Jason Shen

Jason Shen

The Outlier Coach—helping founders build conviction in what's next · 3x venture-backed startup founder (acq by FB) · Author of 'The Path to Pivot' & 'Weirdly Brilliant' · ADHD · Former NCAA gymnast


Sep 24
Don’t Call it That: A Naming WorkbookToday I’m sharing the insights I gleaned from a wonderful (and fairly short) book Don’t Call it That: A Naming Workbook [http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00I1MRY80/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=B00I1MRY80&linkCode=as2&tag=
Aug 30
Six Blistering Bodyweight Workouts You Can Do in Under 30 MinsOne of the biggest reasons why people say they don’t exercise is because they don’t have time. Of course, we all have the same amount of time, and there are plenty of really busy people who work out [https://web.archive.org/web/20161001013436/http://www.businessinsider.com/
Aug 26
Goodbye Percolate, Hello EtsyI joined Percolate in March of 2014 as the 100th employee at the company (today: 250+). Back then, we were all piled into a single floor of our NY office in SoHo. We’ve grown tremendously, raising two rounds of funding, opening offices around the world, and delivering The System
Aug 04
Until You Ship, Communication Is the DeliverableLessons from a book on "alpha product managers" on the paramount importance of communication
Aug 01
The Extraordinary Power of Self-ReflectionI recently stumbled across an old document on my laptop. It was a PDF with journal entries from several years ago. While many of the entries were typical day-to-day activities, I also found about 100 short lessons that I had captured during this journaling period and I shared a few
Jul 31
Why Being Real Matters> Lying is a requisite and daily part of being a founder, the grease that keeps the startup flywheel running. No one likes to put it that way of course. Instead, we use phrases like “hustling” and “fake it until you make it” to make the idea of lying more
Jul 28
The Little Book of TalentFive years ago, I stood in a bookstore for about an hour and read half of a wonderful book called The Talent Code [https://web.archive.org/web/20160622022700/http://amzn.to/1Sexp7L] by Daniel Coyne. It had come out around the same time as a few other books in
Jun 15
29I turned 29 last month. No contest or giveaway. This year we’ll keep it simple. Three simple lessons I’ve learned as I round the last lap of my twenties. Just because it isn’t on your resume doesn’t mean it’s not real work. This includes relationships,
Feb 28
The Success Equation, Untangling Skill and Luck in Business, Sports, and Investing.These reading notes began life as an “Ignite-style” 5 minute presentation with slides automatically progressing every 15 seconds — which I gave on a Monday morning presentation for Percolate. The words below are essentially what I said during that talk. The Success Equation, Untangling Skill and Luck in Business, Sports, and
Jan 05
8 Thoughts from a Techie on SF vs NYCWe take a quick break from the #WkofBks to bring something a little different for the Your Turn Challenge (Day #5, yes I’m behind). I just spent a week in San Francisco, seeing friends and working out of the Percolate SF offices. While they were fresh in my mind,
Nov 24
Zero to One: Notes on Startups or How to Build the FutureIn spring of 2012, Peter Thiel, cofounder of Paypal and Palantir and early investor in Facebook, taught a course at Stanford in the Computer Science department calledCS183: Startup [http://blakemasters.com/peter-thiels-cs183-startup]. One of the students in the class, a law student named Blake Masters, took meticulous notes that were
Nov 16
Three Days with MaGICInspired by Silicon Valley, many cities and nations around the world are trying to build startup and technology hubs – to spur innovation and economic development. In Asia, Shenzhen, Singapore, Indonesia, and Bangalore have become known as startup hubs [https://web.archive.org/web/20150723075401/http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/
Sep 28
How Google WorksToday, I’m sharing thoughts from the book How Google Works [https://web.archive.org/web/20160525213329/http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00HUU13Y0/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=390957&creativeASIN=B00HUU13Y0&linkCode=as2&tag=helpyour-20&linkId=PTHPN6KB6TVDYUMN] , which I
Sep 24
How to Make Sense of Any MessReading Notes on Abby Covert's How to Make Sense of Any Mess [https://bookshop.org/books/how-to-make-sense-of-any-mess-information-architecture-for-everybody/9781500615994] The Book in a Nutshell: The human race is creating more information than ever before, in the form of signs, articles, websites, apps, and much more — and the world would
Sep 24
Lean In: Women, Work, and the Will to LeadDisclaimer: as a man writing about gender inequality, I acknowledge my privileged (and biased) viewpoint in this discussion. I’ve run this post by several smart, awesome women and incorporated their feedback, but I know I still run the risk of getting things wrong. Still, this topic is so important
Sep 05
You Had One JobA list of all the jobs I've ever had
May 26
28Photo by Jagoda Kondratiuk [https://unsplash.com/@jagodakondratiuk?utm_source=unsplash&utm_medium=referral&utm_content=creditCopyText] on Unsplash [https://unsplash.com/search/photos/28?utm_source=unsplash&utm_medium=referral&utm_content=creditCopyText] A few years ago, I started a birthday tradition on this blog,
Apr 04
The Year Without PantsOne of the few people who can match Paul Graham [http://paulgraham.com/] as writer is Scott Berkun [http://scottberkun.com/]. They have both succeeded as technologists, Graham in Viaweb + YC, and Berkun in Microsoft and Automattic. They both write thoughtful essays on a wide range of topics, like the
Mar 22
How a Potluck Brunch Led to My New Job at PercolateI actually hadn’t heard much about Percolate before I moved to New York, but like many great opportunities, it emerged out of serendipity.
Mar 15
The Minimum Viable TransactionIn 2009, an entrepreneur named Eric Ries coined at term that would move the field of product development forward. The minimum viable product (MVP) making something that could “collect the maximum amount of validated learning about customers with the least effort [https://www.jasonshen.com/%22http://www.startuplessonslearned.com/2009/