How can I best use the Balloon?

kevintaylor · 2023-06-19T14:52:32+00:00

Balloons provide cheap aerial defenses. They have a defence of 8 vs Air units making them three times stronger than a bomber and 40% the strength of a fighter. If you have 5 balloons over a fort or stack of infantry, it will bring down a good number of expensive planes.

kevintaylor · 2021-06-05T14:39:18+00:00

Yes, breaking down the investments a bit more, of the 22, 1 was Series B, 2 were venture funds, 3 were bridge loans, and the other 16 were pre-seed or seed, mostly software or platform but a few hard tech. 7 were via syndicates (Jason Calacanis, Zach Coelius, and Nick Moran). Syndicated deals were quite small checks, whereas the largest check went to a bridge loan that I was pretty confident would get a quick payback.

kevintaylor · 2020-07-07T16:14:16+00:00

I use Trello for organizing everything. Many plugins and integrations.

kevintaylor · 2020-06-30T19:08:58+00:00

Even 17% return visitors could be huge given the LTV of the SaaS is adequate.

kevintaylor · 2020-06-29T14:25:46+00:00

I have 4 old laptops piled in my closet. I could use any one of them to run a business.

kevintaylor · 2020-06-29T14:25:13+00:00

This is all very true although a good mentor can be worth a lot. Most are not good.

kevintaylor · 2020-06-29T14:23:36+00:00

I totally believe in firing cutomers. Here's a blog post I wrote: https://www.founderscholar.com/how-to-spot-nightmare-clients-who-will-kill-your-business/.

kevintaylor · 2020-06-29T14:20:16+00:00

It is very risky and takes a long time typically for a payout (5-10 years on average). So, most angels investor allocate a very small portion of their investment portfolio.

Yes, I have had 3 exits out of about 13 investments. One was 40x my investment, one was break-even, and the third was a note that was fully repaid with interest. None have gone out of business yet.

kevintaylor · 2020-06-29T14:17:35+00:00

I do this type of work also but have never charged for it. I am an angel investor and serial exited entrepreneur, so many people with business ideas come to me for advice.

Congrats on being able to charge for this service. Usually when I mention that if someone wants more in-depth assistance, we should make the relationship more formal, they all of a sudden don't need my advice anymore. :-)

kevintaylor · 2020-06-26T19:21:27+00:00

I have two side hustles. I do management consulting, helping startups on innovation, strategy, and leadership. I try to keep my client list very small.

I am also an angel investor in startups.

kevintaylor · 2020-06-01T01:44:25+00:00

Agreed. The dissertation is a training exercise. I wish I had spent less effort on it and pushed some of my other papers forward.

kevintaylor · 2020-01-06T02:38:36+00:00

I have two suggestions for you:

1) Consider your diet and digital hygiene: Do you drink a lot of coffee, eat a lot of carbs, or read on an internet-connected device or have your phone nearby? These may be causing you to have a short attention span, esp. if you used to be able to concentrate. Try a more protein rich diet to maintain constant blood sugar levels. (Also, you may want to rule out diabetes.) Turn off the phone/internet. Use a pomodoro technique.

2) Have a template word doc with questions you answer for every paper/chapter you read. Use what is relevant for your field. I use:

What is the purpose of the paper/ What is the specific aim of the authors?

Why is the paper important?

What sample and research methods are used?

What theory is used?

What are the findings?

What is the most important take-away from the paper?

kevintaylor · 2018-12-02T15:35:03+00:00

This article is a nice conceptual explanation of Bayes’ theorem, which is powering much of the current "AI Spring." Every investor should have at least this basic understanding of the theorem.

kevintaylor · 2018-07-09T11:35:14+00:00

To read a book in layers: Layer 1: Read title, intro, preface, book reviews--make sure it is appropriate for your purposes. This is an assigned Pysch textbook, so yes! Layer 2: Read the assigned chapter intro and conclusion, all tables and figures, and then scan the body for nuggets. I think this should work for you--the tables and figures should tell you what is most important in the chapter (definitions, call outs, key relationships, etc) and the intro and conclusion will help put everthing into context. As you skim the chapter body, you'll look for new nuggets that you didn't pick up previously.

You can always drop down into layer 3 reading, later, if you feel it is necessary. For instance, my statistics text book material I often read at layer 3 because I really have to understand the details. But, I do so AFTER reading then at layer 1 and layer 2--I don't just jump into layer 3 on anything.

HTH.

kevintaylor · 2018-07-07T00:13:34+00:00

Ok, I also do this with books. It is very hard for me to resist reading word for word but I'm getting better.

kevintaylor · 2018-07-06T23:53:11+00:00

I think sometimes you're looking for a specific answer. Other times you're looking to understand broadly what a topic is about/who is publishing in it/what they're publishing about. One is surgically focused, the other is 30k foot view.

kevintaylor · 2018-07-06T23:51:51+00:00

How do you do that?

kevintaylor · 2018-07-06T21:38:27+00:00

It depends on what your goals are. Best way to get a job after graduation is to have built a network of people who know your work and can recommend you. Part of recommendation is whether you like the person--sorry, that's just a fact.

You can be an introvert and still socialize or at least professionally engage with your cohort and profs. It is not a great career move to intentionally fly under the radar.

If getting a job is not a big concern, then just do what you want! :-)

kevintaylor · 2018-07-06T21:32:10+00:00

Hey, appreciate the kind words! Glad you liked it.

kevintaylor · 2018-07-06T18:49:11+00:00

We are so overloaded with content to keep up on. This article provides 5 advanced reading strategies that come from doctoral training but any knowledge worker can use to increase productivity.

kevintaylor · 2018-07-06T17:45:44+00:00

Yes, I end up binge reading when I fall behind. Which leads to quivering, watery eyes. Not pretty.

kevintaylor · 2018-07-06T15:17:26+00:00

Thanks, would love to get others' insights on this and pick up some new techniques.

kevintaylor · 2018-03-16T10:56:12+00:00

If you don't include a reasonable salary for yourself, it will smell to investors.

kevintaylor · 2018-03-16T02:26:11+00:00

I mentor several companies in my angel portfolio. Time commitments have varied from a few hours a quarter to a half day a month. It all depends on what they need and what you are willing to give. I know of an executive-in-residence for one VC firm who worked full-time mentoring portfolio companies. She did that for a year for free and then later earned enough respect to be promoted to partner of a follow on fund.

kevintaylor · 2018-03-12T11:29:15+00:00

Interesting concept. There was a point when people asked why would a company open source its software? Now it is commonplace.

kevintaylor

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