Invest in platforms built on unique data @ValueStreamVC • Husband to and co-host of @themostimpthing Podcast w/ @danimarconeuf • Father to 3 amazing Neufitos
Did not expect a question that starts out 'Do you think before you speak?' to go so well. A+ question from Charlotte Harpur A++ response from Eileen Gu.
I first discovered Brad when .@XPOLogistics acquired Norbert Dentressangle, I was living near Lyon in France at the time, and that moment lit a spark that’s shaped much of how I think about building companies and leading teams.
Brad’s playbook still guides me, and this episode had those timeless nuggets and then some:
• Get the major long-term trend right
• Build super-organisms, not org charts
• Feedback loops, intense and essential
• Be absolutely brutal in the management of your time, you only have time and capital, and how you deploy them determines your results
• Never underestimate the power of incentives
Eight billion-dollar companies later, he remains a student of feedback, time, and human motivation. Few people have had a greater impact on my career philosophy. Keep it up! .@FoundersPodcast
Daft Punk’s Thomas Bangalter performed his first DJ set in 16 years at Paris' Centre Pompidou on October 25. He appeared unmasked alongside Fred Again.., Pedro Winter (Busy P), and Erol Alkan for a four-way b2b celebrating Because Music's 20th anniversary. The performance marked the last night before the venue closes for 5 years.
The French producer's set included selections from Daft Punk's catalog including "Rollin' & Scratchin'," "Digital Love," and "Contact"—as well as tracks by the Chemical Brothers and excerpts from Jonny Greenwood's recent film work.
The venue held personal significance for Bangalter which Fred Again.. shared in a post via IG: “Thomas told me in this lift on the way down to the show that the first time he fell in love with electronic music was in this building in 1992. He also told me hasn’t played a proper set without the mask on for 24 years.”
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📸 via @anthonyghnassia
"Toddler parents can take solace in the fact that parenting probably matters less than we think it does. Rather than try to shape our little two-foot-tall companions, we should help guide them to become the best version of who they already are."
Yes.
Much more brilliance and family inspiration on this week's episode TMIT 32: Cliff Weitzman, CEO of Speechify, on How Family Builds Greatness --> https://t.co/2xtX5yesaZ
“You cannot fail unless you quit.”
@cliffweitzman's favorite reminder that success isn’t about IQ or EQ. It’s about AQ, our Adversity Quotient.
How do you respond when things get really hard?
John Collison: We only had 50 users two years after founding Stripe
“We started working on Stripe in the Fall of 2009, and we launched Stripe in September 2011,” John Collison reflects. “I remember right at the beginning when we were starting it I said to Patrick [Collison], ‘Yeah let’s do it. How hard can it be?’ Which gives you a sense of our mindset. And the answer was: two years of difficulty. We had not predicted that.”
John remembers feeling dejected when Stripe only had 50 users two years later:
“When you spend two years getting 50 users, it doesn’t feel like a whole lot of progress. It feels like things are going pretty slow.”
But this is one of the challenges of startups, he argues:
“If you’re working on a startup that’s a bad idea, it’s going to feel like slow-going. But if you’re working on a startup that’s a good idea, it may feel like slow-going too.”
Yet slow growth has a silver lining:
“I think the thing that allowed us to take off in the subsequent years was the fact that since we were spending so much time on each one of those users; since we were hyper-focused on building a great product; and since we weren’t dealing with problems of scale yet, that allowed us to build the product that we wanted. Part of the culture that set in really early on was taking abnormally good care of those early users.”
The Stripe founders would get an email or phone call anytime a user ran into a bug. When they sent the customer an email moments later alerting them that the bug was now fixed, people’s minds were blown.
They set up a Campfire room that any customer could join and use to message John and Patrick at any hour of the day or night. And if a user was based in the Bay Area, the founders would invite them to come by the office and help integrate Stripe for them.
In the Stripe dashboard they would prompt their customers for feedback and feature requests. Then the Stripe founders would reply to that feedback within 10 minutes.
“What this meant was that even though the user growth was happening quite slowly in the early days,” John explains, “it actually had a pretty surprising viral effect where people had a good experience, they told their friends about it, and we were able to spread entirely through word-of-mouth even to this day.”
Video source: @ECorner (2015)
Love that Jensen doesn't like the term moat either. He prefers "strong, self-reinforcing network." Thanks @FoundersPodcast for an excellent episode on "How Jensen Works."
I'm trying to spend more time telling my kids stories of my "roaring 20s".
As a work-from-home mom today, I like to remember that I once spent a week working solo in Rio with two bodyguards.
TMIT 29: Mindset Reset – What We Get Wrong About Growth Mindset
Mindset isn’t just “fixed” or “growth.” It’s a spectrum—and once you see that, you’ll understand yourself, your kids, and your family in a whole new way.
In this episode of The Most Important Thing, we translate insights from Mary C. Murphy’s Cultures of Growth into family life. What starts as a book about organizations becomes a practical guide for leading your home with clarity and calm.
00:00 Beyond Parenting: Leading Family Culture with Intention
07:10 Unpacking Growth Mindset: It’s Not Just Fixed or Growth
11:55 Why Performative States Block Learning and Growth
21:09 When Hard Work Signals Growth, Not Lack of Talent
33:44 How to Discern and Grow from Constructive Criticism
39:30 Leveraging Others’ Success to Fuel Your Own Growth
46:45 The Most Important Takeaways from Today’s Mindset Reset
What you’ll learn in this episode:
• Why everyone flips between fixed and growth mindsets depending on context
• The four predictable triggers that shape mindset: evaluation, high effort, critical feedback, and the success of others
• How to recognize a performative state—and why it’s the worst time for feedback
• Reframing high effort as progress, not failure
• How to weigh critical feedback with discernment
• Turning others’ success from a jealousy trigger into an inspiration spark
Takeaway:
Mindset isn’t static—it’s a spectrum we all move along. Seeing it this way unlocks compassion, resilience, and a culture of growth at home.
We are all about minimum effective dosage when it comes to our operating system - and just that you have containers as a couple is really The Most Important Thing about having a shared OS.
🎙️TMIT 28 : How We Divide, Conquer, and Connect – The Shared Operating System Behind Our Marriage
Every couple has to navigate how to divide responsibilities, whether it’s managing groceries, handling finances, or aligning on long-term goals. For us, the breakthrough happened when we shifted away from addressing everything on the fly and instead put a shared system in place to prioritize what matters most.
What we’ve realized is that the specific system you use isn’t as important as simply having one. A system creates intentional spaces for conversations, moving them out of the daily chaos and into a structure that lets you focus less on managing tasks and more on truly enjoying time together.
This week, we’re breaking down the framework we’ve built to divide responsibilities, stay connected, and work as a team. From long-term planning discussions to weekly check-ins and daily task management, we’re sharing how these rhythms have helped us replace frustration with trust and a sense of partnership.
0:00 Avoiding Chaos: The Need for a Shared Operating System
2:24 Research-Backed Benefits of Shared Leadership and Connection
5:58 A High-Level Look at Our Shared Operating System
8:22 Calibrating Your Family’s Long-Term Vision and Goals
13:51 Disciplined Goal Setting with the 12-Week Year Method
17:07 Supporting Each Other’s Vibe-Focused Quarterly Goals
22:16 Streamlining Finances with Quarterly Fact-Based Reviews
25:07 The Essential Weekly Stand-Up for Family Logistics
28:36 Managing Daily Tasks to Reduce Cognitive Load and Stress
37:05 The Ultimate Goal: More Connection, Less Resentment
⸻
What We Cover in This Episode:
• How resentment showed up in our relationship and what changes helped us move past it.
• The four parts of our shared “operating system”:
• Vision discussions (planning for 3–5 years ahead)
• Quarterly planning (Greg’s 12-week structure vs. Danielle’s vibe-focused goals)
• Financial check-ins (facts over feelings)
• Weekly reviews (logistics, chores, and family schedules)
• Why writing down next steps is essential for reducing mental load and staying on the same page.
• The psychology behind these practices—like cognitive load theory and the Zeigarnik effect.
• Why the ultimate goal isn’t just productivity—it’s creating space for connection, fun, and presence.
⸻
Resources Mentioned:
• The 12 Week Year by @brianpmoran@MLennington
• Getting Things Done by @gtdguy
🎙️TMIT 28 : How We Divide, Conquer, and Connect – The Shared Operating System Behind Our Marriage
Every couple has to navigate how to divide responsibilities, whether it’s managing groceries, handling finances, or aligning on long-term goals. For us, the breakthrough happened when we shifted away from addressing everything on the fly and instead put a shared system in place to prioritize what matters most.
What we’ve realized is that the specific system you use isn’t as important as simply having one. A system creates intentional spaces for conversations, moving them out of the daily chaos and into a structure that lets you focus less on managing tasks and more on truly enjoying time together.
This week, we’re breaking down the framework we’ve built to divide responsibilities, stay connected, and work as a team. From long-term planning discussions to weekly check-ins and daily task management, we’re sharing how these rhythms have helped us replace frustration with trust and a sense of partnership.
0:00 Avoiding Chaos: The Need for a Shared Operating System
2:24 Research-Backed Benefits of Shared Leadership and Connection
5:58 A High-Level Look at Our Shared Operating System
8:22 Calibrating Your Family’s Long-Term Vision and Goals
13:51 Disciplined Goal Setting with the 12-Week Year Method
17:07 Supporting Each Other’s Vibe-Focused Quarterly Goals
22:16 Streamlining Finances with Quarterly Fact-Based Reviews
25:07 The Essential Weekly Stand-Up for Family Logistics
28:36 Managing Daily Tasks to Reduce Cognitive Load and Stress
37:05 The Ultimate Goal: More Connection, Less Resentment
⸻
What We Cover in This Episode:
• How resentment showed up in our relationship and what changes helped us move past it.
• The four parts of our shared “operating system”:
• Vision discussions (planning for 3–5 years ahead)
• Quarterly planning (Greg’s 12-week structure vs. Danielle’s vibe-focused goals)
• Financial check-ins (facts over feelings)
• Weekly reviews (logistics, chores, and family schedules)
• Why writing down next steps is essential for reducing mental load and staying on the same page.
• The psychology behind these practices—like cognitive load theory and the Zeigarnik effect.
• Why the ultimate goal isn’t just productivity—it’s creating space for connection, fun, and presence.
⸻
Resources Mentioned:
• The 12 Week Year by @brianpmoran@MLennington
• Getting Things Done by @gtdguy
🎙️ TMIT 27: Parenting Gurus and the Business of Anxiety
This week, we explore a topic that hits close to home and raises some big questions: the booming industry of parenting advice and how it’s built on the back of your anxiety.
But it doesn’t have to be this way. Parenting challenges don’t reflect failure; they reflect purpose. The hard stuff? It’s what builds strong families.
00:03 Intro & Nerves
02:18 Love-Hate with Parenting Advice
04:21 Repetition as a Business Model
06:27 You’re Already Enough
08:00 The Guilt Loop
10:18 Parenting Is Hard…but Meaningful
13:09 Painkiller vs. Vitamin
20:33 The Psychology of Anxiety Marketing
29:00 The Business Model Explained
43:09 Daily Culture Moments
Here’s what we’re breaking down:
• Why so much of today’s parenting advice feels rooted in fear
• How post-pandemic influencer culture plays on guilt cycles and moments of vulnerability
• The psychology behind pain-point marketing (think negativity bias, availability heuristics, and identity triggers)
• The business strategies driving influencers like Dr. Becky (Good Inside) and Big Little Feelings
• Why phrases like “you weren’t set up for success” might do more harm than good
This episode is your reminder that:
You don’t need a script to be a good parent.
You don’t need a subscription to know your kids.
And you definitely don’t need to believe the story that says you’re unequipped.
Parenting is hard because it matters — not because you’re failing.
The strength, intuition, and joy you’re looking for? It’s already inside your home. You just have to know where to look.
✨ Instead of focusing on tantrums and meltdowns, we created a list of 100 family culture moments — proof that joy, connection, and belonging are already happening in your home.
This isn’t a to-do list. It’s an already doing list. A reminder that you’re not “underequipped”… you’re already doing great.
📎 Download the list here: https://t.co/pxgzC6QIX2
🎧 Listen to the episode wherever you get your podcasts or on our website https://t.co/EqG9M7E1Ov
📸 Follow us on X/IG/TikTok @themostimpthing