April 16, 2024 • 21 mins
In this episode, we sit down with Alex Minicucci, founder of Relentless Venture Studio, to explore the nuanced world of entrepreneurship and innovation. We discuss the critical differences between the romanticized notion of starting a business and the gritty reality of entrepreneurship. Drawing from decades of experience, Christian Hammer and Alex delve into the challenges faced by both startups and large corporations in fostering innovation. Through stories of success and lessons learned, this conversation unveils the essence of what it means to build and scale a business in today's ever-evolving tech landscape.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to Tectastic, where we navigate theintersection of technology and business,
uncovering innovations that redefine our world.
Alex, it is wonderful to have you on isfantastic.
Thank you for being here.
My pleasure here.
Thank you for having me.
So I do wanna know more about relentlessVenture Studio because I think what you are is
(00:23):
interesting and necessary, but I also wannatalk about the journey getting there.
I've been a tech entrepreneur for 30 years onagain off again.
I also jumped off for a period of time and wentand worked for very large companies.
Trying to show them how to be more like astartup to bring back innovation.
And my first chance that was Nike where theybrought me as the entrepreneur, and that's
actually where I found my cofounder He was, thechief technology officer from Nike at the time.
(00:48):
And there's a big difference between startingsomething new from the ground up inventing it
and trying to fix something broken than, of ascale.
And it's actually harder to see these thingsthat are similar than it is to see the things
that are different.
The things that are similar are a desire, ahunger to to improve, to capture more market,
(01:09):
to be impactful in some way.
But the things that are different are scarcityof your resources.
Like as a startup, you've got basically youand, you know, whatever resources you could put
to it.
And when you're young and early, that's notmuch.
And as you get older, you've got betterrelationships.
You've got experience to draw from.
Hopefully, you've got a savings account thatyou can rely on.
(01:29):
Right.
But that lack of hunger, that lack of necessityis why big companies have trouble actually
innovating.
You know, I agree with everything you justsaid.
I'm I'm running a little book very brief, but II deal with a lot of incubators, early stage
companies, people coming to me saying, Alex, Imean, the starting a business or considering
starting a business.
(01:49):
And how do I know, you know, if I should orwhat my path should be?
And and the first chapter in my book is youprobably shouldn't be an entrepreneur.
Here's why.
So if you
do anything else, do that.
They do just reach chapter 1 and throw the bookaway and and just go get a job.
And and and it really starts out with, if youhave to ask that question, you probably
(02:11):
shouldn't be.
Yep.
And to your point, with your experience, youeither have it in your DNA, some fire in your
belly, that fire that hunger that need and youjust have to go that path.
Or if you don't if you don't feel that burningdesire to do it, you probably shouldn't.
And oftentimes, people are, I think, misled.
And if it's not really the fault to incubators,but people wanna be encouraging.
(02:33):
But just because you love to cook food does notmean you should own a restaurant.
And that is a very, very different skill set.
And I met somebody actually that I, localcollege here at Cal Poly And she was a lovely
young lady, very smart, very talented, whowanted to make furniture that reflected her
interest in culture.
And she was talking about building a furniturecompany.
(02:55):
And I said, well, show me your artwork.
So she shows me your furniture.
I go, this is beautiful.
K.
So who's gonna sell it?
Who is going to inventory it?
Who's gonna make sure you have insurance onthis?
Who's gonna hire people to help you scale?
Which is I don't think about any of that.
I said, well, that's the difference between,you know, being a, like, a tradesman and
starting a business.
Yes.
But my suggestion might be you go find anorganization has that infrastructure and you
(03:19):
create a product line within that company andlet them deal with all the stuff that you
definitely don't wanna do and 2 don't know howto do.
And so I think that's a huge distinguishingfactor.
The success of entrepreneurs is you gotta havethat fire in your belly, but you've gotta adapt
to the 90% of it.
That's just business muck and has very littleto do with the magic, the thing that you're
(03:41):
passionate about trying to Unfortunately, youknow, there's a lot of administrative stuff
involved in in building and running a business.
Every time I went and worked for anothercompany and something that I didn't found and
start myself, I had trouble, a lot of trouble.
I I look and go, that was the wrong decision.
Like, in my head, I knew it was the wrongdecision because partially.
I've been there a hundred times already.
(04:02):
I already know, you know, there's dragonsthere.
Don't go that way.
Or whatever.
I I was more comfortable betting on myself thanbetting on somebody else.
And why would I not bet on myself?
That thought process always got me back to theentrepreneurship and always got me going
there's a better way of doing this.
There's a better solution here go do it myselfbecause I don't trust anybody else to do it.
(04:22):
And, I don't know.
I I and I found every other entrepreneur I knowand respect.
They're broken in the same way.
Whatever.
You're gonna do your thing.
I trust myself.
I'm gonna go do it, and I'm gonna build thisthing because I can't imagine somebody else
doing it right or the way that I want it doneor
It is a common thread.
It is a common characteristic.
You can you can pick them out of a crowd, andit's a it's a strength and a weakness.
I mean, it it is a quirky to to wanna do it.
(04:45):
And it's for a lot of people, it's that anxietyand nervousness in your belly of the
uncertainty.
And I love the uncertainty.
Yes.
I've made it my mission life for no 2 days ofmy life to look the same.
And I I remember sitting down one time yearsago, I owned an IT company, and we were in the
break room.
And one of my lead techs sits down, and he'smaking his lunch.
(05:06):
He got a little brown bag.
He's eating his lunch.
And I said, hey, buddy.
You know, what what do you hope to be 10 yearsfrom now?
And he says, lord willing, Alex, do the exactsame thing I'm doing today.
And and I and I, you know, I started it for asecond.
I just thought it was terrible.
And then I realized that that's great for a lotof people.
And what he wants is that stability and thatconsistency.
And, he enjoyed his work.
(05:28):
He put himself into his work, but his workdidn't define him.
And I think as an entrepreneur, you know, thethe exercise, they give you in grade school.
If you had a a $1,000,000,000, what would youdo tomorrow?
I do the same thing.
And, I love what I do.
I'm in it for the deals.
I'm in it for the people.
I'm in it for the learning and the experience.
My brain hurts every night.
When I go to bed, try and learn AI and allthese different things, and I'm constantly
(05:51):
relearning and reinventing.
To me, that makes life exciting.
There's no other path for me.
And so I think it's interesting when youcommunity of entrepreneurs that share those
characteristics that it can be a lot of fun.
Sometimes we find each other in the weirdestplaces too.
I will spend some time Wayfair, which is agreat company.
Niraj and Steve are wonderful to 2 founders.
I love them dearly.
And, one of the other executives they broughtin into a very similar to mind is now started
(06:14):
in his own company.
It's an AI also, like, it's really surprising.
Frankly, we were so alike, and we were sittingat Wayfair asking ourselves the same Christian.
Like, Why are we doing this?
Like, we we know the problems that need to besolved.
90% of them in any big company are actuallycultural problems, which are not solved by
anybody, but the founder, you're not gonnachange the culture of a 10,000 person company
(06:36):
that's doing 24,000,000,000 a year in revenueby showing up as an executive and being like,
hey, change the process, and, we're gonna buildthis technology instead of that technology.
It doesn't do a damn thing.
It's gonna come from those founders.
And then we both asked ourselves that at thesame time, and then we went off and both
founded companies, you know, just a short whileafter that.
I always knew I was going to go back to it.
For me, it was a lifestyle problem in that youget to a point where you get paid a lot of
(07:01):
money to go fix company's problems when itcomes to something like innovation and
technology, and they will pay you a lot ofmoney to go solve it for them.
And if you're good at it, you realize theplaybook.
It's like, oh, Here's the freaking playbook.
I they're gonna ask you to do the same damnthing.
So I'll bring in this integration partner andI'll subcontract out this work, and, we'll do
this to pay down this problem, and then I'll bebored, and I'll go look for the next one.
(07:24):
It's hard to get out of that, though.
It's a trap.
It's a really rough trap to get out of becauseyou get really comfortable with that big
paycheck.
There was a moment I woke up and went, knocked.
I simply can't do this anymore.
I have to go back to who I am.
And who I am involves solving enormously hardproblems with a team of people that I respect
and care about that are passionate aboutresolving the same damn problem.
(07:47):
Love that.
Love it.
You know, I I've gone through a similar trialwhere I'll have an exit.
I'll sell to a company.
You a larger company.
You know, you've got a transition servicescomponent and get to know some of that team.
And usually in there, they go, wow.
You don't see to be good do.
Wanted to come and play it a little longer withus.
And you're like, oh, this is fun.
And and I always refer to it as a kid in acandy store.
(08:07):
Like, these larger companies don't realize howgood they've got it with these big customer
bases, lots of resources, grade reach.
And as an entrepreneur, go, wow.
What can I do with You know, let me add it?
And then you try to mobilize some action andyou watch everything move.
They're just a a snail pace.
Mhmm.
And it's frustrating.
(08:27):
And so I I did some of that, and I had to makea decision that I just I won't do work for
hire.
I will only work projects.
I have an an equity stake in.
That was part of me forming my venture studio.
You said exactly right.
Solving big challenges with team of people youtrust.
That's exactly what my venture studio as arelentless venture studio that pulled my a
players from previous products in the last 20years.
(08:48):
And create a centralized team and said,alright.
We're gonna go hunt for stuff.
And either company used to buy, companies wannabuild, people we wanna partner with that we
really like, but we have an equity piece ineverything we do.
And and then let's go fix things.
I know it's been a lot on going down thatendeavor by having that centralized team that's
jailed.
What happened was before, I've Hammer on 6solid exits from when I was 18 to 40.
(09:12):
And about every 3 years.
And every time I sold a company, I had to startover.
Yep.
And so I gotta check, you know, when I had tomove out of my office, with my desk, and, you
know, my team, and I come up with a new ideaand ideas were fine, but I had to build a new
team and find a new office and start everythingover.
How do I build an organization allows me toexist in perpetuity in my problem solving
(09:33):
entrepreneurial ADD mode?
And be opportunistic in my projects, but what IHammer to rebuild my infrastructure every 3
years.
So that that also was a function of buildingmy, my venture studio, which has worked out
pretty well.
The last company I had during the dotcom phasewas a venture studio.
I was called, Techno Loft because we thought wewere very clever.
IFA 65 and come out with.
(09:54):
I'm blue and was all over the radio, and we'relike, oh, we'll be a loft that is technology
and plays techno music.
Yeah.
And we did fairly well.
We ended up having to close that one down whenall the investment dried up in the world.
And when you're a venture studio, you tend torely on your clients having money.
Yeah.
So we folded that.
Yeah.
Went off to another one a couple of exits.
I think I've had about the same number as you,but not every 3 years.
(10:16):
I was never that in systemic.
It was usually, like, big one and then a couplefizzles And then big one, and then a couple
fizzles almost like clockwork on that front.
And it was largely because I didn't want to bethe CEO, I very much avoided that role.
And it was the requirement to be out frontselling all the time.
I wanted to build solve.
I wanted to make the thing.
(10:36):
I'm gonna make the thing that solves theproblem.
Right?
And every time the fizzle, what happens when Iwasn't in charge, and every time we Hammer the
pop, I was in a good spot where I had a lotmore control over it.
And I, I learned my lesson.
It just took me, like, 6 tries to figure itout.
Like, oh, man Hammer to be a lot more involvedin the day to day in making decisions, have to
care about the selling.
(10:57):
I mean, your job as an entrepreneur is 90%sales.
So
Yeah.
Suck it up.
That is that is a tough lesson learned, man.
I've done the same thing, and I learned thatwith my venture studio where early on in my
career, I was gonna obsess the control.
So I think I benefited from that.
And then with my venture studio model, I waslike, alright.
I'm going to shift gears to become an advisorand a mentor.
(11:18):
You know, I'm gonna share my strategy and sharemy resources and help a dozen companies who
have their own respective founders or CEOs And,and that was a challenge, because I'm not a
great teacher, apparently.
And so and, you know, most entrepreneurs I metaren't it's like, you're the mic of George.
Right?
Give me the ball.
Let me take a shot.
I'm still trying to teach the other companies,how to perform a CEO's kinda give them some
(11:41):
guidance on planning and you give them someresources and watch out for these pitfalls
because I've made these mistakes and make someintroductions to help accelerate some the
growth.
But there's always that challenge of, you'renot the one driving the ship directly.
And, and there were some challenges with that.
That's, that's definitely one of the hardestparts of the Venture Studio model in scaling
that part.
One of my friends who started a companyrecently, they went through a Venture Studio,
(12:03):
and it was very, very good for him.
He needed that structure, that support aroundhim so that he didn't prematurely hire a bunch
of people from his background that, like, hey.
I need a marketing guy.
Well, you you do eventually.
You don't right now.
Like, you're a little early on that.
Things like that.
It helped him out a lot because he had a lotmore indoctrination into the large enterprise.
(12:23):
He had been an entrepreneur in his past.
Kind of just telling the same trap I did andthen stated a lot longer than I did.
It it's fun to watch him come out the otherside of that.
He learned a lot it really set them up forsuccess.
They're in a great path right now.
And then I've got other friends that they wouldhave been a disaster in a venture studio
because that's what they are.
They should be running a venture you know, theyare the adviser you want that their repeat
(12:45):
serial entrepreneur that can go out and justthey know all the right people.
They know what they need to do.
They're gonna go do their thing.
And they would Hammer been struggling in thatspace because it would have felt stifling to
them.
At least the ones that I've interacted withYeah.
They could be very stifling.
But I'm really curious about yours because youdo come from that repeat entrepreneur success
playbook thing.
(13:05):
And you have to now take a big step back fromcontrol over it, right, like, as you were
saying.
So how do you manage that within the studio?
How do you have the right level of engagementbecause one of the problems I found with every
entrepreneur I know is we have no idea how orwhen to ask for help.
Know, that that is a fundamental problem.
And, you know, it starts with good planning andgain consensus on that plan.
(13:27):
Right?
So we we've got a structure where we talk aboutknow, the 3 year plan, the 1 year plan, setting
quarterly objectives, all pretty academic.
Like, they're dialing those things in.
And and a lot of these entrepreneurs haveinherently to plant.
And all that does is it becomes a beacon on thehill to make sure we're all growing in the same
direction.
Right?
So we we set some benchmarks there.
(13:48):
Selling some KPIs, how are we measuringChristian at what intervals in developing a
discipline to look at the numbers?
That's the other thing that's fundamental.
I'm sure your experience there is, like, ifpeople don't look at their numbers, they don't
look at their financials, their financials area mess, what KPIs are telling us we're on
track.
Tell me about lead generation.
How well is it performing?
How well are things converting?
(14:09):
What's my lifetime value?
What's my churn?
All these guys, you know, they're they'refocused on the widget, taking widgets to
market, destroying whatever money they've gotout the wall, they will stick, And we said, no.
No.
In order to grow systematically, we need tohave these disciplines in place.
So the first is the educate of them just notknowing that these things either exist or that
(14:31):
this is a principle that should be employed,how to put it in place.
So that's where we start is Let's create someformality around where we wanna go.
And and what that does too is a great exerciseon expectations.
I had coffee with somebody the other day justsomebody who asked for some guidance.
And brilliant young woman, PhD, starting a, aninteresting little SAS content site, And she's
(14:54):
making $500,000 a month, something like that,just getting started, very early stage.
And I said, tell me tell me your goal for yourbusiness.
And she says, well, probably to go public.
And I went.
Okay.
Oops.
I said, you you understand statistically whatit's like to go from where you're at it going
public.
And public is a means to an
(15:15):
ad.
Yes.
It's not the end.
Yes.
It sounds exciting, entrepreneurially.
Once you do it, the the luster is gone.
You realize it's kind of a horrific experiencein a lot of ways.
So it's just a funding round.
It's just a funding round.
Right?
It's it's simply like a a a different struck inorder to do certain things, but it's it's means
to an end.
It is not the end.
(15:35):
And so it just sounds exciting.
And, and, yeah, you can create a lot of whatseems like paper wealth, but if you're the
principal, you're not gonna be able to spend itor move it or do anything with it.
It gets very, very hard.
I, you know, aside the fact that we have to getthere, so I said, you know, do you have a lot
of money in the bank?
She said, no.
Do you have kids?
Yes.
So what would $3,000,000 do to your worldtomorrow?
(15:55):
Just I would change my life.
I said, so why don't we set that as the as thegoal?
This is your first business.
Let's talk about a $3,000,000 exit.
Knowing your business you know, what what do,eggs and multiples look like?
Because we talked about eggs and multiples.
We talked about what you would need to do toget there and said, spill the 3 year plan to
get there.
And and it took this big, big world ofentrepreneurs.
(16:18):
I mean, this appetite bigger than your stomachand made it all very real, very tactical.
So that's kind of the first exercise I like todo with my my portfolio companies Let's get on
the same page and let's be real.
We're very focused on execution.
And so let's let's let's get to that model.
So when you're there, we can come out with thenext 3 years, it's like.
But at least we've we've established amilestone that's realistic.
(16:40):
And so we started there.
We come back to, well, what are our goals?
How do we measure it?
How do we stay on track?
How do we hold ourselves accountable?
It's a lot of entrepreneurs to your pointaren't good at being held accountable or
holding themselves accountable, very hard.
You throw this remote work stuff in there andmake it even harder for people to hold
themselves accountable.
(17:00):
So these were just some of the fundamentalsthat I think came in and and helped just frame
up what being a tech entrepreneur is.
I had a few cases where becoming part of ourventure studio and knowing, you know, my
background and having done fairly well wherethey were counting their money on the day they,
you know, we got engaged.
It was like, I'm gonna beat you, millionaire.
(17:21):
Like, no.
No.
No.
Oh.
If we got a long run to go, man, eat that ramenand save that money because we're we're gonna
need it.
It's not gonna Nothing's gonna be easy aboutthis.
Yeah.
So, so setting the expectations is absolutelykey, and then putting some disciplines in
place.
To measure the the path and then make sureyou're on the path, is really important as
well.
(17:41):
Anybody who thinks that this is a easy pathtowards becoming wealthy has never it before.
Yeah.
I saw awesome kids.
We we have a great entrepreneurial ecosystemhere in San Diego, California, and the Center
for Innovation Entrepreneurship, which is acollaboration between the college and the city
and a handful of local business owners, BlakeIrving, former CEO GoDaddy was one of the co
(18:03):
founders.
Nice.
Rick Stolemeyer.
Mindbuyer is one of the co founders, myself,and a few others.
And so, you know, we're we're we're all greatbeards done this for a while.
And I see on on Instagram, a handful of kidsthere at 2 in the afternoon, and they're
throwing frisbee's at the beach, hashtagentrepreneur life.
Yeah.
I mean, oh, no.
(18:24):
I actually I I went I went and and and I wroteI wrote a comment.
I and, never in my life.
Well, did this ever meet entrepreneur life?
We're gonna have to talk later.
Yeah.
So, like, this is this is what you do when, youknow, for a week after got the check.
And then you get back to it and and keepplugging along, but that was that's not the
entrepreneurial life that us gray beards know,man.
(18:45):
It's not romantic.
It's not pretty, but it is exciting.
And so you have to have it in your belly toendure that pain.
I couldn't imagine doing anything else.
We're we're getting short of time, and this hasbeen a fascinating conversation.
Alex, I wanna give you a chance to say a lastfew words, like direct people towards where
they can find out studio or your book or any ofthe myriad things that, you do that are
(19:09):
interesting and they'd be excited by.
Yeah.
Thank you.
Yeah, our company name is Relentless VentureStudio.
The website is relentless.comverelentless.com.
If somebody wanted to go on there and learn alittle bit more about what we do, our portfolio
companies, and if they submit on the form andask for me, it'll get me eventually.
I'm gonna also hit you on LinkedIn.
(19:29):
Pretty active on LinkedIn.
So you can find me on there as well.
My name is Alex Minneckucci.
So you can just search me on there, send thisphone, find me there.
So, yeah, I'm always happy to help aspiringentrepreneurs, give a little bit advice if I
can.
We love to connect people with resourceespecially where we're at.
And as part of the country, it's it's hard toget connection to the right people.
So I'm all about trying to connect and createopportunities.
(19:52):
So we do a lot of that So if you've gotsomething exciting, something interesting,
Hammer to chat so they can connect people withthe right people, or maybe we got a project
that it ties into, and, we could do somebusiness together.
So I always love to meet interesting peoplethat are that are doing cool stuff.
Describe why I do the podcast, Alex, it waslovely having you on.
(20:15):
And that's a wrap for this episode of wannathank you personally for joining us, and we'll
see you next time.
Until then, keep exploring and stay curious.
Thank you for listening.
If you are new here and enjoyed the content,please subscribe.
It really helps us out.
And if you are a regular listener, thanks somuch for your continued support.
(20:37):
Overwhelmed by tech debt.
Discover Vala AI, the solution to techchallenges with the simplicity of a click No
engineering background?
No problem.
Vala AI enables anyone to effortlessly tackletech issues, freeing up your time from tech
headache.
Make tech debt vanish with Vala AI, where yourtech solutions are just a click away.
Welcome to Tectastic, where we navigate theintersection of technology and business,
uncovering innovations that redefine our world.
Alex, it is wonderful to have you on isfantastic.
Thank you for being here.
My pleasure here.
Thank you for having me.
So I do wanna know more about relentlessVenture Studio because I think what you are is
(00:23):
interesting and necessary, but I also wannatalk about the journey getting there.
I've been a tech entrepreneur for 30 years onagain off again.
I also jumped off for a period of time and wentand worked for very large companies.
Trying to show them how to be more like astartup to bring back innovation.
And my first chance that was Nike where theybrought me as the entrepreneur, and that's
actually where I found my cofounder He was, thechief technology officer from Nike at the time.
(00:48):
And there's a big difference between startingsomething new from the ground up inventing it
and trying to fix something broken than, of ascale.
And it's actually harder to see these thingsthat are similar than it is to see the things
that are different.
The things that are similar are a desire, ahunger to to improve, to capture more market,
(01:09):
to be impactful in some way.
But the things that are different are scarcityof your resources.
Like as a startup, you've got basically youand, you know, whatever resources you could put
to it.
And when you're young and early, that's notmuch.
And as you get older, you've got betterrelationships.
You've got experience to draw from.
Hopefully, you've got a savings account thatyou can rely on.
(01:29):
Right.
But that lack of hunger, that lack of necessityis why big companies have trouble actually
innovating.
You know, I agree with everything you justsaid.
I'm I'm running a little book very brief, but II deal with a lot of incubators, early stage
companies, people coming to me saying, Alex, Imean, the starting a business or considering
starting a business.
(01:49):
And how do I know, you know, if I should orwhat my path should be?
And and the first chapter in my book is youprobably shouldn't be an entrepreneur.
Here's why.
So if you
do anything else, do that.
They do just reach chapter 1 and throw the bookaway and and just go get a job.
And and and it really starts out with, if youhave to ask that question, you probably
(02:11):
shouldn't be.
Yep.
And to your point, with your experience, youeither have it in your DNA, some fire in your
belly, that fire that hunger that need and youjust have to go that path.
Or if you don't if you don't feel that burningdesire to do it, you probably shouldn't.
And oftentimes, people are, I think, misled.
And if it's not really the fault to incubators,but people wanna be encouraging.
(02:33):
But just because you love to cook food does notmean you should own a restaurant.
And that is a very, very different skill set.
And I met somebody actually that I, localcollege here at Cal Poly And she was a lovely
young lady, very smart, very talented, whowanted to make furniture that reflected her
interest in culture.
And she was talking about building a furniturecompany.
(02:55):
And I said, well, show me your artwork.
So she shows me your furniture.
I go, this is beautiful.
K.
So who's gonna sell it?
Who is going to inventory it?
Who's gonna make sure you have insurance onthis?
Who's gonna hire people to help you scale?
Which is I don't think about any of that.
I said, well, that's the difference between,you know, being a, like, a tradesman and
starting a business.
Yes.
But my suggestion might be you go find anorganization has that infrastructure and you
(03:19):
create a product line within that company andlet them deal with all the stuff that you
definitely don't wanna do and 2 don't know howto do.
And so I think that's a huge distinguishingfactor.
The success of entrepreneurs is you gotta havethat fire in your belly, but you've gotta adapt
to the 90% of it.
That's just business muck and has very littleto do with the magic, the thing that you're
(03:41):
passionate about trying to Unfortunately, youknow, there's a lot of administrative stuff
involved in in building and running a business.
Every time I went and worked for anothercompany and something that I didn't found and
start myself, I had trouble, a lot of trouble.
I I look and go, that was the wrong decision.
Like, in my head, I knew it was the wrongdecision because partially.
I've been there a hundred times already.
(04:02):
I already know, you know, there's dragonsthere.
Don't go that way.
Or whatever.
I I was more comfortable betting on myself thanbetting on somebody else.
And why would I not bet on myself?
That thought process always got me back to theentrepreneurship and always got me going
there's a better way of doing this.
There's a better solution here go do it myselfbecause I don't trust anybody else to do it.
(04:22):
And, I don't know.
I I and I found every other entrepreneur I knowand respect.
They're broken in the same way.
Whatever.
You're gonna do your thing.
I trust myself.
I'm gonna go do it, and I'm gonna build thisthing because I can't imagine somebody else
doing it right or the way that I want it doneor
It is a common thread.
It is a common characteristic.
You can you can pick them out of a crowd, andit's a it's a strength and a weakness.
I mean, it it is a quirky to to wanna do it.
(04:45):
And it's for a lot of people, it's that anxietyand nervousness in your belly of the
uncertainty.
And I love the uncertainty.
Yes.
I've made it my mission life for no 2 days ofmy life to look the same.
And I I remember sitting down one time yearsago, I owned an IT company, and we were in the
break room.
And one of my lead techs sits down, and he'smaking his lunch.
(05:06):
He got a little brown bag.
He's eating his lunch.
And I said, hey, buddy.
You know, what what do you hope to be 10 yearsfrom now?
And he says, lord willing, Alex, do the exactsame thing I'm doing today.
And and I and I, you know, I started it for asecond.
I just thought it was terrible.
And then I realized that that's great for a lotof people.
And what he wants is that stability and thatconsistency.
And, he enjoyed his work.
(05:28):
He put himself into his work, but his workdidn't define him.
And I think as an entrepreneur, you know, thethe exercise, they give you in grade school.
If you had a a $1,000,000,000, what would youdo tomorrow?
I do the same thing.
And, I love what I do.
I'm in it for the deals.
I'm in it for the people.
I'm in it for the learning and the experience.
My brain hurts every night.
When I go to bed, try and learn AI and allthese different things, and I'm constantly
(05:51):
relearning and reinventing.
To me, that makes life exciting.
There's no other path for me.
And so I think it's interesting when youcommunity of entrepreneurs that share those
characteristics that it can be a lot of fun.
Sometimes we find each other in the weirdestplaces too.
I will spend some time Wayfair, which is agreat company.
Niraj and Steve are wonderful to 2 founders.
I love them dearly.
And, one of the other executives they broughtin into a very similar to mind is now started
(06:14):
in his own company.
It's an AI also, like, it's really surprising.
Frankly, we were so alike, and we were sittingat Wayfair asking ourselves the same Christian.
Like, Why are we doing this?
Like, we we know the problems that need to besolved.
90% of them in any big company are actuallycultural problems, which are not solved by
anybody, but the founder, you're not gonnachange the culture of a 10,000 person company
(06:36):
that's doing 24,000,000,000 a year in revenueby showing up as an executive and being like,
hey, change the process, and, we're gonna buildthis technology instead of that technology.
It doesn't do a damn thing.
It's gonna come from those founders.
And then we both asked ourselves that at thesame time, and then we went off and both
founded companies, you know, just a short whileafter that.
I always knew I was going to go back to it.
For me, it was a lifestyle problem in that youget to a point where you get paid a lot of
(07:01):
money to go fix company's problems when itcomes to something like innovation and
technology, and they will pay you a lot ofmoney to go solve it for them.
And if you're good at it, you realize theplaybook.
It's like, oh, Here's the freaking playbook.
I they're gonna ask you to do the same damnthing.
So I'll bring in this integration partner andI'll subcontract out this work, and, we'll do
this to pay down this problem, and then I'll bebored, and I'll go look for the next one.
(07:24):
It's hard to get out of that, though.
It's a trap.
It's a really rough trap to get out of becauseyou get really comfortable with that big
paycheck.
There was a moment I woke up and went, knocked.
I simply can't do this anymore.
I have to go back to who I am.
And who I am involves solving enormously hardproblems with a team of people that I respect
and care about that are passionate aboutresolving the same damn problem.
(07:47):
Love that.
Love it.
You know, I I've gone through a similar trialwhere I'll have an exit.
I'll sell to a company.
You a larger company.
You know, you've got a transition servicescomponent and get to know some of that team.
And usually in there, they go, wow.
You don't see to be good do.
Wanted to come and play it a little longer withus.
And you're like, oh, this is fun.
And and I always refer to it as a kid in acandy store.
(08:07):
Like, these larger companies don't realize howgood they've got it with these big customer
bases, lots of resources, grade reach.
And as an entrepreneur, go, wow.
What can I do with You know, let me add it?
And then you try to mobilize some action andyou watch everything move.
They're just a a snail pace.
Mhmm.
And it's frustrating.
(08:27):
And so I I did some of that, and I had to makea decision that I just I won't do work for
hire.
I will only work projects.
I have an an equity stake in.
That was part of me forming my venture studio.
You said exactly right.
Solving big challenges with team of people youtrust.
That's exactly what my venture studio as arelentless venture studio that pulled my a
players from previous products in the last 20years.
(08:48):
And create a centralized team and said,alright.
We're gonna go hunt for stuff.
And either company used to buy, companies wannabuild, people we wanna partner with that we
really like, but we have an equity piece ineverything we do.
And and then let's go fix things.
I know it's been a lot on going down thatendeavor by having that centralized team that's
jailed.
What happened was before, I've Hammer on 6solid exits from when I was 18 to 40.
(09:12):
And about every 3 years.
And every time I sold a company, I had to startover.
Yep.
And so I gotta check, you know, when I had tomove out of my office, with my desk, and, you
know, my team, and I come up with a new ideaand ideas were fine, but I had to build a new
team and find a new office and start everythingover.
How do I build an organization allows me toexist in perpetuity in my problem solving
(09:33):
entrepreneurial ADD mode?
And be opportunistic in my projects, but what IHammer to rebuild my infrastructure every 3
years.
So that that also was a function of buildingmy, my venture studio, which has worked out
pretty well.
The last company I had during the dotcom phasewas a venture studio.
I was called, Techno Loft because we thought wewere very clever.
IFA 65 and come out with.
(09:54):
I'm blue and was all over the radio, and we'relike, oh, we'll be a loft that is technology
and plays techno music.
Yeah.
And we did fairly well.
We ended up having to close that one down whenall the investment dried up in the world.
And when you're a venture studio, you tend torely on your clients having money.
Yeah.
So we folded that.
Yeah.
Went off to another one a couple of exits.
I think I've had about the same number as you,but not every 3 years.
(10:16):
I was never that in systemic.
It was usually, like, big one and then a couplefizzles And then big one, and then a couple
fizzles almost like clockwork on that front.
And it was largely because I didn't want to bethe CEO, I very much avoided that role.
And it was the requirement to be out frontselling all the time.
I wanted to build solve.
I wanted to make the thing.
(10:36):
I'm gonna make the thing that solves theproblem.
Right?
And every time the fizzle, what happens when Iwasn't in charge, and every time we Hammer the
pop, I was in a good spot where I had a lotmore control over it.
And I, I learned my lesson.
It just took me, like, 6 tries to figure itout.
Like, oh, man Hammer to be a lot more involvedin the day to day in making decisions, have to
care about the selling.
(10:57):
I mean, your job as an entrepreneur is 90%sales.
So
Yeah.
Suck it up.
That is that is a tough lesson learned, man.
I've done the same thing, and I learned thatwith my venture studio where early on in my
career, I was gonna obsess the control.
So I think I benefited from that.
And then with my venture studio model, I waslike, alright.
I'm going to shift gears to become an advisorand a mentor.
(11:18):
You know, I'm gonna share my strategy and sharemy resources and help a dozen companies who
have their own respective founders or CEOs And,and that was a challenge, because I'm not a
great teacher, apparently.
And so and, you know, most entrepreneurs I metaren't it's like, you're the mic of George.
Right?
Give me the ball.
Let me take a shot.
I'm still trying to teach the other companies,how to perform a CEO's kinda give them some
(11:41):
guidance on planning and you give them someresources and watch out for these pitfalls
because I've made these mistakes and make someintroductions to help accelerate some the
growth.
But there's always that challenge of, you'renot the one driving the ship directly.
And, and there were some challenges with that.
That's, that's definitely one of the hardestparts of the Venture Studio model in scaling
that part.
One of my friends who started a companyrecently, they went through a Venture Studio,
(12:03):
and it was very, very good for him.
He needed that structure, that support aroundhim so that he didn't prematurely hire a bunch
of people from his background that, like, hey.
I need a marketing guy.
Well, you you do eventually.
You don't right now.
Like, you're a little early on that.
Things like that.
It helped him out a lot because he had a lotmore indoctrination into the large enterprise.
(12:23):
He had been an entrepreneur in his past.
Kind of just telling the same trap I did andthen stated a lot longer than I did.
It it's fun to watch him come out the otherside of that.
He learned a lot it really set them up forsuccess.
They're in a great path right now.
And then I've got other friends that they wouldhave been a disaster in a venture studio
because that's what they are.
They should be running a venture you know, theyare the adviser you want that their repeat
(12:45):
serial entrepreneur that can go out and justthey know all the right people.
They know what they need to do.
They're gonna go do their thing.
And they would Hammer been struggling in thatspace because it would have felt stifling to
them.
At least the ones that I've interacted withYeah.
They could be very stifling.
But I'm really curious about yours because youdo come from that repeat entrepreneur success
playbook thing.
(13:05):
And you have to now take a big step back fromcontrol over it, right, like, as you were
saying.
So how do you manage that within the studio?
How do you have the right level of engagementbecause one of the problems I found with every
entrepreneur I know is we have no idea how orwhen to ask for help.
Know, that that is a fundamental problem.
And, you know, it starts with good planning andgain consensus on that plan.
(13:27):
Right?
So we we've got a structure where we talk aboutknow, the 3 year plan, the 1 year plan, setting
quarterly objectives, all pretty academic.
Like, they're dialing those things in.
And and a lot of these entrepreneurs haveinherently to plant.
And all that does is it becomes a beacon on thehill to make sure we're all growing in the same
direction.
Right?
So we we set some benchmarks there.
(13:48):
Selling some KPIs, how are we measuringChristian at what intervals in developing a
discipline to look at the numbers?
That's the other thing that's fundamental.
I'm sure your experience there is, like, ifpeople don't look at their numbers, they don't
look at their financials, their financials area mess, what KPIs are telling us we're on
track.
Tell me about lead generation.
How well is it performing?
How well are things converting?
(14:09):
What's my lifetime value?
What's my churn?
All these guys, you know, they're they'refocused on the widget, taking widgets to
market, destroying whatever money they've gotout the wall, they will stick, And we said, no.
No.
In order to grow systematically, we need tohave these disciplines in place.
So the first is the educate of them just notknowing that these things either exist or that
(14:31):
this is a principle that should be employed,how to put it in place.
So that's where we start is Let's create someformality around where we wanna go.
And and what that does too is a great exerciseon expectations.
I had coffee with somebody the other day justsomebody who asked for some guidance.
And brilliant young woman, PhD, starting a, aninteresting little SAS content site, And she's
(14:54):
making $500,000 a month, something like that,just getting started, very early stage.
And I said, tell me tell me your goal for yourbusiness.
And she says, well, probably to go public.
And I went.
Okay.
Oops.
I said, you you understand statistically whatit's like to go from where you're at it going
public.
And public is a means to an
(15:15):
ad.
Yes.
It's not the end.
Yes.
It sounds exciting, entrepreneurially.
Once you do it, the the luster is gone.
You realize it's kind of a horrific experiencein a lot of ways.
So it's just a funding round.
It's just a funding round.
Right?
It's it's simply like a a a different struck inorder to do certain things, but it's it's means
to an end.
It is not the end.
(15:35):
And so it just sounds exciting.
And, and, yeah, you can create a lot of whatseems like paper wealth, but if you're the
principal, you're not gonna be able to spend itor move it or do anything with it.
It gets very, very hard.
I, you know, aside the fact that we have to getthere, so I said, you know, do you have a lot
of money in the bank?
She said, no.
Do you have kids?
Yes.
So what would $3,000,000 do to your worldtomorrow?
(15:55):
Just I would change my life.
I said, so why don't we set that as the as thegoal?
This is your first business.
Let's talk about a $3,000,000 exit.
Knowing your business you know, what what do,eggs and multiples look like?
Because we talked about eggs and multiples.
We talked about what you would need to do toget there and said, spill the 3 year plan to
get there.
And and it took this big, big world ofentrepreneurs.
(16:18):
I mean, this appetite bigger than your stomachand made it all very real, very tactical.
So that's kind of the first exercise I like todo with my my portfolio companies Let's get on
the same page and let's be real.
We're very focused on execution.
And so let's let's let's get to that model.
So when you're there, we can come out with thenext 3 years, it's like.
But at least we've we've established amilestone that's realistic.
(16:40):
And so we started there.
We come back to, well, what are our goals?
How do we measure it?
How do we stay on track?
How do we hold ourselves accountable?
It's a lot of entrepreneurs to your pointaren't good at being held accountable or
holding themselves accountable, very hard.
You throw this remote work stuff in there andmake it even harder for people to hold
themselves accountable.
(17:00):
So these were just some of the fundamentalsthat I think came in and and helped just frame
up what being a tech entrepreneur is.
I had a few cases where becoming part of ourventure studio and knowing, you know, my
background and having done fairly well wherethey were counting their money on the day they,
you know, we got engaged.
It was like, I'm gonna beat you, millionaire.
(17:21):
Like, no.
No.
No.
Oh.
If we got a long run to go, man, eat that ramenand save that money because we're we're gonna
need it.
It's not gonna Nothing's gonna be easy aboutthis.
Yeah.
So, so setting the expectations is absolutelykey, and then putting some disciplines in
place.
To measure the the path and then make sureyou're on the path, is really important as
well.
(17:41):
Anybody who thinks that this is a easy pathtowards becoming wealthy has never it before.
Yeah.
I saw awesome kids.
We we have a great entrepreneurial ecosystemhere in San Diego, California, and the Center
for Innovation Entrepreneurship, which is acollaboration between the college and the city
and a handful of local business owners, BlakeIrving, former CEO GoDaddy was one of the co
(18:03):
founders.
Nice.
Rick Stolemeyer.
Mindbuyer is one of the co founders, myself,and a few others.
And so, you know, we're we're we're all greatbeards done this for a while.
And I see on on Instagram, a handful of kidsthere at 2 in the afternoon, and they're
throwing frisbee's at the beach, hashtagentrepreneur life.
Yeah.
I mean, oh, no.
(18:24):
I actually I I went I went and and and I wroteI wrote a comment.
I and, never in my life.
Well, did this ever meet entrepreneur life?
We're gonna have to talk later.
Yeah.
So, like, this is this is what you do when, youknow, for a week after got the check.
And then you get back to it and and keepplugging along, but that was that's not the
entrepreneurial life that us gray beards know,man.
(18:45):
It's not romantic.
It's not pretty, but it is exciting.
And so you have to have it in your belly toendure that pain.
I couldn't imagine doing anything else.
We're we're getting short of time, and this hasbeen a fascinating conversation.
Alex, I wanna give you a chance to say a lastfew words, like direct people towards where
they can find out studio or your book or any ofthe myriad things that, you do that are
(19:09):
interesting and they'd be excited by.
Yeah.
Thank you.
Yeah, our company name is Relentless VentureStudio.
The website is relentless.comverelentless.com.
If somebody wanted to go on there and learn alittle bit more about what we do, our portfolio
companies, and if they submit on the form andask for me, it'll get me eventually.
I'm gonna also hit you on LinkedIn.
(19:29):
Pretty active on LinkedIn.
So you can find me on there as well.
My name is Alex Minneckucci.
So you can just search me on there, send thisphone, find me there.
So, yeah, I'm always happy to help aspiringentrepreneurs, give a little bit advice if I
can.
We love to connect people with resourceespecially where we're at.
And as part of the country, it's it's hard toget connection to the right people.
So I'm all about trying to connect and createopportunities.
(19:52):
So we do a lot of that So if you've gotsomething exciting, something interesting,
Hammer to chat so they can connect people withthe right people, or maybe we got a project
that it ties into, and, we could do somebusiness together.
So I always love to meet interesting peoplethat are that are doing cool stuff.
Describe why I do the podcast, Alex, it waslovely having you on.
(20:15):
And that's a wrap for this episode of wannathank you personally for joining us, and we'll
see you next time.
Until then, keep exploring and stay curious.
Thank you for listening.
If you are new here and enjoyed the content,please subscribe.
It really helps us out.
And if you are a regular listener, thanks somuch for your continued support.
(20:37):
Overwhelmed by tech debt.
Discover Vala AI, the solution to techchallenges with the simplicity of a click No
engineering background?
No problem.
Vala AI enables anyone to effortlessly tackletech issues, freeing up your time from tech
headache.
Make tech debt vanish with Vala AI, where yourtech solutions are just a click away.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Special Summer Offer: Exclusively on Apple Podcasts, try our Dateline Premium subscription completely free for one month! With Dateline Premium, you get every episode ad-free plus exclusive bonus content.