SAM ZAWADZKI

Y Combinator's Start Up School 2018 has just started! Bring on 10 weeks of topical relevant start up lectures! In the first video A Conversation with Paul Graham, one theme kept on coming out, a signal in the noise of start up hype and low probability success. "Founders need to follow demand, the way a scientist follows the truth." - Paul Graham. The video is full of fun stories and but most of the talk was a little fluffy, and full of the usual start up hype. Y Combinator is

Closing deals over the phone is an art form. If you use this formula you will succeed. 1) Rapport Would you help someone you hate? Probably not. But you're likely to help a good friend no matter what. Sales is a relationship business, everyone hates cold callers, and won't do business with them, no matter the benefit. They just hate unsolicited contact. If your call is not relevant, or personalised. It will fail. They key to starting a conversation and getting the time to com

Running a company with growth ambitions is a team sport. It simply can't be done alone. Learning how to inspire, lead and manage people is vital to success. For tech startups salaries are the most expensive cost, but the value delivered by a team depends massively on it's leadership. I thought it would be interesting to compare a couple of leadership styles to game of thrones characters... Daenerys Targaryen aka Daenerys Branson (Dragon Queen) Renegade that challenges the est

While I might not be an expert, I'm certainly no beginner. Over the years I have done quite a lot of pitching. I've won a number of competitions including: 'The Pitch' a UK wide pitching competition, "The EDGE" competition winning £50,000 funding, and raising £150,000 seed funding from angel investors. After a substantial amount of practising, I thought you might enjoy learning some of my pitching insights. To start with... pitching is the skill to clearly communicate informa

The Nest is an annual start up conference held by Toucan and Time Inc. This year I was invited to speak alongside my mentor Fiona Dent, MD of Time UK. Over the last 8 months Fiona has provided continual inspiration and guidance. Fiona stressed the importance of understanding who your target client is. Only with a detailed profile on the client can you build an effective marketing and communication strategy to reach and convert them. Together we worked on consumer profiling an

Some key lessons I've learned that may, or may not be useful to you. a) 'great ideas' are worthless and usually wrong. Take your assumptions and figure out how to validate them. Don't be afraid of being wrong, it can be hard to find right (what ever that is). Implementation is key, ideas are nothing without it! b) focus take one little thing and make it work. Build on that victory and then do the next thing. Set clear goals and objectives. Understand your motivations and writ

There is something very Scottish about not wanting to accept help, a stubborn pride that comes from growing up in the wee sunless country. I’ve always thought that coaching was something for people who just can’t handle their own stuff. Peepshows continual mockery of coaching enforced my ostrich beliefs (when one decides to keep their head in the sand ignoring facts). It was a pleasure to discover how wrong my preconceptions were. Over the last three months I’ve been receivin

For the back story on what and where the expression mechanical turk comes from, see 18th Century Chess Robot and Amazon Marketplace. In this context I will refer to Mechanical Turk as a cost analysis between getting work done by a computer or getting work done by a human. To provide some background. In our property technology software an estate agent can set viewing slots on a property, which a consumer can then book onto online. At present the agent must set day & time avai

The chaos of Lahore is overwhelming. People ooze through the crowded streets in a never ending flow of human. I was fortunate to get a birds eye view of the mayhem from the safety of a mosque's minaret. I found the economic disparity between east and west depressing. The people below were trying so hard to earn enough money to simply exist. One person caught my eye, an older man who was wandering through the streets with a huge bunch of balloons. I observed him for about 5 mi

Use your network for find people, search online Upwork is great place, find work you admire then find out who did it. Short list people you would like to work with and review their work to ensure they are indeed a good fit for your brief. Get at least three quotes, always. Always ask for two references for each freelancer and call them. Take time to give a detailed brief and where possible meet in person to talk through the brief together. Ask for them to come back with a ful