New
Three Points Episode out now!
Episode #
16
February 1, 2023

Becoming an Effective Founder with Martin Gonzalez and Josh Yellin

Episode Overview

Martin Gonzalez and Josh Yellin are the researchers behind The Effective Founders Project: a Google For Start-Ups initiative that set out to discover the reasons why some start-ups succeed and others fail.

In this episode, they share three surprising points on how to become an effective founder including:

  • Treat people like volunteers
  • Invite disagreement
  • Overcome discouragement

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Episode Resources

Episode Transcript

Episode Guest

Martin Gonzalez

Martin Gonzalez is the Global Organization Development Lead for Google’s Compute Business (think Chrome, Android, Pixel, Nest, Fitbit, AI/Machine Learning/Quantum Computing research groups).

He works with Google’s senior leaders to shape their team’s culture, grow their people and build cool things that matter. He’s part of the faculty of the Google School for Leaders and has been a frequent guest lecturer at MBA programs at INSEAD, Stanford, Wharton and London Business School.

He is also the creator of Google for Startup’s PeopleLab, an effort to take what Google has learned about developing people and culture to startups around the world. He has run leadership courses and mentored thousands of tech startup founders, from seed stage to unicorn, across more than 40 countries in the Americas, Asia, Africa, and Europe.

Episode Guests

Martin Gonzalez

Martin Gonzalez is the Global Organization Development Lead for Google’s Compute Business (think Chrome, Android, Pixel, Nest, Fitbit, AI/Machine Learning/Quantum Computing research groups).

He works with Google’s senior leaders to shape their team’s culture, grow their people and build cool things that matter. He’s part of the faculty of the Google School for Leaders and has been a frequent guest lecturer at MBA programs at INSEAD, Stanford, Wharton and London Business School.

He is also the creator of Google for Startup’s PeopleLab, an effort to take what Google has learned about developing people and culture to startups around the world. He has run leadership courses and mentored thousands of tech startup founders, from seed stage to unicorn, across more than 40 countries in the Americas, Asia, Africa, and Europe.

Josh Yellin

Josh Yellin is a cofounder of Google’s global startup acceleration program. During his time with Launchpad, Josh led the growth of Launchpad Accelerator into a global program focused in 8 locations. The program partnered closely with 300 of the foremost growth-stage startups across the world.

Additionally, upon seeing the broad-sweeping global need for stronger management and leadership among the world’s top startups, Josh cofounded PeopleLab with Martin Gonzalez in 2015. Since its inception, Josh has facilitated leadership workshops with hundreds of founders in several cities around the world and has mentored many startups on various people and operations topics.

Today, Josh is a Chief of Staff in Google Research. Prior to joining Google, Josh led operations for the largest startup community in Silicon Valley, and co-founded Urban Rivers, an environmentally-focused nonprofit.

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