Penelope Trunk’s Brazen Careerist. Advice at the intersection of work and life.
Is this your first time here?     About this blog   |    About my company, Brazen Careerist   |    Penelope's guide to starting a blog
 

Browsing category "Entrepreneurship"

Thanksgiving drama on steroids: Adding a family business to the mix

Posted to: Entrepreneurship |  Money |  Negotiating
November 25th, 2009
+-----------------+

I think its safe to say that for the majority of people, Thanksgiving is not about goodness and gratitude, but rather, family drama.
Until now, I have been pretty much on the outside of this American tradition: The tradition of building up Thanksgiving to be a great family moment and then the family not living up [...]

Read More...

+================+

How to find the right job for you

September 23rd, 2009
+-----------------+

We reorganized the company today. We brought in a new, interim CEO, who’s not me. For many entrepreneurs, that is their worst nightmare.
But I couldn’t be happier. For one thing, it’s a sign that my company, Brazen Careerist, is doing well. Remember when the company was running out of money and my electricity was getting [...]

Read More...

+================+

All-new launch for my company. Hooray!

Posted to: Entrepreneurship |  How to blog
August 25th, 2009
+-----------------+

My company just launched, all-new, at BrazenCareerist.com. For those of you who have been asking for the past year: "What's your business model?" You can read about it on TechCrunch. If  you want the full pitch, you can read the press release, (and you should know that all last week, when I wasn't blogging, I was [...]

Read More...

+================+

How to face cash-flow issues in a start-up

Posted to: Entrepreneurship
July 9th, 2009
+-----------------+

When I launched my company, Wired magazine contacted me to write a column about how to run a start-up. The editor, Dylan Tweney, blew me away with his offer. It wasn’t just that he took me to lunch in the grown-local lunchroom at Wired. He also had this unbelievable faith in me that I knew [...]

Read More...

+================+

New gender gaps for the new millennium

Posted to: Entrepreneurship |  Money |  Parenting |  Women
June 2nd, 2009
+-----------------+

I have said about ten million times that there is no more glass ceiling, there is no more salary gap between men and women, and there is no reason to keep bitching about sexual harassment because it’s merely a legal issue, not a men-are-evil issue.
Okay. So if the gender gaps are not around these feminist [...]

Read More...

+================+

Tips for coping when your startup is out of cash

May 15th, 2009
+-----------------+

My company is running out of money again. Well, really, it already happened. But it’s happened so many times that I am sort of used to it. It's a routine. You may recall that part of the routine is not paying my electric bill. But there is more.
1. Focus on something you can control.
You might [...]

Read More...

+================+

6 Tips for being a CEO without ruining your kids’ lives. I hope.

Posted to: Entrepreneurship |  Money |  Parenting
April 29th, 2009
+-----------------+

I get questions all the time about how I manage having kids and a startup at the same time. After trying to answer the question a few times, I realized that there's the pretty-much-BS answer about how it's all about being clear on your values. Or there’s the complicated, too-long-for-interviews answer.
To really get tips for [...]

Read More...

+================+

Starting a company in Silicon Valley is stupid

Posted to: Entrepreneurship
March 20th, 2009
+-----------------+

One of the reasons I moved from New York City to Madison, WI is that I knew I would start another company. I wasn't sure what it would be, but I had already launched two startups, and I could feel another one coming. It's a sort of itch I get when I have too many [...]

Read More...

+================+

Get your next mentor by being slightly annoying

Posted to: Entrepreneurship |  Mentoring
March 3rd, 2009
+-----------------+

Brian Wiegand is a very low-profile guy who has sold three companies, most recently to Microsoft. He is big enough that TechCrunch writes about him as a good bet for anyone betting. But the bane of Brian’s existence is that his exits have all been for under $50 million.
This is enough for him to [...]

Read More...

+================+

For a startup, money doesn't solve problems, it just changes them

Posted to: Entrepreneurship |  Money
February 26th, 2009
+-----------------+

We finally locked up funding for my company. There are some catches, though, and one of them is that we can’t use the funding to pay back debt.
This is a problem because our company has been out of money, pretty much, since November. We have revenue, but not enough to cover operating expenses. So we’ve [...]

Read More...

+================+

8 Blogs I read when I'm stressed about funding my company

Posted to: Entrepreneurship |  How to blog
January 29th, 2009
+-----------------+

People ask me all the time, "What blogs do you read?" The answer is that I read different ones at different times. It's a mood thing, I think. I could give you my favorite blogs for finding cool research, or my favorite blogs from my friends, or my favorite fashion blogs for when I don't [...]

Read More...

+================+

7 Things to consider before launching a startup

Posted to: Entrepreneurship
January 5th, 2009
+-----------------+

My company is out of money, which you are never supposed let happen. And definitely never supposed to confess to. Because then investors can give you any terms they want. Rape. Carnage. Pillage. Everything. And in our case, it's coming from the angels who invested in our first round of funding, which means that the [...]

Read More...

+================+

Startups are still fulfilling, even though getting funding in a recession stinks

Posted to: Entrepreneurship |  How to blog
December 15th, 2008
+-----------------+

I can always tell when things are really falling apart for me by how many days in a row I wear the same outfit. Last week, I wore my I'm-a-successful-CEO outfit four days in a row. In case you need a visual, it is black all over with ruffle near the neck – a little [...]

Read More...

+================+

Work stuff that makes me happy

Posted to: Diversity |  Entrepreneurship |  Parenting
December 8th, 2008
+-----------------+

It's a season of joy, right? You are probably thinking that you can count on my blog posts to be a respite from seasonal joy. But still, I'm susceptible to peer pressure. Mostly because I think it's an obligation of a friend to be sort of cheery. Because cheeriness is contagious. And on some level, [...]

Read More...

+================+

Live call today, 3 P.M. Eastern time

Posted to: Entrepreneurship |  How to blog
November 11th, 2008
+-----------------+

I will be on a live call today with Guy Kawasaki and John Jantsch. You can sign up to be on the call here.
John is the force behind the Duct Tape Marketing blog, which is a great example of how to use a blog to grow a whole business. Today, his blog looks like an [...]

Read More...

+================+

The entrepreneur's guide to a good divorce settlement

Posted to: Entrepreneurship |  Negotiating
July 25th, 2008
+-----------------+

Here's what happens in every meeting I have with investors: They ask about my divorce.
Many people ask about my divorce. Usually it's because the person cares about me. But with the investors, there is no pretense. They just want to know if Nino is going to get a large percentage of my stock in the [...]

Read More...

+================+

How to sell anything to anyone

Posted to: Entrepreneurship
June 25th, 2008
+-----------------+

People are always asking me what our business model is for Brazen Careerist. Now that we have a network of 150 great bloggers, we are focusing on companies. A lot of companies come to us asking for access to the bloggers. Not surprisingly, companies want to recruit from the bloggers and their friends. But we [...]

Read More...

+================+

Start-up skill: Find people who compensate for your weakness

April 2nd, 2008
+-----------------+

The update on my company is that Ryan Healy and I are not talking to each other. Well, he is talking to me, but I am giving him the silent treatment.
Still, I am confident that things are going well. First, because I am bad at the silent treatment—I have too much to say all the [...]

Read More...

+================+

Announcing the launch of BrazenCareerist.com!

Posted to: Entrepreneurship
March 3rd, 2008
+-----------------+

It's the big moment where I tell you to go check out BrazenCareerist.com. It's the first stage of our company, and it's a network of fifty young bloggers who I love, all blogging about their professional interests.
This would be a great time to tell you the grand story of the birth of my grand company.
When [...]

Read More...

+================+

How to decide if you should start a company

Posted to: Entrepreneurship
February 22nd, 2008
+-----------------+

Do you want to know how to tell if you have a business idea that will succeed? You know what? I don't know how you know that. And if I did, I'd be a venture capitalist, right? But I do know how you can tell if you have a business idea that is worth reorganizing [...]

Read More...

+================+





+--------------------------------------------------------+