20VC: Startups Fail Because They Do Not Take Enough Risk, Why A/B Testing is Inefficient and Slows You Down, Why It is Impossible To Hire Good PMs so Stop Trying & 3 Key Signals The Best Engineers Present with Grant LaFontaine, Founder & CEO @ Whatnot
The Twenty Minute VC (20VC): Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
The Twenty Minute VC
4.4 • 637 Ratings
🗓️ 23 March 2022
⏱️ 40 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Grant LaFontaine is the Founder & CEO @ Whatnot, the fastest-growing marketplace in the US, empowering people to make a living off their passion. To date, Grant has raised over $225M for Whatnot from the likes of CapitalG, a16z, YC, Scribble Ventures and Wonder Ventures to name a few. Prior to Whatnot, Grant was a PM @ Facebook working on the Oculus App Store and before that was the founder of Kit.com, ultimately acquired by Patreon.
In Today’s Episode with Grant LaFontaine You Will Learn:
1.) The Founding of Whatnot:
- How did Grant make his way into the world of tech and startups?
- What were some of his biggest lessons from Facebook? How did that impact how he has built Whatnot?
2.) Impossible To Hire Product Managers:
- Why does Grant believe it is impossible to hire product managers today?
- How does this impact the decision-making powers of engineers?
- How does Grant test for this product knowledge in all engineers he adds to the team?
- What are clear signals of 10x engineers in hiring processes?
3.) A/B Testing and Risk Mindset:
- Why does Grant not believe in the effectiveness of A/B testing? Why does it not work?
- Why does Grant believe one of the biggest reasons for startups failing is they do not take enough risk?
- How does Grant try to ensure that his team takes as much risk as possible with everything that they do?
- How does mindset to risk change with scale of company and with leadership?
4.) AMA:
- Why does Grant disagree with founders angel investing?
- What are the biggest challenges Whatnot has faced in scaling?
- CEO coach? Who? When? What is the biggest lesson?
- What is the single driving metric of Whatnot? How does Grant advise founders to determine their North Star metric?
Item’s Mentioned In Today’s Episode with Grant LaFontaine
Grant’s Favourite Book: Foundation: 1/3 (Foundation Trilogy)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is 20 VC with me, Harry Stebbing. Today we feature the founder of one of the fastest growing |
| 0:04.4 | marketplaces in the US. Oh yes, we are joined by the one and only Grant LaFontaine, founder and CEO |
| 0:09.4 | What Not, the fastest growing marketplace in the US, as I said, empowering people to make a living |
| 0:14.6 | off their passion. To date, Grant has raised over $225 million for What Not from the lights of |
| 0:20.2 | capital G, A16Z, YC, Scribble Ventures and Wonder |
| 0:24.3 | Ventures, to name a few. Prior to What Not, Grant was a PM at Facebook working on the Oculus |
| 0:29.0 | App Store, and before that was the founder of Kit.com, ultimately acquired by Patreon. |
| 0:33.5 | I'd also want to say a huge thank you to later at Capital G, Elizabeth at Scribble, |
| 0:37.7 | Dustin at Wonder, some amazing questions, and then also to Anu at YC for the intro. |
| 0:42.1 | Such a team effort here and really did make it so special. |
| 0:45.1 | But before we move into the show today, from websites and online stores to marketing tools and analytics, |
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| 0:55.1 | Now, there are three things for me that really stood out about why I love Squarespace. |
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| 1:39.9 | speaking of game-changing products there with Squarespace, you really think spending time on building |
... |
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