Companion lists at the right and also listed in the nav bar cover resources and insights related to lean startup logic/methods; product design; product management; marketing; and sales, among other topics.
Business Development Function
- The book, Pitching and Closing, by Taub and DaSilva, provides a comprehensive overview of the business development function, along with guidance on how to structure and negotiate partnerships
- HBS course note on the role of the business development manager by Bussgang, Eisenmann, et al.
- Entrepreneur Elad Gil discusses attributes of good bus dev professionals and how to hire them
- Brian Balfour provides a "how to" guide for consumer startups seeking to identify and negotiate B2B2C partnership opportunities
- Sangeet Choudary describes how startups like YouTube, PayPal, and Airbnb were able to gain traction by piggybacking on established platforms
- Holger Luedorf of foursquare presents Startup Business Development 101, offering advice on how to prioritize and manage partnerships
- John O'Farrell of a16z describes how quality trumps quantity and clarity regarding mutual objectives is crucial in doing business development deals, using Opsware's transformative distribution agreement with Cisco as a case study
- Chris Dixon on the Goldilocks Principle of business development, that is, how a big company may view partnership opportunities with a startup that is "too hot" vs. "too cold" vs. "just right."
- Fred Wilson on how an orientation toward users versus brands should drive business development and other priorities at a startup.
- Charlie O'Donnell of First Round Capital describes business development challenges for startups
- Angel investor/Hunch CEO Chris Dixon on how startups should think about incumbents
- Mark Suster of GRP Partners on why you're most vulnerable right after you've won a deal
- HubSpot co-founder and CTO Dharmesh Shah on the dangers of partnering with big firms
- Marc Andreessen on how dealing with big firms is like pursuing elusive, unpredictable and dangerous Moby Dick
- Paul Graham with similar advice for early stage startups: Don't talk to corporate development
- Mark Suster of GRP Partners on why you should never negotiate one deal point at a time
- Doug Kiponen and Ben Smith on managing relationships with big companies
- David Beisel on how to do due diligence calls for recruiting, biz dev, fund raising, etc.
- Mark Suster on the value of cutting out middle-men in different types of startup negotiations
