Each month I’m going to provide a list of resources (podcasts, talks, blog posts, books, music etc.) that I consider to be must-haves. There’s no doubt that you’ll see recurring themes or resources throughout these posts. Not all of them have to do with software development, and some are just for fun, but by and […]
Archive | General
The Scott Barstow Show, Episode #009 – Ben Wiant
My guest for this episode is Ben Wiant, Business Development Manager for Kelaca. Ben’s day job is recruiting for his clients, but to call Ben a recruiter doesn’t really do him justice. Ben studied cultural anthropology and instructional design in college and has an extensive background in designing an implementing systems to maximize organizational performance. […]
Monolith vs. Micro-Services – What?
When you’re first starting out building your product, your developers are going to have a choice to make about how to build the application. There are (generally) two ways that applications get built: Monolith and micro-services based. In this article, we will walk through what each of these terms mean, the tradeoffs of each approach, and […]
Assumption is the Mother of All F**kups
How many assumptions are baked into the idea you’re working on? In other words, how many things have to go right for you to be right? In my experience, almost no one (including me on more than one occasion) actually sits down and lists all of the assumptions that are being made. The “so what” […]
The Scott Barstow Show, Episode #008 – Jessica Mitsch
Jessica Mitsch is the Executive Director of Code Schools for The Iron Yard, one of the most successful programming boot camps in the world. She’s been with The Iron Yard nearly since the beginning and has been responsible for launching some of their largest and most successful campuses. We talk about The history and why […]
Time Kills All Deals – Using the OODA Loop to Move Quickly
Time kills all deals – David Morken, CEO of Bandwidth The quote above I first heard from David a long time ago when I was at Bandwidth trying to hang on during some pretty wild times. We were in the middle of putting together a deal that would wind up being one of the most […]
Technical Co-Founder vs. CTO – What’s the Difference?
There’s a big difference between hiring a CTO (Chief Technology Officer) and finding a technical co-founder for your company. Since almost every technology business has this problem, it’s worth exploring what each term means and how the search for each of them differs. What’s a Technical Co-Founder? The key point about a technical co-founder is […]
How to Do Customer Interviews Right
It’s not often that I see someone at the top of their game, but it happened this week. I was working on due diligence for the venture firm I work with. We are involved very early on this particular deal, so we wanted to hear what customers thought personally, rather than through the filter of […]
Starting Your Business: LLC vs. Corporation
This is a follow up to a guest post by my good friend Jesse Jones on Three Legal Mistakes that Can Sink Your Company. I got a number of responses to that post asking for a follow up on what was the best legal structure for a new company. Jesse was kind enough to provide […]
The Scott Barstow Show, Episode #007 – Gret Glyer, Founder of DonorSee
My guest for this show is Gret Glyer, founder of Donorsee. DonorSee is a new app that connects donors and fundraisers using the power of story and feedback to make a direct impact on the world. Gret is also a missionary in Malawi, one of the poorest countries on earth, where he’s building a girls […]