What motivated you to become an entrepreneur?
I should have done it much earlier. But I also had a time of my life working for Spotify, which I joined at series B as an employee no. 150 and leaving when it was a post-IPO streaming giant with 8K+ employees. I was not sure what my next dream job could be, I just knew it had to be at the intersection of content, tech and media, hence I started my own startup with my dear co-founder, another ex-Spotifier, Riccardo Buzzotta.
What should leaders understand about their own role and responsibility?
There are no overnight miracles, it's very hard work: both physically and emotionally. Requires resilience, grit, strategic approach and grind.
What's an attitude that we should pay more attention to in the workplace?
Balance rest and work, as rest is an essential part of being productive.
What was a pivotal moment where your business made a big leap forward?
To come yet, we are just a bit more than 1 year old. We’ve raised a little pre-seed round during the summer of 2023 after having faced 120+ rejections from investors. It allowed us to build the initial tech, launch our beta and start getting the first paying customers.
What book do you recommend the most?
Right now, I am re-reading Gabriel Weinberg’s “Traction.”
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Here’s More, From Other Founders Around the World
What motivated you to become an entrepreneur?
After graduating, I worked for an extremely well-paying automotive company. But I always had the feeling that there was more out there. So I quit and went into research with the aim of becoming a founder.
What’s an important guiding principle that informs the way you build and run your business?
One of our core values is experimentation. Rather than get stuck in arguing about what solution may best solve a problem or play to our ego, we focus on the smallest step we could possibly take to learn whether that’s true. It moves our minds away from thinking too big without sweating the small stuff and from getting stuck in discussions rather than actually doing something to understand the possible solutions better.
What should leaders understand about their own role and responsibility?
Your own time and energy is the most precious resource you have. Use it wisely, and learn what gives you energy, and what saps you. In the early years of building something, you need to throw a huge amount of time at it - and do many things you perhaps don’t like doing. But as you scale, it’s vital to take a step back and build a business that can grow rapidly beyond the time you put into it.
What shift in perspective has allowed you to see things differently?
It may sound simple, but realizing and truly understanding that we are all different and driven by different things has made a significant impact on me. This insight has changed the way I approach relationships and leadership.