It has been six months since I began as Cofounder and CEO of Third Derivative. Below is a very long assessment of how things are going, but the TLDR is that I am really thriving in this role, loving my team, and feeling really good about this decision! What is Third Derivative?A joint venture ofContinue reading “Third Derivative Six Month Update”
Category Archives: Leadership & Entrepreneurship
We Built Something Big: RMI Launches Third Derivative Climatetech Accelerator
Two weeks ago, I announced that I had become the co-founder and CEO of Third Derivative climatetech accelerator, a new joint venture between Rocky Mountain Institute (RMI) and New Energy Nexus. Now that we are fully live, I couldn’t be more excited to share what we’ve built. It still feels a little surreal. Two weeksContinue reading “We Built Something Big: RMI Launches Third Derivative Climatetech Accelerator”
Why We Built Third Derivative
I mentioned in my prior post that I shared our rationale for building Third Derivative on LinkedIn; here is the full text: Leading a climate tech startup is tough. You often have greater capital needs and longer paths to market, making it harder for you to compete with software ventures for funding. Commercializing climate techContinue reading “Why We Built Third Derivative”
Third Derivative: My Next Great Adventure
Far over the misty mountains coldTo dungeons deep and caverns oldWe must away ere break of dayTo seek the pale enchanted gold. I have founded or led eight climate tech startups. I’ve had one really big success, a few smaller successes, and a few “learning experiences” along the way – but every one of themContinue reading “Third Derivative: My Next Great Adventure”
The End of Smart OES
Last year Smart OES was acquired by Ingenero, one of our corporate strategic investors! I’ve been meaning to blog about this momentous event, but the acquisition itself and then major moves in other areas of my life (More on that soon!) have kept me busy. Finally I have a chance to reflect back on SmartContinue reading “The End of Smart OES”
My Entrepreneurship Principles: Leadership
In my first piece on Mindful Entrepreneurship, I laid out several principles to optimize the entrepreneurial process. In my second piece, I argued that culture is extremely important to startups. In this final (?) piece, I will now examine how leadership can create an optimal startup culture and help others execute the entrepreneurial process. EntrepreneurialContinue reading “My Entrepreneurship Principles: Leadership”
My Entrepreneurship Principles: Culture
While I was hunkered down surviving Hurricane Florence, I had further opportunity to reflect on my principles as an entrepreneur. In the first part of this brief series on Mindful Entrepreneurship, I laid out my keys to the entrepreneurial process. In this second part, I will focus on culture. Entrepreneurship Culture Culture matters a lot.Continue reading “My Entrepreneurship Principles: Culture”
My Entrepreneurship Principles: Process
I have recently been reflecting on the principles that I believe make entrepreneurial ventures successful. Today, the 56th anniversary of JFK’s famous moon speech, a speech that inspired a nation to accomplish an impossible goal, seems like a good day to try to distill those principles down into a succinct post. I won’t claim toContinue reading “My Entrepreneurship Principles: Process”
Startup Fundraising: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly
One year ago today, Smart Office Energy Solutions closed a $1.3M angel round of funding. We’ve accomplished a great deal since then – expanded the team, finished gen-1 product development, obtained all the requisite certifications for our hardware, and built a large sales pipeline – but I find anniversaries to be a good time toContinue reading “Startup Fundraising: The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly”
Entrepreneurial Leadership
Last week I was invited to give a talk on a topic of my choice to the team of a high-growth startup in Durham. Because leadership challenges often cause friction during times of high growth, I chose to address the topic of entrepreneurial leadership. Check out my video below and let me know what youContinue reading “Entrepreneurial Leadership”