Articles about Founder Mode
Thursday, July 3, 2025
Founder Mode – Episode 14 – 15-Minute Workout with Lou Perrotta
Episode 14: In this episode of Founder Mode, we hit the gym with legendary trainer Coach Lou Perrotta—who’s spent decades working with elite entrepreneurs, celebrities, and top performers. Coach Lou shares how fitness, mindset, and consistency create compounding results—both in the gym and in business. From towel pull-ups in hotel rooms to 15-minute daily routines,...
Thursday, June 26, 2025
Founder Mode – Episode 13 – Building AI Before It Was Cool with Dennis Mortensen
Episode 13: Kevin Henrikson and Jason Shafton sit down with serial entrepreneur Dennis Mortensen (IndexTools, Visual Revenue, x.ai, and now LaunchBrightly) to unpack what it was really like to build an AI company years before large-language models existed. Dennis recounts owning the x.ai domain before Elon, hand-labeling 32 million emails to train an early scheduling...
Wednesday, June 11, 2025
Founder Mode – Episode 12 – From Hollywood to High-Rises: Making Robots with Asa Hammond
Episode 12: From building gravity-defying camera rigs for Alfonso Cuarón’s Gravity to sending drones into live nuclear reactors and, most recently, designing job-site robots that can survive the dust and chaos of construction, Asa Hammond’s career shows how precision engineering and artistic vision can coexist. In this conversation, Asa explains how the exacting pixel-perfect discipline...
Tuesday, June 3, 2025
Founder Mode – Episode 11 – The Future of Commerce: Product Design & Logistics with Samantha Rose
Episode 11: From hand-carving a single silicone spatula in her kitchen to running a portfolio of revived consumer brands, Sam Rose walks Kevin and Jason through the through-line of her career: obsess over the customer, build a brand (not just a product), and make logistics as lovable as design. She explains how a “collision with...
Tuesday, May 27, 2025
Founder Mode – Episode 10 – How to Bootstrap Your Tech Team Using AI with JJ Zhuang
Episode 10: Serial CTO and Acompli co-founder JJ Zhuang joins Kevin and Jason to explain why the next generation of great products will be built by tiny, AI-super-powered teams. He unpacks lessons from taking Acompli’s first line of code to a $200 million Microsoft exit, steering Instacart through pandemic hyper-growth, and relearning to code with...
Tuesday, May 20, 2025
Founder Mode – Episode 9 – De-Risking Brick-and-Mortar for DTC Brands with Megan Berry
Episode 9: Megan Berry—architect, pop-up pioneer, and Mentors Fund partner—shows DTC founders how to move from clicks to bricks without torching cash. She explains her 8-foot-by-50-square-foot kiosk “permit hack,” the KPIs (unaided brand awareness, repeat engagement, dwell-time hot spots) that justify a multimillion-dollar flagship, and why post-COVID stores should feel like friction-free showrooms, not inventory...
