Managing Hope

My parents are immigrants from Communist Russia. Whenever I ask them about what growing up there was like, they ask me to “imagine a place without hope.” It’s hard for me because, all my life, I’ve relied on dreams to fuel my progress. To me, startups are all about hope. While that hope takes on different forms and peoples’ goals vary, the idea that there is a light at the end of the tunnel keeps entrepreneurs going, innovating, and striving to reach that light. The trouble with hope is that sometimes that light can be blinding and cause the journeyman to lose sight of the potholes immediately in front of him. As I’ve seen, a pragmatic approach is critical to success. Read on for 5 ways in which I try to keep the pedal to the proverbial metal.

Can Long Distance Work?

Last October, I made a commitment to work with a law firm in the Bay Area this summer. Meanwhile, in January, I co-founded a startup based in New York. The idea we had at the startup is that it wasn’t completely critical that I be in New York to make the company work, and we’re in the process of that experiment right now. Even with phone calls, text, email, Skype, gchat, facetime, etc, it’s hard to keep on the same page with my partners and make sure our business is going in the right direction. Read on for notes I’ve made to myself.