High Growth Handbook

Elad Gil is an entrepreneur, operating executive, and investor or advisor to private companies such as Airbnb, Coinbase, Checkr, Gusto, Instacart, OpenDoor, Pinterest, Square, Stripe, and Wish. He is cofounder and chairman at Color Genomics. Gil was the VP of corporate strategy at Twitter, where he also ran product and operational teams. He joined Twitter via the acquisition of MixerLabs, where he was cofounder and CEO. He spent many years at Google, where he started the mobile team and was involved in all aspects of getting it up and running. He was involved with three acquisitions (including the Android team) and was the original product manager for Google Mobile Maps. Prior to Google, Gil had product management and market-seeding roles at a number of Silicon Valley companies. He received his PhD from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and has degrees in mathematics and biology from the University of California, San Diego. He lives in San Francisco.

“If you want the chance to turn your startup into the next Google or Twitter, then read this trenchant guide from someone who played key roles in the growth of these companies.”—Reid Hoffman, cofounder of LinkedIn and New York Times No. 1 bestselling author“Elad jam-packs every useful lesson about building and scaling companies into a single, digestible book. My only gripe is that he didn’t write this when we were in the early days of Box, as it would have saved my ass countless times.”—Aaron Levie, cofounder and CEO of Box“Elad eschews trite management aphorisms in favor of pragmatic and straight-shooting insights on complex topics, like managing a board of directors, executing functional reorganizations with as little trauma as possible, and everything in between.”—Dick Costolo, former CEO of Twitter and serial entrepreneur“Elad first invested in Airbnb when we had fewer than 10 people, and he provided early advice on scaling the company. This book shares these learnings for the next generation of entrepreneurs.”—Nathan Blecharczyk, cofounder of Airbnb, chief strategy officer and chairman of Airbnb China“Armed with observations gathered scaling some of the most successful and important companies in Silicon Valley, Elad has no-nonsense, highly applicable advice for any operator transitioning a company from the proverbial garage to the next stage, and beyond.”—Max Levchin, cofounder and CEO of Affirm, cofounder and CTO of PayPal“Elad is one of the most experienced operators in Silicon Valley, having seen numerous companies hit their inflection point. His advice has been key for Coinbase as we go through hypergrowth, from hiring executives to improving M&A.”—Brian Armstrong, cofounder and CEO of Coinbase“Elad is one of the best-connected and well-respected early-stage investors in the Valley—he invested in Minted when we had fewer than 50 employees, and his advice was critical to us in growing our business to where we are now, in the low hundreds of millions in sales. In his book, he crystallizes all of these learnings for the next generation of companies.”—Mariam Naficy, cofounder and CEO of Minted

• DEDICATIONACKNOWLEDGEMENTSABOUT THE AUTHORHOW TO USE THIS BOOKINTRODUCTION CHAPTER 1: THE ROLE OF THE CEOCHAPTER 2: MANAGING THE BOARDCHAPTER 3: RECRUITING, HIRING, AND MANAGING TALENTCHAPTER 4: BUILDING THE EXECUTIVE TEAMCHAPTER 5: ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURE AND HYPERGROWTHCHAPTER 6: MARKETING AND PRCHAPTER 7: PRODUCT MANAGEMENTCHAPTER 8: FINANCING AND VALUATIONCHAPTER 9: MERGERS & ACQUISITIONS APPENDIX: THINGS TO JUST SAY NO TO