Problem Solvers (Entrepreneur.com)

The world is full of conflict, but Bar Rescue's Jon Taffer says most people approach it all wrong. They either see conflict as something to avoid, or they argue with emotion and a winner-take-all mentality. “If we're going to engage together, I should have a purpose for engaging with you,” he says. In this conversation, inspired by his new book "The Power of Conflict", Taffer explains how to use conflict purposefully and constructively.

SwagUp COO Artem Mashkov had a problem: His employees were miserable and making mistakes. But instead of blaming them, he looked internally—and discovered a hiring system that was recruiting the entirely wrong kind of employee. Then he made some big changes in how SwagUp hires... leading to sometimes strange interviews, where he challenges candidates to think creatively and tries to scare them out of the job.

Codie Sanchez started by buying a little laundromat. Now she has a portfolio of small local businesses that drive tens of millions in annual revenue, and developed a playbook for anyone looking to buy small businesses and build serious wealth. Her new book is called Main Street Millionaire, and in this episode, she explains how and why small biz is such a great buying opportunity.

How do you scale when your business depends on it? Chieh Huang of Boxed knows this well; his company is like an online wholesale club (with no membership fees), and in four years, he took it from a garage to $150 million in funding and its own custom-built warehouse. In doing so, he survived one of the hardest kinds of uphill battles in business. Some business ideas only work at a large scale, but those businsses must start small like everyone else -- and then endure a long, gaping middle point when they’re running their business at a size that inherently doesn’t work. Huang shares how he got over the hump.

When something's wrong, we often make a mistake: We try to treat the symptom of the problem without understanding what the REAL problem is. Today I offer a helpful problem-solving framework. You'll learn to diagnose your problems, identify the right "one-word problem," and then come up with a solution that actually works.

There are three types of skills, Jen Kem says: The ability to visualize, strategize, or mobilize. Everyone has these skills in different combinations — and when you can assemble a team with the right mix of combinations, you've built something unstoppable. On this episode, Kem (author of the new book "Unicorn Team") explains how it works, how to identify which combination of types you are, and how to hire the right people.

Bureaucracy doesn't have to grind you down, says Marina Nitze, who has fixed government bureaucracies and now has lessons for us all. She's the co-author of the new book, "Hack Your Bureaucracy."

Catherine Connelly cofounded one of the first social media platforms, and was early in the online dating space. And over time, she learned how to do a very hard thing: She killed features that she loved, and that customers loved, because they no longer served the company. How and when do you do that? She discusses. Read Catherine's new book, Designing Success: Lessons from 20 Years as a Female Tech Entrepreneur.

In 2006, a debate raged inside of Nintendo: Do they bundle their new Wii console with the game Wii Sports, or sell the game separately? Reggie Fils- Aimé was president of North America at the time, and he argued yes — because even though it meant giving up revenue upfront, it would lead to more Wii sales later. Here, he explains the battle and how he won it.

There are a lot of Uber-like startups out there—companies that connect customers with some set of service providers, such as cleaners, lawn care pros, or, in the case of Storyhunter, companies looking for video freelancers. But these companies all face the same danger: They're at risk of disintermediation, or being cut out of the deal. (After all, if you're a consumer and find a great cleaner through a startup, why keep using the startup? Why not work with the cleaner directly?) This is the problem Storyhunter faced, and solved. Its solution: Understand its users, and then become incredibly valuable to them in every way possible. (Original air date: 7/31/17)

Do you know what makes your brand special? Sometimes, you're wrong — and the "special sauce" you cling to can actually be holding your company back. That's the story of HiBall, an energy drink that was struggling to gain traction... until they rethought a critical part of the brand. Sales went through the roof, and the company was sold to Anheuser-Busch. Here, HiBall cofounder Dan Craytor explains what happened.

Not every company has a whiz-bang product, so how can you make it pop? Squarespace Chief Creative Officer David Lee has done that, winning tons of awards and making campaigns with the likes of Adam Driver, Zendaya, Dolly Parton, Keanu Reeves and John Malkovich (which earned him an Emmy). Here, he offers a unique way for entrepreneurs to think about their brands, and some big questions to ask when you start crafting your new stories.

Natalie Ebel is the co-creator of Backdrop, an innovative paint company that was just acquired. But even as her company has grown and her job has gotten busier, she refuses to outsource her brand's social media. Why? Because it's a critical connection to her consumer, she says — and a key to building the brand's great community.

What happens when you’re trying to sell to consumers, but your best customers are actually other businesses? Furniture-maker Poppin’s answer: It radically transformed itself to meet this new customer. That meant changing its brand voice, marketing, products, and supply chain. In this episode, we explore how and why it made the switch—and became the go-to furniture maker for Facebook, Snapchat, Google, Warby Parker, and others.

When things are going wrong, how do you know whether or not to keep going? That's the question that faced Kabir Shahani of Amperity, a company that, in its early days, missed a huge deadline and seemed unable to develop the technology it needed to thrive. Important, difficult questions had to be answered. Investors wanted to make sure their money wasn't being squandered. And in the end, Kabir learned an important lesson—both about when to keep going, and how to measure success. Episode sponsored by Shapr - https://bit.ly/2U0InkC

What’s it like when your company goes viral? Take it from Kristen Tomlan, the founder and CEO of a viral cookie dough company called DŌ: “It’s terrifying.” And exhausting. And it exacerbated every weakness in her business, including staffing, supply and production. We learn how she fixed it, and harnessed the kind of huge opportunity that may have sunk others.

This episode turns into a Sliding Doors special. Jason talks to a former colleague from 20 years ago, whose career didn't turn out the way he hoped for, and then offers advice on how to play catch up. This episode is from Jason's other podcast, Help Wanted, which you can find here: https://link.chtbl.com/LsYdERXQ

It’s the case of the mysteriously popular growler! The e-commerce company Huckberry sold tons of growlers during the holiday season—but the people who bought the growlers disappeared afterwards. They never came back to buy more products, which was very unusual for Huckberry. What was going on? The answer forced the company to rethink its entire marketing approach. (Here’s a hint: The buyers weren’t who Huckberry expected.)

An internet connection is the lifeblood of any business, so how can you maximize your uptime? In this special episode brought to you by AT&T Business, we hear from entrepreneurs who have struggled with lost connectivity and about how you can solve the problem. This episode is sponsored by AT&T Business. To learn more about how AT&T Business can help keep your business going, visit att.com/solvers.

Lenny Rachitsky built a thriving newsletter about product development. Here's how he did it, step by step, and how he's now making more money from the newsletter than he did as a product lead at Airbnb.

Entrepreneurs should be life-long learners. They should constantly develop new skills, even if they don’t know the ROI on those skills. And that’s why James Altucher—the former hedge fund manager who’s built and sold many companies—dedicated himself to mastering stand-up comedy. In this conversation, he explains why he kept pushing himself to try something difficult and often embarrassing, and how stand-up has helped him in the most unexpected ways.

Right now, as you listen to this show, someone out there might be thinking about hiring or partnering with you—but they can't, because you haven't put enough of yourself out there. On this episode, we discuss fear and self-promotion with Kassi Underwood, an author and coach who focuses on overcoming fear.

For many entrepreneurs, the stretch between Halloween and New Year’s is when teams get stressed, systems get strained, and even the smallest inefficiencies amplify into crises. But if a company builds itself well enough to survive into January, it’ll be in great fighting shape for the rest of the year. That’s what happened to popular New York-based cupcake company Baked By Melissa, whose disastrous 2009 holiday led it to rethink fulfillment year-round—and win the holidays every year since.

What does it mean to run a sustainable business? It's about building something that can last. In this episode we look at two unexpected "sustainable" approaches — what your brain needs after a hard day of work, and how to build a team that'll survive the ups and downs. Sponsor: Paper & Packaging Board. Learn more at howlifeunfolds.com

How do you find your first customers? It’s a question first-time founders are often flummoxed by. But Keith Krach has developed a tried-and-true strategy—starting during his days at Ariba (which sold for billions), and extending into his current time as chairman of Docusign. In this special live edition of Problem Solvers, taped at Entrepreneur Live in Los Angeles, Keith explains how to turn a company’s first customers into valuable ambassadors.

Here at Entrepreneur magazine, we hear a lot of stories about how entrepreneurs founded their companies. Many tend to follow a similar format. Someone has an idea. They take a bold risk to make it a reality, often sacrificing a fair amount of time, money, and relationships in the process. They become incredibly resourceful. They outsmart their competition. And at some point... they lie. It's so common to hear about an entrepreneur's lie -- to win over a first client, say, or to bring in resources when they're needed the most -- that we forget to pause and ask: Where's the line? On this episode, we consider the question with the cofounder of Stonyfield Yogurt, who saved his company in its early days with a particularly clever and daring bend of the truth.

Tami Halton Pardee started out working in Hollywood—an industry known for crushing hours and sociopathic behavior. Then she left to work in real estate in Los Angeles—another industry known for crushing hours and sociopathic behavior. But instead of going with the flow, she decided she’d work differently, structuring her company to allow her employees a better work-life balance, and being kind to her clients. As she tells us, competitors looked at her like she was crazy, but her business exploded.

Neal Goyal ran a ponzi scheme, defrauded investors out of roughly $9 million, and spent years in prison for his crime. Today he’s out, and we have a frank conversation about what leads someone to make the kind of decisions he made, and the amount of soul searching and self-repair required to come back from it.

Change can be scary, and entrepreneurs are at the forefront of that conflict. We invent things. We create change. But of course, that change can be scary… for other people, or for ourselves. What then? On this episode, we dive deep into what transformative change looks like—by examining the surprising, weird, often alarming history of the elevator. (Episode comes to us via the podcast Pessimists Archive, which is another show hosted by Problem Solvers host Jason Feifer.)

Most people say "I can't do that." Entrepreneurs say, "Let's figure out what I CAN do." How do you develop that kind of mindset? I talk with educator Charlene Walters, author of the new book "Launch Your Inner Entrepreneur: 10 Mindset Shifts for Women to Take Action, Unleash Creativity and Achieve Financial Success".

You can learn a lot from a simple margarita… because when you take one home from a restaurant in America, you’re participating in a change that was hundreds of years in the making. In this episode, we dig deep into how cocktails-to-go became suddenly legal (and why they were once illegal in the first place). It’s a surprisingly complex story that reveals our weird history with alcohol, and how the smallest shifts can lead to unexpectedly massive changes, and how entrepreneurs can take advantage. This episode is from my other podcast, Build For Tomorrow.

Expert copywriter Laura Belgray explains what you're doing wrong in your emails (and especially your newsletters), and how a few simple changes can boost open rates and engagement. Laura's copywriting company is at TalkingShrimp.com, and her new book is "Tough Titties: On Living Your Best Life When You're the F'ing Worst". — Book time with Jason at intro.co/jasonfeifer

The most important question an entrepreneur can ask today: "If I were starting my business today, what business would I build?" We discuss this (and how to reinvent yourself too!) with Matt Higgins, a recurring shark on Shark Tank and CEO of the investment firm RSE Ventures.

How do you raise prices? It’s not easy, as the cofounders of Motto can attest. For more than a decade, they’ve been raising prices -- while evolving from a little design shop to a full-scale, high-end branding agency. Along the way, they were forced to reconsider exactly what work they do, how they structure their relationships with clients, and even what kind of company they run. Because pricing isn’t just about a number. It’s about your value, what you’re really worth, and who you want to work with.

Baked goods company Foodstirs had big plans for 2020, but had to reinvent everything when the pandemic came. This is a story about the importance of knowing your mission, and how it can keep you focused even when times get tough.

In every partnership, there will be disagreements. But they don't have to ruin your relationships. Today, listen in on a coaching session about this: Jason talks with an entrepreneur who disagrees with his cofounders (and family members!). This is an episode from Jason's other podcast, Help Wanted.

How do you build a sustainable business? Figure out what you’re great at, and then how to build a great team around you. Jon Bier did it; he now runs multiple companies, including Jack Taylor PR, and advises many others. But it did not come easy. Here, he shares the hardest lessons he learned. (Also, check out Jon’s podcast, One Day with Jon Bier.)

It’s become a truism of startup life: To grow a company, first go out and get investors. But is that true? Does every company need investment? Not really. That’s what Eric and Sasha of the men’s retailer Buck Mason discovered, after they went out to raise cash and were rejected by every investor they met. It forced them to step back and rethink who they are as a company, and how they can thrive. Their conclusion: They needed to grow smarter, not faster. And now they’re doing just that.

What does it really take to make a brand eco-friendly? For Shine Pet Food, it meant sweating every CO2 molecule—and making hard, expensive decisions. Sponsor: Paper & Packaging Board. Learn more at howlifeunfolds.com

This was a hard year, but also a good year. Why? Because we were forced to make change. Here are the lessons we should take into 2021.

Namogoo is an Israeli company that solves a problem most companies don't know exist. That became quite a sales challenge: Its founders needed to get clients' attention, and then convince them to pay attention to a problem they'd been completely overlooking. Here's how they did it.

I bombed on stage. It was terrible and embarrassing. Then I learned something very important about how to recover, and it's a lesson I'll use for the rest of my life. Here it is. It'll make you feel better the next time something goes wrong.

Morgan is engaged to Jack. Jack didn't include Morgan in a business deal, but she feels *strongly* that he should have. Now she's mad. What should they do? In this episode from Jason's other podcast, called Help Wanted, Jason and his cohost Nicole Lapin help this couple through a rocky moment — and talk about what happens when finances get personal.

Want to get your product onto store shelves? Listen to this. Matt Adelmann used to be a buyer at Target, where he was responsible for placing products on shelves. Here are the three mistakes that founders always get wrong about retail — and how you can set yourself up for success.

How can a small gym compete against a world of big, well-funded chains? In this special episode celebrating Entrepreneur and Yelp's list of America's Favorite Mom & Pop Shops, we take an inside look at Ambitious Athletics in Washington DC — by zeroing in on one customer interaction, and what made it so special. This episode is in partnership with the podcast Behind the Review.

Selling perfume online seems impossible. After all, people need to be able to smell it, right? And when former Ralph Lauren executive Eric Korman launched his online perfume company PHLUR, he ran smack dab into that problem. Industry peers thought he was crazy. He hung in and devised a solution: an ingenious a mix of smart e-commerce strategy, science, photography, psychology, music, and storytelling. And with that, he made the impossible possible.

Amy Morin, author of the book "13 Things That Strong Kids Do", explains how to create the entrepreneurial spark — and how, in the entrepreneurial quest, adults and kids all grapple with the same big issues. Set Your Children Up for Success with Entrepreneur Kids: All About Money. 

How do you see the opportunity that others don't? That's what we discuss with Kuo Zhang, president of Alibaba.com, who has overseen a massive transformation of the company.

When things go wrong, we often look backwards to fix them. But when Dribble got hit hard by Covid, Michael Sacca and his team started thinking ahead. He explains how to look past the initial panic and start using crisis as an opportunity for improvement. This episode is sponsored by AT&T Business. To learn more about how AT&T Business can help keep your business going, visit att.com/solvers.

Most writers obsess over their words. Sahil Bloom did that too — but he also became curious about how words travel, and why they go viral, and the needs that other writers have. That’s because he came from the world of finance, not writing, and was able to apply a business lens to the sometimes-squishy world of content... and now runs a newsletter with 600,000 subscribers that brings in upwards of $70,000 a month, along with a network of businesses that serve other writers (and earn much more). In this episode, he explains how he did it. Learn more about him at sahilbloom.com.

Barefoot Wine is one of the largest wine brands in the world. But it was nearly destroyed in the very beginning, when it was forced to stop all sales for a month. Its founders panicked... and then used that suspension to create the greatest sales opportunity a young brand like theirs could ever hope for. This is the story of how Barefoot Wine grew by repeatedly turning errors into advantages.

Retail is not as simple as getting products into stores, as Tiffany Krumins learned the hard way. Here are her tough lessons, which she learned after scoring big on the first-ever episode of Shark Tank.

When things are going wrong, how do you know what change to make? Wharton professor Katy Milkman, author of the book "How to Change", explains a few simple ways to identify the best path forward.

Sam Sisakhti had a great idea for a company, and early on it seemed like others agreed. He got funded on his very first pitch. But when that funding fell apart, and Sam embarked on a punishing year and a half of brutal rejections, he learned invaluable lessons about himself, his business, and the nature of entrepreneurship, and he turned his failure into a big success.

Our jobs are not to do things perfect. We can't! But we can make our mistakes very useful. Here's how — along with a personal story about a very recent, embarassing failure. (To see the newsletter I talk about in this episode, visit jasonfeifer.com/newsletter)

Mac wanted to draw attention to his company's event, so he posted on LinkedIn... and made a joke about Russia's invasion of Ukraine. The internet erupted in anger. In this episode, a rare kind of conversation: Mac apologizes, explains where such a stupid post came from, and we explore the human side of public shaming.

In 1923, a famous scientist predicted how work would change in 2023. Now, 100 years later, we can confirm: He was shockingly right… and yet totally wrong. What happened? The answers can tell you a lot about what’s coming in the next 100 years, and how technology will (and maybe won’t) change work forever. This episode originally aired on the podcast "Build For Tomorrow".

Are you setting the right boundaries at work? In this episode, we pick apart a very real relationship between an employee and employer, and see where boundaries end... and where assumptions begin. For more like it, listen to the new podcast "Help Wanted". This episode is sponsored by Target Accelerators. Learn more here: https://entm.ag/targetaccelerators

Are you uncomfortable talking to strangers? It's time to get comfortable! Talking to strangers has many personal and professional benefits — and it's something you can learn to do better. Joe Keohane, author of the book "The Power of Strangers: The Benefits of Connecting In A Suspicious World", explains how. This episode is sponsored by AT&T Business. To learn more about how AT&T Business can help keep your business going, visit att.com/solvers.

IAC CEO Joey Levin told Problem Solvers host Jason Feifer that everyone -- everyone, at every level! -- feels like they're making things up as they go. On this episode, Jason dives deeper into that idea. At times when you feel intimidated, or worry you're not up to the task, or feel at a loss for the right answer, let this be your guide: It’s knowing that in actuality, nobody inherently belongs. Nobody is ready from the start. Nobody has the answer already prepared. And nobody sees you as an impostor any more than they see themselves that way.

Be honest: What do you do when the world around you changes? Most people probably say they change along with the world... but few actually do. Most people resist. And resistance leads nowhere. That’s the big lesson of the rise of chain stores, a transformational event in American business that pitted entrepreneur against entrepreneur, and ultimately led to some big lessons in what it takes to be competitive. This episode comes to us from Pessimists Archive, another podcast hosted by Problem Solvers host Jason Feifer.

Should a leader show vulnerability? That depends on how they do it, says leadership expert Jacob Morgan, author of the book "Leading with Vulnerability." He interviewed 100 CEOs and surveyed 14,000 employees, and found that, depending on how a leader shows their vulnerability, people are either more drawn or more distrustful of them. In this episode, Morgan explains how to use vulnerability smartly — as a way to build trust, not as a way to unburden yourself.

Lauren Berger was like many solopreneurs: She'd built a one-person business called Intern Queen, and it made her a good amount of money. But it wasn't scaleable. She could only do so much. In this episode, we learn how Lauren ultimately transformed her one-woman shop into a company that can scale... and in the process, discovered a new line of work that now makes up 90% of her revenue.

How can you provide a great digital product or service, while still providing the human contact that consumers want? The mortgage company Own Up originally got that balance wrong... and fixing it transformed their business.

What's the secret to making something great? It's a combination of predictability and surprise — and a healthy Rule of Rules. To find out what all this means, listen to this, our special 250th episode of Problem Solvers!

How do you find meaningful work? Start by recognizing what is meaningful. Bruce Feiler, author of "The Search", breaks down the lies we tell ourselves about work, the many different jobs we have, and the literal ABCs of meaning.

Jaliyla Fraser is the Founder and CEO of Fraser’s Mathematics Solutions. What started as a STEAM summer camp for students, Fraser’s Mathematics Solutions now provides high-quality mathematics learning for administrators, teachers, and parents to help the students in their lives succeed. Fraser’s Mathematics Solutions also produces school supplies for students to help them reach their full potential. Listen to the Side Hustle to Small Business podcast on Apple Podcasts or Spotify, or visit: entm.ag/hiscox

What do you do for a second act, when your first act literally changed an industry? That was the question facing makeup powerhouse Bobbi Brown, whose simple line of lipsticks blossomed into the billion-dollar company Bobbi Brown Cosmetics. She left it in 2016 with no plans for what to do next; all she knew was that she was done with corporate life. But she’s since found an answer—expanding into new territories with multiple new brands. But the second act isn’t really so different from the first act, she says: At its heart, everything an entrepreneur does is just about doing.

Want to build incredible products? Listen closely to your customers, and (importantly!) have a system to turn those insights into action. In this episode, I speak with Mary Beth Westmoreland, VP of Selling Partner Experience at Amazon, about how this happens on her global selling partner experience team. Her team's products impact millions of businesses, so the stakes are high — and she's incredibly thoughtful about how great leadership, teamwork, and customer feedback systems can combine in all the right ways. To learn more about how Amazon is helping independent sellers succeed, visit http://sellingpartners.aboutamazon.com/

It feels like everyone's just one hack away from disaster, but cybersecurity expert Adam Levin (host of the podcast What the Hack) says things are going to get better. Here, he explains how we're going to solve this problem — or at least adapt to it.