Emilie Kormienko

We agree to many requests not because we want to do them, but because we don't want to be seen as rude, arrogant, or unhelpful. Often, you have to consider saying no to someone you will interact with again in the future—your co-worker, your spouse, your family and friends.

Building relationships was, in parallel with hypothesis generation, the most important part of this phase. I got a strong response to my initial post, which I think was an unintentional effect of spending a lot of time trying to get to know open source developers beforehand. Once I started publishing, those conversations meant that there were a... See more

The auditory cortex seems to perform a simple calculation: it uses the recent past to predict the future. As soon as a note or a group of notes repeats, this region concludes that it will continue to do so in the future. This is useful because it keeps us from paying too much attention to boring, predictable signals. Any sound that repeats is... See more

First, we pivoted, redefining our business. We “fired” all our unprofitable customers and sharpened the product specifically for power users. We borrowed against our receivables to keep growing without dilution. Little by little, the bet paid off, and we scaled our revenue 10x, from $70k/mo to $700k/mo.

Make sure to keep up physical exercise: Every Friday before work, Reitano and Roman’s third co-founder Rob Schutz go for a lap swim.

Throughout this process, it’s essential that you get your team’s input before finalizing anything. You most likely missed something along the way, and your team won’t feel bought-in if they don’t have a chance to share their perspective.