Who Should I Work For?

by Scott

Between most of my college friends hating their jobs and my unconventional career path, I find myself talking to a lot of young people about career advice. The conversations take many forms, but I always come back to the same piece of advice: work for someone who is genuinely interested in your personal and professional development. But what does that look like? How can I determine whether that’s the case?

             

If I was graduating college today or switching industries, I’d try to work for someone that embodies the following qualities:

Relevant domain mastery:

You should work for someone who is very good at what you want to get good at. I’ve experienced the spectrum of …
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How I Got into BD – Part 3

by Scott

The first two parts of this post are good context for the third and final part below. It probably makes sense to read part 1 and part 2 here.

Now let’s talk about where BD came into the picture.

While I was working on Sfter I got to know Charlie O’Donnell through his softball team which I joined through twitter. I was excited to get back on the diamond, but I have to admit that a strong motivation stemmed from the desire to get to know Charlie. He’s definitely a cornerstone of the New York tech scene and someone I wanted to know. I had a great time that season and enjoyed getting to know Charlie.

It was through Charlie …
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How I Got into BD – Part 1

by Scott

A lot of people have been asking me how to get into BD recently. Similar to Venture Capital, I don’t think there is a boilerplate prescription for getting into BD. There are definitely things you can do to put yourself in a favorable position like networking, blogging, and gaining an understanding of what BD actually means. That’s all great, but I’m here to tell you that I think getting a job in BD is about putting yourself in a position to capitalize when a “right time, right place opportunity” presents itself by working your ass off.

I think it’d be useful to outline how I got into business development by re-telling my startup journey. More than anything else, I want …
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I’m Reading 850 Books in 2012: Part One

by Scott

Amidst the barrage of publicly broadcasted New Year’s resolutions I’ve consistently noticed the aspiration to read a ton of books. Reading is awesome. I thoroughly enjoy it. But I wonder if the people that are planning to take down a small library this year aspire to do this for the right reasons. This trend is in direct alignment with a pervasive behavior I’ve decided to leave behind in my journey to progress my career.

I like to think about how I spend my time professionally bettering myself in terms of inputs and outputs. 

Input noun definition: something that is put in. In this context, I think about inputs as things I consume ranging from blog posts, …
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Unconventional Thoughts About the Best Thing Young People Can Do

by Scott

I’m on my 4th job since graduating in June 2010. So yeah…compared to most of the people I graduated with, I’ve had an extremely unconventional career thus far. In short, I look like a Mexican jumping bean.

When I ask a good portion of my classmates what the plan is, I often hear a familiar ring: “I’m going to spend two years banking/consulting, than go to a private equity/hedge fund, than go to business school…than some day I’m going to be happy in Greenwich Connecticut!”

That sounds exciting and fulfilling.

At one point during my undergraduate years this sounded pretty good. But my benchmark of good was everyone else in an atmosphere where the blind followed the blind. Looking back, its strange to …
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