100 Best Bits of Advice from 10 Years

vector research partners ( aka V4RP )

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The 100 Best Bits of Advice from 10 Years

We combed the V4RP archives to pull together the 100 very best pieces of advice we’ve read over the past decade—from folks like Stewart Butterfield, Claire Hughes Johnson, Alexis Ohanian, and more.

Outline

Rewind to 2013, and the tech world looks wildly different. Slack was still in preview, Twitter (remember that name?) had just gone public, and Google Glass was still hyped enough to make everyone scratch their heads. Candy Crush Saga beat out Vine for Apple’s top downloaded app.

But what we care about is the launch that actually stuck:

When we started V4RP, we made a few promises to ourselves:

• We’d get out of the way and let experts tell you what actually matters.
• Every article would give you tactics you could use today—no theory.
• We’d never be boring. Each story is designed to teach, stick, and sometimes make you laugh.

These marching orders pushed us into uncharted territory.

V4RP has always been longform. But for this pice, we went bite-sized. Here are 100 snippets of the best advice we’ve read over the last decade.

Quick note: even 100 nuggets barely scratch the surface.

ADVICE FOR GROWING AS A LEADER & BOOSTING YOUR CAREER

1. If you want to grow as fast as your company, give away your job every couple of months. – Molly Graham
2. End every conversation with the optimism you want to carry into the next. Visualize the next interaction and act accordingly. – Chris Fralic
3. “Leave when you stop learning” is directionally right—but know that learning can be organizational, not just technical. – Brie Wolfson
4. Focus on what’s keeping your manager up at night. Solve one level up, not just your own problems. – Jan Chong
5. The quality of your questions drives the quality of feedback. Ask specifically: “How can this deliverable be 10% better?” – Shivani Berry
6. Founders own their burnout. Track it like a KPI for yourself and the team. – Steve El-Hage
7. Treat emotional health like fitness. Just because you’re not panicking daily doesn’t mean you’re emotionally fit. – Dr. Emily Anhalt
8. Treat joining a company like investing your time. Will this step make your future amazing? – Elliot Shmukler
9. The hardest founder transition: from hands-on product work to stepping back. Enjoy the joy of finishing problems vs. managing people. – Drew Houston
10. Sail your ship by your own principles, not external winds. – Wade Foster
11. Find the balance between hermit and social butterfly—lean toward hermit. Every minute counts. – Alexis Ohanian
12. For public speaking, polish your best idea. Don’t keep mining for new ones. – Anjuan Simmons
13. Focus on engagement, not impression. Impressing is a byproduct. – Adam Grant
14. To be world-class, you need brutally honest feedback, not “You’re doing great.” – Amber Feng
15. Separate what you can and cannot control—lift weight off your shoulders. – Liz Fosslien
16. Treat your network like a muscle, not an ATM. – Karen Wickre
17. Goals are great—if you define what success/failure looks like beforehand. – Annie Duke
18. Prioritize what matters most before interviewing—each question should map to deal-breakers. – Anna Binder
19. Stop believing “funding or hires will fix it.” Gratitude trains your brain to handle scarcity. – Katia Verresen
20. Startups are dizzying. Schedule time to write things down. – Stacy La
21. Focus = clear intention, not blind charge. – Fidji Simo
22. Grow with the company; find ways to help your peers. – Cristina Cordova
23. Big company: reduce risk. Startup: ship, iterate, repeat. – James Everingham
24. Vulnerability = trust = leadership leverage. – Don Faul

ADVICE FOR GROWING & MANAGING YOUR TEAM

25. Radical candor = care personally + challenge directly. – Kim Scott
26. “I trust you, make the call.” Six words that change teams. – Sean Twersky
27. Flip 1:1s: “What would you save for the end of this meeting?” – Ximena Vengoechea
28. Telling someone what to do ≠ solving the problem. – Sidharth Kakkar
29. CEOs: build fire departments, don’t put out fires. – Sam Corcos
30. Encourage disagreement—lean into productive conflict. – Jack Altman
31. Give praise with as much prep as criticism. – Russ Laraway
32. Would each report want to be on your team again? If unsure, probably no. – Julie Zhuo
33. Listen for what you’re not hearing. Don’t just grease the squeaky wheel. – Matt Wallaert
34. Adults need the truth. So do the adults you hire. – Patty McCord
35. Let junior employees interview candidates—they notice different signals. – Marco Rogers
36. Localize problem-solving to grow faster. – Claire Hughes Johnson
37. Iteration > initial polish. – Nikhyl Singhal
38. Live your company’s values; everyone is watching. – Jeff Lawson
39. Prepare to give away your top talent—they’ll leave eventually. – Clarissa Shen
40. Writing quality signals care. Poor emails = poor culture. – David Nunez
41. Trust matters more than fixing individual behaviors. – Anne Raimondi
42. Play to your strengths; don’t force management. – Dharmesh Shah
43. Think bigger, blow ideas up, see what sticks. – Joe Gebbia
44. Practice matters—mistakes are part of the system. – Kevin Fishner
45. Critique with care: highlight what works. – Katie Dill
46. Delay = harder behavior change. Act fast. – Michael Lopp
47. As a manager, progress isn’t always visible. – Raylene Yung
48. Leaders set the Everest, teams find the path. – Amanda Richardson
49. Empower leaf nodes to solve problems themselves. – Jean-Denis Grèze
50. Managers must know where they stand on every goal—instantly. – Christa Quarles
51. Avoid yak shaving. Evaluate time spent, not just output. – Mike Krieger
52. DEI requires active respect and integration. – Trier Bryant
53. Tolerate troublemaking—uniformity kills startups. – Bethanye McKinney Blount
54. Explain the “why” to engineers; it’s never wasted time. – Nick Caldwell
55. Dream candidates want to see the product, not just your charm. – Maya Spivak
56. CEO = editor of excellence. – David Cancel

ADVICE FOR STARTING UP

57. Pick the team first, idea second. – Waseem Daher
58. You know your customer when you can predict 75% of what they’ll say. – Christina Cacioppo
59. Building comes after delivering value. – Gagan Biyani
60. Describe your customer’s goals in simple language. – Matt Lerner
61. The business model is as important as the market or product. – Jay Simons
62. 30 customer meetings before writing code—patterns emerge fast. – Michael Sippey
63. Set hilariously aggressive deadlines—avoid non-critical details. – Tara Viswanathan
64. Adoption ≠ better; it = worth changing. – Jonah Berger
65. Track what your co-founder does right daily. – Esther Perel
66. Fundraising = live performance; know your pitch inside out. – Oren Jacob
67. Product-market fit = downhill boulder; lack = uphill struggle. – Felicia Curcuru
68. Build your audience before you need it. – Ryan Hoover
69. Nailing positioning early makes everything else easier. – Arielle Jackson
70. Treat feedback from customers as objective, not “my baby.” – Cindy Alvarez
71. Juicy insights come from extreme reactions. – Alex Torrey
72. Co-founder trust = vulnerability + consistency. – Jeff Wald
73. Distill all feedback; separate signal from noise. – Nat Turner
74. Target Goldilocks early users, not execs. – Pete Kazanjy
75. Share the good, bad, and ugly in investor updates. – Mathilde Collin

ADVICE FOR GROWING YOUR COMPANY & YOUR PRODUCT

76. Focus on user “why,” not business “why.” – Jiaona Zhang
77. Most decisions aren’t worth more than 10 minutes. – Dave Girouard
78. Ask: why do people love it? What’s holding them back? – Rahul Vohra
79. Three voices in product: business, code, pixels. – Alex Schleifer
80. Technical debt isn’t a scarlet letter—it's inevitable. – Kimber Lockhart
81. Every customer interaction is marketing; listen closely. – Stewart Butterfield
82. Speed ≠ sloppiness; pair speed with prioritization. – Jaleh Rezaei
83. Launch ≠ finish line. It’s opening chess move. – Caryn Marooney
84. First 30 seconds of customer experience = critical. – Scott Belsky
85. Delight > copying competitors. – Andy Rachleff
86. Kindle strategy = initial users; fire strategy = scaling. – Casey Winters
87. Communities grow organically—start small, iterate. – David Spinks
88. Focus on customer behavior, not vanity metrics. – Payal Kadakia Pujji
89. Product strategy > flashy distractions. – Ravi Mehta
90. Internal resonance comes first—employees are toughest critics. – Terra Carmichael
91. Prioritize must-haves first, nice-to-haves second. – Caitlin Kalinowski
92. Ask why it won’t work—answers why it will. – Rick Song
93. Annual plans need bold, focused resource allocation. – Lenny Rachitsky & Nels Gilbreth
94. Data is meaningless if siloed—call users directly. – Lloyd Tabb
95. Stay aware of trends, not just competitors. – Andrew Ofstad
96. Voice of the customer is non-negotiable. – Kalina Bryant
97. Feature commits = tech debt; flexibility > all. – Nate Stewart
98. Resilient founders obsess over potential threats, not competitors. – Bob Moore
99. Designers: zoom out to why it’s purchased, not just existing users. – Hareem Mannan
100. Customer development = one-on-one with a direct report; ask the hard questions. – Ryan Glasgow

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