Pattern Breakers

Immad Akhund: How Mercury Saved The Day For Startups

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 16 Mar 2026 07:00:00 +0000

When Silicon Valley Bank collapsed over 48 hours in March 2023, it marked the third-largest bank failure in United States history and the largest since the 2008 financial crisis. But the fintech company Mercury was willing and ready to save the day for startups in need, landing $2 billion in new deposits in five days. That's what it looks like when a founder who thinks about a problem all the time is ready to seize the moment when it arrives.

In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr. of Floodgate speaks with Mercury co-founder and CEO Immad Akhund about why more than 200,000 of the world's most ambitious companies trust Mercury with their money, and why the company’s success was no accident. A prolific angel investor with a history of backing more than 350 startups including Ripple, Airtable, and Substack, Akhund had been living inside the startup ecosystem for years, and knew firsthand all about the challenges founders faced with banking. “In some ways the idea seems obvious to me,” Akhund says. “There’s no reason banking has to be broken.”

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Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books.

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John Zimmer: Pink Mustaches, Rideshare Wars, and the Legacy of Lyft

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 9 Feb 2026 08:00:00 +0000

Lyft co-founder John Zimmer helped spark a movement to revolutionize transportation, but the road was never a smooth one. Zimmer and co-founder Logan Green had to outmaneuver entrenched taxi monopolies and rewrite the rules of urban mobility on the fly, all while scaling a business model that many experts insisted was a logistical impossibility and battling Uber co-founder Travis Kalanick for market supremacy. In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr. of Floodgate speaks with Zimmer about a variety of different essential lessons from Lyft’s journey, including his ability to spot anomalies and create a genuine breakthrough. They also discuss the origins of and strategy behind Lyft’s iconic pink mustache logo, how Uber operatives tried to bring Lyft down, and why he’s always taken the answer “no” as an invite for a conversation. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Spenser Skates: How Perseverance Paid Off for Amplitude

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 5 Jan 2026 08:00:00 +0000

When Amplitude launched in 2012, the analytics market looked crowded, and the company spent more than a year struggling to find any traction. But co-founder and CEO Spenser Skates prioritized truth seeking over narratives. He studied the outcomes of past Y Combinator batches and noticed a simple rule: Most companies died before they even learned enough to make something that people want. All Amplitude had to do was survive.

In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr. of Floodgate speaks with Skates about that crucial realization and how his company preserved through its first two years on the map, why he’s never been afraid of failure, Amplitude’s surprising early adopters, the value of learning sales skills, and how he tries to raise the bar for the company even higher amid all of its success.

Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike.

Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books.

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Wade Foster: Why Zapier is Built for the AI Revolution

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Tue, 18 Nov 2025 17:00:00 +0000

When Wade Foster was a kid growing up in Jefferson City, Missouri, there weren’t many models for how to carve out a career in entrepreneurship. But when he and his friend Bryan Helmig developed an easier way to help users connect web-based applications, they ushered in what would eventually become Zapier, a remote automation giant that’s now worth an estimated $5 billion and is ideally positioned for the AI era. In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr. of Floodgate speaks with Foster about his early days in Missouri and his first impressions of Silicon Valley, the concept of seed-strapping and how the company has thrived despite raising just $1.3 million, the importance of making constant contact with reality, and why Zapier is the perfect model for how to build a large-scale company while challenging virtually every part of the conventional wisdom. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Howie Liu: Building Airtable to Feel Magical

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 29 Sep 2025 12:50:50 +0000

Spreadsheets were originally designed for finance people. But when Howie Liu and his co-founders started Airtable in 2012, they had a deeper insight that a spreadsheet-database hybrid could be used by anyone for just about anything, including project management, content calendars, recipes, and even travel itineraries. Now the company is valued at an estimated $4 billion, and it’s a prime example of why showing a real difference with your product is vital for achieving breakthrough success. In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr. of Floodgate speaks with Liu about the original idea behind Airtable and the company’s early days of development, as well as why it took the company roughly two years to release a product to the public. They also discuss the value of visual metaphors and magical capabilities and how they helped Airtable differentiate from competitors in the market, as well as how Airtable is preparing for the future of AI. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Joe Liemandt: The AI-Powered School Rewriting the Future of Education

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Tue, 9 Sep 2025 14:00:00 +0000

Long before he attended Stanford, founded software giant Trilogy, or became the youngest member of the Forbes 400, Joe Liemandt wrote a high school paper about the potential for a futuristic technology called Artificial Intelligence. Four decades later Liemandt sits in the principal’s chair at Alpha School, an AI-powered private school founded in Austin, Texas with a revolutionary approach to learning and ambitious plans for the future. In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr. of Floodgate speaks with Liemandt about what an average school day looks like at Alpha School, why kids can still excel with just two hours of focused academics per day, how the school teaches grit and self-confidence, what he’s looking for from pattern-breaking entrepreneurs eager to join his team, and what it was like to be stuck in an elevator with Maples, his college roommate at Stanford. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Mårten Mickos: Essential Lessons From A Legendary Tech CEO

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 25 Aug 2025 07:00:00 +0000

Mårten Mickos isn't the kind of CEO who tries to dream up world-changing ideas or invent brand new markets. Perhaps best known for leading MySQL to becoming a $1 billion success story that powered Facebook, Google, and YouTube, Mickos also led teams at Eucalyptus and HackerOne and has consistently shown an ability to convert the potential energy of an idea into the kinetic energy of execution. In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr. of Floodgate speaks with Mickos about the essential lessons he’s learned from being a CEO, the importance of developing curiosity in the startup world, and why it’s essential to know your genius, own your gaps, and surround yourself with people who carry the tools you don't. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Eric Schmidt: The Implications of Superintelligence

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 4 Aug 2025 07:00:00 +0000

Best known as the CEO who helped transform Google from a promising startup into one of the best businesses in human history, Eric Schmidt has recently become one of the most important voices in the global conversation about artificial intelligence. He’s co-written two books on the subject including the New York Times bestseller Genesis: Artificial Intelligence, Hope, and the Human Spirit, co-written with longtime friend Henry Kissinger. He goes beyond examining what AI can do, and asks larger questions about the implications on human judgment, dignity, diplomacy, and democracy when intelligence is decoupled from morality.

In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr. of Floodgate speaks with Schmidt about how AI is transforming human agency, global stability, and the very nature of innovation, from personal super intelligence to geopolitical risk. The conversation dives deep into the moral, philosophical, and strategic stakes of AI's rise, and what it means for the future of humanity.

Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike.

Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books.

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Pedro Franceschi: Lessons from an Evolving Entrepreneur, from Hacking iPhones to Building Brex

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 30 Jun 2025 07:00:00 +0000

At just 13 years of age, Pedro Franceschi was one of the first to jailbreak the iPhone. By the time he was 15 he had co-founded a payments company that would process over a billion in transactions. And by the time he was in his early 20s, helped transform a last minute YC pivot into Brex, one of the most iconic fintech breakout stories of the decade. In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr. of Floodgate speaks with Franceschi about how he made headlines and found startup success in his native Brazil, why he traded it in for stints at Stanford and YC, how mental burnout can destroy a business, and why adaptive flexibility can be a vital founder superpower, if you build it like a muscle with practice, commitment and time. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Mitchell Hashimoto: How Solving His Own Problem Sparked HashiCorp

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 16 Jun 2025 07:00:00 +0000

The most successful founders don't usually chase startup ideas. Instead, they're pulled toward problems they can't ignore. Back in 2009, Mitchell Hashimoto set out to fix what frustrated him by hacking nights and weekends, open sourcing the tools he wished had existed for over a year. His quiet persistence and commitment to fixing the problem ignited one of the decade's most influential cloud companies: HashiCorp. In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr. of Floodgate speaks with Hashimoto about those early days, building Vagrant to streamline dev setup, the dawn of HashiCorp, and the tough decisions Hashimoto faced when hiring a CEO and deciding if he should sell the company he built from scratch. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Jake Knapp: The Founder’s Guide to Product-Market Fit

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 5 May 2025 07:00:00 +0000

For startups in the zero to one phase, finding product-market fit isn't everything. It’s the only thing. And there are few people in the entrepreneurial world better at solving the product-market fit puzzle than Jake Knapp, who helped build Microsoft Encarta and Gmail, co-founded Google Meet, and has advised teams at Miro, Slack, LEGO and NASA on product strategy and time management. Knapp also wrote the New York Times bestseller Sprint, and he’s a guest instructor at Harvard Business School. In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr. of Floodgate dives into the details of Knapp’s new book Click, which helps founders figure out who your customer is, what problem they have, how your idea stands out, and how to test your idea quickly to see if it really works. The book offers 12 important lessons, a step-by-step playbook, and memorable stories from Nike, Microsoft, Google, and Slack, and helps founders to stop guessing and start building something people truly need. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Amjad Masad: Resolve, Persistence, and the Rise of Replit

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Tue, 15 Apr 2025 07:00:00 +0000

Amjad Masad's journey is defined by relentless persistence. Born and raised in Jordan, he borrowed computers to teach himself coding, and then earned money building software for local internet cafes. He applied to Y Combinator again and again, finally gaining acceptance on his fourth try. His constant drive fueled continuous improvement, culminating in the breakthrough success of Replit, the $1.1B company focused on empowering the next billion software creators.

In this wide-ranging episode, Mike Maples, Jr. of Floodgate speaks with Masad about his journey from Jordan to Silicon Valley and the early days of Replit, how he always focused on figuring out the future of technology, the reasons some founders simply feel born to succeed, and why the 1997 book The Sovereign Individual resonates so loudly today.

Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike.

Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books.

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Aaron Levie: The Restless Founder Plotting the Future of Cloud Storage and AI

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 31 Mar 2025 07:00:00 +0000

When the team behind Box first went looking for funding back in 2005, they tried just about every trick in the book. They sent Bill Gates a fax. They dropped a prospectus off at Paul Allen’s house in Seattle. And they took a shot at convincing Mark Cuban to join two ambitious college kids with a hunch the way businesses stored and collaborated around information was about to change. Two decades later Box is a cornerstone of the cloud era with $1 Billion in revenue, but co-founder and CEO Aaron Levie is as restless as ever. In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr. of Floodgate speaks with Levie about how he started Box when he was still in college at USC, why it’s fatal for startups to hire sales reps too slowly, and how he’s personally leading the way as the company looks to reinvent itself in the era of AI. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Guillermo Rauch: The Product Visionary Fueling Vercel and Millions of Developers

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 17 Mar 2025 07:00:00 +0000

Guillermo Rauch didn’t find success by accident. He began working on computers as a kid growing up in Argentina and was hooked immediately, eventually falling in love with programming and open source before moving to Silicon Valley. Since then his blend of technical foresight, audacious ambition and obsessive attention to detail in products has made him the successful CEO of Vercel, the cloud platform service company used by over a million developers each month, from small companies to tech giants like Netflix and Scale AI. In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr. of Floodgate speaks with Rauch about his early days as a programmer and connecting to open source community, the origins of his wildly popular blog post “7 Principles of Rich Web Applications” and how it led to founding Vercel, the importance for founders in telling their individual stories, and his thoughts on AI and how it will change the future of software development. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Zach Perret: The Survival Story of a Fintech Giant

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Tue, 25 Feb 2025 13:43:32 +0000

Long before Plaid became a $13.4 billion fintech juggernaut, it was just another struggling startup. Co-founders Zach Perret and William Hockey burned through cash and pivoted from one failed idea to the next, ultimately getting turned away by roughly 100 VCs during seed round funding. But Plaid persevered, and eventually revolutionized how financial data moved through the internet, eventually boasting customers like Robinhood, Coinbase and Venmo. In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr. of Floodgate speaks with Perret about the company’s austere early days, convincing the banking industry to change its legacy ways, the concept of lighthouse customers, and why every day your startup lives, you get another chance to find greatness. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Baiju Bhatt: First Robinhood, Next …. Outer Space?

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Tue, 28 Jan 2025 08:00:00 +0000

As the co-founder of Robinhood, Baiju Bhatt didn't just help launch a company. He sparked a movement that fundamentally shifted the dynamics of investing, and created a new path for everyday people to participate in the markets. But can the man who changed the way people think about money do the same for energy? In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr. of Floodgate speaks with Bhatt about the origins of Robinhood and how hands-on research in the Stanford cafeteria helped the company find product-market fit, and how Bhatt’s new renewable energy company Aetherflux could make science fiction ideas a reality. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Josh Reeves: How Gusto Took The Pain Out Of Payroll

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 16 Dec 2024 08:00:00 +0000

When Josh Reeves, Tomer London and Edward Kim founded Gusto in 2012, roughly 40 percent of the employers in the United States were still doing their payroll by hand. Thousands of small business owners spent their time reading up on various federal and local tax codes or buried in late-night paperwork, drained of the energy to truly chase their dreams. In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr. of Floodgate speaks with Reeves about how Gusto identified pain points for small business founders everywhere, what it took to turn payroll from a grind into a tool that freed entrepreneurs to focus on what truly matters, and what he’s learned as the CEO of a revolutionary $9.5B software company. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lesson: RIP To Old-School Marketing

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 7 Oct 2024 07:00:00 +0000

Most startups stick to traditional methods of getting their message out. Pattern Breakers, however, don't follow the old rules of marketing. Instead they ignite a movement where they ultimately rise to the top, uncontested, while others later scramble for the leftovers. In this Breakthrough Lesson, Mike Maples Jr. of Floodgate examines three lessons learned from the recent viral breakout of the educational technology company Mentava, and why true Pattern Breakers don’t depend on the media or outside voices to shape their narrative. Instead, they speak for themselves, directly and boldly, telling the world their story in their own words. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Niels Hoven: Teaching Two Year-Olds to Read Like Second Graders

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 23 Sep 2024 07:00:00 +0000

The team behind the educational technology company Mentava is a small one, but its product idea is extremely ambitious: An app that teaches two year-olds to read at a second grade level. The idea is the brainchild of founder Niels Hoven, a father of four committed to accelerating K-12 education and helping high-achieving kids reach their true potential. In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr. of Floodgate speaks with Hoven about the origins of Mentava, how one very online critic gave the company an unexpected sales boost, and why Hoven has found himself engaged in a much bigger story about the shared and growing frustration with the cult of lower standards in education. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Daphne Koller: Changing Lives With Coursera

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 5 Aug 2024 07:00:00 +0000

Few startup founders follow a path to success like Daphne Koller, a polymath whose academic career in machine learning, computer vision, and computational biology make her a force far beyond the business arena. Koller left her academic career at Stanford in 2012 to co-found Coursera, the world’s largest platform for massive open online courses (MOOCs). After building the company into a global phenomenon she left Coursera in 2016 to become chief computing officer at Calico, and in 2018 she founded insitro, a drug discovery startup. In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr. of Floodgate talks with Koller about the origins of Coursera and the challenges the company faced in its early days, as well as its lasting impact for learners worldwide. She also discusses what she sees in the future for insitro and why she believes so strongly in machine learning-driven drug discovery and development.

Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike.

Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books.

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Pattern Breakers: Which Startups Change the Future?

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 29 Jul 2024 07:00:00 +0000

On this special episode of Pattern Breakers, host Mike Maples Jr. of Floodgate joins LinkedIn founder and legendary investor Reid Hoffman for a conversation on Hoffman’s podcast Masters of Scale, where iconic business leaders share lessons and strategies that have helped them grow the world's most fascinating companies. Mike discusses the insights he’s gathered from decades of investing, inflection theory, what the latest AI sea change means for the future of business, and ideas from his new national bestselling book, Pattern Breakers.

This episode originally aired on the Masters of Scale podcast.

Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike.

Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books.

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A Sneak Peek at Pattern Breakers

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Tue, 9 Jul 2024 07:00:00 +0000

Today is a huge day for Pattern Breakers, the book.

Co-written with Peter Zeibelman of the Stanford Graduate School of Business, Pattern Breakers has been dubbed “the most important start-up book of the last ten years” by legendary entrepreneur and co-creator of the Lean Startup movement Steve Blank. Pattern Breakers draws from decades of experience in entrepreneurship and venture capital from its co-authors to offer a radical set of new ideas for how entrepreneurs, investors, and corporate leaders can dominate the future.

Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike.

Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books.

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Maddie Hall: A Different Path to the Future

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 1 Jul 2024 07:00:00 +0000

There is no single path to becoming the founder of a pattern-breaking startup. For Maddie Hall, her journey began with a crucial choice: to brainstorm startup ideas or to spend time with people already shaping the future. She chose the latter, following Sam Altman at OpenAI as his Chief of Staff. This experience, along with the connections and knowledge she gained, inspired her to co-found Living Carbon. Her startup offers "supertrees" that grow faster, produce harder wood, and absorb more carbon from the atmosphere. In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr. of Floodgate talks with Hall about her career path and how her decisions led her to start Living Carbon, where she is driven by the urgency of addressing the climate crisis.

Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike.

Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books.

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Breakthrough Lessons: Founder-Future Fit

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 24 Jun 2024 07:00:00 +0000

Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike.

Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books.

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Justin Kan: Pattern Breaker Personified

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 10 Jun 2024 07:00:00 +0000

If pattern breaker was a term in the dictionary, you just might find an image of Justin Kan. From his attempts as a teenager to send a camera to outer space, to selling his first company on Ebay, to strapping a camera to his head to play the starring role on Justin.tv, Kan has always been a man with uncommon ideas and the ability to convince people to follow his lead. On this episode, Mike Maples, Jr. of Floodgate speaks with Kan about the runaway success of Twitch, but also his fear of scarcity, chasing extrinsic goals, and what he learned from his setbacks at Atrium, where he served as founding CEO.

Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike.

Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books.

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Breakthrough Lessons: The Value of a Superbuilder

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 3 Jun 2024 07:00:00 +0000

In the early days of a start-up, the superbuilder can be as important to greatness as the start-up leader, and they’re often not the same person. But what are the traits of a great superbuilder, and why do they play such a crucial role in the zero to one phase of a company? In this Breakthrough Lesson, Mike Maples, Jr of Floodgate discusses the success of superbuilder Kyle Vogt and how his ingenuity saved Justin.tv, as well as how superbuilders help a startup tackle adversity and attract greatness to the team.

Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike.

Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books.

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Kyle Vogt: A Problem Solver With A Purpose

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 27 May 2024 07:00:00 +0000

Kyle Vogt has always been fascinated with designing robots and machines. From his youngest days, he retrofitted his father's car to drive itself along the highways of his home state of Kansas. Later, he dropped out of MIT and became a wildly successful startup founder, playing a crucial role in the development of Justin.tv and Twitch. With Cruise Automation, he returned to his roots, making robotaxis a reality rather than science fiction. In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr. of Floodgate speaks with Vogt about his career and the lessons learned from a lifetime of solving problems. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Learning to Savor Surprises

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 20 May 2024 07:00:00 +0000

The ability to notice and savor surprises is a key overlooked skill of the greatest founders. It allows you to narrow in on the types of capabilities that will lead to breakthroughs. In this Breakthrough Lesson, Mike Maples, Jr of Floodgate calls on the lessons learned by Twitch co-founder Emmett Shear to discuss why founders should seek surprises instead of validation, and how positive surprises can be a key source of greatness. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Emmett Shear: How Twitch Changed Media by Merging it with Gaming

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 13 May 2024 07:00:00 +0000

Emmett Shear was a gamer long before he helped define one of the most important new media companies at the intersection of gaming, media, and the creator economy. What can we learn from his success as a founder? (hint: it has something to do with truly listening to users.) Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: The One Thing That Matters Most…

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 29 Apr 2024 07:10:00 +0000

In the early days of a startup, finding product-market fit is paramount. Once you have it, failure is almost impossible. Without it, you can do everything else right, and still fail. In this Breakthrough Lesson, Mike Maples, Jr of Floodgate discusses three heuristics for maximizing the odds of success: Find the right North Star, offer a Delta 4 experience, and don’t fool yourself. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Michael Seibel: “The Godfounder” Discusses Justin.tv, Twitch, and Y Combinator

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 29 Apr 2024 07:05:00 +0000

Michael Seibel didn’t set out to become a legendary startup founder. As a young man, his sights were set on politics, dreaming of a future on the Supreme Court. But his friendship with fellow Yale classmate Justin Kan led to a fortuitous cross-country trip to California that changed everything. In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr. of Floodgate talks with Seibel about the creation of Justin.tv and Twitch, and the wisdom he shares with aspiring founders as a partner and managing director at Y Combinator. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Welcome to Pattern Breakers

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 29 Apr 2024 07:00:00 +0000

Mike Maples, Jr. of Floodgate is back with a new season of his podcast, once called Starting Greatness, now renamed Pattern Breakers. The focus remains, but with increased ambitions. In this season intro, Mike explains his reasons for expanding the podcast's scope, what listeners can anticipate going forward, and details about a forthcoming book set to release this summer. Subscribe now so you don’t miss an episode, and check out the new Pattern Breakers letter on Substack at www.patternbreakers.substack.com to read essays and receive updates about what we can learn from the rare startups that achieved outlier success. It’s go time for Pattern Breakers! Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Nail Your Niche

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 12 Jun 2023 08:05:00 +0000

Founders are naturally drawn to the tantalizing potential of their product reaching a vast market, but the route to victory starts with nailing a niche before going for the broader opportunity. In this lesson of greatness, Mike Maples, Jr of Floodgate calls on the lessons of Spotify co-founder Daniel Ek to examine how this is done: Identify a stronghold where you can dominate, deliver a Delta 4 experience, and do everything possible to create unfair advantages in your favor. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Daniel Ek: How Spotify Revolutionized The Music Business

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 12 Jun 2023 08:00:00 +0000

When he was a little boy growing up in Sweden, Daniel Ek was obsessed with two things: the binary realm of computers and the artistry of music. As a young adult, he combined his love for both by co-founding Spotify, which became the global standard-bearer for streaming, Spotify now has more than 500 million users per month. In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr of Floodgate interviews Daniel Ek to break down the importance of recognizing technology infections, securing the perfect niche to secure early product-market fit, and how creating something radically different changed the music industry while redefining consumer listening habits. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Crisis Reveals Greatness

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 27 Mar 2023 06:40:00 +0000

Startup founders dealt with uncertainty, stress and trauma in the wake of the run on Silicon Valley Bank, but the most important lessons from this crisis never showed up in social media. In this lesson of greatness, Mike Maples, Jr of Floodgate calls on the actions of a variety of founders who showed incredible courage and competence to showcase three crucial lessons for founders for how to deal with another potential crisis: Scenario planning, financial agility, and crisis communication. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Untold lessons from the SVB bank run

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 27 Mar 2023 06:25:00 +0000

The recent run on Silicon Valley Bank led to a variety of accusations, recriminations and finger-pointing on social media, but how can FOUNDERS actually learn from the crisis? And what lessons can we learn from the founders who crushed it under tough circumstances? In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr welcomes Floodgate co-founder Ann Miura-Ko on the show to discuss these topics. Mike and Ann also speak with SmarterDx CEO Michael Gao about how he handled a wild weekend for his company, and legendary marketing guru Christopher Lochhead stops by to discuss the best strategies for crisis communications. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Refuse Mediocrity

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Thu, 15 Dec 2022 08:05:00 +0000

When we REFUSE to accept mediocrity, we can start building greatness. But how can you avoid the pitfalls of learned helplessness and help your company break through the arbitrary limits that impede progress? In this lesson of greatness, Mike Maples, Jr of Floodgate calls on the lessons of Boom Supersonic founder Blake Scholl to examine three tips to help founders develop startups that change the future: Embrace the belief you can make radical change, find a big problem that speaks to your soul, and then get maniacally focused on the details. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Blake Scholl: How Boom Supersonic Took Flight

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Thu, 15 Dec 2022 08:00:00 +0000

More than fifty years after the first Concorde took flight, consumer air travel is actually SLOWER. Blake Scholl and his team at Boom Supersonic are out to reverse this stagnation and change how we think about commercial aviation. In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr of FLOODGATE interviews Scholl to learn more about the history of American aviation, the origins of Boom Supersonic and the challenges it faces now, and how tech founders are exploring unfamiliar spaces with great success. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Mark Leslie: Silicon Valley Go-to-Market Legend (Part 2)

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 22 Aug 2022 08:00:00 +0000

Mike Maples, Jr of Floodgate welcomes back go-to-market expert and Stanford Graduate School of Business lecturer Mark Leslie for the second of their two-part interview, this time focusing on the role and responsibilities of a CEO and a deep dive into Leslie’s Compass, an essential set of heuristics for every startup founder. Leslie also discusses the value of founders focusing on a five-year plan for their startup, why it’s challenging to make meaningful change inside a large company, and why every founder should understand the relationship between their sales and marketing departments. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Leslie’s Compass

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 22 Aug 2022 08:00:00 +0000

When a startup product goes to market, the two key muscles it can flex are marketing and sales. In nearly every facet of a startup product, marketing or sales takes the natural lead in getting the product to customers. But startups often pour resources into these two areas in unfocused ways, and the results can be disastrous. In this lesson of greatness, Mike Maples, Jr of FLOODGATE discusses the work of Silicon Valley legend Mark Leslie and specifically the framework of Leslie’s Compass, a simple but essential set of heuristics designed to bring more clarity and focus to your startup’s strategy. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: The Sales Learning Curve

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 1 Aug 2022 08:05:00 +0000

When a startup launches a new product, it's tempting to ramp its sales force too quickly. Often, this leads to a crash-and-burn scenario for companies that failed to learn what it took for the *entire organization* to achieve product-market-fit. In this lesson of greatness, Mike Maples, Jr of FLOODGATE discusses how Mark Leslie's Sales Learning Curve framework helps startups keep themselves honest about their progress toward product-market fit, rather than falling into the trap of wishful thinking that usually leads to disaster. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Mark Leslie: Silicon Valley Go-to-Market Legend (Part 1)

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 1 Aug 2022 08:00:00 +0000

During the 1990s, Mark co-founded Veritas Systems, which he piloted from nothing to 6,000 employees and $1.5B in revenue in a decade. Now a lecturer in management at the Stanford Graduate School of Business, Leslie is one of the foremost experts in go-to-market strategy in Silicon Valley, and in the first of this two-part series with Mike Maples, Jr of FLOODGATE, Leslie discusses what strategies he used to make Veritas a runaway success, and the origins for the Sales Learning Curve. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: The Infinite Game

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 16 May 2022 07:05:00 +0000

We’re taught from a young age about *finite* sporting games like baseball, basketball, and soccer. Or board games like checkers or chess. Or academic games like grades and test scores. Or status games like credentials and university degrees. In these games, we know the rules and how to determine who scored the highest, according to rules set by someone else. But what about *infinite* games, where the rules and players are changeable, and the primary goal is to keep the game going? In this lesson of greatness, Mike Maples, Jr of FLOODGATE discusses how Shopify founder Tobi Lutke exemplifies the advantages of playing the Infinite Game and how to tell when business leaders have fallen into the trap of finite games at the expense of achieving their mission. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Tobi Lutke: A Startup Founder Arming The Rebels Against Amazon

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 16 May 2022 07:00:00 +0000

Growing up in Germany, Shopify co-founder and CEO Tobi Lutke was never quite comfortable with people telling him to do things because that's the way they're done. In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr of FLOODGATE interviews Lutke to discuss the origins of Shopify, the difference between finite games and infinite games, and the reason it's important for startups and companies to always question assumptions imposed by "experts." Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Tim Westergren: How The Band Kept Playing At Pandora

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 28 Feb 2022 08:05:00 +0000

Tim Westergren maxed out 11 credit cards, racked up hundreds of thousands of dollars in debt, and was rejected 348 times for a second round of funding for his revolutionary idea for a music streaming platform. But like any true artist, Westergren remained committed to his vision of creating an aesthetically more beautiful future with Pandora, and now the company boasts more than 6 million monthly subscribers. Mike Maples, Jr of FLOODGATE interviews Westergren to discuss the company’s humble beginnings, why it took an act of Congress to keep the company alive, and why both men believe the best founders are artists who can sell their vision. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: The Artistry of Startup Breakthroughs

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 28 Feb 2022 08:05:00 +0000

Too many people mistakenly believe that being a good entrepreneur comes from simply talking to customers and solving their pain. But the most impactful companies are built for aesthetic reasons - think of Twitter, Lyft, Apple, and Medium - and those companies serve as expressions of what their founders thought the world needed. In this lesson of greatness, Mike Maples, Jr of FLOODGATE discusses the success of Pandora’s visionary founder Tim Westergren, and offers three tips for founders looking to bring a more aesthetically beautiful future to the world. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: “BIG D" Design

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 20 Dec 2021 14:50:33 +0000

Lots of people think about design from the perspective of how a product should look and function. But design can be applied to greatness on many more levels than most realize. In this lesson of greatness, Mike Maples, Jr of FLOODGATE discusses how you can design your opportunity, your team, your market, your category, your culture, and even your own life. "Big D" design is about understanding that you have the chance to be more intentional in more areas that contribute to success than most realize. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Qasar Younis and Peter Ludwig of Applied Intuition: A Startup Designed to Win

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 20 Dec 2021 14:50:20 +0000

Qasar Younis and Peter Ludwig both grew up in the backyard of American automotive giant General Motors in Detroit, but didn’t cross paths until their days as product managers at Google. Since then they’ve pooled their affinity for cars and technology as the co-founders of Applied Intuition, a fast-moving startup that has already achieved greatness with their advanced simulation software for autonomous vehicles. Mike Maples, Jr of FLOODGATE interviews Younis and Ludwig to discuss how the company has made its mark so quickly, and the value of being highly intentional about what will drive success from day one.

Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike.

Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books.

Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: How to Defeat "We're F*cked, It's Over" (WFIO) Moments

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 15 Nov 2021 08:05:00 +0000

Your startup will face multiple WFIO moments on the path to greatness...COUNT ON IT. But that doesn’t mean you should let these moments get inside your head. In this lesson of greatness, Mike Maples, Jr of FLOODGATE discusses how every startup team MUST be prepared to take the initiative in the crucible of the WFIO moments they will inevitably face. The bright side? You can use these horrible situations as defining moments to show everyone that your startup is destined to defeat the impossible. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Ben Horowitz: “The IPO From Hell” and Other REAL Lessons from the Startup Crucible

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 15 Nov 2021 08:00:00 +0000

Startups are romanticized AFTER they win. But it takes extraordinary grit to have what it TAKES to win. Ben Horowitz, the co-founder of Andreessen-Horowitz, is the perfect guest to tell it like it is, as he has for many years in his books "the Hard Thing About Hard Things" and "What You Do Is Who You Are." Mike Maples, Jr of FLOODGATE interviews Ben to discuss the ups and downs of dealing with "the struggle," and why the best startup leaders are often the ones who simply refused to quit. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: The future is DESIGNED, not predicted

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 1 Nov 2021 09:05:00 +0000

Moderna CEO Stephane Bancel understands that the task of a revolutionary startup is to manifest a radically different future, and not merely settle for a marginal improvement. But how did he make that future a reality with messenger RNA Therapeutics, and how can you do it with your startup? In this lesson of greatness, Mike Maples, Jr of FLOODGATE goes in-depth on the three strategies to designing a future where your startup achieves greatness: Play offense with risk, use the Backcasting method, and connect the future to the present. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Stephane Bancel of Moderna: $5B and 10 years on the path to changing humanity

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 1 Nov 2021 09:00:00 +0000

What’s it like to run a startup that has achieved its goal of impacting humanity at a time of desperate need? Moderna CEO Stephane Bancel joins Mike Maples, Jr of FLOODGATE to discuss the power of taking offensive risks to seize unlikely futures with massive upside, sometimes with the result of changing the odds of life itself. For founders seeking greatness, the conversation also teases out many of the enduring lessons of how we can increase the odds of creating massive breakthroughs. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Apply Game Design to Business Software

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Tue, 21 Sep 2021 16:14:09 +0000

Rahul Vohra shows us how game design can be used to make business products far more engaging and contribute to a state of flow. Since future success in business software and services is increasingly driven by product-led growth and bottoms-up adoption driven by end-users, mastering game design is vital for startups seeking greatness. In this lesson of greatness, Mike Maples, Jr talks about the specific and actionable steps you can take to harness the power of game design in your products. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Rahul Vohra of Superhuman: How to create business products people enjoy using

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Tue, 21 Sep 2021 15:54:15 +0000

Rahul Vohra of Superhuman has adopted some of the most cutting-edge approaches to making a business product people *want* to use, rather than have to use. In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr of FLOODGATE talks to Rahul about how any startup founder can apply the principles of game design to their products, and why this is becoming increasingly important in a world where users (rather than IT) increasingly decide which products win. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: The Myth of TAM

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 23 Aug 2021 17:06:20 +0000

The conventional thinking is that a big total available market (TAM) is one of the most important factors in startup success. But Julia Hartz's success at Eventbrite shows the limits of this thinking. In this Lesson of Greatness, Mike Maples Jr of Floodgate talks about the difference between available markets and potential markets and offers heuristics for determining the potential market for future breakthroughs. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Julia Hartz: From Zero to One to IPO and Beyond

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 23 Aug 2021 17:04:33 +0000

Eventbrite CEO Julia Hartz didn't start out life thinking she would be a tech founder, but she has achieved a feat that's very rare: Starting a great startup and going the distance, even past IPO. She also navigated one of the toughest setbacks in recent tech history when the COVID-19 pandemic jeopardized Eventbrite's entire business. In this episode, Mike Maples Jr interviews Julia Hartz to discuss what founders seeking greatness can learn from her varied experiences and choices along the way. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Price Before You Build

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 2 Aug 2021 07:05:00 +0000

Most startups postpone pricing decisions until after the product is developed. They HOPE they can make money rather than KNOW they will at the outset. In this Lesson of Greatness, pricing guru Madhavan Ramanujam shows us that without a price, you literally don't have a product. Therefore, we should follow some of the best practices aligned with having the willingness to pay discussion early and in the most effective ways. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Pricing Guru Madhavan Ramanujam: How Smart Startups Design Their Products Around the Price

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 2 Aug 2021 07:00:00 +0000

New startups fail for many reasons. Perhaps the most obvious is they can't get people to pay the necessary price for their products. Madhavan Ramanujam's book Monetizing Innovation, is the foremost guide in the industry for startups who want to make pricing a core part of their success rather than an afterthought. In this interview, Mike Maples Jr of Floodgate talks to Madhavan about the key success factors as well as mistakes to avoid. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Find your wave before your market

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 19 Jul 2021 20:24:50 +0000

The best startups almost always ride a wave that represents a sea change. Such waves give the founders the power to show up with a radically different idea that changes the subject -- and the future. In this lesson of greatness, Mike Maples Jr talks about how the example of Jerry Yang and David Filo at Yahoo illustrates this perfectly and how you can leverage this insight as a founder seeking your own path to greatness for your startup. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Jerry Yang: How Yahoo went from a hobby to the early King of the Internet

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 19 Jul 2021 20:20:42 +0000

Before Google or Facebook; prior to the days of snapping, tweeting, and texting....Yahoo was the original King of the Internet. But in the early days, Jerry Yang and David Filo weren't sure if it was even a valid business. In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr of Floodgate interviews Jerry Yang about what it was like to learn that what started out as a hobby was destined for business greatness. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Hire like your life depends on it

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 28 Jun 2021 14:24:00 +0000

Many startup founders would agree that team building is the most important part of startup success. But very few startups actually live it. The founders of Cloudflare offer key lessons in how to start with the right founding team, how to collaborate more effectively, how to design a company culture....and most importantly, how to make hiring the very best your top priority...for real. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Matthew Prince and Michelle Zatlyn of Cloudflare: How to build a better Company as well as a better Internet

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 28 Jun 2021 14:23:03 +0000

It takes a lot of effort to build a breakthrough product. It's perhaps even rarer to design a company that endures. In this interview, Mike Maples Jr of Floodgate interviews Matthew Prince and Michelle Zatlyn of Cloudflare to highlight what we can learn about how to get a startup's foundation right, along with recruiting, hiring, and company design. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Why you must master risk-taking to seize greatness

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Tue, 1 Jun 2021 18:05:50 +0000

Most people think that risk should be avoided. But Vinod Khosla teaches us otherwise...Risk is something people *take* when they create breakthroughs. This lesson of greatness talks about the key frameworks for why this is the case as well as how to take risks intelligently to tilt the odds in your favor. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Vinod Khosla: Your willingness to fail is what will let you succeed

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Tue, 1 Jun 2021 18:04:41 +0000

Vinod Khosla is a Silicon Valley legend, having achieved greatness as a founder with Sun Microsystems and as one of the best venture capitalists of all time. In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr of Floodgate talks to Vinod about why it's wrong for breakthrough builders to play it safe and how to turn the odds in your favor when setting out to build a massive breakthrough. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Design your category

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 17 May 2021 07:10:00 +0000

Startups change the future so they MUST be different, rather than better. Christopher Lochhead shows us how category designers realize that different is believable from a startup, but better is not. Any powerful startup idea pre-supposes an exponentially different future, which means your startup MUST change the way the people think about the future rather than incrementally improve on the products they already use. Different forces a choice rather than a comparison. And different sticks, while better gets lost in the noise. In this lesson of greatness, we cover the specific steps involved in applying category design to your startup. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Christopher Lochhead: Why Legendary Startups create Categories

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 17 May 2021 07:05:00 +0000

Christopher Lochhead is a bestselling author, #1-rated podcaster, and one of the best marketing minds of our time. As one of the co-inventors of category design, Christopher offers valuable insights for startups wanting to stand out in an ever noisier world. In this episode, Mike Maples Jr talks to Christopher Lochhead to clarify what category design is and why it’s vital for founders determined to create something legendary that changes the future. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: DESIGN for network effects

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 3 May 2021 13:32:33 +0000

Many founders claim their startups contain network effects, but many of these claims only scratch the surface. Networks that achieve greatness are designed, with many trade-offs and factors in mind regarding the "nodes," how interactions take place, what causes people to stay engaged, and the types of relationships that get created. Anu Hariharan shows us the specific decisions and trade-offs we can weigh that startups often overlook. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Anu Hariharan: How to think about network effects for your startup, from the beginning

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 3 May 2021 13:25:48 +0000

Anu Hariharan from YCombinator's Continuity fund is one of Silicon Valley's top experts on network effects and how they can be applied to all types of different businesses. In this interview, Mike Maples of Floodgate talks to Anu about how a raw startup can design network effects into its business as a core strategy from the very beginning. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Start a Movement; not just a business

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 19 Apr 2021 23:05:00 +0000

David Sacks demonstrates how the best startup founders talk about causes much bigger than themselves or the companies they're building. Google was about organizing the world's information. Tesla was about moving the world to sustainability, not just selling cars. These startup leaders saw a world that they wanted to create and built a movement around their visions. Sacks shows us how great startup products aren't just selling a product that solves an immediate problem; they are selling a vision of a better world that people can buy into. By doing this, they create MOVEMENTS; not just businesses. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

David Sacks: Legendary Startup Product Expert

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 19 Apr 2021 23:00:00 +0000

David Sacks, known as one of the best startup product strategists and operators of the last 20 years, discusses key lessons learned from his tenure in the PayPal Mafia, where he was head of product, along with key takeaways as founding CEO of Yammer and what he learned from working directly with industry greats like Peter Thiel and Elon Musk. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Be a Learn-it-All; not a Know-it-All

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 5 Apr 2021 15:36:39 +0000

Maybe you've struggled with needing to seem in charge or on top of a challenging situation, even when you're unsure of what to do. If so, you've likely heard the siren song that tempts you to be a know-it-all. But Matt Mullenweg shows us how the learn-it-all is most likely to achieve greatness.

Check out Mike’s interview with Bob Metcalfe (of Metcalfe’s Law) where he also discusses leadership lessons.

Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike.

Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books.

Follow Mike on X!

Matt Mullenweg: How a modest empire builder powered a huge chunk of the web

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 5 Apr 2021 15:29:59 +0000

Wordpress CEO Matt Mullenweg talks with Mike Maples Jr of Floodgate about his early successes, setbacks, and what founders can learn from his continued growth as a manager and leader. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: ALWAYS know your competitive edge

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 22 Mar 2021 06:55:27 +0000

Mark Cuban shows us that it's not enough to play by the rules as they are defined. If you are going to achieve greatness as a startup, you need to find your EDGE...which means you have to outmaneuver your competition before they even engage with you on the competitive battlefield. You have to change the rules to your advantage and not just play by the rules as they are given to you. Never fall into the trap of not anticipating how a giant competitor will try to run you out of business someday...because it will happen every time if your startup matters in the first place. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Mark Cuban: You only have to be right once...if you take big enough swings along the way

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 22 Mar 2021 06:46:53 +0000

Mike Maples of Floodgate talks to Mark Cuban about a wide range of topics with a common theme...you have to go after opportunities where the stakes are high enough that when you win, you can win BIG. And as a corollary, you have to anticipate that giant competitors will try to stop you because otherwise, you are thinking too small. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Thinking in Bets

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 8 Mar 2021 10:52:27 +0000

Annie Duke shows us that making high-quality decisions is one of the most important skills we can build for improving our odds of success in startups and in life. It's also a skill that can be sharpened and improved over time, regardless of how uncertain the circumstances. By adopting scientifically-proven frameworks from her books "Thinking in Bets" and "How to Decide," we can make better predictions and choices more often and with more confidence. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Annie Duke: Decision-making Secrets from a World Series of Poker Champion

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 8 Mar 2021 10:36:07 +0000

(04:51) - Explaining what makes a decision good or bad

(6:36) - On how memory creep impacts our view of Hilary Clinton’s 2016 campaign

(11:30) - On the use of a knowledge tree to inform decision making

(16:59) - Looking at Pete Carrol’s controversial decision in the Super Bowl

(26:16) - On founders falling into a trap around pricing their product

(38:08) - When to make informed decisions and follow a process

Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike.

Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books.

Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Get REAL

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 22 Feb 2021 08:30:00 +0000

Tim Ferriss' success shows the value of building real things for real people rather than creating abstract approximations that represent what's real. The lessons of getting real apply directly to startups who want to avoid the trap of unshaped work and indirect understanding of what customers are truly desperate for. Check out Mike’s interviews with Steve Blank for more learnings on product-market fit. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

How Tim Ferriss found product-market fit for “The Four Hour Workweek”

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 22 Feb 2021 08:05:00 +0000

(2:47) - Tim looks back at the origins of the 4-Hour Workweek and early incarnations of the book

(9:30) - Mike and Tim discuss the idea of talking to real customers and of “getting real” to increase the chances of your startup’s success

(12:41) - Tim offers his thoughts on category design and the importance of creating a category, as well as working in categories where there were few competitors

(18:02) - Tim discusses the marketing ideas behind the 4-Hour Workweek and finding product-market fit, and offers ideas for book promotion

(31:05) - Mike and Tim share their ideas on the role of a startup advisor, and how to pick the right advisor for your company

(36:44) - Mike and Tim discuss the risks of negotiating with high-conflict people, and Tim reflects on his failures as a startup advisor

(40:27) - Tim stresses the importance of a quality product over public relations and personal brand

Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike.

Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books.

Follow Mike on X!

Welcome to Season 2!

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 22 Feb 2021 08:00:00 +0000

In this opener for Season 2, Floodgate Co-Founder Mike Maples, Jr talks sets the agenda for a new season of Starting Greatness and plans for taking the show and content to the next level. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: You are Yoda, not Luke

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 27 Jul 2020 17:31:30 +0000

Nancy Duarte emphasizes that storytelling has been one of the most compelling tools of persuasion for centuries. But founders embracing the storytelling form often make a crucial mistake: They cast themselves as the protagonist in the hero's journey, rather than the specific people they intend to persuade. Getting storytelling right means the founder is the mentor of the story (ie Yoda), rather than the hero (ie Luke.) This is true whether the audience is the customer, future employees, investors, journalists, or the audience at your next TED talk. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Nancy Duarte: Why storytelling is vital to entrepreneurship

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 27 Jul 2020 17:26:16 +0000

Nancy Duarte has helped people like Al Gore tell an inconvenient truth, as well as some of the most important tech execs, get their stories told. She has cracked the code in applying story patterns to business communication. In this interview, Mike Maples, Jr of Floodgate asks Nancy for the most important ways that founders can leverage storytelling to turn their movements from ideas to reality. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Why the world needs breakthrough builders; How it can be you

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 6 Jul 2020 19:54:44 +0000

The future doesn't happen to us: It happens because of us. In this Lesson of Greatness, we introduce backcasting as a tool for entrepreneurs or people in any field who want to create a future that is meaningfully better and doesn't just bring forward the baggage of the past. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Mike Maples and Shane Parrish: How to create a Breakthrough

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr, Shane Parrish) — Mon, 6 Jul 2020 19:48:42 +0000

The present has stopped working. Now, more than ever, we need breakthroughs that put us on a better trajectory. In this episode, we flip the script and Shane Parrish from the Farnam Street Blog and Knowledge Project interviews Mike Maples Jr of Floodgate about tools available to people who want to build a better future. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Don't Just Be Resilient: How to be Anti-Fragile

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Wed, 10 Jun 2020 17:03:33 +0000

Everyone knows a fragile team is more likely to fail. But an anti-fragile team is more than just resilient....it's more like a Hydra: When you cut off one of it's heads it grows two back in its place. Anti-fragile teams actually get BETTER when the environment around them is high-pressure and chaotic. In this lesson of greatness, we drill down into what it means to be anti-fragile and how you can apply the concept to your own startup team. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Manny Medina: From Hell and Back to the Threshold of Greatness

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Wed, 10 Jun 2020 17:03:12 +0000

From his surprising beginnings as a shrimp farmer with Communist parents in Ecuador to his death-defying pivot from a failed startup idea to what is now Outreach, Manny Medina's story is both colorful and compelling. In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr of Floodgate discusses Manny's unconventional journey and his struggles and triumphs on the path to greatness with Outreach, now valued at more than $1 Billion. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: You have to take the Initiative

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 11 May 2020 15:26:23 +0000

Commander John Boyd was a fighter pilot who changed the art of war in the late 20th Century. He offers a vital lesson of greatness, especially in times of massive uncertainty: Decisive leaders take the initiative, ALWAYS. This episode describes why that's the case and how the philosophy of taking the initiative can help you achieve greatness in what matters to you. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Steve Blank: How to turn the tables on COVID-19

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 11 May 2020 15:14:55 +0000

Many startups face difficult choices when it comes to overcoming COVID-19. In this special episode, Mike Maples Jr of Floodgate interviews Steve Blank about techniques founders can use to shape circumstances rather than be shaped by them. Steve has a unique vantage point since he's weathered every dislocation affecting startups since 1978, including the 1987 crash, the dotcom bubble burst, and the 2008 financial crisis. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Don't Mess with Metcalfe's Law

mike@floodgate.com (mike maples) — Sat, 4 Apr 2020 04:11:13 +0000

Bob Metcalfe has traveled in many orbits, but most recently he has been a professor at the University of Texas....so it seemed only appropriate to honor the unstoppable power of Metcalfe's Law in this lesson of greatness. Mess with it at your peril :) Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Bob Metcalfe: Co-inventor of Ethernet. Tech industry legend and Polymath.

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Sat, 4 Apr 2020 04:05:18 +0000

Bob Metcalfe has lived in the future since the late 1950s. And lucky for the rest of us, he has brought us along for the ride. In this interview, Mike Maples Jr of Floodgate talks to him about the origins of networked computing as well as the birth of "Metcalfe's Law." Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Distribution, Distribution, Distribution

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 2 Mar 2020 14:13:51 +0000

Many say that in real estate, the key to success is location, location, location. A key lesson of greatness from Reid Hoffman is that for consumer products and network effects businesses, a key to success is distribution, distribution, distribution. In this Lesson of Greatness, Mike Maples Jr of Floodgate builds on this by outlining specific strategies founders can learn from Reid Hoffman to get distribution for their startup ideas. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Reid Hoffman: The Network Philosopher King

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 2 Mar 2020 14:12:32 +0000

Reid Hoffman's success as a founder of LinkedIn, investor in Airbnb and Facebook, and charter member of the PayPal Mafia have a common thread - an intense passion for creating valuable networks with people at the center. In this episode, Mike Maples, Jr of Floodgate talks to Reid about key approaches for building valuable business and consumer networks from the ground-up. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Why You Need to Nail a Niche before Going Big

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Tue, 18 Feb 2020 17:13:53 +0000

In Crossing the Chasm Geoffrey Moore clearly lays out a very important idea: you need to appeal to a niche of visionaries, before pragmatists—or your startup will usually fail. In this Lesson of Greatness, Mike Maples Jr of Floodgate builds on this by showing that to get big, you have to start small. The episode contains specific strategies for founders to consider when nailing their early niches on the way to massive success. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Why Geoffrey Moore's Crossing the Chasm is a must-read for Ambitious Startup Founders

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Tue, 18 Feb 2020 17:07:01 +0000

Crossing the Chasm by Geoffrey Moores is the most influential book on technology go-to-market ever written, and for good reason. In this episode, Mike Maples Jr from Floodgate talks to Geoffrey Moore about how startup founders can apply its core principles to building great startups, as well as how to avoid critical mistakes. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Why Finding Undiscovered Talent is the Winning Mindset

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 3 Feb 2020 09:05:02 +0000

Great Startup Recruiting is surprisingly similar to great Startup Ideas: Just like you have to find undiscovered opportunities to start a great startup, you need to find undiscovered talent to build a great startup team. In this Lesson of Greatness, we discuss how to find great undiscovered talent and five key factors to look for. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Keith Rabois: Key lessons from Peter Thiel, Reid Hoffman, and Jack Dorsey

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 3 Feb 2020 09:00:32 +0000

Few people in the history of startups have seen more examples of excellence than Keith Rabois. Not surprisingly, Keith is also one of the best investors in Silicon Valley, having achieved great success as an Angel and now at Founders Fund. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Why Great Ideas Won't Wait

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Tue, 21 Jan 2020 05:27:41 +0000

It's tempting to start a company when it meets the conditions of your "master plan." But sometimes you realize that an idea has visited you and it is now or never...you must either plunge in and take the chance NOW, or watch from the sidelines while someone else makes it happen. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

How Todd McKinnon of Okta believed (even when he sometimes didn't) in the inevitability of breakout success.

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Tue, 21 Jan 2020 05:25:10 +0000

Todd McKinnon co-founded Okta when most around him thought it was a bad idea. And soon, he started to wonder if they were right. Was he cut out to be a startup company builder? But eventually, he proved to everyone (and most importantly to himself) that he was right to believe from the very start. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: How to Get Customers to Hire Your Product

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 13 Jan 2020 09:05:12 +0000

What job should a desperate customer hire YOUR product to do? Answering this question is key to unlocking a key lesson of greatness. Here we discuss how the Instagram founders illustrate this lesson perfectly and how you can apply it to your own success as a startup founder. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

How Instagram Delighted 1 Billion Users....but Almost Didn't

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 13 Jan 2020 09:00:13 +0000

Find out how Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger trusted their instincts and overcame rookie mistakes on the way to building Instagram, which now gets close to 100 Million photos uploaded a DAY. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: How You Can Tame the Startup Rollercoaster

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 30 Dec 2019 09:05:22 +0000

The Startup Rollercoaster is not fun, but it's a reality of startup life. The great founders learn to manage it rather than be overwhelmed by it. In this lesson of greatness, Mike Maples summarizes key lessons from Kim Polese's success at this, as well as specific techniques to stay grounded through all of the inevitable ups and downs. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Kim Polese: Building the Early Web with Java and Marimba

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 30 Dec 2019 09:00:07 +0000

Kim Polese, the founding product manager for Java at Sun, as well as co-founding CEO of Marimba, talks about how Java almost didn't come to be....as well as her experiences riding the startup rollercoaster as a high-profile, and ultimately successful startup founder. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Find your inner MacGyver

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 23 Dec 2019 09:05:05 +0000

If you want find greatness, you have to improvise to beat impossible over and over again. There is no course or framework to teach you how to do this. Instead, you must never surrender to any fear or obstacle you face. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Osman Rashid: “How did Chegg find a way through?”

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 23 Dec 2019 09:00:05 +0000

Osman Rashid, co-founder and original CEO of Chegg, talks about how Chegg’s startup team of misfit rebels navigated through a crazy sequence of near-death experiences…one day at a time…and lived to tell the tale of achieving greatness. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Living in the Future

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 16 Dec 2019 09:05:21 +0000

William Gibson, the cyberpunk novelist has said “The future is already here; it’s just not evenly distributed.” This perfectly describes a key lesson of greatness from Marc’s Netscape experience. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Marc Andreessen: “Was Netscape an Overnight Success?”

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 16 Dec 2019 09:00:03 +0000

Mike Maples, Jr talks to Marc Andreessen, Co-founder of Netscape—the startup that launched the Internet era. What it was like when Netscape was about to blow up? What does he wish Netscape had done differently? -- and what lessons from its success are not fully understood? Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Real Artists Get Out of the Building

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 9 Dec 2019 18:32:35 +0000

“Getting out of the building” means something deeper than many realize. Mike Maples Jr explores why in this key lesson of greatness. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Steve Blank: Great Entrepreneurship is Artistry

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Mon, 9 Dec 2019 18:32:15 +0000

Steve Blank’s Customer Development methodology is one of the critical teachings of entrepreneurship over the last twenty years This episode explains why great founders are more like artists than normal business people and why getting out of the building is more about artistry than running a focus group. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: Hack Value Before Hacking Growth

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 2 Dec 2019 09:15:21 +0000

Why proving a startup’s value hypothesis before testing its growth hypothesis is critical. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Sarah Leary of Nextdoor: “The Moment You Know You've Created Something Valuable"

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 2 Dec 2019 09:10:08 +0000

Nextdoor today is worth more than $2 Billion and is used by 250,000 neighborhoods throughout the world. Silicon Valley types had doubts about their approach, but Sarah offers valuable ideas for finding the path to the light. One crucial hint is that users matter far more than the folks in the "chattering class." Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Breakthrough Lessons: You Need a Breakthrough Insight

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 2 Dec 2019 09:05:07 +0000

Learn why great startups have unique insights that defy conventional wisdom. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Andy Rachleff on “How to Know If You’ve Got Product Market Fit”

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples) — Mon, 2 Dec 2019 09:00:05 +0000

The Co-founder of Benchmark Capital & Wealthfront explains the most important goal of a startup: how do you find product-market fit? As the man who coined the term, he’s the expert—and in this episode, he also shares lessons learned from legendary startup super performers such as Scott Cook, Reed Hastings, Don Valentine, and many others. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Why Greatness is a Decision

mike@floodgate.com (Mike Maples Jr) — Tue, 19 Nov 2019 23:16:51 +0000

In the Starting Greatness premier, Floodgate co-founder and podcast host Mike Maples, Jr., explains why greatness is a decision—and what questions you need to ask yourself to make your startup a success. Check out the Pattern Breakers Blog at patternbreakers.substack.com for even more Pattern Breaking content from Mike. Mike's book Pattern Breakers is available now wherever you buy books. Follow Mike on X!

Pattern Breakers

Immad Akhund: How Mercury Saved The Day For Startups

John Zimmer: Pink Mustaches, Rideshare Wars, and the Legacy of Lyft

Spenser Skates: How Perseverance Paid Off for Amplitude

Wade Foster: Why Zapier is Built for the AI Revolution

Howie Liu: Building Airtable to Feel Magical

Joe Liemandt: The AI-Powered School Rewriting the Future of Education

Mårten Mickos: Essential Lessons From A Legendary Tech CEO

Eric Schmidt: The Implications of Superintelligence

Pedro Franceschi: Lessons from an Evolving Entrepreneur, from Hacking iPhones to Building Brex

Mitchell Hashimoto: How Solving His Own Problem Sparked HashiCorp

Jake Knapp: The Founder’s Guide to Product-Market Fit

Amjad Masad: Resolve, Persistence, and the Rise of Replit

Aaron Levie: The Restless Founder Plotting the Future of Cloud Storage and AI

Guillermo Rauch: The Product Visionary Fueling Vercel and Millions of Developers

Zach Perret: The Survival Story of a Fintech Giant

Baiju Bhatt: First Robinhood, Next …. Outer Space?

Josh Reeves: How Gusto Took The Pain Out Of Payroll

Breakthrough Lesson: RIP To Old-School Marketing

Niels Hoven: Teaching Two Year-Olds to Read Like Second Graders

Daphne Koller: Changing Lives With Coursera

Pattern Breakers: Which Startups Change the Future?

A Sneak Peek at Pattern Breakers

Maddie Hall: A Different Path to the Future

Breakthrough Lessons: Founder-Future Fit

Justin Kan: Pattern Breaker Personified

Breakthrough Lessons: The Value of a Superbuilder

Kyle Vogt: A Problem Solver With A Purpose

Breakthrough Lessons: Learning to Savor Surprises

Emmett Shear: How Twitch Changed Media by Merging it with Gaming

Breakthrough Lessons: The One Thing That Matters Most…

Michael Seibel: “The Godfounder” Discusses Justin.tv, Twitch, and Y Combinator

Welcome to Pattern Breakers

Breakthrough Lessons: Nail Your Niche

Daniel Ek: How Spotify Revolutionized The Music Business

Breakthrough Lessons: Crisis Reveals Greatness

Untold lessons from the SVB bank run

Breakthrough Lessons: Refuse Mediocrity

Blake Scholl: How Boom Supersonic Took Flight

Mark Leslie: Silicon Valley Go-to-Market Legend (Part 2)

Breakthrough Lessons: Leslie’s Compass

Breakthrough Lessons: The Sales Learning Curve

Mark Leslie: Silicon Valley Go-to-Market Legend (Part 1)

Breakthrough Lessons: The Infinite Game

Tobi Lutke: A Startup Founder Arming The Rebels Against Amazon

Tim Westergren: How The Band Kept Playing At Pandora

Breakthrough Lessons: The Artistry of Startup Breakthroughs

Breakthrough Lessons: “BIG D" Design

Qasar Younis and Peter Ludwig of Applied Intuition: A Startup Designed to Win

Breakthrough Lessons: How to Defeat "We're F*cked, It's Over" (WFIO) Moments

Ben Horowitz: “The IPO From Hell” and Other REAL Lessons from the Startup Crucible

Breakthrough Lessons: The future is DESIGNED, not predicted

Stephane Bancel of Moderna: $5B and 10 years on the path to changing humanity

Breakthrough Lessons: Apply Game Design to Business Software

Rahul Vohra of Superhuman: How to create business products people *enjoy* using

Breakthrough Lessons: The Myth of TAM

Julia Hartz: From Zero to One to IPO and Beyond

Breakthrough Lessons: Price Before You Build

Pricing Guru Madhavan Ramanujam: How Smart Startups Design Their Products Around the Price

Breakthrough Lessons: Find your wave before your market

Jerry Yang: How Yahoo went from a hobby to the early King of the Internet

Breakthrough Lessons: Hire like your life depends on it

Matthew Prince and Michelle Zatlyn of Cloudflare: How to build a better Company as well as a better Internet

Breakthrough Lessons: Why you must master risk-taking to seize greatness

Vinod Khosla: Your willingness to fail is what will let you succeed

Breakthrough Lessons: Design your category

Christopher Lochhead: Why Legendary Startups create Categories

Breakthrough Lessons: DESIGN for network effects

Anu Hariharan: How to think about network effects for your startup, from the beginning

Breakthrough Lessons: Start a Movement; not just a business

David Sacks: Legendary Startup Product Expert

Breakthrough Lessons: Be a Learn-it-All; not a Know-it-All

Matt Mullenweg: How a modest empire builder powered a huge chunk of the web

Breakthrough Lessons: ALWAYS know your competitive edge

Mark Cuban: You only have to be right once...if you take big enough swings along the way

Breakthrough Lessons: Thinking in Bets

Annie Duke: Decision-making Secrets from a World Series of Poker Champion

Breakthrough Lessons: Get REAL

How Tim Ferriss found product-market fit for “The Four Hour Workweek”

Welcome to Season 2!

Rahul Vohra of Superhuman: How to create business products people enjoy using