Ep 19 Kathryn O'Day —Triathlons, Startups, and Success: A Playbook for Entrepreneurs
Episode Summary
Katherine O'Day, partner at Atlanta Ventures, discusses her journey from employee #9 at Pardot through two successful acquisitions (ExactTarget, then Salesforce) to COO at Rigger (acquired by Splunk, then Cisco). She shares insights on building company culture, bootstrapping versus raising capital, and her current work doing early-stage investing and running a venture studio that co-founds companies with experienced entrepreneurs.
Key Quotes
"You cannot train for an Iron Man by cramming—you have to be consistent day after day for months and years. It's the same with building a company. You can't pull an all-nighter and build a company; you have to be consistent over time."
"Little boys grow up bluffing or saying they can do something and figuring it out on the back end. The default mode for women is 'I can't do that, I've never done it before.' You don't have to have it all figured out to show up in a room and belong there."
"Because we had stayed lean and scrappy, Rigger was a home run. You can have great outcomes without raising a lot of money. The best way to raise money is to not need it—actually, the best way is to have your customers pay you."
Transcript
Hi, welcome to Tales From The Sky Lounge, it's a podcast about business consulting and venture investing. We get out there in the world, we talk to people who are making it happen, and we get their stories. If you could like and subscribe, it really helps us get our message out. Today's guest in the Sky Lounge is Katherine Oday. Hi Katherine.
Hey Todd, it's great to be here.
Yeah, it's awesome having you. I'm really looking forward to this. Why don't you tell us a little bit about who you are and what you're working on?
Sure. So I have been in the startup world for the last decade and a half building companies, including multiple exits to large tech companies. And then I joined the dark side a few years ago as an investor. Now I'm a partner at Atlanta Ventures where we do early stage investing and we also have a venture studio.
Wow, very cool. So many things to kind of dig into there, but first I know you've got a secret talent. You are an athlete and can we talk about triathlon for just one second?
Want to go deeper?
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