Category Archive

  If there’s a gene for entrepreneurship, the Wojcicki family has it. Susan Wojcicki is the CEO of YouTube. Her sister Janet is a leading anthropologist and epidemiologist. Their youngest sister Anne is the CEO and co-founder of 23andMe, the world’s first direct-to-consumer genetics testing service. And yes, their mother Esther Wojcicki wrote a book about parenting, which is called How to Raise Successful People. (The key is letting your child lead, she says.) Perhaps it was the family’s propensity for entrepreneurship that prompted Anne to explore the idea of an FDA-approved genetics testing service for anyone willing to part with $100 and some saliva. The core concept is not, after all, something many entrepreneurs consider. She herself, however, says her idea emerged because she is “obsessed with bringing the consumer voice to healthcare.” 23andMe has certainly given individual people unprecedented access to their own genetic information, data that even …

  Follow your passion. Is that profitable career advice? Or a one-way ticket to life as a starving artist, gamer, or writer? According to Nick Woodman, founder and CEO of the American technology company GoPro, your passions are your most reliable guides in life and in business. Nick started creating his product after watching amateur photographers like himself struggle to take pictures while surfing the waves in Australia and Indonesia. Today, the business pulls in more than $1 billion in annual revenue. While Nick may have achieved success by following his passions, you probably know many other entrepreneurs who have followed their passions straight into penury. You know it takes more than passion to lift an entrepreneur from a failed company to an internationally successful one. Nick knows that, now, too. After GoPro nearly went belly up in 2017, Nick admitted that long-term success required a big dose of realism …

What does it take for a 33-year-old female blogger to raise $100 million in venture funding, build a $1.2 billion business, and make Time’s Next 100 list? According to Emily Weiss, the founder of Glossier who accomplished all the above, it takes an unbeatable brand. “I am crazy for good branding,” she said, “and I admire companies that get it right.” Get it right, she did. Emily, who started adult life as an intern at Teen Vogue and then as an independent beauty blogger, has flipped the established beauty industry upside down with her creative messages, packaging, and products. Here’s how she did it: Why the Beauty Industry Is So Difficult to Disrupt   Women and men have been applying makeup as a beauty treatment for about 5,000 years now. From ancient people who applied beauty treatments made from henna, chalk, and soot to modern folks who rely on elegant …

  In 2012, Facebook purchased a photo-sharing app called Instagram for the staggering sum of $1 billion. By 2019, Instagram was bringing in 25% of Facebook’s annual revenue, which means that one app was earning nearly $20 billion a year. For context, Google’s popular video-sharing platform YouTube was pulling in just $15.1 billion. How did Instagram get started? And how did it turn into the massive, revolutionary company it is today? Here’s the story behind the photos: Who Founded Instagram? Kevin Systrom and Mike Krieger founded Instagram in a San Francisco co-working space on October 6, 2010. Systrom had been working on the project a year earlier under a larger concept called Burbn. When that failed to catch fire, he and his partner peered deeply into the data.   Kevin Systrom Systrom was born on December 30, 1983 to Diane and Douglas Systrom in Hollister, Massachusetts, which is part of …

Most entrepreneurs don’t start with a string of high-powered connections and money to burn. At least, the ones in the most inspiring business stories don’t begin that way. Those entrepreneurs begin with the germ of an idea, a hobby that becomes side hustle, or a series of odd jobs that somehow coalesce into a company. They add a little snap to what they’re doing. A little sizzle to their efforts. Then after about ten years of incremental additions to their seedling idea, they get a break-though. And all of a sudden, everyone’s buzzing about their “overnight success.” Sophia Amoruso, the entrepreneurial former CEO of Nasty Gal & founder of GIRLBOSS, knows all about starting small and growing into greatness. Or as she puts it, “Each time you show up to work and work hard and do your best at everything you can do, you’re planting seeds for a life that …

Experience is a great teacher, but she charges a high tuition rate. Just ask Alex Rodriguez. The baseball star turned entrepreneur told his audience at the 2019 Inc. 5000 Conference & Gala in Phoenix that his 2013 suspension from the sport had cost him more than $45 million, but he said, “It was worth every penny.” While most entrepreneurs haven’t lost — or made — anywhere close to $45 million, small business owners everywhere can identify with going through tough experiences that taught costly, painful lessons but that set them on the right track. Alex Rodriguez just did everything in a bigger way than most people do. Rodriguez, known as A-Rod, created an impressive athletic record as a 14-time All Star and a World Series champion, but in addition, he’s a true entrepreneur with his hands in many businesses along with taking on a role as a media personality. Through …

Growing up as the daughter of a mother with an alcohol problem and a father who left before childhood got started sounds like the plot of a pop teen romance novel instead of background for one of the world’s great business stories. But that’s exactly how Bethenny Frankel got her start in life. After a childhood she herself described as “difficult,” Bethenny grew up to found Skinnygirl, appear on numerous reality shows, and launch an organization dedicated to helping people affected by natural disasters. None of it came easy for her. “You cannot show people only the petals and not the thorns,” Bethenny would later say. “It’s not fair to them.” Certainly, her entrepreneurial journey and background have included both petals and thorns. But for entrepreneurs, and female entrepreneurs especially, Bethenny’s approach to her life and business endeavors has a lot to teach about knowing what you want, dreaming big, …

In the late 1960s, the chemistry teacher at Stowe School in England noticed one of his students looking particularly engrossed in his work. Curious, since that particular student was generally disengaged in class, the teacher strode over to where the boy sat. Under the desk, the student was working feverishly on a magazine he was creating. In a fit of anger, the teacher snatched the magazine and tore it up. It was not a propitious beginning for Richard Branson. But disappointment from teachers was nothing knew. All his life, Branson had been thought “dyslexic and a dunce” by the educators who taught him. Not long after the chemistry class incident, Branson left school for good. On the way out, his headmaster told Branson, “You will either go to prison or become a millionaire.” The headmaster was almost right on both counts. Sir Richard Branson’s net worth now stands at $4 …

Some entrepreneurs hold great ambitions in early childhood. They’re turning over sports cards on the playground or setting up a lemonade stand in front of the house. Not Jack Dorsey. As a kid, Dorsey never imagined himself as a CEO, entrepreneur, or public figure. In his flights of fancy, Dorsey saw himself as the Wizard of Oz, the man who pulled the levers from behind the curtain. Who knew that the quiet boy who buried his head in maps and computers would one day found and lead Twitter and Square, becoming a multi-billionaire in the process? Oh, no one ever doubted that Jack Dorsey was brilliant — when Jack was a teenager, his boss, a man called Jim McKelvey, nicknamed him Jack the Genius — but he was just so unconventional! Like all great business stories, though, Dorsey’s rise from shy computer nerd to global titan of technology came from …

Silicon Valley has a problem with women. There aren’t enough of them. Despite more women than ever earning college degrees and entering the workforce, just 26% of computing operations jobs in the U.S. get filled by women. In most of Europe, Asia, and Africa, those numbers look even more dismal. Social scientists, economists, and tech gurus alike wonder why. Is it the “pinkification” of girls — the idea that girls are introduced to gender-specific roles at an early age? Is it the insider network culture of technology firms? Do many women just not enjoy STEM fields? Do they find working in these fields incompatible with other life goals? Experts are still learning what will help rectify the gender imbalance in global technology firms. But one woman is already serving as a female powerhouse in Silicon Valley, YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki. Not only does Wojcicki serve as the head of the …