Unpacking What Makes a Great Entrepreneur—and what breaks one | Alex Bard

In this episode of Maverick Mindsets, we welcome Alex Bard to today’s episode!Alex started with nothing as an immigrant from Russia, and ended as a seasoned founder, operator, and investor with a remarkable track record in the tech world! From co-founding four enterprise software companies; three of which were successfully acquired, to leading Salesforce’s ServiceCloud to over a billion in revenue, Alex brings deep insight into building and scaling high-growth businesses. He’s also served as CEO of Campaign Monitor, taking it global in just three years. Now a partner at Redpoint Ventures, Alex shares his journey, lessons learned, and advice for the next generation of entrepreneurs and mavericks alike!In the interview with Alex, you'll learn:Introduction to his challenging beginnings and the sacrifices his family made (02:48) Leaving the suffocating environment of the corporate world to become an entrepreneur (5:49)How mistakes and sacrifice eventually led to exiting to a global tech company ( 7:00)How venture capital works and the risks and rewards (8:10)How to discern ‘good’ from ‘great’ to identify a billion dollar opportunity (9:58)Why the root of the motivation in startup founding teams is crucial (12:50)Why an entrepreneur needs to be inherently curious but open minded, and yet stronglyopinionated (15:46)Understanding the size of the market opportunity (17:22)The importance of being a great story teller? (18:36)Why building momentum is important in business and life (21:30)The different skills required for a start up versus a scale up (22:01)Why measuring the right things in business matters (24:50)What Alex has learnt from giants such as Richard Branson, Mark Cuban and Mark Benioff (27:02)Personal growth, curiosity, and leveraging the tools such as ChatGPT (31:18)Why is AI the most important technological wave of all times (33:50)Connect with Alex on Linkedin:https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexbard/?profileId=ACoAAAAAjYwBiHZS-uUz_0wdA-ZfZyRr6o06VxsCheck out his company at:https://www.redpoint.com/Connect with Rick on Linkedin:https://www.linkedin.com/in/ricklowemaverick/Podcast Soundtrack by ⁠NewLoudhttps://linktr.ee/newloud