad Feld, Matt Blumberg, and Mahendra Ramsinghani (P)2023 Echo Point Books & Media, LLC

Brad Feld, Matt Blumberg (Author), Scott R. Pollak (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Entrepreneur’s Weekly Nietzsche: A Book for Disruptors

FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE—PATRON PHILOSOPHER OF TODAY’S DISRUPTIVE ENTREPRENEURS His favorite personality was a “free spirit”: an obsessed individual with a vision of the future and the will to make it so, a rebel who creates the future with childlike enthusiasm. Now, serial entrepreneur Dave Jilk and venture capitalist Brad Feld extract from Nietzsche a modern Art of War, connecting the dots to our high-tech business environment. Each quick, digestible chapter expands on a quote from Nietzsche to stimulate your thinking about a vital aspect of entrepreneurship, and stories from entrepreneurs help make the ideas concrete. Understand why hitting bottom might be the best thing that can happen, how your firm’s “artistic style” can align your organization, and the role obsession plays in your success—and your definition of it. Glean insight and inspiration from every page of this surprising, approachable gem.

Brad Feld, Dave Jilk (Author), Jane Oppenheimer, Paul Bellantoni (Narrator)

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Startup Boards: Getting the Most Out of Your Board of Directors

By far, the best way to make sure you have an awesome board is to start by having awesome Board members. In Startup Boards, Brad Feld talks about how having awesome Board members is managing them well giving transparent information, well organized, with enough lead time before a meeting; running great and engaging meetings; mixing social time with business time; and being a Board member yourself at some other organization so you see the other side of the equation. Its about taking the process of choosing Board Members seriously, interviewing many people, checking references, and remembering that there should be no fear in rejecting a wrong fit.

Brad Feld, Mahendra Ramsinghani (Author), Tavia Gilbert (Narrator)

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Como cerrar rondas de financiacion con exito (Venture Deals 2nd Edition): una guia practica para ope

A medida que cada nueva generación de emprendedores emerge, existe un renovado interés en cómo se unen los acuerdos de capital de riesgo. Sin embargo, realmente no hay una guía definitiva para los acuerdos de capital de riesgo. Nadie entiende esto mejor que los autores Brad Feld y Jason Mendelson. Durante más de diecisiete años, han estado involucrados en cientos de financiamientos de capital de riesgo, y ahora, con Venture Deals, comparten sus experiencias en este campo con usted. Inspirado en una serie de entradas de blog - creadas por los autores después de un acuerdo particularmente desafiante - este recurso confiable desmitifica el proceso de financiación de capital de riesgo y le ayuda a obtener una perspectiva práctica de esta disciplina dinámica. Ya seas un empresario, capitalista de riesgo o abogado experimentado o aspirante que participe en este tipo de acuerdos en particular, puedes beneficiarte de las ideas que se encuentran a lo largo de este libro. Atractivo e informativo, Venture Deals describe hábilmente los elementos esenciales de la hoja de términos de capital de riesgo, desde términos relacionados con la economía hasta términos relacionados con el control. Feld y Mendelson se esfuerzan por dar una visión equilibrada de los términos particulares junto con las estrategias para llegar a un acuerdo justo. Además de examinar las tuercas y tornillos de la hoja de términos, Venture Deals también le presenta a los diversos participantes en el proceso, analiza cómo funciona la recaudación de fondos, revela cómo operan las empresas de capital de riesgo y describe cómo aplicar diferentes tácticas de negociación a sus acuerdos. También obtendrá información valiosa sobre varios problemas legales comunes a los que se enfrentan la mayoría de las startups y, como bonificación, descubrirá cómo es una carta de intención típica para adquirir su empresa.

Brad Feld, Jason Mendelson (Author), Luis Carlos, Luis Carlos De La Lombana (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Startup Community Way: Evolving an Entrepreneurial Ecosystem

We are in the midst of a startup revolution. The growth and proliferation of innovation-driven startup activity is profound, unprecedented, and global in scope. Today, it is understood that communities of support and knowledge-sharing go along with other resources. The importance of collaboration and a long-term commitment has gained wider acceptance. These principles are adopted in many startup communities throughout the world. And yet, much more work is needed. Startup activity is highly concentrated in large cities. Governments and other actors such as large corporations and universities are not collaborating with each other nor with entrepreneurs as well as they could. Too often, these actors try to control activity or impose their view from the top-down, rather than supporting an environment that is led from the bottom-up. We continue to see a disconnect between an entrepreneurial mindset and that of many actors who wish to engage with and support entrepreneurship. There are structural reasons for this, but we can overcome many of these obstacles with appropriate focus and sustained practice. No one tells this story better than Brad Feld and Ian Hathaway. The Startup Community Way explores what makes startup communities thrive and how to improve collaboration in these rapidly evolving, complex environments.

Brad Feld, Ian Hathaway (Author), Mike Lenz (Narrator)

Audiobook

Startup Communities: Building an Entrepreneurial Ecosystem in Your City, 2nd edition

First published in 2012, Startup Communities became a blueprint for what it takes to build a supportive entrepreneurial community. Now regarded as a classic, the 'Boulder Thesis' created and popularized by Feld within the book generated enormous media attention nearly a decade ago. At that time, Boulder was an emerging startup laboratory-a hub of innovation building new tech businesses. It quickly accelerated into a world-class ecosystem for entrepreneurs. Boulder's entrepreneurial density, combined with the geographic concentration of entrepreneurial activity around the Boulder downtown core, made it a hotbed of startup activity. Thanks in part to the book, what happens in Boulder now leaves Boulder. Rapidly growing startup communities in Atlanta, Detroit, Denver, Kansas City, Nashville, and Indianapolis are just a few examples. Startup communities continue to pop up across the US and around the world, prompting fresh new revelations and stories from Feld about what's happened over the last decade. Startup Communities 2nd Edition describes what makes a startup community ecosystem first click, then hum, and in time, excel. The book also discusses the necessary dynamics and pre-conditions of building communities of entrepreneurs who can feed off each other's talent, creativity, and support.

Brad Feld (Author), Mike Lenz (Narrator)

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Do More Faster India: Techstars Lessons to Accelerate Your Startup, 2nd Edition

David Cohen, cofounder and managing partner of Techstars, and Brad Feld, cofounder of Techstars and managing partner of Foundry Group, team up to focus on the rapidly expanding Indian marketplace, bringing their years of shared experience to entrepreneurs, investors, and community ecosystem developers. Do More Faster India educates listeners on all the major areas of creating, developing, and supercharging a young startup with a focus on the nuances of the Indian market and how Techstars is fostering new business opportunities in India. Each chapter is written by a different mentor or founder involved with the Techstars program and provides a unique perspective on the seven themes at the core of the Techstars mission: Ideas and Vision, People, Working Effectively, Product, Fundraising, Legal and Structure, and Work and Life Harmony. With a renewed focus on one of the most influential emerging markets in the world, Do More Faster India includes chapters written by Indian entrepreneurs and dedicated to India-specific topics and culture, as well as how Techstars fits into and serves the increasingly powerful Indian audience.

Brad Feld, David Cohen (Author), Adam Lofbomm, Edward Bauer (Narrator)

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Startup Life: Surviving and Thriving in a Relationship with an Entrepreneur

Startup people lead very intensely rewarding lives but time is always short and relationships are often long-distant and stressed because of long periods apart. Coping and adopting are critical for any entrepreneur and their partners. Brad Feld shares his own personal experiences with his wife Amy offering a series of rich insights into successfully leading a balanced life as a human being who wants to play as hard as he works and who wants to be as fulfilled in life and in work. In this book, Brad Feld addresses how the village of Startup people can put aside their workaholic ways and lead rewarding lives in all respects.

Amy Batchelor, Brad Feld (Author), Brad Feld (Narrator)

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Venture Deals, 4th Edition: Be Smarter than Your Lawyer and Venture Capitalist

How do venture capital deals come together? This is one of the most frequent questions asked by each generation of new entrepreneurs. Surprisingly, there is little reliable information on the subject. No one understands this better than Brad Feld and Jason Mendelson. The founders and driving force behind the Foundry Group-a venture capital firm focused on investing in early-stage information technology companies-Brad and Jason have been involved in hundreds of venture capital financings. Their investments range from small startups to large Series A venture financing rounds. The new edition of Venture Deals continues to show fledgling entrepreneurs the inner-workings of the VC process, from the venture capital term sheet and effective negotiating strategies to the initial seed and the later stages of development. Fully updated to reflect the intricacies of startups and entrepreneurship in today's dynamic economic environment, this new edition includes revisions and updates to coverage on negotiating, gender issues, ICO's, and economic terms. New chapters examine legal and procedural considerations relevant to fundraising, bank debt, equity and convertible debt, how to hire an investment banker to sell a company, and more.

Brad Feld, Jason Mendelson (Author), Barry Abrams (Narrator)

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Do More Faster: TechStars Lessons to Accelerate Your Startup 2nd Edition

Refreshed, updated, and expanded. Do More Faster provides time-tested advice, tips, and experiences by founders and mentors of Techstars to help entrepreneurs succeed! David Cohen and Brad Feld, leading advocates for entrepreneurs and startups, team up to provide first-time entrepreneurs with the tools, insights, and experiences to help them do more faster. The authors share their decades of experience working with thousands of startup founders and have enlisted the advice of dozens of Techstars startup founders and mentors. Contributors include Tim Ferriss, Eric Ries, Matt Mullenweg (WordPress), Isaac Saldana (SendGrid), and other successful entrepreneurs. Cofounders of Techstars, the worldwide network that helps entrepreneurs succeed, Cohen and Feld recognize the daunting task of creating a sustainable business and have seen first-hand the common mistakes first-time entrepreneurs make over and over. The authors take the complexity and uncertainty of starting a business and distill the critical factors into seven themes: Ideas and Vision, People, Working Effectively, Product, Fundraising, Legal and Structure, and Work and Life Harmony. They share their hard-won successes, failures, and advice for anyone with an idea who wants to create a business.

Brad Feld, David Cohen (Author), Edward Bauer (Narrator)

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Do More Faster: TechStars Lessons to Accelerate Your Startup

It is a cold, hard fact of business life that most startups fail. Even many of those entrepreneurs who ultimately succeed have stories of personal challenges, unsuccessful companies, and difficulties along the way. The founders of TechStars, a mentorship-driven startup accelerator, have worked with entrepreneurs and companies over the past twenty-five years, and have seen a number of the same issues come up again and again. In Do More Faster, the founders of TechStars identify the key issues that first-time entrepreneurs encounter, and offer proven advice from successful entrepreneurs who have worked with the TechStars program. The authors organize the most critical issues into seven themes: Idea and Vision, People, Execution, Product, Fundraising, Legal and Structure, and Work and Life Balance. Many of the examples are personal experiences from the entrepreneurs themselves, integrated into a cohesive narrative-while at the same time able to stand on their own. Throughout the book, they debunk numerous myths about startups and reveal some surprising truths. They explain, for instance, that the core of a startup is not always a world-changing and earth-shattering idea-in fact, it is often the case that successful startups started out doing something else. They also underscore the efficiency of execution: great entrepreneurs know how to synthesize data, make a decision about the path they are going down, and execute. And they offer some alternatives to traditional ways of raising money, while stressing that you shouldn't start with the assumption that you need to raise money. Mastering the seven themes may not ensure success, but understanding the issues, reading the stories, and getting advice pertaining to these issues will increase your chances dramatically. And if nothing else, you'll realize that you aren't alone in facing these challenges.

Brad Feld, David Cohen (Author), Sean Pratt (Narrator)

Audiobook