Learn from the top European start-up founders, entrepreneurs and start up experts. Every week I invite another guest who is literally on fire, sharing fresh knowledge, insights and actionable advice from their own personal successes and failures. Simply listen and learn the lean, mean tips & tricks that will help you turn your idea into a business, get funding and grow it in Europe.
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Conversations with entrepreneurs on issues of the day, raising money, and starting and growing your business. This is audio from The Charlie Paparelli Show on YouTube.
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Solving the real problem: Lessons from Kurt Kandler
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By Gregg Hinthorn
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In the closeness is the bonding for baby, mom, and dad. Simple philosophy. Simple products. Successful outcome. Brian Fosse founded Lalabu with his wife, Kerrie. At the time, she was his only encouragement in starting this specialty clothing business. And as they neared bankruptcy a few years later, even Kerrie began having doubts. But Brian presse…
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The most fulfilling occupation in life is...
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I’ve met hundreds of entrepreneurs during my forty-year career in startups. Many of them were wildly successful. The successful knew their industry, solved a real problem, and timed the market just right. And they also knew how to make money. But after cashing out, they didn’t move on to the next stage in life…philanthropy. I was connected to Greg …
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The rewards of determination, dedication, support, and wisdom
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Twelve years after Greg Thompson started his company, it took off. Fifteen years after that, his insurance brokerage grew fivefold in premiums. His profits exploded. “Did you ever think of shutting down your business and doing something else during those twelve years?” I asked Greg. “Yes.” But Greg persevered. It is so important to learn from Greg …
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How am I screwing up this company I started?
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Greg Thompson is an entrepreneur who built a specialty commercial insurance brokerage. In this interview, Greg shares his experiences moving from an insurance agent to entrepreneur to general manager to CEO. For topics: How to set yourself up for board positions while building your company. How to develop your company even faster through acquisitio…
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When I asked Authur Washington, the Principal of KIPP collegiate, how many students in his school, he said, “Eight hundred and forty scholars. Eight hundred and forty beautiful souls!” His answer set the tone for our conversation. This conversation describes the building of a great leader—a man who is sacrificing to accomplish the mission God gave …
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Increasing your company’s value in an impending economic contraction
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Alan Taetle is one of the most respected VCs in the Southeast and Noro-Moseley Partners’ co-managing partner. They are the oldest VC firm in Atlanta., now investing in their eighth fund. I asked Alan to join me for a short conversation about this contraction in values. Both in the public markets and in the private markets. During his twenty-three-y…
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Brian Livingston was the state wrestling champion. He hiked the entire Appalachian Trail. Then took the well-marked path of law school and a career as a litigator. And then he realized, “This is not me.” He knew from fourth grade he was destined to be a writer. It took twenty-two years to face this truth, but he did. On the evening of January 20, 2…
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3 Ingredients of Effective Leadership: Dare. Serve. Measure.
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At age 21, Cheryl Bachelder’s father took her on business appointments in China, Japan, and Korea after threatening to quit college. Her college education no longer served her interests, and she saw no purpose. Her father’s investment changed her life. As CEO, Bachelder led a historic turnaround of AFC Enterprises, the parent of Popeye’s Louisiana …
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Entrepreneur's Guide to Getting Sales Reps on Plan
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He achieved the sales club at New Relic in his first year as an Account Executive. That’s my son I’m talking about, Nick. My questions are: How did he do it? What did he learn after being a Business Development Rep for three years? Did his sales manager help him, and if so, how? As an entrepreneur trying to get your salespeople motivated and on pla…
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He sold $60mm in software in one year. Russ is clearly the most successful major account seller I know. Russ West is a Senior Account Executive with a red-hot Silicon Valley startup named Yugabyte. In their last funding round, they were valued at $1.2b. I am sure Russ contributed to their valuation by helping grow their SaaS sales in the F50 right …
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Mem: Eliminate note taking friction
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Dennis Xu is a Stanford graduate, entrepreneur in Silicon Valley, and the co-founder of Mem. They recently raised a $5.6mm seed round on zero revenue. Since Mem’s founding in 2019, they went from writing the first line of code to attracting over 100k users. Mem.ai is a new entry in notetaking software's hectic market space. Dennis is competing with…
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This is the promise of a morning routine. In this conversation with social entrepreneur Karim Abouelnaga, we talk about the importance of a morning routine. He is thoughtful, diligent, and disciplined about his morning routine. He believes these early morning activities are the foundation for his success. He told me it is the reason for his health,…
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The Judge on Finding True Fulfillment
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He is a former federal judge who insisted I call him Bill and not Judge. In that first meeting, he made a powerful impression on me. Here is a man who is humble, intelligent, and a servant-leader. Digging just a little deeper revealed the values he lives by. Bill Duffey remembers what it was like to practice law before the legal profession changed.…
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Mike Gomez told me, “I solve the ‘I didn’t know” problem. “What’s that?” I asked. We think companies buy from us because of the product we sell. We later find out, our product or service was simply a qualifier to get us in the deal. The real buying criteria have to be discovered in the sales process. We are not selling to companies. We are selling …
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Entrepreneur: Who Can Help You Succeed Faster and How Can They Help?
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I am sharing this conversation with one of our community’s best angel investors. There is a lot to be learned here by first-time entrepreneurs seeking angel funding. Specifically, who can help you succeed faster, and how can they help? Bill Midgette is an active angel. He is the former CEO of a public company. He leads the selection committee for t…
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An Entrepreneur Who Broke All the Rules, Yet Achieved Great Success
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Sid Mookerji built Software Paradigms International Group, LLC, a worldwide information technology company. He started it in 1994 and sold it in 2018. He grew it organically through cash flow. His biggest competitor was IBM Global Services, but they also just happened to be his partner. And it is this last bit that speaks to why Sid is such a wild …
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How the First Truly Successful Cyber Security Company Began in a Dorm Room
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Chris Klaus is the founder of Internet Security Systems. Sitting in his dorm room, he put down the sci-fi book that gave him a big idea and started coding. This was the genesis of becoming the first genuinely successful cyber security company of the 1990s. I loved Chris’ surprise when government labs contacted him looking for his product. They hear…
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One-on-one with a Legend: Horst Schulze, Ritz-Carlton Hotel
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Horst Schulze created the Ritz-Carlton Hotel brand single-handedly. After twenty years as an international hotelier, this was his chance to put his mark on his industry by injecting his core values and beliefs. He took one failing and decrepit hotel in Boston called the Ritz-Carlton and grew it into fifty hotels rated #1 or #2 in their respective m…
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What Does It (Really) Mean to be a Friend?
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This is the question I pursued in a conversation with Jacob Southerland. Jacob is my son’s best friend. Over dinner with the two of them, Jacob talked about his friendship with my son and his other friends. His views on friendship were so unique I recounted some of them in a blog. This blog hit a nerve with you, my readers, and my followers. This g…
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Develop an Eye for Your Entrepreneurial Niche
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Wendy Salle built the single highest-grossing optical store in the United States of America. I am a client of Salle Opticians. I found it over twenty years ago in Phipps Plaza shopping mall in Atlanta. Salle sells high-end optical to a well-heeled clientele. They have the best eyeglass frames that money can buy. And they fit them with the most care…
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5 (Proven) Ways to Get in front of Angel Investors
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Entrepreneurs often ask me, “Where can I meet angel investors?” This video answers that question. In this interview, we talk about how angel investors source deals. One of the overlooked success factors for Venture Capitalists and angel investors is early looks at new deals. Getting the first look at a deal that just hits the market gives the angel…
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From Successful B2B Entrepreneur to Crypto Success
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Greg Smith is one of those secret successful entrepreneurs. This under-the-radar success usually occurs in vertical market B2B businesses. Unless you were in the vertical served by the entrepreneur, you would never know they existed. But Greg built Advectis to speed mortgage approvals through the efficient collection, storage, and transmission of t…
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From Professional Golfer to Serial Entrepreneur
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Christian Ries pivoted Zeto eight times before he achieved product-market fit. He said, “The key to finally getting there is to avoid falling in love with your business model or solution.” Christian is the co-founder and CEO of Zeto, a home management service. It shifts the burden of home maintenance from the owner to Zeto and their team of vetted …
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You (Really) Can Get Past the VC Gatekeeper
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Scott Lopano is the first contact at Tech Square Ventures. TSV is a Southeast-focused venture fund investing in early-stage technology companies. They are looking for opportunities to achieve the returns their limited partners expect. Finding those right investment opportunities takes an experienced VC, and that’s Scott. Scott sees over one thousan…
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Yvonne Bryant Johnson, the founder of Bryant and Associates, is a close friend and a leader. A leader in her home, her community, and in business. She is also a self-proclaimed militant. She is a seeker of justice. If it is right, it needs to be right for everyone. I was always impressed with Yvonne. She seeks social change by trusting God and gett…
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Authentic Leadership Breeds Superb Execution
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This is an interview with Mike Dickerson, CEO of ClickDimensions. Mike Dickerson is an entrepreneur turned corporate executive. In every company he led, he demonstrated the heart of a general manager—a talented operator with the gift of superb execution and people skills. These leadership skills were developed by interacting with the most outstandi…
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41. Always listening. Always applying. Always creating.
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This is Frank Bell’s formula for success as an entrepreneur. In this interview, it became clear that people consistently brought Frank the idea for his next company. They saw the problem in the marketplace. Frank’s gift was that he was standing in front of them when they told him about it, and he listened. Then Frank would take the time to research…
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Joel Neeb told me he was coasting on his success and reputation. Then Stage IV cancer hit. He was told he had eighteen months to live. He was thirty-three, a fighter pilot, husband, and father of two boys, three and one. And that’s when he began to move his life from success to significance. Joel is an Air Force Academy graduate where he was one of…
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39. Coach to the Most Famous Entrepreneurs in the Southeast
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The two big questions that must be answered by an entrepreneur 1. What is the purpose of your business? 2. What is God’s purpose for your business? These are the questions a prayer partner asked Bob Lewis the day he founded LewisLeadership. Bob is a coach and consultant to the most famous current generation of entrepreneurs in the Southeast. These …
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38. Live Your Dream by Seeing Problems
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Bird Blitch built a healthcare and payments company from scratch. Thirteen years later he sold PatientCo for over $450mm to Waystar Health. His first company sold too, but for the equivalent of one year’s living expenses, and that’s what he used to create PatientCo. In this conversation, Bird shares his secret of building big companies. And it isn’…
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37. Consumer Nightmare is an Entrepreneur's Dream
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Jim was an entrepreneur from birth. He just didn’t know it. But when he joined our startup as a twenty-two-year-old and saw it modeled. Bang! He was a co-founder of his first company. Then he founded four others. His life is the entrepreneur's life. Jim has been in search of the big problem in the market that deserved a big company to solve it. He …
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36. An Entrepreneur's Supernatural Moment
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It took twenty years for Rob Kischuk to reconcile his interests and talents with a business model that works. At forty-three he arrived. Rob is the founder and CEO of Dellwood Labs. His mission is to build the code that captures your vision. His talent is to attract, assemble and motivate the technical teams to build and deliver the desired product…
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35. From Corporate to Entrepreneur and Business Owner
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"Selling. No Problem. If you dropped in the middle of downtown with nothing but my phone, I would sell my way to prosperity," said Clint Emerson. Early in Clint's career, he was a sales executive for Lanier/Harris Corp. He used his success as a springboard into the executive ranks. He became the turnaround country manager for the Caribbean, then Au…
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"It is all about the people," said Charlie Paparelli. That's right. In this 20 minute video, I'm being interviewed. Brendan Tolleson asks me the questions. Brendan is the CEO and co-founder of RevPartners. I've watched Brendan over the years building his career. (https://revpartners.io/) He started as a leader on the soccer field and, over time, be…
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33. Volunteering to Build a Meaningful Network
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Ashish Mistry and BLM Ventures started with a $500k investment in a startup and never looked back. He and his co-investor met at Emory’s MBA program. Neither one of them was in a tech career, but both decided that’s where the action will be. Ashish Mistry may not have a technology industry background, but he does have one amazing skill. He understa…
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32. Food Can Be a Platform to Transform Lives
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“If I should be given credit for one thing, it is this. I remained true to my calling for over forty years," said Bill Bolling. I've never had anyone who accomplished so much in their life tell me this. Forty-two years ago, Bill founded the Atlanta Community Food Bank. But even more impressive, he is the creator of the community food bank concept. …
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31. An (Insider) Angel Investor Discussion
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As an entrepreneur, you will be well served to listen to David Friedman of Tech Coast Angels. David is the chapter director of TCA of Orange County. In this discussion, David shares: The angel groups process for investing Deals they’ve done and are interested in doing Terms and Exits Partnerships with other angels and angel groups The heart of a tr…
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Blake started life in Jamestown, North Carolina. He is the son of a career army non-com and the first in his family to go to college. From there it was all upside. D1 Swimming Scholarship President’s Advisory Council at Georgia Tech Wallstreet Startup entrepreneur Successful exit Led international expansion for a public company at 28 And this story…
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David is my son. He is also the 2021 London School of Economics Entrepreneur of the year. I wanted to know, “How did you do that?” In this interview, I learned: Why as a newly married man, he chose to quit his job, sell everything and move to London to pursue his Executive MBA. Why he felt called to be a social entrepreneur right out of undergrad. …
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28. The Way to Success and Sustainability
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Merrick Furst is a distinguished professor of the College of Computing at Georgia Tech. Impressive, but wait. He started nine companies. But wait. He started an accelerator that launched dozens of startups with values exceeding $1b. But wait. He shares the secret to making your startup a long-term success. This is my friend, Merrick. He is a friend…
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27. It’s time. I am an entrepreneur!
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Karen Houghton set the culture at Atlanta Tech Village. She was there right after David Cummings bought the building and had the vision for a startup community. Karen, working with David Lightburn, set a culture of innovation and community service. Karen is a great leader! She supported hundreds of entrepreneurs who started and built big businesses…
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I never heard such a clear calling to serve Jesus as I did in this interview. Doug Ammar is the Director of the Georgia Justice Project in downtown Atlanta. He has served in this capacity for over twenty-five years. Doug is a recognized expert in criminal justice. He not only changes the lives of the poor accused of crimes, but also changes the law…
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“People support what they help create,” said Michael Arrietta, Founder, and CEO of Garden City. Michael lives this every day. He started a holding company with the goal to be the next Berkshire Hathaway. His model is focused on acquiring service companies with between $2-4mm in free cash flow. These businesses are all over America and most of them …
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24. Millionaire at 26 (Just the Start)
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Bobby John believes he and his Band of Coders can take your dreams, desires, and vision and convert them into reality using software. He is a coder at heart with the soul of a serial entrepreneur. In this interview, Bobby shares how he started a company while in college and became a millionaire at twenty six years old. He saw the first version of N…
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23. The 5 Criteria for a Successful Startup (Plus a Secret Sauce)
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I developed these five criteria based on my 25+ years of angel investing. During that time, I spoke with hundreds of entrepreneurs and synthesized these success criteria. Every startup has to have these criteria present. Every new corporate idea must have these criteria present. Then there is the secret sauce that makes it all work. Give it a liste…
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22. From Immigrant at 14 to Internationally Renowned Author, Speaker, and F100 Advisor
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David Nour is an expert in relationship economics. In fact, that’s the name of his first book. He just released his eleventh book, Curve Benders. It is an even deeper dive into the fulfillment and personal advancement that comes from curve benders in your life. David is an immigrant from Iran. His parents sent him to America to live with his aunt a…
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In this show, Chris Dardaman and I discuss the book, Die with Zero by Bill Perkins. This book caught me while I am in a transition phase of my life. I asked Chris Dardaman, a friend and private investor, to give it a read and then discuss it with me. I chose Chris because he was the founder of Brightworth, a wealth management firm with $4.5B under …
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20. The Purpose-Driven Social Entrepreneur
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Karim Abouelnaga, founder and CEO of Practice Makes Perfect in NYC. He is a successful social entrepreneur, author, and speaker. He grew up poor in the inner city of New York to immigrant parents with little education. After his dad died when he was fifteen years old, a mentor came into his life that raised his expectations. Then he attended Cornel…
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Terry Brown is the Country Director of Leader Impact for Cru (formerly Campus Crusade for Christ). He is born and raised in Arkansas, and has been serving in the Czech Republic for the last 25 years. He is a true missionary. He is a true entrepreneur. The parallels between these two vocations are striking. Committing your life to serve others Motiv…
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